by JF Freedman
“I didn’t order you anything, because I didn’t know if you’d be on time,” she told Kate rudely.
Kate sat down at the wrought-iron table. Five seconds and the woman had already laid down her marker. “I’ve had my morning fix,” she replied easily. Sticks and stones, lady, she thought with delicious upsmanship. I just fucked Warren Baumgartner, and you didn’t.
Angela sipped some foam off the top of her cup. “How’s my son? Is he in trouble again?”
No beating around the bush with this woman. “Why? Has he been?”
Angela shrugged theatrically. “Not recently, to my knowledge. But since he doesn’t live with me and we hardly spend any time together, I don’t know what’s going on with him. He dropped out of school, so I assumed he was up to no good of some kind.”
“He didn’t tell you why?”
“No. He doesn’t confide in me. He saves that for his father.”
Not a lot of love between mother and son, at least from her end. It had to do with the divorce and Warren having custody of Peter, Kate was sure of that. She knew how hurtful it was for a parent to be rejected by a child. Particularly a mother, who had suffered the pain of bringing him into the world.
“So you don’t see him that much?” she asked.
The woman shook her head. “We have dinner together once a month. I always have to be the one to call and ask. Beg, practically. Occasionally he’ll drop by if he needs money. His father gives him a healthy allowance, but Peter doesn’t know from budgeting. He sees something he wants he goes out and gets it, whether he can afford it or not.”
Like the high school girl he saw and wanted to have sex with.
“Actually, I’m being a bit dramatic,” Angela confessed. “Our relationship has thawed somewhat in the past year. Peter finally realized I wasn’t the monster Warren has made me out to be. Our divorce was brutal,” she confided, grimacing. “I had to fight tooth and nail for every dime. And Warren still got primary custody of our only child. I finally got tired of fighting his lawyers,” she lamented resentfully.
“So he’s always lived with his father.”
“We shared him for a while, but Peter understandably wanted to be in one place, not shunting back and forth. And once he turned eighteen, he could choose where he wanted to be. He chose Warren. I was left with whatever bones they were willing to throw me.”
She has reason to be bitter, Kate thought. Someone always has to lose. “But you’re seeing him more now?” she asked.
“Bit by bit,” Angela answered. “I did visit him in Santa Barbara a couple of times last spring. It was easier for us to be with each other up there, away from the shadow of his father. Another reason I was sorry he dropped out.” She sipped some coffee. “Anyway, that’s our personal business, and none of yours. So tell me—why are we here, Ms. Blanchard? Something to do with Peter, obviously.”
“I’m investigating a murder that happened in Santa Barbara County earlier this year. The beginning of September.”
Angela’s eyes widened. “A murder? Are you with the police? I thought you told me you were a private investigator.”
“I am. I’m working for the lawyer who’s defending the man who has been accused of the murder.”
Angela looked at her with suspicion. “Is Peter involved in this? Is that the reason you’re here?”
Kate chose her words carefully. “To my knowledge, he isn’t involved.” Yet, she added silently.
“Then what?”
“We thought he might have seen or known something about the victim that could help our defense.”
She wasn’t going to tell Angela about Peter’s involvement with Maria Estrada. If he wanted to, that would be his choice. She was sure Angela would be on his case about it.
“And did he?”
“It doesn’t appear that he was.”
“So he’s in the clear?” Angela persisted.
The concern was real. You can’t fake that, Kate knew. Estranged from her son or not, Angela still had strong maternal feelings for him. It made her, if not likable, at least an object for sympathy.
“I think so,” Kate answered. She pushed back from the table. This unfortunate woman didn’t know enough about her son’s life to be of any help. “I’m sorry to have inconvenienced you. Thanks for your time.”
“That’s all right,” Angela told her, relieved. “You put a scare into me for a moment. I’m parked down the street. I’ll walk with you.”
The two of them strolled down San Vicente Boulevard toward the ocean. Young families were pushing children in strollers, couples were having a late breakfast or shopping, still others perambulated aimlessly, enjoying the day. All of them were white—not a black or Latino face could be seen. Kate had worked on cases that had sent her to Los Angeles, and she had been surprised at the rigidity and durability of its racial separations.
