Night Watch (24 page)

“Or what? Gil-Darsin gets out and we never see him again?”

“If you sit down with us, Boss, we can lay out where we stand and give you our opinions on which way to go.”

Battaglia made his way to the head of the table. “Since when did this office become a democracy? Five of you each think you get a vote? Are your names going to be on that ballot with me next year
when the editorial writers all claim they know this game better than I do?”

“If you’re worried about the Ivorian vote in Manhattan, Paul,” I said, “there are exactly one hundred twenty-three registered voters here who were born in the Republic of the Ivory Coast. I don’t think they’ll riot for Baby Mo.”

“If you go for the indictment today, who’s putting Ms. Robles in the jury?”

“Ellen is,” McKinney said, sneering in my direction. “Alex will be with her to oversee the presentation, but the victim doesn’t much like Alex.”

“What did you do to her?” Battaglia asked.

“Tried to get at the truth.”

“But you did it so heavy-handed,” McKinney said. “You’re the one always telling people how compassionate to be with rape victims.”

“Of course that’s true. But the first time the witness lies—I’m not talking about mistakes that everyone makes, or confusion as a result of trauma—but when she outright lies, then our most critical task is to find out whether that fib is a stand-alone, or whether lies permeate the entire underpinning of the story.”

“And what did all those hours together lead you to conclude, Alex?” Battaglia said.

I hesitated for fifteen seconds, fully aware that the district attorney had summoned me back from France to lead the charge on this case. “That I just don’t know what to believe.”

“Why not?”

“We all know something sexual happened in that room between MGD and Robles. But she’s the most facile liar I’ve ever confronted. One minute she’s staring me directly in the eye and I’m ready to fight to the death for her, and the next time she answers a question, it’s a complete fabrication.”

Battaglia’s annoyance with me was palpable. He put his elbows on the table and templed his fingers. “Mercer?”

“I think you have no choice but to indict the man,” Mercer said. “I’d like more time to get some background info on Blanca checked, but Alex says Lem Howell isn’t offering that option.”

“Ryan?”

The bright young lawyer leaned forward, pleased to have his say in a top-level powwow. “I hate to disagree with Mercer, but she’s not ready for prime time, Boss. Let MGD out with an ankle bracelet, hold his passport, and—”

That was all of Ryan Blackmer that Battaglia wanted to hear.

“Ellen. Are you ready to go?”

“’Bout as ready as a prairie dog heading out to meet an armadillo.”

“Save those little bits of Texas for home, missy. Got it?” Battaglia had been ridiculed in the media the last time Ellen spoke at a triumphant press conference, when dozens of guns had been confiscated by cops working with her unit. The Gunsherism—“If bullfrogs had side pockets, they’d have pistols, too”—wasn’t meant to turn the serious moment into a comedy show.

“Yes, sir.”

“Pat?”

“Full speed ahead. Ellen’s ready for a bare-bones presentation. Less margin for error that way.”

“Bare bones” was the leanest way to put the legal elements of a case before the grand jury. Only the essential facts were elicited from the witness—nothing requiring long answers or extraneous information.

“She’s still got to be telling the truth, Pat,” I said. “A single lie under oath at this point will undermine the entire case going forward.”

“So what do you want today, Alexandra?” Battaglia asked. “Right this minute.”

“More information. I want to know what Blanca swore to in that asylum application. I want to know what lies she told to get into this country. Have you heard anything back from your request to the State Department?”

“Monday at the earliest,” the district attorney replied.

“It’s irrelevant,” McKinney said. “The whole damn thing is irrelevant.”

“I’ll give that to you, Pat, for the purposes of the grand jury,” I said. “But doesn’t it bother you just a little bit, in getting to these facts, that she’s capable of lying under oath?”

“Everybody seeking asylum does it.”

“Fair enough.”

“What if one of the jurors asks about why she got asylum?” Battaglia countered.

“That’s why you’ve got your bureau chief in there, Boss,” McKinney said, waving a hand in my direction. “She’s their legal adviser. If they ask any questions when Ellen is finished, then Alex tells them it’s none of their business. She’ll keep them in line.”

“What else do you want?” Battaglia asked me.

“The recording of Blanca’s call to her boyfriend in federal prison after the attack,” I said. “I want to know exactly what she told him about it. I want to know if she talked to him about getting millions out of MGD.”

