The Stolen Hours

by Allen Eskens

  Now he was a creature. She was failing a test that she didn’t even know she was taking.

  “So what is it, this name of yours?”

  He smiled at the benevolence he felt in that moment. He would give her a chance he hadn’t given the others, a chance to save herself. If she would treat him with decency, he would let her be. All she had to do was be nice.

  “My name is Gavin.”

  He studied her face as he said the word is because that word exposed his speech impediment, thick and damp like air seeping from a wet tire. A squishy lisp from a squishy man. She would hear: “My name isch Gavin.”

  She giggled, of course, and covered her mouth with her free hand. He could feel the heat of judgment as her eyes moved from his uncombed hair down to his doughy midriff. He found himself sucking in his gut as if he cared what she thought. But why should he care? She was just like the others, ready to dismiss him.

  “Kevin?” she said.

  “Gavin,” he repeated.

  A grin spread across her cheeks. “You look more like a Kevin to me—Kevin the Picture Boy. That’s your name.” Then she laughed hard, as though she had just told the funniest joke.

  Gavin felt assured that the world would neither mourn nor miss this woman. He lifted his camera and snapped a picture, which made her smile. But this picture wouldn’t be included in the package of photographs that he would give to the bride. This one was for him, a memorial of the exact second that Gavin chose her, a memento to keep in his secret hiding place—with the others.

  A groomsman bumped into the bridesmaid, causing her to spill her drink. She turned and slapped the man’s broad shoulder in mock anger. He smiled at her in a way that caused her to lick her lips. And just like that, Kevin the Picture Boy no longer existed.

  Gavin lifted his camera bag and walked calmly to the head table, to where the bridesmaid had been sitting earlier in the evening. Leaning down as though inspecting his camera, he carefully palmed the place card with her name on it. When he stood back up, he looked around the room to see if anyone was watching. They weren’t. He was invisible again—just the way he liked it.

  He glanced at the name—Sadie Vauk—and slipped the card into his pocket.

  Chapter 3

  The Hennepin County Government Center hogged two blocks of downtown Minneapolis, straddling Sixth Street like a steel sentinel. The building housed those mechanisms of the justice system that marked the end of the line: the courts, probation, and the office of the Hennepin County attorney—where Lila worked.

  On the twentieth floor, Lila’s small, windowless office had no character, but in fairness, she had done nothing to give it any. In the six months that she’d been working there, she had hung no pictures, no plaques, no diplomas. The only item that hadn’t been there when she moved in was the picture of Joe that she kept on the corner of her desk. Lila had chosen not to settle in, just in case things didn’t work out.

  She had been hired with the understanding that she would become an attorney in October, once her bar exam results arrived—fingers crossed. For now, her title remained law clerk, one of three culled from a herd of over five hundred applicants, third-year law students brought on board to organize files, write memorandums, and draft criminal pleadings.

  The rules permitted new graduates like her to make court appearances under the supervision of a licensed attorney, but Lila’s supervisor, a sharply dressed man named Oscar Hernandez, preferred that she stay in her office, elbow deep in papers. Oscar worked white-collar cases, so Lila spent her time cross-checking accounting forensics and bank transactions, breaking it all down into graphs and exhibits so that a jury could understand.

  The other two newbies, both of them men, worked in offices just as small and bland as Lila’s, but they had tacked their law school diplomas to their walls, one from the University of Minnesota, the other from Georgetown.

  That morning, as she walked to her office—counting her steps—she passed the office of Ryan Kent, the newbie from Georgetown, and heard him grunt out an anguished wail. She stopped, backed up, and peeked in.

  “Everything all right?”

  He waved Lila in and motioned for her to close the door.

  “She’s pissed off again,” he said in a sharp but hushed tone. “I can’t do anything right.”

  Lila considered herself lucky for having been assigned to Oscar. Although he didn’t let her appear in court, he never yelled. That couldn’t be said of Ryan’s supervisor, Andi Fitch. Lila had seen it firsthand, when Fitch had tasked Ryan with filing a pre-trial appeal and Ryan had applied the wrong rule for calculating the time. Andi had let him have it.

