Chapter 20

 

Owen figured he’d met them all in his time.

As a kid on the streets of Philadelphia, he’d seen them. Hell, been one of them. At boarding school, he’d seen them, too. A higher class of punks, to be sure, but punks nonetheless. More money just meant more expensive vices.

So many of them had the same things in common. Each one thought he was the center of the universe. Each one thought he was above the rules and standards and laws that kept mere mortals from enjoying the pleasures that were ‘rightfully’ theirs.

Some of those punks were dead, now. Some were sitting in board rooms of Fortune 500 companies. Some were, no doubt, in prison.

Sarah had thought she needed to warn him about the convict on their drive to the prison. She had given him a summary of what she’d read in his letters—of the inmate’s early start in a life of crime and his continuous involvement, despite his years of incarceration. Owen had listened, but figured he knew this guy like a book.

But after meeting Jake Gantley in person, he knew he’d been wrong.

Owen had no reason to believe or disbelieve the man’s story of his criminal activities. But he hadn’t been prepared for the strength of Jake’s personality. This was no punk. This was a dangerous man.

Despite the austere environment in the visitor’s room, the inmate had greeted Owen from across the divider like a host welcoming an honored guest to a dinner party. Prison clothes notwithstanding, the man looked clean, trim, and polished. His manners were refined, almost cultured at first glance. His manner of speaking was cool, intelligent, and articulate as he explained to Owen some of the problems with crime stories and the motivational problems of current TV characters—including Owen’s own character, John McKee.

Owen had tried to remain pleasant and casual, listening to what was being said without showing any hint of impatience. He didn’t want to reveal the main reason for this visit. But the hour he’d requested was running short, and Jake had yet to bring up the topic.

“I have done some script-writing myself,” the inmate said casually. “With so much time on my hands here, I’ve completed three correspondence courses on writing in this past year, alone.”

“That’s great.” Owen tried to maintain his level of interest under the watchful gaze of the guard standing just out of earshot near the door.

“In my letters, I mentioned something about the transcripts I’ve been putting together.” Jake’s gray eyes squinted, obviously measuring Owen’s response. “Of course, before I can share any of what I have to offer, an agreement must be reached, and perhaps a contract drawn up.”

“Sure, why don’t you send a proposal to my production office. If it’s something that might interest our team of writers, the lawyers will contact you.”

Owen’s pro forma answer had the desired affect. Jake’s otherwise smooth expression faltered for a moment.

“I’m well aware of the secret handshakes and family connections that are the foundations of deal-making in your business, Mr. Dean. It’s not much different in my line…my former line of work. But my writing won’t be sitting on any slush pile.”

“Then I’m sorry, I can’t help you.” Owen leaned forward, looking Jake straight in the eye.

“You gave me the impression that you were interested in my material,” Jake said calmly.

“I’m sorry to disappoint you. But I have yet to hear anything that grabs me.”

Gray eyes focused again. “You saw the picture I sent you.”

“From an old movie clip. Even the tabloids won’t be interested in an edited clip that’s been floating around the internet for a couple of years.”

“I met Tori recently,” Jake replied.

“Good for you.” Owen glanced at his watch.

The voice turned low. “She was in Sarah Rand’s apartment.”

“The name doesn’t ring a bell.”

“Then I guess you won’t be interested in knowing what I was doing there. Or who hired me to pay her a visit. Or how I ended up ditching the wrong corpse and letting your new girlfriend continue to walk around without a scratch…for now, anyway.”

Owen sat back in the metal chair, his face businesslike. “Didn’t one of your letters say you’ve been in prison for a while?”

“Never heard of our state’s enlightened furlough program?” Jake flashed him a wide smile. “Most of us can’t sit back and wait for the right producer to come around and pay us a million bucks for our work. A man has to make a living.”

“Is this the script you’re selling?”

“It’s a package deal.”

“What if I said I’m only interested in this part of the package?” Owen replied.

The two men’s gazes collided. The heavy silence was broken by the sound of a heavy metal door banging shut somewhere in the distance.

