by David Ellis
“Actually, you’re better than most,” she said. “You’re straightforward. That’s rare.”
“Rare,” he repeated. “Okay, I’ll take rare.”
“I would’ve guessed ten years younger, by the way.”
“Oh—” Paul brought a hand to his face. “Now she’s letting me down gently. Where’s a good bolt of lightning when you need it?”
“How about this, Paul.” She waited until his eyes peeked through his fingers. “You made my day by asking.”
“That, I like. You could smile a little more.” He seemed to calm down a bit. He had a self-assurance that was rare in men, in her opinion—the fact that he was able to move on from rejection without brooding or self-pity.
“By the way,” he added, “this whole thing was a ruse, just to cheer you up.”
She raised her glass. “It worked.”
24
Skeleton
BLANK FACES, INITIALLY, the look of shock and disbelief. Waiting for the punchline. Waiting for their darling sixteen-year-old daughter to explain that she isn’t serious. They watch her, search her face, wait for a smile or laugh.
She tells them again. Yes, she is serious.
“How—who—who did this to you?”
There. The question she has anticipated, from her father. The first question, notably. “It’s not important, Daddy.”
She has no good reason for her refusal. It’s bad enough she has to tell them she’s pregnant—that much cannot be helped. She can’t tell them how. She can’t.
Todd Brisker? Rick Logenthal? Wally Josephs? Jed Arnold’s boy—what’s his name—Billy? Benji Carol?
Her father is suddenly pacing, small circles, jaw and fists clenched, throwing out the name of every teenage boy that comes to mind.
Her mother, Abigail Trotter, the lively facial features that still danced, her bright green eyes and tiny nose, animated eyebrows, now rendered into a blank expression, staring at her only daughter, her special beautiful precious daughter, as if she is a museum exhibit, something fascinating and unknown. Teenage Barbie got knocked up.
“It’s not important,” she tells them again.
“Shelly.” Her father, the powerful, promising politician, hands open, almost pleading. “How could you let this happen? How could you do this—” He flails for a moment, looks around the study helplessly, at the tax returns he has compiled, the financial statements ready to be sent to the state G.O.P. powers, then finds his wife quietly sobbing.
“How could you do this to your mother?”
25
Reports
DAN MORPHEW CARRIED through on his promise and turned over the prosecution’s evidence by messenger to her office. She spread out the file on her office table with a rush to her heart. She would now begin to learn what kind of a case they had on Alex.
The police had two witnesses to the shooting aside from Officer Miroballi’s partner. One was a forty-two-year-old homeless man who had been south of the alley, on the opposite side of the street where the shooting occurred. According to the police report, the man saw Alex Baniewicz walking southbound on the 200 block of South Gentry Street on the commercial district’s west side, which put him south of the City Athletic Club and south of Bonnard Street, the nearest perpendicular street to the north.
According to the report, the homeless man—one Joseph Slattery—saw a police squad car slowly follow Alex, then turn on its overhead lights. Officer Raymond Miroballi left the vehicle and followed Alex on foot. Alex began to run, and the officer pursued him into the alley. Mr. Slattery moved further north to watch and saw Alex open fire on the officer and flee through the alley on the opposite street.
The other witness was a thirty-three-year-old architect named Monica Stoddard, who had an office on the nineteenth floor of the building across the street from the alley. She had a view of the alley from her window, the report said, and she looked out when she saw the sirens flashing. She saw a man—whom she obviously could not identify as Alex—running from a police officer. She saw him turn into an alley and watched the officer pursue Alex.
She saw Alex shoot the officer.
The report of Miroballi’s partner, Officer Sanchez, indicated that he and Miroballi saw a young man carrying drugs on the 200 block of South Gentry Street. The squad car pulled over, but when the suspect began to flee, Miroballi gave chase while Sanchez returned to the vehicle to pursue by automobile. Miroballi radioed in a call for assistance as he turned down an alley after the suspect. Before Sanchez could reach the alley, he heard a gunshot. He found Miroballi dead in the alley and no sign of the suspect. Sanchez then called for assistance—reporting an officer down—and stayed with the fallen officer.
All available units had converged on the area. They cornered Alex about a half-mile away, unarmed and compliant. It was a miracle that Alex had survived that confrontation, she thought.
Back at the scene, they found two one-gram packets of cocaine and an unregistered firearm with the serial number scratched out. A fingerprint analysis did not turn up any identifiable prints, certainly not those of Alex Baniewicz, and a ballistics test showed that the gun was not the one used to kill Ray Miroballi.
So they had a weapon, but not the murder weapon.
Weird.
Blood spatterings were found on Alex Baniewicz’s sweatshirt and in his hair that were matched to Officer Miroballi. Miroballi’s blood was A-positive and Alex’s was O-negative. So that negated any argument that the blood was Alex’s. For good measure, the lab had run a DNA test to confirm that the blood was Miroballi’s.
