Burden of Proof Read online

  “It’s his brother who can’t get enough of the river,” Gary said. “Ethan here is a surfer.”

  “That’s right. Didn’t I read something about a major tournament win?”

  “Cocoa Beach Pro-Am,” Gary said. “Ethan wiped the floor with last year’s world champ.”

  “Me, I’ve always wondered how somebody can stand on one of those things, much less do those fancy maneuvers in the waves.” She gave him a pro’s smile, all teeth and no emotion. “Mr. Barrett—Ethan—I need to know about your source.”

  “He’s gone,” Ethan replied. “Smoke in the wind. Forget him.”

  “Told you,” Gary said.

  Ethan asked, “Were you a cop too?”

  “Naw, the lady here was Treasury. Major league.”

  Beth had lost her smile. “Just the same, Ethan, we need to know what you know.”

  “I only heard about the attack by promising to protect his identity. Can we please move on?”

  When she responded with more of that hard-eyed stare, Gary said, “Like I told you, the shooter’s name is Rickie Schofeld. Multiple arrests as a teen, two stints in juvie. Then he graduated from simple B&Es to major armed burglary. Two years back, he got sent away for ten to twenty.”

  “His third conviction as an adult,” Beth said. “The guy went to Raiford. You know Raiford, Mr. Barrett?”

  “The name, sure.”

  “Hard place to do time. Very hard.”

  Gary said, “Adrian was assigned the case pro bono. Rickie is apparently holding to his story that Adrian messed up at trial.”

  “Which is truly absurd,” Beth said. “Given his previous convictions, he could have gotten life.”

  “That may be part of his lawyer’s strategy. His court-appointed attorney is going for a temporary insanity defense. They’ve insisted on a psychiatric evaluation.”

  Ethan asked, “Who’s the lawyer?”

  Gary smiled as if he approved of the question. “Jimmy Carstairs. Recognize the name?”

  The office and the two people all took on a crystal clarity. Ethan’s shoulder and head drummed in time to his accelerated heartbeat. For once he did not mind. “Carstairs represents the Washington group that wants to buy Sonya’s company.”

  “I had a word with their PI,” Gary said. “She’s a pal from the force. Claims it was their turn on the pro bono circuit.”

  Beth asked, “Do you buy that, Ethan?”

  “Not for an instant.”

  “Now you see why identifying your source is so vital.”

  “Asking me a dozen more times won’t change a thing,” Ethan replied.

  Beth frowned at Gary, who shrugged in reply. She turned back to Ethan. “Can you at least tell us if there was any connection between your source and a motive that conflicts with the shooter’s claim?”

  “I know what you know,” Ethan replied. “And nothing else.”

  “I doubt that very much. So your source made no suggestion about future attacks?”

  “Asked and answered.”

  “Best move on,” Gary said. “The man riles easy.”

  The three of them spent half an hour going through security arrangements for Adrian, Sonya, their home, and their respective businesses. Nothing they discussed required so much time, but Ethan did not complain. Beth was essentially outlining what he would be charged for. She was treating him as a client. He did his best to pay attention and respond in kind.

  They emerged to find Gina waiting in the front lobby. Gone was the university girl’s pants and top. In their place stood a lovely young executive in a pale grey pantsuit, navy silk blouse, and alligator pumps. The outfit went perfectly with Gina’s Parisian hairstyle. Her dark eyes glittered, and all the males within range watched her every move.

  Ethan introduced Beth, informing her and Gary that Gina served as his PA, and they were to treat anything she said as coming directly from him. When Beth departed and Gary left to check on arrangements for their next meeting, Ethan said, “You look stunning.”

  “I’m afraid to tell you how much all this cost,” Gina said.

  “It was worth it.”

  She fingered the lapel of her jacket. “My mother is going to take one look and keel over in a dead faint.”

  “I’d probably join her on the floor,” Ethan replied. “Except for how everybody is watching.”

