We sit quietly for a while. “You two were so solid. You were family,” Martha finally says.
“He wants more than I can give him, Martha.” I’m startled by the bile I feel rising. “I tried to get back in touch. Texted, left messages, but not a word.”
“Words aren’t Mike’s thing. You know that.”
“A guy who doesn’t talk and a girl who can’t stop. What a match.”
“Put yourself in his shoes. It probably took him months to work up the courage to do what he did. He put on the whole show, offered you everything—his love, his world. He was careful to mention your freedom, too—and you walked out without so much as a goodbye. You wounded him, Jilly. Humiliated him.”
“No. I mean, I never meant to hurt him.”
“Does this have anything to do with you taking on the Trussardi case? I mean, Laura Trussardi was his cousin . . .”
My foster mother, who knows me better than she knows herself, has zeroed in on the tender truth that kills. I would trade Mike for a case.
“No,” I say.
“Yes. I never met Vincent Trussardi—I think maybe Brock ran into him at some point—but I can tell you this: the Shaughnessy gossip machine has already convicted him.” She looks at me anxiously. “This could be a loser, Jilly. A big loser.”
I sigh. “I’m aware of that, Martha. But guilty or innocent, he’s entitled to a trial and a competent defense. That’s my job.”
The waiter comes to claim our untouched plates. “Everything all right?” he asks nervously.
“Great,” we say in unison. He smiles at our bleak faces and takes away the crockery.
CHAPTER 20
IT’S 8:00 P.M. THE NEXT day, and I’m on my way home from the office where I’ve been catching up on paperwork after a tedious day on my never-ending drug trial as I wait for news from Richard on Trussardi.
Instead of heading east to Yaletown, I take the long route through the dark streets that lie on the periphery of Hastings—that epicenter of vice where homeless mill, junkies shoot up, and prostitutes hook such fish as they can. In what I call my dark period, when despair temporarily unmoored me from the Maynes’ embrace, I came here more often than was wise. I occasionally circle back—this time the catalyst is my lunch with Martha—to remind myself how close I came to being sucked into the vortex.
The streets are quiet tonight. Young people laugh in the warm evening air outside pubs; a few shove each other or detach and stroll into alleys. On every side, not-so-genteel hotels and rooming houses rise from the pavement. A face at the edge of a group catches my eye. I do a double take, feel a clutch in the pit of my stomach—Damon Cheskey. We’ll pick him up on something else before long, Cy had said after the trial. I slow the car, follow Damon, see him stuff something into his backpack, then peel off from his group and head down the street. At the corner he turns and disappears beneath a sign that says INGLES HOTEL.
I pull over, idle for a while, but he does not come out. I sag, feel my forehead fall forward and hit the soft leather of the steering wheel. I’m naïve, stupid. I invested in Damon, believed in him. You believed in your own fantasy, Jilly Truitt, the private myth of redemption that keeps you going. I put the car into gear and head home.
I turn on the TV, pull up my orange chair, and plunk myself down, but I can’t sit still. I’m up; I’m pacing. Damon’s fate is not my problem, but it eats at me. My great victory reduced to this. A nice boy brought down again. I find myself rooting through a drawer for jeans and a sweater. I throw on a pair of low-cut boots and grab my leather jacket and keys.
I park the car on a side street and make my way around the corner to the Ingles Hotel—a sliver of blackened brick in a streetscape of sister establishments. The scratched wooden door and charcoal window promise privacy, no questions asked, for dark deeds and desperate trysts.
A man with a long, bony face straight from The Scream looks me over suspiciously from behind a battered counter. “Help ya?” he grunts.
“Damon Cheskey’s room number.”
“No idea.”
I decide to get rough, nothing to lose. I pull out my ID, flash it too fast for him to see. “The law,” I say. “Emergency.” It’s not quite a lie.
His eyes widen, and he reaches for a key on the board at his side, throws it on the counter. “Two-eight-seven.”
