Shadow of Doubt (A Kali O'Brien legal mystery)

by Jonnie Jacobs

  “Please, Kali, just ask and see what you can learn. Benson was a friend of your father’s way back when, maybe he’ll talk to you.”

  “Daryl Benson?”

  She nodded. “He’s chief of police now.”

  Benson had been a fishing buddy of my father’s years ago, a high-spirited, jowly man who would occasionally show up on Thanksgiving and family holidays. I was never quite sure whether my mother actually expected him, or if somehow he simply found his way to our doorstep at the appropriate time. I’d only seen him in uniform once — on Senior Prom night he’d pulled over a carload of us and delivered a lecture about reckless driving. By that time, however, he’d stopped coming by the house, and mercifully hadn’t recognized me.

  “I haven’t seen him in years,” I told her. “I don’t think my father had seen much of him lately either.”

  “Besides,” Nona continued, undaunted, “you’re a lawyer. That’s got to mean something.”

  “It means they’d close the door in my face faster than ever.”

  “Please, just try.” Nona’s knuckles were almost white.

  “Why in the world would they suspect Jannine?” I asked. “They can’t build a case against her just because she’s his wife.”

  Nona turned and went back to spreading tuna fish. “No,” she said thinly, “but it seems it was her gun that killed him.”

  <><><>

  I didn’t think the police would tell me much, and I was right. Daryl Benson wasn’t even at the station when I stopped by.

  “I’ll wait,” I told the dour-looking woman at the front desk. Certain clients did this to me on a regular basis. It drove me crazy, but I knew it sometimes worked.

  “No point waiting,” she barked. “He won’t be back until tomorrow.”

  “Can you tell me who’s in charge of the Eddie Marrero homicide?” I smiled pleasantly, but her expression didn’t soften in the slightest

  “Doug Southern, but you can’t see him either. He’s up to his eyeballs in the investigation.”

  “Is there anyone I could talk to then?”

  “Not about that there isn’t.”

  I smiled again. “Do they have any leads yet, any idea who killed him?”

  The woman glared at me. She was maybe late forties, early fifties, it was hard to tell. A casting director’s dream for sit-com army sergeant. “It’s not my place to comment,” she said stiffly, turning back to her work and dismissing me with about as much grace as I roll out for the Jehovah’s Witnesses who ring my bell first thing Saturday morning.

  I might have tried my luck with someone else, but there was no one else around. Wearily, I looked at my watch. Four-thirty. Waiting seemed like an exercise in futility, and I was hungry. I hadn’t eaten since morning and then it was only the half-cup of coffee I’d managed to get down before opening the paper.

  I headed for the door. I’d been about as successful as I’d expected, but that didn’t prevent me from feeling discouraged.

  I’d have been a whole lot more discouraged, however, if I’d thought there was really anything to worry about. Given what Nona had said about the gun, it didn’t surprise me that the police had questioned Jannine. It sounded fairly routine. I was sure the whole thing would be sorted out in no time. Jannine was about as unlikely a killer as they’d find.

  Mike’s Place, across the street from City Hall, was a combination bar and hamburger joint I remembered from my youth. I’d never been there myself, but it was, at that time anyway, the hot spot for swaggering, cheeky young men armed with fake IDs. The place looked as though it hadn’t been touched in the intervening years, but the aroma of fried onions enticed my stomach before my more fastidious side had a chance to protest.

  The place was surprisingly crowded for that time of day and, not so surprisingly, very noisy. The pool table at the back seemed to be a major draw; those who weren’t playing were busy giving advice. A dart board next to the bar attracted a group that was somewhat smaller, though every bit as vocal.

  I considered leaving, but the empty refrigerator at home meant stopping at the store on the way, a mission which required more energy than I had. I ordered a burger with a side of onion rings and a glass of white wine. The man behind the bar snickered ever so slightly and reached for a jug of generic Chablis. It had probably been open for months. “On second thought,” I told him, “maybe I’ll have a beer instead.” A change of heart which only made the snicker more pronounced.

