“Ever see The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance? The guy who got the credit didn’t really shoot Liberty Valance, but he never tells. So Readmore made the stop because he was bored, because he’d been dissed by his captain, but he’s not going to tell anyone that. He’s going to be the dragon slayer.”
“And if Lee won’t allow the evidence?”
“Have a little faith in the man.” Mark’s fist tightened. The little soldier’s bayonet plugged him in the palm. He looked at it, as if surprised to find it there. Carefully, he put it exactly where he found it. “We got them. All that matters now is that we keep them, and the judge knows that.”
Mark walked around the office, feeling invigorated by his sense of righteousness. He checked out the framed citations on the wall. Abram was lauded more than any man Mark knew but the reasons eluded him. The U.S. Attorney was full of affectations; well versed in the law, but hardly well practiced. He had few friends, yet a great many people were willing to go to bat for him. Funny thing, he never seemed to reciprocate. Mark never saw Abram Schuster reach down to give a leg up. He was a curiosity, this small man with the great view of himself as the general of the battle. Abram was no more a leader than half the men and women who had sat in that chair. They were political appointees. It was his office, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, that brought the cases and initiated the action. His agents put their lives on the line; Abram’s assistants only put their reputations there.
“My confidential informant is good, Abram. The best. I trained him and he’d do anything for me.” He almost added that he loved Nick Cheshire like a son but decided Abram would never understand what that really meant. “We’ll put the Stewarts away for a couple of lifetimes and the country will applaud. This case will be the banner that will show how effective we government men can be in Los Angeles. You, me, and Judge Lee. We’re on trial, too. I’m sure it’s dawned on you that this is important to us individually.”
“How long has your informant been in place?” Abram asked, not willing to comment on the last. One never knew who was really listening, after all.
“Three years. He lives just like any other guy in the neighborhood. He goes to a job, comes home, dates. His story is that he’s divorced, and the system screwed him out of a fortune, by the way.” Mark sat again, excited about the quality of his work and willing to share it. “See, that’s what makes this particular cell so frightening. They’re patient. They look like any other middle-class guys, living in middle-class neighborhoods. They have wives and kids and pets. It took a solid year for Nick just to get himself into a meeting. There hasn’t been a traffic ticket since our man went in, but there’s been lots of talk. When we found out what kind of talk was going down, we decided we didn’t want them for conspiracy to commit, we wanted them for something a little more dramatic. Nick’s committed to that.”
“So you let them blow up half a city block? Mark, that’s going a bit far even for you.” Abram looked absolutely shocked and that was a first.
“They were supposed to blow an IRS storage facility in Ventura. There’s no guard on the weekends, which meant no one would get hurt. These people really believe they can generate some sympathy with the general public by attacking the process, not the people who work it. Anyway, Nick steered them to that target because the building was scheduled for demolition next year. We had them move up the schedule and empty the place. Nick confirmed that target twenty-four hours before the downtown blast. Same crime, different location. We’ve got enough, Abram, as long as we don’t lose Nick’s information, eyewitness testimony and the post blast evidence.”
“Somehow, Mark, all this isn’t that comforting considering the fact that this is a government building. Even you spend your day in one. I’d hate for anyone from the Independent Militia to decide to blow up this building, for instance, and not have an informed heads up.” Abram chuckled. It was a droll sound.
“I’ll put you on speed dial.” Mark laughed, but he was amused. It would be fun to see Abram in a real emergency.
The test of a man’s mettle was what he did when he was cornered. Looks, words, big talk, it could all be deceiving. Abram would probably crawl over a woman who was down to get out of harm’s way, but Mark knew he could be wrong. “Look, Abram, Edie’s been on top of this since day one. She’s got her act together.”
“And Lauren, too,” Abram muttered, only to find his casual comment ringing like a bell in his ears when Mark fell silent. “You have a problem with Lauren Kingsley?”
“Not really.” Mark fingered another soldier as he confessed. “She has an attitude.”
