The Devil's Garden

by Richard Montanari

  Michael had already met with Falynn six times, once bringing her to his house in Eden Falls, hoping that spending some time with Charlotte and Emily and Abby might open her up. No such luck. Each time she sat, curled into a ball, completely closed off from the world, embraced by the cold arms of grief.

  Unless there was a continuance, today would probably be Michael’s last chance to prepare her for testimony. She had been subpoenaed by the defense, the judge had already ruled on the matter, and whether Michael liked it or not, she was going to take the stand.

  SHE LOOKED YOUNGER than fourteen, even younger than she had the last time Michael had seen her. She was slight and gamine, with light brown eyes and curly chestnut hair. She wore faded jeans and a burgundy sweatshirt, battered Frye boots, at least three sizes too big for her. Michael wondered if the boots had belonged to her father, if she had wadded-up paper towels in the toes.

  Then there was that face. The face of a sad angel.

  Falynn had been staying at a foster home in Jackson Heights since the murder. Michael had asked for a patrol car to pick her up and bring her to the office. He met her at the back entrance.

  As they rode up to the second floor, Michael tried to plot his strategy with the girl.

  He knew that if he could get her to open up in court, get her to look into the face of each juror – just once, just one heart-cinching time – he would put Patrick Ghegan on the gurney with a needle in his arm. And he knew why he wanted this so badly.

  As they walked down the hallway Michael watched her. She was observant, smart, ever aware of her surroundings. He knew she saw the Christmas lights that ran along the wall where it met the ceiling, lights no one had bothered to take down for more than five years.

  They walked through the small outer office into Michael’s office. Michael gestured to the sofa. “Would you like to sit here?”

  Falynn looked up. The slightest smile graced her lips, but she remained silent. She sat on the sofa, drew her legs under her.

  “Would you like a soda?”

  Silence.

  Michael reached into the small refrigerator next to his desk. Earlier in the day, the only things inside had been a single can of club soda and a bottle of Absolut. When Michael first met Falynn she walked in the room holding a diet Dr Pepper, so this morning he ran out and bought a six-pack of the soda. He hoped she still liked it. He popped a can out of the plastic, handed it to her. She took it and, after a minute or so, opened it, sipped.

  Michael took the chair next to her. He would give it a few minutes before trying again. This was their routine. In their six meetings, Falynn had listened to everything he had said, but said nothing in response. Twice she had begun to cry. The last time they met, at Michael’s house, he had simply held her hand until it was time for her to go.

  “Can I get you anything else?” Michael asked.

  Falynn shook her head, and curled into a ball at the end of the old leather sofa. Michael thought about how the mayor of New York City had once sat in the same place, toasting Michael’s success, a place now occupied by a young girl who might never breach the shell of heartache and sadness that surrounded her. He had never seen anyone so shut down in his life.

  He glanced at the file in his lap.

  Since her father’s murder, Falynn had run away from her foster home three times. The last time she was picked up for shoplifting. According to the police report, Falynn walked into a Lowe’s and shoplifted a package of peel-and-stick decals, the kind you put on the walls in a kid’s room. The decals were yellow daisies. When she walked past the security pedestals she set off the alarm.

  According to the report, the security guards gave chase, but Falynn got away. The guards called the police, gave them a description. An hour later Falynn was found by the police, sitting beneath an I-495 overpass, a place known as a refuge for the homeless. According to the report, Falynn was polite and respectful to the officers, and was peacefully taken into custody.

  The report also stated that police found the stolen decals stuck on the concrete columns under the overpass.

  Michael watched her. He had to start talking. He had to give this another try. Because if Falynn did not testify, there was only a fifty-fifty chance that Ghegan would be convicted on the scientific evidence. Even ballistics could be impeached.

  “As you know, the trial starts tomorrow,” Michael began, trying to sound conversational. “I’ll be honest with you, the defense attorney in this case is very good at what hedoes. I’ve seen him work many times. His name is John Feretti and he is going to ask you tough questions. Personal questions. It would be great if we could go over some of this before tomorrow. If we could get your story out first, it will be a lot better.”

