Across the street from the front of the high-rise condo building, a well-dressed, bland looking man was watching the scene in front. Slightly disguised with hair dye, glasses, a mustache and goatee, he had more than a passing interest in the proceedings.
Shortly after 11:00 A.M., Owen Jefferson with Marcie Sterling behind him, came out to face the media. Surprised at the attention this crime had already engendered, Jefferson waited a minute for the media to get ready before speaking. This also gave the man in the disguise an opportunity to slide through the crowd to get close enough to hear him.
“At this time, all I can tell you is that a man in his late-thirties was found dead by an apparent homicide this morning. No other information can be made available until next of kin have been notified.”
The reporters started shouting questions at the two detectives who answered with “no comments” all the way to their car. While Jefferson and Marcie drove off, the man in the disguise took out a flip phone and made a call.
“It is done,” he said with a barely discernible Latino accent.
“Thank you,” was the only response by Paul Quinones.
While the man Quinones sent to eliminate the problem he and Victor Espinosa had talked about was making that call, another man, one who had blended into the crowd like a chameleon, was hurrying down the sidewalk to get to his car. Charlie Dudek, having recognized Maddy Rivers when she came out, would head for a place to cool out for a few days. In less than ten minutes he was on eastbound I-94 to drive through St. Paul on his way to Chicago.
Seated on his couch in his shorts and a T-shirt, Dale Kubik was grinning like an idiot while watching the twelve o’clock news. There was film of Maddy Rivers coming out of the high-rise with two men. By now apparently Rob’s next of kin had been notified and the announcer was using his name. When the story was finished, Kubik put his coffee down and stood up.
“This calls for a celebration,” he said to himself. With the big smile still on his face, he went to the refrigerator, took out a can of cheap beer, popped it open and downed half of it in one swallow.
“So, what do you think?” Corbin Reed asked Ethan Rask.
The two executives from CAR Securities were in Rask’s Mercedes sedan. They had spoken to Owen Jefferson who gave them very little information other than Rob Judd was dead in an apparent homicide. Jefferson did tell them he had been stabbed several times and asked them not to speak to the media. He let the two men know they were about to notify next of kin and did not want them to hear about this on TV. Of course they agreed and used the same back door Marc used to get past the reporters. Plus, they did not want their names associated with what happened anyway.
“Do you think it was our guy?” Corbin continued.
“It must have been. Who else? The man’s a genius. Did you see who that was that the lawyer was leading out of the building? The one with the blanket wrapped around her?” Rask asked.
“Yeah, Rob’s girlfriend,” Corbin answered.
“She spent the night. She’s probably the cops’ number one suspect.”
Corbin turned back to stare out the windshield. The two men remained silent for a couple of minutes while Rask drove toward downtown.
“We’ll need to put out some kind of press release,” Corbin said breaking the silence. “Once they find out where he worked, they’ll be calling.”
“That’s all right,” Rask said. “It was one of our people who found him. We don’t have to act as if we didn’t know.”
“True,” Corbin agreed. “I can write something up with the usual bullshit in it. What about the girlfriend? We know Rob talked to her. What if she uses that to bargain with the cops?”
“I was just thinking about that,” Rask said. “I’m not sure there is much we can do for now. We’ll have to wait and see.”
“So, what do you think?” Marcie Sterling asked Owen Jefferson. They were in their department issued Chevy sedan. Marcie was driving and Jefferson was silently staring through the windshield.
Owen Jefferson was a veteran homicide detective who had been with the Minneapolis Police Department for almost twenty years. He was a one-time basketball star at the University of Minnesota with a promising NBA career ahead before knee problems ended it.
A six-foot-five, divorced, handsome, bald, black man with a small gold stud in one ear, Jefferson was a highly regarded, professional homicide investigator. In fact, he had recently made the short list for promotion to lieutenant.
