The Rita Farmer Mystery series Box Set Page 12

  On the other hand, how horrible is it to have an affair? Was I just being too Midwestern? I know you’re not supposed to break up another person’s marriage, especially when there’s a kid involved. But really. It’s not like I’d be committing murder.

  I thought those thoughts, then hated myself. I had to get my brain away from them.

  “Gary, I’ve been looking into Tracy’s methods, you know?” When I’m freaked out I start talking like a Valley Girl. “Including talking to Deputy Scanlon at lunch sometimes?”

  “Who’s Deputy Scanlon?”

  “Uh, one of the bailiffs? And he told me—this is a rumor, OK, but I’m seeing it on the Internet too—that she’s been known to tamper with witnesses. The win-at-all-costs thing might be—”

  He stabbed that away with his fork. “Oh, I’ve heard that too. They say she gave somebody a script once, but mainly she makes deals. That’s not tampering. Let’s say you’ve got this lowlife up for possession and assault, and you offer to drop the possession if he’ll talk about his old cellmate you’ve picked up for rape. That’s a deal. Now, if you somehow let that lowlife know what you’re looking for—what you wish he might have seen or heard—that’s wrong. That’s tampering. But it’s actually hard for a prosecutor to do that, because your opponent’s going to grill the hell out of the guy on cross, and unless you’ve really done a lot of work—a lot of tampering!—you’re gonna look bad, if not get busted for it. It’s a huge risk to take.”

  He paused to eat some more salad. I chowed down mine. “I think with Tracy,” he said, “maybe there’s a finer line between dealing and tampering than there should be. I don’t know. I don’t know. In this case, what opportunity would she have had? To do what? There’s no such witness. See?”

  He was so damn smart. “Yeah.”

  “So that’s it.”

  “Well,” I ventured, “since we’re on the topic of rumors...”

  “Now what?”

  “It was in Mimi Pappas’s column that the Tenaway fortune isn’t as big as most people thought.”

  “How would she know that?”

  “Well, I don’t know.”

  Impatiently, he said, “Well, Eileen made one payment to me when we got going, and I’ve seen her last Merrill Lynch statement. I think my bill’s gonna be covered, anyway.”

  “OK.”

  “Rita, what is all this?”

  I met his gaze. “I want to know what happened that night.”

  He looked at me disbelievingly. He opened his mouth to say something.

  We heard a sound in the outer office.

  My heartbeat, already in high gear from being alone with Gary, went into firebell mode.

  Gary glanced at his watch. He rose without hurrying.

  Dread surged through me. “There’s someone out there,” I said needlessly.

  The door swung open and a woman in the prime of her beauty walked in. She wore Ralph Lauren and Gucci, and, I thought I detected in the air, Caron’s Poivre. She carried a sleepy Jade in her arms.

  “Jacqueline,” said Gary.

  “We couldn’t sleep,” she said in a friendly voice, staring a hole straight through my forehead.

  Gary said, “This is Rita Farmer, the newest member of the Tenaway defense team. Rita, Jacqueline Kwan.”

  She was blonder than me, spritelier than me, and nervier than me.

  Glancing at our empty salad boxes and scrawled notes, she said, “Looks like you were just wrapping up.”

  “That’s a fact,” said Gary.

  Chapter 14 – The Man in the Gallery

  As the trial moved into week three, I found myself more and more relaxed in the courtroom. Gary and Tracy Beck-Rubin went at it like a couple of elk with antlers trying to knock each other into the next county. Besides the press, most of whom because of their limited wardrobes and shared cynical facial expressions had quickly become familiar to me, I noticed other regular observers. There was Padraig McGower, former partner of Richard Tenaway, now sole boss of Gemini Imports. He was there, Gary told me, to support Eileen. Gary had originally thought to call him as a character witness for her, but he was too concerned about what Beck-Rubin might pull on cross.

  “Was Eileen having an affair with him?” I asked Gary quietly during a recess.

  “Both of them have told me no,” Gary said, “but I would expect them to deny it. Tracy would probably grill him on his relationship with Richard. Practically everything about Gemini Imports would be fair game for her if I called McGower.”

