Blood Relations Read online

  “You were misinformed.”

  “Apparently so.” He made a slight smile. His round cheeks were smooth and taut. “Who’s going to take it from here? Somebody in the Sexual Battery Unit?”

  “No, I’m taking it. I’ll appoint co-counsel.”

  “And do we have a press conference scheduled?”

  “Not yet. You want to do it?”

  Mora lifted an arm. “No, by all means. It’s your case. What about bond on the defendants?”

  “I want a hundred grand on each of them. And Ruffini’s passport.”

  “This will be something to see. TV satellite trucks lined up outside. Press conferences every afternoon, live at five.” Walking past his desk, Eddie Mora drummed his fingers across its surface like hoofbeats. “Did you tell Miss Duncan we’re filing charges?”

  “I said thank you for coming in, I’d get in touch.”

  “Then I suggest you tell her that we decline to prosecute.”

  Sam kept his voice low and even. “I’ve already told my staff to draw up the arrest warrants and find a judge to sign them.”

  “Before you consulted me.”

  “What do you want, Eddie? You told me to handle it. Now you don’t like the result.”

  Mora shot him a malevolent glare. “I thought you’d be impartial. I was wrong. You’re using this case as a vehicle for some kind of personal vendetta.”

  “Not remotely true.” Sam leaned his weight on the back of a chair, pressing down so he wouldn’t pick it up and smash it over Eddie Mora’s desk. “I wondered about that, Eddie. Why you’d give it to me. My son is dead and I’d walk away from a case that took me anywhere near South Beach. Am I reading it right?”

  Eddie Mora made a laugh of disbelief. “No. You are not reading it right. What I thought, Sam, was that you, with your experience, would see, as well as I do, that if we proceed, this office will waste six or eight fucking months on a case that we can’t win, where we will blow the fucking budget, be accused of harassment or racism or politics or all of the above, because no matter what the fuck you tell me, the witnesses are totally unreliable. Little Miss Duncan will change her fucking mind, and we will all look like publicity-grabbing, incompetent fucking idiots!” Eddie Mora’s face had turned red with rage.

  For several seconds the two of them stared at each other. Then Sam said, “Anything else, Eddie? I’ve got to be someplace at five-thirty.”

  “No. That’s it.”

  The meeting was over.

  On his way out Sam left a message for Eugene Ryabin, and they finally connected by car phone in heavy traffic on Flagler Street.

  “Tell Chief Mazik the warrants have been authorized in Duncan. You want to come by early? We can discuss procedure.”

  Ryabin’s chuckle came over the line. “Such service I get from you.”

  “Not for free.” Sam swung into a parking garage and lowered the window to grab the ticket from the machine at the gate. “Do you know the name Martin Cass?”

  A pause. “Yes. Real estate. A small man, big mouth. What has he to do with this?”

  “I’m not sure. See who he knows at the city manager’s office. And another thing. Ms. Duncan says our Italian friend is involved in a project called the Grand Caribe. I think Cass is working on promotion. See what you can find out.”

  Ryabin said it might take him a few days; Sam could buy him a beer.

  Sam wheeled into a space and cut the engine. The Duncan case was going to be filed. He knew without doubt that any chance he had of taking over Eddie Mora’s job was now lost, and had been lost from the moment he let Caitlin Dorn into his office. Unless he could find out why the state attorney had really wanted this case to disappear.

  chapter ten

  George said, “This place is worse than you can imagine. I never been in a place like this, man. It’s like in the movies. The food sucks, the toilet stinks. And they pack you in with like eight or ten guys, gold teeth, massive B.O. One of them says he wants to do things to you that you wouldn’t even let a woman do—”

  “Hey.” The lawyer’s fat fingers, interlaced on the table, tapped up and down. “My heart bleeds. Look, I was told to come down and see what you want. I assume you would like to arrange legal representation. Do you have a method whereby you can pay the fees or no?”

  “Yeah. I mean, I will. First I have to get out of here.”

  The lawyer shifted as if to stand up.

  “No, wait. I want you to talk to Alberto for me. I couldn’t, you know, on the phone. I mean, it’s probably bugged or something.”

  “Bugged. They don’t bug the fucking phone.”

