Sedona Law 4: A Legal thriller

by Dave Daren

“They said she gave conflicting stories that didn’t match the evidence,” I said.

  “Why did she confess, then?” she asked, her brow furrowed.

  “There are a lot of reasons,” I said. “Believe me, I’ve been investigating this woman for a while. She may not have used the dagger, but she’s far from innocent.”

  “So what’s her ulterior motive?” Gabriel said.

  “I’m not entirely sure,” I said. “But I know it has to do with money, sex, and John Malone.”

  “And Olivia,” Julianna said sadly.

  On that note, a somber mood fell over the table, and we sat in silence for several minutes. Finally Gabriel spoke.

  “I think we need to do a group cleanse, to clear out the negative energy,” he said. “

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “I think we should all have sex together,” his expression was deadpan. “It would cleanse out the negative energy, and help bring us into awareness, and into unity for the arraignment, and for the rest of the case, and the trial. Let’s bring the physical, mental and spiritual energies at this table into alignment.”

  I blinked in shock. How did we get here?

  “I mean,” Julianna said, “only if you guys are into it.”

  “We’re just not at that place spiritually,” Vicki said. “We’re all at different places in our journey toward wholeness and enlightenment. And, I’m not sure group sex is the right choice for us right now.”

  I nodded solemnly to Gabriel and Julianna, but I completely admired Vicki right then. I would have gone with the whole, “Are you nuts?” approach.

  “Totally,” Julianna’s tone had that overly open and accepting note New Agers use. “Whenever you’re ready.”

  “Yeah,” Gabriel said. “It’s a big step.”

  I promptly paid the bill and rose to end the evening as fast as I could without offending our clients. When Vicki and I got back to our car, we both dissolved into laughter. ”

  “Wow,” she said. “That’s a first.”

  “And I thought I had seen everything Sedona had to offer,” I said.

  “Apparently not,” she said. “We’ve got a sex therapist on our hands.”

  “It’s always something,” I said.

  Chapter 13

  It was the morning of the arraignment, and we were scheduled for the courthouse in Preston. Vicki and I made the hour drive out there and rehashed the details of the case on the way.

  “But we still don’t have a motive for the murder,” she said. “We have a dirty politician, a call girl, and a madam, but how does that factor in to a murder?”

  “We know that Malone hated Beowulf,” I said.

  “Right,” she replied. “But, what would be the inciting incident?”

  “Jealousy?” I threw out. “Disagreement over money? I don’t know. We still need that smoking gun.”

  “We need to talk to Judith again,” she said.

  “Yeah,” I said. “This is all going to get really nasty over the next few weeks, because half of these people lied to us. I want to do all of those interviews again.”

  We were quiet for a few minutes as the southwest landscape whizzed by us.

  “This is my first time in court,” Vicki stated.

  It hadn’t occurred to me until then that she hadn’t tried a case. In California she hadn’t been licensed, and in Arizona our big cases were a team effort, and I had done all of the court appearances alone, just because it was easier.

  “How is the case going with Elena?” I asked her.

  She would be doing that one alone, although I would be there if she needed me.

  “We have a preliminary hearing scheduled for next week,” she said. “Asylum cases can get hung up for years. but I’ve been communicating back and forth with her immigration case worker. She should be able to get a temporary visa next week until her case is fully heard.”

  “Wow,” I said. “Good work.”

  “Well, it’s not over yet,” she said.

  “How is she holding up?” I asked.

  “She’s nervous,” she said.

  “Clients typically are,” I said. “You’ve got to have a bag of tricks for that.”

  “Oh, I’ve seen your bag of tricks,” she laughed. “Bullshitting them all the way into the courtroom.”

  “It works,” I said.

  “Poor lady,” she said. “She’s so sweet. I just love her. You know she brought us homemade breakfast burritos the other day?”

  “How did I miss that?” I asked.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “You missed out, they were good. But I’m pretty confident we’ve got her case under control, so that’s been helping.”

