Friend of the Departed

by Frank Zafiro

  “True enough,” I admitted. “You know something else that doesn’t make sense? Why don’t you just hire the second best defense attorney in the city? You can afford it.”

  She shook her head. “The second best? There isn’t one. Everyone knows Joel Harrity is on a level all his own. Hiring him is my only option.”

  “Only it isn’t. You could go with someone else, or reach out to Seattle for a hired gun, if money isn’t an option.”

  “I have my reasons, even if you don’t think they make sense.”

  “Fair enough, but I’ll go you one better. This entire case hasn’t made much sense to me from the beginning. Everything about it has bothered me. The ethical lawyer’s games, the artificial restrictions on information flow, all of it. At least, until last night, when I realized something.”

  “What did you realize?”

  “That I don’t have to solve this case. At least, not in the sense that the cops do. My mission is simple. To tell Joel Harrity whether or not I think he should take your case. That’s it. And to do that, I don’t have to build probable cause, or lock in witness testimony or skulk around doing surveillance. I can just come here, and talk to you.”

  She didn’t react. Instead, she just waited for me to continue, so I forged ahead.

  “It’s as simple as this, Mrs. Brassart: will you answer my questions, or not?”

  Her reply took a few seconds. “Meaning that if I don’t, you’ll recommend he not take on my case?”

  I shrugged. “Probably.”

  “That’s not fair.”

  That made me smile. “My grandmother used to sing me a little song about that. It was in Czech, but she taught me the translation. I never forgot it.”

  She just looked at me, waiting.

  “It goes like this,” I said. “What is life? Life is a book. How much does it cost? A quarter. But I have only a nickel.” I waited a beat, then added with a shrug, “That’s life.”

  “How depressing.”

  “I think it’s more ironic than anything, but I guess it was her way of trying to teach me an important lesson. Life isn’t fair.” I gave her a meaningful look. “If you want Harrity to represent you, then you’re going to have to trust him. And me.”

  She shifted in her seat, looking away. “It’s…difficult.” She looked back at me. “Trusting people.”

  I nodded in agreement. “But sometimes you have to.”

  “Perhaps.”

  I leaned forward. “Look at it from this side. There are only two reasons I can see for not sharing all of the case files and discovery information with Harrity before letting him decide whether to take your case.”

  “Which are?”

  “Number one,” I said, holding out my index finger, “is that you killed your husband, or had him killed.”

  She blinked but said nothing.

  “And number two,” I added my second finger to the equation, “is that you didn’t, but you think the evidence will make it look like you did.”

  She blinked again, but still didn’t reply.

  “If it’s number one,” I said, “then you should just withdraw your request, because Harrity will never represent you. But if it’s the second reason? Well, then you have to trust that he’ll see through that, and still choose to represent you.”

  She remained silent for about thirty seconds. Her eyes were on me, but I could almost see the gears turning behind them. I leaned back and rested my hands on the arms of the wicker chair, and waited.

  Finally, she said, “The evidence seems bad.”

  “I read the affidavit,” I said. “I know.”

  “There’s more than just that. But that doesn’t matter, because I didn’t kill Henry. I didn’t love him anymore, but I didn’t kill him.”

  “So why the cloak and dagger routine? Why not just come clean with Harrity and take your chances?”

  She shifted in her seat again, moving her folded legs to the other side. “I…had secrets. Questions I didn’t want to answer.”

  “Questions like who is inside the house right now?”

  Panic flashed across her face. “What?”

  I shook my head. “Don’t start bullshitting me now. I saw the Mercedes in the garage. I know who it belongs to.”

  “I…” she trailed off, uncertain.

  “Why don’t we get all of our cards out on the table,” I suggested.

  I stood up and headed for the front door.

  Her reaction was delayed, but before I reached the door, she scrambled from her chair. “No!”

  I stopped at the front door and looked back at her. She moved toward me frantically, her arms extended. In that moment, I realized that I still wasn’t sure if I believed her or not. Despite the oddities in the case, and my own doubts, I couldn’t say for sure if she killed her husband, or hired the man inside the house to do it.

  And I had to know.

  “We’re going inside,” I told her bluntly. “We’re going to talk to your neighbor, and figure this thing out.”

  “No! We’re not.”

  “Yes,” I said calmly, “we are.”

  I reached for the knob, turned it and pushed the door open.

  Marie Brassart slid in front of me, still holding out her hands. “Please,” she whispered. “No. None of this matters. I didn’t kill him. That’s all that matters.”

  “Everything matters,” I said. The words registered a faint echo, but I didn’t have time to listen to it. “Now, are you going to invite me in, or not?”

  She stood there, her hands trembling, her eyes filled with panic and beseeching me. I put up a wall and simply stared at her, unyielding. I didn’t want to force my way past her. Technically, that’d be trespassing at the least, and burglary at the worst. Either one wasn’t a great idea when a cluster of cops was hanging out sixty yards away in the woods, watching.

  I didn’t say a word. I knew whoever spoke next, lost. I met her gaze, and I waited.

  It only took a minute before resignation replaced panic. She dropped her eyes, and stood aside.

