“Saint and Smoke aren't in town right now so those interviews will have to wait.” He thought for a moment. “You already saw Blake Purcell. Want to see if you can run down Aaron Whitsel? Compare the two?”
“Do we have an address?”
“The address on the police report isn’t valid anymore. Think you can track him down? If not, I can send it to my people in Minnesota.”
“No, I have someone here who can take a quick look.”
“Can he move quickly?”
“She. And faster than all four of us.”
“Good. Give her a call and let us know what she finds out.”
“Will do.”
Cyn turned to Danny. “Daniel, can you help me with the evidence inventory? I need to match each piece to the exhibit list and make sure we have access to what we need at trial.
Danny stuttered once, then again, under Cyn’s frank gaze before he nodded.
Christian rapped the table once and we all scattered. As I went back downstairs to my office, I called Olivia Brickson. “Hey, Liv.”
“Shep! Am I going to see you down here today?”
“Yep. That’s not why I called though.”
“What’s up?”
“I need a name run down.”
“Witness or perp?”
“Witness.”
“What do you have?”
“A name, an address that isn’t any good anymore, and two known associates.”
“That’s something.”
“One of those associates is dead.”
“Ah. That what he witnessed?”
“Yep.”
“What’s your interest?”
“My client killed him.”
I heard her smile. “Allegedly?”
“Nope. Deader than shit.”
“I’m no lawyer, Shep, but…”
“Yeah. I’m just local counsel on it but, yes, it’s a little dicey.”
“Okay. Timeframe?”
“Easy stuff this afternoon, deep dive next week?”
“Done. Text me the info. Any constraints?”
“Keep it legal.”
“I always keep it legal. I meant what’s my budget.”
“Unlimited.”
“Really?”
“Client engaged a heavy-hitting firm out of Minneapolis. Knock yourself out.”
“Excellent. Send it to me now and I’ll do a preliminary search this afternoon. You can pick it up at the gym on the way home.”
“Five-thirty?”
“Perfect.”
“Talk to you then.” After I hung up, I sent Olivia the information we had on Aaron Whitsel and included information on Dillon Chase and Blake Purcell for good measure. Then I spent the rest of the afternoon putting out other legal fires. Before I knew it, it was five o’clock and I left the office to go to the Brickhouse.
My favorite part of Carrefour is on the north side, a few miles up into Michigan where the hills start to roll and the Cache River makes its way through a still wooded area before it turns south down to Ohio. There’s an abandoned spur of rail-track that’s nestled next to the river that houses a water tower that they used to refill steam engines back in the day and a couple of old buildings, including an old brick warehouse they’d used to store goods.
The building to the left of the water tower was the Railcar, a bar and restaurant that served the best barbeque around. As I stepped out of my car, the sharp smell of the hickory smoke drifting up from its firepit made my mouth water and subtly suggested that I change my plans. I ignored it, pulled my gym bag out of the Jeep, and headed to the warehouse instead.
The warehouse was made of used brick, a mottled orange brick with blunt edges that had built countless warehouses all over the Midwest. A white sign with sharp black letters over the door announced that this was “the Brickhouse.”
I entered the gym owned by Olivia Brickson and her brother Cade, the bail bondsman. Half of the gym was set up with traditional free weights and the other half had racks of cross-training equipment and all the related torture devices you could think of from ropes to kettlebells to chin-up bars to an honest-to-goodness salmon ladder and if you don’t know what that is, I’d have to say you’re better off for it. The softest thing in the gym was a wrestling mat in the back and I’m pretty sure the only reason Olivia installed it was because her insurer wouldn’t let her train by throwing people onto cement.
The gym was busy and Olivia stood behind the front desk beneath a sign that said “Brickhouse” and there wasn’t the slightest irony in that picture. Her shock of short, bleached white hair stood up on top and swooped down over her left eye, barely covering the semi-reflective glasses she always wore. She wore tights and a tank top that left her arms bare so that I could see the tattoo that spiraled out around her left shoulder until it connected to a sleeve of dark green and black ink that covered her left arm from elbow to wrist. I can only tell you that, unlike many people who sport ink, this totally fit.
Olivia was checking in two guys and a woman when she saw me and smiled. “Shep!” She handed the others their cards back. “’Bout time you hauled your soft ass back in here.”
I handed her my card to scan. “Been catching it at home.”
“That’s not the same and you know it. You joining us for a class?”
“I’m not man enough for that. You want to talk to me about Whitsel now or later?”
“Later. Hour?”
“Perfect. Thanks.” She waved, jogged over to her class and clapped. “Alright, if you shirk you shrink. Let’s get going!”
There was a small box with knit stocking caps and gloves where she’d been standing. Above it was a sign: “If you want to run, the road’s outside.” If you ever stop by on your way through Carrefour, you won’t find any treadmills in Olivia’s gym.
I smiled and went back to the locker room to change.