  McGower stood out. He towered over everybody, even Steve Calhoun, who stood six-three in his cowboy boots. And McGower looked even taller because of his brilliant, copper-fire hair, a red explosion starting immediately above his eyebrows, which were the same color. You could tell he tried to rein in the hair by combing a waxy product into it, but you might as well hold up a sheet of giftwrap to deflect a hurricane. With his broad back and sloping shoulders, McGower looked as powerful as a longshoreman. He wore perfectly cut suits—dark silk or pure featherweight wool, in deep cocoa browns or black, always matched with gleaming brogues. His tie tack was a white sapphire the size of a thimble. He looked purposeful even when he was just tugging at his pant cuff.

  I wondered about him. Every time I glanced at the gallery, I saw him paying close attention, always focused on Eileen or Gary. Eileen watched for him every day, and when their eyes met they exchanged warmth. In the hallways at recesses I’d see him talking on his cell phone or standing patiently with his arms crossed. Being responsible for a multimillion-dollar company, how did he have time for all this?

  One time I said to him, “Who’s minding the store?”

  We stood at the windows outside the courtroom. It had rained in the night, and the ocean wind was chasing the spent dirty clouds over the hills to the desert, where they would evaporate before they hit Palm Springs.

  He smiled, surprised. “I am minding it.”

  I reported that to Gary and he said, “Uh-oh,” but then refused to tell me what he meant.

  Another courtroom regular was a compact guy who looked maybe like an ex-Marine, with quick eyes and a spiral notebook in his shirt pocket. He showed up about a week and a half into things. He must have developed his dark tan by accident, because it immediately began to fade back to what I guessed was his normal whiteness. I hate guys who work on their tans. He had a bruise on his cheek as well, that first day or so, which also faded away.

  He was cute in an ugly sort of way—he had this army-corps face and a crew cut, he was this very serious-looking guy who wore short-sleeved white shirts and wasn’t very tall, yet he carried himself in a relaxed, tension-free way. You’d look at a guy like that and expect him to give off rigidity, even suppressed anger, which is so common with military types. But this guy was just the opposite.

  He looked happy.

  I never saw him talk to anybody. Gary didn’t know who he was.

  There was a painful absence of family at this trial. Where were the uncles and aunts? Where was anybody, besides this redheaded businessman, who professed to care about Eileen Tenaway? Where was anybody who shared Gabriella’s blood?

  _____

  When Mark Sharma’s back acted up it made him feel ornery, a word he’d learned from Steve Calhoun. Steve was trying to be a mentor to the wispy lapsed Hindu, and Mark did appreciate this, certainly, because he was a super-smart boy, all of Varanasi had thought that! Mark appreciated Steve’s venerable wisdom, but Steve was not the one running the show.

  Mark got down on his exercise mat, flexed his knees, and rolled his lower back from side to side as Lisa Feltenberger had showed him. Her brother was a chiropractor.

  It was Gary’s attention Mark craved. It was Gary Mark wanted to emulate, it was Gary Mark wanted to tell his troubles to. Needless to say, it was Gary, also, to whom he wanted to be indispensable. He wanted to ride in on a mustang and slay the dragon.

  He stretched his back, winced, and tried to relax. Because he had taken no ti
me to exercise during this trial, he had put on a little fat around his middle, which made him look more mature. That was fine. He unbuttoned his pants and sighed.

  No one could have worked harder on the physical evidence in the Tenaway case. He had checked every single minute of chain of custody, he had researched the testing laboratories, he had found lapses in police procedure, he had reviewed similar cases and written out condensed reports suggesting possible tactics for Gary’s use and amazement.

  For Gary too was the son of brownish parents, or at least it could be said not standard white parents. Ethnic minority. And neither of them was Jewish. Gary had made it in the glamorous world of big-money legal defense in spite of that. How did he do it, Mark pondered incessantly. Certainly it had to do with bold action. Bold, independent action! Gary made people do what he wanted.

