The Girl Who Wrote The New York Times Bestseller: A Novel (Thaddeus Murfee Legal Thrillers Book 8)

by John Ellsworth

  "Oh, you'd be surprised what people will believe if it's found in a book. Surprising, I have found."

  "I hope you're right. I really need this for my career."

  "Done, Angelina. Just keep putting words together. We'll help you make that happen."

  “My, you have changed.”

  “You’ve been very helpful yourself. I feel like I owe.”

  The next morning, Thaddeus retained the services of Moscow attorney Zialina Altedmivic. She would bring a habeas corpus case, which was a remedy under Russian law, despite what Nancy Empress had said.

  He then made logistical preparations. He purchased four MacBooks, two printers, and moved into long-term quarters at the Execustay hotel, ten kilometers north of Moscow, where he rented two bedrooms and two offices. The huge, windowless office furnishings consisted only of a small wobbly table and Wi-Fi. So Thaddeus moved funds from Chicago to Moscow and sent Angelina on a shopping outing. By early afternoon, the stores were delivering desks, phones, and supplies for the Moscow office of Murfee Hightower and Associates. Two more computers were delivered and networking was set up, including a wide area network which joined the computers of Zialina Altedmivic Law Offices with those of Murfee Hightower, Moscow.

  Thaddeus then hired a husband-wife team of paralegals. They would work out of their home in Zacharov Estates, north of the city. Their names were Eugeveny and Natalia Medeved. They were middle twentyish, childless, and into any kind of American rock music they could download from iTunes. Things were shaping up.

  Early the next morning, Thaddeus, Angelina, Zialina and the Medeveds joined around the conference table to design their assault.

  "First," said Thaddeus, "I want Zialina to discuss habeas corpus in Russia. As most of you know, habeas corpus is Latin for 'produce the body.' It is used in cases where you believe the authorities are holding someone illegally. It is filed in the court and requires the jailer or prosecutor to bring the arrested person in front of the judge so that the judge can review the reasons for imprisonment and decide whether those reasons are legal. The judge can also review conditions of release, in most jurisdictions. Zialina, what's the Russian take on habeas?"

  She was a wide, rough woman with a farm wife's shoulders and stocky legs and a stony face that seldom smiled. But she had graduated first in her class at Moscow University and had successfully defended more criminal clients on appeal than any lawyer in all of Russia. She came highly recommended and Thaddeus was very grateful she had agreed to join them. "Agreed," as in twenty thousand American dollars later....

  She nodded at the small group and brushed a comma of graying hair from her forehead.

  "First, some history, because most Americans are surprised to hear what I'm about to tell you. The right to freedom and personal inviolability is guaranteed by the Russian Constitution. Article 22 of the Constitution states that arrest or detention shall be authorized by a judicial ruling. Without a judicial ruling, no person may be subjected to detention for a period of more than forty-eight hours. The legal grounds for taking and holding a criminal suspect or an accused individual in detention are defined by the Code of Criminal Procedure, which entered into force on July 1, 2002."

  "How many hours has Christine now been held?"

  "I did some asking around and my staff reviewed the prison records. At this point, she is ninety-six hours into her incarceration. So the case is ripe. We have—she has—standing to challenge the incarceration."

  "Ripe, as in the law can be used to question her imprisonment at this time?"

  "Exactly. So what we are going to do is put together a brief for the judge. The Medeveds will research it, I will write it and present it, and Thaddeus shall handle the testimonial aspects of the case. Meaning, he will question the witnesses in court."

  "That's my call," said Thaddeus. "I had to be involved, not just turn it over to Zialina and walk away."

  "Of course," said Angelina. "You would never just walk away." She smiled. "That's chapter two in my book. Thaddeus and what makes him tick."

  "Great. Go for it. Zialina, please continue."

  "Just a little more procedure, just to make sure we're all on the same page. Christine—meaning her lawyers—is allowed to provide explanations to the judge. After hearings, which last about twenty to thirty minutes, the judge decides whether to authorize the detention, to deny the detention request and release the individual, or to extend the detention for the next seventy-two hours in order to let the investigator build the case for the next detention hearings. The judge's ruling can be appealed to the higher court within three days."