  I went inside, and she followed, closing the door behind her. I strode into the living room, projecting confidence. All the while, I wished again that I’d brought along my gun. Walter Garrison hadn’t exactly looked like a convict or a pro wrestler, but that didn’t mean he might not be a handful. Yesterday’s fracas in the alley was fresh in my mind, and my aching knee and shoulder chipped away at the confidence I felt.

  “Come on out,” I said in loud, commanding tone. “We need to talk.”

  I braced myself for what might happened next. I imagined Walter Garrison sprinting out of the bedroom like a linebacker and slamming into me. Or maybe coming through the door with a gun in his hand. For all I knew, he’d been the one to run down Henry Brassart, and that made him dangerous.

  Marie Brassart stopped next to me. “It’s all right,” she said quietly. “You can come out.”

  Be prepared for anything, I said to myself.

  Even so, I was shocked when a blonde woman appeared in the bedroom doorway, and walked toward us.

  37

  I experienced a moment of confusion. Several scenarios went through my mind, but when I glanced over at Marie Brassart, and saw how she was looking at the blonde woman, everything fell into place.

  “Who’s this?” she asked Marie.

  “He’s…” Marie looked at me, then back at the woman. “He’s a friend. I guess.”

  The woman frowned. “You guess? Marie…”

  “Jeni Garrison?” I interrupted.

  She looked at me. “How do you know my name?”

  I stepped toward her, and held out my hand. “Jeni, I’m Stefan Kopriva. I’m trying to help Mrs. Brassart.”

  She took my hand cautiously, gave it a single anemic pump, and let go. “Help her how?”

  I motioned toward the couch and chair. “Maybe we could sit down?”

  Jeni looked at Marie, who shrugged. The two of them moved to the couch while I took the chair.
We sat in an uneasy silence for a few moments before Jeni waved a hand at me. “Explain.”

  I held up my hands. “I’m still processing here. I didn’t expect to see you.”

  “Who did you expect?”

  “Quite frankly, your husband.”

  Jeni scowled. “He barely knows I exist. Why would he be aware of Marie?”

  “I only saw the car before,” I explained.

  “Before?” Her eyes narrowed. “Have you been watching us?”

  “I’ve been investigating,” I admitted. “That’s what I was hired to do.”

  “Hired by whom?”

  I leaned back and appraised her again. Her hair was short, and styled in an angled bob that also screamed rich woman to me. She sat rigidly, her hands balled into fists on her thighs, and leaning slightly toward Marie, who had fallen strangely silent.

  I took it all in. I tried to see the story behind it, and wondered if I was right. There was only one way to know. “How long has this been going on?” I asked Marie.

  Marie hesitated.

  “You don’t have to answer that,” Jeni snapped. “You don’t have to tell him anything.”

  “She’s right,” I admitted. “You don’t. But I hope you will.”

  Marie seemed to struggle for another moment or two, then she put her hand on Jeni’s leg. “It’s…it’s all right. He says he’s here to help, and I think I believe him. I…I trust him.”

  Jeni pressed her lips together but said nothing.

  Marie turned her attention back to me. Some measure of confidence seemed to be flowing back into her demeanor. “We’ve been together for about a year,” she stated simply. “Why does that matter?”

  “It changes everything,” I said.

  “How so?”

  I leaned forward. “You’re trusting me, so I’ll be honest with you. When I came here, I still wasn’t sure about you.”

  “You mean whether or not I killed Henry.”

  “Yes. Or had it done. In fact, once I saw the Mercedes, I assumed it was Walter in here, and that you were having an affair with him. I also believed it was a strong possibility he could have done the actual deed on your behalf.”

  “But now?”

  “Now I don’t think so.”

  Jeni scoffed. “So just because it’s not a man, suddenly it’s not possible? You don’t think a woman could have done that? Or is it something else?”

  Her eyes challenged me. I met them evenly. “I don’t know,” I admitted. “Is it possible? Sure. Is it likely? My gut says no.”

  “Fuck you and your sexist, bigoted gut,” Jeni snapped. She turned to Marie. “Honey, we don’t need him. Tell him to leave, and we’ll figure this out ourselves.”

  I didn’t reply, but it occurred to me that she really was offended by the fact that I didn’t think she was capable of murder. Talk about misplaced anger.

  Marie wavered in the face of that anger, looking back and forth between us. The confidence I’d seen in her a moment ago seemed to have ebbed. “I…I don’t know. I think we do need him. Harrity, I mean.”

  “Did you kill Henry?” I asked her bluntly.

  “No.” Her answer was immediate.

  “Did you?” I asked, turning to Jeni.

  “Go to hell,” Jeni snarled back.

  “No,” Marie said softly. “Of course she didn’t.”

  “Then you’re right. You do need Harrity.”

  We sat quietly again, all of us lost in our own thoughts. I stared at a white carved stone bust on the table next to me. The features looked very African, and the white stone seemed incongruous. Maybe that was the point.

  Finally, I asked, “Can I ask you a couple more questions?”

  Marie nodded.

  “You and Henry? Was it contentious?”

  She shook her head. “No. Just distant. I was figuring things out, and he had his work.”

  “Did he know about the two of you?”

  “No.”

