Peggy’s image filled the thirty-two-inch screen. Her face was drawn and washed out by hours spent waiting in the cold and wind at Kessler Park. We watched in silence as she talked about her children, her marriage, and her husband, Kate not offering any commentary until the video ended.
“First time through was for context,” she said. “Now let’s take a look at a few key moments. The first is when she talks about her children. See how her mouth turns down, her eyes scrunch up, and her cheeks sag? That’s agony.”
“What else would you expect?” Lucy asked. “Her husband kidnapped her kids.”
“Her kids are missing,” Ethan Bonner said. “That’s all we know for certain.”
Lucy threw him a poisonous look and started to say something, but Kate cut her off.
“The agony is important because it may indicate that she didn’t kill her children. If she had, she’d show signs of shame, like she did here.”
Kate fast-forwarded to the moment when she asked Peggy if Jimmy’s allegations that she’d had an affair were true. Peggy looked down and away, nodding her head, her voice breaking as she muttered her confession.
“Classic expression of shame,” Kate said.
“It makes sense that she’s ashamed,” Bonner said.
“Agreed. It’s not unusual for a spouse to be ashamed of cheating, no matter how big a jerk the other spouse is and, having spent an hour with Jimmy today, he is that big of a jerk. The question is whether she has other reasons for being ashamed besides her cheating heart.”
“When you asked her who she was fooling around with she wouldn’t tell you,” Bonner said. “What do you make of that?”
“My best judgment? Revealing her boyfriend’s identity would only make things worse. Could be he’s someone Jimmy knows, which would make his feelings of betrayal and her shame even worse, maybe unbearable.”
“If it was like that, if she was fooling around with Jimmy’s best friend or someone else he was close to,” Simon said, “it’s more likely that he would snap and do something to the kids to punish her.”
“Or,” Bonner said, “Maybe she’s afraid her boyfriend had something to do with her kids’ disappearance. That would give her a double dose of shame. She says she left them alone in the house while she went to the store to get some milk. Her boyfriend might have had a key. The kids might even have known him and let him in the house.”
Lucy let out a sigh. “It gets worse. Peggy says that when she left the kids that morning that she went to the Quik-Trip on Independence Avenue to buy milk. I talked to the cashier who worked that shift. He remembered her because she’s a regular. He says she bought beer, not milk.”
Bonner leaned forward in his chair, rubbing his hands together. “I like it. I like it a lot. This has the makings of a fine defense.”
Lucy sprang to her feet. “You unholy asshole! That’s all you care about! Throwing a load of shit against the wall, hoping enough of it sticks to get your fucking client off!”
Bonner leaned back in his chair. “I’m as worried about those kids as anyone in this room, but I don’t have the luxury of being self-righteous and sanctimonious like you do, Lucy. I owe my client the best defense I can give him, and that means I’ve got to make sure the jury knows that someone besides Jimmy Martin could be guilty.”
Hands on hips, she snarled at him. “This morning you were all about how Jimmy has only been charged with theft and contempt, not kidnapping and murdering his kids. So why are you trying so hard all of a sudden to defend him against something he hasn’t been charged with? Did he confess? Are you hiding behind the attorney-client privilege and just using us to build a defense when you know he’s guilty because, so help me God, if I find out you are, I’ll put you in the ground.”
Kate was studying Bonner with freeze-frame eyes, a look that could read bar codes a mile away. I needed time alone with her, to ask her what she saw in Bonner’s expressions. He ignored her, giving Lucy a tight-lipped smile.
“It’s been a while since someone threatened to kill me for doing my job. Bet it happens to you all the time. I bend a lot of rules because I think they’re bullshit, but I won’t breach my client’s confidence because if I do, he’s done and I’m done.”
“Even if it costs Evan and Cara their lives?” Lucy said.
“Let me put it this way. I won’t help Jimmy commit a crime, but I won’t turn him in for one he’s already committed.”
“I couldn’t live in your world,” Lucy said.
“Okay, okay,” I said. “Let’s step down to DEFCON Three. Bonner, I know you can’t tell us if Jimmy confessed. But if there’s a chance that Peggy’s boyfriend had something to do with this, we need to take a look at him, and if you know the boyfriend’s name, now would be a good time to tell us. At least that way, we could try to rule him in or out.”
Bonner pursed his lips, searching for the limits of the attorney-client privilege. “Okay. You don’t think I hadn’t thought of the boyfriend angle? First thing they teach you in criminal defense school is to give the jury any suspect except the defendant, and Peggy’s boyfriend, whoever he is, makes an easy target. I pushed Jimmy to tell me, but all he said was that he’d take care of it himself.”
“The guy has pride,” Simon said, “even if it’s the ugly kind.”
“So, he knows or thinks he knows,” I said. “If Kate’s right about why Peggy is so ashamed, we need to find her boyfriend, and the best place for us to start is with Jimmy’s friends, assuming he has any.”
“There was one person he mentioned several times,” Bonner said, flipping through a legal pad filled with scrawled notes, looking up from the page. “Guy’s name is Nick Staley. That name mean anything to anybody?”
Chapter Thirty-five
Nothing happens in a vacuum. We go through life, content in the belief that our little corner of the world is a gated community, that outside our limited circle of family and friends no one much cares or notices what we do. Politicians and celebrities are criticized for living in a bubble, a closed atmosphere impervious to reality. But the truth is we all live in our own bubbles, ignoring the ripples we create until we bump, trip, or stumble into someone else’s world, the bubbles burst, and the ripples well up, becoming shock waves.
“Nick Staley owns a little grocery store on St. John,” I said.
“You live in Brookside,” Simon said. “Since when do you buy bread on St. John?”
“I don’t. Staley has a son named Brett who works at the grocery. He’s also in love with Roni Chase.”
“Six degrees of separation,” Simon said. “Which one was in a movie with Kevin Bacon?”
Lucy scooted to the edge of her chair. “Jack, you can talk to Roni, find out if her boyfriend knows anything, maybe get her to make an introduction to Nick. That way you can come at him without him being on guard. He might open up or at least let something slip.”
“So now it’s a good thing I’m helping Roni?”
She sat back, arms crossed. “If it’ll help find those kids.”
“It’s worth a try,” Kate said. “If you show up at his grocery store and ask him if he’s sleeping with Peggy and, oh by the way, did he kidnap her kids, he might clam up in spite of your considerable charm.”
“Bonner,” I asked, “have you talked to Nick Staley?”
He shook his head. “No.”
“Why not?” Lucy asked. “You said you’d already thought of the boyfriend angle.”
“I left him a couple of messages, but he didn’t call back. I tried catching him at the store, but missed him. The kid I talked to must have been his son.”
“Mid-twenties, blond, chinstrap beard, pierced eyebrow. Spends a lot of time in the gym and wants you to know it,” I said.
“All that and an attitude to match. Asked me for ID, wouldn’t tell me when or if Nick would be back or how I could get ahold of him. When I told him I represented Jimmy Martin, he acted like he’d never heard of him, which didn’t register with me until now. If his father and Jimmy were buddies, you’d think he’d have been more helpful.”
