Sanchez’s eyes flashed at the word maid but she didn’t say anything.
‘Ms Moss?’ Judge Hawthorne was asking me for some clarification on Valencia’s question.
‘The defense is curious as to the state of Mrs Bryan’s finances, as we will discuss when presenting our case,’ I explained. ‘I believe it goes to motive. Ms Sutton had no reason to kill her mother-in-law for her money, but Mrs Bryan might very well have been in some financial difficulty with people who might have been very angry with her.’
‘It’s shaky but I’ll allow it,’ Hawthorne said. Valencia looked disappointed. Sanchez looked back up to the judge, who told her, ‘Please answer the question.’
‘Mrs Bryan didn’t owe me any money when she died,’ Sanchez said.
‘I appreciate that, but it doesn’t answer the question,’ I countered. So much for being friendly with the witness. ‘Were there times when Mrs Bryan couldn’t afford to pay you on time?’
Sanchez looked like she wanted to swallow her lips. ‘There were times she didn’t pay me right away. I don’t know if it’s because she couldn’t afford it.’
‘Did she tell you why she wasn’t paying you at those times?’ I asked.
‘That was just answered, Your Honor,’ Valencia piped up.
‘No, it wasn’t. Please answer the question, Mrs Sanchez.’
Now Sanchez looked like she wanted to swallow my lips, and more in a Hannibal Lecter sort of way. ‘Mrs Bryan said that she was having some problems with the bank,’ she answered.
‘Thank you. Mrs Sanchez, you said that Ms Sutton said she would cut out her mother-in-law’s heart if Mrs Bryan, and I’m quoting, “tried to turn her husband against her.” What was the context of that remark?’
This time Sanchez seemed genuinely confused. ‘The context? She was angry at Mrs Bryan.’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘And as you said, they were angry at each other over Mr Bryan’s intention to change careers.’ I was looking at Michael Bryan when I said that and he looked exactly as I would have hoped – surprised. ‘Had Mr Bryan told his mother that was what he was going to do?’
‘Yes.’ Sanchez was more comfortable with that answer. It only had three letters.
‘Do you think Ms Sutton actually meant she would cut out her mother-in-law’s heart?’ I asked.
Predictably, and somewhat to my relief, Valencia was on his feet. ‘Objection. The witness is being asked to judge the intentions of the defendant.’
‘Sustained.’
I nodded again, as if acknowledging that I’d asked an improper question and regretted it. The question might have been unorthodox but I didn’t regret it one iota. ‘One last area to ask about, Ms Sanchez. Were you ever present during a conversation between Mrs Bryan and her son when she asked him to loan her money?’
Sanchez suddenly found her shoes fascinating; she looked down at them with intense interest. She said something very faintly.
‘Please speak up, Mrs Sanchez,’ Judge Hawthorne said as I mentally thanked her. I didn’t want to have to do that myself.
Sanchez looked up. ‘I said, “Yes. One time.”’
‘What were the circumstances of that conversation?’ I asked.
‘Mrs Bryan asked Mr Bryan if he could loan her some money to help pay for a special event she wanted to host at Rafael. It was going to launch a new series of works by Pierre Chirac.’
‘How much money was she asking for?’
‘I don’t know.’ Sanchez’s eyes were burning holes in my forehead. No doubt they would serve as ventilation for my brain.
‘Did Mr Bryan loan his mother the money?’ I asked.
‘Yes.’
‘Did he add any conditions to the loan?’ I said. Cynthia had already told me about this and I needed to head it off as efficiently as possible.
‘Mr Bryan said he’d loan his mother the money as long as she never told his wife about it.’
People in the gallery looked at each other knowingly. No doubt they were wondering why the defense would elicit such a damning piece of evidence against its own client.
It was a calculated risk. ‘To your knowledge, did Mrs Bryan tell Ms Sutton about the loan?’
‘Yes. She told Ms Sutton the next day when they were having lunch together.’
‘And how did Ms Sutton react?’ It was crucial that Sanchez answer this question honestly.
‘She said it was OK with her.’ Sanchez looked over at Cynthia and came as close to smiling as she had the whole time she was on the witness stand, which wasn’t especially close. ‘She said she wanted the art show to succeed.’
