Utah: A Lucy Ripken Mystery (The Lucy Ripken Mysteries Book 7)

by J. J. Henderson

  “Nah, the bath was enough.” Ellen smiled. “He’s a cool guy, Lucy. And really cute.” Ellen sat up. “You like him, huh?”

  “Yeah, I do,” Lucy said. “I just hope his legal moves are as good as his other ones.” She put her black clothes back on, then went to the door connecting the bedrooms. She opened it quietly and slipped into the other room to see what he looked like sleeping.

  He’d stretched out across the bed fully dressed less his shoes, and slept that way now, on the diagonal, head hanging over the edge, one arm tucked under and the other slung down to the carpeted floor. The writing table had half a dozen fat law books open on it, along with several legal pads, a couple of DVDs, a laptop computer, and a DVD player connected by a long black cord to the TV across the room. Lucy went over to the bed and had a closer look. Asleep, with his face kind of sagging downwards, he looked older, and more worn. She liked this awkward-looking Jack, draped like a big boy over the bed. “Yo Jack,” she said softly. “This is your wake up call. Showtime, señor.”

  One eye popped open, stared at her like some odd bird. He grinned and lifted his head. “Hey.” He pushed himself up, sat on the edge of the bed and rubbed his face. “God, I don’t even remember how I got over here.” he looked over at the writing table. “Hey, Lucy. How’s our Miss Ellen today?”

  “I think she’s ready,” Lucy said. “At least she didn’t make another run for it.”

  “Well, we’re supposed to meet a friend of mine—a newspaper columnist, actually—at my office in about...” he glanced at his watch... “twenty minutes. It’s five minutes away. We gonna make it?”

  “Yeah, sure. Hope we can find some coffee on the way. Let me make sure E. is on schedule.” Lucy went back in the other room. Her stomach dropped. Ellen was gone. Back on the run.

  Into the bathroom. Lucy heard the toilet flush, and the girl appeared, all fresh, make-up free, hair brushed, wearing pale blue jeans, white tennies, and a pink sweatshirt. “Cool. You look innocent.”

  “Yeah. I was thinking something like this might be good,” Ellen said.

  Jack walked in, an overstuffed briefcase in each hand. “Hey kid,” he said. “Nice threads. I mean, for today.” He paused, and shifted on his feet a little uncomfortably. “Ellen, I just want you to know I watched the DVD last night. I don’t know how this sounds to you, or what, but I understand exactly why you did what you did. OK? I’m not going to say another word about it, but I wanted you to know that.”

  “Thanks,” she said.

  “Now listen. As you know I’ve been helping Lucy out this past few days, and you guys are going to be facing different type situations. What this means is you are probably going to need your own lawyer.”

  “But you said that you would help me...”

  “I said I’d help you with this stuff this morning. Turning yourself in and so on.”

  “I want the same lawyer as you, Lucy,” she said, eyes tearing up. “I want you to be my lawyer too, Jack.”

  “I know, El, I know,” Lucy cut in. “But it’s better if we have separate cases, because we didn’t do the same things.”

  “Yeah, right. You’re not on the DVD. Why should you get stuck with—”

  “Hey, that’s not what I’m talking about here, Ellen.”

  But it was, and they all three knew it. “Ellen, look.” Jack checked his watch. “We gotta go. Listen, I’m going to make sure everything goes OK today, but when push comes to shove you’re going to need someone...you probably...you might...have to go back to Utah, and I can’t represent you there. I’ve made a couple of calls, and I’m sure I can find someone good.”

  “Yeah, sure,” said Ellen. “Sure. So it’ll be just like before. Me, and no one else.”

  “Let’s go,” Lucy said. “And cut the shit, Ellen. come on.” She headed out.

  “Hey, I’m sorry, Lucy,” Ellen said, rushing after her. “I’m just scared is all.”

  Lucy slowed. “I know, I know,” she said. She was being a bitch. She knew it. She just didn’t have her mothering skills in great working order sometimes. This was one of those times. The day ahead, even with Jack at their side, would be hellish. They were giving Ellen up to the system, and the system was not kind. The system had not protected her before. Why would it now? Lucy was angry with herself and scared for Ellen. She had felt all along that the girl’s instinct, to hit and run, had been not entirely wrong. Why else would she have come this far with her? Now Ellen’s fate would be taken from their hands. Lucy hated that the girl had no other viable choice.

