Just Take My Heart - Mary Higgins Clark [84]
He knew he should leave right away. He could call the boss in the morning and say his mother had taken a turn for the worse and he had to go to Florida now. He would tell him how much he'd en?joyed working there and would miss everybody. He could call the rental agent and say the same thing, and that he'd leave the key to the house under the mat. They wouldn't care. I'm paid up till the end of the month, and they'll be just as glad to get me out early so they can get the house ready for the next tenant.
Of course, even though he would disappear from this house, he would soon have to make one trip back to take care of Emily. Whether or not anyone who saw Fugitive Hunt phoned in a tip, as soon as they find Kirk's body, and realize I'm gone, they'll connect me to everything pretty quick. Charlotte and her family, Wilma and Lou . . .
Emily Wallace was all over the newspapers today. I didn't know she had a transplant. I would have been very sympathetic if she had confided in me. But she didn't. It's really a shame that her new heart is going to stop beating so soon.
Making a careful inspection of every room in the house to be sure he hadn't forgotten anything except what he intended to leave, Zach left his rented house and closed the door behind him.
As he got into his car, he glanced at the new flowers he had planted along the driveway. In a week they had grown and spread. He started to laugh. If I only had a little more time, I'd dig these up and put in mums again!
What a joke that would be on the amateur detectives around here.
Just Take My Heart
56
On Monday morning, Jimmy Easton's public defender, Luke Byrne, went to the Bergen County Jail to talk to his client. After the Aldrich verdict came in on Friday, Judge Stevens had scheduled Easton's sentencing for today at one thirty. “Jimmy, I just want to go over what we're going to say in court today,” he said.
Easton looked at him sourly. “You made a lousy deal for me, and I intend to complain about that to the judge.”
Byrne looked at Easton, astonished. “A lousy deal? You can't be serious. They caught you running out of that house carrying the jew?elry. What kind of a defense did you expect me to come up with?”
“I'm not talking about beating the charge. I'm talking about the lousy sentence they want to give me. Four years is way too much. I want you to talk to that prosecutor and tell her I'll take five years probation with time served.”
“Oh, I'm sure Wallace will jump at that,” Byrne snapped. “Jimmy, you made a deal to take four years. Otherwise you'd be getting ten years for being an habitual offender. We're past the point of negotiat?ing. Four years was their bottom line.”
“Don't tell me four years was the best you could do. They needed me to get Aldrich. If you had been tougher, I could have gotten pro?bation. They'd be letting me out today.”
“If you want me to ask the judge for probation, I will. But I can guarantee that he will never do that unless the prosecutor consents. And I guarantee she won't. You're going to do four years.”
“I don't care what you guarantee,” Easton snarled. “You just tell Emily Wallace that if I don't get what I want, she won't be taking any more bows for being such a hotshot prosecutor. Not when they hear what else I have to say.”
Not wanting to debate it any further, Luke Byrne signaled to the guard that he was ready to leave.
He walked the couple of blocks back to the courthouse and went directly to Emily's office. “Got a minute?” he asked.
Emily looked up and smiled. Luke was one of the best public defenders in the courthouse.