The Plea, page 21
part #2 of Eddie Flynn Series
“You should’ve called ahead and told us to expect the camera crew,” he said, with a smile that barely masked his disgust. “I’m sure Mr. Flynn has your interests at heart, but letting TV crews into your confidential attorney meetings is a little misguided.”
“Actually, it was my idea,” said David, and even though I could hear the tension in his voice, he’d managed to crane his neck in order to face Gerry as he’d said it.
“I think it’s a great idea, but there’s a time and a place…” began Gerry.
“We need to get out in front of this with the media,” I said. “It’s already out there. Far better that we make the story ourselves. Then we can control it.”
“We’re getting the exclusive, so we’re amenable to a little editorial input,” said Boo, extending her hand to Sinton.
“Lana Feldstein,” she said.
“Gerry Sinton. Call me Gerry. I don’t believe I’ve seen you on 60 Minutes before, Lana.”
“It’s Ms. Feldstein,” said Boo, taking off her glasses and hitting Sinton with all the power from those incredible eyes. Some kind of electricity, or light, shined out of Boo’s green secret weapons. She seemed to attract men to those eyes like moths to a lightbulb. They needed it but knew it was too hot to touch.
“Of course, Ms. Feldstein,” he said.
He held on to Boo’s hand for a second or two longer than was necessary, but he was unable to hold her gaze for the same period; no one could.
Boo’s phone rang; the timer had run out, and she canceled the chime and pretended to take a call. “Scott, did you get the shots?” she said.
“Scott Pelley—the producer,” I said. “Roger here is able to upload video wirelessly to their editing suite. They’re just going over the shots from the lobby with the editor in the studio.”
Sinton nodded, and his lips worked over his teeth, as if he were trying to get rid of a bad taste. He looked over his shoulder at another man, who stood in the hallway leading to the inner offices. Whatever was conveyed in that look made this man take off, back into the warren of offices beyond the conference room. There was no way they could make a move now, not with video footage of Child’s and my location existing outside of their control.
“You’ve got the full file?” he said.
I handed him the prosecution file so he could make copies.
He handed the file to one of the associates, who quickly left to copy it. We followed Sinton down a glass-paneled hallway.
For the moment, we were safe. Until we had to leave. Although I didn’t want to ride our luck too much. I’d told David we would be no longer than an hour in the office. If he couldn’t hack the algo in that time, then we bailed, no matter what.
CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE
Gerry Sinton led us into a conference room with a long table of dark river slate, sparsely flecked with dashes of luminous green. We pulled up chairs and sat down at one corner of the table, the one closest to a wide-screen TV set on the wall. I’d made sure to coach David on seating arrangements. He was to wait until Sinton sat down, and then he was to sit opposite him, and if possible David was to keep his back to a wall or a window.
Roger panned the room, and Boo did a little introduction of everyone present. She explained that although David Child wanted to grant their viewers complete access, CBS didn’t want to take any steps that might compromise the trial; therefore, none of the sound in the confidential meeting would be recorded.
“Thank you,” said Sinton.
From his leather bag, David produced a sleek silver laptop, powered it up, opened another can of energy drink, and leaned across the table to Boo. She came over, and they began whispering as Boo read what was on David’s screen.
“Ms. Feldstein is helping me out with a personal statement that we’ll release to the press tomorrow,” said David, in answer to Sinton’s searching look. “I thought I would work on it while you read the prosecution files and got up to speed.”
“Of course,” said Sinton.
As David tapped away on the laptop, his back was to a large window overlooking Manhattan. Sinton and his buddies sat across the table. David could work without any of the lawyers seeing his laptop screen. I swiveled around in my seat to admire the view. Behind David was the Corbin Building, one of the old office buildings in the city that had struggled to find tenants since Harland and Sinton bought the Lightner. “For rent” signs were pasted on at least one window of every floor of the Corbin Building. Times were tough, even for landlords.
The associate returned with my original prosecution file and five copies. He gave one to Gerry, one to David, and spread the remaining copies out among his other colleagues who sat beside Sinton.
“I’ll just take a few minutes to read this,” said Sinton.
I did likewise. Roger continued to pan the room, and Boo and David continued to whisper together, with Holly chiming in occasionally.
“It’s difficult to know what to say when somebody accuses you of a crime you didn’t commit.”
That was the signal; the network password Christine had given to us no longer worked. David would have to try to hack into the system.
Gerry took his time, scanning each page. His thick fingers worked delicately at the paper, almost reverently. The associates flicked through at a much faster rate, made quick notes on HARLAND AND SINTON–headed, yellow legal pads.
I didn’t need to reread what was in the file. I’d taken it in the first time, in the cab.
Ten minutes later, turning over the final page, Sinton said, “Shall we watch the DVDs?”
“Sure,” I said, handing him the first disk. He slotted it into the side of the TV and picked up a slim remote. As the TV came on, the lights automatically dimmed.
“I should’ve had a PR firm draft this thing,” said David in frustration—the second signal. He was finding it difficult to hack into their system; he would likely need the full hour.