  The firm’s main conference room was fitted with a long oval table and leather chairs and two walls of shelves filled with law books. A side table was laid with a coffee service, deli sandwiches, soft drinks, and plates of fine china. The room’s only ornament was a bronze Remington statue of a Wild West rider, which held pride of place on the center shelf. Ethan made his way around the table and stood looking at the rider. He had found the statue at a Cocoa Beach garage sale, rusted out and broken in four places. He had spent two months scouring off the grunge, then a surfing buddy who ran a welding shop did an artist’s job refitting the broken segments. Ethan had given the statue to Adrian and Sonya as a wedding present. He ran a finger around where the cowboy’s head was reattached and wondered if there would come a time when such memories did not stab worse than his wounds.

  Adrian entered the conference room and did a comic double take at the sight of his kid brother, the firm’s PI, and a beautiful young woman there waiting for him. “What on earth?”

  “I’m here as a client,” Ethan said. “This is Gina Devoe, my PA. Now please shut the door, sit down, and let’s get started.”

  Adrian ate in the impatient manner of someone who refused to let good food get in the way of work. Soon after they started, Gina rose from her place and left the room.

  Adrian watched her exit, then asked, “She’s your girlfriend, do I remember that right?”

  “She was.”

  “Something happened while she was in Europe?”

  Ethan nodded. “I got news of my coming departure.”

  Adrian pushed his plate aside. “Oh. That.”

  Gina returned with a yellow legal pad and two different-colored pens. She slid her half-eaten sandwich toward the center of the table and made a note at the top of the first page.

  Ethan took that as his cue. “We need to set some parameters.”

  “You should be on my team,” Adrian said. “I keep telling them, parameters are the only thing from the whole deal getting dumped in the circular file.”

  “I keep worrying that the shooter was not just a lone guy with a grudge,” Ethan went on.

  “Gary told me about your concerns. I’m waiting to hear the reasons.”

  Swiftly Ethan ran through his thoughts and finished with what he had just learned from Gary and the security specialist about Rickie Schofeld. Though she had heard much of it while they walked the beach, Gina took notes throughout. Adrian spent the time leaning back in his chair, staring at the sunlit glass.

  When Ethan went quiet, Adrian glanced at his PI and asked, “You ever heard of a multiple offender getting off for good behavior?”

  “Not from Raiford,” Gary replied. “That place likes to swallow inmates whole. Of course, that doesn’t mean it couldn’t happen.”

  “Coincidences.” Adrian said the word like an oath. “I hate them worse than cold oatmeal.”

  Ethan confessed, “I feel like I’m dealing out too many fragments and not enough wholes.”

  “Just the same, you might be on the right track.” Adrian balled up his napkin and dropped it on his half-eaten sandwich. “I want you and Gary to take this potential issue and run with it. I’m already overstretched.”

  “That’s why I wanted to ask you about your case. Assuming my fears are real and there is actually a ‘they’ hiding behind the shooter.”

  “Let me worry about the doubts. You go with your gut.” He looked at Gary. “You okay with that?”

  “I didn’t want to believe him,” Gary replied. “And if he hadn’t been watching where I wasn’t, we’d be gathered for a completely different reason.” He looked at Ethan. “You poin
t, I’m on the hunt. No more questioning.”

  Adrian turned to Gina. “What about you, Ms. Devoe?”

  “Call me Gina, and I’m better than okay,” Gina replied. She offered Ethan solemn eyes. “I want to help. That starts with trusting the guy in charge and following his lead.”

  Adrian said, “Someday my wife is going to tell me that.”

  “In your wildest dreams,” Gary said. “Sorry, that just slipped out.”

  “Back to my question,” Ethan said. “What’s changed with the case? What has upped the stakes?”

  “That’s just it,” Adrian replied. “The case is falling apart, at least for us. We’re just counting down the days to a total loss.”

  Ethan felt as though the words beat him back in his seat, away from the table and all his partially formed plans. “So maybe I’ve got it wrong.”

