First Kill All the Lawyers

by Sarah Shankman

  A silence fell upon the group. Silk shifted. Champagne slipped between pursed lips.

  “Why, no, actually, Tate’s in Pickens County,” said a redhead in pea green.

  “But it’s more or less the same, isn’t it? I mean, all white? It must be uncomfortable for your help to be there.” Even as she spoke, Sam wondered at herself. Wasn’t she the perfect flaming liberal twit? What the hell was she doing? Just bored—cruising for a fight, looking for a hit? She was going to have to talk about this at a meeting: bitchery—an alternative to alcohol.

  “I never thought of it like that,” the brunette said. “But then, our help stays with us, you know. It’s not as if they’re out gallivanting all over the countryside.”

  “Tell us about San Francisco, Samantha,” interjected a silver-haired woman with a massive bosom battened down beneath plum silk. The mediator. “It is the most beautiful city. I can’t imagine why you’d want to come back to little old Atlanta after living there.”

  And they were off and running, expounding on California’s charms. Queen had done exactly the same thing. It was as if this set had agreed on travelogues as a sort of salve, a vanishing cream for confrontation.

  “Look at those girls,” said a woman with a frizzy brown permanent. She tipped her head to one side like a listening bird. “Don’t they remind you of flowers?”

  They did look that pretty, the nearby cluster of young girls in their bright party dresses. Their complexions were as creamy as Kay Kay’s magnolias. More than one of the women in Sam’s group fluttered an age-freckled hand to her throat.

  A blonde in blue watered silk caught Sam’s eye, and smiled. It was Totsie, changed into a fresh dress. She came over.

  “Come join us.” She took Sam’s hand. “I want you to meet some of my friends.”

  Sam let herself be led away, and a collective sigh of relief rose from the women she left behind her.

  “…didn’t mean to be rude,” Totsie was saying. “After all, I am a hostess.”

  She looked better now, though her eyes were too bright. Was she on something? Sam wondered.

  Totsie introduced her around the circle of animated young women.

  “San Francisco!” one of them shrieked. “I love that city!”

  “Oh, I died over the cable cars.”

  “The foghorns,” mooned one who had the slow eyes of a poet.

  “Oh, you would, Ashley,” Totsie twitted her friend. “Now, my favorite is the view from the top of the Mark Hopkins.”

  “You’ve stayed there?” Sam asked.

  “No, but I had drinks there once.”

  “Totsie is so sophisticated,” one of them teased. She was right, Samantha thought. For despite the fact that the Kays’ daughter was obviously having a bad night, there was something very grown-up about her. She was no little girl in a pinafore, Sam thought, no simple, sweet confection.

  “Totsie’s going to be the head of Turner Broadcasting one of these days,” another offered. “Going to push Ted Turner right out.”

  “Over his dead body,” said Totsie. Her color was high, her skin so pale that the blood showed like bright stains in her cheeks. She laughed, took a gulp of champagne, and then started to choke.

  Samantha patted her on the back. Totsie was having a rough time with the bubbly. Her color deepened. Sam considered the Heimlich maneuver, but instead reached for a sandwich from a nearby table.

  “Here,” she said. “The bread will help.”

  Totsie chewed and swallowed, then again. “Thanks,” she finally managed in a strained voice. “I’ll be okay.”

  One of the girls turned to another, as if to politely draw attention away from Totsie. “Where’s Liza tonight?” she asked.

  “Probably painting. She hardly ever comes to these things anymore. Always says she’s too busy.”

  How many Lizas could there be in their circle? “Liza Ridley?” asked Sam.

  “You know her?”

  “I’ve met her. Saw some of her work. She’s quite good.”

  The girls nodded all around.

  “She’s super,” one said.

  “She is,” a girl with dark bangs agreed. “When we were little kids, at Westminster”—she tilted her head in the direction of that very private school, farther out on West Paces Ferry Road—“Liza’s work was up in every show.” She laughed. “That Liza! I remember one summer when we were all up at Tate, Liza must have been eight or nine, and she had a whole bunch of us posing out on a rock in the lake, buck naked! Big Helen, my mama, caught us and threw a hissy. They thought we were playing doctor.”

