Angel's Advocate

by Stanton, Mary

  “That’s right,” Carrie said without expression.

  “It’s nicer outside,” Lindsey said. She smirked at Bree. “And if you want to sit down and get to know me better, it ought to be a place where I feel comfortable, right?”

  “Right,” Bree said.

  They ended up by the pool, seated around one of the tables sheltered by an umbrella, Sasha curled up at Bree’s feet.

  “Would you like some iced tea?” Carrie said. “It’s a little late in the day for coffee.”

  Bree declined, with perfunctory thanks, and said, “Do you know who I am, Lindsey?”

  “Some kind of lawyer.” Lindsey slid down in her seat and tucked her hands around herself. Then she leaped to her feet, scrabbled in her tote bag, and sat back down, this time with a pack of cigarettes and a lighter in hand.

  “Cecily Carmichael asked me to look into the incident at the mall on your behalf.”

  Lindsey blew a plume of smoke into the air and shrugged. “I guess.”

  “I take that to mean you’d like me to represent you?”

  Lindsey shrugged.

  “Yes,” Carrie said. “We would.”

  Bree took a notepad from her purse. “I’d like to get a sense of what we’re dealing with here. As I understand it, the police have been talking to you about the theft of some Girl Scout money?”

  Lindsey dropped the cigarette and ground it out with the toe of her shoe. “It just seemed like a good idea at the time.”

  “What did?” Bree asked patiently.

  “Like, me and Hartley Williams and Madison Bellamy were at the Oglethorpe Mall, okay? Just to, like, check things out. And we were cruising for a parking spot closer to the entrance than, like, Iowa, and Hartley’s going through the wallets to count up the cash we had on hand, and there was, like, nada.”

  “You all forgot your wallets?” Bree asked skeptically.

  Lindsey snorted. “Madison forgot hers. Hartley and I had our purses, stupid.” She shot her mother a look of intense dislike. “I’m on restriction, so I get, like, zero cash a week, and Hartley’s stepfather, Stephen, is a real asshole when it comes to, like, allowances and stuff. There just wasn’t anything in them. And, honest to God, I could have killed for a double latte. So there was this snotty-nosed kid selling those freakin’ cookies, and I remembered how much cash the little buggers collect and we just decided to borrow the cash. Just,” she said, “so’s we could get a cup of freakin’ coffee. I mean, you would have thought we were a bunch of freakin’ terrorists, the way this thing’s been blown up. Way out of proportion. Way out.”

  “The charges are assault, battery, and misdemeanor theft,” Carrie said without emphasis. “She was arrested by two patrol officers and they took her down to the Montgomery Street courthouse and kept her there until I came by. I talked to a detective there—Sam Hunter, I think his name was.” She made a vague motion. “Something like that. I have his card around here somewhere.”

  “I know Lieutenant Hunter,” Bree said, then added, with some surprise, because she hadn’t really thought about it before, “he’s a fair man.” And way too senior an officer to deal with a mere juvenile. She drew a question mark on her yellow pad.

  “Whatever.” Lindsey pulled her knees up to her chin and lit another cigarette. “They put me in a room with some dyke cop until Mamma came running to the rescue.” She reached over and punched her mother’s arm, with no affection. “Came through for me again, Ma.”

  “And the two other girls with you? What happened to them?”

  “Those two. My best friends. My former best friends.” Lindsey expelled smoke through her nose. “Backed each other up, didn’t they? Said it was all my fault.” She leaned over and whispered in Bree’s ear, “Hartley’s dad’s a judge, and even though her mom’s remarried, he’s, like, not about to let his little darling get in trouble with the law.”

  “I know Judge Williams,” Bree said. The judge wouldn’t be averse to making a few pointed phone calls, but she doubted he’d resort to outright pressure. She also knew Sam Hunter. He was the last man you could accuse of playing politics. If Lindsey’s two buddies had been set free, it was more than likely somebody believable had witnessed the whole sorry episode and that the thing was Lindsey’s fault.

  Bree sighed. It wasn’t her job to judge Lindsey; it was her job to represent her interests as best she could. And if the kid were to confess to something, the confession should be protected by attorney-client privilege. Which meant that before this went any further, Carrie would have to sign an ad litem agreement and arrange for a retainer.