  Miraculously, I found an empty table in the corner, away from the bulk of activity. I brushed the crumbs off the chair, sat, and dug into my burger, which was actually pretty tasty. The noise didn’t bother me so much now that I’d gotten used to it. I was kind of drifting along, trying not to think about Jannine and her children, and the hundreds of ways, both big and little, that Eddie’s death would change their lives. I must have been pretty caught up in it because I didn’t notice the woman standing next to me until she set her tray on the table.

  “Mind if I join you?” she asked, sliding into the chair next to mine without waiting for an answer.

  She caught me with my mouth full, so I gestured an invitation. Not, it seemed, that I had a choice.

  The woman smiled tentatively, exhibiting a chipped front tooth. She appeared to be in her early twenties, dusty blonde, with the kind of pale skin that looks washed out and drab rather than creamy. She couldn’t have weighed more than a hundred pounds tops, and the decidedly masculine cut of her grey shirt and trousers did little to enhance her appearance.

  “I hate coming here this time of day,” she said. “The local studs from the construction company leering at me and all. They act like they’ve never seen a woman before.”

  I hadn’t noticed anyone so much as glance in my direction, much less leer at me, but I guess it’s all in how you perceive things.

  “Why do you eat here if it makes you uncomfortable?”

  “It’s convenient” She unloaded her tray — a double burger, fries, milk shake and a piece of apple pie. The meal probably weighed as much as she did. “I work across the street at the police department. I’m a dispatcher.”

  I nodded. That explained the drab pants and shirt. Who knows, maybe it explained the hairstyle and lack of make-up, too.

  We munched in silence for awhile until my companion looked up and said, “It’s an important job, you know. I’m the one took the call about that coach. You read about it in the paper this morning?”

  My mind leaped back from the hazy shadows where it had been drifting. “Eddie Marrero? The one who was shot?”

  She nodded and took another large bite of burger. “Three times, in fact. I guess whoever killed him wasn’t taking any chances.”

  “They have any leads yet.”

  She picked at the piece of lettuce stuck on her front tooth. “Not really, except for the wife. Lieutenant Southern, he’s the chief investigator on this one, he’s betting she did it.”

  The meat in my mouth suddenly tasted like rubber, and I had to swallow hard to get it down. “What makes him think that?”

  “It was her gun. They found it a little ways from the body, under a pile of leaves. And she never reported him missing either. Seems he was shot Saturday, and when he didn’t come home that night she went to bed as though nothing was the least bit unusual. ‘I thought he was with friends,’ is how she tries to explain it, but when they ask her, she can’t come up with a single name. No alibi either, at least not one she can substantiate. There’s probably some other stuff, too. I don’t know the full story, only what I overhear from guys talking. It kinda makes you wonder though, doesn’t it?”

  It did. I felt a flicker of doubt then brushed it aside. There had to be another explanation. “Why would she want to kill her husband?” I asked.

  The woman shrugged and took a long sip of her milk shake. “Who knows? Cops leave stuff like that to the lawyers.”

  There was some truth to that statement, but they didn’t simply disregard considerations of moti
ve either. “Are they going to arrest her?”

  “Not yet. Chief Benson wants to make sure they dot their ‘i’s and cross their ‘t’s first. He’s had some run-ins with the DA before. He wants to make sure this one’s by the book.”

  I breathed a silent sigh of relief. Maybe it wasn’t as cut and dried as this woman made it sound. “They’re still keeping an open mind then?”

  “I guess. I mean some witness comes forward, they’re not going to throw him out on his nose.”

  It wasn’t a particularly reassuring testimonial. Reluctantly, I admitted to myself that Nona may have been right; the police were looking, but not very hard. It was with even more reluctance that I allowed myself to wonder, fleetingly, if they were on track.

  My companion set down her milk shake and threw me a sharp, curious look. “Say, you’re not a reporter or anything are you?” It must have finally dawned on her my interest in the case wasn’t entirely perfunctory. “I could get in big trouble for talking to you.”