  Even when she wasn’t angry, Andi was an intimidating woman: six feet tall, Black with short blond hair styled to give it sharp points. She had dark eyes that could cut glass and lips that seemed incapable of smiling. And although she hadn’t actually yelled at Ryan, her words had landed just as hard.

  The confrontation took place outside of Ryan’s office and lasted all of three minutes, with Andi ordering Ryan to personally drive the notice of appeal to both the defense attorney’s office and the court of appeals in St. Paul. And if he failed to get the documents filed in time, he needn’t bother returning.

  Just watching Andi take Ryan apart that day made Lila’s breath run shallow, and she was certain that had she been in Ryan’s shoes, she would have wilted under Andi’s disappointment. Maybe that was why Lila pitched in to help Ryan whenever she had the chance.

  “What is it this time?” Lila asked.

  “I gave her a complaint yesterday and she threw it back at me. Told me to try again.” Then, in a mocking tone, he added, “‘But do it right this time.’”

  “What’s wrong with it?”

  “I have no idea. She gives me no direction—nothing. It’s like she expects me to read her mind. All she said was ‘Make it so we can convict the son of a bitch.’” Ryan closed his eyes to calm down. “I passed up the feds to work here, and she treats me like an idiot. I can see why her last law clerk quit on her.”

  “Last two,” Lila said.

  “Well, I’m about to make it three in a row. I swear, I don’t need this drill sergeant bullshit.”

  Lila settled into a chair across the desk from Ryan. “What’s the fact pattern?”

  “Guy named Donald Gray got into an argument with his wife—they were parked outside of a convenience store. She tried to get out of the car, and he yanked her back in and hit her. Gave her a black eye.” Ryan handed a photograph to Lila. The woman facing the camera wore a scowl and had a darkened left eye.

  “Any witnesses?” Lila asked.

  “None. The surveillance tapes show a struggle of some kind, but it’s not clear.”

  “Can you see the punch?”

  “No. Just movement. It’s too grainy.”

  Ryan handed still shots from the surveillance video to Lila. She could make out the driver, a man in a red shirt, pointing his finger at the woman. In the next picture, the woman had opened the passenger door and had one foot outside. The man had ahold of her arm near the biceps. In the next picture, he had pulled her back into the car. The fourth picture showed the two people facing each other, both with their arms up as though wrestling. The final shot showed the woman lunging out of the car, a hand to her face.

  Lila sat back in her chair and flipped through the photos again. This time, instead of thinking about the potential charges, she took her thoughts to the trial. What would be his defense? How would she handle the case if she were his attorney?

  “What did you charge him with?”

  Ryan handed the draft complaint to Lila. Count one was third-degree assault, which required substantial bodily harm. The swollen eye met that element, but some juries didn’t like the idea that a black eye could be considered substantial harm. The second charge on the complaint was domestic assault—a misdemeanor—which required a punch but no damage.

  “Is your victim willing to testify?” Lila asked.


  Ryan shrugged. “He’s hit her before—twice—both times she changed her story before trial. Said she lied to the police because she was mad at her husband. Said she hit her eye on a door frame or something. Both cases got dropped. I think that’s why Fitch is being such a—”

  “Stickler?” Lila finished Ryan’s sentence, although that hadn’t been the word he was going to use. Ryan had called her Fitch the Bitch once before in Lila’s presence, but Lila’s look had let him know she didn’t approve.

  “So, what am I missing?” Ryan asked.

  “What’s Gray do for a living?”

  “Runs an assisted living facility.”

  “Ah.”

  “Yeah, a conviction gets him fired.”

  “That would explain why the wife keeps recanting.”

  Lila stared at the pictures again, thinking the case through as if she were the defense attorney, focusing on the State’s obvious weakness—the wife. The key would be to take her out of the equation. Abusers like Gray often talked their victims into not testifying—for the sake of the marriage, or the kids, or a job. But surveillance cameras don’t have that particular human frailty.

