The Deceiving Look (Shepard & Gray), page 17
“I’m not sure I have that long. Can you tell me anything else about it?”
“It was purchased at a Big Lots in the county. The serial number is an exclusive made by Nokia and sold exclusively at Big Lots, and looks like it was activated eleven days ago. I don’t know, maybe Big Lots has cameras?”
“They do indeed,” Solomon said, knocking on the wooden desk with his knuckles. “Einstein, you’re seriously the man. Dinner’s on me. I’m ordering you a pizza.”
Einstein put the phone back together in a second and handed it to Solomon. “I normally charge nine hundred dollars an hour.”
“Two pizzas it is.”
Solomon knew Einstein didn’t like to be touched, so he didn’t reach for a handshake. They chatted a few seconds about what he’d been up to, and when Solomon was leaving, he heard Einstein say under his breath, “Finally.”
Once they were back in the car, Mazie turned the key and started the engine before saying, “Well, he’s interesting.”
“No genius has ever existed without a touch of madness.”
“Don’t nerd out on me, Solomon.”
He chuckled. “You wanna be a good cop, right? Well, investigation is all about your network. You’re not going to know even a fraction of everything you need to know, so you’ve got to have people in your network who do.”
“Yeah, well, maybe some of us like being the lone she-wolf.” She took out some gum and unwrapped it.
There was a pause, and it was clear she was debating something.
Finally, she said, “So you didn’t hand in a phone a serial killer left in your house, huh?”
Solomon’s eyes went wide, and he opened his mouth to say something, but nothing came out.
“I was coming back down the stairs to ask where the bathroom was when I heard you guys talking. Or I was eavesdropping. We’ll never know.”
Solomon hesitated and said, “If I had turned it over, the malware on the phone would’ve been triggered and ruined our best shot at getting him. We’d lose the only link we have.”
She nodded. “I get it.”
“He’s sophisticated. He’ll know if someone—”
“Solomon,” she said softly, “seriously, I get it.” She put the gum in her mouth. “So what’d your pal say?”
“He told me where the phone was bought and the date it was activated. There might be a video.”
Solomon’s mind raced as he considered the possibility of a video existing, his anxiety morphing into a tight knot of dread in the pit of his stomach. If the person behind this had installed malware on the phone as insurance, they would be too smart to allow themselves to be captured on video. But maybe they hadn’t anticipated Solomon enlisting the help of someone like Einstein.
Now in his twenties, Einstein had become a prodigy at fourteen with dual degrees in mathematics and electrical engineering, qualified to work at any major tech company and command a lucrative salary. But instead of going back to the sheriff’s office and basking in the accolades of his peers, he had chosen to retreat into an isolated, damp cave and be alone.
Crap, Solomon thought. We are alike.
“There’s no way he’s on video, Sol. Not this guy.”
“Who knows? He wants me to know who he is. He might be there on purpose. A little reward for me tracing his phone.”
She shook her head, her breath mixing with the cold air as she exhaled a deep sigh. With one hand on the steering wheel, she leaned her arm on the windowsill and stuck her free hand out of the window. “I’m so sick of these crazy bastards.”
Solomon looked out the window and didn’t say anything.
31
It’d been two days since Solomon had requested the video from the local Big Lots, and he didn’t expect it anytime soon. Because of the enormous amount of shoplifting that occurred at big-box retailers, dozens of videos were requested daily, and they were notoriously slow at getting them out.
The phone remained close, always within reach. Despite two textless days, Solomon hesitated to send a message, paralyzed by indecision over the right move.
Early in the morning, Solomon stood in his backyard, shooting beer cans with a .22 handgun. He liked the clinking sound the cans made when he connected, and after he hit all of them, he slowly limped over and set them up again. If he moved too fast, pain would radiate out of his back and down his leg.
The human body was an elegant machine, and Solomon felt disconnected from that. To him, his body was always something that had to be fought, and it was exhausting.