I take the stairs two at a time—no elevators here—and find the room. At the end of the hall, a door opens and a man, pants undone, staggers out of what must be the communal bathroom. He sees me, clutches his crotch, and falls against the wall. I put my finger to my mouth, “Shhh . . .”
I insert the key, step inside two-eight-seven, and silently shut the door behind me. The room is small and sparsely furnished. A single bed, tightly made, hugs the wall, a table beside it. To my right is a metal dresser. The only light is a candle on the floor, behind which sits Damon, cross-legged in a Buddha squat. He is neatly dressed in jeans and a white button-down cotton shirt, open at the neck. His blond hair reflects the light of the candle as he bends his head to roll up the left sleeve of his shirt.
I flatten myself against the door and watch, trance-like, as he takes a rubber band from the pocket of his jeans, twists it around his upper arm with his right hand, pulls it with his teeth to tighten it. The muscles of his arm bunch. He takes the spoon, now heaped with white powder, and places it above the candle, contemplating as the drug melts. His left hand finds the syringe. With care, he tilts the spoon and fills the syringe, inserts the plunger.
I clear my throat. “Damon.”
His head whips up. I read surprise, then anger in his face. “Go away,” he hisses. The edge in his voice tells me he means it. I should go, but I don’t. Instead, I slip to the floor and crouch across from him as he cradles the syringe in his hand.
“Damon,” I say again. “I didn’t put so much effort into your case only to have you end up like this.”
He looks at me straight on. “I’ve done bad things. I fucked people over. I killed a man. I deserve to be in jail, need to be in jail.”
“What happened when you went home, Damon?”
“They shunned me.”
I do a double take at the archaic language, then realize this is exactly the word that a kid schooled in the Mennonite religion would use.
“Not my parents, the others. They took me to church, but no one would look at me. There’s no place for me there.” His eyes scan the middle distance. “No place here either. Kellen still wants me dead.”
“Are you back on crystal meth?”
“No.”
“So now you’re on heroin?”
“I’m not on heroin.”
“Then what’s this?” I point to the syringe.
He doesn’t answer and then I understand. He’s going to overdose, kill himself.
“Damon,” I say. “You have a choice.”
“I have chosen.” His voice is calm and settled.
“That choice is no longer available.”
“Ms. Truitt, this is my business. You should not be here.”
“You have two new choices. If I leave, I will call the police.” I touch the cell phone at my hip. “They’ll be here within minutes. They’ll take you to St. Paul’s and pump you out. It will be painful and cost the taxpayers about two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. But you will not die.”
“And my other choice?”
“You come with me. We turn in your syringe at Insite—they’ll keep it for you. Tomorrow we’ll figure the rest out.”
We sit in silence. His face tilts up to the ceiling, moves sideways to the wall, comes back down to mine. Teeth clenched, features contorted, he is pure, unalloyed anger. I remember that he’s killed a man, and I feel the beat of my heart, louder than it should be. Then in a single motion, he throws down the syringe, tears the rubber from his arm, and rises. His eyes drill into mine, and he lunges toward me from his height. “Fucking bitch, just leave me alone!” he cries as he yanks me upright.
He’s holding me up, gripping my arms hard. I hear my strangled cry, “Damon, don’t do this.”
Abruptly, his hands release me, and I fall back to the floor as he turns away. I watch his shoulder muscles bunch beneath the cotton of his shirt as he stares through the cracked window at the blackness outside. A minute passes, then another. His shoulders sag. He turns back to me, picks up his backpack, stuffs the syringe in its plastic bag and into the pack. “Okay, let’s go,” he says.
My knees are weak, but I try not to let it show. We walk to Insite, an inconspicuous place on the north side of Hastings where people who want to shoot up can do so in supervised safety. It lurches from court challenge to court challenge, persistently troubled by those who believe that addicts deserve to die. But tonight, by some good fortune, it’s open. Damon fills out a form and drops the needle off, then walks with me to my car.
