The Guilty Plea (24 page)

“I see.”

“I know you’ll all be disappointed, but fifteen years is much longer than a usual manslaughter sentence. I’ve seen them as low as nine or ten in a situation like this.”

Wyler didn’t say anything.

“There was always the chance she’d be acquitted. It’s a compromise. Ensures a conviction. Means your family doesn’t have to go through a trial.”

“I’ll tell them,” Wyler said after another long pause. He hung up without even saying goodbye.

Greene called Kennicott to tell him the news and thanked him for his hard work. Then he phoned Phil Cutter so the defense lawyer could inform his client, April Goodling.

“Thanks for the call,” Cutter said. “Class thing to do.”

“You’re welcome,” Greene said.

“Detective, things got heated there a few months ago.” Cutter paused, waiting for Greene to fill in the gap.

Greene held his tongue.

“Maybe one day we can go for a coffee,” Cutter said. “There’s more than meets the eye about this file, but trust me, none of it has anything to do with the murder.”

“Maybe,” Greene said.

“Oh, I forgot. You’re the only cop in homicide who doesn’t drink coffee.” Cutter’s cackling laugh shrieked over the phone line. Greene’s non–coffee-drinking ways were a running joke in the bureau, but he was in no mood to laugh it up with Phil Cutter.

“Ms. Goodling has my number,” Greene said. “Tell her I look forward to seeing her name on my call display.” He hung up.

The drive up to the Wylers’ house was slow, the traffic bad even in the middle of the day. Keeping close to the victim’s family was one of the things Greene liked most about the job. Finding a place among the living where he could make a difference. But explaining to them a compromised plea bargain like this was no one’s idea of a good time.

This was the toughest moment for the families. Once the proceedings were finished there’d be no more phone calls, no more meetings, no more press to bother you, no more frustrations with how slowly the justice system worked, no more exhausting days sitting in court. Just the endless empty road ahead. And the promise of the detectives and Crown Attorneys that they would keep in touch—sincere, but never fully realized.

“Good afternoon, Detective,” Jason Wyler said when he greeted Greene at the door. He leaned hard on one of his canes. The second one was tucked under his arm to free up his hand. “My parents are in the living room.”

Jason led him through the marble hall, moving with surprising agility. Mr. and Mrs. Wyler sat in the same place, closest to the door, where they’d been when Greene and Kennicott visited the day after the murder. No one was on the other two couches this time. Even though they were both tall, the couple looked small in the enormous room.

Jason stood at the edge of the sofa. With his strong upper body, standing looked to be a declaration of independence.

Mrs. Wyler, who was seated closest to him, rose to greet Greene. “Finally this nightmare will be over.” She didn’t look as upset as he’d expected.

“Fifteen years is a long sentence for manslaughter,” Greene said. “I have to warn you, she could be out on parole in five years.”

Mr. Wyler rose slowly, his brow furrowed in anger. “What a joke. Five years for murder.”

Victims’ families always heard the lowest number, Greene thought.

Mrs. Wyler shook her head. “I called Terrance’s lawyer, Anita Starr. She says that with this conviction, Samantha will never get near Simon. We can’t bring my son back, but we can protect our grandson.”

Greene looked around the empty room. “Where’s Nathan?”

“At work, but he’ll be in court tomorrow,” the father said. “Was tied up with an employee issue. He said you’d understand.”

Greene remembered the red-haired cashier. Everyone has his own way of celebrating, he thought. Was that a knowing smirk on Mr. Wyler’s face?

“Jason has decided he won’t come to court. The stress is too much for him.” Mrs. Wyler reached out to touch her son.

Jason stiffened. “It’s not the stress, Mother,” he said. “The place will be a zoo with all the press. I’m going to the cemetery. Say goodbye to my brother by myself.”

“That makes sense,” Greene said. “A day like this is never easy. And it’s good to go back to the grave of someone you loved without a crowd around.”

Jason looked upset. “It’s fifteen years, guaranteed?”

“The Crown will ask for eighteen. The defense twelve. Judge Norville told both sides it’ll be fifteen. The whole thing will take about an hour.”

“She’s pleading guilty for sure?” Jason asked.

“According to her lawyer.” Greene turned to Mrs. Wyler. “How’s your grandson doing?”