  “No,” Gina said. “I mean, I don’t know anything about anything. But I’ve heard how you talk about all this. And I think . . .”

  “What?” It was Adrian who spoke. “Tell us.”

  “I think there has to be something more than what we’re seeing. Ethan is spending his last . . .” Her face crimped so tight she bowed slightly in her seat.

  Adrian looked from Gina to Ethan and back again. His expression held a hint of the same grim sorrow.

  “My cop brain says everything points at a lone gunman,” Gary said. “But I’m definitely open to being convinced otherwise.”

  Ethan waited until Gina had regained composure, then said to his brother, “Break down the case for us.”

  “We’re fighting a losing battle. The situation is terrible and getting worse.” Adrian rose and went to the coffee service on the side table. He spoke with his back to the room. “Sonya’s first attorney was a flake of the first order.”

  “Brad Crawley.” Gary spelled the last name for Gina. “Right family, right credentials. Handsome, charming, and dumb as day-old bait.”

  “Sonya spent a year living a dual life. She worked on her project in the UF labs and taught her classes. Weekends and late at night, she began developing a totally new idea.” Adrian held up his hand while still standing with his back to the room. “I know you want to hear about her work. But it’s extremely complex and I don’t have time to go into it now.”

  Ethan wanted to argue but knew it was futile. “I understand.”

  “Five years ago, Sonya’s lifelong research reached the point where she thought she was really onto something. And in order not to show a conflict of interest with the university, she tendered her resignation and moved up here. Her family’s from Jacksonville. Sonya managed to snag lab space at the new science park.”

  “At least old Brad got that much done right,” Gary said.

  “Yeah, old Brad is fine so long as there’s no heavy lifting involved.” Adrian carried his coffee back over to the table. “Six months later Brad negotiated the sale of fifty-one percent of Sonya’s company to Cemitrex, a DC-based hedge fund specializing in cutting-edge research with high-profit potential. To their credit, it’s only because of their investment that Sonya’s made it to where she is now.”

  Gina asked, “Cemitrex was the only interested investor?”

  Adrian stopped playing with his cup. “Now that is a very interesting question.”

  “Is it?”

  “Cemitrex is the only group Brad didn’t have to work hard to find.” Adrian continued his tight inspection of Gina. “You’re a student?”

  “UF. We had a case study in last term’s business class. I remember what the professor said. It always comes down to how many suitors want to take the lady to the dance.”

  Adrian smiled. “That’s how he put it—suitors looking for a dance partner?”

  Gina returned his smile. “The professor is from Alabama.”

  “Man’s got to be from somewhere.”

  Ethan saw no need to join the exchange. Gina looked fresh and young and happy, rather than a lady facing the sudden loss of the man who would never become her fiancé.

  Adrian continued to address her. “The problem is what Brad let Cemitrex include in the contract. Namely, the right to buy the remaining shares whenever they wanted. Brad convinced Sonya he had added a poisoned chalice. His words, not mine. His contract stipulates the sale price is twenty-two million dollars. Three times their initial investment.”

  “That is stupid.”

  “Is it.”

  “What if she comes up with a product that’s worth a billion dollars?”

  Adrian’s smile returned. “You just took the words out of my first meeting with Sonya.”

  Gina’s eyes flashed. “That man should be locked up for being an idiot with a license.”

  “No argument here.” Adrian checked his watch. “Sorry. Time’s up. I need to bolt.”

  As Adrian rose from the table, Ethan said, “One thing more.”

  “It will have to wait. I’m due at court—”

  “The police want me to make a statement.”

  Adrian’s progress toward the door slowed. “When?”

  “Tomorrow morning,” Gary replied. “Ten thirty.”

  Ethan said, “They’ll want to know about my source.”

  “No,” Adrian said. “That can’t happen.”

  “Exactly.”

  “I’ll handle it.” As Adrian opened the door, he said, “I almost forgot. Sonya wants you over for dinner tonight. Bring Gina.”

  “It’ll be a pleasure. Right, Gina?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Gary?” Adrian asked.