Angela remote-keyed the doors to a freshly washed Lincoln Navigator that was parked on the street. “I’m sorry for being a bitch earlier,” she apologized. “I’m always on the defensive when it comes to Peter.”
“Don’t worry. I understand.” Kate glanced at Angela’s truck. “Nice car. Is it new?”
“I got it a year ago. I have a small landscaping business, so I’m always hauling big plants and bags of fertilizer. I wanted something that could take a lot of cargo, but that was still smart-looking.” Angela laughed. “It’s important to impress the valet parking attendants.”
An unexpected sense of humor. She really isn’t so bad, Kate thought. “I envy you about the landscaping,” she told Angela. “I love to garden, but I have a tiny yard.” And no free time.
“It’s amazing what you can do in a small space,” Angela replied airily. “The next time I come up to Santa Barbara—assuming Peter starts back again next quarter—I’ll come by and show you what you could do.”
“Well…thank you,” Kate answered, surprised at the woman’s sudden congeniality. She’s like me, she realized with a pang. A middle-aged woman who’s alone. Money can’t buy everything, she thought. Immediately followed by “what will her attitude be if she finds out I’m fucking her former husband?” Probably not sweet.
That was for the future, if there was one, an always unpredictable state of affairs.
Angela checked the time. “I have to run. It was nice meeting you, Kate. I hope the next time we can start out on a better footing.”
“Me, too,” Kate told her. “Oh, I forgot. One more thing.”
Angela turned to her. “Yes?”
“When you were in Santa Barbara, did you ever go to a ranch in the Santa Ynez Valley called Rancho San Gennaro?”
Angela thought for a moment. “Yes, I did. Why?”
“Just covering all the bases,” Kate said, improvised off the top of her head. “A friend of mine owns it.”
“Mrs. McCoy?”
“Yes.” Her heart was suddenly palpitating like a hummingbird’s. “Do you know her? I think she may have dropped your name in conversation.”
Angela shook her head. “I only met her once.”
“When was that?”
“Last spring. It was a charity benefit, sponsored by the university,” Angela explained. “For native plant preservation, one of my pet causes. Mrs. McCoy was a charming hostess.”
“Yes, she’s great,” Kate agreed. “So you drove up there?”
“Yes.”
“Did you take Peter with you?” Kate asked, trying not to sound frantic.
“As a matter of fact, I did. He wanted to go about as much as he wanted a root canal, but I insisted. I was only in Santa Barbara overnight, and I wanted to spend as much time with him as I could. Fortunately, once he got there, he liked it. There were other students with their parents, and the old house and grounds are beautiful. That’s where the event was held, at Mrs. McCoy’s old family estate,” she explained. “It’s only used for functions such as that one now. I’m sure you know it, if you and Mrs. McCoy are friends.”
“I know i
t well,” Kate replied. As if off the top of her head: “When you went there, did you drive by a gate at the entrance to the property?”
Angela thought for a moment. “I don’t recall a gate. Is there one?”
“Yes,” Kate answered. “They usually keep it locked.”
“It wasn’t locked when I was there,” Angela said with certainty. “They must have opened it so the guests could drive in.” She frowned in thought. “To tell you the truth, I didn’t even notice there was one. Why do you ask?”
“Just curious.” Kate extended her hand. “Very nice meeting you.”
Angela smiled. “Me, too. I’m sorry I couldn’t help you out,” she said, almost apologetically.
“Don’t worry about it,” Kate told her. “And you never know,” she added cheerfully. “Every bit helps.”
Peter Baumgartner’s face stared into the camera lens. A mouse click, and there was his left profile. Then his right profile joined it. Finally, the back of his head. The images formed a picket line.
Kate had loaded the pictures from her camera into Luke’s PowerBook. They sat side by side at his desk, looking at them intently.
“Damn strong likeness,” Luke commented as he stared at the pictures. “If you put the shot of the back of Peter’s head next to one of Steven’s it would be hard to tell the difference, if you didn’t know which was which.”