The screen filled with the lobby of Central Park Eleven. I watched David and Clara go hand in hand into the elevator, the swipe from David’s key fob and then he selected the floor, and Clara’s fearful reaction in the elevator, which David said was claustrophobia. Camera change to the landing leading to David’s and Gershbaum’s luxury apartments. The time stamp on the camera read 19:46 as the front door to the apartment closed behind David and Clara. The footage played to 20:02 and David leaving the apartment with his gym bag.
Sinton had made notes while the footage played, the time stamps and camera ID numbers.
I flipped through the file and found the security logs for David’s building. The emergency call from Gershbaum went through at 20:02 to security, who must’ve just missed David as he descended in the elevator. The security team checked in with control when they reached Gershbaum’s front door at 20:06.
Sixteen minutes was plenty of time to murder his girlfriend.
While he checked his notes, Sinton wound the footage back so that he could watch David coming out of his apartment. He rewound and watched it again, this time ignoring his notes.
I saw Gerry give David a fleeting glance, then return to the image of his client waiting nonchalantly on the elevator. Of course, I knew what Gerry was thinking—most lawyers have the same thought when they’re representing someone on trial for murder: Did he do it?
Perhaps Sinton thought David looked just too calm as he exited his apartment. He wasn’t fumbling in his pockets, bouncing on his heels to get away. There was no nervous anxiety on display. Sinton was asking himself if David was capable of killing his girlfriend and hiding it so well. I didn’t think so. I thought David was the kind of guy to get anxious ordering a latte. If the kid had just killed someone in cold blood, he’d damn near tear the door down to get out of there, and if the elevator wasn’t waiting on him, he’d leap down the stairs or throw himself out the goddamn window. Instead, the footage showed David, his hoodie up, close the door behind him, stop, turn around, and take a step toward the door, as if he’d forgotten something, then back away from the door, slip his earphones on, turn casually, and hit the button for the elevator. This was my second time watching this, and I wanted to know what had caused David to hesitate, to turn back toward the apartment, then change his mind and go for the elevator.
David wasn’t watching the screen. His attention was concentrated on the laptop.
I had to ask him.
“David, when you left the apartment, did you hear anything in the hallway while you were waiting for the elevator, maybe a shot?”
“No. I would’ve remembered,” he said.
A fountain pen tapped on Gerry’s lips; he put down his pen, made sure it sat straight beside his legal pad, then steepled his fingers. He was evaluating David—weighing it up. Could he have killed her?
But the fact that Sinton was curious about David’s guilt or innocence sparked a thought: The firm had nothing to do with the murder of Clara Reece, or if they did, Sinton knew nothing about it. The murder and arrest of David Child threw the firm into a pressure cooker—no, they wouldn’t bring that kind of heat down on themselves knowingly.
“I thought we could go over the paper file,” said Sinton finally.
“Okay,” I said. “That all right with you, David?”
“You guys go ahead and talk it over. Let me finish this and then we can discuss everything.”
Another message: He still couldn’t access the system.
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
“It strikes me that the major problem here, apart from the security camera footage placing David as the last person inside the apartment, is the gun in David’s car,” said Sinton.
“I agree,” I said.
“So what are we hoping to achieve tomorrow? With this evidence, the preliminary hearing is dead in the water. I say we waive the hearing and get ready for trial.”
“No.”
It took a second for Sinton to register that I’d contradicted him. He leaned back in his chair, folded his arms, and snorted.
“There’s nothing to be gained tomorrow, Flynn, we can’t say there’s not enough evidence to hold David, when in fact, there’s easily enough evidence to convict him.”
“David wants the charges thrown out tomorrow,” I said.
“I’m sure he does, but you and I know that’s not going to happen.”
David lifted his head momentarily, clocked me. I nodded.
“I’ve already told David that it’s a long shot, but these are his instructions. We fight this the whole way.”
Sinton laughed, shook his head. “Come on. Even if by some miracle you win the prelim, the DA can go straight to the grand jury anyway. We’re wasting time with this when we could be preparing for trial.”
“I want to win tomorrow,” said David.
That cut out the argument. Waving his hands, Sinton nodded, and said, “Of course you do, and if you want to fight, we’ll fight, but there’s not a lot to work with.”
Checking my watch, I saw we had less than twenty minutes of the hour left.
Gerry played the accident footage, but I didn’t need to see it a second time. Instead I paid close attention to Sinton and his associates, and so I was pretty certain they didn’t recognize Perry Lake, the professional driver who I was sure had been paid to hit David and had given a false name to the cops. According to the NYPD, Perry was John Woodrow. It made sense. Perry Lake had a list of priors for dangerous driving. I suspected that John Woodrow had a clear record.
“Just give me a second and I’ll be done,” said David.
With my right index finger, I tapped the back of my left hand. He wanted more time, and I’d signaled that he had five minutes.
We sat in silence for what seemed like ten minutes. In reality it was more like thirty seconds. Sinton couldn’t just sit there. He wanted to stamp his authority on the case.
“David, I know that you’re innocent. I know that Mr. Flynn, here, has passion and skill. But he’s also—you’ll forgive me for saying so—a small-time criminal lawyer who would jump at the chance of a huge trial like this. No offense,” he said, giving me a look that said he meant every word to be as offensive as possible.