An hour and ten minutes later, I had finished my lift and the wreckage of Olivia’s class was lying strewn about the gym, sweating, gasping, and, for one poor newbie hunched in a corner, heaving. Olivia, who’d led by example through the whole thing, wiped some sweat from her forehead with a small towel and, in an even, ungasping voice, said, “Shep!” and pointed to her office.
It seemed like a good idea to follow.
In Olivia’s office, a battered desk sat in front of a wall plastered with pictures of her students and trainees competing at different events. There were only two pictures of her—one with Arnold at the Arnold Classic in Columbus and another with Royce Gracie from when she had spent I don’t know how much to bring him in for a ju-jitsu clinic. It was altogether what you’d expect in a gym office except for the ceiling-high bookshelf on one side and the row of three computer monitors on the other.
She offered me a water, took one herself, then sat down at the desk and hit the keyboard until the monitors blinked on. She cracked her own bottle and said, “Why didn't you tell me this was about the Lizzy Saint case?”
“Does it matter?”
“Hell yes, it matters. Well, it doesn't matter for my research but it sure as hell matters for you.”
“Why?”
“Are you shitting me, Shep? Do you really think you should be involved in that case?”
“I'm just local counsel, Liv.”
“So? Even as local counsel you’re going to be chin-deep in this shit for weeks. You really want to do that?”
I shrugged. “They’re paying the bills.”
I had a pretty good poker face but Oliva had known me a long time. She glared at me, shaking her head slightly. When the silence stretched on though, she eventually said, “All right. But if we end up sparring five nights a week again, I'm charging you this time.”
“Fair enough. So what did you find out?”
“Aaron's Whitsel hasn't lived at the address he gave the police for about a year. We found him at some off-campus housing near the University where it's a mix of grad students and people in their first jobs. Blake Purcell li
ves in a nicer complex a mile away.”
“Are they in school?”
“Whitsel’s in the second year of his MBA program. Purcell looks like he dropped out of undergrad after three. No obvious source of income for Purcell to support the townhouse. Whitsel’s place is less expensive and he has a good-sized student loan balance to explain it.”
I thought. “Shoot me the address, will you? I'll check in on Whitsel and see if he’ll talk to me. And I need you to do a little deeper dive for me.”
“On all three of them?”
“You got it. I need you to run arrests and convictions. And I need you to find out if they have any connections with anyone who deals heroin.”
Olivia went still. “You know that makes me more visible, Shep. To the dealers and the feds. They're all watching whoever is watching them.”
“Don't go too far then. We know Dillon is connected somehow. Purcell’s lack of employment or school is suspicious, especially with the car and the townhouse.” I remembered how he’d looked when we’d spoken. “And the clothes and the watch. I want to know who his connections are. And let’s make sure Whitsel is the struggling student he appears to be and just had the bad luck to be there.”
Olivia clicked out some notes. “How does this matter for your case?”
“Doesn't heroin make you angry, Liv?”
“Of course.”
“My client too. The more connections we can show, the better.”
“Okay. Give me a couple of days then I'll update you.”
There was one last pause before she said, “I’m really not crazy about this, Shep.”
“Noted, Liv.”
Most people pushed their hair back when they were sweating but Olivia teased her hair down around her glasses before she nodded and looked over my shoulder at the gym. “I have another class yet but do you want to join Cade and me for dinner after?”
“Can’t tonight. Thanks, though.”
She stared at me. “Eat something good. Get some sleep.”
“I will.”
“Finish that book yet?”
“That Obstacle’s in My Way? Still working on it.”
“The Obstacle is the Way, you asshole, and you haven’t cracked it, have you?”
I grinned. “Working on it.”
She shook her head and waved at the shelf. “Let me know when you’re done and we’ll load you up again.”
“Got it, Coach. Thanks.”
I stood. “I’ll send you the stuff.”
“Sure.”
“Shep?”
I waited.
“I mean it. Take the time to make something good and then eat it.”
“Sure thing, boss.”
“Talk to you tomorrow.”
I waved, gathered my things, and left.
It didn’t take me long to get home and when I did, I was true to my promise and ate some chicken and some green, leafy shit. Then I neutralized it all with beer, which hadn’t been part of our negotiation. After, I moved to the couch and turned on SportsCenter. That Obstacle’s in My Way stayed on the end table. I fell asleep during Bad Beats.
Some days, you can only go so far, you know?
11
The next day, I went up to the third-floor office to see Christian and found that he wasn't there. Instead, Cyn was in the main conference room, a tablet on one side and a stack of photos on the other.
It was a little hard to describe Cyn's presence except to say that, even as she sat there in front of the computer, she projected a certain unyielding hardness and competence. She'd taken off her jacket and her eyes were focused on the screen as her long fingers flew across the keyboard. “Mr. Skald called,” she said without looking up. “He expects an update from you this morning.”
“Do you have his number for me?” I said.
Cyn started and I found that I enjoyed that unusual crack in her competence. She smiled. “Sorry, Nathan. I thought you were Christian.”
“He in yet?”
A look of irritation flashed across her face and was gone. “No. But we worked late last night.”
