Before She Dies (12 page)
“You’re holding up well?” Ms. Wellington pulled files and a yellow legal notepad from her sleek black briefcase.
“I’m fine. I haven’t heard from my mother in a few days. I’m worried about the children.”
“I spoke to your mother this morning when she called the office to see if the jury has returned. She’s taking the kids out of town. They’re spending the next few days at the beach. They’ll be back by the weekend.”
“Is everything all right?”
“Yes. Why wouldn’t it be?”
She glanced from side to side before saying, “I’ve been receiving letters. Some are quite hateful.”
Ms. Wellington sighed. “Your case got a lot of media attention, which can pull out the crazies.”
“Mom hasn’t mentioned any trouble?”
“None. She just thought the beach would be a nice change for the kids.”
“You’d let me know if there was a problem?”
Ms. Wellington arched a brow. “If you haven’t noticed, I am brutally honest.”
Samantha rubbed the strained muscles in her forehead. “I know, I know. I’m just worried. My kids feel like they are slipping away.”
Her expression softened. “They haven’t forgotten you. They love you.”
“How do you know that? Have you seen them?”
“It’s been a month.”
She closed her eyes. “I’ve forgotten what it feels like to hold them. I can’t remember how good they smelled after a bath. I’m losing them.”
Uncharacteristic emotion softened her attorney’s gaze. “You’re not losing them.”
Ms. Wellington’s hourly billable rates rivaled the best in the city. When Samantha had written to Angie Carlson asking for help, it had never occurred to her that Carlson’s high-powered associate would take the case.
“Why did you take my case?” Samantha said.
The question shifted Ms. Wellington’s attention temporarily away from whatever thoughts she’d been ruminating on. “My partner showed me your letter. She knew with her new baby she couldn’t give you the defense you deserved, so she asked me.”
“But why take me on? You could have said no.”
“The case appealed to me.”
“Why?”
Green eyes narrowed. “It doesn’t matter.” Ms.
Wellington unscrewed the top of her gold pen. “The prosecutor offered you another deal yesterday. Manslaughter two. Eight years.”
“Eight years is a lifetime. The last year has put so much distance between my children and me. In eight years, they will have forgotten me.”
“If the jury comes back with a guilty verdict, then it could mean life behind bars.”
“I’d also be admitting that I planned to kill my husband.” She shook her head. “I was defending my kids. Myself.”
Ms. Wellington sat back, staring at her with eyes so keen she nearly squirmed. “So you are rejecting the offer?”
“I don’t want any deals.”
“It’s a good deal, Mrs. White. Mr. Kane won’t make a better offer.”
Samantha shook her head. “I saw the way the jury was looking at you on Tuesday. You had their full attention. They were mesmerized.”
“I’m good at what I do but I’ve lost cases before. If I lose this one, then you go to jail for twenty-plus years.”
She risked never seeing her kids again, versus them hating her. “Do you think we’ll lose?”
“I don’t know.”
She leaned forward. “If you had to guess. What do you think they’ll say?”
“I felt good about my summation on Tuesday. We have jury members who must be on our side. And we don’t have to convince them all. Just a few. But that doesn’t mean their minds can’t be swayed by the others.”
“There’s been no noise from the jury?”
“None.”
“That’s a good thing, right?”
“It means they’ve got some reasonable doubt.”
“Which works in my favor?”
“Yes.”
Samantha dropped her gaze to her handcuffs and nervously picked at the lock. “I’m going to take my chances.”
“You are sure?”
She met Ms. Wellington’s questioning gaze. “Yes.”
Ms. Wellington put away her notebook and closed up her portfolio case. “Okay. I’ll relay that to the prosecutor.”
Chapter 8
Thursday, October 21, 5 a.m.
Rokov had worked until past 2 a.m., sifting through witness statements and tracking down the waitresses from O’Malley’s. The waitresses had been too busy to notice much more than their overcrowded sections.
Rokov normally would have showered at the station and kept pushing, but it was his night to check on his grandmother. Alexa, his sister, would be in Texas another few days. He’d called his grandmother several times earlier in the evening, she’d assured him she was just fine, but he needed to get by the house and touch base with her.
So instead of going to his own apartment, he drove to his grandmother’s house. She’d left the back porch light on for him as well as the light above the kitchen sink. A plate of sugar cookies sat on the counter by the stove. Snagging a couple of cookies, he ate them as he moved toward the spare room. He tugged off his shirt and collapsed back against the pillows.
He awoke at seven to the sound of his cell phone alarm. Pushing up on his elbow, he dug fingers through his short dark hair.
He showered, changed into khakis and a fresh shirt, and wandered into the kitchen. He was surveying the contents of the refrigerator when his grandmother appeared.