Cynthia had told me a little about this. ‘And how did Mrs Bryan react to that?’ I asked.
Sanchez put great effort into putting no inflection into her answer. ‘She said that Ms Sutton could shove her support.’
I dismissed the witness. Valencia saw no reason to redirect. We broke for lunch.
Patrick and Angie were right in front of Cynthia and me as we headed out of the courtroom. Michael Bryan stepped out into the aisle and stopped just as Cynthia reached his row.
‘Cindy,’ he said. The man looked positively stricken.
‘It’s too late for that, Michael,’ my client told him and walked by.
But we didn’t make it all the way out of the courtroom. Patrick must have spotted the two uniformed police officers first because he stopped and backed up and turned so he was facing into the aisle, his back to the seats on the right side of the room. It wasn’t a wide aisle and with me, Angie, Cynthia and Jon all going to the door, there wasn’t much room to breathe, which was a real problem in this heat. You don’t get to go to court in a T-shirt and shorts, much to my chagrin.
The cops walked in like cops do, backs straight and shoulders back, certain they’re in charge of everything and nobody will question that. Cops can be hilarious and understanding. These weren’t.
The taller, broader one, whose name tag read Mancini, fixed his gaze on Angie and me, which was not easy since we weren’t standing next to each other. ‘Which one of you is Sandra Moss?’ he asked.
I didn’t care for his tone, but I took a step forward just as Angie said, ‘I am. Is there a problem, officer?’ Angie will protect me even when she doesn’t know what she’s protecting me from. Everyone should have an Angie.
‘No, I’m Sandra Moss,’ I said clearly. But I didn’t ask if he had a problem, which would have been the next sequential thing in New Jersey. This was California. People were, at least in theory, polite.
‘Which one of you?’ the shorter, slighter cop asked. He looked supremely confused.
Before Angie could claim to be Spartacus again, I said, ‘I am.’ Again, I asked no question. I figured it was their responsibility to explain themselves and not mine.
‘Then who are you?’ the bigger cop asked Angie.
‘I’m her attorney.’ Maybe only some people should have an Angie.
The big cop shook his head as if declaring the whole matter unimportant. He looked at me. ‘Sandra Moss, I have a warrant for your arrest. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say—’
‘What?’ Patrick demanded. The smaller cop looked at him, seemed to recognize him, took one step toward him as if about to ask for an autograph, corrected himself and turned back in my direction.
I think the world of Patrick. I do. But he tends to think everything is about him. I ignored that and kept my eyes on the cop while something in my digestive system tightened just a little. I’m not afraid of police officers generally, but this one had something in his eyes that lowered my body temperature about three degrees. Normally in heat like this I’d have considered that a positive. Not this time.
‘On what charge am I being arrested?’ I said in a voice that I hoped wasn’t quavering.
The smaller cop actually pulled out his phone and called up a note to read it to me. ‘Obstruction of justice, bribery and extortion.’
Before I knew it, I was in a holding cell in the building’s b
asement.
THIRTY-FIVE
‘This is an outrage,’ Patrick said.
‘The fact is, it’s three outrages,’ I corrected him. ‘But that’s not my main problem right now.’
You’ll ask me how Patrick managed to get himself inside a secure section of the criminal courts building of Los Angeles to talk to me in my cell while my attorney, Jon, was still trying to get an explanation of the charges against me and hadn’t actually shown up to discuss it with me yet.
(For the record, Holiday Wentworth had offered on the phone to represent me, but she had no criminal law experience at all and Jon did. The fact that I knew Jon was an excellent attorney everywhere but in front of a judge wasn’t making me feel especially better at the moment.)
‘I don’t understand what they’re charging you with, Sandy.’ Patrick reached through the bars for my hand. I felt like I shouldn’t give it to him, that the prisoner in the other cell (an actual prostitute who was not Madelyn Forsythe) would see it as a sign of weakness and the guard, who must have let Patrick in on the basis of him being a famous actor, would think I was Patrick’s girlfriend. ‘What is the LAPD trying to do to you?’