  “Playing what?” asked a young girl as she joined the circle. “Are you all talking about my daddy again?”

  “No, Beth. We’re talking about Liza.”

  Samantha turned to look at the newcomer named Beth, and then it was her turn to choke.

  No question. This beauty was Beau Talbot’s daughter. With her dark hair, long elegant nose, and big long-lashed brown eyes, the girl was a female version of the young doctor who had taken Sam’s love.

  “Samantha Adams, Beth Talbot.” Totsie was doing the honors.

  When Sam touched the girl’s hand, her own tingled.

  Beth smiled. Her front teeth were just a little crooked, charmingly so, like her father’s. “My dad’s mentioned you.”

  Oh, yeah?

  “He always reads you in the paper. He says you’re the best reporter the Constitution’s ever had. He says—oh, here he is now.”

  Sam closed her eyes. If she could conjure him up, she could conjure him away.

  “Samantha!” There was his voice, the same surprisingly high voice with a laugh permanent-pressed into it.

  He was bald. She knew he was going to be bald. He was fat. His teeth had gone bad. His face was a moonscape of valleys and wrinkles.

  She opened her eyes. He was infuckingcredibly gorgeous.

  He was grinning at her. Grinning. “Samantha, you’re just as beautiful as ever.” Then he laughed.

  The circle of girls disappeared. So did the rest of the room.

  “You haven’t changed,” she managed to say. She felt like she was going to explode. The last time she’d seen this bastard, she’d been nineteen years old. He’d kissed her good-bye at the airport—kissed her again and again. “It won’t be long,” he’d whispered in that high voice that broke. “You’ll come to New York.” Then he’d held her one last time and whispered into her curls, “I’ll love you always.”

  Shit! He might as well have said, “Let’s have lunch.” But nineteen-year-old girls didn’t know that meant the same thing as “Let’s be friends” or “I’ll call you.” Girls were usually women by the time they figured out that’s what men said when they meant “Adios.”

  “Well…” He laughed and ran a hand across the top of his thatch of hair, which had changed—from black to silver. Gorgeous silver. “I’d beg to differ with you.”

  “Nawh,” she said, sounding like a Dead End Kid. “You haven’t changed a bit.”

  His eyes shifted a little at that, as if he weren’t sure what she meant. He was off balance. Great.

  “So. How do you like the Constitution?”

  “So far, so good.” She was volunteering nothing. He wanted to know how the last twenty years had gone? Let him ask.

  “They’re treating you nicely down there?”

  “Yep. Sure are.”

  “You’re not going to talk to me, are you?”

  “Nope.”

  “Come on, Sam.” He reached for her arm.

  She shrugged away from him. “Please don’t.”

  The truth was, if he touched her, she didn’t know what she’d do. Cry. Scream. Detonate. She’d had a hate-on for this man for so many years, and now that she’d finally laid eyes on him again…what? What was this she felt?

  Nervous. That’s it.

  That’s not it. Try another four-letter word.

  Hate.

  No, you said that.

  Anger.
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  Too many letters.

  Fear.

  That’s warmer. That’s partially right. And why do you fear him? What are you afraid of? What do you really feel? Nervous actually was warm, too. Try twitchy.

  Twitchy doesn’t have four letters. Neither does ants-in-your-pants, but that’s what you feel.

  I do not.

  Do too.

  You mean…I can’t believe it…lust? This is not lust.

  You can lie to them, babe, but you can’t lie to me. For my money, it’s lust. Heat. Same thing. Lust.

  She’d always been a sucker for a pretty face. A pretty body. Pretty smile. Beau Talbot—cad, four-flusher, scoundrel, cheat, heartbreaker—had all three. Years, miles, water under the bridge—and still, just looking at him made her hot. This was not logic operating here. She wanted his body. She hated his guts.

  But there were other people around. This was a party. She’d been raised a Southern lady, to be polite. She didn’t throw her club soda in his face. She didn’t walk away. And she didn’t want to let him see that he was getting to her.

  “They’re treating me very nicely downtown,” she said. “I have a lot of latitude.”

