The Fifth Witness - Michael Connelly [47]
“This is like last time, Rojas. Didn’t you learn a lesson about ripping off your employer?”
“Yes, sir, I did. Dahl told me he just wanted to look at something but then he took it and when I tried to stop him he said, ‘What are you going to do about it?’ He had me. I couldn’t stop him.”
“You still have the four hundred?”
“Yes, I didn’t spend a thing. Four hundred-dollar bills. And they looked real to me.”
I pointed him back to the chair. I didn’t want him so close.
“Okay, time to make a choice, Rojas. You can walk out that door with your four hundred and I’ll never see you again. Or I can give you a second—”
“I want the second chance. Please, I’m sorry.”
“Well, you’re going to have to earn it. You’re going to have to help me make right what you did. I am going to sue Dahl for taking that document and I am going to need you to be the witness who explains exactly what happened.”
“I’ll do it but who will believe me?”
“That’s where your four hundred-dollar bills come in. I want you to go home or to wherever they are and—”
“I have them right here. In my wallet.”
He jumped up from the seat and pulled his wallet.
“Take them out like this.”
I held my finger and thumb close together.
“They can get fingerprints off money?”
“They sure can and if we can get Dahl’s off those then it doesn’t matter what he says about you. He’s nailed.”
I opened a drawer of the little table to the side of my bed. A plastic Ziploc bag containing my wallet and keys and loose change and currency was there. It had all been bagged by the paramedics who had been called to the garage of the Victory Building. Cisco had secured it and had only just given it back. I dumped the contents into the drawer and then handed the bag to Rojas.
“Okay, put the money in there and seal it.”
He did as instructed and then I waved him over to give me the bag. The hundreds looked crisp and new. Less prior handling of the currency would mean a better shot at pulling prints.
“Cisco will take it from here. I’ll call him and tell him to come back and pick these up. At some point he’ll need your prints.”
“Uh…”
Rojas’s eyes were on the bag and the money.
“What?”
“Will I get that money back?”
I put the bag in the drawer and slammed it shut.
“Jesus Christ, Rojas, get out of here before I change my mind and fire your ass.”
“Okay, okay, I’m sorry, you know?”
“You’re sorry you got caught and that’s all. Just go! I can’t believe I just gave you a second chance. I must be a fucking idiot.”
Rojas retreated like a dog with its tail between its legs. After he was gone I slowly lowered the bed and tried not to think about his betrayal or who had sent the two men in black gloves or anything else to do with the case. I looked up at the bag of clear liquid hanging up there overhead and waited for the blessed boost that would make at least some of the pain go away.
Thirteen
As expected, Lisa Trammel was held to answer and ordered to stand trial for murder by Judge Dario Morales at the end of a daylong preliminary hearing in Van Nuys Superior Court. Using Detective Howard Kurlen as her primary carrier of evidence, Prosecutor Andrea Freeman deftly presented a net of circumstantial evidence that quickly enclosed Lisa. Freeman took the case across the preponderance threshold like a hundred-meter sprinter and the judge was equally swift in rendering his ruling. It was routine. Matter-of-fact. Chop-chop and Lisa was held to answer.
My client was there at the defense table for the hearing but I was not. Jennifer Aronson held forth for the defense as best she could in a one-sided game. The judge had allowed the hearing to proceed only after questioning Lisa exhaustively to assure himself that her decision to go forward without me there was knowing, voluntary and strategic. Lisa acknowledged in open court that she was aware of Aronson’s lack of courtroom experience and waived any claim to the argument of ineffective counsel as grounds for an appeal of the judge’s eventual determination.
I watched most of it from the confines of my home where