"Your father and I discussed the matter. I thought it was in your best interest if there was only one police agency to deal with-the mediocre one. I call it damage control."
You told him to send me away?"
No, that was the judge's decision. I was against it. At least he waited a few months before he shipped you out of state, but it was still a bad move. I gather you had some kind of alibi. The sheriff isn't a complete idiot." The lawyer's fingers did a little dance on the top of his briefcase while he awaited a response.
Oren had no plans to share the details of two bogus alibis. Evelyn Straub's old statement was folded in his wallet, and there it would stay. He had set fire to Isabelle's statement in full view of the sheriff and the patrons at the Water Street Cafe.
Ad Winston opened his briefcase and perused the paperwork inside. The top sheet was a list of military commendations and decorations, ribbons from combat zones, medals for Oren's valor and medals for his wounds.
"Stunning record," said the lawyer. "I was relieved to discover that you were honorably discharged. And that's all the information Sally Polk is likely to get from the Army. She probably doesn't know as many five-star generals as I do. When my general looked into the matter, what he found was very jarring." The lawyer consulted a sheet of handwritten notes. "I know you left Coventry when you were seventeen years old, but you didn't join the Army until your eighteenth birthday-legal age. When you quit, you were nine months shy of qualifying for a twenty-year pension. You walked away from that-every dime, every benefit."
Winston paused for a moment. "No comment?"
The lawyer turned back to his notes. "Well, with no prompting from me, the general investigated." He pointed to a paragraph. "This lists all the perks you were offered. In the general's own words, the Army offered you the moon if you would only stay. He tells me you never had to quit. They would have given you a leave of absence-all the time you needed. You could've claimed a family emergency, but you didn't. And your father insists you knew nothing about Josh's bones being found-not before you came home."
"My father never lies."
"Henry's better at arithmetic than I am. He knows what you lost when you walked away. He never asked why?" They rode the rest of the way in silence.
The sun had come out again, and the light from the immense window was brilliant. Beyond the glass were the muffled sounds of hammers and the sight of workmen building a large wooden platform on the grass behind the Winston lodge. Truckers unloaded tables and chairs for the guests who soon would fill the house to overflowing.
Oren had not set foot in this place since the age of twelve. Today the front room was an empty cavern of cedar paneling and glass. All the furnishings had been removed to accommodate a night of dancing beneath a ceiling that soared more than thirty feet, and the floor space had the dimensions of a grand ballroom.
Walking alongside his lawyer, he was told that the lodge had been built with the annual festivities in mind. Oren could only see it as a needy display of wealth, a stage for a man who was always performing, always smiling. He wondered what Ad Winston was like when there was no one around to play the audience. He pictured the lawyer sitting in a darkened room, insanely grinning for no reason at all.
No difference.
"You must come to the ball this year," said Winston, leading the way across the wide expanse.
"Maybe I will." Oren delivered this line in a manner close to a threat.
The lawyer paused and turned, eyes flickering, uncomprehending, and then he walked around a screen of potted fruit trees, motioning for his guest to follow him. On the other side of the foliage was a small mahogany bar, ornately carved. A cabinet full of bottles had been built into the wall, and its shelves were enclosed by glass doors with a sturdy lock. A single key lay beside a glass of melting ice cubes. The keeper of the key, a woman in a maid's uniform, was capping a whiskey bottle.
"Hello, Hilda," said the lawyer as he joined her behind the bar. He looked down at the abandoned glass. "No refills, right?"
"She's only had the one-"
"That s enough. You can go, Hilda. I'll do the honors. Young man, pull up a barstool."
Oren was distracted by his view of a small private terrace beyond a pair of French doors. Outside in the sunlight, Isabelle Winston's red hair was fire bright. A taller woman with long pale hair stood beside her. This champagne blonde could only be Sarah Winston, and she was slowly turning toward him, but he never saw her face. The lady was led away like a passive invalid.
Ad Winston set out two glasses. "What'll you have?"
"Jack Daniel's straight up if you've got it."
"I have everything, my boy." The lawyer uncapped a whiskey bottle and poured him two generous shots. "We should talk strategy."
Oren looked down at his glass and idly ran one finger around the rim. "You're fired."
The older man leaned across the bar, for surely he could not have heard this right. "You're firing me?" He laughed at this great joke.
"I know you're the best," said Oren. "But I know how you work… I know what you did to William Swahn."
Perhaps for the first time ever, the lawyer had lost his sense of humor, and he was slow to pour his own drink. "I never discuss my clients with anyone. So any aspect of Swahn's old case is-"
"Nondisclosure agreements. You talk-your client loses money. I got that." Oren drained his glass and slammed it down on the bar-but not in anger. He simply wanted to make Ad Winston jump-and he did. "It only took me six minutes to figure out the scam. Swahn was just a rookie cop in those days… I'm the real deal."
Oren poured himself another shot from the bottle and sipped his glass slowly, enjoying the wary look in the lawyer's eyes. "You were at the hospital the night Swahn was ambushed. You were waiting in his room when he got out of surgery."
There was an unspoken-unspeakable-question in Ad Winston's eyes.
It was Oren's turn to smile. "No, your client didn't tell me. He never said a word. But I knew his partner took a bribe to call in sick the night of the ambush. I'm sure the civilian dispatcher got paid off, too. But that woman was smart enough to disappear before detectives came knocking on her door. Jay Murray stayed. That proves he had no idea why he'd been bribed. And that should've led the investigation away from a cop conspiracy. They would've been looking at civilians."
"The LAPD was liable. There's no disputing that. The dispatcher was employed by-"
"But the lawsuit would've dragged on for years." Oren picked up the bottle and poured himself another shot. "So you blackmailed the LAPD into a fast settlement, a big one. You fabricated evidence of a police conspiracy against a gay man with AIDS. And you had to work fast. When a cop goes down on duty, nobody goes home. Detectives work around the clock. It was probably still dark when you accused Swahn's precinct of ambushing your poor diseased client. The next morning, during an interrogation-that was the first time Swahn's partner heard the rumor. Now that's only odd if you know that cops gossip like little old ladies with guns. So that rumor-your rumor-was started after the ambush and before the sun came up on Jay Murray. And that's how I know you were in Swahn's hospital room when he got out of surgery."
"Interesting theory, Oren. Pure conjecture of course, but-"
"It's a fact. The only thing I don't know is whether or not Swahn was lucid when you signed him up as a client. I used to think he was in on this con game. Now I'm not so sure."
"None of this would hold up in court."