  Falynn said nothing.

  Michael felt he had one last lever. He sat silently for a while, then stood, crossed over to the window. He shoved his hands in his pockets, rocked on his heels, chose his words carefully.

  “When I was really small we lived over on Ditmars, in this small second floor apartment. You know Ditmars Boulevard?”

  Falynn nodded.

  “I had my own room, but it wasn’t much bigger than my bed. I had a small second-hand dresser in the corner, a closet next to the door. The bathroom was down at the end of the hall, by my parent’s bedroom. Every night, right around midnight, I always had to go to the bathroom, but I was scared to death of walking past my closet. See, the door never closed all the way, and my father never got around to fixing it. For the longest time I was sure that there was something in there, you know? Some kind of monster ready to spring out and get me.”

  Falynn remained silent, but Michael could tell she knew what he was getting at.

  “Then one day my father installed a light in that closet. I kept that light on for the longest time. Months and months. Then one day I realized that, if there ever was a monster in there – and I’m still not convinced there wasn’t – the monster was gone. Monsters can’t stand the light.”

  Michael turned to look at Falynn. His fear was that he had put her to sleep with his admittedly ham-handed analogy. She was listening, though. She was still curled up in a ball, but she was listening.

  “If you testify tomorrow, you’ll be shining a light on Patrick Ghegan, Falynn. He will be exposed, and everyone will know who and what he is. If you testify we’ll be able to send him away, and he won’t be able to scare anyone or hurt anyone ever again.”

  Falynn did not look up at him. But Michael saw her eyes shift side to side, saw the wheels begin to slowly turn.

  Michael glanced back out the window. A few minutes passed, minutes during which Michael realized he had taken his best shot, and failed. He envisioned this broken young girl sitting on the witness stand, devastated by the murder of her father, adrift on an ocean of sorrow, unable to say a word. He saw Patrick Ghegan walking out of the courtroom a free man.

  “Everything is so ugly.”

  Michael spun around. The sound of Falynn’s voice was so foreign, so unexpected, Michael thought for a moment it had been in his head.

  “What do you mean?” he asked.

  Falynn shrugged. Michael feared for a moment that she was going quiet again. He crossed the room, sat near her on the couch.

  “What’s ugly?” he asked.

  Falynn picked up a magazine, began plucking away at the mailing label at the bottom. “Everything,” she said. “Everything in the world. Me.”

  Michael knew she was saying this to get a reaction, but when he looked into her eyes, he saw that she believed it in her heart. “What are you talking about? You’re a pretty young woman.”

  Falynn shook her head. “No I’m not. Not really. Sometimes I can’t even look at myself.”

  Michael decided to go for it. He had to. “Trust me on this. Except maybe for the hair, you’re very attractive.”

  Falynn looked sharply up at him. When she saw the smile on his face she laughed. It was a glorious sound. After a few moments – moments during which, consc
iously or unconsciously, Falynn Harris ran a hand through her hair – she turned silent again, but Michael knew the wall had fallen. He let her continue when she was ready.

  “What’s . . . what’s going to happen in there?” she finally asked.

  Michael’s heart galloped. It always did when he made a breakthrough. “Well, I’ll go into the courtroom with Mr Feretti and we will present any applications we might have – scheduling, legal, stuff like that. The judge might have an evidentiary ruling. There won’t be a jury or gallery for this. After that’s over, the jury will be seated and the trial will begin. After the opening statements you’re going to be sworn in, and I’m going to ask you questions about what happened that day. About what you saw.”

  “What will I have to do?”

  “All you have to do is tell the truth.”

  “Is he going to be there?”

  The “he” of course was Patrick Ghegan. “Yes he is. But he can’t hurt you. All you have to do is point him out once. After that, you don’t ever have to look at him again.”