  “Can you talk to him?”

  “In what regard? If I could know, it would be of some help here.”

  “Ask him if he’d go the bail, all right?”

  “The bail.” The lawyer smiled. “He would risk a hundred grand for you?”

  “Listen to me. Alberto said if I ever—ever—needed a favor, to ask him.”

  “That’s the way he expresses himself. He’s a very friendly person. But not that friendly. I don’t think so.”

  “He’s gotta help me out, man.”

  “He don’t gotta do nothing. You’re in jail, that’s your fucking problem.”

  “Man, you’re an asshole, you know that?”

  “For two hundred an hour, why not? Pardon me, but I have other matters to attend to.”

  “Wait. Sit down. It’s not good for Alberto, me being in here, okay? I know things.”

  “What things might that be?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “Yeah? I’ll tell him you said so.”

  George said, “No. Jesus, I don’t mean that. I mean, what if I get beat up? Or stabbed? Then I’m in a coma and say something by mistake?”

  “What a moron.”

  “Listen, dammit. I’m not asking him to give me the money, not like give. And it’s not a hundred grand, it’s ten, which is the bondsman’s fee. That’s nothing for Alberto. There’s no way I’d skip town and stick him with the whole hundred, so don’t worry about it. I’ll pay interest, naturally. Ten, twenty percent. Whatever. Think of it as an investment.”

  “You got no money for a lawyer. No money for bail. Tell me. Where’s the money to repay a loan?”

  “Klaus Ruffini. You know who I mean?”

  “Yes. So?”

  “Klaus will pay me if I can get Ali to drop the charges. I know he will. Then I pay Alberto back. Okay? Give me two weeks. Three at the outside.”

  “And how will you persuade the girl to change her mind?”

  “I got ways.”

  “You got ways.” The lawyer wiped his eyes. “I love how you put it, George. Do you propose to whack this girl? Break her legs, perhaps?”

  “No. Oh, man. I wouldn’t do that to Ali. Come on.”

  “Enlighten me, then. What ways?”

  “I’d talk to her. I tried already, but I lost my temper. You do that with a woman and it’s over, man. Now I know my mistakes.”

  “I see. You believe she would respond positively?”

  “Yeah. She likes me.”

  “You gang-bang the chick and she likes you?”

  “I didn’t mean to.”

  “No, it slipped and fell in.”

  “Would you—oh, fuck. Fuck! I didn’t mean to, all right?”

  The lawyer put a finger to his lips. “I will give you five seconds of free legal advice. When other people may be walking past the door, refrain from screaming that you didn’t mean to do it, because they might conclude that you did it.”

  “Sorry.”

  “I’m impressed you have such rapport with women, George. All right. I’ll talk to Alberto.” When the lawyer stood up he was smiling. “In person. I want to see his face.”

  Rocking slowly in his big leather desk chair, Norman Singletary studied the young man who was staring morosely out the window at blue sky and clouds from forty-six stories up. Handsome kid, thirty years old. Paying a price for
stupidity.

  “Marquis, I hate to plead a case like this. It’s not too late to change your mind.”

  “No, it’s way too late, Mr. Singletary.”

  “You know, I was looking forward to a few rounds with Sam Hagen. I was his division chief when he first started, did I tell you that? Lord. That’s almost twenty years ago. He’s a heavyweight now. Not a stylish fighter, but he can go the distance and put you away if you don’t watch yourself.” Singletary gave a low chuckle. “I don’t enjoy the new guys near as much.”

  The figure at the window gave a weary sigh. “My wife’s about to divorce me. I might get kicked off the movie. I don’t have money for a trial. Between your fees and the bail, I can’t do it.”

  “Hagen and I have had, oh, a dozen good bouts since I left. I think we’re six to five.”

  Marquis Lamont glanced around. “That makes eleven.”

  “One was a hung jury. The defendant was knifed by another inmate before the retrial. That doesn’t count.”

  “Who’s ahead, you or him?”

  The phone buzzed and Singletary reached over to pick it up. His secretary said, “Mr. Hagen on line two, sir.”

  “Thanks. And Doreen? Could I trouble you for some refills?” He lifted his empty glass toward Marquis, who shook his head. “Just mine.”

