The Jury Master

by Robert Dugoni

  He considered the open cabinet doors and empty shelves; their contents were spilled everywhere, dried goods mixed with plates, cups, and silverware. The pungent smell of balsamic vinegar filled the room. “What happened here?”

  She continued to dab at his forehead with the washcloth. “You have been burgled,” she said, eyes widening. “The horrible mess, Mr. David.”

  He gripped the edge of the tiled counter and pulled himself to his feet, his shoes slipping on the floor.

  Melda stood. “I am going to call for you a doctor.”

  “No. I’m okay. Just give me a second to get my bearings.”

  She dried her hands on a dish towel. “The mess. Mr. David, it is everywhere.”

  He walked into the living room holding on to the counter for balance and flicked on the lights. Melda was right. The mess was everywhere. Glass showered the carpet. The television tube had literally exploded. A paperback floated in the fish tank. Even the heating vent covers had been pried from the walls. Melda sobbed behind him.

  Sloane turned and hugged her, feeling her tiny frame tremble. “It’s okay, Melda. Everything is going to be okay.” He spoke softly until she stopped shaking. “Why don’t you make us a pot of tea,” he suggested.

  “I’ll make for you some tea.” She said it as if the idea had been her own, and walked into the kitchen to retrieve the kettle.

  Sloane walked through the apartment, not knowing where to begin.

  “Did you hear anything, Melda? Did you see anyone?” Sloane found it hard to believe, given the level of destruction, that it could have gone on unnoticed or unheard.

  She filled the pot under the faucet. “I hear nothing, but I am out on the Thursdays . . . my dancing night.” She belonged to a seniors group through a local Catholic church. “This morning I come to clean and I find this,” she said. “I go back down the stairs and call the police. Now I come back and you are in the kitchen, but it is dark and my eyes . . . Oh, Mr. David, I am so sorry.”

  Sloane stood in the center of the room considering his destroyed possessions, mentally replacing them where he last recalled them. Curious, he walked through the living room to the bedroom and turned on the light. His mattress had been torn apart like the couch, his closet emptied. But that was not of immediate concern. His immediate concern sat in plain view on the nightstand next to his bed, a gift from an appreciative client.

  His Rolex watch.

  8

  The Department of Justice,

  Washington, D.C.

  RIVERS JONES RECLINED against the cream-colored leather, rocking rhythmically and twisting a bent paper clip along his thumb and index finger while waiting for his call to be connected. He dropped the brown-bag lunch his wife had made for him into the waste can, along with a cold cup of coffee, and picked at a half-eaten bran muffin. He fixed his gaze on the ornately framed diplomas hanging in his drab government office: S. RIVERS JONES IV.

  He had long since dropped the “S,” which few knew stood for Sherman, and the Roman numeral, which stood for “pretentious” if you were anywhere but in the Deep South. Well, he was no longer riding with the good old boys, driving their trucks with mud flaps and spittin’ Skoal through the gap in their two front teeth, and he wasn’t going back. Not ever. He longed for the day when he would never again have to look at the two oversize pieces of paper on his wall, reminders of a career choice his father had dictated. If not for the massive heart attack that killed the son of a bitch, Jones had no doubt he’d be admiring his diplomas right now in an office with a view of downtown Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

  Jones picked off another piece of the muffin and tilted back his head to avoid getting crumbs on his suit. Parker Madsen’s call had awoken him from a sound sleep. Unlike the general, he was not one for getting up at the crack of dawn for calisthenics and revelry. He had just enough time to shower and shave—the shit had to wait—to get to the West Wing on time. Madsen demanded punctuality. The guy was a trip, with his “yes sirs” and “no sirs” and all that crap, but the inside word in Washington was that Madsen would be on the Republican party ticket as Robert Peak’s next running mate. That put Madsen directly in line for a presidential bid. No wonder he had his butt cheeks pinched tight over Joe Branick’s death. With the economy continuing to spiral down the toilet, unemployment and inflation going in the opposite direction, and terrorism against U.S. interests escalating, the unexpected suicide of a man supposed to be the president’s closest confidant couldn’t help matters. The general was looking out for number one, which was fine with Jones. He didn’t care who he hitched his wagon to, as long as he was taken along for the ride.