  Mark Sharma wanted to come across well. He wanted to attract a wealthy American wife as Gary had. American wives look at you with more love if you are successful and televised. Lisa Feltenberger liked him and kept offering to come over and help him with his back, but the thought of her hunching over him digging her skinny fingers into his muscles was too dreadful. He wanted to charge clients two million dollars. He did not want to go back to Varanasi as his parents were ever more loudly insisting, to marry the little girl for whom he had made a flower wreath when he was five. Dowry or no dowry. He wanted to step up to bat and throw a no-hitter.

  Who was this damned new paralegal? Who was this Rita, always at Gary’s side like a dog? What had been wrong with the original team? Rita did nothing. She acted like a mongrel to Gary and a duchess to everybody else. Why was Gary permitting her to spend so much time with him?

  He lay on his exercise mat.

  His back hurt like cotton-picking blazes.

  _____

  At lunchtime Wednesday of that third week my cell phone vibed and it was my agent. Marly said, “Sunshine, I know you haven’t heard from me forever—it’s just been a drought for your type—but OATBERGER WANTS TO SEE YOU FOR THIRD CHANCE MOUNTAIN! How’s that for a long-time-no-hear-from? Huh? Be at his office at ten tomorrow. They’re not giving pages in advance. As usual.”

  Can a heart simultaneously soar and crash?

  “Marly, I can’t.”

  “What, hon? You what?”

  “Can’t.”

  “I’m afraid I’m not hearing you properly, Rita. There must be something wrong with—”

  “Marly, listen. Petey’s in the hospital and he’s having surgery tomorrow.”

  “Oh! Oh, my. Um, who’s Petey again?”

  “My son.”

  “Oh! Well, is it—”

  “It’s a heart operation. Open-heart surgery. He has to have it right away. I have to be there. I can’t do this audition.”

  That night I sobbed my way through two pillowcases and half a box of Kleenex.

  Petey wanted to know what was wrong.

  “Mommy’s sick, baby.”

  I remember the next day with crystal clarity.

  I was in the courtroom, but in my mind I was being waved through Colonnade Studios’ main gate, my hair and face perfect, my clothes neutral, as you never know what you’ll be asked for: prairie maiden? gypsy crone? In my mind I strode into Serge Oatberger’s conference room projecting poise and quiet power.

  In my mind he nodded to me and I met his lackeys. In my mind Oatberger and I talked, and he suggested I improvise a scene with him based on his rough-out of act one.

  In my mind I was incandescent.

  In my mind I wanted to kill myself.

  In reality Tracy Beck-Rubin asked a witness, “And exactly what signs did you see of the defendant’s Valium dependency?”

  “Objection!” shouted Gary.

  Judge Davenport said nothing.

  The whole courtroom looked at him. His face had gone gray and sweaty. He leaned forward on his elbows. “Uh, sustained,” he said weakly.

  The clerk rose uncertainly.

  Judge Davenport cleared his throat and said, “I’m afraid I’m not feeling well. Recess. Half hour.” He got to his feet and tottered into his chambers.

  Half an hour later the clerk announced court was adjourned for the day. I looked at my watch. It was eleven o’clock.

  I rushed to my car, flipping open my cell phone. I screamed to Marly, “I can audition for Oatberger! Call them and tell them I’m coming!”

  “I’m on it.”

  She didn’t even ask about Petey’s heart operation. For all she knew, he’d died on the table and I was getting on with my life.

  She called while I was on the 405 to tell me they wanted to see me at two. I headed for home, where I changed into a simple beige dress and one-inch heels, and made it to the Colonnade main gate at one-thirty.

  And this time it was all for real.

  My heart clattered in my chest as I identified myself to the guard. Colonnade Studios! All that history, all the stars and directors who’d come through these gates! The air thrummed with the very essence of moviemaking: the excitement, the heartbreak, the smashes, the flops. Legends swirled everywhere.

  However, as I drove in, something caught my eye in my rearview mirror. It was a silver Mercedes just like Gary’s. “Dear God,” I muttered, pushing down panic, trying to see through the glare on the windshield. Who was inside? The Mercedes followed my Honda to the parking area, then pulled past, deeper into studio property. Now I could see the person inside and it was a young non-Asian guy in a livery cap. OK. The stab of fear went away and only the excitement remained.