“Doesn’t hurt to sleep once in a while. Trials are a marathon, not a sprint.”
She raised a red eyebrow. “Until you get to the sprint part.”
“True enough. We're not quite there yet though.”
She stared at me and I found that I was glad her green-eyed ire wasn’t directed at me. “Not quite. But soon.”
I nodded and decided that was one argument neither Nathan nor I were going to win. “Is Skald one of the principal partners?”
“His name’s on the door.”
“Is he the original Skald?”
Cyn smiled like I’d said something amusing. “They go back a ways.”
“Home office always keep close tabs on a case like this?”
“Not always. Just ones that have the attention of important clients.”
“Like Hank’s father?”
Her focus turned completely on me. I decided my earlier estimate was correct. “Why do you say that?”
“Hank. When we met with him, he gave me the impression that his family’s important. And rich. Anything else I should know?”
“Does it matter?”
“If it affects our representation of Hank, it does.”
Cyn pulled her hands back from the keyboard and thought, sitting straight as a fishing spear. She appeared to pick her words carefully as she said, “Mr. Braggi's father wants us to give his son the best representation possible.”
“A man with means doesn't usually want the best representation possible. He wants to win. Which may or may not be possible.”
Cyn nodded. “Mr. Braggi's father understands the parameters of our circumstances.” She focused back on me. “You didn't come up here for a genealogy lesson.”
“No. I put the investigator on Aaron Whitsel.”
“And?”
“She found his address. So I put her on Chase and Purcell too and told her to look for connections to the local heroin distributors.”
Cyn's face grew serious. “We have plenty of resources for an investigation like that.”
“I’m sure, but my local person has gone down this road before. She won't be starting from scratch so it’ll probably be more efficient.”
“Do you have a history with this investigator?”
“I do.”
“Is she reliable?”
“She's a pro. And yes.”
“Give me her billings and I’ll see that they’re paid directly.”
“Thanks. I'd prefer to wait a couple of days to see if she finds anything on the heroin before I go see Whitsel.”
“Good. I’ll tell Christian.”
I looked at the hyper-organized files. “If you remember?”
Cyn smiled then, which was exceedingly more pleasant than her focused stare. “I'll let him know what you found, suggest that you investigate further, and he’ll agree that that is an excellent idea.”
She went back to typing and did so for almost a minute before she looked back up at me. “Was there something else?”
“I don't think Hanson will leave the deal on the table forever.”
“We don’t expect him to.”
“A deal could get Hank out in his lifetime.”
“I'm sure it would. But he's not interested in spending decades in a cell.”
“Nobody is. That's not the point.”
“Our client’s wishes are very clear, Nathan. No deal. Fight to win.”
“Our client’s wishes or his father's?”
Cyn's eyes grew very hard at the implication of what I'd said. “In this case, they are of one mind.”
I stood and shrugged. “Had to be said. As local counsel, I have to tell you that Judge Gallon and a Carrefour jury won’t hesitate to do it.”
“We’ve done our homework, Nathan. But,” she held up one finger, “as long as you’re so intent on acting in your local counsel role, do you know the coroner?”
&nbs
p; “I do.”
Cyn rolled her chair down the table, reached into the middle of a stack of manila folders, and rolled back with a folder labeled “Autopsy.” “We know the prosecutor’s going to call him to testify about the body.”
“Want me to talk to him?”
Cyn nodded. “We want to get a sense of his reaction to the findings, to know if he's going to add any flavor to the cause of death.”
“I'll see him today.”
“No appointment?”
“His patients can usually wait.”
Cyn did not appear to be amused by my joke. She nodded and went back to typing. I decided to claim that as a victory and left.
It was time to talk to the coroner, Ray Gerchuk.
12
You don't run into many guys named Ray anymore and you certainly don't run into coroners like Ray Gerchuk. Ray was about as sunny a guy as you would ever meet, which I had because he was an old fishing buddy of my dad's. Going against every stereotype of his position, Ray was tall and fit for a man who was almost sixty years old. He still had all of his blonde hair, although there were some lighter spots around the edges that were either white hair or a reflection of the light. He had a hint of tan on his skin that let you know he spent time outside in addition to time behind the microscope and, if you talked to him for any length of time, you would learn that an inordinate amount of that time outside involved the pursuit of largemouth bass. Hence his friendship with my father.
“Nate!” Ray said as he came out to the reception area of his office. “How’s your pops?”
“On the water as we speak, I expect.”
“Lucky bastard.”
“To say he's enjoying retirement would be an understatement.”
“Don't rub it in. Three more years for me.” He grabbed my shoulder. “How have of you been? Haven't seen you on the boat in a while.”
“Been churning to keep afloat, just not on the water.”
“Ain't that the truth. Your dad said you’ve been pretty busy.”
“That's why I'm here. Wanted to talk to you about a case.”
“Sure, Nate. Which one?”
“The Hank Braggi case. The Dillon Chase exam.”
Lethal Defense Page 7
