Beyond Suspicion (27 page)

•

It was late Friday afternoon, and Jack was at his
abuela
’s when Rosa phoned him on his cell. Expecting bad news, he ducked out of the kitchen and took the call in the living room, out of his grandmother’s earshot.

“Indictment is down,” said Rosa.

He closed his eyes and slowly opened them, absorbing the blow. “How bad?”

“One count, one defendant.”

“Me?”

“No. Theo.”

The knot in his stomach twisted. A moment of relief for himself, a deep-felt pain for his friend. “No murder for-hire-scheme, like we thought?”

“Not yet.”

“You think it’s coming?”

“Could be like we talked about earlier. The prosecutor will use the indictment as leverage against Theo, try to get him to turn against you.”

“He could have done that even if he’d indicted both of us.”

“He’s being cautious, as he should be. You’re a respected lawyer, the son of a popular former governor. You can bet that the state attorney herself is insisting that the evidence against you be ironclad.”

“Marsh’s testimony obviously wasn’t enough.”

“Or the prosecutor has some reservations about it. I heard a rumor that Marsh refused to take a polygraph.”

“That’s just great. They’re not sure if their star witness is telling the truth, so they can’t indict me. But it’s fine and dandy to indict Theo.”

“Theo’s a former death-row inmate. I don’t care if he was innocent the last time, the bar’s a lot higher for you than for him.”

“This really pisses me off.”

“Calm down, okay? We don’t know what additional evidence they have against Theo. It could be worse than we think.”

Jack sighed, realizing she was right.

Rosa said, “Right now we have to focus on making sure they don’t convince Theo to flip against you. That would be all the evidence they need to go after you on murder for hire.”

“The only way they can do that is to get Theo to lie. That’ll never happen.”

There was a brief pause, then Rosa shifted gears. “Where are you now?”

“My grandmother’s house. I didn’t want to be home or at the office when the indictment issued. Just can’t deal with the media right now.”

“Where’s Cindy?”

“With her mom.”

“Are you two…”

“I don’t know what’s happening with us.”

“Have you heard anything at all from Theo?”

“Not a word.”

“Well, his arraignment is set for Monday morning at nine. If we don’t hear from him by then, he’ll officially be a fugitive.”

“I’ve been trying to find him ever since his lawyer told me he couldn’t reach him. I called his friends, talked to his partner, the people he works with. No one seems to know anything.”

“Then do more.”

“I will. But the indictment isn’t going to make it any easier. There’s no bail for murder in the first degree. The thought of going back behind bars isn’t going to sit well with him.”

“You need to find him and convince him that he has no choice. A no-show on Monday only digs a deeper hole for all of us.”

Jack started to pace. Through the archway at the end of the hall, he could see his grandmother standing at the kitchen island preparing dinner. Strange, but he suddenly smelled jail food. “I need to get on this. Where can I reach you tonight?”

“I’ll be here in my office pretty late. You should come by. Jancowitz is delivering the grand-jury materials to Theo’s lawyer tonight, and he promised to share with me. Could be interesting stuff.”

“Yeah. Like reading my best friend’s obituary.”

“We’re a long way from that, Jack.”

He thanked her, said good-bye, and hung up. He took a few steps toward the kitchen, then stopped. Only one thing seemed worse than telling
Abuela
that an indictment might be around the corner, and that was letting her hear it first on television. He drew a deep breath and entered the kitchen.

“Who called?” she asked.

“Rosa.”

She was flattening a mound of dough into a paper-thin sheet, back and forth with a rolling pin. It was for her famous meat-filled pastry shells that were tasty enough to tempt even a life-long vegetarian. “What she tell you?”

“Not good news.”

“How not good?”

Jack stood on the opposite side of the island, grabbed a sliver of extraneous dough, and rolled it into a ball as he told her about Theo, and how they might still come after him. He could see the emotion in her eyes, but she kept working the dough faster and faster as the news unfolded. He finished in a minute or two, but the silence lingered much longer. Just the sound of the rolling pin and the slice of the knife on the granite countertop-rolling the dough, flattening it into sheets, slicing it into triangles.

“Careful,” said Jack. “You’re going to cut yourself.”

Her pace only quickened. Another wad of dough, another flattened square, a diagonal slice that turned the square into two triangles.

After the third cut, Jack grabbed her wrist and said, “Do that again.”

“Como?”

“The slicing motion. Do it again.”

She flattened another sheet, put the rolling pin aside. Then she took her knife and sliced diagonally across the sheet of dough.

“You slice from top right to bottom left,” he said.

“Sí.”

“Not from top left to bottom right.”

She tried it. “
Aye, no.
That would be very awkward for me.”

“Of course it would be,” he said, looking off to the middle distance. “You’re left-handed.”