  He was anxious to make small talk. “Well, be careful. You know what they say about plenty of rope.”

  She smiled politely. “That’s what George says. He’s been warning me off a story I’m beginning—says it’s too dangerous.”

  “What’s that?”

  “A look-see at rural sheriffs.”

  “I’d say he’s right. They play hardball, those ole boys. I wouldn’t mess with ’em, Sam. Why don’t you stick to something safe, like murder? You do that awfully well.”

  She wouldn’t ask him how he knew. “Thanks.” She nodded.

  “I’ve read—” he began, but then a white-jacketed waiter appeared at his side.

  “Dr. Talbot, there’s a phone call for you, sir. I hate to interrupt, but the man said it was urgent.”

  “Excuse me, Sam.” And he did touch her then—just tapped her arm. It tingled as if she’d been shocked. “Please don’t disappear. I’ll be back in a minute.”

  She stood rooted, not thinking about what she ought to be doing: mingling, making conversation, or, if she had any sense, making tracks. Beau Talbot, after all these years. Her arm sent electric messages up, then down to her breast.

  He returned quickly, wearing a very odd expression. But before either of them could say another word, Edison Kay stepped up.

  “Well, well,” Kay blustered around an expensive cigar. “How nice to see you getting to know some people, Samantha. Though I must say that, even though Dr. Talbot here’s the handsomest dog in the room, he is that, a dog. You ought to be careful.”

  Beau smiled politely, then blurted, “Excuse me, Samantha, Edison, I’ve got to leave.”

  “Rushing out?” Edison protested. “Why, the party’s only just begun.”

  Beau leaned over to his host and murmured in his ear, but loudly enough that Sam could hear him. “I just got a call from the GBI. They’ve found Forrest Ridley’s body at Apalachee Falls, up in Watkin County.”

  “What the hell do you mean, Forrest Ridley’s body?” Edison exclaimed loudly. “The man’s a senior partner. He can’t be dead!”

  And with that, the party froze, dead still. Champagne tulips stopped halfway to lips. Words were bitten half-through like cigars. Then the buzz began, and grew and grew until it was almost a roar, and in the midst of it, there was a sharper swell of noise as a woman screamed. George suddenly appeared at Sam’s side, and she never did see who had uttered such an anguished, unladylike sound.

  Six

  Sam jolted awake and, with her eyes still closed, slammed her hand down on the alarm clock on her bedside table. But it kept ringing. She peeled one eye open and stared at it. Seven A.M. Harpo glared at her from the foot of her bed. Still ringing. She fumbled for the telephone.

  “Meet me at the IHOP on Ponce for breakfast,” the voice on the other end said. “I have something important to tell you.”

  “Who is this?”

  “Come on, Sam. It’s Beau. Get up and get dressed and meet me.”

  “Are you crazy?”

  “For Christ’s sake, it’s about Forrest Ridley. Don’t you want this story?”

  Sam was quiet for a moment as the events of the previous night played back through her mind like an old movie: the announcement of Ridley’s death, the hubbub and confusion, the drive back home, skipping the Varsity. But she remembered too the way she’d felt when she’d seen Beau again—the confusion of all those years of hating him, blocking him, forgetting him, and then zap! he touched her, and that tingle.

  “No.”

  “No what? No, you don’t want this story? Or, no, you don’t want breakfast at the IHOP?”

  “None of it.”

  He paused. “Okay, you’re right. The IHOP’s a bad choice.”

  It was, for they’d eaten scores of blueberry pancakes there when they were lovers. The peaked-roof restaurant was filled with memories. Sam had avoided the chain ever since, even in San Francisco.

  “How about the Silver Skillet?” he suggested.

  “No.”

  “Gravy and biscuits, along with the skinny on Forrest Ridley? First dibs on what the Watkin County sheriff had to say? Wear your raincoat. It’s pouring.”

  He was tempting her. But the Silver Skillet was another of their old haunts.

  Then, as if he could read her mind, he said, “Melvin’s, and that’s my best offer.”

  “Where’s Melvin’s?”

  She could hear his grin as he gave her directions.

  “This had better be worth it.”

