The Company of Demons

by Michael Jordan

  When I was escorted into her office, Arlene reached across an ebony granite desktop to greet me with a handshake. Her yellow blouse provided a dash of color beneath her muted brown suit. “Cathy came down and signed the papers, but she doesn’t want any misunderstandings. Your marriage is over.”

  “What changed her mind?” I sank into one of two white leather chairs and leaned my crutches against the other. Vivid abstract paintings on the beige painted walls reminded me of Jennifer’s apartment. Great.

  “First, I reminded her that what happened between the two of you has nothing to do with the trial. Your adultery is an issue for the domestic relations court.”

  “Thank God for small favors.” I gave a half-smile, which probably resembled Oyster’s grimace when they’d hauled his skull from the Frigidaire.

  “Second, and she brought this up before I did, she doesn’t want the father of her daughter to be making license plates for the state. She put Molly first, John.”

  “No surprise there.” Through Arlene’s window, Lake Erie sparkled in the sunlight, and I remembered an anniversary dinner with Cathy, on a cruise ship. We had motored past the hulking Browns Stadium and watched the setting sun reflect on the gleaming Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

  “By the way, her sister would lock you away forever. Quite a mouth, for a good Catholic girl. Getting past her took some doing. You owe me.”

  “You have no idea. But now that I’m out, we’re done with Huggins? By the way, he’s not exactly a warm and fuzzy kind of guy.”

  “Find me a bail bondsman who is. And we should be done with him, but Mark Flanagan has your case.”

  “Flanagan? Shit.”

  “Know him?”

  “Just by reputation. The Flanagan clan was too lace curtain to hang out with the Colemans.” Some viewed the chief assistant prosecutor as a pit viper, others as an aggressive public vigilante, but no one ever claimed that he was less than stellar in a courtroom. He could more than hold his own, even against Arlene Johnson.

  “He told me he’s asking for a higher bond at your arraignment.”

  “Should I be worried?”

  “Not particularly. Flanagan tries this stunt in every high-profile case. He rarely succeeds, but it plays well to the law-and-order types.” Arlene sat back in her chair. “And he pulled something else before you were processed out. We can deal with this, so take it in stride. He filed a motion for a temporary restraining order, freezing your accounts. Business and personal.”

  I took a breath. “No way.”

  “His office submitted an affidavit, claiming they need time to determine whether you’ve scammed any other client accounts, and they want to prevent a transfer of any funds converted from the estate of Wilbur Frederickson …”

  My eye drifted to framed photographs of her with the mayor, two ex-governors, and President Obama arranged on a credenza behind her.

  “John?”

  “Yeah. Sorry.”

  She scanned my face, appraising me. “You’re going to have to be on top of your game to help me and get through this.”

  “I am. Just give me some time, okay? The last few days …”

  “I told you that you should call a professional, John. Anyone who’d gone through what you did sure as hell would. Will you?”

  “I can get through this, Arlene. I’m just tired and … all this stuff at once.” No more shrinks, no more pill boxes. “What did the judge say?” She kept her eyes fixed on me. “She conducted a hearing by phone and essentially granted his motion. But she released enough to allow for bail, something to live on during the proceedings, and costs of trial, including me.”

  “I suppose I should feel good about that.” Everything was happening so goddamn fast.

  “John, face facts. Flanagan’s got a hard-on about this one. My guess: he’ll capitalize on the publicity and run for judge next election.”

  “I’ll vote for him if he loses my case.”

  “Since you’re wondering, we’ve been opposite each other before. I think our win–loss record is tied.” She picked up a folder and flicked it open. “You’ll want to see these. Flanagan sent them over this morning. He didn’t have to do this until the first pretrial but obviously doesn’t feel the need to hold anything back.”

  She removed some photos from the folder. A couple of pictures were of my car, a few more of money in plastic bags, tagged for identification. I examined two close-ups of the “weapon”—a heavy chef’s knife, clearly visible through the plastic.

  “Well?” she asked, idly toying with her opal necklace.