“None taken,” I said.
“The gun, which I think is likely to be the murder weapon, was found in your car.”
“Like I said, I never saw it before…”
“David, come on, it was found next to you,” said Sinton.
“You don’t believe me,” said David.
“It’s not a question of what I believe, David. This is about the evidence. We have to—”
Sinton broke off. It took me a few seconds to realize he wasn’t pausing to come up with the right words to appease his client. He was staring straight at David, transfixed. I got up and moved around the table, picking up the remote as I moved. I hit eject and waited for the disk, but really I was trying to see what Sinton was looking at.
His line of sight focused on David, who was ignoring everyone, head down, typing furiously on his laptop.
Then I saw it.
Gerry Sinton wasn’t looking at David. He was looking behind David. He was staring at the reflection on the window from David’s computer screen.
I was farther away than Sinton and at a worse angle, and even I could see in the mirrored reflection what was happening on David’s computer.
The laptop showed two pages on a split screen. On one side was the Harland and Sinton log-in screen, with a large white box below their logo that asked for a password.
On the other screen was what looked like code. Bright green symbols and numbers that David was able to create at blistering speed before highlighting the sequence and then cutting and pasting the code into the password box on the other screen. I saw LOG-IN FAIL come up on the Harland and Sinton page, and David retyped another sequence.
An electric current shot up my spine.
The DVD ejected onto the rich burgundy carpet. I was already moving toward David. I slammed the laptop closed, almost trapping his fingers.
“Enough PR work. Gerry’s right. If we don’t get you off, then all of this,” I said, gesturing to Boo and Roger, “doesn’t matter a damn.”
The suddenness of my outburst and slam from the laptop closure spread a silence over the room as if all had stopped breathing to let the echoes find a home.
Sinton tapped on the slate tabletop, his pinkie ring making a repeated chipping sound. His gaze seemed far away, across the street to the Corbin Building, over the rooftops and beyond the trees of Central Park. His head swiveled around and snapped those cold eyes on me.
His voice had changed. The deep aggressive drawl had been replaced by a cold, detached tone.
“Your wife went down to the courthouse to speak to you this afternoon. She didn’t come back to work afterward.”
He slipped a cell phone from his jacket, typed something, hit send, and returned his stare to me.
“If she’s ill, she should’ve reported sick. A phone call at least. You mind telling me where she is?”
CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
“I saw her briefly this afternoon. She said she had someplace to be. We’re not together anymore, so I don’t know where she went. Where’s your partner, by the way? I would’ve thought Ben Harland would be here, too,” I said.
“Ben is on vacation. I’m more worried about your wife. Maybe she’s ill. Maybe you said something to upset her,” he said.
“I don’t think so. We had coffee together. It was fine. In fact, David, let’s you and I go get a coffee. You can drop me off afterward,” I said. The escape signal.
Roger fired up the camera, and Boo reached into her bag. I didn’t know what she had in there, maybe a gun, maybe a knife. Boo could handle herself; she could be lethal with pretty much anything larger than a lipstick.
Holly stood, a little too quickly, but it didn’t matter. We’d already been made.
Footsteps in the hall. Fast. Heavy. Two men at least.
The conference room door opened and Gill stood in the doorway. He was still wearing the checkered shirt, but he’d gotten rid of the green jacket. He was on his cell phone. The blond Sergei stood beside him.
“Tell Brond and Fiso to get up here. They’re not answering my calls,” said Gill.
I presumed Gill was calling reception, unable to raise the big guy and his friend in the lobby.
The associates looked confused. They didn’t have a clue what was going down.
“That’s all of our video uploaded to the studio,” said Roger.
Gill and Sergei exchanged a glance. They hesitated.
“This is Mr. Gill,” said Sinton, sweat glowing on his forehead from the glare of the TV screen. “Mr. Gill and his men look after firm security. I’m sure you won’t mind them accompanying you to your hotel, David. We can’t be too careful.”
I felt my fingers digging into my palms. My legs had spread into a stance, and I was ready to separate Mr. Gill’s head from his shoulders if he made a move. If they thought David had hacked their system, none of us would leave the building alive. Gerry Sinton looked desperate—the rules had changed.
A low electric hum from the air-conditioning.
David held the laptop across his chest like a shield, but it only drew attention to his panic. It looked like David was using his chest as a pump to inflate the damn thing. He was on the brink of another panic attack.
I didn’t move. I was waiting for Gill to reach behind his back for a pistol.
“Mr. Gill, would you be so kind as to get that camera for me? I’d like to check it,” said Sinton.
Nodding to the man beside him, Gill stood his ground. He had a good view of the entire room, and his back was to the wall, all of his potential targets and threats in front of him. He wouldn’t want to compromise that position. The blond guy from the lobby, Sergei, moved forward, walked behind Sinton, and made his way toward Roger and the camera. Before he got to Roger, he had to get past Boo.
Sergei, at around six five and pushing the limits of his XXXL suit jacket at two hundred and fifty pounds, fixed his gaze on Roger. As he approached, he held out his right hand, palm open, to push aside Boo if she tried to intervene. She was half his size. He wasn’t even looking at her.