“If you don’t want to deal, Jake, I can walk out right now.”

Gantley eyed him with a look devoid of expression, but Owen had seen that look before. If they were on the street right now, Jake would cut his heart out with a spoon.

“Last chance. Are you selling?”

“I might be…for the right price.”

Owen had him, now. It was a small victory, but a telling one.

“I’m not interested in any fiction,” he said flatly. “I have an office full of writers who can come up with stories.”

“This is not fiction. And…” Jake’s gaze dropped to the bottom of the glass separator. When he looked up again, he was back in control. “I believe if you knew that there was more than one disgruntled character chasing after your girlfriend, you wouldn’t be so blasé.” The inmate stared at him. “Do I have your attention, Mr. Dean?”

“Back it up with facts,” Owen pressed. “You can be inventing this whole thing based on what you’ve been reading in the papers.”

Jake threw a glance in the direction of the guard. “I was contracted to do a job by a certain individual. When I got there, someone else had beaten me to it. Someone else who was not very bright,” he added as an afterthought. “This someone hadn’t done his homework. This same someone dusted the wrong lady.”

“And how do you know it was the wrong lady?”

“I’m a professional. Details are my life.” Jake flashed him a confident smile. “Those fancy earrings that your girlfriend always wears were the first clue. Actually, they should have been a dead giveaway to the dope horning in on my turf. On top of that, there was that music. You don’t have to be an Einstein to know someone with your girl’s sense of style wouldn’t be into Pearl Jam. And then, there was the airline ticket-stub in the pocket of Tori’s tight little jeans. She did have a nice ass, but her real assets were her—”

“Drop it.” Owen spoke impatiently. “Go on.”

Jake flashed him another smile. “The place was a wreck, like the genius was looking for something, but then half-decided to make it look like a robbery.”

“What did you do?”

“I was hired for a two-step job. You might say, it was a ‘dust and vacuum’ job. Now, if someone else had decided to take care of the first half for me, who was I to complain?”

Jake glanced toward the guard again.

“Time was running short, if you get my meaning. I wanted to get paid.” He shrugged. “I did what any other professional would do in a situation like that. I went around and took the luggage tags off the bag upstairs and mixed in her stuff with your girlfriend’s. Then I did whatever else I could think of in the little time I had left. Hey, the first guy had helped me out by knocking off a girl. Now I was returning the favor by messing up the place so that—at least, up front—the cops would think Sarah Rand was the one who’d gotten snuffed.”

“Were you the one who dragged her to Judge Arnold’s boat?”

“Only parts of her—blood, hair, stuff from the rug. I have plenty of time to read all those crime and detection books. I know what those guys look for and how they collect their evidence. I told you I’m a pro. It’s my job to stay up on things. In fact, one of these days, I should write a book about it, myself.”

“Where is her body now?”

“You don’t want to know.” Jake shook his head with a look of feigned distaste.

“Who contracted you to do the job?”

“Now you are getting to the good stuff.”

“Well?” Owen asked impatiently.

“Let’s start with small stuff and then build up.” Jake now wore the demeanor of one business partner talking to another. “I want you to call this cousin of mine, when you get back to Newport. His name is Frankie O’Neal. He is my collection agency. A good guy. Very decent. A little overweight, but I’m working on that. Trying to improve his image, his self-esteem.”

Owen wrote down the address and phone number on a piece of paper.

“If we’re going to deal, you’re going to have to pay. Twenty grand is a fair price for the small stuff, and that’ll keep me supplied with pencils and pens.”

“I’m not asking you to kill anyone, Jake. You’re only giving me a name.”

Gantley shook his head. “You know, I hate talking money. On the other hand, if you take me up on my proposal and look at my writing, just to see if you could use some of my stories, then I’ll give you a break. But as it stands now, my hands are tied. I have mouths to feed, you know. Well, not really, but it sounds good.”

“When do I get the rest of it?”

Jake glanced around. “Tomorrow. That is, if you send some money Frankie’s way by then. And no checks.”

