The Advocate's Daughter (32 page)

Martinez swallowed hard, regaining control. “Those Japs took Juan away and put him in that cell.” He broke into a sob. “I couldn't protect him. You all took my child.”

“What about
my
child?” Sean shouted back at him. “She had nothing to do with this. She was an innocent.”

The chief's eyes turned cold. “How's it feel, Serrat? How's it feel to have something you love taken from
you?
”

Sean lunged toward the chief, but stopped short when he saw the gun. It had a long barrel, a silencer, maybe. The chief gestured with the weapon for Sean to walk toward the marble columns along the wall. He marched him back toward the mahogany bench.

Sean stopped at the steps that led up to the nine spaces where the justices presided.

“Is that what this was all about? Ruining me? Killing me?” Sean said. “You didn't have to hurt Abby to do that.”

“I actually wasn't planning on hurting her. Kenny was just supposed to tell her the truth about you. Let her see you for who you really are. But she was too smart for her own good. She found out who
I
was, put two and two together about Charles Baldwin's murder, something his own son was too stupid to figure out. And she threatened to expose
me
if I revealed your little secret.”

Sean thought again about Abby's visit to the police office the day she was murdered. She hadn't been making a complaint against Malik, she was confronting Martinez. He'd killed Abby to cover his tracks. And so Sean would feel his pain. Martinez's involvement explained so much now: how the killer knew Abby was in the court that night, how he got into the library undetected, how the surveillance tape was erased. And the court's police chief undoubtedly had access to the home addresses and work schedules of the law clerks, so Martinez could easily have slipped over to Malik's house and planted Abby's phone. It explained why Abby's apartment was ransacked and her computer and notebooks taken. Martinez was looking for whatever Abby had uncovered that connected him to Japan and Charles Baldwin's murder.

Sean had a lump in his throat. Abby was trying to protect him. Whatever she believed about Japan, she still thought Sean was worth saving. He turned his head, eyeing Martinez. “You're not going to get away with it.”

“Tell that to the Baldwins.” The chief smirked. “Or to Justice Carr.” Martinez pushed the gun's barrel into Sean's back, directing him through the curtains. Behind the bench, there was a medical gurney, presumably in the event of an emergency with one of the justices, and the place was a bit of a mess with some electronic cords and pads and pens strewn about. There was a large trash bin. Large enough to stuff a body in. He needed to stall.

“Why kill Justice Carr? He had nothing to do with any of this.”

“Collateral damage,” Martinez said, seeming to take pleasure in using the same phrase Sean's father had used about Juan. “Once they started to realize that Malik wasn't the one, it was only a matter of time before they started looking closer at everyone else.”

Sean digested the words, rearranging the storyboard in his head. Finkle and Brice, Martinez and Kenny had been ships passing in the night, not knowing about one another. Their paths intersected only with Abby.

“Get in,” Martinez said, pointing the gun at the trash bin.

Sean stepped toward the bin. He placed a hand on either side of it to allow him to climb inside. He imagined Martinez stuffing Carr in a similar trash can and wheeling him to Carr's BMW in the garage, forcing the justice to drive them out of the building, coercing him to write the incriminating note, cutting out the justice's GPS security chip, then disposing of his body and leaving the car at Union Station. Sean had a pang of guilt that it was his actions that led to Carr's murder.

No more.

In one fluid move, he lifted the heavy gray plastic container and whipped it around, connecting with Martinez's head. The gun went off with a quiet pop, and Sean ran through the curtains behind the bench.

There were more pops and stuffing poofed out of one of the justice's leather chairs. He heard the clank of metal on metal, bullets flying by and hitting the Kevlar lining of the mahogany bench, the shield to protect the justices from any attack. Sean dove over the bench to the black marble partition below.

He caught his breath, protected for a moment by the Kevlar. But then the police chief came soaring over the bench, gun still in hand. Sean darted under the counsel table. He rolled away just as there was a cracking sound and holes appeared through the tabletop. He felt a bite in his arm as he scrambled behind a marble column. He sat on the ground, back against the cool marble. He waited for officers to charge in, but the gunshots were faint and the chamber was largely soundproof.