  Lila stopped on the picture of the woman with one leg out of the car, the man holding her arm, and that’s when it came to her. “Gray yanked her back into the car.”

  Ryan looked at Lila as though confused. “Yeah.”

  “It’s false imprisonment. He didn’t let her leave the car.”

  Ryan pondered that for a second and then said, “Okay, but that’s still only a three-year felony. I already have him charged with third-degree assault. That’s five years. If Fitch isn’t happy with five—”

  “He’d have to register as a predatory offender. False imprisonment carries a mandatory registration—assault doesn’t.”

  Lila could almost see the thoughts forming behind Ryan’s eyes as he worked to catch up.

  Ryan smiled. “That would be some serious leverage.”

  “You have the video of him pulling her back into the car. The jury can see him do that with their own eyes, so it won’t matter if the wife recants on the punch. Fitch can use the big stick of predatory offender registration to get a plea on the assault. Who knows—you might just convict the son of a bitch.”

  “Damn.” Ryan shook his head slowly. “I should have seen it…but…why didn’t she just tell me? Why does she…?” Ryan leaned back in his chair and let the thought pass. “I owe you one.”

  “I’m sure I’ll cash it in soon enough.”

  A tap at Ryan’s door, light but emphatic, interrupted their conversation. Before Ryan could extend an invitation, the door opened and Patrick Hittle, the third of the newbie trio, entered. “Did you hear about Beth?”

  “Beth?” Lila asked.

  “Beth…Malone.” He drew the words out to make clear to Lila he was saying Duh!

  Lila liked Ryan, but could do without Patrick, a man who never missed an opportunity to jab at her, comments that had no purpose other than to show off his big brain. “I can’t hang out after work,” he once said. “I have a MENSA meeting.” Another time he corrected Lila, saying, “Cats aren’t nocturnal, they’re crepuscular—they’re active at dawn and dusk, not all night.” Once, at lunch, Lila made the mistake of ordering a cheese panini. “It’s pronounced panino, not panini. Panini is plural.”

  “It’s pronounced pedantic, not Patrick,” Lila had whispered to herself. At first she thought that Patrick was like that with everyone, but when the three of them were together, it was Lila he threw darts at. So he was a misogynist. But then she noticed that he didn’t treat other women in the office that way.

  That made Lila think that he singled her out because she didn’t belong. She was petite with small features that shaved years off her age. She used to have long, dark hair, but had cut it short after that terrible summer. It didn’t help—she still looked young.

  She once asked Ryan his opinion on Patrick’s dickishness. “He knows you’re smarter than he is,” Ryan had said. “Despite all that MENSA crap, I think he knows, deep down, that you’ll be a better attorney. He’s making a preemptive attack.” Lila didn’t see it.

  Patrick closed the door to Ryan’s office and spoke quietly. “Beth was in a car accident last night—jammed her leg up into her hip, broke the bone in four places. They say she won’t be back for weeks, maybe months.”

  “Oh my God,” Lila said.

  Then Patrick added, “Frank Dovey’s taking over Adult Prosecution till she comes back.”

  That last bit of news landed like the blow of a fist. Frank Dovey—the head of Adult Prosecution? He would become Oscar’s boss—her boss. Lila sank into her seat, letting the conversation between Patrick and Ryan drift away.

  Frank Dovey—her boss.

  The dream of becoming a prosecutor had sustained Lila through seven years of books and study and stress. Her undergraduate degree had been hard enough, but law school came with the feel of trench warfare, the competition for class rank pitting students against each other. Lila had chased a vision of herself through it all—nice suit, polished shoes, confident posture, standing before a jury and putting evil men in prison—men like the ones who had hurt her so badly. In the end, her effort landed her a job that was perfect in every respect—except for Frank Dovey.

  She wasn’t sure whether it had been seconds or minutes since she’d tuned Ryan and Patrick out, but soon she heard Ryan’s voice breaking through the fog. “Lila? You okay?” He sounded concerned. “You need water or something?”

