“No, she should never have married him in the first place. He caught her on the rebound, a bad one. The final straw was all about money. She had the money in the bank to help me get out of jail, but the accounts are in both names. She couldn’t touch it and he said no. Kept saying no. She issued an ultimatum, then walked out.”
“I’m proud of her.”
“She always liked you.”
“Let’s talk about something else.”
They turned onto another street and ambled along. He asked, “What are your plans?”
“I’m scrambling, Simon, as you might guess. I can’t stay here. The kids are in new schools because they have to be in school, right? But they’re about to get yanked around again when I find a job.”
“No way you’re going home?”
“Absolutely not. I’m not sure you realize how bad things are these days, Simon. The press has thoroughly smeared you. Hungry lawyer seduces rich widow then poisons her. You can’t find three people in Braxton who believe otherwise.”
“You were always blunt.”
“Maybe you need some bluntness.”
“No, I don’t. I know it’s bad, believe me. Where are you going?”
“I don’t know. I’m on the phone and computer all day looking for a job and there are some prospects.”
They walked for a long time in silence, until they were cold. When his car was in sight she said, “It’s almost ten. My parents will be home in a minute. You want to say hello?”
“I’ll do it tomorrow. Okay if I take the kids out for pancakes?”
“They would like that.”
He checked into a Hyatt near the campus of VCU and went straight to the bar. Landy was waiting in a dark booth, the perfect spot for a little rendezvous. He had called her on the drive down. She had been expecting another lonely Friday night, with hubby stalking some bad guys in Florida.
They talked about him for a minute or two. She broke the news that she and her husband had agreed, on Christmas Day no less, to split and peacefully go their separate ways. There was nothing left of the marriage, and, thankfully, no children to fight over.
Then they went through the jail talk. As a veteran FBI agent who threw people into jail, she was curious about what it was like in there. Simon downplayed it and refused to whine.
“We’re talking confidentially, okay Landy? You’re not an agent right now and I’m not a lawyer. Just two old friends.”
“Friends and lovers,” she said with a wicked grin.
His heart fluttered but he controlled himself. He gave her the facts as he knew them. The autopsy results, the toxicology reports, his visits to the hospital, the visits of others, or those he knew of. He mentioned a few names of his top suspects and described both his will and Wally’s.
After they ordered second drinks, Simon said, “I need your help. I didn’t do the crime, okay?”
“I know that, Simon. I didn’t believe it the first time I heard it.”
“Thank you. I didn’t do it, but someone did. Someone laced the ginger cookies with thallium. Have you ever heard of thallium?”
“Maybe, somewhere during training.”
“Anyway, I have to dig and I need your help. As far as the police are concerned the investigation is over. They have their man. They’ve closed their case file and given it to the prosecutor. Just like that.”
“I’m not sure about this, Simon. We are strictly prohibited from any sideline work. We can’t moonlight. We have more than enough cases of our own.”
“I get that, but you’ve got to help me track down the poison. I don’t have the money to hire a private investigator, nor does my lawyer. Hell, I’m barely paying him. I’ll do the snooping around Braxton — the hospital, the nurses, the orderlies, the janitors, the florists. I can handle that part of the investigation, but I can’t find the source to thallium without help. It’s been banned in this country for thirty years. Where did it come from and how do you get it?”
She said, reluctantly, “Let me think about it.”
The drinks arrived. She sipped wine and he gulped beer.
With a smile she asked, “Want to talk about our divorces?”
“Please.”
“Good. After you called, I took a long hot bath, shaved my legs, picked the skimpiest lingerie I own, and dressed for the evening.”
“You look great.”
“Wait till you see the lingerie. We’re going up to your room now, Simon, and I’m not taking no for an answer.”
“Who’s saying no?”
Chapter 39
Raymond convinced Judge Pointer to skip a formal arraignment and allow Simon to enter a not-guilty plea on paper. It was a formality anyway, and given the throng that showed up for the simple bail hearing, Raymond preferred to avoid the attention. The not-guilty plea was recorded, and Commonwealth of Virginia v. Simon F. Latch entered the docket. Simon and Raymond agreed that there was no benefit in stalling and decided to request a speedy trial, the speedier the better. Cora Cook was not in a position to object. As the chief prosecutor, it was important for her to aggressively go after the criminals. She had, after all, ramrodded the indictment through the grand jury, then asked for a huge bond in an effort to keep Simon in jail. She could never show weakness, not that she was inclined to anyway. The voters expected nothing less. She agreed to fast-track the case, and joined the defense in a motion to place it on what was informally known as the “rocket docket.” Judge Pointer was happy to accommodate both sides and set a trial date of May 23.
The reality was that Simon’s was the only murder case in Braxton at the moment, and the town had never seen such attention. Journalists snooped around, digging for unique angles. Every lawyer in town was approached for a comment, though most declined. Two true-crime shows, allegedly from Hollywood but actually from Reno and St. Paul, excited the locals with their equipment trailers and bulky cameras. What they were filming was anybody’s guess. At least twice a day a reporter with a film crew stood on the edge of Main Street and shot footage of Simon’s office, with its permanently locked door. Tillie was just behind it, always jittery. She was monitoring the story in the press and online, and her scrapbook was filling up quickly. Simon had no desire to look at it.
“Simon sightings” were rare because he seldom left his building. He peeked through the shades upstairs and often saw reporters lurking in the alley. He was isolated, depressed, and frightened about the trial and his future. He seldom ate and Tillie fussed at him about his weight, as she continued to tone up.
He spent hours at his desk writing, by hand — nothing in the computer — and compiling his notes on Netty’s final days. He broke down each one, almost hour by hour, with as much detail as he could recall. Her movements, his movements, her auto accident, his trips to the hospital, who else was there, who were the doctors and nurses, and so on. She had been admitted on December 17, and died on Wednesday, December 30. He charted every day and asked Tillie to double-check her calendars and phone calls. She had made three trips to the hospital to check on Netty and take brownies. She took those damned ginger cookies that Simon had bought at Tan Lu’s. Who did she see at the hospital? Did she log in at the front desk, as required? Yes, the first time, but not for the second and third visits. The hospital was not strict about monitoring visitors.
The long dreary days of January gave way to more of the same in February. The phone simply wasn’t ringing, and for a street practice that depended on word of mouth, the traffic was far too slow. Word of mouth was out there somewhere, but it was not being kind to Simon Latch.
In the second week of February, Paula called with the news that she had found a promising job with a new retirement village in the town of Danville, four hours south on the North Carolina state line. Danville was roughly the size of Braxton, with good schools and even a small college, and about as far away as possible while still being in Virginia. She had found an apartment and they would be moving in a matter of days. Her parents were driving her crazy and the kids were climbing the walls. Yes, it was all quite unsettling, but finally they were making progress. He volunteered to help with the move-in and she invited him to join the party.