  Jones had just hung up after a chat with the Jefferson County coroner. Dr. Peter Ho had offered no resistance. Not surprising. Most county employees were lazy. Ho was likely relieved he wouldn’t have to do an autopsy over the weekend. In a moment Jones would make things just as clear to the Charles Town detective, and he, too, would undoubtedly be relieved to have a file off his desk. The matter would be as good as closed, and Jones would have another powerful ally in his corner.

  Jones’s secretary interrupted his thoughts to tell him that she had placed his call. He sat forward, wondering how the title “Congressman” or “Senator” would look on a framed piece of paper.

  CLAY BALDWIN SCOOTED forward, the legs of the stool scraping on the linoleum. He drummed the counter a little faster with each unanswered ring. The assistant United States attorney’s secretary had made it clear he did not want to be put into voice mail. Baldwin rotated to consider the white eraser board on which he had printed the name of every member of the department. Ordinarily an orange magnet beneath the word “In” indicated the officer should answer his damn phone, but it didn’t mean squat if the name on the board was Molia. Tom Molia forgot about the board coming and going, and Baldwin was starting to get the feeling the detective’s memory lapses were intentional.

  Baldwin stood, braced for the shock of pain that shot down his leg to his numbed right foot, and grimaced as he stretched the telephone cord to look through the venetian blinds covering the wire-mesh window. Sure enough, Molia stood in the middle of the room, entertaining Marty Banto and a couple of uniformed officers with more hand gestures and facial expressions than a teenage girl.

  Baldwin yelled through the glass, “Hey, Mole!”

  Tom Molia paused, looked up at Baldwin, and waved.

  Baldwin pointed to the phone. “I . . . have . . . a . . . call . . . for . . . you.”

  Molia held his hands to his heart and mouthed back, “I . . . love . . . you . . . too . . . Clay.”

  Banto and the officers burst out in silent laughter.

  Son of a bitch. “Pick up the goddamn phone, Mole!” Baldwin watched Molia walk to his desk and lift the receiver. “Damn it, Mole. I’m not playing grab-ass out here. Answer your damn phone.”

  “Wasn’t sure what you were doing, Clay. I thought you were doing a little Irish jig out there. You got that foot-stomping thing going again.”

  Baldwin stopped stomping his foot. “My foot fell asleep . . . and I’m English, not Irish. What do you think I’m doing? I have a call for you.”

  “A call. Well, for God’s sake, Baldy, who is it, the queen herself?”

  Baldwin let out a slow hiss. He knew that cops liked to abbreviate last names, but the nickname Tom Molia had bestowed on him also happened to accurately describe the number of hairs on his head, which continued to dwindle daily.

  “It’s a U.S. attorney from the Department of Justice.”

  “Well, hell, Baldy, why didn’t you say so? Enough of the chitchat. Don’t keep the person waiting. Put him through.”

  “I told you—”

  “Time’s a-wasting, Clay.”

  Remembering the assistant U.S. attorney’s admonition, Baldwin hurried back to the counter and transferred the call.

  TOM MOLIA GAVE Clay Baldwin a thumbs-up as he answered the phone. “This is Detective Tom Molia.”

  “Detective
Molia,” a woman responded, “are you available to take a call from Assistant United States Attorney Rivers Jones?”

  It was one of those strange Southern names, which was perhaps the reason for the pretentious formality. Molia was half tempted to tell the woman, “Sure, have him call me,” and hang up, but decided against it. “Put him through,” he said, and sat down at a desk that looked as though it hadn’t been cleaned in years.

  “Detective Molia?”