Back at my condo, I make up the couch in the den and ask Damon if he wants anything. He shakes his head and closes the door of the den behind him. I wait in the living room. It’s idiotic—I can do nothing to stop him from walking out of my apartment and back onto the street, if he wants to. Still, I wait. At half-past twelve I cross to the den, open the door a crack. His head, in the shaft of light from the living room, is back against the pillow. He looks so peaceful that, for a moment, I fear he has found some way to end it after all. Then I hear his deep, even breathing and, reassured, tell myself to go to bed.
* * *
WHEN I EMERGE FROM MY room the next morning, I find Damon sitting on a stool at the kitchen island, hair still wet from the shower. I set out orange juice, cereal, and milk. “Help yourself.” Then I go to my newest toy—a gleaming gold-and-chrome coffee machine. I add the espresso, foam the milk, and present him with a steaming cappuccino. “Consider me your personal barista,” I say.
He cradles the cup, then asks quietly. “Why did you do what you did?”
I feel my stomach constrict, like I always do when I think back to my dark place. “I was once in the same situation as you—on the floor of a room, with a candle and a spoonful of white powder beside me. I was scared, screwed up. I had been on the streets and done some stupid things. When I came to my senses, I was too ashamed to go forward, too sick to go back. So I decided to end it. Someone saved me, someone who wouldn’t give up on me. For a dozen years, I’ve been looking for a way to repay the debt I owe.”
Damon eyes me wearily. “Then you know it’s not over.”
“It’s never over, but you’ve gained a day, Damon. That’s good.”
“I can’t just stay here.”
You’re not going back to Insite to pick up your package, I think. Then I hear myself talking.
“Can you answer a phone?”
“Yeah.”
“Drive?”
“Sure.”
“Got basic computer skills?”
“Of course.”
“Okay with lifting boxes?”
He raises his arm—a biceps flexes beneath his white shirt.
“You’re my man, Damon. Let’s go.”
CHAPTER 21
ARE YOU CRAZY, JILLY?”
“Shut the door, Jeff. And keep your voice down.”
I introduced Damon to the team this morning—no explanation, just This is Damon, our new gopher. Debbie, picking up on the name, rolled her eyes. Jeff gave me an incredulous stare, but before he could open his mouth, Alicia dragged him off to deal with a pretend emergency. Now that Jeff’s back from court, he’s dressing me down.
“He’s got to go, Jilly. What the hell were you thinking?” He stands on the other side of my desk, fists clenched into white-knuckled balls.
“I was thinking I was helping him out.”
He rolls his eyes as he slumps to the chair. “He’s our client. We can’t hire our client.”
“Was our client.”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“It matters very much. Our relationship with Damon ended the moment the jury acquitted him. It’s over. No reason we can’t establish a new, different kind of relationship now.”
“He’s bad, Jilly. He hawked drugs, killed a man—who knows what other havoc he wreaked along the way. And you’re inviting him into our office so he can liaise with our criminal clients? You’re giving him the perfect platform for expanding his web of crime. Reputable law firms don’t do that.”
“What happened to the idea of a fresh start? Rehabilitation in the quaint language of the Criminal Code?”
“Rehabilitation is a pretty word. Makes the system feel better when they lock a bad guy up. But you know as well as I that they never change, our boys. It’s the only world they know. Sooner or later they get sucked back in.”
I put my hands on my desk, palms down. “I’m not going to argue with you, Jeff. I know the risks, but I am going to do this anyway. We’ll watch him. Closely. Let him go if necessary. But I have to give him this chance.”
Jeff grunts through gritted teeth. “Whatever you say, boss. But watch the till; watch your back.” He turns to head out.
“Jeff, wait. I need your help.”
He stops. “My help?”
“He needs a place to live.”
“You’re not suggesting Jessica and I take him in? My god, Jilly—”
“No, but you mentioned that your neighbor’s in Europe for a few months. Maybe he’d be willing to sublet?”
“And let Damon trash the pad?”
“I’ll pay for any damage.”
Jeff pauses. “See what I can do,” he mutters as he leaves.
