"I figured," Stacy said, looking down at herself, "TV and everything."
Casey nodded. "Thanks for coming."
Although there was no press podium for her, the media had coagulated around the usual spot on the granite steps, in the shadows of the main entrance, where lawyers, jurors, and families of the accused hurried to and fro to receive their portion of justice. Among the media, she thought she detected mic flags from CNN, E!, and Access Hollywood. Casey breathed deep and fiddled with her hair, tucking it in and out from behind her ears as her own mind wavered between images of a powerful, meticulous lawyer and of a sympathetic woman unjustly accused. As she stepped to the spot in front of all the lights, cameras, and microphones, she went with both, one side of her red hair pinned back behind her ear, the other falling loose across the edge of her cheek and jaw.
She set her briefcase down on the steps, extracting her five-page statement with trembling hands. After the blazing morning heat, the deep shadow of the courthouse tower sent a chill down her spine. She forced a smile at the reporters, thanked them for coming, and began to read.
Somewhere in the midst of her denials and pointed counteraccusations, she began to wish she'd postponed speaking to the press. Her consternation over Jose, a bad night's sleep, and a hangover from the sleeping pill left her feeling nauseated and less than sharp mentally. Not knowing how to go back, though, she plowed through to the end, thinking she could make a quick exit before she threw up.
But when she finished her statement and the questions came zipping at her like traffic on a busy highway, her legs seized up.
"Are you saying that your history of mental illness isn't connected with these wild allegations?"
Wham.
She scowled, searching for the source of the question.
"That is a lie," she said, gritting her teeth, knowing she shouldn't even address it, knowing she should just leave, but somehow unable to keep her mouth shut. "I have no mental illness."
"We've seen your date book from two years ago," said a bleached blonde in a red skirt and jacket, pointing at Casey with a microphone. "You saw a Dr. Eppilito over a dozen times. The psychotherapist. Are you saying you have no mental problems?"
Casey sighed, smiled wanly, and asked, "Who doesn't have problems? My marriage was a train wreck. A former client tried to kill me."
"And you took antipsychotic drugs for your mental illness?"
"What's wrong with you people?" Casey barked, even while the lawyer in her shouted to walk away. "A man was murdered. They cremated his body to destroy the evidence. The US government deported his wife and baby to cover it up, and you want to know about a couple Xanax I took two years ago?"
Cameras flashed and clicked and the reporters began to jostle one another, undulating like a polluted sea, their questions coming like breakers, jumbled together and smashing into her. Gangs. Drug deals. Movie contracts. Corruption. Dirty cops. Murderesses. Madness. Sex. They hit her with everything, until, finally, her stomach heaved. She snatched up her briefcase, choking back the bile, and vacated the steps.
They followed her in a pack, snapping at her with insistent and outrageous questions and accusations. Stacy locked an arm into Casey's and acted as buffer, escorting her down the steps with a stiff back, jutting out her chin and glowering. At the bottom of the steps, the young bleached blonde in the red skirt and heels darted in front of them, microphone first.
"Are you going to return the money you've taken from charity?" she said, her blue eyes bulging and spittle flying from her cherry lips.
The foam bulb on the end of the microphone bumped Casey's nose hard enough to make her eyes water.
"Are you!" the reporter yelled.
Casey grabbed the microphone and yanked it. The reporter held tight, crashing into Casey and careening off of the elbow Stacy fired into her ribs. The reporter sprawled to the pavement, her long legs akimbo. She screamed, but gripped the microphone with both hands and stabbed it at Casey.
Casey knocked the mic aside, stepped over the woman reporter, and marched on toward her car. The pack closed in and the tirade of questions, now indignant and angry, cascaded down on her and Stacy.
"Fucking animals," Stacy said with her arm across her face.
Casey jerked open the car door and looked up at the mob.
"This shitbox is my Mercedes!"
She threw herself inside, and crawled away through the swarm with her full weight on the car's horn.
CHAPTER 52
HEY, BUDDY," KEN TRENT SAID, "WHERE YOU AT?"
Jose squinted at the clock on his phone and wormed his swollen tongue around inside his mouth, searching for moisture. He cleared his throat and said, "In my truck. Why?"
"Where in your truck?"
Jose went rigid at the tone of his ex-boss's voice. He sat up, kicking a trio of empty Budweiser bottles across the floor mat. He studied the tree-lined street in front of him where Casey lived, and scoured the nearly empty parking lot of the small, shrub-trimmed shopping center. On the pavement outside, the rest of the empty beer bottles stood in their cardboard container next to a shimmering puddle of piss.
The third-floor window to Casey's back bedroom stared down at him with a half-shut pink shade, a watchful eye that somehow accused him of cowardice for sitting there and drinking all night without going inside to talk to Casey.
He said, "On my way to a job."
"In town?"
"Yeah," Jose said. "Why? What's up?"
The police captain took a turn at silence before he said, "I think you need to come in and see me."
"I got a wife about to come out of an aerobics class with some college kid," Jose said. "Husband's an insurance agent, paying top dollar, so you gotta do better than a tip on the Mavs game."
"I can't tell you, exactly, Jose," he said. "It's important. It's got to do with that thing you're working on down in Wilmer."
"Tell you what," Jose said. "I can't get down there, but I'll meet you. There's a shopping center across the street from my job, the place just off the Colinas exit on 114. You can buy me a Starbucks."
"Half an hour, okay?" Ken asked.
"Cappuccino?" Jose asked. "If I get there first?"
"Just the closest thing to regular black coffee," Ken said.
Jose always kept a spare set of clothes behind the backseat. He removed the duffel bag and crossed the street, dialing Casey's cell number but getting no answer. Casey kept a key in the flower box outside the back door. Jose dug it out of the dirt and let himself in to use the shower and change clothes. Clean and smelling much better, he jotted out a note telling her that he'd used the shower and explaining that if it hadn't been urgent and involving the Senator Chase case, he never would have been so bold as to use her spare key to let himself in. He added a postscript that said he hoped she'd forgive him for that, even if she couldn't forgive him for his past.
He drove over to the shopping center ten minutes before the appointed time, but instead of entering the large parking lot, he passed by and pulled into the adjoining apartment complex perched on the hill above. Parking out of sight, he walked with a pair of field glasses to the edge of the wrought-iron fence by the apartment complex's pool. He scanned the Starbucks and saw Ken Trent outside in a gray blazer and black slacks, talking to an undercover cop who nodded, looked around, and then hurriedly returned to the unmarked car, where he slumped down in the seat next to his partner.
When Ken disappeared into the coffee store, Jose studied the other cars in the lot and came up with a second unmarked car, where two more cops sat slumped low, one of them talking into a cell phone.
Jose checked the loads in his guns as he crossed the lot toward the back. He hopped the fence and shuffled down the dirt hillside into the back of the shopping center where the AC units groaned from the rooftop and the smell of garbage floated past on warm zephyrs. He jogged the length of the center and came around the opposite side, slipping into the side door of the coffee shop and sneaking up on the police captain at his table against the wall.