  “No, nothing like that,” I assured her, wishing I could find some way to reassure Nona and Jannine as easily.

  Chapter 3

  When Ken finally phoned, early that evening, I was so worn down from worrying about Jannine I didn’t even chide him for not calling sooner.

  “I’ve missed you,” I told him instead.

  “Likewise," he replied.

  Ken is one of those Eastern blue bloods with patrician good looks and an equally well-bred sense of decorum. He is definitely not a man to wear his heart on his sleeve.

  “How are things coming along?” he asked, moving entirely too quickly from the “missing” part. His tone was tender, however, and I felt that familiar prickly sensation spread across my shoulders, almost as though he’d traced a path there with his fingers.

  “Slowly,” I said. “There’s no way I’m going to get out of here by mid-week. I guess there’s a lot more of my past in me than I realized. And now there’s this added complication.” I told him about Eddie’s death and my conversation with the young dispatcher that afternoon. “The idea of Jannine as a killer is preposterous. It would be laughable if it wasn’t so frightening.”

  “It was her gun.”

  “That’s hardly conclusive. They’re grasping at the first thing that comes along because it’s easy.”

  Ken gave one of those nondescript murmurs he’s so good at. “Well, it’s not your problem in any case.”

  “Jannine is my friend.”

  “She may also be a killer.” His tone was gentle still, but the tenderness had given way to the weight of logic. “You haven’t seen her in what, five years? You don’t have the slightest idea what’s been going on in her life.” He paused to let the point sink in, then added, with just a hint of reproachful, “Remember what happened when you got involved in Mary Ellen’s divorce?”

  That was something I would rather not have remembered. My young secretary had been emotionally wrung out from dealing with a manipulative husband and a divorce attorney who gave his client about as much compassion as a shark moving in for the kill. I offered a shoulder to cry on and as much moral support as I could muster.

  How was I to know that the sweet little thing who so willingly brought me coffee each morning had spent the previous twelve months systematically cleaning out her husband’s savings accounts and carrying on a torrid affair with his best friend? One afternoon the husband came looking for her — with a knife. When he discovered she was gone from the office, he went after me instead. Who knows what might have happened if the UPS delivery man, who happened to also be a karate instructor, hadn’t happened by just then?

  “This is different,” I told Ken. “I’ve known Jannine for my whole life practically. She’s the kindest person on earth. She is simply not capable of killing anyone.”

  He sighed. “Well, there’s nothing you can do, so don’t waste energy worrying about it.”

  His attitude irritated me, although he was right about the last part; there wasn’t a whole lot I could do. “How was the partners’ retreat?” I asked, looking to change the subject.

  Ken made a sound, a kind of verbal shrug. “You know how those affairs are, ‘work and pleasure’ usually translates into all work.”

  In fact, I knew only by proxy. Associates, even those approaching partnership, were not part of the firm’s inner workings. “And?” I asked pointedly, after a moment’s silence.

  Ken gave a kind of half laugh. “Latham will give you your review when you get back.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning he’s your supervising partner, not me.” There was something in his tone which added to my irritation. “I thought you were my partner in other ways,” I said. The ways that counted most.

  There was a pause, followed by an audible sigh. “Generally the comments were favorable, though a few people expressed concern about the amount of pro bono work and underbilled time you accrue.” That was nothing novel, and I knew exactly who those “few people” were. “And then there was that run-in you had with Heritage Development which, I might remind you, is one of our bigger clients.”

  “But what they were doing was illegal!”

  “Shady, maybe.”

  I let it drop; we’d argued this issue enough already. “So what are you trying to tell me, that I didn’t get jumped ahead to partner?” I hadn’t really expected it anyway. “That’s okay. At least now I’m a level six.”

  Ken was silent.

  My heart skipped a beat. “Aren’t I?” More silence. “Are you telling me I’m no longer on track for partner?”

  He hesitated. “No one is at the moment.”

  There’d been an outside chance I’d make partner a year early; I’d been hopeful but not overly optimistic. Instead, I’d been whacked clear out of the picture.