“Toda esta bien?”
she asked. Is everything okay?

“Perfecto,”
he said as he leaned across the island and planted a kiss on her cheek. “
Gracias, mi vida.
I love you.”

“I love you, too. But what this about?”

“It’s complicated, sort of. But it’s really simple.”

“What you talk about?”

“You made it all so simple.”

“Me?”

“Yes, you. You’re beautiful. I’ll explain later. I gotta go.”

He grabbed his car keys, ran out the front door, and jumped into his Mustang. The traffic lights were all green on his way to Rosa’s office, a minor miracle that he interpreted as a sure sign that he was onto something. He was in a hurry, to be sure, but the need for speed was more a matter of adrenaline than timing. Less than fifteen minutes later he was banging on the entrance doors to Rosa’s office suite. She let him in and then backed away, as if fearful that he might ricochet off the walls and knock her flat.

“What’s with you?” she asked.

Jack caught his breath and said, “Do you have the grand-jury materials yet?”

“Yeah. Just came.”

“I need to see the autopsy photos.”

“I’m sure they’re in there.”

He followed her to her office. The materials were in two boxes atop her desk. Jack sifted through one; Rosa, the other.

“Here they are,” said Jack. He removed the photographs from the envelope and spread them across the desktop. The gruesome sight cut his enthusiasm in half. Jessie’s lifeless body on a slab evoked chilling memories of the bloody scene in his bathroom.

“What are you looking for?” asked Rosa.

“This.” He cleared away the other photographs and laid one on the desktop. It was a close-up of the wound to Jessie’s wrist. He examined it carefully and said, “Bingo.”

“Bingo what?”

“Jessie’s left wrist was slashed, which is exactly what you’d expect from a right-handed person.”

“Are you saying Jessie was left-handed?”

“No. She was right-handed.”

“Then what’s the big revelation?”

“The slash mark runs at the wrong angle.”

“What?”

He turned his palm face-up, demonstrating. “Look at my wrist. Let’s call the thumb-side the left and the pinky-side the right. A right-handed person would probably slash top left to bottom right, or even straight across, left to right. But top right to bottom left is an awkward movement.”

Rosa checked the photograph once more. “It’s not a severe angle. But now that you mention it, Jessie’s appears to be top right to bottom left.”

“Exactly.”

“So what does this mean? She didn’t kill herself? We sort of knew that all along.”

“It means more than that.” Jack took the letter opener from her desk, then grabbed Rosa’s wrist to make his point more clearly. “I’m right-handed. Let’s say I’m facing you and cutting your left wrist, trying to make your death look like a suicide. My natural movement is to cut from top left to bottom right. That leaves a wound at the exact same angle you would leave if you had cut your own wrist. Try it.”

She took the letter opener, ran it across her veins. “You’re right.”

Jack took back the opener and switched hands. “But if I’m a left-handed person, and I cut your left wrist, the cut runs at the opposite angle. From your vantage point, it’s top right to bottom left.”

She simply nodded, following the logic. “So exactly what are you saying?”

“I’m saying that the only way you end up with a slit at this angle is if a left-handed person is facing his victim just as I’m facing you right now and slashes her left wrist.”

Rosa looked at the photo, then at Jack, her expression stone-cold serious. “Know anyone who’s left-handed?”

“I think I’ve got a pretty good idea.”

“Who?”

He tapped the blade of the letter opener into the palm of his hand and said, “Someone I’ve suspected since the day he came to my office, talking about Jessie’s death as if it were just a business hassle.”

“One Dr. Joseph Marsh?”

“You got it,” said Jack.

•

Dr. Marsh lived in a Mediterranean-style house near Pennsylvania Avenue, a few blocks west of where the noisy Miami Beach nightlife began. The neighborhood was once a haven for retirees, but with the overall revitalization of South Beach, mountain bikes and Rollerblades had long since replaced the wheelchairs and walkers. It was an eclectic area, lots of artists, musicians, gays, and young people-the perfect relocation spot for a rich, recently divorced doctor in pursuit of hard bodies.

Jack parked on the street and killed the engine. It was a dark night, and the canopy of a sprawling oak tree blocked most of the light from a distant street lamp. Rosa was barely visible in the passenger seat beside him.

“This is the last time I’m going to say this, Jack. I don’t think a confrontation with the government’s chief witness is a good idea.”

“I don’t intend to get in his face. I’ve met him several times but I’ve never really focused on whether he’s left-handed or right-handed. I just have to see with my own eyes.”

“What are you going to do, ask him to grab his glove and have a catch?”

“No, I thought I’d just tell him to slap you upside the head.”

“I just want you to be sure about this.”

“I am. This thing I figured out with the angle of the slash on Jessie’s wrist is only one piece of the puzzle. Even if Marsh is left-handed, that’s not the only thing that points to him as the killer. I think she screwed him over.”

