Truth Be Told (Jane Ryland) (12 page)

Key number four. It slipped into the lock perfectly. She took another reconnoitering look. No cars in neighboring driveways, no kids on bikes, not even any birds in the saplings lining the sidewalks. The last of the red tulips, unhappy in the heat, were giving up their petals, but someone had mowed the grass. Made sense. Part of Aaron’s job was to keep the place up, since city inspectors could fine the bank if properties were neglected. Not the best thing for the bank’s image, first taking people’s homes, then leaving them to rot, ruining the entire neighborhood. She gave the key a twist.

Nothing.
Her shoulders slumped. Should she even be doing this?

Clearly not, she had no business. But something was up with Aaron, she’d been awake all night, thinking about it. Replaying it.

Pursing her lips with the memory, she yanked key number four out of the lock, flipped to key number five. If she predicted correctly, this would be another empty house. Why she wanted to make certain of that, she wasn’t sure.

The key slipped in. Turned. Clicked. Worked.

All she had to do was turn it again. The door would open.

What would her father do? What would he think?

Lizzie stopped, fingers on the key, and almost laughed. Well, that, at least, was an easy one. She would never tell him about any of it. Never never never.

She turned the knob. And pushed.

20

This was Peter Hardesty? When Elliot Sandoval said his defense attorney wanted a meeting, Jane had envisioned a wizened professor-looking type, maybe white hair and battered briefcase. The actor who played Clarence Darrow in
Compulsion.
Or maybe a rabbity kid, some newly minted true believer, accepting difficult cases and hoping to grow up to be Atticus Finch.

This guy—khaki suit, hair darker than Jake’s, navy-striped tie in place, and an aura of casual confidence—arrived at the open door of Victoria Marcotte’s office as if he’d been there a million times. He paused, briefly, then entered the room, hand extended.

“Ms. Marcotte. I’m Peter Hardesty, of Hardesty and Colaneri. Peter.” He stepped to her desk, shaking her hand as she half-rose, then turned to Jane, giving her a polite once-over. “You must be Jane Ryland. I’ve seen your byline, many times. Great job on that big adoption story you wrote. Elliot Sandoval speaks highly of you. My law firm consulted on his foreclosure, that’s why he called me. Thank you for hearing our proposal.”

He stood between them, the apex of the triangle. Each of them wanted something. Maybe even the same thing. Maybe not.

Hardesty’s loafers were shiny, but not too shiny. Cool wire-rims, but not pretentious. His suit fit, but not perfectly. Thirty-something, she guessed. Her age, a little older. Independent enough to have his own law firm. Okay, she liked him. Snap judgment, but that’s how it sometimes worked.

Marcotte yanked off a chunky earring, examined it, clamped it back on. A tendril of artfully streaked hair fell into place over the glisten of gold.
Making him wait.

“Of course. Have a seat, Mr. Hardesty,” she said. “The ball is in your court.”

Hardesty eyed the couch, then pulled up a side chair next to Jane. “Okay, bottom line. It’s simple. My firm is tired of cases being tried in the media.”

The lawyer looked at Marcotte, then at Jane, shrugging almost apologetically. “Mr. Sandoval is innocent until proven guilty. His wife is pregnant. We can’t do anything about the TV types—sorry, Jane—and their coverage is shallow at best. But the
Register
is the paper of record in Boston. As I told you on the phone, Ms. Marcotte. You leave him and his family alone, we’ll give you an inside look at the case. You can do a quality story for your readers. An exclusive. Afterward.”

Jane exchanged glances with Marcotte.
This was a new one.

“Your client’s okay with that, Mr. Hardesty?” Jane said.

“Who wouldn’t be? And it’s Peter.” He looked at Jane. “Right?”

“Sure,” she said. “Jane.”

“Okay then,” Marcotte said, ignoring them. “Off the top of my head? We love new. We adore exclusive. I ran it by legal, of course. So far, so good. We’ll let you know if there’s a snag.”

“Of course,” Peter said.

“Nothing signed, nothing on paper, and we pull out whenever we want.”

“Fine,” Peter said. “At that point we’d be free to give the exclusive to another news outlet.”

Jane watched the news negotiation, the two sides volleying their points. Peter had the advantage of preparation—but Marcotte could kill the deal in an instant.

“Fine. We’re on board.” The editor stood, reaching out a hand. “Deal.”

Peter stood, returned the handshake. “Deal.”

