10th Anniversary

could have lost my job, my life savings, my reputation, but that didn’t happen.

Yuki Castellano had been on my defense team. She had fought for me and we had won. I owed her a lot.

I said to Yuki now, “Phil Hoffman asked me to see her. He said we’ve got the wrong person for Dennis Martin’s killing.”

“Are you ka-razy?” Yuki said.

And then she let loose with her trademark breathless verbal fusillade. “You listened to a defense lawyer? You went behind my back and interviewed the defendant in my case? How could you do that, Lindsay? What made you even think you had the right?”

“Chi and McNeill report to me,” I said, feeling my cheeks flaming. “If they made a bad arrest, I had to know.”

I could have called Yuki. I should have called Yuki. But she would have been aboard the same train as Brady, Chi, and McNeill. She would have said, “Don’t do it.”

“I just talked to her, dammit,” I said. “All I did was talk to her.”

Yuki signaled the bartender, a wiry young woman with big breasts named Nicole.

“Hit me again,” Yuki said, pushing her beer mug forward, dumping a bowl of peanuts over the bartender’s side of the bar.

“That’s three,” Nikki said.

“Yeah?” Yuki shot back. “So what?”

“Just sayin’.”

“Well, don’t.”

Yuki swung around to face me. “So, while you were just talking to Candace Martin, what did she say?”

“She said that Ellen Lafferty was likely having an affair with her husband and she has a theory. Candace thinks either Ellen got dumped or she knew she was being played by a player. Candace thinks Ellen shot Dennis.”

“Wow,” said Yuki. “Candace is saying, ‘The other dude did it.’ What a shock.”

Christ, Yuki was mad.

I said, “It answers the big unanswered question, Yuki. Who was the unknown intruder? If Ellen Lafferty didn’t leave the house for her evening off, she was already on the scene.”

“Lindsay, this whole setup is a Phil Hoffman distraction. Maybe Santa came down the chimney and did it. Maybe Dennis Martin pressed the gun into his wife’s hand and pulled the trigger on himself. You should have kept your nose out of this. You’ve made me look bad and for what?”

“Paul Chi. It was his case.”

“Good point. Why didn’t Hoffman go to Chi? He went to you because we’re friends and he’s trying to undermine my case,” Yuki said, slamming her beer mug down on the bar.

“You’re being jerked around, so enjoy that. I’m going to get that woman convicted. Because it wasn’t the other dude, Lindsay. Candace Martin did it.

Chapter 34

ENTERING THE COURTROOM the next morning, Nick Gaines said to Yuki, “What’s this? Some adorable little kids are missing from the front row.”

Yuki put her briefcase on the table and stole a look at the row of seats behind the defense table. She saw strangers there. They looked young and intense. Probably law students. The Martin kids were gone. She guessed they’d served their purpose — before Duncan went off-road and got the judge mad.

Court was called into session. Judge LaVan called on Yuki, asking her to put on her next witness. She was ready.

“The People call Felix Ashton.”

A fortyish man with black hair and mustache, wearing an expensive-looking gray jacket and dark pants, was sworn in.

Yuki asked him to state his name, then his profession. “Real-estate broker. High-end residential properties,” Ashton said.

Yuki paced in the well and said, “How well do you know Candace Martin?”

“We’ve been seeing each other for about a year.”

“By ‘seeing each other,’ you mean romantically?”

“Yes.”

“And how did you meet her?”

“Dennis Martin asked me to appraise the house that he and Candace owned together. She contacted me after I did the appraisal and asked me to give her the information.”

“I see,” Yuki said. She glanced at her notes, looked back up at the witness.

“And what was the value of the house?”

“In that neighborhood and in that excellent condition, no less than three-point-five million. Some would go as high as five.”

“Did you have occasion to meet Dennis Martin more than once?”

“Yes.”

“Under what circumstances?”

“Every couple of weeks, he’d show up in the restaurant where Candace and I were having dinner and take a table near us. He sat next to us at the movie theater a couple of times. He followed Candace to antagonize her. He used those occasions to have sarcastic buddy-buddy talks with me.”

“So he was stalking her. Did that make Candace angry?”

“Objection,” Hoffman said. “Leading the witness.”

“I’ll allow it. Answer the question, Mr. Ashton.”

Ashton said, “Dennis Martin needled Candace all the time. He bragged to her and to me that he was seeing a lot of different women. He told me that he’d divorce Candace in a flash, if she gave him what he wanted — the house and alimony and the kids. He said he wanted it all. And so he was trying to torment her until she gave in.”

“And did Candace ever tell you that she was going to agree to his terms?”

“No.”

“Do you love Dr. Martin?” Yuki asked.

“Yes, I do.”

“And has she told you that she loves you?”

“Yes.”

“But she wouldn’t give her husband a divorce.”

“He was a mean guy. If he hadn’t insisted on custody of the kids, she would have cut him loose. But she didn’t want to give him joint custody.”

“Nice of her.”

Hoffman got to his feet and objected.

Yuki said, “I withdraw the comment. I have only one more question, Mr. Ashton. You say the two of you were in love. Yet Dennis Martin was in your way. Did Candace Martin ever tell you that she’d like to kill her husband?”

“Well … not that she would actually do it.”

“Yes or no, Mr. Ashton? You’re under oath. And we have your deposition.”