  The truth was, Michael would rather have Falynn look directly into the eyes of the jurors. He knew that teenagers – especially teenaged girls – could either be the greatest witnesses or an absolute nightmare. Falynn’s strength was how innocent and vulnerable she looked, her soulful eyes. Michael knew that John Feretti was going to have his hands full trying to break this witness – a young girl who had seen her father murdered in cold blood.

  “We’re going to put him somewhere he can never hurt anyone else again,” Michael added. He was, of course, hoping for more than that. The DA was going to ask for the death penalty in this case. It was not the time to bring that up, however.

  Falynn stared out of the window a few moments. “Do you promise?”

  There it was, Michael thought. He had faced this moment before, specifically with the families of the employees murdered in the basement of that QuikBurger. He recalled Dennis McCaffrey standing before those men and women and making them a promise – the promise of finality, the promise of justice for their loved ones. Michael and Tommy had stood shoulder to shoulder that day and backed the DA’s pledge. It was a promise that nearly cost Michael his life. It was the Patrescu brothers who ordered the car bombing, the attempt on his life he had miraculously survived. In a twisted sense, the madness of that act had brought Michael his greatest joy: Abby and Emily and Charlotte.

  “Yes,” he said, before he could think about it any more. “I promise.”

  Falynn just nodded. She worried the edge of the magazine in her hands. After a few moments, she looked up. “How long does it all take?”

  “Well, that depends on a few things,” Michael began, his heart beginning to soar. It was that old feeling, the feeling that the wheels of justice had just engaged, and he loved it. “The first part of the trial begins tomorrow. He has his lawyer –”

  “And you’re my lawyer.”

  At that moment Michael thought about trying to explain it all to her. He considered explaining how, when a person is a victim of a homicide, it is the state of New York that advocates for the victim, not a single person.

  But all he could see was that face. That sad angel’s face.

  “Yes,” Michael Roman said. “I’m your lawyer.”

  SEVEN

  Aleks walked the city. From 38th Street and Park Avenue he headed south a few blocks and began to wind his way toward Times Square, passing many landmarks he had only read about. The vaunted Madison Avenue, the Empire State Building, Macy’s, Herald Square, the stately, magnificent New York Public Library.

  The city both dazzled and beguiled him. This was the center of the world. He wondered what effect a place like New York had had on his daughters, and what it would take to reverse such influence.

  He knew that all he had to do in a place like New York City was walk down a street, alerting his senses to the aromas, the sounds, the sights, the rhythms. Before long he would catch the tail end of a conversation in Russian, Lithuanian, German, Romanian. He would ask after places, seeking the world beneath the world. It did not take long.

  In a place called Bryant Park he found a pair of young Russian men who said they could help him find what he was looking for. For a small fee.

  They played their games, took their stances, asserted their manhood. Eventually Aleks, who played the thick foreigner for them, got what he wanted.

  THE FIRST BAR WAS call Akatu. It was a dirty, narrow place on West End Avenue in the Sheepshead Bay section of Brooklyn, a place smelling of old grease and sour tobacco. The tavern was half-full at midday, had a parochial feel to it, as if strangers were not welcome, or at the least needed to be watched. Aleks understood. When he entered, he sensed all eyes on him. Some conversations halted.

  As he made his way to the rear of the bar, there were two husky men talking softly, blocking his path. They did not move as he approached, holding their small piece of ground, as violent men will do, forcing Aleks to skirt them by, hugging the wall. One man was thick-waisted and muscular, nearly Aleks’s size. He looked bloated, muscle-bound only, perhaps pumped from a just-finished workout. The other was shorter, also solid, but more likely the one to be carrying a weapon. He wore a cheap and oversized wool blazer in the too-warm bar. Aleks walked around them, giving them their territorial due. For the moment.

  Aleks ordered a Russian coffee and a shot. As he put his hands on the counter, pushing forth a twenty, the barman saw his tattoo, the mark of the vennaskond. The man looked confused for a second – the mark was not nearly as well known as the Russian vory – but his face soon registered the truth. This was a man to be reckoned with. Aleks saw the bartender nod to the two men behind Aleks, and in the mirror he saw them give him some room.