  “How has she been since we liquidated the estate?” I asked.

  We met Elena because she had been the housekeeper for our wealthy client who died. Per the instructions of his will, we liquidated the estate, which was unfortunate for her, because she both lived and worked at the estate.

  “She moved in with her daughter for a little while,” Vicki said. “Now she’s got a little place and another housekeeping job.”

  “That’s good,” I said. “I hated to lay her off.”

  “Maybe that’s why she didn’t bring you a burrito,” she said.

  “That’s it,” I said. “No more pro bono work for her until she brings me a burrito.”

  We arrived at the court, and it was a madhouse. Everywhere we looked, there were news vans, cameras, and reporters talking into live feeds. They weren’t allowed inside the building, so a couple of security guards stood on alert on the steps, and a few stood out in the lot directing traffic and trying to keep some sense of order.

  “Shit,” I said.

  “Thank you, Marvin,” Vicki muttered as a security guard in an orange vest halted us, and let traffic come through past us.

  “Ratings,” I said.

  Finally, he waved us through, and we inched our way through several other security guards, and the overall badly managed pandemonium. This was a small town courthouse, they weren’t designed or prepared for scandalous media trials.

  Vicki checked her reflection in the mirror and reapplied her make-up as I parked. She looked stunning in a form fitting skirt suit. She had a black and white patterned blazer top, and a knee-length black skirt that accentuated her curves. Her long hair fell in soft curls around her face, and the scent of her perfume filled the car.

  “It’s just an arraignment,” she muttered as she fixed her hair for the cameras.

  “Anything else going on in this town?” I laughed.

  “I hear the county fair has a goat competition,” she said.

  “My point exactly,” I said.

  “I don’t know,” she browsed her phone. “They’re giving away ten thousand dollars.”

  “Really?” I said as we exited the car. “We should get ourselves a goat.”

  “I hear they’re good lawn mowers,” she said.

  “Is that right?” I laughed.

  “Yeah,” she said. “You get a goat, it’s eco-friendly lawn care.”

  “Well, damn,” I said. “We live in the downtown district, though. You think they’d let us have a goat?”

  “It is Sedona,” she said.

  I laughed. “It is Sedona.”

  “And you are a pseudo-celebrity,” she joked.

  “I’m sorry, I can’t hear you, what’s that, Kate?” I responded.

  She laughed, and I smoothed my suit and raised my eyebrows at her. Then, with long confident strides, we strolled up to the courthouse, Vicki beside me, her black Loubotins clicking against the concrete in a stacotta rhythm. We were halfway through the lot before they noticed us.

  We did have an online presence, AJ managed all of that for us. So any mediocre reporter could have figured out who we were with a quick search. This made us instant targets, and targets we were.

  We were immediately surrounded by close to two dozen reporters, who penned us into a circle. It was chaos. There w
as shouting, and everywhere I looked, either a voice recorder was being shoved into our faces, or a video camera stared us down. We tried to keep walking, but they followed us.

  “Mr. Irving, how does Julianna Spencer intend to plead today?”

  “What can you tell us about the murder investigation?”

  “Early reports claim that state Senator John Malone may or may not be involved. Can you confirm or deny that?”

  “We’re here with defense attorneys Henry Irving and Vicki Park and--”

  “Mr. Irving, Mr. Irving, over here, do you expect this to go to full trial, or will you push to get the charges dropped?”

  “There is an unconfirmed rumor that the case may be the tip of the iceberg on a drug trafficking ring. What can you tell us about that?”

  “Ms. Park, what is your take on the women’s issues at the heart of this case? Can you give us a quote about Judith Klein?”

  “Mr. Irving, is it true that you previously had a romantic relationship with Ms. Spencer?”

  “Ms. Park, where do you buy your suits?”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Gabriel’s Prius pull into the parking lot. In all the chaos, I whispered into Vicki’s ear.