Before he could stand up, Sean felt the wet thud of metal to the head. His face hit the carpet. In the haze, he turned his head and saw Martinez standing over him. He gave Sean a last, long look. Then he raised the barrel of the gun to Sean's forehead.

Sean managed a hard sweep at the chief's legs—giving it everything he had—knocking him to the ground. The gun flew out of the chief's hand, and Sean clawed on top of the man, his fists pummeling Martinez's face. He was yelling now, primal noises. He hit him again and again and again until his knuckles felt raw.

He would have crushed his skull but for an image that flittered through his head. A skinny Hispanic kid, crying, hugging his knees, in a vacant lot in Misawa, Japan. Juan.

Sean stopped hitting him. Martinez emitted a quiet moan, his face awash in red. Sean hung there, straddling the man, realizing that much of the blood was his own. There was the sound of a building alarm, footfalls and shouts, until he fell beside the man and things went dark.

 

EPILOGUE

The first Monday in October, the start of the Supreme Court's new term, came and went. Chief Justice Mason James was receiving high marks, though the
National Law Journal
's Supreme Court correspondent Tony Mauro reported that behind the scenes the new justice was not popular with his brethren.

Sean had withdrawn his nomination. The official reason was to spend time with his family. That was true enough. But he also couldn't afford the scrutiny that went along with the job.

The public would never know why Carlos Martinez killed Abby or Justice Carr. He hung himself in his cell, a sad parallel given the death of his son. The media speculated that Martinez had been obsessed with a young woman and had killed Carr and framed Malik to cover his tracks. They never connected Martinez to the death of a petty criminal shot in the head outside a flophouse motel. No one asked Sean's opinion about it all. They just wanted it buried.

Sean looked about his office at Harrington & Caine. He was finally settling in. Framed photos of his family covered the place, as did Jack's artwork. Sean glanced at Jack's latest masterpiece drawn in colorful markers. It showed Sean, Emily, Ryan, and Jack walking outside, holding hands. All of them were smiling. Tiny smiles, but smiles nonetheless. Above them, a sun with a smiley face and a stick figure of Abby in the clouds, holding a leash and walking her dog, Lucy.

Sean swallowed hard. He would never know how her relationship with Justice Carr began. Nor would he understand it. But he believed, or wanted to believe, that they were genuinely in love. She'd backed off working on John Chadwick's case to protect Carr, and Carr had taken a big risk getting Abby's necklace back from Billy Brice, neither realizing that the real danger wasn't from Mason James or Sebastian Finkle or small-time drug dealer Brice. The real threat was hidden in plain sight at One First Street.

Sean glanced at a framed photo of Emily from
Before.
He doubted she'd ever look so happy again, but they were trying. They were in counseling and, like Jack's picture, their smiles were small, but he thought they would make it.

From the corner of his eye, Sean saw a familiar figure standing at the doorway. His assistant, Mable, knocked softly.

“Sean,” she said. “Your guest is here.”

Blake Hellstrom, looking as rumpled as ever, strolled into the office.

To Mable, Sean said, “It's Friday and getting late, you really should get home. Looks like more rain is coming.”

Mable smiled and shut the door behind her.

Hellstrom removed his coat, and he and Sean considered one another. Finally, Sean said, “Remember the first time you came to my office?”

Hellstrom gave a knowing nod.

“How's he doing?” Sean asked.

“Malik? It's hard to wash off the stink of being charged with murder, even if you're proven innocent. But he'll be okay. Patti Fallon, to her credit—given the shit she got for prosecuting an innocent man—helped get him a job at Justice.”

Sean nodded approvingly. “So, you wanted to come by,” he said. “I take it you have some news?”

Hellstrom nodded and gestured for Sean to sit at the worktable next to the large rain-spattered window. Hellstrom pulled out some papers from his worn briefcase.