“How do I know you’re not full of shit?”

“You’re a smart guy, Owen.” The inmate smiled again. “Okay. I’ll give you something for free. I read in the paper today that there is a memorial service tomorrow at noon for the millionaire golden boy, Hal Van Horn. Listen good. The one who took out the contract on your girlfriend will be there.”

“Half of Newport will be there.”

“Look really close. You know the immediate circle of family and friends. You can’t miss him.”

Owen got up to go, but Jake stopped him.

“I’ll tell you something else. By now, the cops know she is alive.” He gave Owen a long nod. “If their labs are anywhere near as good as I figure, they already know that the blood they found in the apartment and the boat might match, but they don’t belong to Sarah Rand.”

“Thanks for the warning.”

 

~~~~

 

He was still on hold.

Trapping the cell phone between his shoulder and his ear, Scott Rosen looked at his watch. He frowned and shifted his weight, then stopped.

The attorney stared through the large windows that separated the four newborn infants from the germs and scum that constituted life outside the hospital nursery. An attendant wearing scrubs pushed a fifth glass crib into the room. The new addition—an eight pound, seven ounce baby girl—was wheeled toward the nursery window.

“It should only be another couple of minutes, Mr. Rosen.” The voice on the phone was polite.

“Thank you.”

Scott looked from the nametag on the glass crib to the wrinkled red face of his daughter. His hand touched the glass. She made an angry face, and the pacifier fell from her pursed lips.

He’d returned home this morning only to find a hurried note from Lucy. It was short and to the point. Her water had broken while he’d been gone. Not wanting to disturb him or his work, she’d simply asked one of their neighbors to take her to the hospital.

By the time he’d gotten to the delivery room, Lucy had already given birth.

Scott’s first instinct was that he should be angry at her for not calling him. That thought had fallen by the wayside pretty quickly. After all, who he was kidding? He had been an insensitive jerk throughout her entire pregnancy. Shit, throughout their entire marriage, for that matter. But she had continued to put up with him.

Still, something had changed today, and Scott knew it.

Labor and childbirth had lasted almost three hours. She had gone through it all by herself, without any drugs. When he finally saw her, she looked tired but very proud.

Watching Lucy try to breastfeed their daughter early this afternoon, Scott had seen the new independence. It was as if something powerful had awakened within her.

It had been the two of them—the mother and baby. An experience shared by just them. And then there had been Scott. Looking on. An outsider who didn’t even know how to hold his daughter. Something in her look told him that Lucy now realized she could do without him.

Judge Arnold’s gruff voice came over the phone. “What do you want Scott?”

“I’m a father.” The words tumbled out unexpectedly. What a stupid thing to say. “Sorry, your honor. That’s not why I called you.”

“Congratulations. How is Lucy?”

“Fine. She is doing just great. Thanks.” He was surprised at the sudden warmth in the judge’s voice. “The reason for my call, however, is that I just heard from Senator Rutherford’s office. They’re very upset that you are refusing to go to Hal’s memorial service tomorrow. You understand that the senator had to make a special request for you to be allowed to attend, even with a police escort. As your lawyer, sir, I was surprised—”

“Boy or girl?”

“Your honor…” Scott walked away from the nursery glass. “I’m your lawyer and not your press secretary, but this—”

“Boy or girl?”

“What? A girl.”

“What are you calling her?”

“We haven’t really talked about it.” He glanced at the nursery window and saw his daughter wailing. The attendant came over and picked her up.

“Well, instead of talking on the phone, Scott, you should be sitting at Lucy’s side. Holding her hand. Picking names. What kind of flowers did you have delivered to her room?”

“Flowers? I…I haven’t got that far, yet.”

“Damn it, Scott!” the judge snapped at the other end. “Do you understand the meaning of priorities? Avery and I never had any children, but by God, she never had to go short of flowers or gifts. Women need that kind of attention from their men. It gives them some incentive to keep us around.”

Scott suddenly realized he was foundering. He wasn’t accustomed to losing control of discussions with his clients. He definitely wasn’t accustomed to being reminded how incompetent he was in the area of marriage.

