High in Trial

EIGHT

Eighteen hours, forty minutes before the shooting





Twice a week, Buck and Wyn met for dinner at a steak house on the highway midway between their two homes. The food was good, and it was usually so late by the time they got there that the family hour was over and the place was relatively quiet. The restaurant was open until midnight, so they could relax in a booth over dessert and coffee for an hour or two and unwind from the day.

Tonight, however, Buck was having a difficult time leaving the day behind. And Wyn, who’d always had one of the keenest detective minds he’d ever known, was just as intrigued as he was over the Berman case. She studied the file over a cup of soft serve vanilla ice cream, her hair falling forward to shadow her face as she absently licked the ice cream off the spoon.

“Bad dude,” she observed, turning a page. “Three assaults, walked on every one. Forgery, fraud, possession… I can’t believe he never did time before this.”

“That’s because he never came up before Judge Stockton before,” Buck said. The red vinyl seat creaked as he leaned back against it, stretching out his legs, sipping his coffee. “Nothing pissed off the judge more than a criminal who got off on a technicality. The thing is, he didn’t blame the criminal—he blamed the law. And if you were the arresting officer who screwed up and didn’t get the right warrant or forgot to read a Spanish-speaking person his rights in Spanish, he not only made you wish you’d never walked into his courtroom, he’d make you wish you’d never been born before you walked out. He used to say we were the torchbearers, and he would always hold us to a higher standard, because if you couldn’t count on the guys who fought on the side of right, then what were any of us here for?”

Wyn glanced up, smiling. “He sounds like a real old-fashioned hanging judge. Were you ever in his courtroom?”

Buck shook his head. “He retired before I joined the force. But he’s the reason I went into law enforcement, and that’s no lie. As a kid I spent just about as much time over at the Stockton place as I did at my own, and I guess he taught me pretty much everything I know about the justice system… and more than that, about morality and standing up for what was right. He was one of those legends, the kind you read about in books, like Daniel Webster or Justice Holmes… At least he seemed that way to me.” He shrugged a little self-consciously. “A hanging judge? Not really. But he was a stickler for what was right.”

Wyn nodded thoughtfully, scraping up the last spoonful of ice cream from her cup. “So why do you suppose he let this guy plead to second?”

“You got me.”

Wyn finished her ice cream and turned the last page in the file. “Well, I don’t see anything that would trigger an alarm bell here. Did you talk to his parole officer?”

Buck nodded grimly. “He was on a weekly schedule and hasn’t checked in in two weeks.”

“Uh-oh.” Wynn put down her spoon. “That’s not good.”

“No. It’s not.” Buck took a sip of coffee. “According to his parole officer, he was living with his brother and helping him out with his construction business. The brother hasn’t heard from him in a week.”

“That he’ll admit to.”

“Right. He also hasn’t seen one of the company pickup trucks in about that long.”

“So we’ve got a recently released murderer—”

“Second degree,” Buck reminded her.

“Right, second degree murderer that the trial judge was worried about…”

“Nobody said ‘worried,’” Buck corrected. “All Roe said was that the judge wanted to keep an eye on him.”

She leveled a look on him. “Yeah, so maybe the guy was the judge’s long lost illegitimate son or the innocent victim of a frame and he wanted to make sure prison wasn’t too hard on him. The judge was worried about Berman getting out. He served all but five years of his sentence, which means he was no angel in prison. He hasn’t checked in with his parole officer in two weeks and he seems to have gone on the road. So what we have to figure out is what Judge Stockton was worried about. Who did he think this guy would go after when he got out?”

“Yeah.” Buck blew out a breath. “That’s all we’ve got to figure out.”

Wyn said casually, “Did you talk to Raine?”

The two of them had come to an understanding early in their relationship that there was no way to keep Raine’s name from coming up now and again. Buck had known her all his life and had been married to her most of it. Wyn had been friends with Raine before… well, before. All of their lives were entwined, and they always would be. Still, it was awkward. And Buck couldn’t prevent an automatic shifting of his gaze when he heard her name. He didn’t like it when his worlds collided, or even brushed up against one another. He never knew how to react.

“No,” he replied, “the judge never discussed his cases with the family. Besides, that was twenty years ago. She was just a kid. What would she know? Maude might remember something though,” he added. “Maybe I’ll give her a call tomorrow.”

Wyn reached across the table and snagged his pinky finger with her own. “You know,” she reminded him gently, “it was twenty years ago. The person who put in the notification request is dead. I wonder if…”

She let the sentence trail off and started to look away, but Buck held her gaze. “If I’m making a bigger deal out of this than it needs to be. And if maybe the reason I’m doing it is because of Raine?”

Wyn pulled her hand away. “Okay,” she said quietly. “Maybe.”

He was silent for a moment, his eyes clear and thoughtful. “I’ve thought about that. If it had been anybody besides Judge Stockton, I might’ve let it go. Maybe I should let it go.”

Wyn said, “But?”

