Moment of Truth

by Lisa Scottoline

  Lou had to confirm his theory. He got up, crossed the room, and picked up another pamphlet from the counter. It was white, entitled, WHAT TO EXPECT IF YOU CHOOSE ABORTION. The receptionist was on the phone, and on the way back he smiled at Paige, letting her see the pamphlet. He eased into the chair with an audible groan and opened the bifold. “This is amazing, what they do here,” he said, to no daughter in particular.

  Paige didn’t reply, but continued with her magazine.

  “It looks like they really know their stuff.” He turned to Paige. “You think they do?”

  “I don’t know.” She looked noncommittal under the GUESS.

  “I mean, I’m kinda worried. My daughter, she’s thinking she might have to have an abortion.”

  “Oh,” Paige said, and her face flushed. Lou was struck by the fairness of her skin.

  “I don’t mean to get personal, it’s just she’s my only girl. She has lots of questions. She can’t decide, and I don’t want her to … to … well, it’s not like this is a hospital, you know.” He returned quickly to the pamphlet. “Well, sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything to you.”

  Paige returned to her magazine with a quick swivel of her long neck.

  Lou pretended to read the pamphlet and let the silence fall. If she had something to say, she’d come to him. He had seen it over and over when he questioned younger witnesses, on the job. Young girls, deep inside, just wanted to please. Sometimes silence proved the best weapon. So he didn’t say anything.

  Neither did Paige, who read her magazine.

  Lou rustled his pamphlet.

  Paige studied her magazine.

  Lou worried that silence might not be the best weapon.

  “She needs a counselor,” Paige said, finally looking over, and Lou nodded.

  “A counselor? Not a doctor?”

  “No, not doctors. Counselors don’t do exams or anything.” Paige’s expression had softened and she suddenly looked to Lou like an ordinary teenager, instead of a model. “They’ll answer all your daughter’s questions. They’ll help her decide what to do. They’ll just talk to her.”

  Lou waited, taking it slow. “They just talk to her?”

  “Yeah.” Paige nodded, the cap brim bopping up and down. “As many times as she wants, and they’re really nice.”

  “They’re nice?”

  “Really nice.” Paige broke into a smile. It seemed to Lou as if she wanted to talk to him, but part of her held back.

  “So you think they’ll help her decide? I mean, she’s kinda confused.”

  “Oh, sure, that’s their job. I mean, they don’t push you one way or the other. They just listen and help you decide.” Paige smiled again, with her eyes, too, this time, and Lou felt how young she was, how vulnerable. She knew too much about this process not to be in the same position herself.

  There was a loud intercom beep at the receptionist’s phone, and both Lou and Paige looked up at the sound. The receptionist put her phone call on hold, stood up, and picked up a manila folder from the desk. “Ms. Stone,” she said to Paige. “You can go in now. I’ll buzz you in.”

  Ms. Stone. Lou wasn’t surprised at the use of the alias. This girl played it so close to the vest he wondered if anybody else knew she was in trouble. He watched as she squared her shoulders in her man’s pea coat and followed the receptionist out of the waiting room. She was so in control for her age it reminded him of the young gangbangers he met on the street. Kids, with no mother and no father to speak of, who raised themselves. They got older but they never really grew up, and they stayed hollow at the core. And this girl, who musta had every advantage, didn’t seem any better off.

  Lou didn’t get up from his chair, even though it was his chance to slip out of the place. He felt tired suddenly. He didn’t know when kids had changed, but they had, in his lifetime. They got to be empty inside; they didn’t care about anything. They listened to one-hit wonders, watched movies that weren’t funny, and didn’t read enough books. They didn’t play ball in the street; they collected guns and shot each other. Lou didn’t understand how it had happened, but it had, and it happened to Paige Newlin, too. There was something missing at her heart, and Lou worried that there was nothing in the world that could set it right.

  It took Lou a few minutes before he could get up from the chair, but get up he did.

  28

  Kovich studied the criminalistics report, resting it against the steering wheel of the car, which idled at the curb. Temple students going to class flowed in front of the car but Kovich didn’t notice. “The earring back is from a man?”