Shelly rubbed her eyes and stretched. She got up from her chair and looked out the window, just to change the scenery for a moment. This case, she thought, was defensible. She had pleaded self-defense to squeeze the U.S. Attorney and to scare off any cops who might want to hurt Alex or her. But she could always change the plea to a straight not-guilty. The woman was a problem. She had seen Alex pull the trigger, according to the report. If she could crack that nut, the state, thus far, would not even be able to put a gun in Alex’s hand.
Which reminded her. She found the results of the residue test. The police performed a gunpowder residue test on Alex Baniewicz the evening of his arrest. Residue often, though not always, found its way onto the person or clothing of someone who fired a firearm. The results in the county attorney’s report were characterized as “inconclusive,” which to Shelly meant that they didn’t find any residue but didn’t want to admit that fact. She sighed. This was one of the fun details with which she was unfamiliar. She would need help on this.
She turned next to the transcript of the officers’ radio calls to police dispatch. She had been supplied audiotapes as well, but didn’t think it necessary—or savory—to listen to them just yet. The first exchange came at 7:44 P.M. on the night of the shooting.
SQUAD 13: Dispatch, this is Thirteen. We got a white male, late teens, appears to be holding narcotics.
DISPATCH: What’s your location, Thirteen?
SQUAD 13: 200 block of South Gentry. Southbound.
DISPATCH: Do you need assistance?
SQUAD 13: Don’t think so. I’m going to check him out.
DISPATCH: Watch your back, Thirteen.
That was the first call. The next call came two minutes later, from Officer Miroballi’s handheld walkie-talkie, which appeared to be coded “Radio 27.”
RADIO 27: Dispatch, we have a white male on the run. I’m in pursuit.
DISPATCH: Do you need assistance, Twenty-seven? Do you copy? Twenty-seven? Officer, we are sending available squads.
The next call, one minute later, at 7:47 P.M.
RADIO 27: Dispatch, advise all units that suspect is armed. I repeat, suspect is armed.
DISPATCH: Copy that, Twenty-seven. Vehicles are responding. Where is he running? Twenty-seven? Twenty-seven, do you copy?
The next transcript must have been from Miroballi’s partner, Julio Sanchez, from the squad car the next minute of the hour, 7:48 p.
m.
SQUAD 13: Dispatch, this is Radio Twenty-six. I’m in the squad car.
DISPATCH: Give us your location, Thirteen. Thirteen, advise of your location. 200 block of South Gentry? Thirteen?
The final transcript, from “Radio 26,” was obviously Officer Sanchez’s handheld. The call came two minutes later—7:50 P.M.:
RADIO 26: Dispatch, we have an officer down. Officer down. Officer—we have an—oh, God, Ray.
DISPATCH: Twenty-six, paramedics and ambulance are responding. Keep your man alive, Twenty-six.
RADIO 26: 200 block, South Gentry. We’re in an alley. We have an—Ray Miroballi’s been shot. One suspect, I think. I think there’s only one. Oh, God help him.
DISPATCH: Stay with me, Officer. A white male?
RADIO 26: Late teens, early twenties. Oh, God, come on, Ray. Ray. Ray.
DISPATCH: Twenty-six?
RADIO 26: White male, black coat, green cap, headed west—he went through the alley. He’s going to be headed—oh, there’s so much—probably south on—on I guess Donnelly. Maybe north. I don’t know where he went.
DISPATCH: Stay with your officer, Twenty-six. Stay with him.
DISPATCH: All units, we have an officer down at the 200 block of South Gentry. That’s a Code Blue. I repeat, this is a Code Blue. Suspect is a white male, late teens or early twenties, black jacket, green cap. Suspect believed to be headed north or south on Donnelly. Suspect is armed. Suspect is armed. We have a Code Blue, officers. Suspect is armed.
Shelly had been holding her breath, she discovered, and let out a long exhale. She made note of her personal reaction, because it would be the same one the jurors would feel. Revulsion. Horror. A desire for justice for the fallen officer. Dan Morphew, if he had any sense, would put this transcript front and center in the trial.
She had a defense, she thought, and maybe more than one. But she knew how the men and the women of the jury would feel after hearing these tapes and hearing the eyewitness accounts of the shooting. They would want to punish someone. And they would only be given one choice, only one young man sitting in the courtroom.
26
Reason
“SHHH. SHE’LL HEAR you.”
“Well, I don’t really give a damn, Abby. I really don’t.”
She is in many ways an adult now, but she feels like a child again, sneaking down the stairs and listening. It is close to midnight now, and she went to bed over an hour ago. They have been talking since that time. They talked all day yesterday—Saturday, when she told them—and they have talked all day today. Their big discussion this morning, after a tense breakfast, a talk that didn’t go so well.
“It’s over. That’s it, Abby. It’s over.”
“It’s not—”
“It’s down to me and Justin, Ab. They can go either way. Why on earth would they go with me now? They just need a reason. We just gave them one.”
“That’s shortsighted.”
Shelly hugs her knees but doesn’t move for fear of a squeaking stair. Her heart pounds, echoes so furiously that she wonders if they will hear it. The staircase is cold, drafty, owing to the air escaping from under the door to the garage. She is staring at the door and the floor mat at its base, which she cannot see in the dark but which reads HOME. She smells the change of seasons creeping through the door, the smell of freshly cut grass still clinging to the lawnmower in the garage, which Daddy used today for the first time this year. She closes her eyes now in the belief that she will hear them better.
