The Case Against William (13 page)

Or
so he had thought.

When
you're young, you intentionally overlook such discrepancies. You convince
yourself that she loves you for who you are, not how much you make. That
you're her Prince Charming, not just her provider. Twenty years of marriage
later, you realize she never really loved you. And you pray for that, for someone
to love and someone to love you, hopefully the same person. You no longer want
to have sex like a sixteen-year-old boy; you want to make love like a man.

He
understood now that for Liz it was never about love, just about the cost of
living. She wanted things. His profession was the law, but his job was to
give her the life she wanted. The things she wanted. She had not given him
love, but she had given him the children. And in the end, their love meant
more to him than the love of a woman. Other men lived without money or success
or children or good health. He had all that. So he lived without love and
without complaint. He kept the peace.

Every
man makes his own bed. And then sleeps in it. Frank slept alone.

It
was an hour later, and Frank stood at the window watching two boys mow his
grass. They were actually doing a good job. His son sat in a patio chair
autographing jerseys.

Something
was wrong with that picture.

Most
dads would think it was a perfect picture. Their son the star quarterback.
Having sex with cheerleaders and college girls. His entourage mowing his grass
and washing his cars. That's the dream. For the son and the dad. But not for
Frank. He knew what pressure could do to a human being, how it could push a good
man—or woman—over the edge. Most of his clients were good people who had been
pushed to the edge and then over by the pressure to succeed. Business was a
high-pressure environment. Sports even more. Doping among professional
athletes had become pervasive. Home run hitters hauled before Congressional
committees then charged with perjury. Olympic track stars convicted and
sentenced to prison. The pressure to win. The need to win. To feel special.
To believe you're above the rules. Even the law. His landline rang. He
pushed the speakerphone button.

"Frank
Tucker."

"Frank.
Scooter."

He
knew from Scooter's voice that this was not a social call.

"They
arrested Bradley Todd again."

"For
what?"

"Same
crimes: rape and murder."

"That's
double jeopardy. He was acquitted. They can't charge him twice for raping and
killing the same girl."

Scooter
was silent for a moment. He sighed into the phone.

"It's
a different girl, Frank."

Frank
drove to Austin Sunday afternoon. He checked into the Driskill Hotel in
downtown, bought and read the local newspaper, and then went to the Travis
County Jail. He asked to see Bradley Todd then waited in one of the cubicles
in the interview room on the visitors' side of the Plexiglas partition.
Bradley was now a senior star on the UT basketball team. He was charged with
the rape and murder of Sarah Barnes, his ex-fiancée. She had been stabbed
forty-seven times. The Bradley Todd who soon appeared before him was not the same
Bradley Todd the jury had acquitted two years before. His eyes were
different. He sat and picked up the phone.

"Hey,
Frank." Not Mr. Tucker. "You want to earn another million
bucks?"

Frank
held the phone to his ear and the front page of the newspaper with Sarah's
photo to the glass.

"Did
you rape and kill Sarah?"

"Are
you my lawyer?"

"Depends on your answer. But whatever you tell me is still
confidential."

He
nodded.

"Why?"

"She
broke it off a year ago, our engagement."

"Why?"

"She
said she got tired of all the other girls."

"And?"

"And I kept trying to get her back. But she wouldn't come
back."

"What
happened the night she died?"

"I
went to her apartment and found her with another guy. I got pissed, her
fucking around on me."

"She
broke off the engagement a year ago. She wasn't your fiancée."

"Like
hell. She was mine and she was always gonna be mine. That's what I told
her."

"So
you raped and killed her?"

"I
had sex with her."

"Sex
without consent is rape, Bradley."

"We
had sex while we were engaged."

"It's
not a lifetime pass. What happened then?"

"She
tried to call the cops."

"So
you stabbed her? Forty-seven times?"

He
shrugged. "I got mad."

As
if that made it justifiable homicide. They stared at each other through the
Plexiglas. Frank did not want to ask the next question, but he had no choice.