“Don’t we all have a bit of that,” Abram commented as his sense of dread lifted. “Don’t forget to deal with her fairly, though. The young lady has some rather high-profile gentlemen championing her,” Abram reminded him.
“Actually, I figured her history would have kept her out of the running for a position like this. Ms. Kingsley’s professional cloth is full of holes and that means one of these days, when it counts, her work won’t hold water. Right now, every move counts.”
“She’s aware of that, Mark. Lauren has such a need to wipe her mother’s slate clean that her own work is always above board. She is ethical, meticulous, and righteous to a fault. The fact that the FBI isn’t her favorite agency has never inhibited her performance. Her only vice seems to be that she loves the sound of her own voice, but who didn’t at her age?”
“I guess you’re right. Still, I wish you’d assigned Remillard or Jensen. Those two have some real time behind them. Then there’s the thing about women prosecuting.”
“Sexist are we, Mark?” Abram laughed. The gloom was gone.
“No. No, of course not.” He colored just above his collar. Abram took note, looking for a weak link in the man’s rather strong chain. Just for his own edification, naturally. “I’m thinking about a jury. I think a man would have helped the situation, subliminally.”
“The first one dead in the blast was a woman. Women should prosecute when home and hearth are threatened.”
Mark threw back his head. The gray at his temples glinted under the overhead lights, his eyes actually twinkled. He laughed long and hard. Winding down, he smoothed his well-trimmed mustache as if that would put him back in the proper frame of mind. “You think female jurors will relate to Edie or Lauren? The men might, but I’m telling you it won’t be because they think those two can whip up an apple pie and stitch a flag at the same time.” He stood up, shaking his head. “You’ve got to get out more, Abram.”
Abram stood up while Mark was talking. Mark did the same, shaking his head, chuckles still bubbling up. They walked to the door but didn’t shake hands and that was odd for both of them. Abram usually offered his as a matter of course, Mark to those he considered his equal. Perhaps Mark Jackson made Abram think just a little deeper about his political ways, and Abram made Mark wonder just where it was he stood in the pecking order. Surprisingly, though, Mark put his hand on Abram’s shoulder and smiled a white, bright, agent smile beneath his more-silver-than-gold mustache.
“I’m pulling your chain, Abram. Edie will be great. Lauren’s good at what she does. A little too much baggage for my taste, but good. We’ve got this knocked. If anything gets in the way I promise, I will personally make it go away no matter what it takes. You’ve got my word on that.”
Mark gave Abram a thumbs up as he left the office, case folders under his arm. Abram didn’t see that optimistic gesture. There was a tickling in the back of his mind as he closed his office door and mentally spread the hand he’d been dealt. It looked good. A full house: evidence, attorney power, witnesses, a sympathetic judge, a jaded public who would heap accolades on those who saved them from home-grown terrorists. Still, something wasn’t quite right. Two cards were stuck together and hard as he tried to separate them in his imaginary game, he couldn’t.
Feeling ridiculous, Abram left his office and went to see Edie. But Edie was gone, out for a late lunch—or an early drink.
He found Lauren in her office tossing paper balls at her trashcan. She colored when he found her like that but didn’t stop her last toss or apologize for taking it.
She never apologized. The kind of surety wasn’t good in someone so young.
“You’re done early, Lauren.” He pulled out a chair, noting she missed the trash can more often than she’d hit it.
“We’re done for the day. Maybe the year. Maybe for life,” Lauren muttered.
“Really?” Abram said.
That’s all the encouragement Lauren needed. She started talking and kept it up until she’d told him everything, exhausting every possible ramification and permutation of what had gone on in Jonathan Lee’s courtroom. By the time Abram left her office he had it all in perspective. Mark Jackson might have to work a little harder than he anticipated when it came to making the Independent Militia go away, and Abram was glad he hadn’t assigned himself front line duty.
“I can’t believe it. Poor Judge Lee. What a way to tell him. They left a message with his clerk. That is so tacky.”
