Max scratched his head, his own nervous habit which he immediately caught and turned into a smoothing of his hair. Though he wanted to rip his hair out, instead. Christ! He couldn't believe this. The son of a bitch was going to fuck everything up. Money? He expected to be paid for being interviewed?
Max had to watch his temper. He couldn't make it sound as if he even cared whether or not they did the interviews. He couldn't make it seem as though Barnett was doing him a favor. He didn't want Barnett thinking these interviews would be his payback. He needed to think quickly. He needed to appeal to Barnett's core values, to those few essentials that made him tick. One of which, certainly, was not money.
'You're going to be a celebrity overnight, my friend,' Max told him, smiling and shaking his head as if he could hardly believe it. 'I've got messages from NBC News, 60 Minutes, Larry King and even Bill O'Reilly's The Factor. You're going to have something money can't buy. But I can understand if you'd rather tell them all to go screw themselves. Whatever you want to do. It's entirely up to you.'
He watched as Barnett thought it over, forcing himself to keep quiet, to pretend it didn't matter. He concentrated on breathing, on not thinking about how much he wanted this, how much he needed this. He tried to keep his fists from balling up. And in his mind he couldn't stop repeating, almost like a mantra, 'Don't you dare fuck it up.'
'Bill O'Reilly actually wants me on his show?'
Max swallowed another sigh and calmly managed to say, 'Yep, tomorrow night. It's up to you, though. I can tell him…hell, I can tell them all you don't want to put up with the whole lot of them. Whatever you want to do.'
'That O'Reilly guy always thinks he's so tough.' And now Barnett was smiling again. 'I wouldn't mind telling a few of those assholes what I think.'
This time Max smiled, too. Perhaps he could control Barnett, after all, but he'd need some sort of insurance. For the first time since he'd met Jared Barnett, Max allowed himself to look deep into those dark, vacant eyes, and now he allowed himself to admit the truth. He knew Jared Barnett had, indeed, killed that poor girl seven years ago. Not only did Max know it, he was counting on it.
CHAPTER 1
Tuesday, September 7
10:30 a.m.
Hall of Justice- Omaha, Nebraska
Grace Wenninghoff hated waiting. The air in courtroom number five felt like a hot, wet towel wrapped around her neck. There were too many people, jammed inside, generating too much heat. The squeaking of chairs as people shifted in their seats and an occasional cough interrupted the silence, but that was all. Judge Fielding's presence kept the crowd agitated but quiet as he looked over the papers in front of him, taking his time, not a hint of sweat or discomfort on his face.
Grace reached for her water bottle, took a careful sip. Come on, let's get this over with, she wanted to yell, but instead tapped her pen against her blank legal pad to keep her foot from doing the same. The judge scowled at her without raising his head, his eyes looking at her through his bushy gray eyebrows and over the wire-rim glasses hanging at the tip of his nose. Her pen stopped in midair. He went back to examining the papers.
Rumor was that the maintenance crew had shut off the air-conditioning in the whole building over the long Labor Day weekend, not expecting the return of ninety-degree weather. Yet, Grace couldn't help wondering if Judge Fielding had purposely shut it off in his own courtroom, hoping to make them all sweat. It wouldn't be the first time. Fielding loved to make attorneys sweat…sweat and wait. That combination today couldn't be a good sign, though Grace tried to remain optimistic. As optimistic as a prosecutor could be with the humidity threatening to turn her usually straight, short hair into something worthy of a Chia Pet. She knew she'd need more than optimism today.
She glanced across the aisle at Warren Penn from the high-priced law firm of Branigan, Turner, Cross and Penn. No sweat visible there, either. How did he manage it in that three-piece suit? She had hoped to see his client, the defendant, Jonathon Richey, in shackles and an orange jumpsuit, reducing the city councilman to the cold-blooded murderer he really was. Instead, Richey wore a steel-blue suit and crisp white shirt with red-and- blue tie. The slick politician didn't look affected in the least by his arrest or the allegations against him. In fact, he looked rather smug, and Grace worried that some old-boy network had already taken care of the outcome of this case. Judge Fielding had a reputation of protecting his inner circle. Could he do it in front of a crowd of spectators and under the scrutiny of the media?
Beneath her own jacket Grace could feel her silk blouse sticking to her skin. She glanced down at it to make sure it didn't look as bad as it felt. What a day to wear silk. The blouse had been a birthday gift from Grandma Wenny, who had been trying to dress Grace in pink since she was six years old, although her grandmother had reassured her that this was fuchsia, her German accent making it sound like some erotic, slightly naughty color. Thinking about that made Grace smile.
She watched Judge Fielding, looking for signs that they'd be proceeding soon. He flipped over another page and started at the top with his index finger. Geez. This was only the bail hearing. At this rate, she couldn't imagine how long the trial would take.
She reached to rub the knot still gathered at the base of her neck. The three-day weekend had been too short. Her husband, Vince, insisted they could live with the stacked boxes everywhere. Easy for him to say, he was leaving for Switzerland tomorrow morning. Sure it was business-a new client insisting on meeting his American account rep face-to-face. Grace and Emily would be left to live with the chaos. But the boxes weren't the cause of the knot at the back of her neck.
She loved their new house, although it was far from new, a century-old Victorian with plenty of character and enough space for them to convert part of it into a mother-in-law suite-or in this case a grandmother suite-for Grandma Wenny. The renovations were a pain in the neck-yes, maybe even a partial cause for the very real pain in her neck. There'd been workers tramping in and out of their house, leaving mud and sawdust and holes where walls once were. Still, Grace knew all of this was the easy part. The real work, the real challenge, would be in convincing Grandma Wenny to leave her South Omaha home, the small drafty two-bedroom, mouse-infested bungalow where she had lived for over sixty years, where she had raised three children and one granddaughter, a grand-daughter who had pledged-actually pinkie-swore-to take care of the stubborn old woman.
'Ms. Wenninghoff,' Judge Fielding bellowed, grabbing her attention.
'Yes, Your Honor.' She stood up casually, resisting the urge to wipe her damp forehead.
'Please continue,' he told her as if they'd been waiting only a few minutes and as if she had been the one holding them up.
'As I was saying and as you can see from the arrest warrant, Mr. Richey was arrested at Eppley Airport. Mr. Richey is a flight risk and, therefore, should be denied bail.'
'Judge, this is preposterous.' Warren Penn drew the word out so slowly it sounded like four words instead of one. He also took his time standing up, then moved out from behind the defense table as if he required additional room to make his statement. Grace guessed it was more for the benefit of towering over her.
'Mr. Richey,' he continued in the same drawn-out manner, 'is a businessman. He was simply making a business trip. This trip has been on his calendar for months. I have his appointment calendar and phone logs available for Your Honor.' He waved a hand at the pile on the defense table but made no effort to get them. 'Jonathon Richey,' he went on, 'not only owns a local business here in Omaha, but he's a city councilman. He's a deacon at his church and president of the downtown Rotary Club. His wife, two of his three children and all five of his grandchildren live within this community. Mr. Richey certainly does not pose a flight risk. Taking all this into consideration, Your Honor, I'm sure you'll agree that Mr. Richey should be released on his own recognizance.'
Grace watched Judge Fielding nod and start flipping through the papers again. This was ridiculous. He couldn't possibly be buying any of this crap. Not unless he was looking for an excuse. She glanced over at Richey. Was there some under-the-table deal already set up? He still looked too calm, too cool for this sauna. Grace rubbed her neck again and was disappointed to find it damp.