  I nodded, not quite believing what was in front of me. “I used that knife in Jennifer Browning’s kitchen to cut some meat, an apple.”

  “Start at the beginning, John. Let’s go.” She pulled a notepad in front of her and hunched forward, a silver Mont Blanc in hand.

  I walked Arlene through a chronology of my dalliance with Jennifer. From our first meeting in my office, the kiss in Dino’s parking lot, the rendezvous at her apartment, the mysterious and disconcerting photographs. I detailed my visit to the Alley, my thrashing by the bouncer, the odd phone call with Frank before his murder.

  About the only thing I didn’t describe was the initial chill of the whipped cream on my naked balls.

  30

  “So you’re thinking that she killed her own brother, took the money, and planted the knife and some of the cash in your car?”

  “You want motivation? How about she’s the sole heir for over two mil.”

  Arlene raised her eyebrows. “There’s plenty of folks in my family that I dislike, but I’m not shopping for knives, no matter how much cash might be involved.”

  “But they had no communication, for years.”

  “So he couldn’t have said anything that would upset her enough to kill him.”

  I stared out the window, fixing for a moment on the gauzy contrails traced in the sky. “Maybe the Andar Feo—even Bernie Salvatore thought of them after I found Frank.”

  “Then how’d the money wind up in your trunk? Was the gang making a charitable donation?”

  “She sent me out for a bottle of wine and a damn sandwich, from Subway. Think about it. She had plenty of time to plant the evidence in my trunk.” Christ, I should have listened to Bernie Salvatore when he told me to go home that night.

  “Would that have mattered?” Arlene tapped her pen against a paperweight on her desk, a swirl of color encased in glass. “Fact is, John, if she’d called you the next day, you’d have run to her like a puppy. No surprise. You’re not the first man to shut down his brain for sex—hand job, blow job, straight fuck. You guys will risk anything.”

  Her choice of words surprised me, but I expected that she was capable of handling a conversation with any rung of society, from gangbangers to the chairs of corporate boards. “It wasn’t like that, Arlene. We were together one time.”

  “You think that helps?”

  “I made a mistake, Arlene. She was just so gorgeous to me. That sounds …”

  Arlene rolled her eyes. “Wow. I can see my opening statement now. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, it’s forgivable if my client found her gorgeous. What do you think, John? How does glamorous sound? Or should I go gutter and just say tight pussy?”

  “But … she led me on, Arlene. She kissed me first. Then, at her apartment, she initiated the whole thing.”

  She leaned back and folded her arms. “You’re serious? Where’s this going—that you were date-raped?”

  “You made your point, thanks.”

  “Think about it. I need the jury to believe she used you like a puppet. Because, the problem is, you had the motive, the opportunity, and the means. Having issues with your wife—your words—makes a man think about money a lot.”

  “No, no …” The way that Arlene was assessing my conduct was disturbing. “I wanted to save the marriage. I’ve got a kid, a daughter.”

  “So you want me to sell you as the repentant family man?” Arlene reste
d her pen on the desk. “You’re not giving me a lot here, John.”

  “I’m telling you, Jennifer planned this. Talk about motive. She did it, or somebody helped her. She had plenty of time; I called her hours before leaving for Frank’s.”

  “But you said she claimed she didn’t know where he was. The coroner puts the time of death within an hour or two before you found Frank. You said his text, with the address, was sent about an hour before you went to his house?”

  “Yeah.” I leaned forward. Finally, a ray of hope. “Jesus, I wouldn’t have had time to kill him.”

  Arlene shook her head. “Maybe, maybe not. They can argue you got there early, whacked him, cleaned yourself up somewhere, stashed the knife and the dough, then went back and called the cops. They’ll say you contaminated the crime scene on purpose when you played slip-slide in the blood.”

  “But I had to drive to Tremont. It was rush hour. I mean—”

  “Look, just playing devil’s advocate here, but if I’m Flanagan, I’d suggest that Frank might have given you his address when he first called. There’s a few hours’ window on TOD, you went there midafternoon, killed him, and sent yourself the text later from Frank’s phone.”