  Singletary pressed the button. “Sam? It’s Norman.” He smiled. “Yes, it has. Too long. How’s it goin’?… Yeah, I’m just fine.” He laughed. “Yeah, I hear you.… Well, what I called about.… Right. I’ve had some discussions with my client. He’s here in my office. I want to pass a couple of ideas by you. All hypothetical, you understand.”

  Singletary kept an eye on Marquis, who had paced across the office and was now coming back. “I could tell you the work my client does with young people in the poor neighborhoods, but you know all that. What I want to say is, Marquis Lamont is the wrong man to put on trial.… Well, that’s true, but hear me out. Let’s say there’s a fine young man, a family man, who goes to a nightclub in a strange town with some people he doesn’t know very well.”

  Marquis sank onto one end of the L-shaped sofa and put his head in his hands.

  “Now, at this party they give him free drinks, and they pass around some cocaine—not his thing, but he doesn’t want his new friends to think he’s not with the program. So all right. He’s having a good time. The music is hot, everything’s cooking. Then a young lady dances with him, rubs herself up against him. You know, Sam, there are girls who like to do it with celebrities, and this young man is a celebrity, in a small way. Now what if someone at the party were to say, ‘You know that girl you were dancing with? She wants you. Come on, have some fun. Look, there she is. She’s ready.’”

  Doreen came in with another diet cola and lime in a crystal rocks glass. As Singletary talked, he squeezed the lime, then patted his fingertips on a cocktail napkin.

  “Our young man is led into this, Sam. For the amusement of the people, you understand what I’m saying? A circus act, but he doesn’t see that. My investigator spoke to a witness who recalls hearing someone at the party, maybe a wealthy foreign gentleman, say he would pay a large sum of money to see the big nigger fuck the white girl. And let us say the young man foolishly accepts what has been offered. But he can’t even get it up, he’s so far gone, whereupon he is pushed aside, and the foreign gentleman assaults the young lady with a champagne bottle. Our young man is horrified. He staggers away, goes into a corner, and throws up. Now, how can any reasonable person conclude that he had the requisite intent to commit a crime? Nevertheless, two weeks later the police arrest him for sexual battery, and the state demands a bond of one hundred thousand dollars.”

  Singletary reached into a desk drawer for his flask of Bacardi and poured. He moved a swizzle stick and the ice tinkled in the glass. Slumped on the sofa, Marquis Lamont was staring upward at the ceiling.

  “Tell me, Sam. How many years of his life should our young man spend in prison? Would you not prefer that he testify against those who instigated this crime?… Well, I think a dismissal of the charges would be appropriate, yes.”

  Listening to Hagen’s response, Singletary chuckled. “He wasn’t so drunk he can’t recall who did what. If you work with me on this, you might get a fast guilty plea out of the other two. Unless you want a trial. A trial would look mighty good on TV. Maybe that is what you want.”

  He sipped his drink.

  “This case wouldn’t have been filed if not for Marquis.… Damn right, and I’ll say so to the national media, if I have to.… Race certainly is a relevant issue, and I’d be shirking my duty to my client not to raise it.”

  He listened to Sam Hagen tell him he was full of shit.

  “Then what do you suggest?… Maybe, but only if there’s a withhold of adjudication.”

  Elbows on knees, Marquis gazed fixedly at Singletary, waiting.

  “Uh-huh.… I’d appreciate that, Sam. Next week is fine.… Take care, now.” Singletary hung up.

  “Did he say he’ll do it?”

  “He’ll consider it.”

  Leaping to his feet, Marquis raised a fist. “All right!”

  Norman Singletary’s voice rumbled across the room. “Mr. Lamont. What I have just conveyed to the prosecutor was a bucket of horse manure. I know it and he knows it. And yet it is the dance we all do in this business. If you are saved from prison, it won’t be because Samuel Hagen likes the way you played at Florida State, but because he can use you. You are expedient. You are not innocent. In fact, you should be ashamed.”

  “What?”

  “Ashamed. For playing the fool. For sucking up to no-account trash in their fancy clothes, with their fancy ways. For believing for one drunken, self-deluded moment that they wanted more from you than the chance to snicker behind your back.”