  *

  In the parking lot Sam spotted what had to be Beau’s car, a silver BMW with MD plates. Except for the color, it was a twin to hers. She frowned. The coincidence didn’t please her.

  As she ran for the front door, raindrops were dancing in the puddles.

  Melvin’s, on Northside Drive, had that look of most of Atlanta’s favorite breakfast hangouts: decorated with a medley of chrome and Formica, it was ramshackle, greasy, and seedy. But the biscuits were fluffy, the coffeepot bottomless, and you could order fresh pork loin, country or sugar-cured ham, a pork chop, or two kinds of sausage with your eggs, grits, and redeye gravy.

  Beau stood at the counter talking with a waitress whose nametag declared her to be Bernice. He was dressed in a dark gray suit with a raincoat tossed over his shoulder. She hated the way he looked; he was absolutely, even first thing in the morning, beautiful. She was glad she’d just thrown on jeans, a bright red sweatshirt, and a matching smudge of lipstick. Let him see how little she cared about this meeting.

  “God, you look wonderful,” he said, turning as she approached. “I love the yellow slicker. Makes you look like a kid.”

  “Coffee, please,” she said, looking straight at Bernice.

  “Make that two.” Beau took Sam’s elbow and led her toward the last booth in the back corner.

  She wondered if he often brought women here for breakfast. Was this his early morning hideaway? Or did he and what’s-her-name, that woman from Boston he’d married, have a match made in heaven?

  “So what was so important that you dragged me out of bed this lovely morning?” she demanded.

  “The straight poop on Ridley,” he said.

  “What makes you think I care?”

  “You’re here. You’re a reporter. You have a nose for murder. And you were already asking questions about him.”

  “How do you know that?”

  Beau just smiled. His smiles always had been infuriating.

  She shrugged. “Okay, I’m here. Shoot.”

  *

  Even with his lights flashing and siren blaring, it had taken Beau an hour and a half to drive the seventy miles to Apalachee Falls State Park, where a hiker had found the body of Forrest Ridley. Route 400, the expressway, petered out north of Cumming, where he cut over to Route 19, and after tha
t there was a maze of two-lane roads with ill-marked intersections and little towns with blinking red lights in their centers. The farther north he went, the more winding the roads and the slower his pace, for these were the foothills of the Appalachians. The 2,050-mile hiking trail, which stretched all the way to Maine, began at Springer Mountain just north of Apalachee.

  It began to rain, but Beau had no trouble finding the entrance to the park; at its gate were two deputy sheriffs’ cars, their revolving blue lights projecting an eerie lightshow across the deserted road. He flashed his identification, and the deputies waved him through with the slow, sly grin of the country lawman.

  It was the kind of grin, Beau thought, that made you uneasy, encouraged worry about whether they only thought they knew more than city slickers, or really did. It was the kind of grin that made you feel that they were on the verge of writing you a speeding ticket and would make it stick, even if you’d been in your car sitting still.

  The body had been found at the bottom of the falls, pinned beneath the overhang of a large flat rock. Lee Boggs, a kind-faced older man who was the Georgia Bureau of Investigation’s very best investigator, was already at work.

  “Dr. Talbot.” He nodded, pushing up his rain-spattered, rimless glasses.

  “Boggs.” Beau returned the nod. “What have we got here?”

  “Well, not a hell of a lot. You can see what the terrain looks like.” The creek was sheer on one side, edged with rocks and leaves on the other. “Course, if we’re looking for footprints, I suspect they’d be up at the top anyway. I’ve got Masterson up there. But it’s gonna be tough. You get a million hikers and campers up here with the first sign of good weather, and you know we had that more than a month ago. No telling how many people’ve tromped around here while he was lying in the water.”

  “Where the hell is the body?”

  Boggs’s cherubic face, more suited to a man selling lollipops than to one sifting through scenes of death, clouded over. “Sheriff took him. Said it was an open and shut case of accidental death, and hauled him right off to Monroeville.”

  “He what!”

  “Sheriff Buford Dodd, his name was, said he didn’t even know why we bothered to come up here anyway. Said the man obviously fell off the top of the falls and was killed. Said it’s happened five or six times in the past ten years.”