He took another sip of coffee, glanced at his cup, and set it on the table. “But,” he said simply, “my gut tells me that would be a big mistake.”

She looked at him for a time, saying nothing. Then she nodded once, slowly, and opened the file again. “Okay,” she said. “So let’s start at the beginning. 9:15 p.m., some guy bearing a striking resemblance to Berman robs the Cash-n-Carry on Highway 11 of two thousand sixty-four dollars, in the process shooting one Gerald Sailor, night clerk, who later died of his injuries. Witnesses claimed that in the act of making his escape, the perpetrator scraped his vehicle—a reddish-brown Chevy pickup truck—against the pylon next to the pumps. No security tape, huh?”

Buck shook his head. “It was just a mom-and-pop place. Still is, I guess, but now they have cameras at the pumps and behind the register. Too many people driving off without paying, with the price of gas so high. I get a call two or three times a week.”

“Do you ever catch them?”

He shrugged. “If they’re local. If not, I turn it over to the state patrol. But I guess the cameras are worth it for the small business owner now. Back then, not so much.”

Wyn looked back down at the file. “Two hours later, Berman is stopped for DUI with two thousand fourteen dollars in cash in his glove box and a pistol matching the description of the one used in the robbery, along with a receipt from the Cash-n-Carry. Too bad the machine didn’t time stamp it. His vehicle, a primer-painted 1989 Chevy pickup, showed damage on the right front fender with streaks of green or blue paint.” She glanced up at him. “So the only thing I’m wondering is why a guy would pay for twenty dollars worth of gas, save the receipt, and then rob the cash register at gunpoint.”

Buck frowned a little. “He was stoned. Who knows why they do the crazy things they do?” But the way he said it made her think he’d asked the same question.

“Who was his lawyer?”

“Court appointed. Don Kramer.”

“Senior?”

“Junior. He would’ve been just starting out then. Naturally his old man would give him all the grunt work.”

“Still, he must have done an interview.”

Buck’s lips tightened with a dry smile. “I need you back on the force.”

“You just let me know when you make up your mind.”

He reached for the folder with a small shake of his head. “Who am I kidding? I don’t have time to go chasing down clues on a twenty-year-old crime. If there was anything there to see, Roe would’ve seen it. And I don’t even know what I’m looking for.”

“What you’re looking for,” Wyn reminded him simply, “is answers. Why Judge Stockton thought it was important to keep tabs on this guy for twenty years. Why he hasn’t checked in with his parole officer in two weeks. What one thing has to do with the other.”

“Which is probably nothing.” Buck picked up the check. “Come on, let’s get out of here. Long drive home.”

“So,” Wyn said as they stood at the register and waited for the clerk to swipe Buck’s credit card, “what’s the verdict?”

“About what?”

“You know about what. The one thing you haven’t brought up all night.”

He draped an arm around her shoulders as they walked out into the night. There were only a handful of cars in the parking lot, scattered like islands in a misty sea of mercury vapor lights. He said, “I talked to a guy in Asheville. He said they were going to have some openings in the police department next month.”

She stopped walking and looked up at him. “You? Leave Hanover County?”

He said, “We talked about it. Maybe picking up and starting over some place new.”

“Yeah, but… I thought you meant Fiji or Belize or some deserted Pacific island somewhere.”

He laughed softly. “Yeah, well, baby steps. Your folks are up that way,” he added, watching her, “and it would be good to work together again. That is, if you’d be interested…”

She bumped his arm gently with her shoulder. “Dope. I’m making twelve fifty an hour walking patrol around the hospital parking lot and living in a furnished studio apartment. Anything is a step up from that. But you’ve lived in Hansonville all your life. All your friends are there. Everybody knows you… You’d win the election, you know. Who would run against you? And more importantly, who would be better at the job?”

He replied simply, “I’ll never be another Roe Bleckley. Maybe it’s time I made my own place in the world.”

He walked her to her car and waited while she unlocked the door. She had parked next to a streetlight, its base protected by a florescent yellow concrete bumper. Buck stared at the bumper, frowning a little. “Say, Wyn,” he said, “you’ve been to the Cash-n-Carry, right?”

She glanced up at him as she slid into the driver’s seat of her car, her face illuminated by the glow of the courtesy lights. “Sure. I stop there to fill up every time I leave your place.”

“You remember what color the pylons are at the pumps?”

She was thoughtful for a minute. “I want to say yellow. Maybe that’s just because most of them are. Safety yellow.”

“Yeah,” said Buck. “Most of them are. I wonder if there was ever a time when they were painted green?”

“And if not,” said Wyn, catching on immediately, “how did green paint get on Berman’s truck?”

“And why didn’t his lawyer follow up on that?”

Wyn smiled at him, recognizing the signs of a mind that had already left her, worrying at the knots of a tangled problem. “Let me know what you find out, okay?”

“Sure thing.” He bent to kiss her, but his tone was absent, his caress routine. “You drive carefully now.”

She laughed as she put the car in gear. “You, too, officer.”



~*~