“She was shot.” He says this with a measure of triumph, as if the difference in causes of death completely exonerates Daniel from being involved in any of this. “And both her hands were still on the body.”
I look over at Laurie, who doesn’t seem surprised at what Vince is saying, which means that Vince told her all of this before I arrived. She and I make eye contact, but my eye-reading skills are not quite well developed enough to know what she is thinking.
“Vince,” I say, “you need to face the possibility that Daniel is guilty. There can be some civil ramifications for your newspaper, so-”
“He’s not guilty. How many times do I have to tell you that?”
“You’ve met your quota. So why don’t you tell me how you can be so sure?”
I see Laurie flinch slightly; she must know what’s coming and also knows I’m not going to like it.
“I’m sure because he’s my son,” Vince says.
• • • • •
“I WAS IN THE RESERVES, stationed in Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri,” relates Vince. “Putting in my six months so I could get out of going to Vietnam. I got a weekend pass, I met Daniel’s mother, she got pregnant, end of story.”
My keen intuition is telling me that her pregnancy was in fact not the end of the story, so I probe further. “So you’ve kept in touch with Daniel all these years?” I ask.
He shakes his head with some sadness. “No. His mother never told me about him . . . we had no contact at all. Then, when he was eighteen, he contacted me. Since then I’ve tried to do what I can. I mean, I’m not Ward Cleaver, but I’ve done okay. I’ve been there when he needed me. I paid for the parts of college that his scholarship didn’t cover.”
Vince, a responsible father. The mind boggles. I wouldn’t trust him to watch my beer.
“Where is his mother now?” Laurie asks, helping me out. She knows that I have trouble speaking when I’m totally incredulous.
“She died about three years ago,” Vince says.
“I don’t suppose it was of natural causes?” It’s an obnoxious question to ask, but Vince doesn’t seem to notice.
“Yeah, some kind of cancer,” he says. “I’m not sure . . . we didn’t really have a relationship . . . it was just that one night.”
“Why didn’t you ever tell me this?” I ask. “I mean, having a son, that’s the kind of thing people usually mention.”
“You always tell me everything?” is his challenge back, knowing that our friendship is not nearly that intimate. “I mean, we’re guys, right?”
I see Laurie roll her eyes, one of the few eye signs I can actually read.
“We sure are, and proud of it. The Two Musketeers.” I’m trying to lighten things up a little.
“I guess I was ashamed,” Vince says, some emotion getting through the gruff exterior. “I missed so much . . . I never saw him grow up.”
“How could you know?” Laurie asks.
“I guess I couldn’t. But I sure never tried to find out. Then when he wanted to go into journalism, I figured I could help him more if people didn’t know he was my kid.”
“Makes sense,” I say, even though I’m not sure it does.
“So you’ll stay on the case?” Vince asks. “You’ll defend him?”
I’m in a bit of a quandary here. I’ve pretty much decided there is no way I’m going to take on this case, but I have no idea how to tell this to Vince. “I’ll defend him” is what I say, probably not the best way to get my point across.
He smiles, and I can tell he’s relieved, because he reaches out to shake with his right hand and grab a french fry with his left. “Thanks, Andy. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate this. And believe me, Daniel can pay your fee, no problem.”
My nod is pained; my client can pay for his defense against charges of murder with the money he inherited from his murdered wife. “Why don’t you ask Laurie if she’ll work on it with me?” I ask, fully subscribing to the “misery loves company” theory.
Vince’s head turns toward Laurie as if it’s on a swivel. “Will you?”
She reaches out and squeezes his hand. “Of course.”
Vince goes at the french fries with both hands; he’s feeling a hell of a lot better. “I really surprised you, didn’t I?” he asks, smiling for the first time.
I nod. “You sure did. I still can’t believe it. You actually had sex with someone.”
We hang around for a few more minutes and then leave. Laurie and I don’t go home together, since it’s Thursday and we only stay together on Sundays, Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. It’s one of the goofy little rules we’ve set up to keep our relationship from moving too fast, though by now I’ve forgotten why fast is a bad thing.
Tara is waiting for me when I get home, and we go for a long walk. I hate walking, yet love walking with Tara. If she weren’t around, I would drive to the front curb to get the mail. Fortunately, I don’t have to even think about that, since she will always be around.
During the walk I make another attempt at introspection, trying to understand my feelings about friendship. A murder case is an enormous undertaking, and this one is bigger than most. It will dominate my life for months. I don’t want to do it, yet I am going to because I consider Vince my friend. I only met him a year ago, I obviously know very little about him, yet that friendship is pushing me over a legal cliff.
I take Tara home and go right to sleep; this introspection stuff can get really tiring.
I wake up in the morning, not with a plan exactly, but with a desire to get things moving. I arrange for Kevin and Laurie to meet with me at the office at nine A.M. Kevin’s reaction to the situation as I lay it out is fairly close to mine; he’s feeling anxious to get back in the legal saddle, but not at all comfortable with the horse we are about to ride.
There is a press conference scheduled by the DA, Tucker Zachry, at ten o’clock, and we turn on the television to watch it. I’m sure that Tucker is not going to reveal key elements of their case, but I am curious to find out who in his office will be assigned to prosecute it.
Tucker Zachry was elected to his office last November with sixty-three percent of the vote, a healthy majority to be sure. Based on his looks and television presence, I’m surprised he didn’t get ninety percent. He’s in his late thirties, six foot two, and apparently in just as good shape as he was when he came in fourth in the Heisman balloting as a quarterback at Stanford. He has a ready smile for his constituents and was even a decent lawyer before moving into this higher office.
Obviously, I hate him.
Tucker opens the press conference with a self-promoting speech about the horror of the crimes, about his dedication to protecting the populace, and about the extraordinary police work that has resulted in Daniel Cummings being arrested. He should begin the speech with “Dear jurors,” since every word he says is meant for the prospective jurors out there in television land.
There is no mention of the particulars of the prosecution and the case against Daniel. Tucker professes to wish that he could share the juicy details, but the fact that he is conducting an ongoing prosecution makes that impossible. He even waxes eloquent on the rights of the accused, rights that he wouldn’t really care about unless someone mussed his hair with them.
It isn’t until the question and answer session that the first piece of news comes out. “Who will be the prosecutor on this case?” a reporter asks.
Tucker permits himself a small smile. “You’re looking at him.”
The reporter, surprised, follows up. “You personally?”
Tucker nods. “Yes. I think it’s that important. And with all the attention sure to be paid to it, I want to be the one on the firing line. If something goes wrong, I will take the heat.” He pauses for effect, setting his jaw in determination. “But nothing will go wrong.”
I turn the television off. “This is a disaster waiting to happen.”