On the other hand (so to speak), Patrick was trying to comfort me and he was a dear person. I put my hand on his in a gesture of my own strength. I doubt anyone else was watching and therefore the move and all the thought I’d put into it were meaningless. So be it.
‘It’s a good question,’ I told him. ‘Are they trying to keep me out of court for Cynthia’s trial? If so, it’s a bad strategy. No judge is going to hold me in jail on what even the cops are calling non-violent crimes and certainly Jon is out there getting me into an arraignment as we speak, hopefully in front of a judge who knows me.’
‘If it’s not Cynthia’s trial, then what?’ Patrick asked, trying to turn his hand so that he was holding mine and not the other way around. But I was insisting for reasons I couldn’t even explain to myself. ‘How do they benefit if you go to jail?’
If I’d had an answer for him I would have given it. But if what Trench had told me was true, that people at the upper levels of the LAPD were actually targeting me personally, there had to be a reason for it. I wasn’t a big enough deal, especially in California, to have annoyed officials that high up. It was somehow flattering that they even knew my name.
As well-known as Wendy Bryan had been, could she have had friends in positions that elevated, and if so, would they (assuming they were involved somehow in law enforcement) have been angry enough to try to stop me from defending Cynthia? That seemed like an awfully long stretch.
And Trench had warned about what could happen if a person who had annoyed the higher-ups ended up in prison, even for one night.
‘I can’t begin to say,’ I told Patrick. ‘What I know for sure is that we’ve got to get me out of here as quickly as possible. Where’s Jon?’
‘I don’t know, but when I leave here and they give me back my phone I’ll text him,’ Patrick said, smiling at me. ‘Can’t let the woman I love languish in a cell.’
That again. ‘Not now, Patrick.’
But there was no need to wait for Jon; the door opened and he walked in with an expression of … something on his face. Fear? I hoped not.
‘What’s the deal?’ I said when he got close enough.
Before he answered he looked at Patrick. ‘You’re going to have to leave. This is attorney-client stuff.’
Patrick believes he knows all about being a lawyer because he played one on television. It’s sort of like if the cast of Gray’s Anatomy started doing surgery. He nodded and took his hand back through the bars. Through what I could only assume were Method tears welling up in his eyes, he said, ‘I’ll see you soon,’ and managed not to choke on the words as he said them. Then he turned and walked out of the door. I’m sure he imagined the camera was aimed at him leaving bravely and not me sitting in the cell. Actors.
‘So what’s the deal?’ I repeated.
‘Somebody out there wants you in here,’ he answered. ‘They want to schedule the arraignment for the day after tomorrow.’
The day after tomorrow? These things never take that long, especially when the accused (whatever I was accused of) has private counsel. ‘How is the court justifying that?’ I asked. ‘What the hell is it they say I did, anyway?’
‘Apparently the idea, which is total crap, is that you are paying off court officials to get Judge Klemperer off another case you’re working.’
Judge Klemperer! ‘The Madelyn Forsythe case? This is about that?’ I’d been so deeply engrossed in the murder trial I hadn’t considered the prostitution case. ‘At most that case would result in a ninety-day sentence! Who the … who cares enough about that?’ Then I thought for a second, in particular about the video surveillance that was no doubt trained at this cell. ‘And by the way, no, I’m not paying off anybody to do anything. How stupid am I supposed to be in this soap opera?’
‘Pretty stupid,’ Jon admitted. ‘They say you’re paying the court clerk under the table to transfer Klemperer off the case and get yourself a panel of three judges to hear it.’
My dream scenario. ‘I won’t lie, Jon. I’d love to see that happen. Klemperer hates women and isn’t giving me or my client a chance. But there’s no way I would try to go about doing it like that. I’m a lawyer, not a second-rate bail bondsman.’ My immediate apologies to all bail bondsmen. I’m sure none of you bribe anybody and you’re all first rate. I was under stress, in a holding cell. I’m sure you can sympathize, if not empathize.