  “That’s what it says.” Brinkley leaned over and pointed on the report with a cold finger. The heat still hadn’t warmed up in the beat-up Chrysler and the tall buildings on Broad Street blocked the sun. “Contained sloughed-off skin cells from a male.”

  “Okay, so?” Kovich looked over, and Brinkley edged back into his seat.

  “I don’t know. Let me think. It’s a surprise.”

  “Only because you figured it was the daughter’s, which it ain’t.”

  Brinkley collected his thoughts. “Take it step by step. We find an earring back next to the body, which suggests it came off after a struggle with the doer.”

  “The location suggests a possibility it came off during the struggle with the doer. It coulda come off anytime at all. Fallen off a rug cleaner who wears an earring. A gay decorator who wears an earring. Every guy in Philly wears an earring nowadays, maybe two. My brother wears one, for fuck’s sake. Coulda been anybody, anytime.”

  “Okay, but it’s possible that it came off in the death struggle.”

  “It’s possible.”

  “Good. At least it’s possible.” Brinkley looked out the windshield of the car at the Temple students. Boys and girls flooded into the buildings in parkas, lugging backpacks like tanks. A couple of the boys had their arms around the girls, but the backpacks got in the way. Brinkley watched them idly. “I thought it could have been the daughter’s because I’m working on the theory that she’s the doer, and the father is taking the fall, right?”

  “Also you are dumber than you look, in contrast to me. But yes. Right.”

  Brinkley was thinking too hard to ask Kovich what he was talking about. “If the location suggests the earring back came off during a struggle with the killer, then the killer was a male. So if you combine my theory with this physical evidence, it suggests that a man was at the scene with the daughter.”

  Kovich nodded. “Unless Newlin wears an earring, and he don’t.”

  “Also, remember that there was dirt on the coffee table, put there by someone’s shoe, and it had to be someone who put it there Monday after the maid cleaned. It’s consistent with a male, since lots of women don’t put their feet up on coffee tables.”

  “Mostly but okay. So what we got?”

  “We got a man at the scene, brought there by the girl. Because I don’t believe Newlin is the doer and there’s no male in the picture he would protect, except a man he didn’t know was there. A male his daughter brought in.” Brinkley’s heart quickened and he kept staring out the window. Two of the Temple students kissed. Young love, he could barely remember it. And then suddenly he could. “The daughter has a boyfriend.”

  “How do you know?”

  “You saw her. She’s a knockout. She’s gotta have a boyfriend.” Brinkley gestured out the window to the kids eating face. “Girl like that, she’s gotta have a ton of boyfriends.”

  Kovich grew quiet, but Brinkley didn’t notice.

  “So let’s say she goes over to dinner with the boyfriend and they kill the mother together. Or the daughter does it and the boyfriend helps, one way or the other. We got the wrong guy, Stan. We have to talk to the daughter again and find out if she has a boyfriend.”

  “No.”

  “What?”

  “We’re not bothering that kid again.” Kovich shoved the report at him, and Brinkley knew he was in trouble.

  “Wh
y not?”

  “Because she’s a kid, Mick.”

  “So what? We question lots of kids. This kid’s not from the projects, so we don’t question her?”

  “Don’t go there, Mick. You know me too well for that.” Kovich raised his voice a notch. “The girl lost her mother and now her father. You wanna find out if she has a boyfriend, find another way.”

  Brinkley thought about it. “Okay, let’s go. Turn around.”

  Kovich leaned over and released the emergency brake. “Fine,” he said, and Brinkley heard the winter wind in Kovich’s voice.

  It was never fine when Kovich said it was fine.

  Brinkley scanned the lobby of Colonial Towers. Black marble, cushy tan chairs, and a classy security desk with a young white kid sitting behind it. His hat had slid back on his forehead and his neck sprouted like a stem out of his collar. Brinkley introduced himself and Kovich to the kid, who sat up straight when he saw the badges. “Homicide detectives? Sure, sure. How can I help you?”

  “I wanna ask you a few questions about one of your tenants here. Paige Newlin.” The guard’s face changed immediately from fear to familiarity.