  “How you guys doing over there at Justice this morning, Rivers? You keeping cool or sweating buckets like us?” Molia leaned back in his chair and placed his feet on the corner of the desk, knocking papers and manila folders onto the worn linoleum. A small portable fan oscillated on an antiquated metal filing cabinet in an office that could have held two desks comfortably but into which three had been squeezed. Paperwork obscured framed pictures of wives and children, and the walls were an assortment of wanted posters, memos, and other oddities. A black silhouette torso from the shooting range with a bullet hole directly in the forehead was tacked in the center of the wall, with multiple dart holes. Two darts pierced it. A third dart lay on the floor near the detective’s desk.

  “We’re fine, Detective. I’m in an air-conditioned office.”

  “Well, be grateful for that, ’cause it’s going to be hot again today, I’m told.”

  “You handled the Joe Branick matter, Detective?”

  “You mean the suicide?”

  “Yes, Detective Molia, I mean the suicide.” Jones spoke in a deliberate, put-you-to-sleep drone.

  “No formal report yet, but it’s mine. My luck. I’ve been busier than a jackrabbit in heat the last week. I mean work, you know?” Molia lowered his legs, picked up the dart from the floor, and tossed it at the target, hitting the figure in the shoulder. He shuffled through papers on his desk. “At least this one looks pretty cut-and-dried. They found the guy a couple hundred yards from his car. Single bullet wound to the temple. Gun in his hand. Spent casing. Fired at close range. Probably not going to find the bullet, given the terrain. Powder burns on right hand and temple . . . yadda yadda yadda. I’ve ordered a ballistics test. Doesn’t get much simpler than this.”

  Simple, except that no one had yet heard from Bert Cooperman, and despite assurances that Coop had put in for a vacation leave, there was no answer at his home, the cruiser was not parked out in front of Cooperman’s house, and now the Justice Department was taking notice of an open-and-shut suicide. The ache in Molia’s gut had become a pain that the roll of Tums and two swallows of the Pepto-Bismol he kept in his desk drawer hadn’t dampened.

  “On whose authority did you order a ballistics test, Detective?”

  Molia laughed. “On whose authority? What, are you kidding, Rivers? I got a dead man. I got a gun. I got a dead man holding a gun. I order a ballistics test. Don’t need any authority for that.” He heard Jones take a deep breath. “You got asthma, Rivers? I get a touch of hay fever this time of year myself.”

  “I’m sure you followed normal procedure, Detective Molia—”

  “Mole.”

  “Excuse me?” Jones asked, his tone annoyed.

  “Call me Mole. I haven’t heard ‘Detective Molia’ in years. You keep calling me Detective Molia and I’m liable to start looking around the room for my father. Love to see him, though it would scare the crap out of me—he’s been dead going on six years.”

  “Yes, Detective, Molia,” Jones said. “As I was saying, I’m sure the ballistics test is routine, but this death . . . This man . . . was a White House staff member and a personal friend of the president.”

  “Yeah, I think I read that somewhere.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Well, you tell the president he doesn’t need to sweat this one, Rivers. I’ll see to it personally.”

  There was a pause. “I’m sure you would handle the matter adequately, Detective.”

  Molia heard a “but” coming, and as his son T.J. liked to say, it was a big butt. The assistant U.S. attorney did not disappoint him.

  “But not this time. The Department of Justice will handle this matter. You are to cease any further work and transfer your files to me.”

  “All due respect to you and the president, Riv, but the body—”

  “Detective Molia, did you just call me Riv? Let me explain some-thing. I don’t have a nickname. I have a title. I am an assistant United States attorney. That’s with the Department of Justice. And that is where you will send your file. Do I make myself clear?”

  Molia had been willing to give Jones the benefit of the doubt, to assume he was overworked and stressed like most government types and had simply left his manners at home, but he really hated it when people dropped authority on him. His father had been fond of saying that titles were like assholes—everyone had one. In Washington, some people had two, which usually made them twice the asshole.

  “Well, that is a mouthful, isn’t it?” he said. “You sure you’re in an air-conditioned office, Rivers? You’re sounding a little hot under the collar this morning.”