  “It’s a bit of a coincidence,” I said, pressing just a little.

  “What is?”

  I motioned to the two of them. “You start an affair and a few months later, your husband is murdered.”

  Jeni opened her mouth, but Marie stopped her with a touch.

  “That’s what it is,” she assured me. “A coincidence.”

  “It’s the kind of coincidence juries struggle with,” I said.

  “I know.”

  “If you didn’t have anything to do with Henry’s death, how did the damage to your car happen?”

  “A deer,” Marie answered. “A couple of weeks earlier, I hit a deer.”

  I didn’t answer.

  “I told the police about it,” she said.

  “When it happened?”

  “No. After Henry’s death. When they asked me about the damage to my Lexus.”

  I nodded. “That was in the affidavit. And it’s another disturbing coincidence.”

  Marie’s gaze fell. “I…I know. But that’s all it is.”

  “The police don’t believe that.”

  “Obviously,” Jeni said angrily. “They arrested her.”

  “But she didn’t do it.”

  “No,” Marie said. “I didn’t.”

  “Is that all you came here for?” Jeni said. “To have this ridiculous conversation?”

  I shook my head. “It’s not ridiculous. It’s important. But I did come here for more than that.” I looked at Marie again. “If you didn’t kill him, who did?”

  When Marie raised her eyes to meet mine, they were filled with the glaze of tears, but anger radiated out from them. “I…don’t…know. If I did, don’t you think I would have told the police?”

  “I get the feeling that the police were pretty focused on you right away. Especially after they saw the damage to your car. Do they know about the two of you?”

  Marie shrugged. “I’m not sure.”

  “It didn’t come up in any interviews?”

  “I only talked to them a couple of times after it happened. Once I realized they thought I killed Henry, I asked for an attorney. The attorney advised me not to speak with them again, and I haven’t.”

  “Why didn’t you ask for Harrity right away, instead of the public defender?”

  “The police froze all of our…all of my assets.”

  That made sense, I thought. Then I asked, “But during those first few interviews, the police never made any references to a lover, or an accomplice?”

  “No.”

  “Not even by inference?”

  “Not that I recall.”

  I shrugged. “Well, maybe they didn’t know about it then.”

  “Then?” Marie repeated.

  I nodded. “Yeah, then. They definitely know about it now.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because they’re staking out your house from the woods.”

  Marie’s look of astonishment surprised me a little. When I looked at Jeni, her expression mirrored Marie’s. Somehow, that resonated with me, and told me the truth I needed to know. Neither was devious enough to suspect the cops of watching them. It was a strange reason to trust them, but intuition is what it is.

  “They’re…?”

  “Yes.”

  Marie looked at Jeni. “Then they know.”

  Jeni shrugged. “So what? We’re not doing anything wrong.”

  “We’re having an affair!”

  “So I’ll get a divorce. I love you.”

  Marie touched her face. “I love you, too. It’s not that. It’s that he’s right.” She motioned toward me. “Between you and me being together, and the damage to my car…a jury will think I killed Henry.”

  “That’s why you need Harrity,” I said. “And he’s going to have the same question for you that I do.”

  They both turned their attention to me and I asked them again.

  “If you didn’t kill him, who did?”

  Neither of them had an answer.

  38

&nb
sp; We sat in the living room for another half an hour while I asked her question after question, trying to find a viable answer. As best I could tell, Henry had no enemies that Marie knew about. Not even business rivals.

  I turned to Jeni. “What about your husband?”

  “What about him?”

  “Did he know Henry?”

  She shrugged. “Only to wave at.”

  “Their paths didn’t cross professionally?”

  “No, I don’t believe so.”

  “What about personally?”

  “Not that I’m aware.”

  “Does your husband still play racquetball?”

  Her eyes narrowed. “How’d you know about that?”

  “It doesn’t matter. Does he still play?”

  “It does matter. How do you know all of these things? Have you been spying on—?”

  I used an old interrogation tactic, holding up my hand and looking away. She stopped abruptly.

  “I’ve been looking into this situation,” I said quietly, bring my gaze back to meet hers. “Including things surrounding it. Now, this will go much faster if you just answer my questions.”

  “I don’t know that I care how quickly it goes, or if it should be going at all. I still don’t trust you.”

  “But she does.” I pointed to Marie. “And for all we know, the cops could come through that door any second. So maybe we should stop arguing and try to figure this out together?”

  She didn’t answer right away. After a few moments, though, she looked away and shrugged. “Yeah, he still plays.”

  “At the River City Riverfront Club?”

  She shook her head. “No. South Park Racquet Club. It’s closer, and less expensive. It’s where all the high-end players go.”

  So no connection there, I thought. I tried a different angle. “Did he know about you and Marie?”

  “No,” Jeni replied. “As far as he knows, we’re only friends.”

  Another dead end. I considered, then turned back to Marie. “Was it possible that Henry was having an affair, do you think?”

  Marie shook her head. “I doubt it. Henry was married to his work.”

  “Would you have known if he’d been seeing someone?”

  Marie considered. “I wasn’t paying close attention, to be honest. I think something like that could have gone on for a while before I’d have found some reason to be suspicious.”