  “You know who I mean.”

  “Sure, the model.” The guard frowned. “I read her dad killed her mom. That’s heinous.”

  Brinkley didn’t comment. “We’re investigating that murder, and I need background information about her comings and goings.”

  “She comes and goes, nothing regular, for her job. But you notice her, you know.” The guard smiled shyly. “She’s totally hot.”

  “You ever see her with guys? You know, like boyfriends.”

  “Uhm, yes. She sees some guy, a prep, since she moved here.”

  Bingo. “She’s dating him?”

  “Looks that way.”

  “He stay over?”

  “I’m the night shift, not the morning. But I think so.”

  “What’s he look like?”

  “We call him Abercrombie Boy. He’s like, right out of the catalog, you know.”

  Brinkley had no idea. “No, I don’t.”

  “Tall, a jock. Good-looking. A rich boy.”

  “He got an earring?”

  “I don’t know. Mostly I look at her.”

  “You got a sign-in log?”

  “Yeah, sure.” The guard went behind the desk, pulled out a large black notebook, and opened it up.

  “Turn back to the page for Monday,” Brinkley asked, and the kid found the page and turned the book toward the detectives. It was a standard ledger, with signatures in a list and the time they signed in. Brinkley ran his finger down the page, stopped at the name of Paige Newlin, then jumped to the signature next to hers. Trent Reznor. “Trent Reznor, that’s his name,” Brinkley said, satisfied.

  “Huh? That can’t be his name.” The guard came around and peered at the logbook. “Trent Reznor’s with Nine Inch Nails.”

  “What?” Brinkley read over the guard’s shoulder, then thumbed back in time and checked every name written next to Paige Newlin’s. “Ben Folds, Thurston Moore, Gavin Rosdale,” he read aloud, and the guard took off his hat.

  “Wait a minute. Ben Folds is with Ben Folds Five, Thurston Moore is with Sonic Youth. They’re all bands. None of those are real names.”

  Brinkley went further backward in time, reading the log entries. “Dave Matthews, Eddie Vedder. Also rock stars, aren’t they?”

  “Yeah, older ones.”

  Brinkley tore through the book, checking each time he saw Paige Newlin’s name on a line. The entries went back to December of last year and each name next to hers was different, as was each line of handwriting. Some slanted forward and some back, but he never wrote in the same hand twice. Shit! “Don’t you read what these people write down?” Brinkley demanded.

  “Uh, no.” The kid colored. “I mean, not usually, I guess. We just ask them to write it.”

  “What’s the point then? Why have them sign it if you’re not going to check? What’re you doin’ the goddamn job for?” Brinkley raised his voice, and Kovich grabbed his arm.

  “Excuse us,” he said tensely. “Me and my partner are leaving now. Thanks for your help.”

  “Uh, sure,” the guard answered, shaken, as Kovich steered Brinkley to the entrance door and out onto the sidewalk. The sun was bright but the wind gusted in currents in front of the tall building. Traffic whizzed by, moving smoothly at this hour, and two well-dressed older women approached. Kovich squeezed Brinkley’s arm.

  “You gotta calm down, Mick. You were screaming at the kid.”

  “He’s a fuckup!” Brinkley heard himself shout, which he never did.

  “He’s ten years old, for Christ’s sake!” Kovich yelled back as they squared off on the sidewalk. The two women picked up their pace past the detectives.

  “Then he shouldn’t be working the job! Security is supposed to mean something.” Brinkley gestured at the women, who looked back, startled. “These people, they’re payin’ for security!”

  “What do you care? You don’t live here. You’re losin’ it on this case, don’t you see!”

  It only made Brinkley angrier. It was like nobody but him could see the truth. “The kid, the boyfriend, he’s hiding something, don’t you see?”

  “No, no, you know what I see?” Kovich was shouting now, full bore. “The boyfriend is a wise-ass. A kid playin’ games. Thumbin’ his nose at authority. Who hasn’t signed a fake name for a laugh?”

  “Me!”

  “Well I did, plenty of times, when I was young.”

  “What the fuck for?”

  “For fun, Mick! For goddamn fun!”

