State vs Lassiter Read online

  That unnerves some people. Not me. As a trial lawyer, I’m an actor on a stage in-the-round, so I’m not bothered by folks staring into my ears or at my butt, should they be so inclined. But this was different. These weren’t spectators judging my performance. These were suspicious bloodhounds.

  “You and the decedent checked in yesterday at 4:25 p.m.,” Barrios began, without consulting his notes. “You got yourself comped on a two thousand dollar a night suite.”

  “That a crime?” I was staring at the digital recorder Barrios had placed on the table, thinking I ought to go light on the sarcasm. What I really should do was shut up. No one has ever talked a cop into believing he is innocent.

  “You asked the concierge to book an 8 o’clock reservation at Prime 112. Then you called room service and ordered a bottle of Cristal and stone crab appetizers for two. The waiter set up the order on the balcony off the second floor master bedroom. The decedent drank the champagne. You had two beers from the refrigerator.”

  “You sure it wasn’t the other way around?”

  “Only if those lipstick stains on the champagne glass were yours.”

  While the techs had been swabbing and dusting and clicking photos, Detective Barrios had been doing his homework, and I had been sweating.

  “You used the Jacuzzi,” he continued. “Had sex. Showered, dressed and caught a cab in front of the hotel at 7:42 p.m. The decedent was wearing the same outfit as when she was killed.”

  I was supposed to be impressed, but it wasn’t working. There were security cameras at the valet parking kiosk that would have picked us up getting into the cab. The tapes would show the time and what Pamela was wearing.

  As for the Jacuzzi, those were just assumptions, probably from the wet towels. Except it had just been me. Pamela declined, saying she didn’t want to ruin her hair. But there’d been no sex, despite my hopes for romps both before and after dinner. As it turned out, we didn’t have time before going to Prime 112. After dinner, there was plenty of time, but we’d been squabbling instead of canoodling. So, Lieutenant Columbo just screwed the pooch on that one. Had he just been guessing?

  “This sex we had,” I said to the detective. “Was it good for me?”

  He looked at me with tired eyes. “That’s pretty flippant for someone whose girlfriend was just murdered.”

  “Lover. Pam was my lover. I’m too old for girlfriends.”

  Emilia leaned forward and exhaled a little puff of air. I’d almost forgotten she was there. “You don’t seem overly upset by her death.” She sounded personally offended.

  “You have no idea how I feel, Emilia. But I know where you two are coming from.”

  “Do tell.”

  “Step one of the nine steps of interrogation. Positive Confrontation. You’re showing me you already have all this stuff, and I’m supposed to wonder what else you have.”

  “What do you think we have?” Barrios said, resuming control. He probably preferred the prosecutor to keep quiet. Her turn would come in court.

  “Credit card records from the restaurant,” I said. “You’ll know what we ate and drank and how big a tip I left. You probably already woke up the maître d’ who told you that we argued at the table.”

  “As did your server and the couple next to you who ordered Kobe beefsteak for two.”

  Showing off again, I thought.

  “You continued arguing in the cab on the way back to the hotel and right through the front door into the lobby.”

  And all this time I thought doormen were supposed to be discreet.

  “The security camera at the front door picked up your body language, and it doesn’t take a lip reader to de-code what the decedent said to you.”

  “Millions of couples argue every day, but damn few kill each other.”

  “‘Screw you, Jake.’ That’s what she said as you came into the hotel.”

  “If I killed every woman who told me the same thing, I’d be in the books with Jack the Ripper.”

  “Do you frequently compare yourself to a serial killer who preyed on women?” Emilia broke in.

  “I was making a joke.”

  “As usual, an inappropriate one.”

  “Is this gonna get personal? Between you and me, I mean?”

  Emilia gritted her teeth. Or maybe her jaw muscles just danced like that whenever she was in her tough prosecutor mold. “Your girlfriend. Excuse me, your lover has just been murdered, and you’re cracking jokes.”