  “It’s been a tight year,” Ken explained. “A tight couple of years in fact. Profits are way down. There’s no way we can justify bringing in more partners. Not in the foreseeable future at any rate.”

  “But I’ve worked hard, done a good job. I got a commendation last year.”

  “It’s not personal, you know. The partners’ draws are way down, too.”

  As if that was any consolation.

  “I knew this would upset you. That’s why I didn’t want to get into it just now.” His voice softened. “I’m sorry, Kal, I know how disappointed you must be.”

  Disappointed wasn’t the half of it.

  “Why don’t you come on home next weekend, even if you haven’t finished things off up there. We’ll go out for an evening on the town, anywhere you’d like, get your mind off all this job stuff.”

  The idea had some appeal, but I was afraid if I went home I might never make it back to Silver Creek. Besides, I was feeling notably slighted by both the firm and Ken — hell, by life itself. And there was no way a nice meal could make up for it.

  “I’d better stay here and try to wind things up,” I told him.

  “Well, it’s your call. If you change your mind let me know.”

  I hung up with a heavy click, but Ken had beaten me to it My frustration fell on deaf ears.

  The Goodwill boxes beckoned, but I was not in the mood. Giving up all pretense of productive activity, I poured myself a glass of wine and turned on the television. Loretta ambled into the room and plopped down at my feet. The leftover hamburger I’d brought home from lunch had won her affections. Not that I was looking. I couldn’t understand why my father had decided to get himself a dog in the first place. And I didn’t know what in the world I was going to do with her now that he was gone.

  Sabrina had been my first thought, but as it turned out, her affection for living creatures was rather closely tied to their pedigrees. I don’t care much about pedigrees myself, but I didn’t have much use for four-legged creatures, either. I figured I’d probably have to run an ad in the paper. Maybe I’d throw her in with the truck or the Skill- saw I had to get rid. Package deal.

  I was well into a Star Tre
k re-run when the telephone rang again. I harbored a fleeting hope it was Ken, who had discovered, upon hanging up, how much he actually missed me.

  But it was Nona.

  I’d put off calling because I couldn’t decide what to tell her. The little I’d learned was secondhand information, not much better than gossip. I didn’t want to worry her unnecessarily. On the other hand, maybe she had reason to be worried.

  “Did you talk to Benson?” Her voice was hushed, as though she were trying not to be overheard.

  “He wasn’t in. No one was, in fact.”

  “So you didn’t talk to anyone?”

  “I spoke to the secretary, briefly. She wouldn’t give me the time of day.”

  Nona let out a sigh. “Then you didn’t learn anything at all?”

  There it was. “Nothing substantive,” I hedged. “I don’t think they’ve reached any conclusions just yet.”

  Nona’s voice was still faint, but it now had an edge to it. “There’s something you’re not telling me, isn’t there? Don’t try to keep me in the dark like some addled old lady, Kali. I want to know.”

  I’ve never been a good liar, and this hardly seemed the time to hone my skills. I told her about my conversation with the dispatcher. “But that’s only rumor. This woman could be completely wacko. For all I know she might not even work for the police department.”

  Nona wasn’t looking for easy assurances. “This is just what I was afraid of. Just what I knew would happen.” Her voice trailed off into a thin whisper.

  I felt terrible telling her over the phone. I should have gone there that afternoon, in person, where I could soften the impact with hugs and encouragement. I’d taken the easy way out and Nona was paying.

  “Will you help us, Kali? There have be leads the police aren’t following.”

  “I really haven’t got”

  She interrupted. “Please?”

  There was such trepidation in her voice I couldn’t refuse. Besides, I owed Nona and Jannine. Owed them far more than I would ever be able to repay. They’d been there for me when no one else was. They’d seen me through the tumultuous period of my mother’s death, when I’d felt abandoned and unloved and cheated by life itself. They’d been there in the years that followed as well, offering the affection and warmth my father was incapable of. Now it was my turn.