My phone started to buzz. I took it out of my pocket and checked the screen. It was Cisco. I wanted to take it but sent it to voicemail.
“Go ahead and take it,” Maggie said.
“No, it’s Cisco,” I said. “I can call him back. Who was the reporter who called you?”
“No one I know. Danielle something or other. I’ve never heard of her before.”
“Probably a newbie trying to make a name for herself. Any idea who was talking to her?”
“You already asked that. I don’t know. But as you know, I upset some applecarts when I came in. I dumped every division head, and those people didn’t take it well.”
It was a well-known fact in the district attorney’s office that when a new DA came in, a housecleaning followed. Especially this time. Facing a recall election he was going to come out on the wrong side of, Maggie’s predecessor had stepped down. Maggie was appointed by the county board of supervisors and then elected three months later. The division heads were all loyalists to the predecessor. Maggie had to clean house and put in her own people. It was nothing new. Prosecutors who supported the wrong candidate often found themselves in new and lesser postings, often in courthouses far from their homes. They called it freeway therapy. For an agency that was supposed to be apolitical, it was anything but.
My phone buzzed again. I still had it in my hand. It was Cisco again.
“Just take it, Mickey,” Maggie said. “It must be important.”
I did.
“Mick, they found Naomi,” Cisco said.
“Who found her?” I said.
“I don’t know yet.”
“What do you mean? I thought you were with her.”
“I’m here but not in the room with her. I’m in the lobby and she just called. Somebody just slipped a note under her door. I’m watching the exit to see who leaves.”
I’d known it was only a matter of time before Naomi Kitchens was located by the opposition forces. Whether they followed me to the hotel after court or picked up her trail through electronic means didn’t matter at this point. They had found my key witness.
“What did the note say?” I asked.
“She wouldn’t tell me,” Cisco said. “She’s scared and crying. I can go up to her room, but I’ll miss whoever did this.”
“No, you stay there. I’ll call her.”
“All right.”
I disconnected.
“Trouble?” Maggie asked.
“They’re fucking with my witness,” I said. “I had her stashed out at the Huntington.”
“This is the ethicist?”
“Yeah. I need to call and calm her down.”
I got up and punched in the number of the burner I had given Naomi. I walked out onto the front deck while the call went through. Naomi answered with a statement that drilled a spike into me.
“Mickey, I can’t testify.”
“Whoa, whoa, Naomi, what’s going on?”
“I just can’t testify. That’s all you need to know. Lily and I are going home tomorrow. And I’m hanging up now.”
“Naomi, wait. Just listen to me.”
I paused. She didn’t hang up. I had to think of something.
“Look, you can’t just go home,” I said. “You are a subpoenaed witness. If you don’t show up, the judge will send the marshals to find you and bring you to court. You could be arrested if you don’t show.”
“What are you talking about?” she said, her voice shrill. “Arrested? For what?”
“Well, you asked for a subpoena so you could get out of work. The judge issued it and now you need to show up. If you don’t, the judge can send the marshals after you.”
“I can’t believe this.”
The judge would send the marshals only if I asked her to, but I wasn’t going to mention that.
“Look, Naomi, let’s calm down for a second and talk about this,” I said. “First, is Lily there with you?”
“No, she went down to get something to eat,” Naomi said. “Cisco was watching her.”
“Okay, good. Now, Cisco said you told him that somebody just slipped a note under the door to your room. Is that what happened?”
“I was in the bathroom, and when I came out I saw it there on the floor.”
My phone started buzzing with another call. Cisco.
“Naomi, just hold on a second. Cisco’s calling me.”
I put the call on hold and switched over.
“No go,” Cisco said. “It was one of the valets here at the hotel. Somebody drove up in a Tesla and gave him a hundred bucks to slip the note under the door. He didn’t get a plate, and his description fits half the people in the city: male, white, eyeglasses, silver-gray Tesla. That’s it.”
“All right, I have to get back to Naomi before we lose her,” I said. “Stay there till I call you back.”
I switched over again. “Naomi, I’m back. You there?”
“Yes.”
“Tell me what the note says.”
There was no response.
“Naomi, I can’t help you if I don’t know what’s going on. What did the note say?”
“It just had a name written on it. Alison Sterling.”
“Okay. Who is Alison Sterling?”
Another pause.
“Naomi? Who is Alison Sterling?”
“Me. It’s me.”
32
I spent a restless night worrying about what to do about a runaway witness while Maggie opened her phone what seemed like every twenty minutes to check the Times app to see if the story and editorial had been posted. By morning, there was still nothing. Bleary-eyed, I walked down the steps of the front deck to get the printed edition of the paper — still a loyal subscriber despite its basically being yesterday’s news today. Once I was back inside, Maggie grabbed it from me and nearly ripped it apart looking for the story about her alleged incapacity.
There was nothing there. But there was a story about the start of the Tidalwaiv trial that I managed to save to read later.
“Any chance this whole thing was a hoax?” I asked. “You said you’d never heard of the reporter before.”
“No, it sounded too legit,” Maggie said. “I could hear people in the background and typewriters clicking.”
“Typewriters? They don’t use typewriters.”
“Keyboards, whatever. It wasn’t a hoax. They just delayed it for some reason. Probably to dig up more dirt on me.”
“Then you should make a move that will make the story look stupid if they print it.”
I walked into the kitchen to brew a double-shot espresso on the machine. I needed something to get me going. Maggie followed me.
“What kind of move?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “But think about it: All your press conferences this year have been about prosecutions related to the fires. L.A. is a big place, and most people never go through Altadena or the Palisades and Malibu. To them, the fires are what they saw on TV. You’ve got to have something else. Something else big that you can announce to show that you’re in charge of the whole county. That it’s not just about the fires with you.”
Maggie opened her mouth to say something that would push back on the suggestion. But then she closed it. I could see her mind racing as she came around to the idea.
“If you don’t have anything, I can give you something,” I said.
“What, about your case?” she said. “We’re not finished with the psych eval on Aaron Colton. I’m not going to rush that. I told you I wouldn’t.”
“No, my other case. David Snow. I told you about it. I’m gonna get him out, and everybody likes an innocent-man story. You could announce a move to review his case, and it would be on every channel at six.”