"Sit down."
"What—"
"I said sit down."
She stumbled into the chair.
Jackie's voice came from far away. Gail, are you all right? Answer me. Dodson stood up, reached over the desk, and took the phone out of her hand. He closed it and pushed it aside.
"Move and I'll kill you."
Terrified into immobility, Gail could only stare up at him.
He laughed. "That sounds funny, doesn't it? Move and I'll kill you. I must have heard it on TV. But I do mean it. Please don't get up, Ms. Connor, oh, please don't, because I probably would shoot you. Just sit there and let me think."
Her mouth had gone dry. "I don't understand."
"Yes, you do. She told you, didn't she?" He burst into a laugh. "It's so funny. It really is. Rusty Beck. You want me to help you get him. You want him executed instead. So much death." Suddenly moaning, Dodson ran a hand over his head. The barrel of the gun jerked erratically. "I don't know what to do." His fist came down on a stack of files, and they slid to the floor.
Gail's heart fluttered in the fragile cage of her chest. "Please don't. Please."
"They're probably on their way. We have to leave." He began to open drawers. "What can I take? Nothing. Nothing." He slammed the center drawer, then swung the gun toward her. "I said don't move!" He bared his teeth, and his eyes glittered.
"Oh, my God. It was you."
He picked up the portrait of his wife and child. "This is the only thing I want to take with me. It's all that matters. Amber. Sweet angel." He pressed his lips to the glass.
There were sirens in the distance, coming closer.
Gail moved slowly forward in her chair, ready to slide off and run.
Arm extended, Dodson swung the pistol, aiming it directly at her. "We're leaving now." His face was splotched red with emotion and shiny with tears. "You have to come with me. I can't do this alone."
The piercing wail of sirens surrounded them, and finally, he heard.
"They're coming. It's too late." He hugged the portrait to his chest. "God forgive me."
Jackie bailed out of the pickup truck in the middle of the street. She had reached the scene first, but a patrol car hit the brakes behind her, and another squealed around the corner at the end of the block, emergency lights flashing.
She took the steps in one leap.
"Bryce!" One of the officers shouted across the yard. "Hold on. Wait for backup!"
The door was locked. No one was inside the office. She slammed the butt of her Glock 19 through the glass and reached around for the dead bolt. "Dammit, dammit, come on."
Just as she turned the bolt, she heard a gunshot. She pushed the door open. Holding the pistol extended in both hands, she ran for the entry to the hallway and pressed herself against the living room wall. Three officers came in after her, guns drawn. More sirens were closing in.
She shouted, "Police! Drop your weapon and come out, hands on your head. Now!"
Gail's voice screamed back at her. "Jackie!"
She looked quickly into the hall. Gail stumbled through a door at the end and dropped to her knees. The front of her dress was flecked with blood.
"He's dead." She leaned against the wall, weeping.
CHAPTER 26
Monday evening, April 9
It was past nine o'clock when Anthony was finally able to free Gail from the detectives at the City of Stuart Police Department. They had questioned her like a potential suspect—customary in such cases. They had swabbed her hands for traces of gunpowder and listened with professional skepticism to her disjointed explanations of why Gary Dodson had put a bullet in his brain.
Returning to the hotel on Hutchinson Island, Anthony turned on the light and locked the door. He told Gail to go take a hot shower and change her clothes. No reply. She paced across the living room to the glass patio doors and back again, twisting her hands at her waist. Her dress was spattered with blood: rust-colored spots on pale blue linen.
"If only I had lied to them. I could have said he confessed. It might have made a difference." Her hair was wild and uncombed. She had rinsed out the blood in the law office bathroom before calling Anthony on her cell phone. She told him what Jackie had found: The air conditioner in the Dodson house had been running all day, chilling Amber's dead body. Anthony, please hurry.
Breaking speed limits to get there, Anthony created the murder scene in his mind. Dodson and his wife had argued that morning, another in a series of arguments between a frustrated, unhappy young woman and a man staggering under the weight of his financial, sexual, and moral failures. It started in the kitchen. He grabbed a knife and stabbed her. She ran for the bedroom. In the hall he nearly caught up, ripping out a handful of her hair. She tried to close the door, but he pushed it open, and the impact sent her staggering backward. He knocked her onto the bed, raised the knife, plunged it into her, again and again, blood flying from the point of the knife across the headboard, up the wall, to the ceiling. She was dead, this young woman in her red silk panties and top, and he kept stabbing until he was exhausted.