  “It’s a defense mechanism, okay? It’s the way I deal with loss.”

  “C’mon, Jake. I know you. You have a hard bark, and if you have any heart, it’s packed in concrete.”

  “Absolutely untrue. And pretty damn offensive, too.”

  In truth, I was forcing myself not to think about Pam. Trying to postpone the pain in order to concentrate. If I allowed myself to think about her, feel the heat of her breath, hear the chimes of her laugh, I could not fend off the cross-examining detective. An even deeper truth was that I cared for her. Deeply and more all the time. The relationship was going somewhere. I respected Pam’s intelligence and accomplishments. What made our argument last night so painful was the feeling of betrayal. I had trusted her with my clients’ money. What had she done? Then there was my own guilt for the failure to protect her. A wave of conflicting emotions.

  “Jake, tell us what you and Ms. Baylins argued about,” Barrios said. Double-teaming me.

  “Why don’t you ask the cab driver? Or the maître ‘de. Or that couple eating the Kobe steak.”

  “We know it had to do with your bank accounts. You accused Ms. Baylins of mishandling your accounts. She accused you of stealing from clients. Is that about it?”

  “I’ve never stolen from a client.”

  “So you must have been indignant at the allegation?”

  “Was I?”

  “I’d be furious.”

  I smiled at that. We’d just moved to step two. Theme Development. It’s where the cop looks through the eyes of the suspect and tries to establish a common bond. The cop empathizes and gains the suspect’s trust. Maybe he even says something stripping away all blame from the suspect: “Hell, who could blame a man for killing a woman who did that?”

  “I don’t steal from my clients. And I don’t kill my lovers, okay George?”

  “But you have a temper, Jake. You can’t deny that.”

  Wow. That was fast. Step three. Stopping Denials. In cop school, they teach them to interrupt all denials. They don’t want the suspect to become wedded to his story, because that will make it harder to get to step nine of the solid gold interrogation: The Confession.

  “I don’t have a temper,” I said.

  Emilia barked out a little laugh. “I remember bar fights. Jeez, one was poolside of the Hyatt at the Bar convention.”

  “That’s three times, Emilia.”

  “What is?”

  “Your personal attacks. First, I have an inappropriate sense of humor. Next, no heart so I can’t feel pain. Now, you’re practically testifying about my alleged violence.”

  “Facts are facts.”

  “C’mon, let’s get it out on the table!” I snapped.

  She fiddled with a turquoise wristband. Terry cloth to catch the sweat in a heated tennis match. But just now, I was the one sweating. “Get what out, Jake?”

  “Ah jeez. You and me. Our past.”

  “Go on.” Gesturing toward the tape recorder. “Say what you have to say.”

  “We were…how shall I put this? Involved?”

  She shook her head. “Overstates the case.”

  “Dating, then.”

  “Such a quaint term, Jake. Images of ice cream sundaes and Saturday afternoon movies.”

  Barrios leaned back in his chair. No way he wanted a piece of this.

  “Okay, we weren’t involved,” I said. We weren’t even dating. We were…?”

  “Banging, Jake. We were fuck buddies.”

  Call me old-fashioned, but I recoil w
hen a smart, olive-skinned beauty with a dozen years of parochial school and a law degree from Georgetown–a place crawling with Jesuits–drops the F-bomb.

  “Whatever you call it, Emilia, you can’t be objective about me.”

  “It was ten years ago, Jake. The statute of limitations has expired.”

  Next she’d be saying she didn’t remember it. But I did. And she was downplaying the relationship. There were some blissful days and steamy nights. So why didn’t it amount to more? Emilia was so damn competitive. And truth be told, so was I. She didn’t try to mold herself to my needs, nor I to hers. Compromise was not in either of our vocabularies. We each liked to win, not to tie.

  Pamela Baylins was the opposite. She folded herself into my life, easy and acquiescent. Restaurants, movies, trips. “Whatever you want to do, Jake.”