  “But he didn’t give me the address when he called.”

  Arlene pursed her lips, shook her head. “Think, John. Too bad he didn’t text you then. How can I prove he didn’t tell you the address?”

  “Because it’s the truth. Jennifer knows that; I told her.”

  “Are you kidding me?” Arlene looked at me as though my face had sprouted a third eye. “If she set you up, you think she won’t deny it? And if she didn’t know where Frank was, how could she kill him?”

  “Jesus, I don’t know.” I raised my hands. “Maybe she found the address somehow, had time enough to kill him, then go back home.”

  “Yep. And, if you had the address, there was plenty of time for you to kill him, pretend to find him dead later, then call the cops. Anyone see you that afternoon?”

  I closed my eyes and held them shut for a long second. “I sent my secretary home for the day.”

  “Great. The jury won’t find anything suspicious in that.”

  “But … hey, whoever killed him could have texted me from his phone, lured me in.”

  Arlene nodded and rolled the opal on her necklace between her fingers. “And you helpfully walked right into it.”

  “But there’d be fingerprints on the phone!”

  “Not if they held it in something, like a glove or handkerchief, and used a pen or pencil on the keypad. Which, by the way, is probably just what Flanagan will suggest you might have done.”

  “C’mon … what about the photos?”

  “What about them, Johnny?” Arlene’s tone verged on condescending. She was exasperated, I could tell. “All I can say about them now is that it looks like somebody was trying to scare her—the same girl you’re accusing of being a cold-blooded murderess.”

  “Christ! But it had to be her.”

  Arlene turned her chair toward the window and seemed to scan the horizon. “Think carefully about what you’re saying. If she killed him, why not just take the money Frank had—every lousy bill! Why stash it in your trunk? Everyone would have thought the Andar Feo had boosted the cash, and she could have walked. No fuss, no muss. And if it was this dastardly Mexican gang, and not her, why’d she have to set you up?”

  I swallowed hard. My lawyer was fast losing confidence in my position. “I have thought about it, Arlene. Jennifer wouldn’t have wanted them to beat her to Frank. Don’t forget, it looked like he had Oyster’s two hundred grand. Based on what they found in my trunk, that was for real—where else could that kind of money come from?”

  Arlene turned back from the window and leaned on her desk, her shoulders slumped. “I’ll give you that, but Jennifer is inheriting more money than most people ever dream about. Why take the chance?”

  “Because she couldn’t count on the Andar Feo, don’t you see? I mean, these guys aren’t locals. They might have even left town—it’s not like they inked a deal with Jennifer. She had no guarantees what they’d do, and she could have ended up the prime suspect. But if the finger’s pointing in my direction, she’s scot free. Frank’s case is closed with no suspicions about her, no questions—ever.”

  Arlene’s eyes burned into mine, and then she picked up her pen and made a few notes. Standing, she strolled to the window and leaned into the burnished metal frame that separated the nearly floor-to-ceiling windows. “You do understand, we’ll need to convince a jury that she’s one devious-ass black widow. Problem is, she is a widow—one you just described as gorgeous—with a regular job, who helps immigrants learn English. Persuading them that Jennifer crawled out from under a rock won’t be easy.”

  “Damn, Arlene, she had me convinced that she wanted me. That was one giant sucker punch.”

  “Which makes you …?”

  I didn’t say anything. God, I wanted a drink, wanted out of there.

  “John, you’re not a bad-looking man, not at all. But you’re older and married. You really thought that Miss Gorgeous couldn’t wait for you to yank down her panties?”

  I stared hard at the floor. “C’mon, you already made your point.”

  “The point is that I don’t have much here to go with. Arguing it was her or a Mexican drug gang will be a tough sell.”

  “Maybe the Butcher. I mean, she killed Oyster …”

  Arlene straightened and took a step toward me. “Jesus Christ! Did the Butcher plant a knife, which you just told me belonged to Jennifer, in your car? Were all of them—Jennifer, the bikers, the Butcher, and her brother—conspiring? What about the Pope? Him, too? Give me something here.”

