The 3rd Victim (17 page)

Joe nodded. ‘It cuts pain by blocking peripheral nerves and fibres. The relief is immediate because it penetrates the skin so quickly. They say you can taste it seconds after you rub it on your skin – it has a sort of bitter, garlic-like tinge.’

David considered the information Joe was giving him. He remembered now how the doctors had explained to him that the drug is absorbed so efficiently that it is metabolised in moments. ‘I can ask her if she injured herself, Joe,’ he began, ‘but I don't see –’

‘You start with that and get back to me, okay?’ Joe interrupted.

And despite his confusion David agreed. ‘You said “first up” – so what else did Martinelli come up with?’ he asked, now sensing it was time to move on.

Joe took a breath before continuing, his right leg now tapping on the worn living room carpet. He placed his cell on the coffee table, as if willing it to buzz. ‘Martinelli's blood analysis, both on the blood found at the scene and on the nightshirt, has followed, and
is
following the usual protocol – first comes the grouping, and then the more specific work on the DNA.’

David knew exactly what Joe was referring to. Forensics analysts used the standard ABO blood grouping system established by Dr Karl Landsteiner back in 1900. Landsteiner ascertained that every person's blood falls into one of four international blood groups classified by red blood cell function and the presence of a substance known as agglutinogen. A group contains A agglutinogen, B group has B agglutinogen, AB group contains both, and O group has neither. Martinelli would have performed tests involving the application of two solutions each containing antibodies to type-A and type-B antigens. The type-A antibodies when mixed with type-A blood will cause it to form clumps – and the type-B antibodies when mixed with type-B blood will have the same result. If blood clumps under contact with both A and B antibodies, then it is of the blood type AB, while O-type blood does not clump with any other blood type and is therefore identified because of its stand-alone significance.

‘The paediatric blood at the scene was AB positive,’ continued Joe. ‘It's rare, but can happen with certain parental blood combinations.’

David nodded.

‘Your client is an A, and according to the medical file we have just received from Dick Davenport, Jim Walker was type O.’

Joe had said O, not ‘
Oh
’.

David picked up the plastic sleeve Joe was pointing to and pulled out a pathology report which showed Jim Walker to be type O.

Then Joe's phone buzzed and Joe picked it up to read whatever was on the screen.

‘Okay,’ said David. ‘Sienna's an A, her husband was an O,’ he looked up at Joe to continue.

Joe nodded, holding up his cell. ‘Martinelli just confirmed Jim Walker's pathology report. It's legit. The husband was definitely an O.’

David frowned. ‘I still don't see the problem Joe.’

Joe took a breath. ‘The kid was AB, David, and an AB child comes from parents who are A and B, or A and AB, or B and AB, AB and AB but not …’

‘A and O,’ said David, his heat skipping a beat as he saw it. ‘Oh my god, Jim Walker wasn't Eliza's father.’

Joe nodded. ‘There's no way on earth he could have been. It is a medical impossibility.’

35

T
wo days later David was having another face-to-face with a different old friend – but once again the subject hung heavy between them.

‘My report is not yet ready,’ said ME Gus Svenson as he stretched back in his red vinyl chair. The chair squeaked in protest as if Svenson's lean but long frame was asking way too much of it. David's eyes were drawn to the deep crimson of its colour, an almost too-suitable backdrop to the coroner in the bright white coat.

‘I know, Gus,’ said David. ‘I just thought maybe you'd have some preliminary suppositions …?’

‘Not my job to suppose,’ said Svenson as he relaxed his stretch to lean toward his desk. ‘My conclusions are difficult, you see,’ he said by way of explanation. ‘The body is small and has deteriorated, all blood is gone and internal structures compromised by a lack of development and the positioning of the body in the drainpipe.’ He shook his head. ‘I do not believe I describe this.’

David understood what Gus was saying, the fact that a medical examiner had to utter such words was a crime in itself. ‘The evidence points directly at my client, Gus,’ said David, knowing he could trust the man before him. ‘But she is innocent, so to be brutally honest, I will take anything you've got.’