  "So this case could go on for more than one hearing?" asked Eugeveny.

  "That's right. And just because we might succeed in getting her released doesn't mean they can't start the whole arrest and incarceration process over again."

  "So we need something definitive," said Thaddeus. "We need to somehow make the underlying case go away."

  Zialina looked at him. "We do. We need evidence that she's not guilty of the reported attempt on the president's life. Remember, they say they caught her inside the compound with a loaded weapon and that she made a move toward assassination. Wait—wait, Thaddeus. I know what you want to say. So let me say it for you. There's video and the video does tend to back up this claim. However—and this is a big however—my guess is that the entire production is a fake, from what Thaddeus tells me about Christine."

  "She was on her way to the Middle East," Thaddeus said. He was unable to keep still any longer. "She was on her way to the Middle East at the request of the CIA. Yes, she had taken on a mission for the CIA, but it didn't involve Russia. It was ten thousand miles in a totally different direction. But Russia is using her relationship to the CIA to embarrass the United States and make it look like the mission was to take place in Moscow with the assassination of the president."

  "How did she wind up in Moscow?" asked the paralegal wife, Natalia. "I'm sketchy on that."

  "Bad luck, pure and simple. She happened to be on a commercial Swissair flight that got hijacked. It was supposed to land in Zurich, where Christine was going to change planes and go on to Turkey. Instead, it came to Moscow. No one saw it coming."

  "And why are you here, Mr. Murfee," said Eugeveny.

  "I had agreed to travel the first leg of the trip as cover for Christine. I'm her normal employer. She's my lead paralegal in Chicago."

  "Okay, thanks."

  Thaddeus said, "So, how do I make this go away?"

  Everyone looked at Zialina. She raised her eyebrows and shrugged. "We need to talk about that. Off the top, I don't have any ideas."

  "Natalia?" said Thaddeus.

  "No."

  "Eugeveny?"

  "Afraid not."

  "Angelina?"

  "You need to have the Russian president recant his statement. Nothing less than what the Russian president can say will undo what the Russian president has already said. That's intro to journalism 101."

  Thaddeus looked at the reporter.

  "You know, you might have something, Angelina."

  "Seriously, dude. Unless the judge hears it from the man himself it ain't gonna turn heads. This is Russia."

  "Probably same would be true for America," Zialina said.

  Angelina looked at her, then nodded slowly. "Agree."

  "Okay. I can roll with that. So how do we get the president to change his story?"

  "He won't change it voluntarily. Thank would be unthinkable," said Zialina.

  "I'm not thinking voluntarily," said Thaddeus. "I'm thinking I force him to change his story."

  "And you're going to do that how?"

  "I don't know. All right. When can we get this habeas corpus on file and when can we have a hearing?"

  Zialina fielded it. "I can have it on file before the sun goes down. Tomorrow will be hearing day."

  "Then let's do it," said Thaddeus. "Everyone have everything they need?"

  All said they did.

  After the
others were gone, Angelina re-heated pizza in the microwave and waved a piece at Thaddeus. He accepted and they both were chomping down, both in deep thought.

  After several minutes, Angelina said, "Where is he vulnerable?"

  "Family. Someone he loves."

  "You're thinking going after someone?"

  "I honestly don't know how else to do it."

  "May I suggest we wait until after tomorrow's hearing. Maybe something will come up that gives us some new way of looking at this."

  "Agree. We'll wait. But no longer than tomorrow. I can't get Christine's battered face out of my mind. How do we know that's not still going on?"

  "Thaddeus, you're powerless over the Russian penal system. If it is going on, there's not a damn thing you can do about it. Except attend tomorrow's hearing and try to get her released on bail."

  "Did I tell you I plan on being there?"

  "I'm sorry. I sounded preachy."