“No shit, Sherlock!” Kate couldn’t sit still, she was so antsy with excitement. “When I first saw him from the back, it felt like a ghost coming to life. And then, when I found out from the mother that Peter had been at the ranch, I almost wet myself.”
Luke laughed, but his eyes remained riveted to the screen. “Great work, kiddo.”
“Thanks.” Kate’s mind was in overdrive. “Are you going to confront Alex Gordon with this? It puts everything in a whole new light—doesn’t it?”
“Yes and no,” Luke said cautiously. “Peter Baumgartner’s being with Maria Estrada the day she was killed doesn’t establish a nexus that he had anything to do with it. We know the girl was loose. Who knows who else she was with that day?”
He turned away from the images on the screen. “I don’t buy Alex dismissing from this,” he said, thinking out loud, “and short of that, I don’t know what practical good it does us to give this to him now.” He leaned back, thinking out his options. “I could whistle Dixie in three-quarters time and Alex wouldn’t walk from this case on this evidence, he’s too invested in it. And it isn’t bulletproof, at least not yet.”
He straightened up. “First things first. I need to talk to our client.”
Steven and Luke sat at Juanita’s kitchen table. Juanita had gone to the stable to give them privacy, although Luke knew that as soon as he left she would be all over Steven, wanting the low-down. There was nothing he could do about that. He would impress on Steven the importance of keeping this confidential, but he didn’t know if Steven could keep any secrets from his grandmother.
“Kate Blanchard, my detective, has come up with some new information,” he told Steven. “Stuff the police don’t know about.”
“What kind of information?” Steven asked eagerly. He leaned forward with expectation.
Luke played it cagey. “Some potential witnesses who might—let me emphasis might—know about other people who were with Maria that day. That could have a bearing on our defense.”
“You mean whoever really killed her?” Steven asked eagerly. “Damn! Finally.”
“We can’t make that direct a connection, not so far,” Luke cautioned him, “so don’t get your hopes up that high. But it will help us.”
Steven beamed. “Great! What do we do about it?”
“That’s the million-dollar question,” Luke told him. “The D.A. isn’t going to dismiss the case against you based on this material. He’s in too deep with what he has, and it doesn’t absolve you, although it raises substantial doubts.” He hesitated. “The question is, do we tell him anything about it, or wait and use it at the trial.”
Steven frowned. “You’re the lawyer. You tell me.”
Luke smiled. “I don’t want to show our hole cards until we have to. But I needed to run this by you. At the end of the day, it’s your decision.”
Steven nodded thoughtfully. “Thank you, but these are your choices to make. I’ll go with whatever decision you think is right.”
PART IV
31
MARCH ARRIVED, BRINGING MONSOON-FORCE rain. It came late—January and February are the normal wet months for Santa Barbara, but they had been dry, so this later-than-usual precipitation was a source for joy and relief: the drought was finally over. But in the areas where the fire had wasted everything in its path, the runoff created massive mud slides that swept down the hillsides, carrying tons of raw dirt into the swollen rivers and onto home sites and roads, creating an equally vicious disaster. Highway 154, the main artery from Santa Barbara into the Santa Ynez Valley, was shut down for over two weeks. Crews from Caltrans, the state highway agency, labored to clear the mud, rocks, and other detritus that buried the narrow two-lane highway for almost ten miles.
The State of California v. Steven McCoy, scheduled to begin in the middle of the month, had to be postponed. Steven, Juanita, and the others on the ranch, as well as dozens of families in neighboring areas, were shut off from any access, in or out.
Finally, the highway was opened. Juanita and Steven were able to navigate over the pass into the city. They, along with Steven’s parents, would stay at a hotel in town for the duration of the trial.
Luke had alerted the court that Steven would be staying in town, rather than at the ranch. Permission had been granted as long as Steven stayed in the direct custody and control of his grandmother, as his bail stipulation required.