  “As I was saying—”

  “Actually, I was the one talking, Rivers. You interrupted me. Not the first time, either, I might add. And what I was saying was, all due respect to you and the president, but the body was found in West Virginia by a Charles Town police officer. That makes it a local police problem—or, more specifically, since I was the lucky son of a gun to get up at the crack of dawn and leave my comfy bed to drive out there, it makes it my problem.”

  “Not any longer,” Jones hissed. “The Department of Justice’s jurisdiction supersedes your jurisdiction, and the White House has personally requested that this office handle the investigation. Any attempt by you to interfere will be met with harsh penalties.

  Do I make myself clear, Detective?”

  “What investigation?”

  What followed was what some people liked to call a “pregnant

  pause,” but what Molia called “bullshit time.” Rivers Jones, assistant United States attorney with the Department of Justice, was pulling his tongue out of the back of his throat, buying bullshit time, stalling for an answer.

  “Excuse me?”

  “You said ‘investigation,’ Rivers. What investigation are you talking about?”

  “If I said ‘investigation,’ I misspoke. Force of habit. I meant to say ‘matter.’ We will handle this matter.”

  Not good enough. “You didn’t misspeak. You said the White House has asked you to conduct an investigation. Clearly, I might add.”

  There was another pause. Now Jones was about to get angry, which was also predictable. When you pushed a person who didn’t have a good answer, they either crumbled or got angry. Again the assistant United States attorney did not disappoint him.

  “Detective Molia, are you fucking with me? Because if you are, I want you to know I don’t find it the least bit amusing. I don’t have the time. My orders come from the president of the United fucking States. If those orders are good enough for me, I sure as hell know they are good enough for you.”

  Molia removed the pencil from behind his ear and sat forward, sticking the pencil in a half-eaten hamburger on a piece of grease-stained yellow wax paper. He’d pushed a button, as intended, and Jones didn’t have the brains or temperament to talk his way out of it. People with something to hide were either evasive or aggressive. Jones was both. In the process he’d likely made two mistakes, letting Molia know there was an investigation and that the White House was involved. His stomach was never wrong.

  “Well, Assistant United States Attorney Rivers Jones, I’m just a police detective trying to do the job I swore to do to the best of my abilities twenty years ago. So until I receive the proper authority from my superiors, I will conduct my investigation in the interest that is best for the people of Jefferson . . . fucking . . . County.”

  “Who is your authority, Detective Molia?”

  “That would be Police Chief J. Rayburn Franklin . . . th
e Third,” he said, and heard Rivers Jones hang up.

  9

  Law Offices of Foster & Bane,

  San Francisco

  SLOANE STEPPED FROM the elevator and hurried through a reception area of Italian marble, Persian throw rugs, leather furniture, and artwork secured to the walls. Similarly furnished reception areas greeted clients on each of Foster & Bane’s five floors: expensive decor befitting a firm of nearly a thousand lawyers generating $330 million in annual revenues in offices scattered throughout the United States, Europe, and Hong Kong.

  Sloane was behind schedule; the police had taken their time getting to his apartment. Once there, they appeared less than interested, asking the obligatory questions, which was as far as their investigation would go. Sloane had no clue who had trashed his apartment, or why, and since nothing of value was taken, not even the Rolex, he figured pawnshops wouldn’t be of any help, either. He suffered through the exercise because he knew enough about insurance companies to know that his insurer’s first question would be whether he had filed a police report. Now that the report was out of the way, he needed to file the claim, and he kept his insurance information at the office.

  At just before eleven o’clock, the office would be in full swing, which meant answering questions about why a man who was supposed to be on his first vacation in five years was at the office. He decided to keep his answer simple. He was just tying up a loose end before leaving town.

  He strode past the receptionist on the nineteenth floor, framed by a panoramic view of the San Francisco Bay stretching from Angel Island to the Bay Bridge, and leaned around the corner. The hallway was empty, though he heard voices spilling from the offices—associates toiling to secure “billable hours.” More precious than gold, billable hours were the means big law firms used to measure associate productivity and commitment to the firm—not to mention to bill their clients for their services.