His partner, Marcie Sterling had been thrust upon Owen a couple years ago. Behind their backs, they were known as the Odd Couple. A six-five black man and a five-foot-seven-inch white woman did not exactly look right as a pair of detectives.
Originally, Jefferson correctly believed she was a recipient of gender affirmative action in the PD. Jefferson, a little resentfully, took her under his wing and their first case together taught him that with a little training, experience and mentoring, Marcie would likely be Chief Sterling one day. The resentment he initially felt was long gone.
“I don’t know what to think,” Jefferson answered her.
“Come on, do you think she did it?”
Jefferson looked at Marcie who was watching him with a smirk on her face. They both knew Maddy Rivers. In fact, Marcie was needling him a little bit because of prior comments Jefferson had made about Maddy. Comments that made it clear Owen Jefferson harbored a little thing for her.
Jefferson inhaled a deep breath then said, “My heart and gut tell me no, but I also recognize that could be because I don’t want to believe it. On the other hand, my head tells me we don’t really know what anyone else is really capable of doing.”
He turned to look through the windshield again and continued.
“I hope she didn’t do it,” he softly said.
Marcie reached over and patted him on the back of his left hand and said, “Me too. I really like her despite how much I envy her.”
“We’ll see where the evidence goes,” Jefferson said. “And take it from there, no matter what.”
“I know,” Marcie agreed.
SEVENTEEN
When Marc arrived at Maddy’s apartment, barely ten minutes from Rob’s building, she was still in the shower. Tony had answered the building’s intercom and buzzed Marc in. Tony also left the door open for him and when Marc walked in, Tony was sitting on the couch talking on the phone.
“Marc just came in, Vivian. Let me call you back,” he heard Tony say.
Marc looked at Tony and nodded his head toward the bathroom.
“She’s in the shower,” Tony said.
Marc walked back to the bathroom, opened the door about three inches and yelled to her to let her know he was there.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
He heard the shower curtain being pulled back then Maddy stuck her head out. “Yeah,” she said. “I’ll be a while yet. The shower is helping to clear my head.”
“Take your time. We’ll be in the living room.”
Marc went back to the living room and pulled a chair up to the coffee table in front of Tony.
“You called Vivian?” Marc asked referring to Vivian Donahue, the Queen of the Corwin family.
“No, she called me,” Tony said. “She wants to talk to me about something we’ve been working on. She didn’t know about our girl so I told her.”
“Oh, geez,” Marc replied. “What did she say?”
“I thought she would reach through the phone and grab me by the throat. I got her to calm down and she said if we need anything, let her know,” Tony said. “She’d move mountains for Madeline.”
“What are the two of you up to?” Marc asked, referring to the project Vivian had Tony working on.
“Hmmm, nothing I can tell you about. At least not without her permission and at this point, the fewer people who know the better.”
“Oh, well, okay then,” Marc said feigning indignation. “Just so you know, if I ever win the lottery, I’m not telling you.”
“Probably true,” Marc agreed.
“What about this business?” Tony asked, turning serious, referring back to Rob Judd’s murder. “Did you get a look inside that bedroom?”
“Yeah, I did. Thought I might throw up. God, it was awful,” Marc replied.
“What do you think…”
“I don’t think anything, yet,” Marc said cutting him off. “I believe she was drugged but we need to get her tested today and keep her away from the cops for now.”
“Jefferson is gonna want a statement,” Tony said.
“Good for him,” Marc said. “I want a lot of things. We’ll see if I let her give him one.”
“Give who one what?” Maddy asked as she came around the corner of the hallway from the back. She was wearing a large, white terry cloth robe with a white towel wrapped around her hair.
“Give Owen Jefferson a statement,” Marc said.
Maddy sat down next to Tony, gave Marc a puzzled look then said, “Was Owen there? I don’t remember seeing him.”
Marc and Tony exchanged looks then Marc said to Maddy, “Yes, Jefferson was there.”
“Oh, God,” Maddy said then hung her head and started sobbing again. Tony put his arm around her, she leaned into him and the three of them sat like this for over a minute.