  With Pamela, you got what she figured you wanted her to be. Which meant, now that her apparent thievery came to light, I really didn’t know her at all. She was so unlike Emilia, who was combative and challenging, the living embodiment of a Helen Reddy song.

  “I am Woman, hear me roar.”

  Like any good trial lawyer, Emilia loved to argue. But unlike some, she couldn’t leave it in the courthouse.

  “Our brief time together is legally irrelevant,” Emilia said now. “Hell, it was irrelevant at the time.”

  “Not to me,” I said, honestly. “And that means you shouldn’t be interrogating me.”

  “Who’s interrogating? You’re giving a voluntary statement and you’re free to go at any time. Do you want to go, Jake? Do you want a lawyer? A beer? Anything?”

  “Face it. You have a conflict of interest, Emilia.”

  “Why? I thought you were just a witness. Are you saying you’re a suspect?”

  “You and your damn lawyer games. This is why we didn’t get along.”

  “We got along fine, Jake as long as all we did was fuck after Happy Hour.”

  That word again, coming from those full, seductive lips. The Trevi Fountain spouting piss.

  “I didn’t realize it until now, but you’re steamed because I stopped seeing you.”

  “So I want to frame you for murder?”

  “Who knows?”

  “For the record, you didn’t stop seeing me. I dropped you when I met that English professor from Boca.”

  “The cross dresser?”

  She slammed her hand down on the table and the recorder toppled over. “He was playing ‘Tootsie’ in Regional Theater.”

  I turned to Detective Barrios. “Is this what you two cooked up? Good cop, insane cop?”

  He gave me a little smile as if he’d just solved a Brinks’ hijacking. “You ask me, you two are made for each other.”

  “Oh, please, detective.” Emilia shot Barrios a look that could leave bruises.

  “I mean it. The scent of arousal is in the air.”

  “I’m not gonna answer any more questions with her here,” I said.

  Emilia stood and threw her hands up in surrender. “In order to make Mr. Lassiter comfortable, I’ll leave.”

  Good. I’d rather face one inquisitor than two.

  She nodded to Barrios and started for the balcony door. Little turquoise balls were fastened to the top of her tennis socks and bounced over the back of her sneakers. When she reached the door, she turned to me. “I can re-assign the case to Abe Socolow, Jake.”

  “Great. I’ve kicked his ass in court so many times, he brings a pillow to court.”

  “Or how about Abby Press? She’s new to major crimes, but she’s fair and honest.”

  “You know damn well I dated Abby for a year.”

  “Ended badly, didn’t it? Problem is, Jake, you’ve left a trail of damage wherever you go.”

  “Pick whoever you want, Emilia. The best you’ve got, because I didn’t do this.”

  “Did you love her?”

  “Who, Abby?”

  “Pamela, you idiot!”

  “Is that a personal or professional question?”

  “Screw you, Jake!”

  “I cared for her. She was my lady. We had potential together. I didn’t kill her, and I damn well want you to nail the bastard who did.”

  “I promise to do exactly that, Jake,” Emilia said. “Nail the bastard. Even if it’s you.”

  4

  Hell No!

  When the balcony door closed behind Emilia Vazquez, George Barrios gave me a half-smile and a little shrug.

  Ah, women, he seemed to be saying.

  Now, it was just the two of us guys. But the savvy detective simply picked up where my ex-whatever-she-was left off.

  “Emilia’s right about that temper of yours,” he said, evenly.

  “No way, George.”

  “C’mon, Jake. You have a propensity for violence.”

  “A propensity, is it?”

  “I remember when you got arrested for slugging a cop.”

  “A case of mistaken identity,” I said.

  “Bullshit. That was you.”

  “Yeah, but when I hit him, I didn’t know he was a cop.”

  “As a lawyer, your reputation is pretty rough.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You’re a killer in the courtroom.”

  “Hey George, they don’t call us sharks for our ability to swim.”