  The three of them rode quietly down on the elevator. Soon they were on their way to Jack’s office in Pioneer Square. He parked in the lot behind the old red brick building. The three of them got out and headed in the back door.

  Lucy hardly had time to notice, much less admire, the interior of the lobby, with its high vaulted ceilings and cast-iron columns and cool terrazzo floors, for a small mob had gathered to meet them. Cops, reporters, cameramen. “Holy Shit!” she said, suppressing an instinct to turn and run. Instead, the three of them paused just inside the glass doors, and let the gang half-encircle them. Flashes flashed and questions flew. She clutched Ellen’s hand and concentrated on picking faces out of the crowd. She recognized the two FBI guys, and then caught the eye of her sister Loretta, flanked by a pair of smarmy-looking male associates. Lucy wondered briefly if either of the two geeks could be the husband, and hoped not. Two uniformed cops preened officiously for the eight or ten baying newspeople with cameras, microphones, and readied notebooks; their aggressive, anxious, yet perfectly-coiffed talking heads thrust all manner of machinery forwards into Lucy and Ellen’s faces while barking questions. Lucy had seen this media assault pack routine so many times on television that she felt strangely calm as it was directed at her for the first time in her life. She knew the role she had to play, and started right in. To every question she said, “No comment, sorry, we have nothing to say at this time.” At every camera she looked calmly, her expression carefully composed into a Mona Lisa half-smile, for she knew from her own shooting experience, and from watching the tube, how a photo or a video could make an innocent beauty look like a guilty monster—or at least monumentally unattractive. She held Ellen’s hand tightly. “Please, direct all questions at my attorney, Mr. Yates, thanks.”

  Yates parried elegantly, fending off both cops and reporters with practiced ease. Ellen kept her eyes demurely, appropriately cast down, and said nothing, even when asked repeatedly, “Did you do it? Did you kill your Daddy? Why’d you kill your father, Ellen? Ellen, why’d you do it?” She, too, seemingly had seen enough TV to know how to play this fugitive celebrity role. Lucy glanced at her sister, and nodded a silent hello. Loretta smiled back at her, her face masked in that curiously vacuous expression, laden with latent hostility disguised as serenity, that Lucy recalled from their initial meeting at her mother’s house a few days ago. It felt like ages had passed since then.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” Yates said loudly, and the unruly gang fell silent. “You all have some inkling why we’re here. Yes, this is the quote unquote notorious fugitive Ellen Longford and her associate, Ms. Lucy Ripken. Her protector, I should say, for Lucy has been instrumental in watching over Ellen, and in making sure that Ellen do the right thing, which is to turn herself in and deal with what she has to deal with. They are both here in the interests of justice. Now wait, wait,” he went on, as a general hubbub ensued. “This is one of the most complicated situations I have ever come across in 20 years of practice. And yet it is really very simple, as will be revealed in time. Meanwhile, I can’t answer any questions. Representatives of the FBI are here to take Ms. Longford into custody. Please be patient. We will be issuing a complete statement later today. Thanks.” Another outcry followed his words.

  Then Loretta spoke up, loudly enough to get the floor. “Ladies and gentlemen,” she cried out. “May I have your attention. My name is Loretta Graves, and I am Lucy Ripken’s half-sister. I am here on behalf of L
ucy and Ellen—and on behalf of Ellen’s unborn child! Ellen is pregnant, and my sister, my dear sister, has convinced her that she should have an abortion.”

  “Whoa, whoa,” Lucy shouted over the barking reporters, into the flash and glare of camera and video lights. She couldn’t let that slide by unremarked. The cameras turned towards her. “It’s true, she’s pregnant. And I did advise Ellen to consider terminating the pregnancy, for reasons which are more complicated than my half-sister imagines. Now, if you will just let us get on with our business.” Christ, the last thing she wanted to do was argue this now, in front of these morons.

  “OK, let’s go,” Yates said. “Show’s over, folks.” He opened a path through the gauntlet and led the way towards the elevator, where a security guard in a blue uniform waited. Lucy and Ellen ignored the questions hurled at them as they hurried after him. The two FBI guys, dressed in their FBI suits, moved to meet them at the elevator doors. Yates held the doors open while they crowded into the small elevator car. The guard stood outside, blocking the way.

  “Hello, Ellen,” Larsen said gravely. “I’m John Larsen, and this is Morris Devereaux. We’re with the—”

  “FBI,” Ellen said. “I know. You’re here to arrest me. That’s the deal, right? So am I supposed to say hi, act like everything’s cool?”

