“Isn’t he, John? Which isn’t to say he’s not culpable. Or rueful.”
“Rueful,” said Nguyen. “Even by his account Imelda Soriano was cold-blooded murder. He put her in a shallow grave and hightailed it to Rome for a vacation.”
“Not a vacation,” said Loach. “We needed to decompress.”
“We,” said Milo.
Moftizadeh said, “There were two of them traveling. A collective pronoun is in order.”
Nguyen said, “How lawyerly, Fahriz. When are you running for Congress?”
Loach said, “What I meant was, I needed to keep an eye on her.” Quick glance at his lawyer. “It’s confusing, I’ve been feeling more and more confused... the memory.”
Nguyen said, “We’ve got an EEG coming, Fahriz? Don’t bother answering, I couldn’t care less. You can dim cap to your heart’s content. We’re talking three murders, you think a jury’s going to view your client as kindly Uncle Joe? At the absolute minimum, we’re talking accessory after and I’m not convinced of even that. In fact, nothing I’ve heard changes my mind about Murder One.”
Loach lowered his face.
Moftizadeh said, “I understand where you’re coming from, John, but I sincerely believe that would be a misstep on your part. You know what happens with a pair of defendants — particularly defendants able to arouse sympathy. She’ll blame him, we’ll blame her, the jury will grow confused and you’ll experience dilution of verdict across the board. If there was a poisoning, she did it. She pulled that trigger. Twice. Are you really willing to see her skate on manslaughter in order to crucify my client?”
Nguyen headed for the door, Milo following.
Moftizadeh said, “This isn’t right, look at objective elements here, John. Given the lack of physical evidence against my client, Murder One is highly unlikely. He killed no one, he wielded a shovel. A man with no criminal past and unlikely to have a criminal future. A man whose charitable contributions to inner-city—”
Nguyen waved him silent. “Forget about abusing a corpse. The least I’m willing to consider is accessory before the fact.”
“But that wouldn’t be accurate, John. He really was informed after.”
“That’s his story.”
“It’s a true story.”
Nguyen pulled the statement out of his pocket and scanned. “No way will he avoid a serious charge on Imelda Soriano. Even if I believe that he swallowed DePauw’s ludicrous story and I don’t, even by his account he was aware Soriano was cold-blooded homicide — and don’t insult my intelligence with that panic crap. Santos was shot because she had incriminating information about the murder of Zelda Chase and Soriano was shot because she was seen speaking to Santos. This is witness elimination, pure and simple, and that’s special circumstances.”
J. Yarmuth Loach said, “I can tell you something.”
Moftizadeh said, “Hold on—”
“I can tell you why. The first domestic was... what happened to her. She knew Zelda didn’t fall over, outside. Enid had locked her in the house for two days. Kept her in the cellar. Fed her soup. The domestic wasn’t supposed to see it but she disobeyed Enid and went downstairs to sweep the steps and heard something and got a key.”
Milo said, “Soup.”
Loach nodded. “Canned vegetable soup. She... fortified it.”
“With?”
“Something from her garden,” said Loach. “She likes doing it. Devising her own pesticides.”
Nguyen and Milo sat back down. “If Mr. Loach is willing to write down what he just said, along with a statement specifying his awareness that Imelda Soriano was a premeditated homicide that he helped cover up, I’ll go with after the fact. Even on her.”
Moftizadeh said, “Appreciate that offer, John, but we really need more.”
“Once he’s convicted, if you petition for reduced sentence based on infirmity, I won’t challenge you. He could be out in a short time.”
Loach said, “I’ll take it.”
Moftizadeh said, “Yarmie—”
“I’ll take it. I can’t stay here.” As if ready to check out of an inferior hotel.
Nguyen said, “You have more stationery in your briefcase?”
“I do, John.”
“Get it out. Start composing, Mr. Loach.”
The handwritten addendum was examined and agreed upon. Two pages in Loach’s shaky hand, signed and dated.
Nguyen placed both sheets in his pocket.
Moftizadeh said, “In view of the reduced charges, let’s revisit the issue of bail. Give me something reasonable.”
“Reasonable being...”
“What Mr. Loach can actually pay. It’s in your best interests, John. He’ll be of far greater utility to you once he’s out of this terrible environment.”
John Nguyen smiled. “I could go with that logic if it was only three victims, Fahriz.”
“Pardon?” said Moftizadeh.
“Have I said something confusing? We’ve got your client’s story on three murders but there’s a fourth.”
“I don’t under—”
“Three plus one equals four, Fahriz.”
Moftizadeh turned to Loach. Loach’s eyes bugged.
“What the hell’s going on, John?”
Nguyen said, “Fresh evidence. Out-of-the-oven evidence. Fill them in, Lieutenant.”
Milo said, “A man named Roderick Salton — your client’s assistant — was murdered by poisoning prior to the other three homicides. That crime took place nowhere near Mrs. DePauw’s property and, in fact, Mrs. DePauw was out of town. Unlike Mr. Loach who, on the day in question, used his corporate credit card to pay for lunch at the Water Garden restaurant. Food for two, wine for one. Which makes sense because Mr. Salton was a Mormon.”
“That’s an assumption—”
“Restaurant staff identify Mr. Loach and Mr. Salton as dining together that day. One server describes the atmosphere as shifting from friendly at the beginning of the meal to tense by the end. Given Mrs. DePauw’s proclivity for poison, we checked her whereabouts and she was at the Grand Hyatt in Lake Tahoe. She flew in privately the previous night, returned two days later to L.A. by commercial jet.”
Loach blurted, “Of course she was gone. She went there for an alibi!”
Nguyen said, “That was the plan the two of you cooked up?”
“I—”
Moftizadeh barked, “Quiet, Yarmie!”
Loach buried his head in his arms and began mewling.
No sympathy from his lawyer, just morbid fascination.
Milo said, “I’m sure Mr. Loach is correct. Mrs. DePauw went to Tahoe to establish an alibi after she furnished Mr. Loach with a toxic substance from her garden called aconitum. Deadly stuff, Mr. Loach slipped it into Mr. Salton’s food. By the end of the day, Mr. Salton was dead, his body dumped after dark near the courthouse on Hill and Washington.”
Nguyen said, “A neighborhood and a facility that Mr. Loach knew well, as he’d filed papers there on behalf of Mrs. DePauw on various real estate disputes.”
Moftizadeh’s Adam’s apple rose and fell. “Without admitting acceptance of this... tale, what possible motive would my client have to kill this Salting person? And what evidence do you have that remotely supports such a fanciful—”
“Sal-ton,” said Milo, spelling it. “The motive was similar to Soriano and Santos. Mr. Salton knew too much. But unlike Soriano and Santos, he had the ability to do something about it.”
“How in the world—”
“Hear me out, Counselor. We know for a fact that Zelda Chase entered Mr. Loach’s office and made statements about Mr. Loach killing her mother years ago.”
Nguyen said, “Which was taken for psychotic ranting but was obviously true.”
“That,” said Moftizadeh, “is categorically false. We just—”