Irina Rokov had a petite slightly bowed frame, thick graying hair, and a wrinkled face. She had been born in Tver, a city a few hours north of Moscow. She’d lost family members in Stalin’s labor camps and seen all her brothers die on the eastern front during World War II. She’d been pregnant with her only son when her husband had gotten drunk and fallen in front of a train. She’d birthed her son days later and soon after took up needle and thread to earn a living for both. When her son had grown and married, he’d taken his mother and his very pregnant wife to the United States. Unlike many of her generation who’d emigrated, Irina had learned English and also how to drive a car.
“You came in very late last night,” she said.
“I’m on a case.”
Instead of telling him he worked too hard, she nodded. “You must eat.”
“I’ll grab a sandwich.”
“Sit at the table. I will make you a decent meal.”
His head throbbed from lack of sleep so he grabbed a cold soda from the refrigerator, popped the top, and sat down. He took a long liberal pull, closing his eyes as he drank. He finished off the can, and before he could rise to get another, his grandmother set a new one in front of him.
“This case is bad,” she said.
“Yes.”
“I saw the news. A woman murdered.”
“Yes.” She’d not ask for details of the case and he’d not give her any. But just knowing she paid attention to his work lifted his spirits.
She took a thick dark loaf of rye and cut off two even slices with a long serrated knife. With bent fingers that had clutched a needle and thread too many times, she smoothed thick mustard on the bread and then covered it with slices of roast beef she’d no doubt made for a dinner he’d missed. She cut the sandwich into neat even pieces and then set it in front of him.
He bit into the sandwich and smiled at her. She nodded back.
As he ate, she made a second sandwich and wrapped it in waxed paper. Next, she set her kettle on the stove and filled a tea ball with loose black tea. When the water boiled, she poured it into a pot and let the tea brew.
“The woman that died,” he said. “Had a business. She used a computer to read horoscopes and tarot cards.”
His grandmother sat at the table and looked at him. “If she needed a computer, then she was not for real. A seer needs no computer or cards for that matter. They just see.”
As many whispers as he’d heard about his grandmother’s insights, he’d never really asked her about them. As a kid, he’d loved her but her sternness had kept him and his brothers and sisters at arm’s length. Now that he was older and had seen horrors on the job, he understood that her losses had taught her to guard her heart, even from her son and grandchildren.
Now as a grown man and a cop, he recognized that he was much like her. Closed. Guarded. He did not invite people into his circle easily, and when they betrayed his trust, he was slow to believe again.
“Is that the way it works with you?” he said. “Do you just see things that will be?”
She shrugged a stooped shoulder. “I just see.”
“And what have you seen lately?”
“Not too much. But I am old and my energy is not what it used to be. When I was young, I saw too much.”
He wasn’t sure if she referred to her psychic talents or life in Russia.
“So did you see that woman?” she said.
“What woman?”
“The redhead. The one you watched on television the other night.”
“How did you know?”
She looked almost bored. “You wore your good suit to court.”
Damn, what was it about the suit? “I like to look professional in court.”
“You do not always wear the best suit for court. You wore the best Monday.”
He chuckled. “You don’t miss much.”
“She likes you.”
His smile eased. “How can you be so sure?”
“She would be a fool not to.”
“You are thinking like a grandmother.”
“Maybe. I think that she enjoys being with you. And I think she is not the type to say when she likes a man.”
“How do you know that?”
Her eyes danced with the unexpected light of amusement. “Don’t wear that shirt today. I like the blue shirt better. It sets off your eyes.”
“It’s in the laundry.”
“It is clean. You left it here last week.” She pushed off from the table and rose. “Now your tea is ready, and I must get back to bed. Take that sandwich with you. You will be hungry.”
“Thanks.”
She raised a finger. “And don’t forget we have a family dinner next Thursday.”
“I won’t forget.”
“Bring your partner. I have something to tell her.”
“Sinclair? What do you have to say to her?”
“It’s for me to say to her.” And his grandmother walked down the hallway, her thick blue housecoat billowing around her thin legs.
Rokov rose and poured himself a cup of tea. The brew carried a much-needed kick of caffeine, guaranteed to get him through the rest of the morning. He and Sinclair would be going nonstop until they had a break in this case.
He sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, then slowly rose. He found his pressed blue shirt, changed into it, and then hooked his cell, badge, and gun to his belt. By seven thirty he was refreshed enough so that he could think clearly. He checked his watch. Time to find out what the computer forensics team had discovered for him.
“It didn’t take a great deal of digging,” Audrey Sanders said as she glanced up from Diane Young’s laptop. Audrey had short black hair cut in an odd asymmetrical way, wore dark rimmed glasses, and a pink turtleneck over worn jeans. She was in her late twenties and had a hummingbird tattoo on her ankle, which showed in warmer weather when she traded jeans and high tops for sandals and capris.
Rokov and Sinclair moved into her office. Every bit of flat surface in her area of the forensics department was covered with some kind of CPU, laptop, keyboard, or jumble of wires.
