I grinned. “Jason, you took a bunch of pictures of the first couple experiments, didn’t you?”
“Oh, yessir, Dr. B.,” he said. “I’ve got probably three hundred. I filled up the memory card on my camera, and it holds a gigabyte.”
“A jury’ll like this,” I said.
“I sure like it,” said Cash.
CHAPTER 18
THE PHONE RANG THE NEXT MORNING, JUST AS I WAS hoisting a spoonful of Raisin Bran to my mouth. I had the newspaper open to the comics; the combination of crisp cereal and corny cartoons was my favorite way to start the day. I looked at the clock on the wall above the stove; it read seven-thirty. “Well, damn,” I said—not because it was early (I’d been up since six) but because the cereal was sure to be soggy by the time I got off the phone. I figured it must be Jeff, Miranda, or Art calling.
“Turn on CNN right now,” said Art, and hung up.
I stared at the phone as if further enlightenment might be forthcoming from the dead receiver in my hand. When none came, I went to the living room and switched on the TV, flipping to channel 22, CNN. The screen was filled with an aerial view of a patch of pine forest, filmed from a circling helicopter. The woods framed a clearing containing a brick ranch house, a garage, a couple of ramshackle sheds, and a small garage-type building with a rusted flue projecting from the roof. The clearing was filled with law-enforcement vehicles, a few black-and-white cruisers and SUVs, but mostly the unmarked Town Cars and Crown Victorias favored by the FBI and their state-level counterparts. The caption crawling across the bottom of the screen read, “Hundreds of bodies found in Georgia woods.”
I found the scrap of paper where I had written Burt DeVriess’s cell-phone number—a number he’d never given me when I was his client, only after I took his Aunt Jean’s case. He sounded sleepy and pissed off.
“Hello?”
“Burt, Bill Brockton. Turn on CNN right now,” I said. Then I hung up with a smile, probably just as Art had.
My phone rang five minutes later, just after CNN cut to a commercial break. It was DeVriess. “Damn, Doc,” he said, “when you take a case, things happen. I should’ve teamed up with you years ago.”
“You were too busy busting my chops on the witness stand,” I said. “Anyhow, maybe now that it’s out in the open, those folks will be held accountable.”
“I can promise you they’ll be held accountable,” he said. “I’m dedicating the full resources of this law firm to holding them accountable.”
The full resources of the firm, as far as I knew, were Burt and Chloe. But then again, the full resources of the firm had rounded up the video expert who’d cleared me of Jess’s murder. Even so, Burt’s declaration struck me as odd. “You’re a criminal defense attorney, Burt, not a prosecutor,” I pointed out. “You defend people like this.”
“Mostly,” he said. “But I’ve decided to branch out—try my hand in the civil courts, as a plaintiff’s attorney.”
“Plaintiff’s attorney? You’re going to start suing people?”
“I believe so,” he said. “And now seems like a good time to dip a toe in the water.”
“You’re going to sue the crematorium for not cremating your aunt?”
“My aunt and a whole bunch of other folks.”
A lightbulb flickered on above my head. “Ah. A class-action lawsuit. But how you gonna track down all the families of these people?”
“I won’t have to,” he said. “They’ll track me down.”
“How will they know to do that?”
“You forgetting what a master of the media I am, Doc?”
I had a quick flashback to the press conference Burt had held—had orchestrated, scripted, and choreographed—the moment the video expert had found the evidence that cleared me of Jess’s murder. “Silly me,” I said. “What was I thinking? You’ll probably be on Larry King, and I should hang up so you can start working the press and taking phone calls.”
“Before you do,” Burt said, “can I ask you for another favor?”
“You can always ask,” I said.
“I know you must have called in some markers to set those wheels in motion down in Georgia,” he said.
“I’ve helped a few people in law enforcement over the years,” I said. “They’re pretty willing to help me in return, if they can. Besides, it was the right thing to do.”
“Whatever string you pulled down there to blow the lid off that thing—any chance you could tug on it one more time?”
I felt my guard go up, knowing he was probably already laying plans for a class-action suit that could net him millions in contingency fees. “What do you want, Burt?”