“I can’t remember,” Maddy said through her sniffles. “And I can’t stop crying. I hate this!” She took the handkerchief Tony held for her, blew her nose and wiped her eyes. “What if I did this?” she softly said looking at Marc. “What if I did that to Rob?”
Marc leaned forward, elbows on his knees and sternly said, “First of all, do not ever say anything like that to me or anyone else again unless I ask you. Second, I don’t believe you are capable of such a thing so put it out of your head. Even drugged I don’t see you doing this.”
“I don’t believe it, either,” Tony added.
Maddy weakly smiled at her friends and quietly said, “Thank you.”
At that moment Marc’s phone rang for about the twentieth time since leaving the office. He had spoken to Carolyn and Connie Mickelson and told them what had happened. The other calls were all ignored. This one, after checking the caller ID, he decided to answer.
“Hi, Gabriella,” Marc said when he answered his telephone.
“Is she all right?” he heard from Gabriella Shriqui, Maddy’s best friend and reporter with Channel 8. “I’m outside the station in the parking lot so no one can hear me,” she continued, the concern in her voice quite obvious.
“She’s okay, Gabriella,” Marc said. He was looking at Maddy who gestured for the phone. Marc handed it to her and within ten seconds, Maddy, the strongest, toughest woman Marc and Tony knew, was sobbing again.
Marc took the phone away from her and said, “I think she’s been drugged and keep that to yourself…”
“Of course, I’ll keep that to myself! What do you think I am?”
“Sorry, sorry,” Marc stammered. “I’m taking her to a doctor. I’ll call you later, I promise.”
“My guess is, I think you were definitely drugged with something,” Dr. Nathan Lockhart said to Maddy. He was examining the pupils in her eyes with a tiny penlight, clicked it off and slipped it back into the pocket of his white coat.
“We’re going to need blood and urine but based on your eyes and what you’ve told me, I’m pretty certain somebody slipped you something.”
“Why both blood and urine?” Maddy asked, a little curious.
“Some drugs show up in one but not the other. Roofies, which is a likely candidate, shows up in urine but not blood. I’ll have the lab do a full spectrum analysis.”
“Okay, interesting,” Maddy said showing signs her mind was starting to clear. “While I’m gone do you want to bring Marc back and tell him?”
“Do you want me too?”
“Yes, definitely. He’s my lawyer and he needs to know,” Maddy replied as she hopped down from the exam table.
“I’ll have a nurse get him and bring him back after she shows you to the lab and bathroom. We’ll be in my office when you’re done.”
“Thanks, doctor,” Maddy half-smiled and said.
“I’ll have the lab put a rush on it,” he told her.
The front doors of the clinic slid open and Marc and Maddy walked into the heat and sunshine of the July afternoon. As soon as they did, they spotted the white van with the Channel 8 logo on the side in the parking lot.
“Oh, shit,” Marc quickly said when he saw the reporter and cameraman heading their way.
“Mr. Kadella, Ms. Rivers,” Samantha Johnson, the court reporter for the station was calling out to them. Samantha was someone both Marc and Maddy knew. She worked at the same station as Gabriella Shirqui. In fact, Samantha had Gabriella’s old job of covering the local courts and crime scene.
Marc and Maddy, trying to ignore her, kept walking toward his car.
“Marc, please, wait a second,” Samantha pleaded as she tried to catch up with them.
“You get in the car,” Marc said as he slipped the keys into her hand.
“Yes, Samantha,” Marc said as he turned to block them from Maddy. “What is it?”
“I would like a quick interview,” she said.
“What about?”
“Madeline Rivers. You and another man were seen leaving the scene of a brutal murder with her. We have it on good authority that the victim was Ms. Rivers’ boyfriend, a man by the name of Robert Judd. Is she involved? What can you tell us about the death of Robert Judd? Why are the two of you coming out of a medical clinic?”