“How do you mean?”

“Somehow, the entire million and a half dollars that Jessie wormed out of her viatical investors ended up in a bank account that didn’t have his name on it. I’m sure that Marsh went along with that arrangement because he wanted to prevent his wife from getting her hands on it in the divorce. But something tells me that when it came time to give the doctor his half of the loot, Jessie gave him the heave-ho-‘It’s been nice, doc, thanks for helping with the scam, now see ya later.’”

“You realize we’re totally shifting gears. The whole defense we’ve been crafting so far is that Jessie was murdered by the investors she scammed.”

“Which is probably why we aren’t making any headway. One thing has always bothered me about that anyway. Why would they kill Jessie and let the doctor live?”

“I don’t know.”

“And how do you think Dr. Marsh is going to react when I ask him that question?”

“I think he’ll say exactly what he said to the grand jury:
you
killed her. So, please, don’t have that kind of talk with him. Just get him to sip coffee or write something down, anything to satisfy yourself that he’s left-handed. Don’t take it any further than that.”

“We’ll see how it goes.”

“No, I already see where it’s going. If all you really wanted to know was whether Marsh is left-handed, you could go ask his wife. You want to get in there, go toe-to-toe, get your friend Theo off the hook, and stem off your own indictment. He got the best of you in that last conversation you had in your office, and now you want to even the score.”

“I’m just feeling him out, okay? From what I’ve seen of Dr. Marsh, he’s way too impressed by his own cleverness. If I keep my composure and push the right buttons, I honestly think he’s arrogant enough to say something we can use to hang him.”

She shook her head, as if she didn’t approve. “I see there’s no talking you out of this.”

“Nope.”

“You realize I’m not going with you. The last thing I need to do is be a witness to a conversation that might disqualify me from being your lawyer.”

“I agree.”

“Good luck.”

“Thanks.” He stepped down from the car, pushed the door shut, and headed up the walkway. It was a short walk, but it seemed long. The small front lawn was well kept, surrounded by an eight-foot-tall cherry hedge that was trimmed and squared-off neatly to resemble fortress walls. Jack almost checked for a moat. Long rows of colorful impatiens flanked either side of the curved path of stepping stones that led to the front door. The driveway was off to the left, and the doctor’s Mercedes was parked in it. That was promising, almost as good as a sign on the door saying the doctor is in.

Jack climbed one step at a time, three in total, acutely aware of the scratchy sound of his soles on rough concrete. This was technically no sneak attack, but the closer he got to the front door, the less welcome he felt. It wasn’t anything he heard or saw. Just vibes.

He drew a breath and knocked on the door.

A full minute passed. Jack heard nothing. He knocked again, a little harder. Then he waited. He checked his watch. Almost ninety seconds. It was a small house. Even from the most remote corner, it couldn’t possibly take more than a minute or so to reach the front door. Unless he was showering or sleeping or-

Who the hell cares if I’m bothering him
? He knocked a third time, a good solid pounding that could easily have preceded the announcement,
Police, open up!

He waited a full three minutes. No one home. Or at least no one was willing to come to the door. In the back of his mind he could almost see Rosa smiling and saying something along the lines of
Just as well, God’s doing us a favor
.

He turned away and climbed down the stairs. Instead of taking the serpentine footpath, he exited by way of the driveway, a more direct route to the street. The silver Mercedes was a ghostly shade of gray in the moonless night. It seemed odd that the car was in the driveway and yet the doctor hadn’t answered the door. Jack took two more steps toward the driveway, then froze. He hadn’t noticed in the darkness, but on the other side of the big Mercedes was a smaller, black vehicle, almost invisible in the night. It was a Volkswagen Jetta, and in an instant, Jack recognized it.

Theo?

He sprinted toward the Jetta, pressed his face to the glass and peered through the dark, tinted windows. Theo’s windows were so dark they were illegal, making it impossible to see in. Jack walked around to the windshield, but he saw nothing inside. He tried the doors, but they were locked. He stepped back and nearly bumped into Dr. Marsh’s Mercedes. As he turned, something inside caught his eye. The driver-side window wasn’t as dark as Theo’s, so he could make out the image inside.

His heart was suddenly in his throat.

A man was slumped sideways over the console, his torso stretching from the driver’s seat to the passenger side. On impulse, Jack opened the door and pulled him straight up in his seat.

“Dr. Marsh!” he said, as if he could revive him.

The doctor was staring back at him, eyes wide open, but the stare was lifeless. The back of his head was covered with blood.

Jack released his grip, his hands shaking. The body fell face-first against the steering wheel. He backed away, grabbed his cell phone, and dialed 911, his mind racing with one scary thought.

Theo, where on God’s earth are you?