“Let's start with Japan,” Hellstrom said. “The Japanese law experts I've spoken with don't think the events you've described would render you guilty of anything under Japanese law, other than being a dumb kid in the wrong place at the wrong time. That might be different under U.S. law, but since the incident happened outside the military base, Japanese law would apply.”

The incident.
The impersonal language of a criminal defense lawyer.

Hellstrom continued, “So, if this ever comes to light, there's no risk to you, at least legally.”

“What if I come forward on my own?”

Hellstrom sighed. They'd been through this before. “It's unlikely they'd pursue it. Beyond the legal issues, it was a bit of a scandal back then when they put an American kid in a cell with some hard cases. Given what happened to Juan Martinez, they wouldn't want to dredge all that up again.”

“Did you find Mr. Takahashi's family?”

“No. We had no better luck than you did. He and his wife ran the store together and they had no kids. Both are deceased with no living family, best we can tell, so there's no one to even try to compensate for the loss. Again, my advice is that there's nothing more to be done.”

Sean made no response. He just stared out the window into the gloom.

Hellstrom remained quiet.

After a long moment Sean said, “Can I ask you something? It's personal, so I'll understand if you'd prefer not.”

Hellstrom nodded.

“I understand that you lost a child?”

This time it was Hellstrom who shifted his gaze out the window. A hard swallow. “Tommy was sixteen…”

“Does it ever get better?” It was the same question Sean had asked Carl Martinez, who believed that peace came only through revenge.

Hellstrom thought awhile. “I can't say it ever gets ‘better.' You don't recover. You cope. It used to be that Tommy was the first thing I'd think about when I woke up. Most days now I can make it until about noon.”

Sean had hoped for a more optimistic answer. But he admired this wise old lawyer for stating the truth.

“Advice?” Sean asked.

“What I've learned is that everybody grieves differently, in their own way,” Hellstrom said. “Some people are forever crippled in despair, some people bounce back faster than seems possible. All I know is that it's something that never leaves any of us. What I try to do is live my life in a way that I think would have made Tommy proud.”

“I guess that's what I'm struggling with,” Sean said. “Abby believed in justice, the rule of law, right and wrong. Wouldn't the right thing to do be coming forward about Japan?”

“I know you've lived with this thing for a long time, and you want to do something. But I can tell you from experience, sometimes there just isn't a clear right and wrong, a clear black and white, and I think your daughter understood that. It would be a mistake to come forward, Sean.”

More silence fell between them. Hellstrom studied Sean for a moment, then sighed heavily. “Why do I get the feeling you're not gonna follow my advice?”

Sean gave a faint smile.

Hellstrom shook his head. “All right, let's move on to something we can agree on.” His mouth curled into a mischievous smile. “I got a call from Detective Whiteside with the Montgomery County police. Based on your statement and Ryan's, they got a warrant and searched Sebastian Finkle's condo and his safe.”

“Did they find the dirt files? Or photos of Brice or the metal bar to prove Finkle was at the football field that night?”

“Nope.”

Sean met eyes with Hellstrom.

“The safe was cleared out. Nothing there.”

“So why are you smiling?”

“Shoes.”

Sean was puzzled.

“Finkle may have cleaned house of any incriminating files, but he didn't get rid of his size-eleven Prada sneakers. They were able to match them to marks left on Billy Brice's neck; he died after his throat was stomped on. I guess Finkle didn't want to throw out his five hundred dollar shoes.”

Sean smiled. “What if he turns over the pole with Ryan's prints on it?”

“Covered in the immunity agreement. Our only contingency was that you and Ryan had to tell the truth, and you did. And, anyway, the only thing I think Sebastian Finkle will be turning over is his partner in crime.”

“You think he'll roll over on Mason James?”

“I've found that it doesn't take long inside a cell for guys who wear five-hundred-dollar sneakers and who live in fancy condos to start thinking about how they can get out. And offering up evidence on the chief justice of the United States is probably one of the surest get-out-of-jail-early cards around.”

“But if not?” Sean asked. “We can't just let James get away with what he's done.”