When he was done shooting, he cleaned his weapon and then showered and dug a suit out of a closet upstairs. It was covered in dust. He slapped off the dust and then put it on. A black suit with a white shirt and blue tie.
Solomon sat on the porch, enjoying the sweet taste of a mango as he cut it with a knife. He left the knife and remaining fruit on the porch and stood as Billie’s truck pulled up. As he approached the vehicle, the strong aroma of coffee hit him. The scent was overwhelming, as if an entire pot had spilled out in the truck. Two empty coffees were in the cupholders, with a full one in her hand.
“You planning on not sleeping this year?” he said.
“Long night.”
The protective order hearing initial appearance between Dax and Billie was scheduled for an hour from now. Solomon tried to remember if he’d put on deodorant and thought maybe he hadn’t, which would be terrible because he hadn’t been in court for so long he was certain he would be sweating.
“We have interviews set up all week,” Billie said, changing the subject.
“Who’d you include?”
“Everyone.”
“Everyone?”
She nodded and sighed. “Everyone. Patrol, Homicide, criminalists . . . even Mathew from the ME’s office. If you’re wrong, Solomon, I’m out of a job.”
“I’m not wrong.” Solomon thought a moment. “You mind if I come along to some of the interviews?”
“You know I can’t let you anywhere near them, right?”
“I’ll just sit behind the window quietly minding my own business.”
“If you promise to just observe. I mean it, Solomon. You can’t ask anyone anything. You’re not a prosecutor anymore.”
“I know.”
As they approached the courthouse, Solomon noticed the stark contrast of the modern gray stone building to the quaint residential neighborhood. The building had large windows on every floor, giving it an air of transparency that seemed oddly out of place. As they approached the metal detectors, a couple of bailiffs greeted them, chatting with the sheriff, who was technically their boss. Solomon went through the detectors and was then subjected to the wand while Billie watched with a mischievous grin on her face.
“Benefits of being a cop, huh?” Solomon said to the bailiff wanding him.
The bailiff ignored his comment and then let him through.
Solomon caught up to Billie, and they took the elevator to the second floor. The windows overlooked the parking lot on one side and the street on the other. The neighborhood was clean and had a pleasant feel to it.
The courtroom itself was paneled with dark wood but had multiple large windows overlooking the mountains to the west. There were only a few people there, and Solomon went to the docket, a ream of paper with printed court cases on it, at the petitioner’s table and found their case as the first one to be called. He sat down at the respondent’s table while Billie sat with the observers.
An attorney in a gray suit with a beard the same color came to the petitioner’s table to the right of Solomon. He wore large glasses that seemed too big for his face. He set an old-time briefcase on his table and sat down, crossed one leg over the other, and saw Solomon.
“Solomon.”
“Chester.”
“I saw your name on the docket last night. I had heard you weren’t practicing anymore.”
“Doesn’t everyone come out of retirement at least one time to get their butts kicked?”
Chester didn’t grin or smile, and certainly didn’t laugh. Solomon remembered him as the type of man that took everything, especially himself, too seriously. People that took themselves too seriously had a tendency to be unpleasant to be around.
Solomon’s gaze shifted to the wooden pews behind him, now filling up with people waiting for their hearings. Solomon saw Dax in a corner, staring at him intensely. It was surprising to recognize the pale figure as someone he once knew. The man in the courtroom, with empty eyes, looked like a lifeless copy of the person Solomon knew. With thin cheeks and a grayish face, Dax looked sick.
Billie, however, refused to give him the satisfaction of acknowledging his presence. As Dax’s gaze shifted from Solomon to Billie, a smirk crept onto his lips.
“Don’t suppose you’d just stipulate to no protective order in place?” Solomon said to Chester.
“We’ll pass, thank you.”
Chester opened his briefcase and took out a manila folder filled with sheets of paper and a hole punch and stapler. Lawyers have a tendency to only use whatever technology was popular when they first became lawyers.