“Plays with his trains all the time. The social worker’s been terrific. Recommended he stay at the nanny’s place until Christmas. Keep him with all his friends. We’re making the transition gradually. Jason picks him and the nanny up every Friday night and they’re here all weekend. We love having him around.”

The zipper on Greene’s old briefcase made a ticking sound as he opened it and pulled out some forms. “If any of you would like to take the stand and talk about Terrance, you’re more than welcome to do so. If you don’t wish to speak, then you can write out what we call Victim Impact Statements. I brought a few that you can fill out.”

The three looked at one another. Often, testifying or writing out a statement could be cathartic for people, but everyone was different. You never knew who’d want to step forward.

“My brother can speak for me,” Jason said. His body was beginning to sag, but he looked determined to stay on his feet.

“I don’t want to fill out any damn forms,” Mr. Wyler said. “Let Nathan talk for all of us.”

“I agree, dear.” Mrs. Wyler put her hand to her husband’s cheek. It was, Greene realized, the first time he’d seen any physical contact between the two. She guided him down to the sofa and laid her head on his shoulder, the white stripe in her hair disappearing in the folds of his neck. “I hope tomorrow is the last time in my life I ever have to see that woman.”

The moment Margaret Kwon’s plane landed on the runway she booted up her cell phone and scrolled through for the number she wanted.

“Ari Greene,” the detective said, answering her call.

“I need a dinner date tonight,” she said.

“Margaret?”

“Plane’s pulling up to the terminal.”

“Why didn’t you call before you took off? I would have picked you up.”

“Damn. I forgot how polite you Canadians are. I hear there’s going to be a guilty plea tomorrow.”

Greene laughed. “You have very good contacts. Tell the cab to take you to the House of Seoul, a Korean place on Bloor, west of Christie.”

“Don’t tell me there’s a Little Korea in Toronto too.”

“Eleven restaurants on one block,” he said.

When she arrived half an hour later, Greene was talking to the owner, a squat woman who was about four and a half feet tall. “
An nyeong ha seh yo,
” he said to Kwon when she walked in, giving her a kiss on the cheek.

“Hello to you, Detective,” Kwon said. “That’s the only thing I can say in Korean too.”

They sat on a bench seat. Paper-thin napkins were stuffed into a green cup on the table, along with cutlery—long-handled metal spoons and matching chopsticks, held in a plastic container. There were no tablecloths. Greene’s was the only white face in the place.

Kwon kicked him under the table. “You like it here because you’re at least a foot taller than everyone else.”

As they ate Greene filled her in on the details of the expected guilty plea. He didn’t seem very happy about it.

“Isn’t a guilty plea what you wanted?”

“Let’s see what happens.” He fixed her with his eyes. “Any news about April Goodling?”

“Nothing. She’s disappeared.”

“Want to go for a drive?” he asked.

“Sure. Where?”

“If it was my last time in New York, you’d probably take me to the Statue of Liberty. So I thought—”

“Niagara Falls? I’ve never been.”

The trip took about an hour. When they arrived at the deep gorge beside the Niagara River she heard a roar come up from over the edge. The windshield filled with specks of water and, after one last sweeping turn, the falls jumped into view. The noise grew louder and Greene put on his wipers.

Greene drove to an empty parking lot near the edge, where there were restricted access signs all over the place. He parked at the curb closest to the water. Within seconds a security vehicle appeared out of the darkness.

An older man in ramrod shape jumped out. “Evening, Detective Greene.”

“Gerald, this is Margaret Kwon, reporter from New York,” Greene said.

“Evening, ma’am,” Gerald said. “Have a nice night.”

“Is there any place we could go where no one knows you?” she asked Greene.

“Probably not.”

They walked through the light mist. There was a wide stone walk-way and a wrought-iron-and-stone fence along the edge. The dark water above the falls moved at a steady, powerful pace.

Greene led her to the spot where the sidewalk and railing turned. They were looking right across the top of the falls. The water was so calm a second before it hurtled down in a chaotic white froth, as if each drop had been taken by surprise, the floor under its placid world evaporating in a moment.

Most of all there was the sound. A primitive rumble from deep below. The spray on Kwon’s face felt like a cleansing mist. She was transfixed by the black water. Flat and constant, hitting the edge, breaking up, turning to foam, disappearing from view. Over and over and over
and over and over again. She lost track of time. Space. Drawn to something so unstoppable. The water. The movement. The darkness.