‘But then you will not want what I have. The baby's neck was cut right to left at a depth of approximately two inches – deep for an infant – which mean the incision severed both the jugular and the thorax.’

‘Her windpipe was severed.’

Gus nodded. ‘Yes.’ The ME took a breath. ‘And the lack of oxygen would have led to the cardiac arrest. There was also a second cut, small but deep at the base of the back of the neck.’

David frowned. ‘I don't understand,’ he said.

‘I suspect the cut at the back came first. Perhaps the killer picked up the child and moved the instrument from hand to hand as they placed her in the cradling position –’ Gus mimicked the hold, ‘– which we know she was in when she died.’

‘The killer juggled the knife.’

‘Yes, accidentally slicing the victim in the process. The only plus to this that the first cut severed part of the spinal cord which would have eliminated the pain experienced during the second. It reduced the trauma.’

‘A considerate killer,’ mocked David.

‘Accidentally considerate, yes.’

David nodded. ‘Will the blood spatter on the nightshirt support your findings?’

‘Not for me to say but … from my conversations with Dan Martinelli, I am certain this will be so.’

‘So the DA can argue the child was killed and cradled by someone wearing my client's nightshirt?’

‘Yes.’

David swallowed. ‘And the knife itself?’

Gus's brow tightened. ‘Hard to say. It was small, sharp, but once again impossible to classify given deterioration of the wound and surrounding tissue. Perhaps a paring knife? But a slim one, one that would fit in the palm of a hand.’

‘There was no such knife found at the scene.’

‘A plus for you.’

‘If there is such a thing,’ said David, before looking at Gus once again. ‘I'm drowning here, Gus.’

‘Like the child,’ replied Gus, who must have read the confusion on David's face. ‘She aspirated her own blood.’

David sighed before getting to his feet. ‘I have to go.’

Gus got up to walk David to the door. ‘I will give you report when I finish.’

‘Thanks, Gus.’ David shook his friend's hand. ‘When this is over, come for dinner – you look like you could use a good meal.’

‘A good meal, a good sleep,’ smiled the ME. ‘I will read your daughter the Swedish fairytale about the Swan Maiden of Blekinge.’

‘Does it have a happy ending?’ asked David.

Gus hesitated. ‘No,’ he said.

And David nodded, before moving out the door.

*

It was Monday morning. They were at L'Aroma on Newbury Street. The café had been Davenport's choice. L'Aroma was one of those trendy Back Bay locations where people queued out onto the street for coffees polluted by things like chocolate or syrup, but in the back there was a small alcove that was dark and discreet, where the clientele were affluent – just Davenport's sort of place.

‘What's this all about?’ he asked his doctor friend as he shifted his arm so that his crisp white shirt sleeve cuffs rose that fraction to reveal the face of his Rolex Explorer. ‘I believe I may have found some new clients, but I need to confirm their viability, so I don't have long.’

‘
New clients
?’ asked Davenport, his eyes jerking up. He lowered his voice. ‘I thought we'd decided to move on.’

‘We have. It's just that this opportunity could work for us on a number of levels so …’ he hesitated, knowing there was no need to reveal his plans to Davenport just yet. ‘Why did you want to see me?’

Davenport waited while the waiter placed a short black and a strong cappuccino on the table. ‘We have a problem,’ he said, his eyes dropping to his concoction of froth and bubble.

‘What sort of problem?’

‘It's the girl – Sophia.’

‘Is there something wrong with her?’

‘No.’ The shake of the head was exaggerated. ‘Her health is good. She is completely on track.’

‘All right. So what's the issue?’

‘Well, the girl underwent a routine ultrasound – which was not conclusive, I might add. So I took it upon myself to extract some foetal blood, to confirm what the original radiologist suspected, and … I am afraid the news is not good.’

Two café patrons squeezed around them, the scent of coffee and dark chocolate and sickly sweet caramel filling the air with a perfume so pungent that, teamed with his suspicions regarding Davenport's imminent revelation, it made the bile rise in his throat.

He calmed himself. ‘You're going to have to spell it out to me, Dick. I can do many things, but I can't read minds.’