“We’ll take Jane off day-of coverage of the Shandra Newbury homicide,” Marcotte said.

“And we’ll provide you”—Peter nodded in Jane’s direction—“with exclusive access to all of the evidence, the police interviews, as well as…”

Jane sat, half-amused, as the editor and the lawyer planned her future. The participants in this drama were certainly rearranging. Jake out of town, probably in D.C. by now. DeLuca and Kat wherever they were going. Jake had told her other detectives would handle the Shandra Newbury–Waverly Road homicide. So instead of Jake and Jane having to dance around reality, hiding the truth from each other, Jane’d finally be able to dig into a case with someone who was
providing
information, not protecting it. This time she didn’t need cop sources. She’d get her scoop from the other side.

And, hooray, Peter Hardesty would not have to be aware of her relationship with Jake. Another life problem successfully solved.

“Peter?” Jane managed to wait until this conversation wound down, but there was a key question the editor hadn’t asked. “Do you expect Mr. Sandoval to be arrested? When? And why? I’m wondering, frankly, what’s the point of this arrangement if you don’t?”

*   *   *

Elliot Sandoval had told him Jane Ryland cut right to the point. Here was proof. Peter was surprised this Victoria Marcotte—the
Wizard of Oz
witch theme hummed in his head, though the stylish and superior Marcotte was not green—had posed every damn question but the critical one.

He’d seen Jane on TV, of course, one, maybe two years ago, before she was fired from Channel 11 in the fallout from that defamation case judgment. She seemed to have come through it unscathed. She looked better in person than on TV—younger, maybe, and thinner. She never smiled on the air, he realized, maybe that made the difference. He’d focused on her boss for this meeting, figured winning over Marcotte was key. But it was Jane who’d asked the big question. Now he had to answer.

“Yes, we’re expecting it,” he admitted. He pulled out a manila folder, placing it on the edge of Marcotte’s glass-topped desk. “The police, two homicide detectives, tried to interview him, you’re aware of that.”

Jane nodded. She turned toward him in her chair, a thin black sweater tied around her shoulders, wearing some kind of little sleeveless dress, bare legs, flat shoes.

“But they didn’t charge him,” Jane said. “Why not?”

Peter opened his file, pulled out the stapled paperwork, handed it to Jane. “Good question. This is a cobbled-together transcript of what the police asked my client and his wife prior to my arrival. Before the Sandovals forgot, I questioned them about it, made sure it was documented.”

“The Sandovals talked to the police?”

“Cops.
”
Peter shook his head. “They pushed. Hard. Clearly took advantage of the Sandovals. You know the bullsh—sorry, stuff, those detectives always try to pull.”

Jane had a funny look on her face. “Yeah.”

“Take a look at the transcript, such as it is. It’s not admissible, in any way, it’s simply their memory of a conversation that I think, frankly, was improper.” Peter leaned closer to Jane, wanting to point out a certain paragraph. Got a whiff of some kind of citrusy-floral fragrance, clean and fresh. She’d pulled her hair back in a stubby little ponytail, strands falling out and curling over her cheek. He looked at her left hand. Looked away. Looked again. Bare. Couldn’t believe what he was thinking. “We’ll fight them on it, if need be. It’s arguably a Miranda violation if they suspected Mr. Sandoval. Let me show you, here’s where they—”

“Did they?” Jane looked up from the transcript. “Suspect him?”

“Page four,” he said. “You know he works construction, freelance. The detectives mention a two-by-four as the murder weapon.”

“And then, according to this, Elliot refers to the ones in his truck.” Jane turned the pages of the printed transcript. “Which Ja—I mean, the cops—say they’d already noticed. So, yeah, I understand what you mean. Seems like they were on a mission, and not simply fact-finding.”

Peter nodded. “Exactly. If they considered him a suspect, and didn’t read him his rights, then by law—”

Marcotte’s desk phone trilled, a sharp triple tone that cut through what Peter was trying to explain. The editor rolled her eyes, apologizing, then narrowed them as she picked up the receiver and listened.

Peter checked with Jane. She shrugged, smiling.

“Where?” Marcotte trapped the phone between her cheek and her shoulder, pulled a pen from a silver container, began writing on a white legal pad. Peter noticed she glanced at Jane several times as she listened. “Really? When? Do they have an identification yet?”

Jane stood and turned for the door, so Peter did, too. Maybe Marcotte expected privacy.

