“Objection! Not relevant to this case! There is no established connection between Michelle Hardgrave and this case!”
“Sustained!”
“She didn’t love you, Lewis! She loved the drugs!”
“The objection is sustained, Mr. Harvey! You will stop that line of questioning immediately!”
“Withdrawn, Your Honor.”
“Stick to the current case, Mr. Harvey!” Judge Windsor’s eyes narrowed as he stared at the defense attorney.
Harvey moved back to his table to review his notes. “That’s a nice tie, Mr. Lewis.”
“It is.” He adjusted his tie in the middle of his shirt.
“You like your ties, don’t you?”
“I do.”
“You like to have a little bit of flair, a little bit of color, don’t you?”
“It’s my style. It makes me who I am. Just because I wear nice ties doesn’t mean I’m a criminal.” The tone of Lewis’ voice was understandably frustrated.
“You were wearing that tie last time I saw you, and you mentioned that Judge Hardgrave also liked that tie.”
“He loved it. He had an armchair that was exactly the same color. I sat in his orange armchair and this tie blended right in.”
“Blended into a purple armchair?”
“No, man. Orange.”
“Orange?”
“That’s what I said.” The arrogance and anger flowed off his words. “Are you stupid?”
“Are you certain it was orange?”
“Yes.” Lewis squinted his eyebrows in confusion.
“When was the last time you saw Judge Hardgrave?”
“Objection,” Chettle called out. “Again, I fail to see how this is relevant to the case.”
“Mr. Harvey?” Judge Windsor asked.
“I assure you, Your Honor, that this is very relevant to the date of the alleged crime in the current case.”
“Overruled, but you’re at the limit. Don’t push me, Mr. Harvey.” Judge Windsor nodded, letting the questioning continue to satisfy his curiosity. “Please answer the question, Mr. Lewis.”
“Three days before his death.”
Harvey’s voice rose. “And when was the last time you were in his living room?”
“The same time.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“In his living room?! He made that comment about liking your tie?” Harvey’s hand slammed down on the defense table.
“Yes!”
“Because that bright orange armchair wasn’t delivered until the day of his death, which also happens to be September 12 when you were not with my client in the El Mejor diner! So, I will ask you again.” Harvey’s voice boomed aggression. “Mr. Lewis, where were you on September 12?!”
“I said—”
“Mr. Lewis! I put it to you that you were not with my client on September 12, but you were with Judge Hardgrave at that time!”
“I—”
“Mr. Lewis! The only way you could have known the color of the armchair was orange, like your tie, was if you were there that day!”
“I—”
“Mr. Lewis! You’re under oath!”
“I…” Lewis stammered.
“Mr. Lewis! You were with Judge Hardgrave! Not Carlos!”
“No.”
“Mr. Lewis! You are under oath!”
“So what?!”
“Mr. Lewis! You were with Judge Hardgrave that day!”
“Whatever! So what if I was with Hardgrave on that day! That doesn’t prove anything!”
“You shot him.”
“No!”
“Mr. Lewis! You shot Judge Hardgrave and planned to use Carlos López as your alibi!”
“No!”
“Except your plan didn’t include the fact that Carlos’ apartment was being raided that morning for your drugs!”
“Not my drugs!” Lewis began to falter under the shock of the accusation.
“Mr. Lewis! You shot Judge Hardgrave because he wasn’t going to give you any more money! He wanted nothing more to do with you!”
“I-”
“He hated you!” Harvey snarled. “And his daughter hated you! She dumped you! She hated you, Lewis!”
“No!”
“You shot her father in cold blood!”
“No!”
“You shot him!”
“So what?! I shot the prick!” Lewis finally snapped.
Harvey had pushed the right buttons.
“Yeah, I shot him. I shot him up close. Real close. I saw the blood splatter everywhere. I hated that guy. He deserved it.”
The courtroom erupted into a commotion.
The noise was overwhelming.
“Order! Order!”