Dick Davenport blinked. ‘Listen,’ he said. ‘I'm sorry. I don't know how this happened. You know how meticulous I am when it comes to the transfer.

‘I know what a huge problem this creates,’ Davenport continued. ‘The client will not be pleased. The original tests must have been wrong – two girls and no boy.’

He took a long slow breath as Davenport mopped at his brow with a logoed napkin. ‘Are you sure?’

‘I'm sure.’

‘On top of everything there's the question of Sophia and …’ continued Davenport, perhaps understanding that any attempts to absolve himself would be met with the contempt they deserved. ‘What do you want me to do about her?’

Silence as he tried to compartmentalise. There was too much to consider. Two of a kind? Unless … The thought came to him like a road train. ‘The midwife,’ he said. ‘You are sure she went back to Dublin?’

Davenport hesitated, obviously unclear as to why he was being asked the question ‘Yes,’ he answered.

‘I want you to locate her.’

‘You're still angry. It was not my fault Sienna chose to go with the woman. It made no difference in any case. Eliza was born Eliza. She was who she was.’

‘I want you to locate her,’ he said again.

‘All right, but …’

‘There's something else.’ A new thought came to him.

‘What is it?’

‘I want you to ingratiate yourself with the District Attorney.’

‘I thought we were playing it low key, making it look like we supported Sienna.’

‘We were, and we still are, but that doesn't mean you can't get a crisis of conscience. You're a humanitarian, Dick, and what she did does not sit with you – do you understand?’

Davenport took a breath. ‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘Although this may result in my appearing somewhat schizophrenic given that when the police came to call, I made it clear that Sienna was a friend and –’

‘As for Sophia,’ he interrupted, in no mood to hear Davenport's whining, ‘I want you to do what is required.’ His voice was even despite the gravity of the news. ‘She is no longer of any use to us.’

Davenport swallowed, his face turning white. ‘Is that really necessary? I mean, perhaps the clients might be open to accepting …?’

‘No. Their request was specific and you need to act while the situation still offers us the discount of two for the price of one. You were the one who created this problem in the first place, a problem that is impossible to solve I might add, given our access to half of the resources is now restricted.’

A humbled Davenport nodded, his eyes settling on the table.

‘You're right when you say that this places us in an extremely difficult position,’ he added when Davenport failed to look up, ‘so I'll need you to follow through on my recommendations quickly. You knew what this was all about when you agreed to be part of the process, Dick – and when it comes down to it, it's not like you haven't done it before.’

The creator looked crestfallen. ‘What will you tell the client?’ Davenport asked at last.

‘Nothing – at least not yet.’

‘I'm afraid there is no avoiding it.’

But he was not so sure, the only thought consuming him being that perhaps he had underestimated Sienna Walker after all.

PART THREE

36

E
sther Wallace sat back in the oversized armchair and lifted her feet so that they faced the eighteenth century fireplace. She felt like taking a bath but the cottage did not have one – just some rickety old shower that spurted alternate bursts of too-hot and then too-cold rust-coloured water across the slate-covered bathroom floor.

Esther liked a bath – always had done, which was quite appropriate really considering she grew up in the Stratford-upon-Avon city of the same name. And she thought of Bath then – all civilised and structured. It was no wonder Jane Austen chose it as her home between 1801 and 1806. Austen liked a civilised setting, unlike Bronte, who grew up mere miles from Esther's current location, a landscape born out of wretchedness and misery and –

Esther gave an involuntary jump as her cell started to ring. The sound itself bringing back memories ring, ring … ring, ring as opposed to the American ring … ring … ring …

It was just as well, she thought, as she got up to answer it, because her mind was starting to wander. Her phone had not rung in the entirety of her stay here, which was over two months at this point.

‘Yes,’ she said, her voice going down, not up, at the end of the three-letter opener as if she was already answering the question.

Her mottled brow creased as she listened intently – and she remained disappointed when the caller signed off, not just because she only had the chance to utter that singular word, but because she blamed herself for what had happened – or more specifically, her inability to stop things before it became too late.