Judge Martindale’s courtroom was the largest Superior Court chamber in the courthouse. It was high-ceilinged, over twenty feet tall. Large south-facing windows, now streaked from the rain, took up almost an entire wall, from the low wainscoting to the pressed-tin ceiling. The other three walls were faded adobe in color, bordered by dark wood trim. All the seating fixtures were the same rich, dark wood—judge’s bench, witness stand and chair, jury box, prosecution and defendant’s table and chairs. Behind the railing that separated the participants from the spectators there were eight rows of benches made of the same wood as in the rest of the room, divided down the middle by a wide aisle. The benches were deep and comfortable, like those in an old-fashioned train station. Spectators had been known to fall asleep during boring parts of trials. As long as they didn’t snore, the bailiffs left them alone.
Jury selection had taken three days. There were seven women and five men, two-thirds of whom were middle-aged or older. Eight were white, four were Latino. There were no blacks or Asians—they were such a small segment of the county population that neither ethnic group rarely served.
Alex Gordon stood tall at the podium. He was wearing a dark-blue Hugo Boss suit, a crisp white shirt with French cuffs, a silk tie in a subtle pattern. His hair was freshly cut, and he’d had a manicure.
Behind him, seated at the prosecution table, one crossed leg nervously jiggling up and down, Elise Hobson was wound up tight. Elise always had a queasy stomach at the beginning of a new trial, like an athlete waiting for the starting gun to fire. She snuck a few glances across the aisle to Luke, who was leaning back in his chair, a picture of easy composure. When he felt her energy directed toward him and turned to look at her she twisted away abruptly, not wanting him to see her staring. This was going to be a war. Luke was the enemy. She didn’t want him to see or feel any sign of weakness, of uncertainty.
Not that there were any. She felt good about this case. Better than good—terrific. She and Alex had prosecuted dozens of high-level cases, and had won over ninety-five percent of them. They had this one nailed, she was confident of that. This victory would be especially savory, because Luke Garrison was the opposing lawyer. His shadow still hung heavy over her, and on Alex
, too. Kicking his ass would go a long way toward casting it off.
Alex began his opening statement to the jury.
“I want to thank you in advance for your time, your energy, your devotion to the belief in one of the most basic rights a citizen has in this country—the right to an open trial by his or her peers. When all the facts and arguments in this trial are over, you are going to deliberate the guilt or innocence of the defendant in this case, Steven McCoy.”
He turned and looked at Steven, who returned his gaze without expression. Luke, sitting at Steven’s right, kept his eyes on Alex as well. No casting glimpses at the jury box, no looking away. You are not arrogant, but neither are you afraid. You are innocent. You can stare anyone in the face without cringing.
Alex turned away, his attention on the members of the jury again. “And when all the facts and arguments in this case are over, your decision about Steven McCoy’s guilt or innocence is going to be an easy one. You are going to find him guilty of murder, in the first degree. You are going to do so not because of any emotional sway I or my colleague, Ms. Hobson, can have over you—we can’t. Nor will you be persuaded of any possible innocence on his part due to the oratorical skills of his lawyer, Mr. Garrison. You may be entertained by Mr. Garrison, who has a great courtroom presence. He has been known to charm birds out of trees. You will find him witty, original, and seductive. But he will not be able to convince you that his client, Mr. McCoy, is innocent of the murder of Maria Estrada, for a good and compelling reason—he can’t. The overwhelming evidence in this case will override any courtroom magic Mr. Garrison can call up. You will evaluate this evidence, and you will conclude, as the police who painstakingly investigated this case have, and I and my colleagues have, that only one person could have murdered Maria Estrada—Steven McCoy.”
He stopped for a moment to look back at Steven, so that the people sitting in the jury box would look at him, also. Then he turned to them again.
“Here is what we are going to prove. That hardly anyone except Steven McCoy even knew about the remote area on the McCoy ranch where Maria Estrada’s murdered body was found. We will prove that no one except Steven McCoy had access to that remote area during the time that Maria Estrada disappeared and was killed. That is vitally important, ladies and gentlemen, it is critical. Please understand how critical that is. I mean that literally—no one else could have physically gotten to that area, and we’ll prove that to you, with the aid of convincing, credible witnesses. We will also put eyewitnesses before you who will testify to the whereabouts of Maria Estrada on the day she disappeared and was killed, all of whom will link the defendant to her.