Pat McKinney shook his head. “Ellen’s questions don’t even touch the fact that she has a boyfriend. The jury won’t know about him, so they won’t know he’s in jail.”

“What if the facts she told him—which are on tape by the way—are different than what she told the police and all of us?” I asked.

“The feds can get that tape to us by the weekend,” Pat said. “I’m all over that.”

“How about the prison authorities just play it for us from Arizona or wherever he is?” I asked. “We’ve got three Spanish interpreters on staff.”

“So far, I’m not having much luck finding anyone in the business who speaks the Mayan dialect they used in the call, Alex. Our Spanish interpreters can’t understand a word Blanca said when they talked to each other.”

“Do you have all the surveillance tapes from the hotel?” I asked Pat McKinney. “The hallways, the front desk, the entrance?”

“All? What do you mean all? I’ve got what we need for today.” He looked to Ellen for confirmation, but she’d been deflated by Battaglia and her eyes stared blankly ahead.

“You’d hardly know that unless you had every tape from the time period in question. I would have asked for them from every camera that might have caught any of the players—including the security team—and MGD’s girlfriend.”

“I’m satisfied with what we’ve got,” McKinney said. “If Blanca changes her mind again, we’ll go back for more. Besides, before you got here I was filling the Boss in about Blanca’s argument that she wouldn’t ever be sexually involved with a black man. It’s hard to get around that one. It’s horribly racist, but it makes her position clear.”

“Did you have that conversation before I came in the room by plan?” Mercer said. He didn’t volunteer much in meetings with Battaglia, but when he spoke, he got everyone’s attention.

“Well—no, I—uh—well, it was just a new fact the Boss didn’t know.”

“Do you have something to say to that, Mercer?” the district attorney asked, getting up to ground out the tip of his cigar.

“Bullshit,” Mercer said, in a firm but quiet voice. “Most respectfully, sir, bullshit.”

Pat McKinney threw back his head and pursed his lips. Whatever he’d been trying to sell to Battaglia before we walked in had just been compromised.

“You think she’s lying about that?” Battaglia asked.

“Her prejudice? I just think it’s ugly. And personally, I think she threw that line in out of the blue yesterday, as though Mr. Peaser put it in her head as one more reason to find in her favor.”

“You know what her boyfriend looks like?” The DA turned to Pat McKinney.

“The jailbird? No idea.”

Mercer stood up, took some photographs from his jacket
pocket, and passed them to Battaglia. “They’re called mug shots, Pat. You could have had them pulled up in a flash, like I did.”

“This is Blanca’s convicted felon?” Battaglia said, squinting at the picture.

“Yeah. He’s from the same town she is. Got those Mayan features, but I’d say there’s been some chocolate sprinkled into his family tree over the last few generations.”

McKinney still had fire. “The other thing I was telling the Boss just now is that last night Byron Peaser gave me another factoid in Blanca’s favor. She’s been HIV-positive for eight years and on a battery of medications. No way in hell she’d volunteer to have sex with a stranger.”

“Welcome to my world, Pat. Just when you think you have all the answers,” I said, “you enter the dark realm of special victims work. You know how many women who are already HIV-positive think that giving blow jobs doesn’t put them at risk? You know how many others just figure they’re already infected with the worst thing a man can pass along to them, so why not have sex? If that’s your ace in the hole, so to speak, Pat, it’s a losing argument.”

“Two people alone together in a hotel room for twenty minutes. Everything in the world’s at stake for both of them. One is shielded in all the privileges our Constitution allows,” Mercer said, “and that leaves only the other one to tell a story—out of both sides of her mouth, in this case.”

“So what do I do?” Battaglia asked, standing and pacing in the middle of the long room.

“We put her in,” I said. “We get an indictment today and file it tomorrow.”

“But you want more time, Alexandra.”

“Yes, Paul. My head’s in the same place as Ryan’s. And like Mercer, I don’t believe Blanca’s bullshit and prejudice. But Lem won’t budge. No hint of a story from MGD that would flat out contradict his accuser. Won’t agree to an ankle bracelet to monitor his guy. So like Pat and Ellen, I think we’ve got to get her under oath—she’s
never wavered on the story about what happened in the room with Gil-Darsin. If you can take the heat that goes with riding this whole thing on Blanca’s back, then we go in today, and continue to work around the clock to sort out every detail that’s dangled before us.”