37

I
t had been over three weeks since David's ‘forensics report’ meeting with Joe, and since he had told Sienna Walker that the man she'd thought had fathered her daughter was not the father after all. She had taken the news quietly, even answered calmly in the negative when David asked the question he knew he had to – about her fidelity and the possibility that Eliza was fathered by another man in her life.

David understood this was unlikely, not just because he trusted his client but because Eliza was born using IVF and as such, the ‘anomaly’ concerning her paternity must have occurred in the laboratory before the embryo that became Eliza was transplanted back into his client. But he knew he had to ask, if only so they could move on and deal with the puzzle at hand.

While Sienna had tried desperately to contain her emotions, to separate the trauma from the logic of it, David had detected that deep sense of sorrow in her eyes. Most would not have seen it, because Sienna Walker held such weaknesses close to the chest, but David had become attuned to what his client was thinking, probably because he had spent close to every day with her for what was now over a month – that, and the fact that the four walls of the tiny courthouse meeting room that now contained them, much like those of the now too-familiar interview room walls at County, acted as incubators to those kinds of emotions – the ones that you harnessed for fear of going crazy, and the realisation that confined spaces like this could be home for the rest of your life.

That being said, there was a new fire in Sienna Walker's belly – the loss of her husband, the death of her daughter, the knowledge that the two people she loved most in the world were not biologically related, somehow combined to ignite in her a fresh determination to fight. She was sad but steely, down but not out, and David had to admit he had come to rely on his client as a valid part of her own defence team – not just because she was smart and proactive, but because she was considerate, reasonable and had an uncanny ability to pull apart the evidence and put it back together with a clarity even he, on occasion, couldn't grasp.

‘So you are saying the DA could use this paternity issue against me.’ Sienna was up and pacing around the small space at the Suffolk County Superior Court. She had been allowed temporary release from County to attend a short court appearance relating to the pre-trial motions David was filing on her behalf. They had been debating why Katz had not released to the media, amongst other things, the nature of Eliza Walker's paternity.

‘Arthur thinks it's possible,’ said David. He was frustrated. They had been waiting for the DA to produce his discovery in the case of the Commonwealth vs Walker for over a month. David had filed a motion of non-compliance and taken it to Judge Isaac Stein, who promptly told the DA he would be liable for sanction unless he produced all items by the end of the day. But Katz's stalling had him worried as the DA obviously had his own reasons for holding on to items such as the forensics and medical material – information David luckily had access to, thanks to his good friend Joe.

David pulled out a chair to join his mentor at the rectangular black oak conference table which took up most of the room. ‘The paternity issue doesn't assist us beyond the fact that it poses a number of questions as to how and why your husband's seminal fluid got replaced by somebody else's. We can ask ourselves – if the exchange was deliberate – why Davenport, and as a flow-on Daniel Hunt, would do this, but we all agree that the swap could have been accidental, which means Katz could argue that you found out about it, saw your daughter as removed from your husband, and basically, in a fit of grief, snapped.’

Sienna looked at Arthur. She had obviously grown to respect the elderly attorney over the past few weeks, a respect that was now mutual. ‘I see,’ she said, her English accent as crisp as ever. ‘But that theory goes against our assumptions on the DA's strategies. We believe he will steer clear of any diminished responsibility argument, because to do so would give me an out.’

This was true. In recent weeks Katz had made it very clear that he was going after their client for the strongest possible charge of murder one, so David did not believe he would use the paternity as a means of locking Sienna into some sort of ‘mental breakdown’ prosecution. In fact, like Joe, he thought Katz would steer well away from it, simply so that he could send their client to prison for the rest of her life.

‘You agree?’ Sienna looked at David.

He nodded. ‘I hate to say it, but I think the Kat will be after another motive, one that will eliminate the jury's propensity to sympathy.’

Sienna looked at Sara who was perched on the windowsill. ‘Sara?’ she asked.

‘I agree with David,’ she said. ‘Arthur's argument is a logical one, but I can't see Katz taking the easy way out.’

‘So what is he going to use for motive?’ asked their client.