Lauren Kingsley’s feet were propped on Judge Wilson Caufeld’s coffee table. Her shoes were off, her hands laced behind the back of her head and her head was tilted up to stare at his ceiling. She looked as if she lived there, and in a way she did. A judge’s chambers had been her second home since she was ten and nothing about the trappings of that office surprised, scared, or intimidated her. The world at large sometimes did, but when that happened, Lauren Kingsley just talked louder and moved quicker until the boogiemen went away. What happened today didn’t scare her. It just made her feel terribly sad. She swiveled her head, watching Judge Caufeld go about his business.
“It’s a horrible thing. Horrible. I don’t think there would have been any other way of doing it,” Caufeld intoned. “Frieda Lee was hurt so badly they couldn’t have waited for a recess. I still can’t believe it. That poor woman. Car-jacked right in Santa Monica. What is this world coming to? Someone had to tell Jonathan that he was needed at the hospital and his clerk wanted to be the one to do it. Better her than having the LAPD disrupt the courtroom, or a reporter.” He shook his head like an old bull elephant. “What I feel so badly about is that Jonathan reacted so poorly. Given his outburst, I’m not sure he’ll be able to return to the bench. I understand his distress, but public opinion, the system, neither will be forgiving of something like this. Despair is not allowed for a judge of his caliber. His emotions should be private. The law demands that we look with a knowledgeable eye, not an emotional one, at the business at hand.”
Wilson Caufeld shook his head again as he thought of Jonathan Lee’s situation, but a glance at Lauren made him sorry he had voiced his thoughts. He hoped Lauren hadn’t connected his comments with her memories, but one look was enough to know she had.
Lauren’s eyes were closed, her body just a tad more rigid than it had been a moment earlier. She looked beautiful though she would have preferred a more generic adjective like polished or handsome. Her mother, Lauren was quick to point out, had been beautiful. To Wilson, the two women were identical. Fair of hair and coloring, chiseled face except for that nose. A Kingsley nose, just a tad pug, charming enough to soften that jaw of hers that was now clenched so tightly. The fair hair that nature curled was still caught in braids wound in a figure eight at the back of her neck the way she had worn it for more years than Wilson could count. Her color was heightened, not through make-up, but by hurtful memories of another judge who had kept silent during a time of despair. That silence led to disastrous results.
“No long face, Lauren.” He scolded himself for his insensitivity rather than her reaction. “This is a special lunch, and I won’t have anyone ruining it. Not Jonathan Lee or the sad circumstances in which his wife has found herself. Not you. Not me. Not even Allan. I told him to be here exactly at noon and now it’s twelve-thirty. Sit down and eat. We won’t wait. That young man can never be counted on. I shouldn’t put even the smallest bit of faith in him.”
Wilson Caufeld motioned Lauren to the far end of chambers. She swung her legs off the table, put her shoes back on and stood up. Her trousers were beautifully cut, pleated, full and breaking just so on top of her Italian loafers. Wilson hadn’t seen her legs since she was sixteen. Pity. He waved her to lunch again and she laughed. All was well.
“You better not let anyone hear you say that about Allan. Last I heard he had a client list that looked like the Who’s Who of corporate America. If you slander him, he’ll have your head on a plate.”
Lauren shrugged out of her double-breasted, dusk colored blazer and put it carefully over the back of her chair. Beneath it was a blouse made of ivory silk that fell beautifully over small breasts and covered her thin, strong arms. Another inch shorter, a less refined profile, fewer absolutes and ultimatums falling from her lips and she would have seemed almost childlike.
“I was the one who recommended Allan as counsel to half those corporations. I’ve seen his press, Lauren. The greatest defense attorney of the century, indeed. Silliness. Greatest con artist. Most glib lawyer to hold a bar ticket,” Wilson protested affectionately as always. “He’s forgotten where he came from. I gave him his first job. I’ll tell anyone who will listen that Allan Lassiter can’t be trusted if he can’t even honor his luncheon dates. Allan is no gentleman, Lauren.”
“Oh stop grumbling. You adore him, and you know it. Besides, he adores you back.”