What then? Sanity returned.
He ripped the clock cord from the wall and wound it tightly around her throat. He reset the clock. Then a shower. A shave. Dressing for the office as if this were any other morning. A call to Amber's work— the call overheard by Whit McGrath and Rusty Beck. A call to the baby's day care center. Two bottles in the crib. And before leaving, Gary closed the bedroom windows, pulled the curtains, and turned the air conditioner to its lowest setting. He made sure during the day to remain in sight. At 10:00 a.m. he faked a phone call to his wife. Returning home at the normal time, he turned off the AC, opened the windows, and went to check on his son. The anguish in the call to 911 had been real. Grief and shock disguised his guilt, and a mistaken eyewitness turned the police in another direction.
Only Jackie Bryce, twelve years later, had noticed the great quantity of water under the AC drip pipe. But what did a puddle of water prove, when Kenny Ray Clark had been tried and convicted of the crime?
"Gail, please. We're going to call Governor Ward in the morning. You should get some rest."
"But he won't listen," she cried. "He won't. I'm the lawyer for a guilty man. He'll think I'm lying. You saw how the police reacted. They almost laughed in Jackie's face. The governor isn't going to pay any attention." She fumbled for his hands with trembling fingers. "Anthony, we've got to do something. It isn't fair! We can't let this happen!"
He brought her hands to his chest and held them tightly. "We will talk to Whit McGrath. He knows Kenny is innocent. He's known it all along."
"You're right," Gail said. "Now. Let's go to his house now." Gail looked around for her purse, then noticed her dress. "All this blood. I don't care. Let him see it. That should give him a shock."
"Not tonight, tomorrow," Anthony said.
"We've got less than two days!" She took a shaky breath to quiet her voice. "All right, tomorrow. But you go. Please. You can do it. I'm afraid I'd screw it up. I shouldn't have taken this case. I had to be strong. I don't know why, but I don't care about that anymore. We have to save Kenny now."
"Amorcito, of course I'll go. Whit McGrath has to listen this time. He doesn't have a choice. Hector will have the photographs of the car by tomorrow morning. Don't worry. I'll talk to him."
"Do you think it will work?" Gail's eyes fixed on him, moving back and forth on his. She wanted hope, but not to be lied to.
Anthony was surprised to hear the words come so easily, even more surprised to find that he believed them. "Yes. I think we have a good chance." He kissed her forehead. "A very good chance. Let me take care of it."
Sometime in the night Gail slipped out of bed and closed the door softly behind her. Taking her cell phone, she went out onto the balcony. Her view was a heavy black sky and stars that seemed to pierce through it with a strange blue intensity. She slid the glass door shut and sat down to dial Jackie's number. She answered on the second ring.
>
"Jackie, it's me ... No, I'm fine. Sorry to call so late ... You too, huh? Well, Anthony is sleeping like a rock. Listen, I didn't get a chance to tell you this earlier, with everything going on. I love you. Really. You're so great. You were wonderful today, oh my God, coming in there with your gun drawn, but even more than that, how you stood by me. I mean, there I was, babbling away like a crazy woman, and you took such good care of me.... No, you are wonderful. And you're my cousin too, so I'm entitled to be gushy. . . . I want to tell you what's going on. Tomorrow Anthony is going to see Whit McGrath.... He says he can probably talk him into it, and I've got my fingers crossed, but this case has been so tough, right from the start.... Jackie, in case it doesn't work, we're going to be up against the wall.... The chances of the Supreme Court granting a stay are extremely remote. So I was wondering if you could talk to Garlan. . . . It's a long shot, but he might, if you explain it to him I don't know what else to do, Jackie. I've never been through anything like this in my life. I'm so damned tired. It's made me think about who I really am, and what I do, and whether I want to keep on being a lawyer, and I don't think I do.... Seriously. I used to think I was pretty good at this, but... No, things don't always look better in the morning, unfortunately...."