  But first, Bree would have to agree to represent this brat.

  Life was too darn short.

  She clasped her hands on the table and leaned forward. “Lindsey, Carrie-Alice, I’d like to make some phone calls on your behalf to see if we can find exactly the right lawyer to handle this case.”

  “I thought you were going to get me out of this,” Lindsey said.

  Bree avoided Carrie’s eye. “And indeed I will, if I can. What you want from me, Lindsey, is the best advice I can give you.” She held up her hand and ticked the points off on her fingers. “First, you’re seventeen, is that right? That’s underage here in Georgia, and you need an advocate who knows the juvenile courts inside and out. That’s not me. Second, we’re dealing with felonies, here. Minor felonies, to be sure, but we’re looking at criminal charges. I’m more at home with torts and the ways to enforce performance bonds. Now, I take it you have a law firm that represents the family interests?”

  “Stubblefield, Marwick,” Carrie said.

  Bree didn’t roll her eyes, but she wanted to. The firm was notorious for its late-night infomercials soliciting business from the brain-damaged, the handicapped, and elderly people who’d fallen down in supermarkets. And John Stubblefield, the senior partner, was one of the most truly obnoxious men Bree had ever met.

  “Stubblefield, Marwick,” she said diplomatically, “seem to be more expert in civil law than criminal. But there are several excellent firms here and in Atlanta that can give Lindsey the kind of support she needs.”

  “So that’s it?” Carrie said.

  “That’s it,” Bree said firmly. “If you’ll excuse me for a moment, I’ll make a few phone calls right now.” Bree got up. There was no way she was going to make the calls with the two of them sitting in front of her. But her conscience wouldn’t let her totally abandon Aunt Cissy’s friend. Once the story hit the evening news, Carrie and her daughter were going to be besieged by local reporters. The Girl Scout angle was just too cute and the Chandler name too big. They needed an advocate, and fast. “If there’s a quiet place where I could get through to some of my friends, I’ll try and get you set up with an appointment right away.”

  Carrie hesitated. “Lindsey’s being arraigned, is that the right word?”

  Bree nodded.

  “She has this arraignment on Monday at ten. This is Thursday. That doesn’t leave us a whole lot of time to get somebody new.”

  “We can always ask for an adjournment,” Bree said cheerfully. “Do you mind if I use the office we passed by? I’ll be out in just a few minutes.”

  She didn’t exactly run from the scene, but she didn’t linger, either. The unhappiness between mother and daughter, the truly scary look in Lindsey’s eye, was a genuine miasma, an unhealthy fog in the air. What kind of kid mistreats a dog with a cast on its leg? Or a dog with no cast on its leg, for that matter? Sasha seemed to share her uneasiness. He stuck close by her, ears forward, a ready sentinel.

  In the short hallway, she picked up her briefcase and went into Probert Chandler’s home office.

  Unlike the rest of the house, the den had a perfunctory air, as if furnished from a catalog. A couple of tennis trophies sat on top of the maple credenza. A formal studio photo of Carrie-Alice, in the same pearls and an identical twinset, sat on the desk. There were two kinds of books on the shelves: worn paperback tough-guy adventure stories by people like Vince
Flynn, and bound copies of trade magazines with titles like Today’s Pharmacy and Drugstore Weekly. The latest copies were dated four months earlier. A framed, fading color photograph of a much younger Probert Chandler and two other young men sat on the credenza, too. All three were dressed in the really ghastly college kid uniform of the ’70s: bell bottoms, embroidered vests, and tight shirts with pointed collars. Bree grinned a little at that. A formal oil portrait hung over the bookcase: Carrie-Alice, Lindsey, and two other kids who had to be an older brother and sister stood around a seated Probert. Probert looked just like Harry Truman, down to the wire-rimmed glasses. An indefinable air of unhappiness emanated from Carrie. But the artist had given Lindsey a healthy pink to her cheeks, and ignored the gauntness at her temples. The portrait was familiar. It must have run in Time or People magazine at some point in the last few months. Bree contemplated it for a moment. Lindsey’s older sister had a matronly air. Her brother looked smug.

