“Based on what?”
Jay hasn’t a clue. For whatever questions Neal has yet to answer about Tuesday night, Jay can’t see how they rise to the level of a capital murder charge. It makes it hard not to see the situation the way Neal does, as a political stunt.
“How does your client plead, Mr. Porter?”
“Not guilty,” Neal says indignantly, practically shouting it.
“Not guilty, Your Honor.”
“You have an argument as to bail, Mr. Porter?”
Neal grabs Jay’s arm. “I am not going to jail.”
In front of the bench, Jay stammers, trying to line up a simple argument. He hasn’t done this in over a decade, and never in a capital case. “The defense would, uh, request that Mr. Hathorne be released on his own recognizance.”
“The state can’t allow that, Your Honor.”
“Mr. Hathorne poses no flight risk, Judge. He’s got roots in this community, is at this very moment, in fact, deeply involved in a citywide election, the details of which may be of some interest to Your Honor, since the candidate running against my client’s employer runs the very department that brought these charges,” Jay says, his words picking up speed, remembering the power of calling someone out in open court, the truth trotted out onstage. “Absent compelling evidence against Mr. Hathorne, it certainly gives the appearance that someone is gaming the system to gain an advantage that doesn’t have the least bit to do with administering justice for Alicia Nowell,” he says.
“Are we doing opening arguments now?” Nichols says.
“Save it for trial, Mr. Porter. Is the state ready to set a date?”
“Not at this time, Your Honor.”
“Bail is set at five hundred thousand,” the judge says. As he calls the next case on the calendar, a bailiff approaches Neal to handcuff and print him for processing. He is absolutely terrified, shaking all over. “Call my grandfather,” he says to Jay, who, having walked in here to go through the motions of a misdemeanor arraignment, has just laid out, in open court, an explosive defense argument, one that Gregg Bartolomo is still busy getting down on paper. As Jay starts out of the courtroom with Ellie, he comes, for one tense moment, face-to-face with Maxine Robicheaux. Red-eyed, her voice low and quivering, she whispers, “Shame on you,” before turning and walking out of the courtroom.
CHAPTER 13
Gregg Bartolomo catches them on the courthouse steps, along with a handful of television reporters, some court watcher having tipped off the local stations while Neal was in lockup waiting for a wire transfer of fifty thousand dollars from his grandfather’s bank to a bail bondsman. Court staffers move aside, making way for the multiheaded beast moving down the stairs, the swarm of press and rubberneckers, Jay at the very center of it, his client on one side and his daughter on the other. Gregg, the seasoned newspaperman, doesn’t let more than a few inches get between him and his subjects, making notes on the scene, letting the girls in heels and the men in shiny suits do the dirty work, shouting vulgar questions over their microphones and one another: Did you have anything to do with the death of Alicia Nowell? Was she working for your uncle’s campaign? Did Axel try to stall the investigation? Gregg notes every twitch of Neal’s eyebrow, every upward curl of his lip, but is smart enough to simply observe at this point, leaning in at just the right moment to whisper in Jay’s ear, “You let me know when you want to tell your side.”
Jay reaches for Ellie’s hand, squeezing it tight, keeping her close as they push through the crowd. He turns to Neal. “Where’s your car?”
“On Congress.”
“Then you’re coming with me,” he says, as they start for Jay’s car parked in the lot directly across the street.
He gets Neal as far away from the courthouse as fast as possible, taking whole blocks at forty miles an hour, Ellie riding shotgun. She keeps turning around every few minutes to sneak a peek at their passenger, the man in khakis accused of murder. Jay’s cell phone rings the second they pull into the driveway outside his office. It’s Lonnie. “You do realize you’re going to be on the front page of tomorrow’s paper. What in the world have you gotten yourself into?”
“I have to call you back.”
Inside, he tells Neal to have a seat in the parlor. The phones have been ringing nonstop, Eddie Mae reports. Gregg Bartolomo. Channels 2 and 13, 26 and KCOH. The entire news community is already on to the story, must be if within half an hour it’s already trickled down to Lonnie, who’s now at a Birraporeti’s on Gray, interviewing for a job at its bar. It’s a quarter to three, and Ben will be of out of school soon, a circumstance Jay hadn’t accounted for. He hadn’t expected the day to take the turn it has, from misdemeanor arraignment to a looming murder case. Sam Hathorne is on his way to Jay’s office at this very moment. Jay leans over his desk, dialing Mrs. King’s number into his office phone. Her house is ten minutes from Poe Elementary School. Ellie stands on the other side of the desk, watching her dad. She’s been asking a version of the same question since they left the courthouse. “Who was that woman?” she says, meaning Alicia’s mother. “Why did she say that to you?”
When Alice King answers the line, Jay asks for a favor, running through a routine they’ve traded back and forth for months. Would she mind picking Ben up from school, and maybe swinging by to get Ellie too? She could take them back to her place. Jay promises to bring dinner later, if she wants.
There’s an unexpected stretch of silence on the other end.
“Actually, I don’t think Lori is going to be spending so much time with Elena anymore. I just don’t think the girls are the best influence on each other.”
“Oh,” Jay says.
He’s caught off guard at first, and then furious.
“Right, ’cause my daughter got yours pregnant.”
“Excuse me?”