Gail leaned her head on her updrawn knees and stared out at the ocean. "What would I do? I don't know, Jackie. I don't know."
Tuesday morning, April 10
Sunlight slanted through the open patio doors, and a slight breeze lifted the curtains. Anthony poured a cup of coffee from the room service carafe and kept an eye on the television. He kept the volume low. Gail was still asleep.
The NBC affiliate based in West Palm led with the Dodson story. A woman news anchor said, "Yesterday in Stuart the husband of a murder victim took his own life as the attorney for his wife's convicted killer looked on." There was footage of Dodson's law office, the body being taken out on a gurney, a small crowd watching from behind yellow crime scene tape. "Gary Dodson, forty-four, a Stuart real estate attorney, was said to be despondent over the 1989 murder of his wife, Amber, and their baby son. The man found guilty of the crime, Kenneth Ray Clark, is currently on death row, scheduled to die by lethal injection on Wednesday."
Kenny's face appeared, taken from the Department of Corrections Web site, a sullen man in a bright orange shirt. Anthony said, "So now you are accused of murdering the baby too."
The reporter's voice continued, "One of Clark's attorneys, Gail Connor, was in Dodson's office discussing the case when Dodson allegedly took out his gun and inflicted the fatal wound. In a surprising twist, Connor and her co-counsel, Anthony Quintana, both of Miami, say that Dodson was actually his wife's killer, and that their client is innocent."
Anthony looked at his own face under the glare of lights. The station had edited out most of what he had said. "Dodson got away with it for twelve years, but when he realized that Ms. Connor knew the truth, he shot himself. Kenny Clark was wrongfully convicted and sentenced to die for another man's crime."
The reporter reappeared on the screen. "Martin County Sheriffs Office Lieutenant Ronald Kemp was the lead investigator in the Dodson case."
The picture switched to Kemp, who said, "There's no evidence whatsoever linking Gary Dodson to the murder of his wife. Ms. Connor claims that Dodson acknowledged his guilt. Unfortunately he's dead, and we have only her word to go on."
The reporter came back. "Keep it here for further developments at noon. In other news, brush fires in western Palm Beach County continue to—"
Anthony turned off the television. He had seen enough. Police and news media were disregarding everything Gail had said.
He stood in front of the decorative mirror over the wet bar in the living room to put on his tie. His shirt was spotless white-on-white, custom-tailored. His cufflinks were monogrammed gold. He wore only one ring, an onyx and diamond, and his slim Cartier watch. He pulled back his cuff. The watch said 7:12. McGrath customarily arrived at his company's main office in West Palm Beach at 8:00.
There was time for another cup of coffee. Anthony needed a jolt of café cubano, but this weak stuff would have to do. Room service had brought the morning newspapers along with breakfast, and he laid them out on the counter in the small kitchen.
The Stuart News. Front page photograph of the gurney being taken down the steps. Smaller photos of Dodson, Amber, Kenny Clark. LOCAL ATTORNEY COMMITS SUICIDE AFTER ACCUSATION THAT HE KILLED WIFE.
"I see," Anthony murmured. "It's Gail Connor's fault."
The story continued inside, but there was nothing about the crime scene photos, the extra bottle of milk, the hands of the clock that had been set ahead. Reporters had uncovered Jackie Bryce's connection to the story. The irony was too good to pass up. Sheriff’s daughter involved in defense of man her father put away for murder. Gail Connor's cousin, twenty-five-year-old rookie on the Stuart Police Department, working for Clark's attorneys. "Police sources say that Officer Bryce had access to official crime scene photographs. Bryce alerted Connor about the condensation from the air conditioner, which led to Connor's belief that Dodson had cooled his wife's body to confuse the time of death."
A terse comment from Garlan Bryce: "My daughter has no access to our files. The photographs were obtained by Ms. Connor through a court order."
It was too bad about Jackie. She was already beginning to suffer the consequences of being on the wrong side.
Anthony closed The Stuart News and opened The Palm Beach Post. Same basic story. MURDER VICTIM’S WIFE’S KILLER ACCUSE HUSBAND. FAMILY SAYS DODSON DESPONDENT OVER DEATH OF WIFE.
