Cary scratched the stubble of a five o’clock shadow on his jaw. “Sure, right—it was a combination of business and pleasure. We went to a bar, shot the shit, caught up on old college friends. Got some good advice on the corporate stuff. You know, I wanted to pay Lee for his time, but he wouldn’t charge me a dime for it. He didn’t even let me pick up the dinner tab.”
That sounded typical. Lee loved to pick up a check. It gave him the opportunity to show off his fancy American Express card.
“Since he wouldn’t accept anything, I got an idea. I’d give him a present instead. A gift. I told Lee that I had something for him, but I needed to deliver it to his hotel.”
“And?”
“And before too long, I showed up at Lee’s hotel room with a bottle of twelve-year-old Scotch.”
“The police report said it was Macallan Scotch.”
“Yes, ma’am. And there was a bonus. We’d just sat down when a little hooker knocked on the door.”
I kept my voice businesslike. “How did you locate a hooker in that brief space of time? And why?”
Cary shot me an “aw, shucks” grin. “I know where to look. I know Vicksburg pretty damn good. And I know Lee Greene really well.”
I ignored the reference to Lee’s preferences. “Let’s talk about the Scotch. Where did you get it?”
“Liquor store, not far from the restaurant. In the Battlefield Shopping Center.”
“Had it ever been opened?”
“No, ma’am. It was virgin, Ruby.” He winked at me.
I pressed on. “When you came into the hotel room, did you both have a drink?”
“I got in there to his room at the Magnolia Inn, and we got some ice from the machine, and I poured one for Lee, one for myself. But I never got a chance to taste it. The call girl came in right about then, and she took the glass from my hand. She sat on Lee’s lap and knocked that drink back.”
“Did you pour another one?”
“No! I left, to give them privacy. I wanted to pay him back.”
I finished my notes, then reached into my briefcase and pulled a pink subpoena out of a file folder. Reaching across the desk, I handed it to him. “Cary, here’s your subpoena for Lee’s trial. I’ll need you in court on Friday. You may have to sit around the courthouse hallway before you’re called to the stand.”
He tossed it onto a stack of loose papers. “You don’t need to give me that. I guarantee I’ll be at that trial. I owe him.”
I shoved the pad into my bag and dug for my keys. “I went to Ole Miss, too. Graduated from undergrad about five years ago.”
“Well, that makes you a few years older than me, I guess,” he said, looking at me with surprise.
“Oh, I’m ancient. Twenty-seven. Got one foot in the grave.”
He scratched his jaw again. “That right?”
“Were we on campus at the same time? Do you think we ever had a class together?”
He cleared his throat. “Probably not. I wasn’t there that long. I dropped out and went into business on my own.” He flashed the grin again. “You don’t have to have a degree to be a kick-ass salesman.”
“Just a degree in kick-ass.”
He threw back his head and laughed. “Yes, ma’am. I’ve got a degree in that.”
He followed me out of the office as I left, saying, “See you in court. You know I’ll do whatever I can to help ol’ Lee.”
As I slid into my driver’s seat, I said, “I’m glad to hear it. Your testimony could make all the difference.”
But as I drove back to Rosedale, I puzzled over the information he’d shared, wishing I had asked more questions. The whole story about the hotel still didn’t make sense. Lee had said from the outset that he couldn’t remember anything after the first drink at the hotel. He only dimly recalled the prostitute coming to the room. He could remember that she was pretty, that she was black, that she was wearing red fishnet hose. But that’s all.
I knew what the DA would claim in court: the young prostitute went into a coma and died during a sex act with Lee, with a toxic mix of alcohol and drugs in her system. The prosecution would tell the jury that the girl’s drink was drugged, that she died from an overdose of Rohypnol—roofies, the “date rape drug.”
Isaac Keet would contend it couldn’t be self-inflicted. No one roofies herself.
But that raised another curious issue—one that I would introduce. The prostitute was there in a “professional” capacity. Who roofies a hooker?
Chapter 56
IN MY OFFICE early the next morning, I paced in front of the storefront window, waiting for Suzanne to arrive. She couldn’t stand me up for the second day in a row. There was too much at stake.
A car pulled into one of the parking spots directly in front of my building on the square. I pressed my hands to the glass and squinted; the sun had risen to the point where it blinded me from my vantage point.
But it wasn’t Suzanne’s car. A young man emerged from the vehicle and shuffled to my office door. His shoulders were slumped.
He tried the doorknob, but it was locked. I wasn’t open for business. It wasn’t even eight o’clock. He stepped over to the storefront and cupped his hands around his face to see inside. Then he rapped on the glass. Apparently, he’d spied me inside the building.
For a second, I considered sneaking off down the hallway to hide, but it wouldn’t do to be impolite. My mama didn’t raise me that way.
I unlocked the front door and cracked it open. Raising my hand to block the glare of the morning sun, I now recognized the man. It was Deputy Brockes, dressed in jeans and a Crimson Tide sweatshirt.
“Morning, Deputy. What can I do for you?”
His face was unnaturally pale, making the circles under his eyes stand out in contrast. “I need to see Miss Greene.”
He stepped forward, so I blocked the entrance. “She’s not here, Deputy. We’re not open yet.” I tapped the letters painted on the door. “Our office hours are nine to five, usually. But we’re in trial right now.”
His head ducked. Recalling the scene in court the day before, I knew it hadn’t been necessary to mention the trial. Looking at his unlined forehead, I wondered what role this young man could have played in the demise of my witness from Vicksburg.
“It’s okay,” he said. “I can wait.”
I opened my mouth to protest, but then Suzanne’s Lexus roared around the corner and zipped into the spot next to Brockes’s car. The deputy ran up to the driver’s side of the Lexus and stood beside the window as she rolled it down.
To Brockes, she said, “Looks like you beat me here.”
“Thank you so much for seeing me, Miss Greene.”
She unbuckled her seat belt and exited the car, pulling her enormous Dooney & Bourke briefcase along. “Come on in, hon, and let’s talk.”
I held the door open, glowering as Suzanne entered the office with Brockes at her heels. “Suzanne, we need a chance to confer before court.”
She swept right past me. “Plenty of time for that, after I’m done with this young man.”
The deputy dogged her tracks all the way to Suzanne’s private office space. “Thanks so much, ma’am. Everybody says you’re the best lawyer in this part of Mississippi, you know that?”
“That so?” Suzanne said as she waved the man into her office. Then she pulled the door shut with a solid click.
Shaking my head, I went to my own desk. I had a phone call to make. I looked through my handwritten notes, made on the night I’d first met Detective Guion in the sketchy bar in Vicksburg. I could swear he gave me a name: a man on the Vicksburg police force he trusted.
I scanned the notes with a sharp eye, but it took two reviews of my chicken scratch handwriting before I found the officer’s name. I picked up my phone and dialed hastily, hoping I’d get a human on the other end, rather than a recording.
I was in luck. “Connect me with Officer Beau George, please,” I said, and the receptionist connected me. A man’s voice spoke in a gravelly drawl.
“This is George. I’m unavailable, but you can leave a message when you hear the tone.”
Lord, yes, I’d leave a message: a desperate plea, begging him to return my call. I’d just ended the phone call and was sorting through the manila folders I needed for the second day of evidence when I heard the front door open. A man’s voice called: “Hello? Anybody home?”