Murder One

51

BEN SAT IN HIS car, staring at the open window on the third floor of the apartment building. His brain was a blur. All the thoughts, revelations, surprises, kept whirling through his head, spinning around him, making him dizzy with disappointment, and worst of all, the inescapable knowledge that he had made a total fool of himself. How could he possibly be so stupid?

Every so often, he would see one or the other of them float past the window. He couldn’t tell what they were doing. Packing, maybe. Having dinner. Having wild and passionate sex. The possibilities were endless.

At one point, he saw Keri’s barely clad figure come to the window, stop for a moment, grin, then move on. Did she know he was there, watching? Was Keri intentionally taunting him, flaunting the fact that there was nothing he could do to stop her? Probably not, but it was making him crazy, just thinking about it.

He pressed his fingers against his temples. He couldn’t keep this bottled up any longer. He had to tell someone. But who? What Keri had said was right: the attorney-client privilege protected everything she’d said, not only the parts that incriminated her, but the parts that incriminated Andrea as well. He couldn’t tell anyone—

Except someone who was inside the privilege. He had a partner now, by God. A member of the firm. She couldn’t tell anyone else, but he could tell her everything.

But how? He didn’t want to stop watching the apartment. He had to make sure Keri didn’t blow town, had to follow her if she did. If she left that apartment, chances were she’d be gone forever.

Slowly, carefully, he considered all the possible options, weighing the ramifications of each.

And then he remembered his mother’s Christmas present.

He popped open his briefcase and pulled out the small metallic gray Palm Pilot. He typed out a message to Christina on the little keyboard. Then he transmitted it to myFax.

After he was done, he turned off the electronic gizmo and put it back in the briefcase. It must be true that confession is good for the soul, he mused. By no stretch of the imagination did he feel good. But he did sense the tiniest alleviation of the awful aching in his gut. The disquietude that ravaged his brain was easing—only a little, but enough that he could almost think clearly.

His eyes, however, remained focused on that third-floor window. He settled back into the seat and waited for his message to be received.

“Ben?”

Mike stepped through the glass doors that led to the main lobby of the office. The doors were locked but fortunately, Ben had given him a key some time ago, when they were working together on an Internal Affairs case.

“Ben? Are you in here?” Probably not. But he had missed their eight o’clock get-together and he hadn’t been at home and he wasn’t answering his phone. It was probably stupid to worry, but Ben had raced out of Kirk Dalcanton’s apartment with a stricken expression on his face, and he did have a profound talent for getting himself into trouble. Look what happened when Mike went out of town for a few weeks. He just felt better when he knew what his friend was doing.

“Ben? Are you here?”

He heard an abrupt beeping sound. A sign of life? He walked to the front desk, the post normally occupied by Jones. So what was the—?

Ah. The fax machine. Someone was sending a late-night message. Probably an advertisement for a 1-900 sex number or something equally important. Or was Ben expecting it? Did this mean he would be here soon?

He glanced at the page spit out by the printer. No, it was for Christina. So it couldn’t possibly—

Wait a minute. He scooped the fax up. He didn’t normally read other people’s messages, but before he’d even realized it was for someone else he’d read more of it than he could disregard.

His eyes quickly scanned the short message. Jesus God—could this possibly be true?

He saw the name at the bottom of the page. This message was from Ben. So it had to be correct.

His buddy was going to be pissed that Mike had read his message. Tough. Mike couldn’t overlook this. He snatched the nearest phone receiver and began dialing.

“Maurice? I need three patrol cars immediately. Here’s the address …”

“Police!”

Mike didn’t give them a second chance. He shouted “Police” again, then knocked down the door.

It was an old door, well worn and probably cheap to begin with. It didn’t take much effort. He swarmed into the apartment, Sig Sauer at the ready. Six uniformed police officers closed in behind him.

“I have a warrant,” Mike shouted, as he glided through the apartment. “A warrant to search, and a warrant to arrest.” He motioned to the officers. “Spread out,” he told them. “Cover the whole place. Fast.”

Mike was the lucky one who burst into the bedroom. He recognized the persons inside immediately. Keri Dalcanton was on one side of an unmade bed, throwing on a white T-shirt. Nearly naked, Andrea McNaughton was on the other side.

The bedspread was thrown off and the sheets were dangling crossways. This bed had obviously seen some spirited action. Clothes were strewn about all over the floor. The room was stripped almost bare; everything was in the packing boxes that littered the apartment.

But those weren’t the details that ranked most prominently in Mike’s mind. There was one other.

Andrea McNaughton was holding a gun.

“Please lower your weapon, Mrs. McNaughton,” Mike said, in a voice that sounded a lot calmer than he really was.

She looked back at him with eyes as cold as frost. “No.”

“I don’t want to hurt you,” Mike continued. He could hear the other officers gathering behind him. But the doorway created a bottleneck; they couldn’t get in. And at the moment, he couldn’t move without quite possibly getting himself shot. “I have a warrant for your arrest. Please lower your weapon.”

“Don’t do it,” Keri snarled. “Aim for his head.”

Andrea did not lower the gun.

“I have a warrant for your arrest, too, Ms. Dalcanton.”

She laughed at him. “The hell you do. I’ve been acquitted, asshole.”