"Did
you rape and murder Rachel Truitt two years ago?"

Bradley's
eyes were void of remorse.

"Yeah."

"You
lied to me."

Bradley
shrugged again. "You wouldn't have defended me if I had told you the
truth."

"And
Sarah lied to protect you?"

"We
were engaged."

"Did
she know you killed Rachel?"

"No.
I told her I was partying on Sixth Street, which was true, but if she didn't
say I was with her, the jury would convict me."

"They
would have. So she committed perjury for you. And now she's dead. I believed
you, Bradley. I thought you were innocent. Now another girl is dead."

"So
are you going to be my lawyer?"

"No."

Frank
got drunk in the hotel bar.

Six
months later, Frank's cell phone rang. He answered.

"Mr.
Tucker, this is the court clerk. Are you stuck in traffic? The judge and the
jury are waiting for you."

"Uh,
yes, the traffic. I just pulled into the parking lot. I'll be right up."

Frank
unscrewed the top on the pint bottle of Jim Beam and took a long swallow. He
screwed the top back on, grabbed his briefcase, and got out of the Expedition.

Almost
two years before, the subprime mortgage market had collapsed. A year before,
his client had been indicted by a federal grand jury for mortgage fraud. For
doing exactly what the federal government wanted him to do: make home loans.
Prop up the residential real estate market. The economy. Easy money kept the
nation's economy humming along, the people employed, and the stock market
high. Easy money was good for America.

But
when the market crashes, someone has to be punished.

The
politicians—the drug lords of easy money—are never punished; the mortgage
brokers—the street dealers who implemented easy money—are. His client had
approved mortgage loans guaranteed by the full faith and credit of the United
States government to anyone who could fog up a mirror. Income to repay the
mortgage was optional. Wall Street bankers bundled the mortgages into salable
securities and sold them to mutual funds, pension funds, foreigners—to any
sucker they could find. No one complained as long as real-estate prices
marched upward; but, of course, what goes up must come down.

The
housing market came down.

The
politicians pointed fingers at the big banks before voters pointed fingers at
them. But the government bailed out the Wall Street bankers then indicted the
brokers. Including Frank's client. The trial had lasted two weeks. The jury
had a verdict. Frank was late. He rushed into the courtroom in the federal
building in downtown Houston. He hurried up the center aisle and sat at the
defense table. The judge was not happy; he nodded to the bailiff. He
disappeared through a door then returned with the jurors in tow.

The
jury acquitted Frank's client of all charges.

After
the jury had been dismissed and the courtroom had emptied, the judge motioned
Frank to the bench. Frank walked over to the judge.

"Another
acquittal, Frank. Congratulations."

"Thanks,
Melvin."

The
judge sniffed the air; more specifically, Frank's breath. In his rush, he had
forgotten to use the breath spray after that last shot of Jim Beam.

"Frank,
have you been drinking this morning?"

Like
most drunks who didn't know they were drunks, he tried to laugh it off.

"Hell,
Melvin, I've been drinking every morning."

"You
tried this case drunk?"

Frank
shrugged. "I still won."

"You
won, but not like you usually do. You never made mistakes before, Frank, but
you made a lot of mistakes this time. You won because the prosecutor made
more."

The
judge regarded Frank Tucker. He had gained weight. His complexion had
reddened from the whiskey. He wasn't the man or the lawyer he once was.

"Frank,
what the hell happened to you?"

"A
girl died."

Melvin
sighed. "I read about all that. Frank, it wasn't your fault. That's
part of the job description. Your client might be guilty."

The
judge's expression turned judicial.

"Frank, showing up in federal court drunk … you crossed a
line. You need help. And your clients need a sober lawyer, even if you are
better drunk than most lawyers are sober. I've got no choice. I've got to
report you to the bar association."

"Melvin,
please—"

"Frank,
they'll suspend your law license."

