“Yeah, but I was there, Mike. I heard him.”
I looked up. “Shipley?”
“Yeah. It was her third big case. Third or fourth, in the courthouse across the street from her office.”
Paul Battaglia had assigned Coop to the pioneering Special Victims Unit of the DA’s office at a surprisingly early point in her career. Her predecessor had resigned abruptly, and he had come to rely on that rare combination of skill and compassion that hallmarked her career.
“Came to be, Battaglia wouldn’t let her walk through the crowd without a bodyguard,” Lee said. “Boy, did she fight that.”
“But she needed it, didn’t she?”
“Yeah, Alex needed it all right. Because Shipley brought himself-and probably bought himself, too-a whole posse of rabble-rousers. The perp on trial was one of his faithful, but he just happened to be a serial rapist. Best way to take the attention off the bad guy was to harass Alex Cooper. Day and night, on the street in front of the courthouse, even in the hallway of the building. It was just after Shipley’s Twainey Bowler fiasco.”
“The false accusation a decade ago?” I said. “I know he scorched Coop that time.”
“Scorched? He flat out tried to torpedo her. Made it personal, Mike. Real personal. Shouted ‘Jew bitch!’ every time she passed through the crowd.”
I was pissed off. I had known Coop then, but not well. I was sorry I hadn’t punched Shipley in the face fifteen minutes ago. Sorry I hadn’t shoved his fat face through the panes of glass in the vestibule window.
“Nobody spoke out, did they?”
“The only one with the balls to take the reverend on was Alex herself,” Lee said. “But Battaglia gagged her. Told her to take the high road.”
“Fuck the high road,” I said. “It’s usually a dead end.”
“So how come nobody takes Shipley on? Nobody ever calls him out?” Lee was marking each piece of evidence he had bagged so I could take it to the lab for analysis.
“They’re all cowards. Gutless wonders.”
“He’s on the steps of City Hall when the mayor gets sworn in. Think I’d be there if I hadn’t paid taxes in a decade? Think you’d be invited if you had invented some fake crime ten years back and made some poor law enforcement guy lose his job? And never apologize for or explain it, even a decade later? You and me, we’d be walking a beat in Coney Island. News jocks even use him now as a talking head.”
“Last thing I’d ever want to be.”
“Chris Matthews? He plays hardball with everybody else but treats Shipley like he’s the next pope. Joe Scarborough? Not shy about going after corrupt politicians, but Shipley’s got a permanent pass. Imus? Yeah, Imus has no use for him. He’s the only one.”
“When I walk into a room and hear Shipley’s voice on the tube, pontificating about justice, I just want to throw a tire iron at the screen.”
“Hold the thought. Your day will come. Rumor has it he’s getting his own TV show,” Lee said. “Like on one of those cable channels that don’t care if ratings are in the toilet.”
“He’s had his own show for years, hasn’t he?” I asked. “The Price Is Right. That’s Hal Shipley’s show. The price is always right for Hal to play.”
“Nobody takes him on, like I say.” Lee Petrie was just about ready to go.
“I think his luck is about to change, Lee. Coop has the fortitude to take him on. And it looks at the moment like all roads lead to Hal Shipley,” I said, thinking about the district attorney and his connections to the reverend. “Coop’ll thrive on this one. She’d like nothing better than to put his guilty ass behind bars.”
“What did Angela Wilson tell you? What did Shipley say? You’re gonna jail him for what?”
“Aiding and abetting a homicide, Lee. That’s where I’m going with this, before the feds ever get out of the starting blocks on their tax case,” I said. “We’re going to nail the fat fuck for murder.”
THIRTEEN
It was just before seven A.M. when I reached the lab. The ME had taken samples of blood, skin, and hair along with her to the morgue, so the routine testing and any forensic work she might order would get under way immediately.
I had stopped at the property clerk’s office to re-count the money that Lee Petrie, his partner, and I had been through once at Wilson’s apartment. Twenty-seven thousand large, all under the roach-infested sink. I got permission to take the bills with me to the lab instead of vouchering them and letting them sit on a shelf collecting dust, in case we might be lucky enough to get touch DNA off any of them.
I had the bullet that killed Wynan Wilson for the ballistics examiners. No spent shell-the shooter had been cool enough to pick up her debris. No gun yet, but that could be just a matter of time. I had toiletries that either Wilson or Keesh might have used, and kitchen utensils that might yield results about the most recent visitors. Saliva from the highball glasses in the sink could tell us whether the deceased had a drinking partner.
Once I’d signed off on everything, I walked outside to my car. It was a nippy fall morning. I started the engine and then checked my phone for messages.
Nothing from Lieutenant Peterson, so nobody at City Hall had dropped a dime on me. I was right about Shipley’s bluff.
And nothing from Coop.
She didn’t want to bother me at a crime scene and expose me to the ribbing of the other guys, who were comically ruthless at the news that Coop and I had hooked up. I didn’t need to jack her up, either, before her meeting with Battaglia about the computer mess created by Antonio Estevez and his bride.
Garden-variety domestic, I wrote to her in an e-mail. She’d get the irony in that once I told her the full story. It’s how law enforcement referred to O. J. Simpson’s murder of Nicole, until an incompetent judge and an overhyped media frenzy screwed the case up. Perp in flight, but you’ll like my idea to smoke her out.
I sent her a second e-mail. Assign a star to handle this one, will you? Someone who can withstand a little heat from the New York Times.
Coop would want this case for herself, but with Shipley tied up in the investigation-if not in the actual crime-she would recuse herself. I knew that. But I also knew that she would pull the strings from behind the scenes and that nothing would derail her from outing the truth about the reverend, even when political pressure fanned the flames.
The last e-mail was personal, to separate it from any discovery motions that would put our correspondence into play. Far-fetched, but after Estevez, worth doing.
Hey, Coop. Going home for a few hours’ sleep. The weekend will feel really good. So will you.
FOURTEEN
“Mike? It’s Catherine. Am I getting you at a bad time?”
I caught about three hours’ sleep before my cell phone buzzed. I sat up on the side of the bed to sound alive for the conversation.
“Not a problem. Coop gave the Wilson case to you?” I asked. “What does an adult say that sounds as good as ‘awesome!’? You are so gonna love what I’ve got-”
“I don’t know anything about the case. That’s not why I’m calling.”
“What’s up? What do you need?”
“I’m looking for Alex,” she said.
I checked my watch. It was almost noon. “She’s with big, bad Battaglia. Taking the weight for the Estevez leak. She wasn’t looking forward to the meet, but that’s what was looming when I left the shindig.”
“The DA didn’t get in until almost eleven. He called over for her to come see him right away,” Catherine said. “Laura hasn’t heard from her yet and the boss is steaming.”
I laughed. “You must be low broad on the totem pole. You’ve been assigned to ask me to look under the covers and see if she’s hiding in bed with me? Doing the deed with-?”