‘We're not sure,’ said David. ‘Joe Mannix suggested Dick Davenport might be willing to discuss your thoughts about becoming a mother – so if he's on Katz's witness list, which we suspect he will be, my guess is the Kat will use him toward motive.’

‘You think Dick will claim I didn't want to have a baby?’ She took the next logical step. ‘But why would I put myself through the IVF if …’

‘For your husband,’ said Sara.

‘And then, when I found out that Eliza wasn't Jim's …? Oh god, David, I can see where the DA might go with this.’

‘We don't believe he has anything concrete,’ said David, feeling the need to reassure her. ‘I plan to see Davenport myself, in fact I've placed a number of calls to his surgery, but he hasn't returned them as yet.’

‘Perhaps that is because he is already in the DA's camp?’

‘If he doesn't call back I'll walk on over to his surgery and sit there until he sees me – at the very least this will give me a sense as to where his loyalties lie.’

Sienna nodded, perhaps knowing there was nothing more they could do about this until they clarified Davenport's position.

‘What about Markus Dudek?’ asked Sienna. ‘Have we made any progress as to the nature of his recent investments …? And Jim's accident … have we … did you …?’

David took a breath. Their ‘case’ against Hunt was moving slowly. Information on Dudek and his investment activities was proving impossible to accumulate, given Dudek had constructed a Fort Knox-style wall around any data relating to his trading accounts. Approaching such enquiries from the run-of-the-mill public record angle was proving equally as restrictive, given Hunt's annual shareholders report made no mention of any activity relating to Dudek's investments bar listing his company as a client who occasionally sought financial planning advice.

As for Jim Walker's accident, Joe had gone down every investigatory avenue available to him including contacting the Baltimore police, the crime unit investigators involved in both the collection of at-the-scene material and the subsequent analysis of the limited samples collected from the incinerated mess, and the homicide detectives who worked on Walker's case. But everything, including the court documents relating to the accidental death finding, appeared above board and conclusive.

‘I'm sorry, Sienna,’ said David after a time. ‘I know it feels like we are running in circles. There has to be a way to break down the wall that is Hunt and his illegal dealings, we just have to figure out what it is.’

He glanced at Sara and knew what she was thinking – that they were fast running out of time, that they had spent the past month trying to build a case
against
Daniel Hunt instead of one that
defended
their client – and despite the fact that one could ultimately do the other, they were, at least at this stage, two very different things.

*

‘Okay,’ said Sara a few moments later, after reading the dilemma on David's sleep-deprived face. She could see what was happening: that David was losing heart, that the pressure of trying to save their client was compounded by his hatred for the man they believed to be responsible. And this is where she always stepped in – when she knew that David cared too much and his frustration and anger had started to cloud the lines of logic, and so she took them back to the beginning, to what they did have … to what they knew.

‘The way I see it, at least at this stage, we need to agree upon what we agree upon.’ She looked around the room and got a somewhat weary nod from all three of her companions. ‘We agree that Eliza was killed by someone intent on hurting both the child and her mother, perhaps as a secondary phase of some plan which started with the possible murder of the dad. We believe that Daniel Hunt and his friend Dick Davenport are responsible, but once again, at this stage, we have no proof.’ She glanced quickly at David, and then Arthur, who gave her a nod to move on. ‘We know the child was not Jim Walker's biological offspring and we believe that this might be relevant to our case, but if so, we have no explanation as to Hunt's or Davenport's motives, as Eliza's paternity has no relationship to the “insider trading” argument we are pursuing to clear Sienna in court.’

It was a harsh but true summary, and she knew it had to be said. Truth be told, their case was weak at best and nonexistent at worst, and they weren't going to gain any ground until they broke things down and examined them – piece by individual piece.

‘We believe Jim Walker was killed while on a job for Daniel Hunt. We know he had meetings in New York, where Markus Dudek is based, so perhaps there was a link between this last trip and our assumptions about Dudek's activities. Sienna,’ she turned to their client, ‘did your husband say he was going to see Markus Dudek while he was in New York City?’

