Just Take My Heart - Mary Higgins Clark [6]
Just Take My Heart
5
Gregg, I've said it before and 111 be saying it again over the next six months because you'll need to hear it.“ Attorney Richard Moore did not look at the client sitting next to him as his driver slowly managed to work the car through the throng of media that was still shout?ing questions and aiming cameras at them in the Bergen County Courthouse parking lot. ”This case hangs on the testimony of a liar who's a career criminal,“ Moore continued. ”It's pathetic." It was the day after the grand jury had handed up the indictment. The prose?cutor's office had notified Moore and it had been agreed that Al?drich would surrender this morning.
They had just left the courtroom of Judge Calvin Stevens, who had arraigned Gregg on the murder indictment and had set bail at one million dollars which had been immediately posted.
“Then why did the grand jury vote an indictment?” Gregg Aldrich asked, his voice a monotone.
“There's a saying among lawyers. The prosecutor could indict a ham sandwich if he's so inclined. It's very easy to get an indictment, especially in a high-profile case. All the indictment means is that there's enough evidence to allow the prosecutor to go forward. The press has kept this case front and center. Natalie was a star and any mention of her sells papers. Now this longtime crook Jimmy Easton, caught red-handed in a burglary, claims you paid him to kill his wife. Once there is a trial and you're acquitted, the public will lose inter?est in it quickly.”
“Just the way they lost interest in O.J. after he was acquitted of his wife's murder?” Aldrich asked, a note of derision in his voice. “Richard, you know and I know that even if a jury finds me not guilty— and you're a lot more optimistic than I am about that outcome—this case will never be over unless and until the guy who killed Natalie knocks on the prosecutor's door and spills his guts. In the meantime, I'm out on bail and I have surrendered my passport, which means I can't leave the country, which is terrific for someone in my business. Of course, that is to say nothing of the fact that I have a fourteen-year-old daughter whose father is going to be front and center in newspapers, on television, and online for the indefinite future.”
Richard Moore let further reassurances die on his lips. Gregg Aldrich, a very intelligent realist, was not the kind of client to accept them. On one hand, Moore knew the state's case had serious problems and depended on a witness he knew he could skewer during cross-examination. On the other hand, Aldrich was right that having been formally accused of the murder of his estranged wife, no mat?ter what the verdict, in some people's minds he would never be free of the suspicion that he was a killer. But, Moore thought wryly, I'd much rather have him dealing with that situation than sitting in prison for life after a conviction.
And was he the killer? There was something that Gregg Aldrich was not telling him. Moore was sure of it. He didn't expect anything resembling a confession from Aldrich, but with the indictment only a day old, he was already beginning to wonder if whatever information Aldrich was withholding would come back to haunt him at the trial.
Moore glanced out the window. It was a miserable March day, totally in keeping with the mood inside the car. Ben Smith, the private investigator and sometime chauffeur, who had worked for him for twenty-five years, was at the wheel. From the slight tilt of his head, Moore knew that Ben was catching every word of what he and Aldrich were saying. Ben's keen hearing was a plus in his line of work, and Moore often used him as a sounding board after his conversations with clients in the car.
Forty minutes of silence followed. Then they were stopping in front of the Park Avenue apartment building in Manhattan where Gregg Aldrich lived. “This is it, at least for the present,” Aldrich said as he opened the car door.