  “Can’t. Kid stuff.”

  “Rain check, then.”

  Ethan called after his brother, “I won’t let you down.”

  Adrian stopped by the door long enough to offer them all a genuine smile. “Bro, that is the last thing I’m worried about.”

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-SIX

  In the months leading up to their wedding, Adrian and Sonya had bought a fifties-era teardown on Fort Caroline Road in the Saint Johns Bluff residential district. They spent a year and every cent they had in building their dream home, a haven from all the pressures the world was already bringing to bear.

  Ethan had been there before, of course. But previous occasions had been marred by the bitter friction that had defined his relationship with Sonya. So in many respects it felt as though he saw it for the first time.

  Adrian walked down the brick front walk as Gina pulled into the drive. As they rose from the car, he said, “Hope you’re hungry.”

  “Very.”

  “Good.” He smiled a greeting to Gina. “You look lovely tonight, Miss Devoe.”

  “Why, thank you ever so.” She made a pirouette. “Ethan bought it for me.”

  “All I did was tell her to go spend,” Ethan corrected. “Gina did the buying.”

  She wore sky-blue silk gabardine trousers, a navy blouse with pearl buttons, navy open-toed sandals, and a simple gold chain holding a small golden sand dollar. “It was a tough job. But somebody had to do it.”

  Adrian smiled as his wife slipped in beside him. “Sonya doesn’t cook all that often. When she does, I become her lab assistant. I pity the jokers who have to deal with that lady every day.”

  “They worship the ground I walk on.” Sonya stepped forward and kissed Ethan’s cheek. “How are your injuries?”

  Ethan touched the spot on his cheek and tried to remember if she had ever before shown him affection. Perhaps at the wedding. But if so, it would have been the sort of generic motion offered to any cheek within reach. “Much better, now.”

  The home’s simple brick exterior was spiced by grey clapboard siding along the roofline and around the door and windows. A steeply pitched roof hid Adrian’s second-story office. The house stood on a deep lot that extended back through a wooded marsh to a long deepwater pier and boat dock on the Saint Johns River. The house’s rear was a brick-and-timber U, with three bedrooms running along one side and Sonya’s home office occupying the other. T
he screened central veranda held a small pool, an outdoor living area, and exercise equipment. It was a functional and happy place that suited them perfectly.

  Sonya asked Gina if she was willing to help in the kitchen, then issued a series of precise instructions to her and Adrian. Sonya’s manner suggested she was used to being obeyed instantly.

  She told Ethan, “You and I need a moment in private.” She led him to a pair of cushioned chairs planted by the pool. A trio of candles burned on a cast-iron coffee table. “I’m having a raspberry tea. Would you like something to drink?”

  “Maybe later.”

  Sonya seated herself and said, “We need to set up a protocol.”

  “I learned to hate that word, back when the doctors pretended they could do something to make me all better,” Ethan said. “Protocol. It ranks right up there with treatment. They both sounded so glib, rolling off the doctors’ tongues.”

  “Just the same.” Sonya did not budge. “You are a treasure trove of information and data. And I intend to mine you to the fullest extent possible.”

  “Do I have any say in the matter?”

  “Absolutely,” she replied. “You can set the appointment times.”

  Ethan was not certain she was joking. “I’ll think about it.”

  “You’ll do more than that.” She set her untouched glass on the table. “Even the smallest items, things you might consider inconsequential, may in fact hold the compass headings we require to understand what precisely has happened and how we should proceed.”

  “What do you want from me?”

  “Blood, fluids, scans—”

  “No, Sonya. I’m sorry. But no.”

  She went silent. “You can’t refuse me.”

  “I just did. I have a few weeks to go and a lot of work to do. What free time I have left, I am not spending in your lab.”

  “Please, Ethan.” She leaned forward. “I’m begging you. And I hate to beg.”

  “You’re not good at it either.”

  “Once a week. An hour. No more.”

  He nodded. “All right.”

  “Really?”