  “That’s not fun!”

  “You wouldn’t know fun if it bit you in the ass, Mick. You don’t know how to laugh anymore! You’ve been an asshole ever since Sheree walked out on you!”

  Brinkley was about to yell back but he stopped short, his chest heaving, as soon as it registered.

  Kovich blinked behind his big aviator glasses. “Aw, shit,” he said quietly. His soft shoulders slumped.

  Brinkley suddenly found it hard to swallow. Or even speak. He pivoted on his heel and walked away, ignoring the stares of passersby, so blind in anger and pain that he didn’t notice the man in the car parked at the curb, photographing the scene on the sidewalk.

  29

  Davis knew who Marc Videon was the moment he entered the divorce lawyer’s office at Tribe & Wright. Marc Videon was The Necessary Evil. Corporate law firms didn’t want their CEO clients to go elsewhere to off-load their wives, because there was a chance they wouldn’t come back, so the firms were forced to employ a Necessary Evil. Davis had encountered one in every white-shoe Philly firm, and the suspect profile was so blatant it should have been unconstitutional: The Necessary Evil was always an outsider in a bad suit, nominally a partner and compensated on a salaried basis, and invited only to those firm social functions that the messengers went to, democratic events like the Christmas Party. Meeting Videon, Davis saw that he fit the bill, with his too-wide pinstripes that fit too tight on his squat form, a slightly greasy face with small features, and unnaturally dark hair that matched a pointy black goatee.

  “Sit down, please,” Videon said, seating himself. His office was as large as other Tribe partners’, but in law firms, everything was location, location, location, and Videon’s office was nowhere, stuck on the bottom floor of the firm near the duplicating department. Davis could practically feel the heat and hear the harsh cathunka of Xerox machines as big as oil tankers, belching paper like smoke. Nor was Davis surprised to see that Videon had only one desk, an undistinguished box of walnut veneer, with chairs and end tables that reflected only a mid-range furniture allowance.

  “Thanks.” Davis introduced himself, then sat down across from Videon’s desk, which was cluttered with papers, cases, and scribbled notes. The Pennsylvania guidelines for alimony rested on the keyboard of a thick gray laptop, and Davis pulled out his legal pad. Next to him sat Art Field, the tape recorder
with a law degree. Whittier had excused himself for this meeting, and Davis assumed he’d gone on to gouge the Fortune 500 in six-minute increments. “I appreciate your agreeing to meet with me on such short notice.”

  “What ‘agreeing’? I’m under subpoena, n’est-ce pas?” Videon’s neat head swiveled to Art Field, who was clearly annoyed at being acknowledged.

  “Yes,” Field answered. “There is a document subpoena as well.”

  Videon smiled. “Oh, goody. I like it rough.” He ran a manicured hand through his thinning hair, which was nevertheless black as night. In fact, Davis figured that BLACK AS NIGHT was the name on the box. Videon had to be sixty, if he was a day. “I knew you’d come to talk to me sooner or later. Let’s start with what a shame it is about Honor Newlin.”

  “It is a shame,” Davis said, seriously. He wasn’t so sure he liked The Necessary Evil, which would make sense. Evil shouldn’t have a lot of running buddies.

  “Yes, of course, a shame. A terrible shame. A terrible tragedy. Have I said ‘terrible’ enough yet to convince you of my sincerity? Put otherwise, are you buying this shit?” Videon paused as if expecting an answer, but Davis didn’t give him one. “Yes, well, to the facts. Honor Newlin was in to see me on Monday. The day she was murdered. She wanted to divorce Jack.”

  “Begin at the beginning.” Davis took out his pen. “What time did you see her?”

  “First thing in the morning, I think. Hold on.” Videon moved the alimony guidelines aside, adjusted the laptop, and hit a few keys. Davis couldn’t read the screen because of the angle. “Honor came in at 9:30. She was late and she’d already had a drink.”

  Davis made a note, hiding his surprise. He didn’t dare look over at Field. “How do you know?”

  “I knew her. Besides, I offered her one, and she turned me down. She said she’d already had one. Other than that, pure guesswork.”