  “Hello, Ellen,” said Devereaux. “Nice to see you again, Miss Ripken.”

  “Lucy. Please.”

  “Some getaway last night, Yates,” said Larsen drily. “Especially since well, here you are. What was the idea?”

  “We needed our beauty sleep,” said Lucy.

  “Hey Jack,” a woman called out from the media pack. “Didja see the item yet?” Still blocking the elevator doors, the slouching Yates turned, caught the eye of a woman Lucy didn’t know, fortyish, with overstyled blonde TV hair, big glasses, red lipstick. She was waving the metro section of the daily paper.

  “Nora, you bad girl. I told you to keep this to yourself,” said Jack, wagging a finger at her as he released the doors and they began to slide shut.

  “I did, Jack,” Nora said. “I don’t know how the word got out.”

  “It was me. I called the TV people,” said Loretta Graves, slipping past the security guard onto the elevator just as the doors slid shut. “Sorry, Lucy. I wanted them to be here.”

  “You meddlesome bitch!” Lucy said. “How dare you.”

  “Lucy, Lucy, calm down,” said Loretta. “Lord have mercy, I’m not here to—Oh, hi, Jack Yates. I’m Loretta Graves. Lucy’s sister.”

  “Half-sister!” Lucy snapped. Jack gazed at Loretta, his expression sour.

  “We’re sisters in the eyes of the Lord, I know that,” Loretta said. “Gentlemen,” she said to the feds. “Nice to see you again. Is this your floor?” She said to Yates as the elevator stopped on the seventh, or top, floor. He nodded. “So what are we waiting for?” Loretta said. “Ellen, I am so glad to see that you’re OK. Thank you Jesus! I heard that you’d left.”

  “How the hell did you find out where we were going to be?” Lucy said.

  “I have my ways,” Loretta said. “Actually, I’ve got some friends in the PD here. Good Christian gentlemen. All it took was a phone call.”

  “Right this way,” said Jack, striding down the corridor.

  “What was that lady talking about, Yates?” said Larsen. “The big-haired blonde?”

  “She’s a columnist. I called her last night. Told her some stuff” he said, as he led the way around a corner. “Damn!” he said, stopping short. At the end of another corridor, Jack’s name and two others stood out on a milky glass office door. Flanking the door stood two men in Western style suits, arms folded over string ties, heads in cowboy hats, feet in cowboy boots large and gleaming. “Looks like we’re about to savor the charms of a pair of country cops.”

  Lucy felt Ellen go tense, then pull away. She clung to her hand. “It’s OK,” she said. “Take it easy, El.”

  “Christ,” said Larsen. “Utah boys.”

  “No shit,” said Devereaux.

  “To what do we owe the pleasure?” asked Jack Yates, leading the way down the last stretch of hallway towards his door. The two men stepped forward. “Gentlemen?”

  “Let me handle this,” said Larsen, stepping forward.

  “William Singleton, Utah State Marshal, sir,” said one. “This is my partner Owen Landry.” The other nodded. “We are here to take into custody for extradition to the sovereign state of Utah one fugitive juvenile named Ellen Longford.” They both looked at Ellen. “Since she has not yet been taken into custody here, or booked, we have been instructed to place her under arrest and take her directly back to Utah to face charges.”

  “Singleton, there’s no way you’re taking this girl,” Larsen said. “She’s a federal prisoner.”

  “She’s not a prisoner at all, Larsen,” said Landry. “You know that.”

  “Hold on a minute,” said Loretta. “Gentlemen, my name is Loretta Graves, and I am an attorney licensed to practice in both Washington and Utah. As I am representing Ms. Longford in these matters, don’t you think you ought to be directing this discussion my way? And by the way, Mr. Larsen is correct. She may not technically be under arrest but since she is in the custody of the Federal Bureau of Investigation any claim you might assert as to your so-called “rights of arrest” is superseded by federal law. If you’d like me to obtain a writ from a judge to that effect I would be happy to do so but I think you’d be wise to simply wait until a proper extradition hearing can be organized and scheduled. Given the situation I’m sure the court will act post-haste.”

  “She’s right, gents,” said Yates.