  “I’ll handle the press, you go get the clients,” I said.

  She nodded, and I stopped and turned to the cameras and gave them a winning, charming smile. I saw the Prius park.

  “Thank you all for coming out,” I said, and I couldn’t deny there was a certain rush of having half a dozen cameras trained on me. “I’ll give you a couple of quotes.”

  Now that the reporters had my undivided attention, Vicki smiled and slipped out of the crowd undetected. I looked into the lenses and then borrowed from Senator Malone’s placating comments.

  “We are deeply saddened by the tragic events that followed the dance performance last month,” I spoke into a trio of microphones shoved at me. “Our thoughts and prayers go out to the victim’s family. Experiencing a death is a traumatic event for any family, and we hope to get these people some answers as soon as possible.”

  It occured to me, then, that I hadn’t seen a shred of Beyo’s actual family, other than a third-hand reference to an estranged ex-wife. Was this guy such a reprobate that not even his own family wanted to claim him after his death? I hoped that the police and coroner had a different experience on that than I had.

  “Julianna Spencer does intend to plead not guilty, then?” a reporter asked. She shoved a voice recorder so close to me, she almost hit me in the face. I winced and instinctively pulled away.

  “I cannot tell you that at this time,” I said. “I can only tell you that we are conducting a full investigation on the death of Beowulf Vandergarten, and we are talking to everyone involved. Anyone that has any knowledge of the crime, is urged to contact our office, or local law enforcement as soon as possible.”

  The last part surprised me even as it came out of my mouth, but I liked the way it sounded.

  “Do you think Senator Malone is involved?” a reporter asked me on camera.

  “I have no reason to believe that, no,” I lied. “We have a great relationship with the senator. He has served this district tirelessly for many years, and we intend to honor his reputation and give him the respect he deserves.”

  Bullshit. Bullshit. Bullshit.

  Through the crowd, I could see Vicki had reached Julianna and Gabriel, and Chloe and Olivia were with them. Vicki briefly conferenced with all of them, and they looked in our direction before power walking toward the doors.

  “Some have said that there is a drug trafficking ring at the center of this controversial murder. What do you know about that?” another reporter asked.

  “Drug trafficking?” I repeated. I didn’t know where that rumor came from. “No, nothing in our investigation hints in any way at drug trafficking.”

  “What do you think was the reason behind the murder?” another reporter asked.

  Vicki and the clients talked to a security guard who escorted them up the steps.

  “I cannot comment on that,” I said.

  “As you might know,” another reporter said with a video buzzing at me. “We are a Starbright station.”

  I nodded as I followed where this question was going. I rapidly formed our firm’s official position on Marvin Iakova.

  “What role, if any, do you think Marvin Iakova had in this crime,” he asked. “And what potential impact do you think that would have on media in this state?”

  “I do not have any evidence at all that Marvin Iakova was involved in the murder,” I said. “I only know that he was there the night of the murder, which is public knowledge. As far as the impact it would have on local media, I couldn’t say. You would know those figures better than me.”

  “There is an unconfirmed rumor that you were with Marvin Iakova when he learned of the murder,” another reporter stated.

  “That is correct,” I said.

  I wasn’t sure if there was wisdom in admitting to any further association with Iakova, so I erred on the side of silence. But man, these people had done their homework. Small town media deserved more credit than it got.

  “And you are meeting with Marvin Iakova later this afternoon, am I correct?” the same reporter asked. “Why would the defense attorney on a high profile murder case meet with him unless they regarded him as a suspect?”

  I raised an eyebrow and glanced at the reporter, and I instantly recognized his type. Young, ambitious, and hungry for a career. I couldn’t say I blamed him. But, Marvin Iakova was a polarizing figure. He had to be kept at arm’s length.

  “Like I said,” I replied, “we are meeting with everyone that was backstage that night. This is a murder investigation, and we need to keep our eyes on the ball.”