  A leather executive office chair sat behind the desk. Bree hesitated a moment, but the only other chair in the place was a reproduction wing chair patterned in green and yellow plaid. She sat down, put her briefcase on her lap . . .

  The blow came out of nowhere. Directly under her heart. She tried to breathe. Couldn’t. Couldn’t take in air. Couldn’t scream. Could only strike out with both fists . . .

  Bree leaped out of the chair and half fell against the desk.

  “No,” she said.

  Sasha sat on his haunches, his eyes wise.

  “No!” Bree said again.

  And then the horrible, grainy, bad black-and-white movie image of a middle-aged man flickered in front of her. Silent flames bloomed like evil flowers around his feet. His hands reached out to her. Clawed talons pulled at his face, his chest, his hair, and drew him down.

  “Help me help me help me . . .”

  Probert Chandler.

  And then a whisper . . . “I didn’t die in the car . . .”

  “Phooey!” Bree said. “Phooey, phooey, phooey!”

  I didn’t die in the car.

  That’s what her first dead soul had claimed—that he hadn’t died in the sea. Bree’d taken a lot of risks to prove that—and that he had been unfairly convicted of greed by the Celestial Court.

  Marlowe’s. Lindsey. Blood. Blood. Blood.

  And now Probert Chandler pleaded with her from the midst of these black and vicious flames.

  “Fine,” Bree said a little bitterly, “this is just fine.”

  Beaufort & Company had a client after all.

  Three

  Nothing in his life became him like the leaving of it.

  —Macbeth, William Shakespeare

  “I can’t believe my own sister stood up in front of the entire TV viewing population of Savannah and made excuses for that little creep!” Antonia slung her legs over the back of the theater seat in front of them and rolled her eyes. Bree sat next to her in the second row of the Savannah Repertory Theater.

  It was six thirty in the evening.

  Three hours earlier—twenty minutes after her encounter with Probert Chandler’s ghost, and ten minutes after Bree had accepted a five-thousand-dollar retainer from Carrie-Alice—the WKYR news van had pulled into the Chandler driveway. The media circus had lasted all afternoon. Bree chased the last of the reporters away at five thirty, then left the Chandler house and sulky Lindsey. She stopped for takeout from the Park Avenue Market, then drove straight to Savannah Repertory Theater to get some sympathy from her sister.

  She’d have been better off soaking her head in a tub of tomato juice.

  “You’d get more business hanging around the Chatham County Ambulance garage,” Antonia added. “At least you’d get a better class of client.”

  “Snide,” Bree said gloomily. “You’re being snide.”

  The stage was busy with last-minute prep for that evening’s production of The Return of Sherlock Holmes. Far overhead, a tech fiddled with the lighting over Reichen bach Falls. Antonia broke off to holler: “Too blue! Try a number two gel!” She scribbled in her stage manual for a minute, then said, “Your hair looked great, though. That white-blonde usually doesn’t come across all that well on camera.”

  Bree’s hair was long, thick, and silver-blonde. It had been a constant nuisance until she’d taken to braiding it and piling it on top of her head. It was good hair, but good hair didn’t mitigate the circumstances one little bit, even in the South. As a matter of fact, it made Bree a lot more recognizable than she wanted to be. Lindsey’s escapade had made the six o’clock news, as Bree thought it would. Lindsey was persona non grata in Savannah at the moment, and so was anyone who championed her cause. When Bree’d arrived at the theater, dinner for Antonia in hand, one of the ushers tsked at her in a really irritating way and muttered, “Shame! For shame!”

  “Phooey,” Bree said. Then, “Don’t I get some points for not losing my temper?”

  “You didn’t bust the reporter in the nose, that’s true. But you came across as snippy. Very snippy.”

  Bree thrust a tuna panini at her sister. “Shut up and eat.”

  Antonia paused, her sandwich halfway to her mouth, her eyes intent on the stage. “Perfect!” she shouted. Then, “That’s a wrap!” She sighed. “Oh, God. Oh, God. There’s bound to be a major screwup somewhere. But we’ve gone over and over it. It’s in the lap of the gods, Bree. In the lap of the gods.” She bit into the sandwich and chewed frantically.

  “It’ll be fine,” Bree said. “And it’s dress rehearsal tonight, not the actual premiere.”