“No. Wait.” The editor pointed to them. “Don’t leave. Stand by.”

Jane stopped, and Peter almost ran into her. “Sorry,” he said.

Marcotte put her hand over the mouthpiece, aimed her words at them. “We’re set on the deal, okay? And you two can continue without me. I’ve got a possible situation here.”

“What’s up?” Jane said. “Anything I can do?”

“Yes,” Marcotte said. “There is. Will you get me Chrystal Peralta? Tell her we’ve got a body on Moulten Road. Homicide is on the way.”

21

“This is Jake Brogan.” Jake’s cell showed caller ID blocked, so maybe it was Frasca checking in. But there was no one on the other end. “Hello?”

Jake hung up, figuring whoever it was would call back. He’d spent the last three hours pulling rubber-banded manila folders from accordion files, reading the fusty multi-syllabic psych-talk that analyzed the reasons a raft of poor saps confessed to crimes they didn’t commit.

Four cups of fancy coffee and two crullers later, plowing through all the professional lingo, Jake felt he’d been reading fiction, stories too bizarre and unbelievable even for the movies. And, he had to admit, law enforcement manipulation so brazen it was embarrassing.

Jake read stomach-churning cases of overzealous detectives and special agents, battering confessions out of the semi-defenseless or totally confused in the pressure cooker of an interrogation room, usually plying them with phony reassurances and false promises.

The case where he and Frasca met—a young Vietnamese woman, in barely marginal English, confessed to killing her child because the cops had guaranteed her if she did, “it would all be over” and she could go home. Instead, she was slammed into the Framingham House of Correction awaiting arraignment for murder. Jake and Frasca had discovered the baby had been sick, doctors’ records proved it, and the young woman was completely blameless. Now free but humiliated, she hadn’t come out of her home in the last year.

She’d confessed all right. They all had. But none were guilty. Misguided, confused, or impaired or young or stupid or manipulated or coerced. But not guilty. Jake powered through Frasca’s case files, absorbed, almost forgetting why he was here. The guy in Sweden trying to impress a girlfriend who thought he was a wimp, a poor dupe in Illinois who’d been kept awake by the cops for forty-seven hours until he finally caved. And forget about recanting. Once a confession was “given,” it obliterated any other evidence. Witnesses, alibis, everything, would be ignored—because why would someone confess to a crime they didn’t commit?

Jake sighed, leaned back in the soft leather, stared out the plate glass at the gathering gray clouds, thought about Gordon Thorley. No question his confession to Bing Sherrey had been taped. The Massachusetts courts frowned on what had once been the norm, those “we forgot” or “the machine broke” excuses by detectives about why their interrogations weren’t recorded. Jurors had actually been ordered to be skeptical of “confessions” where the questioning wasn’t on tape—judges instructing jurors they could infer that a lack of audio meant police had behaved inappropriately.

But Bing Sherrey hadn’t offered solace or security or release or redemption. He hadn’t offered anything. Thorley’d shown up on his own.

All the more reason to be perplexed.

Jake glanced at the stack of DVDs Frasca had left. Might as well watch those. But now, faced with dozens of similar but unique cases of false confessions, he wondered if any of it mattered. What was he expecting to learn, really, from all this? Some kind of key to Thorley? Some kind of psychological explanation for his actions, or scientific proof of guilt?

Or maybe, just maybe, finding nothing was the proof of something else. That Gordon Thorley—not young, not mentally ill, not stupid or manipulated or strong-armed—actually was the Lilac Sunday killer.

Jake stared blankly at the dregs of his coffee and the cruller crumbs, imagining the future.

What if this year’s Lilac Sunday, five days from now, was the first without the ghost of Carley Marie Schaefer hanging over it? The first the Schaefer family could hope for some justice? The first without the memory of failure sending Gramma Brogan to face Gerald and Maureen Schaefer at their annual “Remember Carley Marie” news conference, and then to her room for the rest of the day.

Jake, lost in speculation, flinched when his cell phone rang again, dropped his pencil. Was Frasca already done with his meeting? Already close to noon. No wonder he was starving. Was that thunder outside?

“Brogan,” he said. He paused, listening, then inserted a DVD into the slot in the machine under the TV monitor. He didn’t push play, though, his hand frozen in mid-air as he listened to Bing Sherrey’s terse recitation. “Are you serious? Was it an accident? No? Are you sure?”