“Twenty-five. She give me half up front, half when it was done.”
“She say why she wanted him killed?” I said.
“Nope.”
“She ever follow up with you?” I said.
“No.”
“So she gave you twenty-five thousand, and you put it in your pocket and walked away and never saw her again.”
“That’s right.”
“How’d she give you the money?”
“Whaddya mean how? She fucking handed it to me.”
“Cash?”
“Yeah. In a bag.”
“Big bills?”
“Hundreds.”
I went over it with him another time, and Belson tried him once. The story didn’t change.
Finally Ann Kiley said, “I think it is clear that my client has told his story and he retells it consistently.”
“I think you’re right,” I said.
“You’ll speak to the district attorney,” Ann Kiley said, “about my client’s willingness to cooperate.”
“Sure,” Belson said.
As we walked to my car, I said to Belson, “Anything bother you?”
“Like what?” he said.
“Like an entry-level slu)o being represented by Kiley and Harbaugh,” I said.
“Pro bono?” Belson said.
“You think?” I said.
“No.”
“It bother you?”
“Sure it bothers me,” Belson said. “And it bothers me that he got into the deal through a guy named Chuck whom we can’t identify, and it bothers me that his story is so exactly the same every time. And it bothers me his lawyer let him keep talking about it with only my sort of casual comment that I’d speak to the DA.”
“I noticed that myself,” I said.
“However,” Belson said, “sergeants don’t get to be lieutenants by helping people unsolve a high-profile murder.”
“True,” I said.
“But, I’m not forgetting what I owe you… When Lisa was gone.”
“That’s not an owesie,” I said.
“It is to me. I’ll help you when I can.”
“Mary Smith says she never hired this guy,” I said.
“Mary Smith’s an idiot,” Belson said.
“Well,” I said. “There’s that.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Larson Graf faxed me an invitation list with the names of Mary Smith’s 227 closest friends, in alphabetical order. I recognized enough of the names to assume that these weren’t people who hung out at bowling alleys.
The first one I was able to talk with was a guy named Loren Bannister, who was the CEO of an insurance company. He probably thought I was a prospect.
“Mary Smith?” he said.
“Yes, sir. Your name was high on her list.”
“Maybe because the list was alphabetical,” he said.
Bannister was square-jawed and silver-haired with a nice tan. He was in full uniform. Dark suit, white shirt, gold cuff links, red tie with tiny white dots.
“You’re too modest,” I said.
“Um-him. I assume this is connected with Nathan Smith’s death?”
“Yes.”