Sinclair, freshly showered, had changed into a chocolate brown turtleneck, slacks, and flats and had tied back her hair. Her face had a rosy glow, no doubt a by-product of a sleepless night and too much coffee.
Cops were accustomed to going nonstop when they had an active murder investigation.
“So what did you find?” Rokov said.
“Clearly security was not a priority for her. Her pass code was the only security measure she employed. Using her name and birth year was not smart or original. Even if I didn’t have the codes, I could have cracked it in a half hour. Anyway, client files, with names and addresses, were clearly marked, as were her income spread sheets.” She shook her head. “The lack of security is so naive.”
“She had several locks on her apartment door,” Sinclair said.
Audrey glared at Sinclair. “She made her living on the Net, which has doors just like apartments. For all intents and purposes, she might as well have propped open the screen door on her computer. The Net is the fucking Wild West and no one seems to care.” She raised her hand. “Sorry, pet peeve.”
Rokov grinned. “Duly noted.”
“Here is a printout of her clients. I’ve prioritized them in two ways. First alphabetically and then by frequency of use.”
Rokov scanned the list. There had to be over two hundred names on there. “What else can you tell me about her?”
“She had about twelve blogs she followed. All did the woo-woo psychic stuff like her. She had a thing for erotic book downloads. And she did most of her shopping, including her grocery shopping, online. She must have had a steady stream of delivery people coming to her door. And she was a bit of a gamer. Even entered a few tournaments.”
“You ever cross swords with her?” Rokov teased.
“If I did, she didn’t last long. I remain undefeated.”
Rokov understood that Audrey was a big deal in video realms, but that world was totally foreign to him. “Diane Young make any enemies that you could see via the games or e-mails?”
“None.”
“Well, she caught someone’s eye,” he said.
“And he lured her out of the apartment,” Sinclair said.
“We’ll start first with the clients and see if any had issues with her.”
Just after 3 p.m., the homicide team assembled in the windowless conference room on the third floor of police headquarters. The room was decorated in pale beiges that looked closer to brown than white and furniture that was at least a decade old. A large white board hung behind the head of the table, and on the credenza under it, a coffeemaker spat out its third pot for the afternoon.
Rokov had been on the homicide team two years now and he had worked his share of murders not only with Sinclair but with each of the three other detectives.
“So what do we have?” Garrison said, settling. He shrugged broad shoulders as if working out the stiffness.
“Sinclair and I have spent the better part of the night trying to piece together Diane Young’s last days. Audrey dug through her computer. No suspicious e-mails or calls so far, but she gave us
Beyond
’s client list, and we are going to dig through that.”
Beyond
’s client list, and we are going to dig through that.”
Malcolm Kier pulled a pen from his breast pocket and laid it beside his notebook on the table. “How many on the client list?”
“One hundred and six. We have identified the top ten users of
Beyond
. These folks have the highest billing rates of last month. And six of those made the top ten for the last three months. One woman paid out four thousand dollars to
Beyond
in September.”
Beyond
. These folks have the highest billing rates of last month. And six of those made the top ten for the last three months. One woman paid out four thousand dollars to
Beyond
in September.”
Kier shook his head. “You telling me there was a woman who paid four grand to have her stars and cards read?”
Rokov nodded. “Her name is Sandy Tennyson, age fifty-seven. We spoke to her first thing late this morning.” He flipped through the pages of his notebook. “She has bone cancer, and according to her, the doctors had not given her more than six months. She did a random purchase with
Beyond
four months ago. Diane said that all her troubles would be vanquished by the end of this year.”
Beyond
four months ago. Diane said that all her troubles would be vanquished by the end of this year.”
“Did Young know Tennyson had cancer?” Kier said.
“Tennyson swears no,” Sinclair interjected. “But to hear her speak, it wouldn’t take a psychic to figure out she is sick.”
Garrison tapped his thumb on his yellow notepad.
“Is that what Young did? Did she string this woman along and make her believe there was hope?”
Rokov shook his head. “I don’t know. Only Young could answer that. But she collected a lot of money from Tennyson.”
“Would piss me off if someone gave me hope and then snatched it away,” Kier said.
“Even if Tennyson figured out this was a scam, she doesn’t have the strength to drown a woman, even one as small as Young, and then drag her up to that abandoned warehouse,” Rokov said.
“And she does have an alibi,” Sinclair interjected.
“As do her two sons, both in their early twenties. She and her husband are divorced, and there seems to be no other relatives.” Rokov scanned his notes. “The other top five clients have similar stories. Illness, job loss, one even has a missing child.”
Garrison’s expression turned grim. “Who has the missing child?”
“Her name is Abby Powers. She was the other client we saw today. Her daughter Bia went missing in the early eighties. The kid vanished from their apartment in the middle of the night.”
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