When Lewis realized that his anger had gotten the better of him, he sunk back into the chair, his mouth wide open.
He couldn’t control his anger.
And it had just cost him his freedom.
“You killed Judge Andrew Hardgrave on the same day that you claim to have seen my client with the briefcase.”
“I…” Lewis held his words. “I didn’t say that.”
“You did. You just said it. You’re on record saying that, Juan Lewis. This is a court of law, and every statement is recorded.”
“Your Honor.” Chettle was frantic. “The prosecution calls for an adjournment.”
Judge Windsor looked to the detectives standing at the back of the room, ready to arrest Juan Lewis for the murder of Judge Andrew Hardgrave. “In light of this testimony, I think that’s a very wise decision.”
“Lewis, you killed my friend. You will go to prison for a very long time.” Harvey snarled.
“Mr. Harvey,” Judge Windsor boomed. “We’re done with questioning now. In light of this new confession, the court has to recess.”
“But I’m not done questioning yet.” Harvey looked up to the Judge.
“For now, you are. The court is adjourned!”
Detective Matthew Pitt, dressed in his finest suit, walked from the back of the courtroom to the witness stand. He read Juan Lewis his Miranda rights for the murder of Judge Andrew Hardgrave.
“Do you have anything to say, Juan Lewis?” Pitt placed handcuffs on the witness.
“I was alone,” Juan Lewis called out loud enough for the entire courtroom to hear.
The random statement caught Harvey by surprise.
He stared at Lewis, but he avoided eye contact.
“I was alone,” he repeated loudly.
Then the reality hit Bill Harvey.
It hit him like a truck.
This wasn’t over yet.
Juan Lewis didn’t murder Judge Andrew Hardgrave.
And a dangerous killer was still free.
Chapter 28
With frantic energy, Bill Harvey raced from the courthouse. Aggressively, he pushed past the media throng that had assembled and jumped straight into the nearest cab.
Desperately, he called his office repeatedly.
“Pick up, Kate. Pick up.”
She didn’t.
When the cab arrived at his office door, Bill Harvey almost fell out of the cab, anxious to get to the office before anyone else.
“Kate!” he yelled, racing through the door. “Kate!”
As she sat at her desk, innocently about to grab a bite to eat, she looked at the desperate man in front of her.
“What is it, Bill? What’s wrong?”
“It wasn’t a man that hit you.”
“What do you mean?”
“It was a woman.”
“Who?”
Harvey pulled the phone out of his pocket. “The most dangerous person involved in this mess is still out there. She’s free. This isn’t over yet, Kate. I have to find your attacker before she does it again. As soon as she hears about Lewis going to prison, she’ll want revenge. And she’s coming after you.”
“Who? Who am I avoiding, Bill?” She was panicking. “I thought I was avoiding Lewis. What about the necklace
? Didn’t you say that the necklace belonged to Lewis?”
Harvey’s eyes thinned with acknowledgment of the truth. “It’s not Lewis.”
“But the necklace?”
“That necklace is a lover’s necklace. You take one half, and your lover takes the other.”
“But Lewis would have—”
“Lewis isn’t the murderer, either.”
“Then who is?”
Harvey turned to the door and locked it.
“Michelle Hardgrave.”
Chapter 29
“Jack,” Harvey yelled into his phone. “I need to find Michelle Hardgrave. Now.”
“Good luck with that one, buddy.”
“Why?”
“She has no fixed address, and nobody is going to tell you where to find her. You’ll have no luck locating her.”
“You must know something. Anything.”
“If I knew anything, Harvey, I would tell you, but I don’t. Your best bet would be to look at one of Lewis’ homes. Maybe she’s there. What’s the rush?”
Without answering the question, Harvey hung up the phone and turned to Kate. “I want you to go straight away and get Connor. Go to your mother’s house. Don’t stop for anything. Once you’re at your mother’s house, don’t go out. Lock the doors, and keep Connor inside. This woman is dangerous, Kate, and she’s coming after you.”