  "Hey, don't be. All ideas are welcome here. I'm just—scared. I love that woman and I can't see bad things happening to her. I already know I won't sleep tonight."

  "I heard you up and around last night. Who were you talking to?"

  "I called Katy just to check on her and the girls."

  "Everything okay there?"

  "Outstanding. Katy can handle anything that comes up. Pretty amazing lady."

  "You must really love her."

  She had said it almost as a question. Thaddeus knew he only wanted to turn it aside.

  "Love her, adore her, worship her. She's everything to me."

  Angelina looked down. She moved her pizza crust around with a forefinger. "I knew that. I wasn't testing you."

  "What? Testing? I didn't think you were."

  "No way, dude. You're like ancient."

  "I'm thirty-one, thank you. If that's ancient, don't tell my dad."

  "Tell me something about yourself. Something I can use in my best seller."

  "I was born in Phoenix, Arizona."

  "And? Go on."

  32

  FROM: Thaddeus Murfee: A New York Times Bestseller

  Marvelous Marvin of Madison Street

  by Angelina Sosa

  What good has ever come of abandonment? Abandonment can only happen where there is needful attachment. Attachment by itself isn't enough. It must be needful, the attachment, to cause the emotional difficulty associated with abandonment.

  Thaddeus needed his mother. He needed his father. But he was abandoned to the system, the State of Arizona.

  In place of the secure feelings that make most children sleep soundly, Thaddeus was filled with an anxious longing, a hope that soon his mother and father would be restored to him. But when it didn't happen the first year and didn't happen the second year, he finally gave up and moved on.

  That part of a child that knows the safety net of a parent ready to catch them when they fall was denied him.

  Which made him more self-reliant than most. Self-reliant, because Thaddeus learned early on that he and he alone was there for Thaddeus. There was no one else to catch him. There was no one else looking out for him.

  Sure, there was a custody arrangement with the state, but that wasn't the same thing as having a parent looking over protectively. And Thaddeus came to know this when he found himself in minor scrapes as a very young boy and had no adult to turn to. Custody and loving care were two totally different animals. The one could be judicially ordered; the other could only be given.

  So he grew up faster than most, and one day just walked away from the school and the place where he had lived the last eight years. Just walked off, no good-byes, no requests for permission, no forwarding address or discussion of future plans, just gone.

  Everything he owned was reduced to a backpack. Every penny he had saved from various odd jobs around the neighborhood was stuffed inside his shoe: $402.01.

  At the 7-Eleven a block away he bought a bottle of water. It was May in Phoenix and the thermometer would top out that day at 104°. Hydration was key, in the desert. He drank off half the bottle then slipped it into his backpack.

  At Central Avenue and Madison, he took a seat on the bus bench. The bench advertised the services of a chiropractor who had eight locations in the Valley. Eight. He knew he didn't want to be a chiropractor. Something about touching other people that was a turnoff. There hadn't been physical closeness in his life and he unconsciously avoided it now. Which ruled out all the helping medical sciences.

  Besides, there was something else that played around the edges of the mind where it projected the future. He had been to court no less than five times during his dependency. Usually modifications to custody terms. Once a change in homes. Whenever he had appeared in court with some court-appointed attorney, he was always impressed with how much power a court could have over someone's life. He hadn't decided if that was a good thing or not. But he had decided that he wanted power over that power. In short, he wanted the state out of his life.

  So when he was very young, he decided he would be a judge. Or, at the very least, a lawyer.

  The police stopped as he sat on the bus bench and asked some questions and got some straight answers. They returned him to the home.

  Then he met Marvelous Marvin of Madison Street, the first hip, slick, and cool lawyer he'd ever seen up close. They were introduced in juvenile court.

  MMM was a lawyer on the court's short leash and was doing probationary work in the juvenile courts as a predicate to having his law license restored after an ethics violation cost him his license for six months. It wasn't that big an offense, something about failing to file a divorce he'd been paid to file. Then turning off his phone and not responding to repeated inquiries by the client.