Most protective order hearings were handled by commissioners, appointed arbiters that were similar to judges but only had narrow functions. A thin woman in a blue skirt and blouse came out and sat at the computer next to the commissioner’s. A second later, an old bailiff came out of the commissioner’s entrance and said, “All rise. Third District Court is now in session. The Honorable Frank Irving presiding.”
Commissioner Irving emerged from a set of double doors, his robe taut against his towering figure. He stood at least six and a half feet tall, with a long, gaunt face and salt-and-pepper hair that hung limply around his shoulders. Solomon knew he also played in a band on the weekends and wouldn’t cut his hair for anything.
As he settled into his chair, he beckoned for everyone to sit, his deep voice resonating through the chamber.
He turned to his computer a moment and then said, “First case, please. Counsel will state their appearances.”
“Solomon Shepard for Ms. Gray.”
“Chester Leonard for the petitioner, Dax Granger.”
“All right, would Ms. Gray and Mr. Granger join us at their respective tables, please.”
Billie sat next to Solomon and Dax next to his attorney. Billie glanced over at him, and Solomon could see not just disgust and disappointment, but fear. She wasn’t one to spook easy. She saw something in Dax that she was genuinely afraid of.
Solomon looked over to the table and was amazed how much Dax had changed. It looked like he’d aged twenty years. His clothes were tattered and his hair unkempt. Scruff was on his cheeks, and his eyes were rimmed red. From a slight sway to his upper body as he tried to sit still, Solomon could tell Dax had been drinking before coming here.
“Mr. Leonard, the floor is yours,” the commissioner said.
“We would call Dax Granger to the stand, please.”
“Of course. Mr. Granger, please be sworn in by my clerk and seated in the witness chair.”
Dax’s eyes darted around the room as he settled into the witness chair, his jittery movements suggesting an underlying nervousness. His hands fidgeted with the edge of the witness box, his fingers tapping and tracing over the smooth surface. As he was sworn in, his face twisted into a grimace, as though he resented having to take an oath. The smirk that had been playing on his lips only grew wider as he caught Billie’s eye, and he tilted his head slightly in her direction.
“Your Honor,” Chester said, “we would ask for stipulation as to time, identity, and location.”
“Do you stipulate, Mr. Shepard?”
“Yes, Your Honor.”
Chester was standing at the lectern. All the papers he had were spread out on the table, but he wasn’t looking at any of them, and Solomon realized they were props. He seemed to be doing it from memory, like all the best trial lawyers.
“Dax,” he said as casually as possible, probably attempting to disarm the commissioner and make Dax seem the victim, “you know Ms. Elizabeth Gray here, correct?”
“I do.”
“Tell us about your relationship.”
Dax stared at her, and she stared back. For an agonizing few seconds, Dax didn’t say anything.
“Dax?” Chester asked.
“Yeah, sorry. It’s kinda hard to talk about. Um, I mean, we were in love. I was either at her house every night or she was at mine. It was the perfect relationship. The kinda thing you see in movies.”
“It didn’t stay that way, though, did it?”
He shook his head. “No. Billie, she likes to be called Billie instead of Elizabeth, started to change.”
“Change how?”
“It seemed like the closer we got, the more she pushed me away. And I understood. She’s got a lot on her plate being the sheriff, but it started becoming abusive. She would throw plates and threaten me with arrest or that she was going to hurt me. One time she pulled out her mace and sprayed it in my car as I was pulling away. She just was getting more and more bizarre.”
“How long did this last?”
“I would say it was probably about three months when this all started happening. I just thought, you know, it was just what it was. We were both coming out of relationships, and I knew it’d take us a long time to adjust. So, I just thought of it as that.”
“Did you seek any professional help for Ms. Gray?”
Solomon glanced at Billie, who sat stone faced. Her eyes locked on Dax and her hands firmly pressed together on the table. Solomon could only imagine what thoughts were going through her head.