  Marquis Lamont stared at the carpet.

  Singletary took a sip of his drink, then unfolded his glasses and put them on. “Did you bring my retainer?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Don’t you hang your head in my office, you hear me?”

  Marquis Lamont unfolded a check from his wallet and handed it across the desk. A certified check for $25,000. “Mr. Singletary?”

  He glanced up, looking over his glasses.

  “Six wins to five. Who’s got the six, you or him?”

  Jerry Fine, a partner in the firm of Cohen, Kaplan, Porter, Wolfe & Berkowitz, had come to Klaus Ruffini’s house to discuss the criminal charges against him. Collar open and jacket off, Fine sat on the terrace in the shade of a canopy in a metal-framed, blue canvas butterfly chair from the fifties, his knees level with his chest. The house was sleek and white, with yellow metal lattice over the windows and tubular red railings on the second level. Fine could see Biscayne Bay and the Miami skyline a few miles west. The sun glittered like bits of glass on the turquoise water.

  One of several persons who seemed not to have a defined function at the house had brought Jerry Fine a vodka and soda in a heavy, chilled glass. Others came and went. The guy who served as Klaus’s bodyguard and Tereza’s masseur was lifting weights by the pool, watching the naked girl swimming around in it. Another model in a thong bikini, sound asleep or comatose, was working on a sunburn. A fat, bald man dressed completely in black, except for a red scarf at his neck, carried some swatches of fabric over to Tereza Ruffini, who waved him away. She was in the middle of an argument with Klaus.

  They were circling a white limestone table screaming at each other in several different languages. Rather, Tereza Ruffini was screaming. Klaus was laughing. A very jolly guy, Fine had observed. Klaus had straight brown hair that flopped over his forehead and bright blue eyes. He was barefoot, wearing khaki pants and a faded shirt with palm trees on it. At thirty-four, three years younger than Jerry, he was already getting soft in the belly. His wife Tereza was tall and skinny, with black hair so short it looked like it was painted on her skull, and an incredible pair of hooters. Jerry Fine couldn’t pick up even the Eng
lish words they shouted at each other because someone had put a CD of Little Richard on the stereo inside, and the massive speakers were blasting through the open French doors.

  The law firm that Jerry Fine worked for was the largest, most powerful in Miami. They took care of all the Ruffinis’ legal matters when they were in the States. Otherwise, the couple might be found at their houses in Milan, Aix-en-Provence, or Geneva. Tereza designed clothes; Klaus managed the multinational chain of boutiques where they were sold. He also played with real estate. Cohen Kaplan billed nearly a million dollars a year to handle his deals, his proposed deals, his traffic tickets, and the occasional shakedowns—of which this alleged rape could be the latest.

  Jerry Fine did not like defending people accused of sordid crimes like rape. He had a master’s degree in tax law and a CPA. He preferred financial crimes: tax evasion, embezzlement, or bank fraud. Cohen Kaplan’s clients did not commit rape. But Jerry Fine would defend this case, sordid or not. It would cost Klaus a quarter million for a trial, possibly twice that. Jerry Fine could think of no reason to enter a plea. He would assemble a team of private investigators and experts in forensic evidence, psychology, and jury selection. But first he had to discuss the case with Klaus. So far Klaus had only slapped him on the back and told him not to worry.

  At an hourly rate of $300, sipping a second vodka and soda, and watching the naked girl climb the ladder and dive into the pool, Jerry Fine was in no particular hurry. As Little Richard gave way to the crooning of the Platters, Fine took out his portable phone and conducted some other business while Tereza and Klaus finished theirs.

  Finally, Klaus came over and sank into the yellow butterfly chair beside Jerry Fine’s blue one. Tereza had already begun another argument with a blond woman in heavy, black-framed glasses. Her assistant designer. Or her interior decorator.

  Klaus put a hand on Jerry Fine’s thigh. Fine had learned that Klaus wasn’t queer; he simply liked to touch people. “Jerry, you know what? George Fonseca wants $50,000 and he will make the Duncan girl dismiss the case. What do you think?”

  Jerry Fine looked at him, then said, “No. It’s a felony, called witness tampering. Besides, only a judge or the state attorney can dismiss a case.”