I take a deep breath, decide to go find Damon. I don’t need to look far—he’s pacing outside my door, backpack over his shoulder. He pushes around me into my office.
“I’m leaving,” he announces.
“Why?” I shut the door behind us.
“Jeff’s right. It won’t work.”
“So you were eavesdropping.”
“He was coming through the walls.”
“And you agree with him? That rehabilitation’s nonsense, a fresh start’s a chimera?”
“No. Yes. I don’t know what to believe.”
“What about your family?”
He shifts his backpack uncomfortably.
“You owe it to yourself to give it a try, Damon. I believe you can make it.” I look him straight in the eye. “Debbie is waiting at the front desk. Ready to put you to work.”
He smiles faintly. “ ‘Move that pile of boxes. After you get me a coffee,’ ” he mimics in a perfect Liverpool twang.
“Not bad, Damon. The accent, I mean. Just keep Debbie happy—that’s your number one job.”
“Tall order, Ms. Truitt.” He lets the backpack slip from his shoulders. “But what the heck, I’ll try.”
CHAPTER 22
THE LATE-DAY SUN FILTERS FAINTLY through the arched window, the soft light making my boardroom seem larger than its diminutive dimensions. I have placed Vincent Trussardi on one side of the long table. Jeff, Alicia, Richard, and I take seats opposite. Alicia’s laptop is open, her fingers poised to take notes. We are ready for our war room chat.
The door opens, and Damon shoulders through like he’s been carrying trays of coffee his entire life. Against all the odds, in a few short weeks, he’s acquired the air of a sophisticated go-to office hand cum paralegal. In black slacks, a pale blue shirt, and a tie, he’s clean and groomed.
He goes straight to Vincent, halts. The tray wavers.
“Damon?” I say.
He recovers smoothly. “An espresso, Mr. Trussardi? Biscotti?” He glances encouragingly at the drink and the cookie. Trussardi eyes him briefly and accepts with a gracious nod. Damon serves all round and exits, tray high on the palm of his right hand.
Richard looks at me—Where did you find this guy, Jilly?
I shake my head—It’s a long story.
The shock at Damon’s arrival has been supplanted by guarded acceptance as he makes himself useful doing whatever needs doing: answering the phone, roaming t
he net, politely convincing loiterers to leave the premises, and, yes, producing decent coffee on cue from our antiquated machine. When I finally told Jeff the details, he shook his head.
“He’s bipolar,” he opined. “Suicidal one day, our man Friday the next. Still say you’re crazy, Jilly.”
“Sure,” I replied. “Anyway, thanks for getting him the sublet at your condo.”
“Can’t have the boss living in sin, Jilly.”
I start the show-and-tell for Vincent by laying out the Crown’s theory. “They’re going to argue that you knew Laura had rekindled her affair with Trevor, that she was pregnant with his baby, and you killed her out of jealousy. We may be able to poke a hole in that argument, depending on the results of the paternity test, which should be in any day now.”
“It will prove the child was mine,” he says firmly.
I scan my notes. “They found residue of a sleeping drug in the body. Did your wife take sleeping pills, Mr. Trussardi?”
“Yes, sometimes she had insomnia.”
“Might not mean much,” I reply. “This particular drug has a half-life of eight or nine hours. If she took it late the night before, the traces would still be there. Otherwise, nothing noteworthy. She was strong, in the bloom of health.” I turn to the police reports. “We’ve been through all the statements from you, Carmelina, the gardener, the cleaning lady. The gardener talks about the boy who hung around the property. There’s evidence of footprints on the outskirts of your property, but we can’t prove much with that. Did Laura ever mention the boy after the evening she brought him to the house and he ran away?”
“No, we never discussed it.”
“Did you ever see the boy, apart from that occasion?”
Trussardi hesitates. “Once. I told him to go away.”
“What did he say?”
“He said—” He breaks off. “It was nonsensical babbling that doesn’t matter. The boy may have had a fixation on Laura, but why would he kill her?”
Full Disclosure Page 10