“Listen. I’m a downstate prosecutor. Anyone south of the interstate has to overcome the impression that he doesn’t have a piece of hay in his mouth and a first cousin for a wife. My sixteen-year-old daughter is sleeping around and got knocked up? Come on, Abigail.”
“That’s just a stupid stereotypic—”
“It’s an impression. Maybe the voters wouldn’t care, but we’re not talking about voters right now. We’re talking about the slatemakers. They want to get behind one candidate this fall and run with him. Whoever that is has the nomination. And it won’t be me. Not now.”
Glass tapping glass, liquid gurgling. Daddy is pouring himself a drink. Shelly feels a tear squirt out of her shut eye unexpectedly. They are coming so easily. Emotions so raw and at the surface. For her parents, too, she realizes, not just her.
“Then we wait four years,” Mom says. “You’re still young in ’92.”
“Oh, don’t talk to me about ’92. What if Justin wins? Then he’s the incumbent in ’92. I run against him then, I’m a pariah. I lose and never get another chance.” Footsteps. Daddy is pacing.
“Lang, honey—”
“This was it. You see that, don’t you, Abby? I was their first choice. This was our chance. We might not get another one now.”
She stands up slowly. She is practiced by now, moving gingerly to avoid a crack of the knee or ankle. She takes two stairs at a time, placing the foot down first, then applying the weight. She returns to bed and prays that sleep will come quickly.
27
Inquiry
SHELLY LAID OUT copies of the prosecution’s evidence on her bed. Her apartment was arranged like it had been since the intrusion—couch in front of the front door, the glass of marbles balanced on the handle of the sliding glass door, the alarm fully armed—but it was her hope now that there would be no more visits. She had made a point, in court, of announcing that Officer Raymond Miroballi had tried to kill Alex, of requesting protective custody for her client on the theory that his life might be in danger in detention. She had repeated these claims to the press outside and read about them in today’s paper. She had stayed within the confines of her agreement with the federal government but had made her point, nonetheless, to rogue police officers who might want to do harm to either Alex or her. The spotlight was shining now, and she felt safe.
The intruders were cops, weren’t they?
Shelly jumped at the sound of the phone ringing, the portable phone lying next to her on the bed bellowing out its shrill cue.
“You’re a hard one to get hold of,” said Governor Trotter.
She held her breath. If ever there were a time, even on her meager budget, to spring for caller identification, this was it.
“I meant to call,” she said. “Congratulations on the nomination.”
“Since when did you leave the law school, Shelly?”
Without telling you, you mean? Well, he was certainly cutting to the chase. “Long story,” she said. “Recently.”
“You’re working for Paul Riley now?”
“No, not really. I’ve taken a leave from the school. I’m representing someone outside the parameters of the law school.”
“So I’ve heard.” A somewhat icier tone.
“Is that why you’re calling?”
“Shelly, I’m calling you because I haven’t spoken with you since Christmas. I want to see how you’re doing.”
“I’m doing fine. How are things at the capital?”
“Shelly.” Her father seemed to be struggling. “Edgar’s concerned about you. I’m concerned. You’re defending a capital murder case and representing a cop killer.”
Oh, and he’s also your grandson.
“What exactly is it that worries you?” she asked. “That I’m out of my league? That I’m turning the spotlight on the city police?”
“Why are you handling this case, Shelly?”
“He needs my help.”
“Lots of boys need criminal defense. You don’t help them.”
Shelly recoiled. “I have to justify why I’m representing this boy?”
“No, of course not. Hold on a second, if you would.” A woman was speaking in the background to the governor. He responded as he typically did, with a decisive, crisp answer. “Sorry about that. Listen, Shelly—you leave your job to take on some drug peddler’s case? Why do that? What’s so special about this kid?”
“So you do want me to justify it.”
“I admit I’m curious.�
�� She could picture him in his high-backed leather chair, his jacket off and sleeves rolled up a tuck. He cut the perfect model of the state’s chief executive.
“He deserves a chance,” she said, and winced as she played that over in her mind.
“Just tell me you’re being careful.”
“I’m being careful,” she promised. “I always am.”
28
Testing
SHELLY STOOD AT the intersection of Bonnard and Gentry downtown. It was only three short blocks from the offices of Shaker, Riley & Flemming. “There’s the City Athletic Club,” she said, pointing to the northeast corner of the intersection. “He was at the open gym that night.” The club had its own building, a fourteen-story edifice wedged between two newer buildings double its size. Flags of the city, county, state, and U.S. waved above the entryway, along with a flag bearing the club’s crest. “He walked down Gentry, crossed Bonnard, and was heading south. He was going to the bus.”
Joel Lightner, a private investigator whose services Paul Riley had lent for this case, nodded. He was not the prototypical investigator, in Shelly’s eyes. He was tall and gangly, with an oval face and tight curly, gray hair. His long olive coat was open, and he seemed not to notice the whipping winds that came out of nowhere in this city.