  The State Bar had eventually served him with papers and Marvelous Marvin of Madison Street watched as his license grew wings and flew out the window for six months. But now he was working his way back into the Bar's good graces.

  One of his cases was as guardian ad litem for thirteen-year-old Thaddeus Murfee. The question had come up whether extended summer vacation with Thaddeus' mother was going to be granted on her petition. MMM had resisted her motion, arguing she hadn't yet proven to the court that she was able to maintain sobriety and provide the boy with a stable home environment. It had been a difficult hearing, one that left Thaddeus in tears when he saw his mother's disappointment over the disallowance of her motion to modify summer visitation.

  Afterward, MMM took Thaddeus to dinner at the Stockyards and bought him a steak and talked to him. Talked to him like a real person, which was the first time Thaddeus had ever known such intimacy with an adult. Marvelous Marvin listened to Thaddeus for over an hour and even cried with him at one point, after which he paid the bill and took the boy home.

  Marvelous Marvin then applied to be Thaddeus' Big Brother. Big Brothers and Sisters immediately agreed, so MMM filed a petition in court to serve as Big Brother. The court appointed a DCFS worker to do a background; MMM was found to be a fit and proper person to serve as Big Brother, and the petition was proved.

  Thaddeus officially had a new family member. A big brother.

  A big brother who took him to ASU football games. And Phoenix Suns basketball games. Who took him to the Grand Canyon and helped him through two days of downhill skiing instruction on the San Francisco Peaks. Who bought him a guitar and enrolled him in lessons.

  Soon Thaddeus was making his own music and formed a band with other kids in his group home. . The Motherless Child, they called their group; and Thaddeus sang lead on some songs while Jeremy Lanier sang lead on others. Behind the scenes, Marvelous Marvin Madison helped the band improve. He supplied additional instruments and music lessons and occasionally lined up a birthday or Bar Mitzvah where the band could entertain.

  Marvelous Marvin picked Thaddeus up most Saturdays at nine a.m. Marvin had petitioned for and been awarded weekend visitation with Thaddeus. They would go to Marvin's home in the Arizona Biltmore Estates off Twenty-fourth Street, whe
re Thaddeus had his own room.

  When Thaddeus was fifteen, he took driving lessons in school; and Marvin allowed him to drive his Jaguar with Marvin riding shotgun. Then Marvin picked up a used Chevy pickup, stick, and taught him stick shift so his license wouldn't be restricted.

  But most of all, Marvin spent time with his younger brother. They spent time watching TV, reading books, and talking about the Anasazi tribe of Arizona and visiting their cave dwellings in Northern Arizona.

  When Thaddeus admitted he had his eye on a girl at the group home, Marvin made arrangements to drive the two of them to a movie and pick them up after. The next weekend there was a dinner at Marvin's. Marvin had a date, Jennifer Rowley; and he gave Thaddeus permission to bring Andrea Rodriguez, his first girlfriend. They gobbled down Marvin's spaghetti, drank diet colas and coffee, and played Monopoly before lapsing into a Netflix binge on Parenthood.

  "So Thaddeus," said Marvin, one Saturday morning when Thaddeus was in his junior year of high school, "what do you want to do with yourself when you graduate?"

  "Join the Army."

  "No, come on. For real."

  "I want to join the Army. Lots of the kids in my foster family go in the Army."

  "You can shoot higher than the Army. What about college?"

  "If I do the Army first, I get the GI bill. Then I can afford college after."

  "What would you say if I told you I've set up a college fund for you myself? Would that help your decision?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "It's nothing great. Just that I settled this PI case a couple years ago and put a hundred and fifty grand into an irrevocable trust for you. You know how the stock market's been. Your fund is over three hundred grand now. You can go to college just about any place you want."

  "Oh hell no, really? You did that for me?"

  "Oh hell yes. You're my kid brother. I've got to make some arrangements for my bro."

  "This is too much. I don't know."

  "Yeah, you know. I've taught you how to receive gifts from the world. Just stand up and say 'thank you' like you deserved it. Come on, now."