  “The critics!” Antonia could have been Richard the Third calling for his horse, the despair in her voice was so strident. “The critics!”

  “They’ll love it. Anyhow, local critics are always really kind when it comes to hometown productions. You could be staging the musical version of Gilligan’s Island and they’d love it. And how much attention do they pay to the technical part of it any . . .” The look on Antonia’s face was chilling. Bree shut herself up.

  “I am an employed professional,” Antonia said coldly, “and this is professional theater.”

  “Of course it is.”

  “It’s an Equity production,” Antonia continued, her eyes narrowed. “And I’m the assistant technical director. The only thing hometown about it is that it’s being produced in the theater’s hometown. And the only thing local about the critics . . .”

  Bree raised her eyebrows encouragingly.

  “. . . is that they’re local.” Antonia relaxed and grinned at her. She reached over and patted Bree’s knee. “It sounds like you had an exceptionally lousy day, sister. I am well and truly sorry.”

  Aside from a certain similarity in their voices, which one of Antonia’s sappier boyfriends had described as molten honey, the sisters couldn’t have been more unlike. Antonia was small, with her mother’s red-gold hair, bright blue eyes, and curvy figure. Bree was tall, slender, with green eyes and that strange, silvery hair. Their temperaments were different, too. Bree had a rare, explosive temper, but generally got through the day with an equable attitude. Antonia was as volatile as vinegar and baking soda.

  Bree sighed heavily. “Yeah, well, that’s what I get for letting Aunt Cissy in the back door. I should have known better.”

  “So, you’ve taken on this lost cause for Aunt Cissy’s sake?”

  Bree rallied. She’d eaten her own tuna panini in the car, and the protein was kicking in. “I don’t know that Lindsey’s a lost cause. I’m a pretty decent lawyer when push comes to shove.”

  “C’mon, Bree. The kid primped for the news cameras like she was on a fashion shoot. Has she expressed any remorse for what she did?”

  “Allegedly did,” Bree said.

  “The fact that the mall security camera caught it all on tape means it’s still an alleged crime? Is that some kind of legal thing, flying in the face of the facts?”

  The security tape was an undoubted fly in the ointment of Lindsey’s defense. Bree snatched a potato
chip from Antonia’s stash and admitted, “So she did it. And I wouldn’t say she’s expressed remorse. As such.”

  “There you are. A brat. I especially loved Cordelia Eastburn’s decision to push for the ‘full penalty allowed by law.’ ”

  “She’s running for reelection,” Bree said of the district attorney. “Cordy, that is. I don’t think poor Lindsey could be elected dogcatcher at the moment.”

  “What is the full penalty allowed by the law, anyhow?”

  “For assault? Battery? Robbery? And Cordelia’s come up with something worse, if you can believe it—menacing with a deadly weapon.”

  “Lindsey had a gun?” Antonia said in astonishment.

  “Nope. She had her daddy’s Hummer. Now, you and I might agree that a Hummer’s a deadly weapon just from the fact it gets six miles to the gallon in an age when that’s a crime against humanity, but Cordy’s claiming Lindsey tried to run the little kid down. So on that charge, given Lindsey’s age?” Bree bit her lip. “Depends. Could be as much as five years.”

  “Jeez. In a county lockup. I don’t wish that on anybody.” Antonia balled up the sandwich wrapping. “I’ve got to get backstage. Thanks for the food. You coming to the show tonight?”

  “I might drop in. I’m meeting Hunter at Isaac’s, over on Drayton”—she glanced at her watch—“ten minutes ago.”

  “Hmm,” Antonia said.

  “No ‘hmm’ about it,” Bree said crossly. “It’s not a date. He’s the one that did Lindsey’s intake interview. I just have a couple of questions.”

  “A Savannah police lieutenant did an intake interview for a juvenile?” Antonia furrowed her brow. “As a dedicated Law & Order watcher, that doesn’t sound like usual police procedure to me.”

  “Nope.” Bree got up and dropped a kiss on her sister’s head. “Which is why I offered to buy him a drink. Good luck tonight, sis.”

  “Aaagh,” Antonia said, her attention back on the stage. “Aaagh, aagh, aagh. Who left that dolly on the apron? Somebody’s going to break a leg!”