Pat looked at me, seemingly shocked that I had agreed with him.

“Glad you’re being sensible, Alex,” he said.

“I’d rather take our time like Ryan says, but it’s not the sensible choice, with all of MGD’s resources and the fact that Lem Howell hasn’t proferred any plausible scenario on his client’s behalf. But I’m not the one who’s going to be hit with the
RUSH TO JUDGMENT?
headlines. That’s all on the Boss’s head.”

“I’ll put my armor on,” Battaglia said. “You think you can get this done today? We can do the filing and press conference by tomorrow or Friday?”

“Absolutely,” McKinney said.

Battaglia dismissed us as quickly as he was able. We all gathered our notepads and started toward the door. I took an extra minute to shuffle my papers in hopes I could have a private word with the district attorney.

“Ryan Blackmer,” the DA said to me. “I like that kid. He’s not afraid to say what’s on his mind. I hope he’s wrong this time.”

“Ryan always says what’s on his mind. It should be refreshing,” I said, “after all the ass-kissing you get.”

I didn’t need to drop McKinney’s name in that sentence. Battaglia had already picked up the phone to ask Rose to get his mole at WEB headquarters on the phone.

“Listen, Paul, I think you ought to know some other stuff that’s going on.”

“‘Stuff’?” he asked me. “Is that a term of art?”

“Sorry. You’re right. There was a woman murdered in Mougins this weekend.”

“I take it you have an alibi.” The side of Battaglia’s mouth drew back in a grin. It wasn’t even ten o’clock, and the second cigar was already lighted and filling the space between us with smoke.

“And then a man’s body was found by Night Watch in the Gowanus Canal.”

“Saw it in the tabs. Had his throat slit. So?”

“Well, he was a waiter. It’s complicated but, uh—” I searched for the right words as I fiddled with the buttons of my gray-striped suit and tugged at the collar of the silk blouse. “There may be a connection to Luc Rouget in all this.”

Battaglia covered the mouthpiece with his hand while he continued to hold for the person he had called. “What does that mean exactly?”

“I don’t know, Paul.”

“Well, what does Luc say? What kind of connection?”

“I—I haven’t been able to speak to him in a day or so. I’ll let you know as soon as I do. The woman who was killed in Mougins used to work in Luc’s restaurant, several years ago. I’m sure it’s total coincidence, but I just thought you should know.”

“I don’t believe in coincidence, Alexandra. You’re well aware of that.”

“Then you should know that the Gil-Darsins live in Grasse, Paul. It’s the neighboring village of Mougins,” I said, struggling to keep my eyes steadied on the DA’s face. “They’ve been customers of Luc’s restaurant—for years, Boss, for many, many years.”

I thought the look from Paul Battaglia’s eyes was going to burn through the lenses of his glasses. “Go on.”

I didn’t know where to go. “There may be no significance in all this. I wouldn’t say they were close. But Luc’s father, Andre, was a good friend of Papa Mo’s.”

Battaglia grunted. “The great dictator. The thief who took the ivory out of the Ivory Coast. Lives like a king in France but left his people penniless. Go on.”

Someone spoke into the phone on the other end and I took a deep breath. Battaglia released the mouthpiece and answered. “Just a minute, Mr. King. I’m getting rope-a-doped by one of my lawyers here.”

He was already leaking information to James King, the straight-arrow, brilliant former IRS head who would be in the running to succeed Gil-Darsin at the World Economic Bureau.

“Don’t leave me hanging, Alexandra,” Battaglia said, wagging the cigar as he talked out of the side of his mouth.

“That’s all I’ve got, Paul. I just wanted you to know.” I could save the news about the matchbox in Luigi Calamari’s pocket for later. And the bloody skull. I wasn’t supposed to have known about either of those things yet anyway.

“Tell Luc to stay in the kitchen, will you? You look like the cat that swallowed the canary, young lady. I don’t want you slinking back in here later to tell me something else you wanted to say to me right now but it got stuck in your gullet.”

“Whatever happens, Paul, you can count on me not to slink.”

“Another minute, Mr. King. I just want to make sure we’re on a secure line,” Battaglia said, before turning his attention back to me as I moved toward the door. “I hope this—this nonsense didn’t have anything to do with your visit to Tiro a Segno last night. I hear you didn’t even wait long enough for the pasta to get al dente.”