Solomon leaned over and whispered to her, “I’m guessing none of this is true?”
She shook her head once but didn’t say anything.
“We tried counseling, but she was so busy it would never work. I’d just end up being alone there.”
Solomon rose. “Your Honor, as much as I admire memory lane, could we wander off of it for a second and actually talk about the grounds for this request?”
“I agree. Let’s move it along.”
“Very well, Your Honor, I was just laying some groundwork. I have here a video that my client gave to me last night that I’d like to introduce to the Court.”
Solomon rose. “Objection. The respondent has received no such video and would ask for time to review it.”
Unlike trials in a criminal court, the rules of evidence were rarely applied in protective order hearings. Much of the time, they were granted or denied based on whether the commissioner felt the respondent was a real threat or not.
“Mr. Shepard has been out of practice for a number of years, Your Honor, so I would remind him that I have no obligation to turn over evidence prior to a temporary order hearing, and it was designed as such by the legislature in the interests of justice.”
“The objection is overruled. Please play the video.”
Chester went to the clerk and had a laptop hooked up to the court’s system. A screen came down from the wall across from where a jury would sit in the courtroom. Solomon sat down and leaned over to Billie.
“Do you know what this is?” he asked.
She nodded.
The fact that she wouldn’t look at him meant Solomon wasn’t going to like what he was about to watch.
The video opened in a parking lot. There was no snow and the sky was blue and clear, and Solomon guessed it was sometime in the summer. Billie was coming out of a gym dressed in yoga pants and a tank top, drenched in sweat from a workout and sipping on a water bottle.
The video, which was clearly taken on a phone, was shot from a low angle, probably because Dax was trying to conceal it.
“What are you doing here?” Billie said on the video.
“I just came to talk.”
“Leave me alone, Dax.”
“How can you expect me to go from wanting to marry you to having you hate me in a month? I can’t just turn off my emotions like you.”
There was no hesitation in the next motion. Billie moved with a quickness and purpose that left no room for second thoughts. She flung her towel and water bottle into her truck and emerged with her handgun. Dax stumbled backward in alarm as Billie pointed the weapon at his face, her finger poised on the trigger.
Solomon looked at Billie, who stared at Dax on the stand. Dax stared back in turn but had an expression on his face of pure pleasure.
In the video, Dax and Billie argued for a bit, and then the video ended with Billie getting into her truck and driving away.
“What happened there, Dax?” Chester asked from the lectern.
“Just what you saw. I wanted to talk to her, and she pulled her gun on me. If you notice, she clicked off the safety, so it wasn’t an idle threat. I think she was going to kill me. That’s why I need this protective order.”
“But you went to her.”
“I did, and it was a mistake. I should’ve just left her alone, but I loved her.” He shook his head as his eyes wet with tears. “I still love her. But I’m scared of her. I’m scared of what she’s going to do.”
Chester nodded. “Thank you, Dax.”
The commissioner said, “Your witness, Mr. Shepard.”
Solomon rose and limped to the lectern. His leg caused him pain that radiated out from where the leg connected to the hip. The pain wrapped around his body and made every position uncomfortable.
“You have a stalking injunction taken out against you by Ms. Gray, correct?”
“Yes.”
“At the hearing, the Court found a hundred and seventy-two incidents of unwanted contact directed by you to Ms. Gray, is that right?”
“I wouldn’t say it that way, but—”
“A simple yes or no will suffice. A hundred and seventy-two incidents, yes?”
“Yes.”
“These include phone calls, text messages, messages on social media, and in-person contact, yes?”
“Yes. Like I said, I was—”
“You answered the question, thank you,” Solomon interrupted. “Of the in-person contacts, there were four where you showed up at Ms. Gray’s office, two where you showed up at her house, and five where you showed up places like the gym, as we saw in the video. Correct?”