  Lucy was too dumbfounded by Loretta’s move to say anything. She and Ellen simply watched as the two sets of lawmen faced off. “We also have a fugitive warrant for a Lucy Ripken,” Utah One said. “For conspiracy to commit homicide, aiding and abetting in the—”

  “Don’t even think about it,” said Yates. “Ms. Ripken is—”

  “She’s ours too, Utah,” said Devereaux. “In fact, to tell the truth I don’t know what you boys think you’re doing here at all. S’not like you have a god damned thing to do. So why don’t you take your big ol’ hats and get the hell out of the way!”

  For a few long seconds the Utahs glared, contemplating a physical confrontation. Finally Utah One said, “See you in court.” Then he looked at Ellen. “In Utah. Your father was a friend of mine. We are going to put you away till your hair turns gray.”

  “Shut up, jerk,” snarled Lucy. “Don’t you threaten her. She’s just a kid.”

  “Gentlemen, why don’t you take Mr. Devereaux’s advice and get the hell out of here,” said Yates. “It’s pretty clear you haven’t got a legal leg to stand on. And you’re in our way.” He pushed past them, pulled out his keys, and unlocked his office door. “We’ve got some work to do.” He opened the door. “After you, Ellen,” he said. She led the way into the office. The others followed. Lucy was last in. She slammed and locked the door behind her, then turned around.

  “Those creeps,” she said.

  “It’s OK, Lucy,” Loretta said. “They were just doing their job.”

  “No, they were doing my job, or trying to,” said Larsen. “Dumbass cops.”

  “Speaking of jobs,” said Yates, “That was a nice piece of work out there, Ms. Graves. What do you think, Ellen? You like this lady for your lawyer?”

  “Hey, wait a minute,” Lucy said. “This is way too fast. El, you want to talk this over? Just you and me?”

  “No, that’s OK,” Ellen said. She looked at Loretta. “You know I don’t have any money.”

  “Don’t worry about that,” Loretta said.

  “Ellen, are you sure about this?”

  “Yes, it’s OK, Lucy,” she said. She looked around, then focused on Lucy. “I know you’re worried about the baby and all, but I want to have the baby. It doesn’t matter what you or Loretta—Mrs. Graves—says. I think I’ve probably already
made up my mind.”

  “But Ellen, you’ve—”

  “Pardon me, ladies,” said Larsen, “But there is a little matter of several criminal acts that need to be dealt with. I know you all think this is, like, a done deal, but you saw those goons. Utah is not going to be welcoming you back with open arms, Miss Longford. You do understand that?”

  “She knows what’s coming,” said Lucy.

  “Let’s not assume she’s going anywhere,” said Loretta. “I think there are strong grounds to argue against extradition at all.”

  “I’m glad to hear you say that, Mrs. Graves,” said Yates. “Exactly the tactic I was going to suggest.” He opened a double door. “Well, let’s move into the conference room and sit down and sort this mess out, shall we?”

  Someone knocked on the glass entry door. Yates went over and opened. “Hey, Nora,” he said. “How did you get in here?”

  “I used one of my many connections, Jack. As always.” The big-haired blonde strode into the room. “I came up the fire escape.” She looked around. “Hello everybody.” Then she focused on Ellen. “You must be the—ah, cause of all this excitement. And you’re Lucy Ripken.”

  “Hey,” said Lucy.

  “I’m Nora Delfino, a friend of Jack’s—and a writer for the local paper. I do a personal interest kind of column. Love to talk to you both when things settle down. This is an amazing story, I know. Jack, didn’t you tell them you called me last night?”

  “Look, Ms. Dollfino,” said Larsen, “We have some business to tend to here.”

  “Oh, don’t let me stop you,” she said. “I’m just a—butterfly on the wall. Right, Jack?”

  He grinned. “Sure, Nora. If nobody minds, I’d like her here. Just to, you know, have it on the record.” The Feds shrugged. They had nothing to hide.

  The lead item that Nora ran in her column that day, with a photo of Jack Yates:

  FUGITIVES IN TOWN For those who’ve been following the strange and still unfolding saga of Ellen Longford, the Utah teenager alleged to have murdered her own father before going on the run with a woman from New York named Lucy Ripken, an update: the story is taking another strange turn this morning, when the two women are reportedly turning themselves in to agents of the FBI. Their interests are being looked after by none other than our favorite defender of lost leftist causes, attorney and man about Bainbridge Island Jack Yates, he of the endless legs and the relentless courtroom attitude. Yates claims to have evidence—a photo, a DVD?—that will completely exonerate both women from the most serious of the charges they’re facing. Stay tuned for updates.