Frank
Tucker didn't start drinking because his client had raped and murdered Rachel
Truitt, the first girl. That's a risk every lawyer takes when he takes a case,
that the client might be lying. He was convinced that Bradley Todd was telling
the truth. That he was innocent. That he was not a rapist and a murderer. He
was wrong. But Bradley had already raped and murdered Rachel when Frank agreed
to represent him. So he suffered no moral guilt over her death. Rachel
Truitt's death had not occurred on his watch.

But
the second girl's death had.

Sarah
Barnes had died because he had won an acquittal for Bradley Todd in the first
case. His client had been guilty of brutally raping and murdering an
eighteen-year-old coed, but Frank Tucker had "gotten him off," as the
newspapers referred to Bradley's acquittal after he was arrested for the second
murder. So Bradley Todd wasn't on death row where he belonged, but on the
streets, free to rape and murder another young coed. And he had. Sarah was
twenty-one. She was sister to Ben and Carla. Daughter to Gary and Cindy. She
was a cute Christian girl. A dead girl.

Her
face haunted Frank Tucker.

He
had found himself in the press again, but it wasn't favorable press. Travis
County District Attorney Dick Dorkin finally had his revenge. He had been
quoted in the Austin paper: "Frank Tucker once called me a failed
politician. Perhaps I am. But at least I don't have that girl's blood on my
hands. At least my conscience is clear. At least I can look myself in the
mirror each morning and know I'm not responsible for Sarah Barnes's death. I
tried to put Bradley Todd on death row for raping and murdering Rachel Truitt.
But his billionaire father could afford to hire Frank Tucker and pay him a
million dollars to get his son off. And Frank Tucker did just that. He set
Bradley Todd free to kill again. And kill he did. Frank Tucker got the
verdict he wanted for Bradley Todd two years ago. I hope he can live with his
own verdict of himself today."

He
could not.

He
stared at Sarah's photo from the two-year-old story in the paper. He carried
it with him always. He looked at her face daily. He downed another shot of
whiskey straight up. Four shots would usually blur her image from his mind.
He would pass out on the fifth shot.

William
sat in a chair behind a table set up on the artificial turf inside the indoor
practice arena. The head coach stood to one side, his mother to the other.
His father was supposed to be there, but it was probably just as well that he
wasn't. If he were drinking, he might make a scene on national television.
Arrayed on the table in front of William were five caps bearing college
emblems: UT, A&M, ND, USC, and F. The five finalists competing for William Tucker.

I
am a star.

William
was eighteen and a senior; he hadn't mowed the grass or washed his own car or
gone a week without sex in two years. He had led his team to a third straight
undefeated record—he loved winning—and a third-straight Class 5A state football
championship. He stood six feet five inches tall and weighed two hundred
twenty pounds with seven percent body fat. He had a forty-eight inch chest and
a thirty-two inch waist. He benched three-fifty and squatted four-fifty. He
ran a 4.4 forty. He wore a size seventeen shoe. He was a beast, a freak of
nature, and the number one college prospect in the nation. And the nation was
waiting for him to decide where he would play his college football. He would
make that decision today and then graduate from high school next week, before
the Christmas break. In January, he would enroll in college for the spring
semester. For spring football practice.

"Two
minutes," the television producer said.

The
world was mired in the Great Recession, but football-loving America—which is to
say, most of America—took a timeout from their economic misery to watch ESPN
that day. It was national signing day, the first day high school seniors could
sign binding letters of intent to play Division I-A football on full
scholarships at the colleges of their choice. The expensive and time-consuming
process that had begun when the boys were twelve—the scouts watching their
middle school games and charting their progress and size through high school;
the recruiting letters to thousands of boys beginning in their freshman year;
the on-campus visits by hundreds of boys; the head coaches' home visits to a
select few—it all came down to this day. Today the process either succeeded or
failed. Each school's recruiting class would be graded by college football
analysts on cable television: A to F. Who won, who lost. Who had convinced
the best football players in America to become student-athletes at their school
for the next four years, although there was little student left in the
student-athletes of today and few stayed long enough to graduate. The best
players left school after their sophomore or junior years. Money awaited in
the NFL.