“But Bill—”
“No, Kate. This isn’t the time to argue.”
As he talked, the phone buzzed in his pocket.
An unknown number.
If this was a telemarketer, Harvey would tear them apart on the phone.
“Bill Harvey,” he answered.
“Bill Harvey, this is Michelle Hardgrave.”
“Michelle Hardgrave?” His eyes squinted as he looked at Kate. “How can I help you?”
“I have a job for you. I need you to sign a document. Meet me at the Vincent Thomas bridge in thirty minutes. Bring a pen.”
Chapter 30
The bridge was only twenty-five minutes away by cab, and Harvey wasted no time organizing a ride. This wasn’t a job for a new Uber driver; this was the time for a life-long cabbie that knew the L.A. streets like the back of his hand. He threw a fifty at the cabbie and told him to drive faster than he had ever driven before.
The back seat of the cab was dirty, smelly, and rotten, but that made no difference now. His only focus was his destination.
Gripping the door tightly, he stared out the window, trying to understand why Michelle Hardgrave would want to meet him at the Vincent Thomas bridge.
It wasn’t the place to assault someone. It wasn’t the place to commit murder. If Michelle wanted to do that, she would have asked him to meet in a more secluded area, perhaps a warehouse. This was no quiet area.
But it also wasn’t the place to conduct a public-style execution. Not enough people to witness the event. If she wanted that, she would have done it on the courthouse steps.
He felt safe but wary.
“Stop!” he yelled to the cabbie as they approached the bridge. He jumped out of the car, tossing a few more bills into the front seat.
Standing at the end of the bridge, looking towards the swollen river below, was the lone figure of Michelle Hardgrave.
Her hair blew gently in the breeze, and for the first time, Harvey saw the resemblance to her father. The same broad shoulders. The same lean legs.
Holding a piece of paper tightly, she stared out to the river. Cautiously, Harvey approached her.
“Michelle Hardgrave.”
Slowly, she turned away from the river, looking at the man approaching. Her mini-skirt was old and dirty; her denim jacket was the same.
“He isn’t a good man.” There was a reflection in her voice; the voice of a woman well-educated, but with the edge of someone who had lived their life on the streets.
“Your father did a lot of great things in this world, Michelle. He helped a lot of people.”
She looked back to the river. Her hair was dry and brittle from dehydration, her skin looked the same. Her body looked like the water had been slowly sucked from it. She was a beautiful girl once, a girl with the world at her feet. Now, she looked ten years older than she was, some teeth missing, the whites of her eyes almost glowing yellow.
Only her blue and green love heart necklace appeared well looked after.
“I was talking about Juan.”
“I can’t speak for Juan Lewis. I don’t know him.”
“He’s going to prison, isn’t he?”
“For a very long time, Michelle.”
Turning to face Harvey, she looked contemplative, pensive—the same look that her father often had.
“He was a very horrible man as well.” Michelle scratched the part of her arm where needle tracks had broken the skin.
“Lewis?”
“No.” She shook her head, avoiding eye contact. “This time I’m talking about my father. Andrew. He was a very horrible person. He got what was coming to him. He used to beat my mother and me. Constantly. Every second night he would drink too much, and he would beat her first, and when I was old enough to try and stop him, he would beat me second. I went to school so many times with bruises and black eyes, but nobody said anything. Why would nobody say anything? Why wouldn’t somebody help me?”
“I don’t know, Michelle.”
“He tried to hide it. He tried to cover it up. I bet he never told anyone how bad he really was. Under all that public goodwill, he was a despicable man at home.”
“He told me.” Harvey stepped closer to Michelle, wary of her instability. “He regretted what he did to you and your mother more than anything. It ate him up inside. He worked so hard to make up for those mistakes.”
“Mistakes? It was more than that. It was more than just a mistake. His behavior ruined my life. Ruined it. That’s more than just a mistake. That’s the behavior of an evil man.”