“Judge, about Hal’s memorial service tomorrow. I believe the media will have a field day at your expense if you were not to attend.”

“Good,” the older man growled. “Let them. You’re my lawyer. You make my excuses. But more important, be sure to bring some pictures of your Baby X when you come to see me on Monday. And in the meantime, pass on my congratulations to Lucy. She is quite a girl, Scott.”

“But, your hon—”

Scott heard the phone in his hand go dead, and he knew he’d lost the battle.

Slipping the phone back into his pocket, he looked at his daughter. The attendant was carrying her into another room, and his thoughts returned to one of the files in his briefcase. The one he’d been reading just before Evan Steele had interrupted him.

It was all related. The judge’s open hostility toward his stepson…even now, after his death. Hal’s damning testimony to the police and the D.A. about a relationship between Judge Arnold and Sarah Rand. The report Scott had discovered in the files this morning that surely affected Avery’s will.

An attendant carrying a large bouquet of flowers came out of a patient’s room. It took a moment before what he was looking at sank in.

“Shit,” he exclaimed under his breath, heading for the elevator.

He was in the hospital flower shop by the reception desk on the main floor, waiting for his order of two dozen roses to be wrapped when he saw the other man enter the shop. Seeing celebrities around town had never impressed Scott. In fact, he didn’t know who most of these people were. He hardly watched any television that wasn’t news related, anymore. He didn’t go to the movies. Or plays. He was lucky to find time to read a novel, now and then. As Lucy was quick to say about him, he was ‘culturally challenged.’

Owen Dean, though, was a face and a name he was quite familiar with. Of the few movies that he’d seen over the years, Dean’s had been the ones. He’d read about the success of his television show in the papers, though he’d never seen it. But he’d been very impressed when he’d read that the actor and movie producer was spending a semester teaching at a local college.

The celebrity glanced at the flowers being wrapped and placed an order. As he turned to go, he nodded at Scott before taking a second, closer look at him.

“Excuse me, but aren’t you Scott Rosen?”

The lawyer was flattered and baffled at the same time. “Yes, I am.”

“I’m Owen Dean.” Strong, confident handshake. “I’ve been reading so much about the Rand murder lately that I couldn’t pass up saying hello.”

“Thank you,” Scott replied, still a bit flustered. “But I’m a little stunned that you recognized me. I mean…I know you. I’ve been a fan for years, but…”

“Newspapers.” Owen smiled. “I’m always interested in the guys behind the scenes. The ones who do all the work. One of the papers ran your picture, though I get the feeling you prefer to work out of the limelight.”

“To some extent, that’s true. It’s the work I love.”

“I thought so. That’s my latest goal in life. To step into the background a little more.”

“So you can do all the work?”

He laughed. “And enjoy it, too. There is nothing fun about being in the spotlight all the time. No privacy. No time for the important things. You know what I mean.”

Scott nodded as the two of them walked out of the shop.

“This whole thing, this Arnold-Rand case, must be putting a lot of pressure on you.” They stopped by the elevators. “Do you have a defense team, or are you doing it all alone?”

“We’re consulting with the best guys in the business—Dershowitz, Miller, Bergman—but we’re still in the preliminary stages. Once we get a little more into it, we’ll put together a complete defense team.”

The elevator opened, and the two men stepped back to allow an elderly couple to exit before they got in. Each of them pressed the button for their floor, but Owen held the elevator as a rather frazzled-looking woman rushed across the lobby, calling for them to hold the door.

“And how is it going, so far?” the celebrity asked as they started up. “I mean, just your opinion, from a defense perspective.”

“Fine.” Scott waited until the other passenger got off before giving his honest answer. “Confidentially, so far I feel like I’m more in the middle of a conspiracy movie than a murder case. It’s difficult to explain.”

The door opened onto the maternity floor.

“It was a pleasure meeting you, Mr. Dean.” He extended a hand.

“The pleasure was all mine.” Owen offered. “Best of luck with the case.”