“I’m arresting you for perjury,” Mike explained. “You lied on the stand. And given more time, I’ll bet I can think up a few more charges to nail you with.”

“Son of a bitch.” Keri turned toward Andrea. “Kill him, Andrea. It’s our only chance.”

“There are six other officers standing behind me,” Mike said quickly. Keeping his voice calm seemed to get harder the longer that gun was pointed at his forehead. “You have no chance. Give it up.”

He watched Keri’s eyes flash all around her. Like a trapped rat in a cage, she was desperately looking for a way out. And not finding any.

“She’s the one who did it,” Keri said suddenly, pointing at Andrea. “I knew about it, but she was the one who killed Joe.”

Andrea kept her eyes trained on Mike. “Keri, shut up!”

“She’s the one you want,” Keri continued. “She’s the killer. She did all the sick stuff, with the knives. She’s a psycho, totally.”

“Keri!” Andrea shouted. “Shut your goddamn mouth!”

She didn’t. “I’ll turn state’s evidence. You’re going to need a witness, right? Give me immunity and I’ll give you a killer.”

Andrea’s face trembled with rage. “Keri, close your fucking mouth!”

“I’m offering to talk. Please. You have to protect me from her. She might hurt me!”

“Me hurt you? You ruined my life!” Spittle flew out of Andrea’s mouth. “You stole my husband. You butchered him.”

“See?” Keri said. “See how crazy she is? Give me immunity, and I’ll tell you everything that—”

“You traitorous bitch!” In the blink of an eye, Andrea whipped her gun around and fired. The bullet struck Keri in the neck. She fell backward onto the carpet. A second later, Mike fired. He hit Andrea in the arm, knocking the gun out of her hand.

“Call for an ambulance!” Mike shouted. He rushed inside. Keri was already unconscious. He ran to Andrea. Her arm was gushing blood and her eyelids were fluttering, but she was still awake.

“I don’t know what … happened to me,” Andrea said. Her voice was too soft to even be considered a whisper. “All my life, I’ve never done anything wrong. I was a good girl. And then … then … all at once … I blew it.”

“You’re going to live,” Mike reassured her. “I’m going to get you to the hospital.”

Her eyelids slowly closed. “Please … don’t bother.”

“Your honor, this is an outrage!”

In all the years she had worked with him, Christina had never seen Ben so angry. His face was red, he was breathing too fast, and every word came out as a shout.

“That was confidential information, your honor! The police department had no business reading my confidential communications!”

Judge Hart’s lips were firm and set. She tapped her reading glasses against the bench as she spoke. “Major Morelli has already explained how he obtained the information, Mr. Kincaid. Do you dispute his story?”

“No, I don’t dispute it. But it’s no excuse. That information was absolutely privileged.”

“Maybe it was, but he got it, just the same. And Keri Dalcanton was not his client. He had no duty to her. To the contrary, he had a duty to see that any information pertaining to a murder was turned over to the law-enforcement community. As far as I can see, he acted entirely properly.”

“He had no business being in my office in the first place!”

Judge Hart turned her attention to Mike, who was standing next to Assistant D.A. Dexter, both of them pointedly not making eye contact with Ben. “How did you get into the office, Major?”

Mike cleared his throat. “I have a key. Ben—er, Mr. Kincaid gave it to me on a previous occasion.”

“And why were you there?”

“I was looking for Mr. Kincaid. We’d made an appointment, and he didn’t show up. I didn’t mean to read the message intended for his associate, Ms. McCall, but before I even realized to whom it was addressed, I’d read more of it than I could ignore.”

Judge Hart shrugged her shoulders. “He’s committed no crime. I suppose if you want to sue him for invasion of privacy you could, although I don’t think I’d recommend it.”

“Your honor,” Ben said, “I strongly urge you to invalidate this improper, unconstitutional search and to suppress all information obtained as a result.”

“Wait just a minute, Mr. Kincaid.” The judge looked at him sternly. “I gave you what you wanted before, when the police were using photocopied search warrants. That was a violation of fourth amendment rights. But there’s no constitutional violation here. And there is no way on God’s green earth I’m going to exclude critical evidence in this case again. Your motion is denied.”

“Your honor,” Ben shouted, “you can’t condone this egregious conduct when—”

“Mr. Kincaid, I’ve ruled. Now give it a rest or I’ll hold you in contempt.” She rapped her gavel and strode out of the courtroom.

“It doesn’t matter anyway, Ben.” This came from Mike, who slowly crossed the courtroom to Ben’s table. “We just got a message from the hospital. Keri Dalcanton is dead. Died from the gunshot wound.”

Ben’s lips parted wordlessly.

“Andrea McNaughton is going to be okay. She’ll stand trial for her crimes.”

Ben glared at him coldly. “You had no business reading Christina’s fax.”

“I know that,” Mike said flatly. “I told you—I didn’t mean to. But after I did, there was no way I could pretend I hadn’t. Not after I knew that those two had conspired together, and that they were preparing to leave town and might never be seen again.”

Ben’s expression did not change.

“Ben, I’m a cop, not a defense attorney. I can’t let the bad guys get away. Not if I can help it.” He looked at Ben earnestly a few more seconds, then frowned and left the courtroom.