“He knew he did wrong. He talked to me about it, Michelle. He was so sorry for what he did. He regretted it every day of his life. He hated himself for doing that to you, and all he wanted in those final years was for you to be happy.”
The emotions of the beaten teenage girl, the emotions that she had never let go of, came flooding back, filling her with rage, hatred, and fear. She didn’t have the energy to fight it anymore, she didn’t have the power to be strong and hold it back. The tears welled up in her eyes as she gripped the railing.
For so long, she avoided the emotions. She tried to mask them with constant hits of heroin, but all that did was sink her further into a pit of self-loathing.
“I never forgave him.” She sighed, shaking her head and sniffing away the tears. “Never. I never wanted to forgive him either. That hatred was a part of me. I couldn’t let that go; it was a part of my identity. Instead of hating myself, I could hate him. I could use all that energy to hate him. He was still evil in my eyes.”
She scratched the other arm, desperate to avoid looking Harvey in the eye.
“People can redeem themselves, Michelle. Your father spent the last ten years of his life trying to redeem himself. He tried to help so many people, me included, so he could leave a better mark on this world. He wanted to leave this world a good man, not an evil one.”
“No matter how much good he did in this world, he damaged my life beyond repair. I have spent my entire adult life addicted to one thing or another, trying to escape the pain of a father who didn’t love me. He didn’t love me. Why couldn’t he love me?” Harvey didn’t answer. “I tried to forget it, but I couldn’t. It destroyed me. He used to beat me all the time. How could someone do that?”
He didn’t answer her question. Instead, he moved closer, wary of her nervousness. “Why did you call me out here, Michelle?”
“I needed a lawyer. Isn’t that what you do?”
“Yes, but what for?”
Michelle started to unroll the piece of paper in her hand. “It’s my will. I need a lawyer to sign it, and I kn
ew that my father was close to you. I figured you would help me because you knew my father. That’s why I needed you to come here.”
“Why here? Why not my office?”
“This is the last place Mom walked before she went into the hospital. She never left the hospital after that. This was the last place she walked free before she died of cancer.” She wiped another tear away. “She loved bridges. She loved this place. She loved the breeze in her hair and the sun on her shoulders. She felt free here. This was her place of peace. Her place to escape him.” She drew a long breath. “She was the only person to ever love me.”
“Your father loved you,” Harvey added. “He loved you more than anything.”
“He did?” Her voice was desperate. “But he was horrible to me. How could you beat someone that you love?”
Harvey couldn’t answer that question. He didn’t understand it either. “He regretted his past so much, Michelle. He hated what he did to you and your mother. He used to talk to me about you. He would bring out photos of you, and there was love in his eyes, a smile on his face. His favorite photo was you dressed up as a lion for your elementary school play. You looked so cute.”
“He still had that photo?”
“Next to his bed.”
That brought a smile to Michelle’s face. “I remember that day. I was so nervous before the play, and Dad gave me a great big hug and said everything would be fine. That was one of the only times I really felt his love.”
“All he wanted was your forgiveness and your health. He wanted you to be happy.”
“I know that… now.” She paused again; looking out to the flow of water in front of them. “I finally realize that. The court case made me realize that. All this time I hated him, and he loved me. And now…” She went to say the words that she had never been able to say. The words caught in her throat.
Harvey waited, providing her all the time she needed.
“I… I forgive him.”
A strong ray of sunshine poked through the gray clouds, a sign from the heavens above.
“I forgive him.” A lone tear slowly rolled down her cheek. “It seems so strange to say that. After all those years of hate, after all that anger, I forgive him. That forgiveness only came to me today. I finally picked up the paper and read his obituary. I had it with me for months, but I couldn’t bring myself to read it. Today, I read about all the good he had done in the world. All the lives he had changed. All the people he had helped. And I realized that I’m just being one selfish little girl. It’s time for me to forgive him. I have been holding onto that hate for so long, and now I almost feel free.”
Bill Harvey Collection Page 14