‘Well, they have some bank records that have clearly been doctored showing this employee of the court clerk’s office with deposits of three thousand dollars, a thousand dollars each for three months, in cash. They’re going to try and tie those to you. You’d better check your accounts and make sure nobody’s hacked in and withdrawn that exact amount of money.’ Jon’s mouth twitched and for a moment I thought he believed I’d committed this ridiculous crime. Then I realized that was his way of showing anger when he was trying to conceal it.
‘Three thousand bucks,’ I said. ‘Not only am I guilty of bribery, I’m cheap on top of it. What’s the clerk saying?’
‘So far nothing. Apparently he took the three grand and booked a trip to Chichen Itza for the weekend. But there is good news. You’re not going to be spending the next two days in jail. I got you an arraignment for six o’clock tonight.’
Suddenly life seemed better. Funny how quickly that changes. Yesterday, if you’d told me the good news was that I’d be arraigned for bribing a public official today, I would not have thought that a terrific deal. ‘Jon! How’d you do that?’
‘Thank Judge Hawthorne. Nobody’s going to delay her trial and remove the lead defense attorney, charges or no charges. You’ll be back in her courtroom tomorrow morning by her order.’
I wanted to hug him more than I had wanted to hug Patrick when he was taking my hand, which pretty much summed up our relationship at this moment. ‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘I appreciate you taking this on. You didn’t have to do it.’
‘Yes, I did.’
That was sweet. ‘You’re taking this personally,’ I said, thinking I should have been the one who was doing that.
‘I got shot over this and lost a kidney,’ Jon said. Fair point.
‘Well, I appreciate it.’ That certainly seemed an inadequate thing to say.
Jon stood and put a determined look on his face. ‘Get yourself presentable as much as you can,’ he told me. ‘We’re gonna get you arraigned.’
THIRTY-SIX
The arraignment took four minutes, according to my iPhone. Jon entered my plea of (completely) not guilty, the judge (Harmon Evans, whom I had never seen before) noted the state of my ongoing murder case and the letter from Judge Hawthorne and released me on my own recognizance while doing an admirable job of not rolling his eyes at the sheer absurdity of the whole situation.
I was home in an hour, soaking my feet in front of Patri
ck (which should have disabused him from any notion that he was in love with me but didn’t), Cynthia, who was probably wondering why I didn’t have someone on staff to take care of my feet properly, and Angie as soon as I could arrange it. (Emily was probably fuming that she hadn’t been invited to the foot-soaking.) My feet seemed to be taking the brunt of the punishment I’d endured today. Jon went home to relax for the night. He didn’t say anything, but I knew the many surgeries he’d undergone had depleted him and he needed more rest than he had before.
‘Emmie called me today,’ Patrick said out of nowhere. Naturally. ‘She still wants to know why I called off the engagement.’ This was a periodic occurrence, he had noted over the past few months. Was he trying to make the point that he cared more for me than for the woman he had been planning to marry? Did that matter?
‘Did you tell her it was because she was a controlling bitch who wanted to micromanage your life?’ Angie, when she was ‘off the clock’ as Patrick’s assistant, tended to speak a little more bluntly than when she was working on his behalf.
Patrick smiled that beguiling smile with the hint of sadness in it, the one that probably had gotten Emily to fall in love with him to begin with. ‘I think I put it a tiny bit more diplomatically.’
I wanted to deflect any further talk of Patrick’s love life for … the rest of my life. ‘I don’t think I got arrested today because of your case, Cynthia,’ I said. If Patrick could change conversational gears without so much as a segue, so could I.
Cynthia, who had been sort of staring into the middle distance as if acting in a scene in which her character didn’t want to betray the pain in her heart at the revelation of her husband’s infidelity (or perhaps I was taking the analogy too far), turned sharply at the mention of her name. ‘Why not?’ she asked with an edge to her voice. Was she offended that I’d get arrested for something other than defending her?
‘Because there’s no upside in it for the upper echelons of the LAPD to get me off your case. I’m not the world’s most renowned criminal defense attorney. And as accomplished as you are, Cynthia, I don’t really think it matters enough to those men’ (they were pretty much all men) ‘to bother with arresting me. Besides, I think the attempts to shoot Patrick and me and the attack on Jon were all related, and they started before Wendy Bryan died.’
Judgment at Santa Monica Page 20