“No comment, no comment, none of your business,” Marc said. Knowing Maddy was in Marc’s SUV by now, he told Samantha, “Shut that thing off and I’ll give you something.”
Samantha nodded at the camera operator who shut it off. She then turned her microphone to Marc.
“That too,” Marc said. When she shut it off he continued. “If anything comes of any of this, I’ll give you an interview.”
“Come on,” she pleaded, “you can do better than that.”
“Nope,” Marc smiled thinking the only reason she got that much was because Marc thought the sultry redhead was sizzling hot, which she was.
While Marc and Maddy drove out of the parking lot, Marc had Maddy speed dial a number on her phone then hand it to him.
“Hi, Maddy. Are you okay?” he heard Gabriella ask.
“It’s Marc,” he said. “Tell me you didn’t sic Samantha Johnson on us.”
“What? What are you talking about? Of course not,” Gabriella said, the anger in her voice rising as she spoke. “What kind of person…”
“Gabriella, stop,” Marc said. “I didn’t believe it but she and a camera guy caught us as we were coming out of a clinic. I just…”
“Well, I didn’t send her! What did you tell her?”
“I told her I owed her an interview but nothing today. I’m driving. I have to go, I’ll talk to you later,” he said then cut off the call before she could yell at him some more.
“I knew it wasn’t her. She’s a great friend,” Maddy said.
“I know and now I’m in trouble with her,” Marc said with a sigh.
“Why was there so much media at Rob’s building?” Maddy asked.
“Are things starting to come back to you?”
“No, not really. Nothing after the fireworks started last night. I only vaguely remember being on Rob’s couch this morning and you and Tony showing up. I still don’t remember seeing Owen or Marcie there. Why all of the media?” she repeated.
“I don’t know,” Marc said. “Probably got a tip from a cop or maybe one of the cops spoke out of school over the radio. They heard it somehow, that it was a bad scene,” Marc continued not wanting to make it sound any worse than it was, “and they all came running. Some black gangbanger gets popped and they all just shrug. A well-t
o-do white guy, well, that news sells tickets. Sorry. I don’t mean to be flip about it or upset you.” Marc reached over to squeeze her hand. Instead, with tears in her eyes, she grabbed his hand and didn’t let go until they were back at her building.
EIGHTEEN
Tony Carvelli angle parked his Camaro in the parking area in front of the Corwin Mansion on Lake Minnetonka. He was coming from downtown Minneapolis after a fruitless attempt to extract information about Rob Judd’s death from his friend and former police colleague, Owen Jefferson. After leaving Maddy’s apartment, while Marc was talking to his doctor friend, Tony made a run downtown to police headquarters. He sniffed around for an hour or so trying to glean anything he could from cops he knew, with no success at all. Jefferson had been polite and professional, as always, but was not forthcoming with anything Tony didn’t already know, which was no surprise to Carvelli.
As Tony made the walk from his car to the front doors of the Mansion with Maddy on his mind, he thought about how he had come to know Vivian Donahue.
A black sheep member of the Corwin clan, Robert Corwin, Jr., Vivian’s nephew by her older brother Robert, was murdered by two men working for a local gangster. By coincidence, Marc Kadella had represented one of the men, the one that was mostly innocent. The thug who had killed Vivian’s nephew got off due to a corrupt judge and Vivian hired Tony to find out the truth.
Vivian Corwin Donahue, annually one of Forbes Magazine’s ten richest and most powerful women, and Tony had become part-time lovers. It was through Tony that Vivian had come to know Maddy Rivers and loved Maddy like the daughter she would have liked to have. All of these things passed through his mind as he took the steps leading up to the front door. He hesitated a moment, drew a deep breath then rang the doorbell. Tony was not looking forward to telling Vivian what had happened to Maddy. But he also realized that this woman could move mountains, which might be useful in helping Maddy clear her name.
Marc Kadella Legal Mysteries Vol 1-6 (Marc Kadella Series) Page 233