  “There are reports that he staged the murder as a publicity stunt,” he continued.

  Vicki and the clients were gone, so this press conference was over.

  “You are a Starbright employee,” I snarled. “Have some loyalty to your boss. I’m sorry, people, that’s all for now.”

  I held up my palms and the crowd parted.

  “Thank you, Mr. Irving,” was the resounding comment as they let me pass through unhindered. I jogged through the parking lot and up the steps. I didn’t know how far behind that had put me, but I needed to get back on track.

  I arrived inside and searched the lobby areas for Vicki and the clients. The courthouse in Preston had the sort of old Americana look that could be charming. Patterned linoleum and winding wooden staircases all harkened back to another era.

  I imagined the early days in this courthouse, when people waited in these lobbies and talked of the day’s headlines, a man landing on the moon, and the death of the incumbent President Kennedy.

  They thought the world was going to hell, then, what with the Beatles and their long hair and all. I wondered what they would have thought if they knew that this courthouse would one day see a murder trial for a nude polyamorous Brooklyn dancer.

  I found our party gathered in a crowd around Vicki’s phone. She was streaming the live feed of my press conference, where talking heads now filled airtime summarizing and rehashing everything I had said. Gabriel nervously rambled about the details of the case, and Vicki smiled as I approached.

  “That was impressive,” she said.

  I winked. “It’s not my first time around the mulberry bush with reporters. How’s everybody holding up?”

  “We’re good,” Gabriel said as he took a sip of coffee. “Fifth cup since Sedona.”

  “Espresso?” I asked.

  “You know it,” he said.

  I laughed. “How’s everyone else?”

  I glanced at Olivia who sat on a bench and sullenly played with her hands. Chloe wrapped her arms around her, and the two sat in an embrace. Julianna stood silently. She channeled Audrey Hepburn’s Holly Golightly in a knee length black dress and dark shades. Geez. This was starting to become a mess. I was just glad I didn’t have to handle
all the relationship nonsense behind this case. I was just here to give legal advice. No one else answered my question.

  “Alright,” I said. “This is going to be quick, so we don’t need to stress about it. The judge is just going to read the charges, which we already know, and then he’ll ask you guys how you want to plead. Anyone have any questions about what’s about to happen?”

  Everyone shook their heads, and I checked my phone. It was time to go in.

  “Oh, my god, did I miss the event?” Zondra’s voice resonated through the lobby, even though she was still about ten feet away.

  “Zondra,” I said. “No, you’re right on time.”

  “Holy Jesus,” she said and clapped her hands around her face. “Holy baby Jesus in the manger. How you holding up, baby girl?”

  Julianna sighed and still didn’t say anything.

  “She’s not taking it well today,” Gabriel said, and he started rambling to Zondra, who listened with ever increasing concern.

  I turned to Vicki, and she sighed. It was time.

  “Alright, people,” I said. “Let’s move.”

  With that, we all filed into the courtroom. The room matched the outdated decor of the building. It was a small space, a few rows of wooden pews, and then separated areas for the defendant and prosecution up front. Chet was already there, sitting and going over his notes. He looked up when we walked in so I nodded to him, and he nodded back.

  We all took our seats on the defense side, with Chloe, Olivia, and Zondra sitting in the visitor’s row. Zondra squeezed Julianna’s hand before finding her seat. Olivia was quiet and somber, and to an observer, it could be attributed to grief. But, I suspected it looked more like guilt. Julianna removed her sunglasses to reveal swollen eyes, and Gabriel wrapped his arm around her as they sat.

  “We’re going to get through this,” he told her. “It’s just you and me, together, babe.”

  She smiled, and this set off a fresh round of tears, and they embraced. Vicki and I smiled at each other awkwardly. That was the thing about having couples as clients. They either held tightly to each other for comfort, or killed each other with infighting. Fortunately, we had only seen the first type. Our last couple had a baby right in front of us, and I almost had to deliver it myself.