  My heart throbbed so hard I felt my pulse in my toes.

  Oatberger was flanked by Mel Santoro, his cinematographer, and two murky-looking assistants, one of whom offered me a bottle of green Gatorade.

  I hate Gatorade, but everybody knows Oatberger loves it, so I accepted the cold drink and took a couple of wretched sips.

  Oatberger quizzed me to see how familiar I was with his films, then he stood up with me and asked me to talk to him as if I were a ranch wife whose husband had gone to fight Pancho Villa across the Rio Grande. “Your name is Emily Rounceville, you’ve just given birth to your fifth child,” he said, “and I’m the rancher next door. I’m not a nice man.”

  Nice or not, he was thoroughly tanned, with that signature shaved head. You could almost take him for a Moroccan, or maybe a burly Egyptian, with the right headwear. He wore little silver glasses, which made him look in a constant state of narrow, intense focus.

  He began the improvisation by telling me he was kicking me and the kids and old gramps off our ranch.

  I avoided doing the clichéd weary country wife posture of bracing my back with my hands. Instead, as I worked the scene, I shifted my weight from side to side as if my feet hurt. I had some indignation ready, as I knew Oatberger liked his heroines indignant. I underplayed it, though, wanting to let my emotion build slowly.

  I sensed he was trying to goad me into playing it obviously, trying to push me into a crying rage, so I resisted. I held my temper back, showing it was there, but holding it as if it were an unbroken horse. Right then I got the idea to metaphorically be a proud mare, and so I imagined equine feelings. I lifted my head warily and flared my nostrils, shifted my hips. I loosened my jaw.

  I talked in short sentences about how our families, his and mine, were close. When you’re close you don’t expect news like this. When you get news like this you got to think about it. You got to think what to do.

  I looked at him as if I were planning to kill him with my teeth as soon as he turned his back.

  If you ask me, I was incandescent.

  Oatberger merely muttered, “Thank you.”

  Chapter 15 – “Try gasping.”

  Judge Davenport felt better the next day, Friday, and the trial resumed. Marly left me a message saying Oatberger typically takes weeks and weeks deciding on his leads, which evidently was what I’d auditioned for. I couldn’t imagine what the hell I’d do if he wanted me back for another look before th
e trial ended. Even though I had carefully trained myself to think positive after auditions, I knew my odds were slim; Oatberger typically met with dozens of hopefuls per lead before making up his mind.

  Tracy Beck-Rubin brought forth a Montessori mom who testified that Eileen had once pointed to Gabriella and said bitterly, “If she’s lucky, she’ll die young!”

  Gary objected all over the place, but this wasn’t his day. Using witnesses as her colors and questions as her brushstrokes, the frumpy-cat prosecutor painted a picture of Eileen as Mom From Hell. You almost started to be glad Gabriella was dead and spared the horror of growing up Eileen Tenaway’s child. I watched the jurors gradually abandon their natural skepticism and start to climb into Beck-Rubin’s pocket. She could see it and feel it too, and it felt mighty good.

  That night, an exhausted Gary took it out on me, half rightly. “Rita, whatever you’re doing with Eileen—it’s not working.” He paced his undersized office, the black dark shining in through the windows. I fidgeted at the conference table. “I’m busting my hump against Tracy every day here—and the judge!—and all we’re doing is losing ground. It’s obvious, I look at that jury and I see that they’ve totally gone with Tracy, they’re not even glancing at Eileen anymore, and when they do they look at her like she’s a toad.” He stopped pacing. “Do you agree with me?”

  I sighed, “I don’t want to agree with you.”

  He did not smile. “What are you going to do? What are you going to change? You’ve got to start pulling more weight around here, or I’m going to have to—”

  “Gary.” I loved how the fury flashed from his eyes, but I didn’t want to hear him threaten to fire me. “OK. Calm down.” I toggled my pen in my fingers. “I admit I’ve been stalling. Afraid to try something different, maybe.”

  He began to speak again, but I said, “I have an idea.”

  _____