Sienna's brow knotted. ‘In the weeks before his death, Jim spoke less and less of Dudek. I asked him about him, but … I sensed he refrained from discussing his suspicions for fear of upsetting me – or, perhaps in hindsight, of involving me in something he deemed to be unsafe.’ She took a breath. ‘Yes. He said he was going to New York, but Jim had a number of clients in Manhattan and –’

‘Hold on a minute,’ David interrupted her. He lifted his hand and rubbed at his forehead, as if willing a thought to come. ‘Jim was killed in Maryland.’

‘Yes,’ said Sienna.

‘Just outside of Baltimore.’

‘Yes.’

‘So who would he be meeting with there?’

Sienna shook her head. ‘I don't know. But as I said, he had taken to avoiding conversations about work, and he had clients up and down the east coast so …’

‘He thought Hunt and Dudek were involved in some form of insider trading,’ David said, ‘but he had no proof.’

‘That's right,’ said Sienna.

‘Because there
was
no proof.’ It was Arthur's turn to comment. ‘We've been over this, David. We've contacted every market watchdog we can think of and made the subtle enquiries necessary. If Jim Walker had proof, he most likely would have reported it, but there is no record of it, not with the SEC or any other market monitoring authority.’

‘Arthur's right,’ interrupted Sara. ‘He could well have intended to report Hunt but perhaps Hunt stopped him before Walker accumulated what he thought was enough proof to justify his accusations.’

But David was shaking his head. This was not what he was getting at, and Sara could see he was trying to clear his thoughts.

David turned to Sienna. ‘You need to think hard, Sienna, back to the morning your husband left on that trip. Did he say
anything
? Give you any indication of where he was going and who he needed to see?’

‘No. Jim travelled a lot for his work. I was just as used to it as he was. He didn't say or do anything significant, he …’

‘Please,’ said Sara. ‘Sometimes the smallest of details can help.’

Sienna nodded and paused to think. She took a breath before looking up from the table and starting to break it all down. ‘He was running late, I remember that. I'd been feeling tired and he made me breakfast and …’ She took another breath. ‘I knew he was running behind, so while he took a shower I helped pack his bag. I gathered up his files and collected his diary which was sitting face up on the dresser and …’

Sara looked at David. ‘He listed his appointments in a diary?’

‘He was sort of old-fashioned that way,’ Sienna nodded. ‘He liked to write things down. Quick notes, little abbreviations. But as I said, there was nothing unusual there. No mention of Dudek or any meeting in Baltimore – if there had been, I would have remembered it.’

‘So what
did
you see?’ asked David, obviously not ready to let this go. ‘Please, Sienna, this may be important.’

Sienna nodded then closed her eyes in concentration. ‘There was a series of acronyms. Jim liked to work in acronyms as did everyone in his business – you know, abbreviations for cities, states, companies, people's initials and so forth.’ She swallowed, her eyelids squeezing that fraction closer together. ‘There was an NYC for New York City … and … and the number 3.’ She opened her eyes. ‘Perhaps he had three meetings in Manhattan.’ She looked up at Sara who smiled and nodded for her to go on.

Sienna shut her eyes again. ‘NYC, 3 … then, underneath this … a name and the acronym … W … C … no.’ She opened her eyes once again. ‘It was WDC. I am sure of it.’

‘WDC?’ asked David.

‘It's the stock code for Westfield Shopping Empire. They're an Australian company, and another of Jim's clients. They own a number of big shopping complexes around the country. They have a US base in Los Angeles, but they also have other satellite offices … I don't think they have any in Baltimore. I'm sorry,’ she said, looking at David, ‘I'm afraid this isn't helping.’

‘It's okay, Sienna,’ he encouraged. ‘You're doing great.’

She nodded and closed her eyes to focus yet again. ‘All right, WDC – I think next to this was a name, a contact … an initial – “J” I think, and then a name – Tom or Ted … Baker or Barker … It was an average name, and there may have been a phone number next to it. A long distance one, with the area code included but …’ Her blue eyes opened once again, as her shoulders slumped in defeat. ‘I can't recall it. I'm sorry.’