Lauren swiped an olive from a platter as the judge turned it to a more pleasing angle. He gave her a paternal slap on the wrist, and she smiled. She kissed him on the cheek, pulled out her chair and waited while Wilson bustled about complaining about a man for whom they both forgave everything. She watched Wilson Caufeld with her chin on her upturned hand.
A black man so light he could have passed for white, but would never think of it, Wilson Caufeld was Lauren’s friend, her substitute father and mother, her mentor. Her mother had told Lauren about Wilson Caufeld instead of reading her to sleep with fairy tales.
Wilson Caufeld began the practice of law when it was almost impossible for an attorney of color to make his mark in the mainstream. He was proud to call himself a Negro rather than hide behind his light complexion to forward his career. Decades later, to the horror of the politically correct, he still referred to himself that way. A private man who longed for a family, he had suffered the loss of a beloved wife before being blessed with children. He never found someone special enough to replace Victoria in all the years of being a widower. Wilson Caufeld was a funny man, but shy of his own wit. In public, his intelligence and single-mindedness overshadowed his kindness. Few knew exactly how endearing he was. In his entire career he had taken only two people under his wing and into his heart: Allan Lassiter and Lauren Kingsley. They had grown up with Wilson, while Wilson had grown older and wiser.
Wilson had taught Allan Lassiter to be an excellent attorney, but he’d taught Lauren so much more. She learned how to function through hurt, keep her chin up, win by throwing small punches, and protect herself even though there were chinks in her armor. Sometimes he told her she was beautiful, but she knew that couldn’t be true because an essential part of her was missing. All Lauren saw was the masculine cut of her jaw, the broadness of brow. Her mirror didn’t register the fullness of her lips, the softening curl of her hair, only the pain-filled eyes that looked back when she wasn’t on her guard. He said she was smart, but Lauren knew that, when it was critical, she had been too stupid to see tragedy looming ahead in her life. No matter that she was hardly more than a child at the time. She had still been blind to her mother’s despair.
Wilson Caufeld clapped his hands. “We’re ready. If Allan hasn’t the decency to join us at the proper time on such an important day, then—”
On that cue the door opened and Allan, in all his glory, stood on the threshold ready to be admired. Though the act was old, and they knew the scene well, they admired him anyway. Allan Lassiter was a breath of fresh air, a crystalline wave b
reaking over a snow-white beach, an expanse of sky so blue it brought tears to the eyes. In short, Allan ranked right up there with every breathtakingly beautiful thing God had ever made. If Lauren Kingsley was the daughter Wilson Caufeld never had, then Allan was the son and just that much more adored. It was a narrow margin and one Lauren didn’t begrudge him. Allan kissed the top of her head while he took the spotlight and adjusted it on himself.
“I know you were talking about me. I hope you were saying good things.” He placed his hands on Lauren’s shoulders. “Judge, when are you going to convince this woman she’ll do better in the courtroom if she doesn’t dress like Dick Tracy? Show a little leg, Lauren.”
“No jurist in his right mind would be swayed by such a blatant bid for attention,” Wilson sniffed, trying to hide his pleasure that Allan had finally arrived to fill out his family. “And we were only talking about you to lament your shortcomings.”
“I have none, and you know it,” Allan laughed. He put his arm around Wilson Caufeld and squeezed, grinning the whole while. Lauren swore the old man blushed. “Must be big news if you’ve got the tablecloth on.” He slipped out of his jacket and tossed it onto the couch without thought for its fine quality. Sliding onto a chair he gave Lauren a smile as his voice dropped, the way it did when seduction was on his mind. “You look good, Lauren.” This part of the act she’d stopped taking seriously years ago. He cleared his throat and broadened that grin. There were more interesting things to talk about. “Considering the morning you had, I’d say you look stunning. Drove old Jonathan Lee right off the bench, did you? Better work on your oral skills, Laurie. You can’t win if you let the judge lose control before he hears what you have to say.”
The Mentor Page 4