  Barrios made a notation in his little notebook. Maybe I’d said something inculpatory. Or maybe he was reminding himself to buy a gallon of milk on the way home.

  “Last night, you got back to the hotel just after 10 p.m. Did you go straight to your suite?”

  “Pam wasn’t in the mood for the Boom Boom Room.”

  “Boom Boom’s been closed for decades, Jake.”

  “Why wasn’t I informed? I was hoping to see Sinatra.”

  “Later, you left the suite.”

  “Obviously. The kid who thinks he’s Michael Phelps found me on the beach.”

  “What time did you leave the hotel?”

  “Don’t know.”

  That was true. I’d had too much to drink and had argued too long with Pam. But even if I knew the time, my answer would have been the same. I was in dangerous territory, treading carefully. If the M.E. established time of death earlier than my departure from the suite, I’d be screwed. And I had as much faith in those T.O.D. calculations as I do in a two-week weather forecast.

  “C’mon, Jake,” Barrios prompted me. “You must have some idea. How long were you back in the room before you left?”

  He really wanted to pin me down, and I wanted to squirm away. “No idea, George.”

  “Why’d you leave in the middle of the night?”

  “I didn’t say it was the middle of the night.”

  “Okay. Whenever you left, why? Were you still arguing?”

  I could deny it, but the scratches on my face would reveal that lie. For all I know, guests in the adjoining suite might have heard us, too.

  “We had words,” I admitted.

  “Care to share some of those words?”

  “Same stuff you’ve already heard. The trust accounts.”

  “But why’d you leave?” Barrios hammered again.

  “I’d been drinking. A lot. We both had. Best I recall, I wanted to walk on the beach, clear my head.”

  “Were you afraid of what you might do to Pam?”

  “As I recall, Pam suggested I take off for a while, get some air.”

  “So was she afraid what you’d do if you stayed in the suite?”

  “Aw, jeez, George. You gotta know better than that.”

  “What about your belt? Why’d you leave that in the room?”

  “I don’t remember taking it off. Maybe I was getting ready for bed, then decided to leave for a while.”

  “Did you strike Pam with the belt?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Wrap it around her throat?”

  “Way too early for that question. You haven’t even softened me up yet.”

  “Maybe you didn’t
intend to kill her. Scare her a bit is all. Convince her to keep her mouth shut about your bank accounts.”

  “Where’d you learn your interrogation skills, George? Law & Order?”

  “How’d you get those marks on your face?” he fired right back.

  “Pam slapped me.”

  “Slapped?”

  “A combo slap and scratch. The way a cat swipes with its paws.”

  “Had you hit her first?”

  “My Granny taught me a long time ago that only a low-life scumsucker hits a woman.”

  “So that’s a no?”

  “A hell no!”

  The book tells them to try and overcome my denials, after which the cop would become my pal and help me out. Then I would be expected to lose my resolve, which I’d show by dropping my head into my hands, maybe even crying. Barrios would pat me on the back and offer alternative motives, one of which would be understandable and maybe even socially acceptable, the other one morally repugnant. I would be expected to choose the acceptable motive – he wouldn’t care as long as I admitted the killing – and he could sharpen his pencil for a signed confession. I sure as hell wasn’t going that route.

  “Did you push or shove her?” Barrios demanded.

  “No.”

  “Grab her hard?”

  “I never touched her.”

  “Then you must have said something to provoke her to scratch you like that.”

  “I’m sure I did.”

  “What did you say?”

  I dug up the memory. Back in the suite after dinner. Drinking, arguing.

  “Dammit, Pam. What games are you playing with the money?”

  “It wasn’t me!”

  “First thing in the morning, we’re going over the accounts with Barry Samchick, and you better have some damn good explanations.”

  “Or what?”

  “I’ll find the State Attorney on the first tee at Riviera and get your ass fired.”

  “Try it. And first thing Monday, I’ll sue your ass for slander.”