  Lila looked around and saw that Patrick had left. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I should get back…” Lila started to stand, but Ryan put a hand on her shoulder, gently easing her back down to the chair.

  “No hurry. What’s going on?”

  “Nothing, really.”

  “Lila.” Ryan’s voice took on the soft tone of a therapist or maybe even a friend. “It’s me.”

  “Frank Dovey.”

  “Yeah, I hear he’s a bit of a dick.”

  “It’s more than that. He and I…we have a history.” As soon as she said it, she could hear the hint of affair in the words.

  “You and Dovey?”

  “In court,” Lila said quickly. “We have a history in court. When I was a second-year, one of my law professors hired me to help him with a murder trial. We beat Dovey, and I think it cost him a judgeship.”

  “The Pruitt case? You were part of the Pruitt case?”

  “You heard about it?”

  “Just gossip.”

  “What’d you hear?”

  Ryan sat down and laced his fingers behind his head, looking at the ceiling as though trying to remember. “The victim’s sister…she was politically connected, right?”

  “Personal friend of the governor.”

  “Right. One of the paralegals told me that Dovey was so sure he had the judgeship that he’d joked that she should start calling him Your Honor.”

  “Oh good lord.”

  “Yeah, and then he lost the case. Word has it that the sister went to the governor and blackballed him. The paralegal said he smashed one of his chairs against the wall when he found out.”

  “I was on an elevator with him back in June,” Lila said. “Everyone else got off on lower floors, so it was just him and me. Once we were alone, I faced the front like a normal person, but he turned and stared at me like…I don’t know, but it was creepy.”

  “Stared at you?”

  “Yeah. He was two feet away.”

  “Did he say anything?”

  “Not a word. He just stared at the side of my head.”

  “Damn.”

  “I know. I’m pretty sure that Beth hired me over his objection.”

  “And now he’s…your boss.”

  “Yeah, well, it was fun while it lasted.” Lila had a smile on her face, but the slight quaver in her voice betrayed her.

  “He’s not stupid enough to fire you. Beth would have his hide. At the end of the day, he’s a pol
itical animal. Self-preservation will trump revenge.”

  “He’ll find a way to get rid of me, I just know it.”

  “You just have to keep your head down till Beth comes back. Avoid riding in elevators with the guy. You’ll be okay.”

  “I hope you’re right about that.”

  Lila tried not to seem dazed as she stood to leave, counting her steps as she walked to her office. On her desk lay a stack of files. Fraud cases. Numbers. Math. Not the kind of thing she dreamt about in law school, but the kind of thing that a newbie should be working on—at least according to Oscar Hernandez.

  She fired up her computer, the hum of its fan teasing the empty room, and tried to get her head into the groove. When her screen popped on, she glanced up to see if she had any emails to answer, and there, in the upper corner of the screen, blinked a message from Frank Dovey. A tendril of dread crept its way up her spine and into her chest.

  She opened it and read. Come see me.

  Chapter 4

  Gavin Spencer always thought of himself as a man who wore his plumage on the inside. Born with a body and face that were genetically forgettable, he had been further hobbled by a tongue that wheezed a sloppy hiss when he spoke the letter S. He was a backdrop, a weed. He was the beige Crayola in a box of sixty-four. But once he came to understand the power of his invisibility, it suited him well. What the rest of the world saw as indistinct, Gavin used as a disguise, turning his weakness into his strength. Gavin was happy enough to let his brilliance shine behind that mask.

  Part of that shine had always been the care that Gavin took to understand his craft. Excellence didn’t come by accident; it took effort. Take photography: The world was awash with happy amateurs taking crooked pictures with their cell phones. They had no appreciation for balance, or ratios, or rhythm. Just point and shoot—the resulting aesthetic no more pleasing than a finger painting smeared on paper by somebody else’s child.

  Similarly, Gavin believed the prisons of the world to be populated by thick-minded thugs who cared not a lick for their craft. Their paths led to incarceration not because of their calling, but because they refused to take that calling seriously. Just point and shoot. Not Gavin. He was a craftsman.