“Only the surface water from the Great Lakes comes over the falls. About three percent,” Greene said. It had been a long time since either of them had spoken. “Some of the original glacial water is still there, down deep.”

Kwon hadn’t expected to be so transfixed. She couldn’t move. Couldn’t talk.

“I went to Europe for the first time when I was thirty years old,” he said. “Instead of flying, I took a freighter. We tooled up the St. Lawrence River, and the land on both sides fell away, and the boat pushed out into the ocean. It was like I was being released.”

“The water never stops, does it?” she said.

“Never,” Greene said.

The spray was fogging up her glasses. “I can see why you come here.”

“Sometimes I sit for hours,” he said.

She reached for his hand and he held it. They hadn’t done this before. Part of her never wanted to let go. But they were both looking at the falls, at the point where the water always flowed over the edge.

Good, good, Jennifer Raglan told herself, looking into the mirror in the female barristers’ robing room. She clipped the white tabs onto the collar of her white shirt. Samantha Wyler was going to plead out today. Fifteen years for manslaughter. Great. Now Raglan could go back to small cases, work nine to five and be home for dinner, weekends her own.

Her daughter, Dana, was thrilled. At the beginning of September she’d joined an all-girls’ hockey team. Either Jennifer or Gordon had to get home, toss Dana into the car, and battle through traffic to practices and games in far-flung suburbs. Because the trial hadn’t ramped up yet, Raglan had been doing the bulk of the driving. Yesterday, when she was tied up preparing for the pretrial with Judge Norville, her husband had driven. Somehow Dana’s neck guard had been left out of her hockey bag and she wasn’t allowed on the ice.

This afternoon the team had a game after school, and since the Wyler case was going to be a guilty plea, Raglan was on driving duty.

Then there was Ari Greene. She’d been spending a lot of time with him during the last few months. He’d been steadfastly cool toward her—but never cold—sending her the message that the door between them was closed. The problem was, she was still rattling the handle. This morning she’d awakened at four o’clock, out of breath, the dream she’d had about his body so real she could almost touch it. This wasn’t healthy.

Yep, all good, Raglan thought as she entered Norville’s court. The big room was packed. The seats directly behind the Crown counsel table on the far right had been reserved for the Wyler family, with ropes across the rows, as if they were being saved for the groom’s side at a wedding.

No special accommodation had been made for Samantha Wyler’s family, Raglan noticed as she picked out the mother and brother, plus the librarian who’d been at the bail hearing. They all sat on the left-hand side.

It was always like this. Both sets of families staked out opposite sides of the courtroom and kept to themselves during long trials. Somehow they’d work out an unspoken choreography of avoidance, one group coming or going before the next, inhabiting different sides of the courtroom, finding their own nooks and crannies in the hallway during breaks, and sitting far from each other in the basement cafeteria.

Raglan took her place at the counsel table. Greene was already there, wearing a well-tailored suit. In the helter-skelter way people’s lives crisscrossed in the courthouses of such a big city, she might not see him again for months. Maybe years. At the other counsel table, Ted DiPaulo sat beside Nancy Parish. A long red coat was draped over a third chair, which was empty. Raglan recognized it from a photo of Samantha Wyler in the morning paper, taken the day before when she was leaving court.

At Crown School they taught you to never make eye contact with the accused. Hey, I’m human, Raglan thought as she stole a quick glance back at the raised prisoner’s box. Wyler wore a black dress and no jewelry. Her eyes were vacant, out of focus.

A staccato rap sounded on the oak door to the left of the judge’s dais. It flung open, and a court officer in full uniform shouted, “All rise.”

Raglan heard a rustle behind her as the spectators stood. Norville, her robes dancing, trotted up to her raised seat. Raglan got a glimpse of the judge’s shoes. They were the same expensive Italian pumps Raglan had worn to the pretrial yesterday. Damn you, she thought.

“Oyez, oyez, oyez,” the court registrar said, rising from his spot directly below the judge. “All persons having business before the Queen’s Justice of the Superior Court of Justice, attend now and ye shall be heard. Long live the Queen. Please be seated.”