He found what he was looking for, the official reaction from the state attorney's office. Sonia Krause: "A jury found Kenneth Ray Clark guilty of the murder of Amber Dodson, and last week the Florida Supreme Court once again reviewed the evidence and once again upheld his conviction. It is unfortunate that Clark's lawyers are interpreting this tragic event as evidence of their client's innocence."
The Florida Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers had issued a statement to the press: "We support the call to stop this execution and order a full investigation."
Lines were being drawn. The police and prosecutor denied that anything had changed. The condemned man's lawyers had introduced a potentially dangerous challenge to the accepted version of the facts. Governor Ward would have to respond, if he wanted to maintain the legitimacy of Clark's execution.
But first, the governor would get a call from his friend, Whit McGrath.
The JWM Corporation occupied a Mediterranean-style building overlooking downtown West Palm, the sparkling blue intracoastal, and the island of Palm Beach on the other side. Whit McGrath's office took up a corner of the top floor, a massive expanse of marble and glass.
A large man in a suit stood just inside the wood-paneled door, his hands loosely clasped in front of him. He had patted Anthony down before letting him into the office. Anthony found this to be more an amusement than an annoyance. It proved that McGrath was a coward.
The size of the office prevented the man at the door from hearing Anthony tell McGrath why he had come, or from seeing the six black-and-white, eight-by-ten-inch photographs laid out in a row on the desk. Hector's friends had been busy last night, thirty feet down in murky water. The flash illuminated weeds, rocks, rotten vegetation, and a car resting upside down under a thick layer of silt.
Giving McGrath time to grasp his situation, Anthony went over to the windows to watch the boats going up and down the intracoastal. Tinted glass muted the glare of morning sun. He could see his own reflection and that of McGrath standing at the desk.
"Well. This is déjà vu. When you and Ms. Connor came to my house with your threats, I thought I'd seen the last of it."
"Then we didn't have the photographs. Now we do." Anthony turned around. "You have no choice, McGrath. Call the governor."
Making a noncommittal noise, McGrath glanced at another photograph, then spun it to his desk. "That car could be anywhere. There isn't a can
al in South Florida without a car in it."
"It isn't a canal, it's a sinkhole, and it's on your property."
"You didn't open the trunk."
"We didn't want to be accused of tampering with the evidence. You know what is in the trunk. What you should be thinking about is what the police will make of it. They will see that you needed title to the Mendozas' ten acres to finalize a two-million-dollar loan. The Mendozas wouldn't sell. You instructed Dodson to falsify his opinion of title. You forged the deed, then you told Rusty Beck to kill the Mendozas and dispose of their bodies. Four people. An entire family."
Slouching against his desk, arms crossed, McGrath shook his head. "That's a pretty wild story, Quintana."
Anthony calmly went on. "Gary Dodson might eventually have turned you in, but you had something to hold over his head—the knowledge that he murdered his wife." Anthony spread his hands apart. "And there it is. Make the phone call."
With a low chuckle, McGrath paced along the edge of his oriental carpet, then back. The man at the door watched. McGrath patted his coat pockets, then took out a crumpled pack of Marlboros and a scuffed Zippo. He tapped the cigarette on the side of it. "What am I supposed to say?"
"That's up to you. We've been through this already. Just make the call." Anthony picked up McGrath's desk phone and turned it toward him. "You probably have the governor's private number in your book."
The Zippo flared, sending a brief flash of orange across his face. "Just call him, right?" McGrath pulled in smoke and squinted over the cigarette as he exhaled. "Trust Kenny Clark to forget about it."
"Meaning what?"
"He's going to be pissed off, isn't he, sitting in prison for twelve years? If he got out, he'd start looking for someone to blame."
Anthony laughed. "He doesn't care about getting even with you, McGrath. What he wants is to live past tomorrow, and if he's lucky, to walk out of prison."
Smoke drifted over McGrath's head, then vanished in the soft breeze from the vents. "So you say. I think he'd try to shake me down, cause me some grief. A guy like that. A criminal, a degenerate. If he wasn't in prison for Amber Dodson, he'd be in for something else, just like his buddy, Glen Hopwood."
Suspicion of Vengeance Page 33