  I couldn’t blame her for being frustrated. My story sounded like a stretch, even to me. “I’m telling you the truth, Arlene.”

  She walked back to her chair and, sitting, braced her arms against the desk. “You’ve been in this business long enough to know that the first casualty of war—or whatever the hell we do in a courtroom—is the truth. I can’t rely on the truth. I need to rely on creating reasonable doubt in the minds of the jurors.”

  “Arlene, if I had anything more to tell you, I would. Has anyone checked for her prints? The knife, my car keys, my trunk …” I felt as though I had lost control, like the night that the tattooed punk had beaten my ass. I remembered lying there, being kicked, watching the Andar Feo guys laugh. Abruptly, my memory shifted to the image of the Butcher bearing down, wielding her bolt cutter.

  Arlene eased forward and crossed her arms on the desk. “We’ll have it all checked out, but if she did touch anything, and she’s half as calculating as you say, we both know she wore gloves. If she does have the money, the cash is most assuredly not resting in a bank account traceable to her.”

  “You’re not exactly filling me with hope here.”

  “By the way, about that retirement watch—gold, by the way—they’ll argue you took it off his corpse.”

  “Who would give a junkie a gold watch? He’d pawn it in a minute.”

  “Good point, but I’m betting the jury will be more concerned with how it wound up in your trunk.”

  “Well, hell, why didn’t I steal the poor kid’s socks while I was at it?”

  “Johnny, get a grip.” She splayed her hands on the desk and tapped her fingers on the granite for a moment. “You’ve done jury work. I know not much criminal, but you have tried some cases, right?”

  I nodded. The thrum of the air conditioner ceased, and the sudden silence was jarring. “Some.”

  “I’ve got a lawyer who slept with his client, cheated on his wife. Who had thirty-five thousand dollars in the trunk of his car, the victim’s watch, along with—get this—a nice, big knife covered with his fingerprints and the blood of the dead man. Have I left anything out?”

  I looked away, out the window, at the vast expanse of Lake Erie.

  “How do you think a jury will assess that evidence?�
�� She followed my gaze over the lake. “This is difficult for you, but we have to face facts. And Fact Number One is that you present a helluva tough case. I’m a damn good lawyer, not a magician.”

  Some other voice was talking in the room—it couldn’t have been mine—asking if I risked lethal injection.

  “There’s not a doubt in my mind that Flanagan will go for the death penalty.” Arlene raised her eyebrows.

  The sky outside was bright blue, nearly cloudless, the kind of day where I used to escape from work early, knock back a few, and ogle pretty women. “Damn it, I didn’t do this.”

  “I’m not saying you did, but there are some procedural things you’d better understand. Flanagan will argue to the grand jury—he may be there as we speak—that they should indict you for aggravated murder with a felony murder specification. In your case, that means the murder occurred during the commission of a robbery. If the grand jury agrees that there’s probable cause for that charge, you’re facing the death penalty.”

  I knew enough to understand that no one, not even my lawyer, could appear before the grand jury to present my side of the story; it would be strictly Flanagan’s show. “Do you think they’ll indict?”

  “In this county, the defense bar likes to say that a grand jury will indict a ham sandwich.” She picked up the photographs of the knife and dropped them in front of me. “Yeah. I think they’ll indict.”

  I wanted to toss aside the fucking crutches and bolt to the elevator. “What about a lie detector?”

  “Sorry. The prosecutor offers you the lie box only at his discretion. Flanagan never offers it in capital cases.”

  “Can the prick make me see a shrink?”

  “First, he’s Mr. Flanagan to you. Make this personal, and he’ll eat you for lunch. If I need to put you on the stand and he gets under your skin, it’s over. And, no, he can’t make you see a shrink, because we’re not making your mental state an issue. We’ll argue that you were set up, not that you killed someone because of your mental state.”

  “What about my history—the psychiatrists, the medications?