  Aleks asked a few questions of the bartender, letting on just enough to get the answers he sought, but give away nothing. After a few moments of conversation he discovered this man could not help him. But the bartender did have the name of a bar and another man who might be able to help.

  The bartender excused himself, moved a few stools down, poured a refill to an older, bottle-blond woman who smoked unfiltered cigarettes and read a Russian newspaper. Her lipstick was the color of dried blood.

  By the time the bartender returned, Aleks’s twenty had turned into a fifty, and the big man in the black leather coat was gone.

  The liquor remained untouched.

  THE SECOND PLACE, a Russian restaurant on Flatbush Avenue, produced no results, other than to lead Aleks to a third place, a café in Bayview. It was a stand-alone brick building, dark and smoky, and when Aleks entered he was greeted by the hiss of the samovar, the sound of an old Journey song on the jukebox, and the shouts of men playing cards in a back room. He mind-catalogued the room: Four hard men around a pool table to the left, to the right, at the coffee bar sat a klatch of old-timers from the Ukraine. They nodded at Aleks, who returned the greeting.

  He asked about Konstantine. The men claimed to not know him. They were lying. Aleks had two more places on his list to visit.

  He turned, saw the REST ROOMS sign at the rear of the bar. He’d make a comfort stop first.

  As he walked the length of the tavern, Aleks sensed a presence. When he turned, there was no one there, no one following him.

  He continued, descending the steps. He found the men’s room at the end of a short basement hallway. He opened the door partially, flipped on the light. Nothing. The room remained dark. It smelled of dried urine and disinfectant. He opened the door fully, checked for the light fixture, and in that split second a shadow stole from the darkness like a spirit, a gleam of steel catching his eye.

  In the moment before the blade plunged towards his back, Aleks stepped to the side. The blade crashed into the drywall. Aleks shifted his weight, pivoted, slamming his left knee into the groin of his assailant, bringing a forearm down onto the hand holding the knife. The man grunted, buckled, but instead of hitting the floor he too shifted weight, exposing a second knife, this one a
long steel filet. It was headed for Aleks’s stomach. Aleks grabbed the man by his thick wrist, powering back the arm. He slipped a leg between the other man’s legs and brought him to the floor. Before he could get the Barhydt out of its sheath the attacker slammed a fist into his jaw, momentarily stunning him.

  In a tangle of arms and legs, the two men crashed into the walls of the dark hallway, each seeking leverage. Moments later, Aleks brought a fist to his assailant’s jaw – three powerful blows that took away the fight. The man slumped to the floor.

  Bleeding from both the nose and mouth, his hands sore from striking bone, Aleks stood, steadied himself against the rotted plaster wall. He turned the man over, took one of the man’s arms in a scissor lock. When his eyes adjusted to the dim light, he looked at the man’s face.

  It was Konstantine. But it was not. The man had Konstantine’s broad forehead, his deep-set eyes, but somehow had not aged a day since he and Aleks had been in the federal army together.

  “Who are you?” Aleks asked.

  The young man wiped the blood from his nose. “Fuck your mother.”

  Aleks almost laughed. If he was in Estonia, and knew that there would be no consequences to his actions, he would have drawn his blade and opened the man’s throat, just for the insult. “I think you are not understanding the question.” He tightened his grip on the young man’s arm, exerted more downward pressure. If he wanted, he could simply apply the leverage of his full body weight, and the arm would snap. Right now, he wanted to. “Who are you?”

  The young man screamed once, a sharp growl, the muscles in his neck cording, his skin a bright crimson. “Fuck . . . you.”

  And Aleks knew.

  This was Konstantine’s son.

  THEY SAT IN a back room on the first floor of the tavern. With a nod of his head, the young man who had tried to kill Aleks just moments earlier had cleared the room of card players. They sat among cardboard boxes of alcohol, napkins, bar food. The young man held a bag of ice to his face.