Her Best Defense. Jackie/Lori Merritt/Myles
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Lisa laid the newspaper out on the table and poured a cup of freshly brewed coffee. She usually put a little cream in her coffee just to take the bite out of it first thing in the morning. This morning, however, she needed all the bite she could get. After a sip of the hot brew, she began to read.
The story started with Glory and Mateo and their “special” relationship. It stated that Mateo Ruiz had been the Witheringtons’ gardener and then intimated that pulling weeds and mowing lawns was not all he’d been paid to do.
“How clever,” Lisa said sarcastically. “And who in God’s name told the reporter that?”
It went on to describe the murder, and how and where Mateo’s body had been found; it even mentioned the fact that Mateo had been shot in the back. Next, there was a paragraph about the Witherington family’s wealth, reportedly derived from its import-export business. The final paragraph was about Lisa and her law firm.
“This is just great,” Lisa mumbled as she got up for another cup of coffee. How on earth did the press get wind of all of this so soon? Obviously Glory and Chandler were big news in the Chicago area—and a front yard homicide was probably the most sensational thing with which either of them had been involved. All Lisa could really be thankful for right now was that the story hadn’t mentioned Glory’s other run-ins with the law. Everything would eventually come out, but Lisa hoped that by then she would have been able to run a little interference. So far, all she was doing was running blind, and that was something she was going to have to change.
Lisa decided she’d better get into the office early on this sunny Saturday morning. She could imagine the kind of hoopla this front-page story could mean for the firm and she wanted to be prepared for the repercussions. However, she only made it to the top of the stairs before her telephone started ringing.
“Hello?” she said, grabbing the phone in her bedroom on the second ring.
“Hi, sugar plum.” It was her mother.
“Mom, it’s ten minutes after six. You never call this early unless something is wrong.”
“Nothing is wrong. I just saw your picture in the morning paper. Front page, no less.”
“Oh, that.”
“I take it this is a new case for you? When did you get this one? I thought you’d just finished up on another.”
“Mom, I’m usually juggling half a dozen cases and so is every other lawyer in the place. I did just finish up another, but Mr. Ludlow asked me personally to take this one. You just don’t refuse a senior partner. I do think one of the reasons he asked me to handle this was because he didn’t think it would go this far.”
“What do you mean? Mrs. Witherington is being accused of murder, isn’t she? Why wouldn’t it go to trial?”
“That’s just it. Mrs. Witherington didn’t do it. Someone else did. We were hoping to clear her name before it got that far. Actually, even before her arrest.”
“Well, honey, I’m no attorney, but it seems to me that if the police have enough evidence to arrest a person for murder, then they must know something.”
“The police can arrest anyone for anything, Mom. So far, all they have on Mrs. Witherington is circumstantial evidence and a coroner’s report. Look, Mom, I don’t mean to cut you short but I really need to get into the office early this morning. I’ll call you tonight. Okay?”
“Sure, honey. I’ll talk to you later. Have a good day.”
The next time the phone rang, Lisa was in the shower. Was it going to be like this all day? Was this what life was like for those attorneys who specialized in the biggest and most notorious high-profile cases?
“Maybe I’ll move over to penny-ante crimes and divorce cases,” she grumbled as the hot water from the shower ran down her face and body.
The phone wouldn’t stop ringing. Whoever was calling was persistent; maybe the call was from one of the firm’s partners. With a sudden sinking sensation, Lisa turned off the water, wrapped a towel around herself and ran for the phone.
“Lisa Jensen,” she said, striving to sound all business in case it was John Ludlow or one of the other partners.
“You been running?”
“What?”
“You’re out of breath.”
“What I am is wet. You got me out of the shower.” Kurt Sandoval was calling this early? What on earth for? Possibly to badger her about the headlines? “Shit,” she whispered.
“What was that?”
It suddenly occurred to her that the police could have released the story to the press, and she became stiff with righteous indignation.
“Did the department release the Witherington story?” she asked without answering his question.
“Not that I know of.”
“Well, somebody did it.”
“That seems rather apparent, doesn’t it?” Kurt drawled. “Actually, I called to find out if you might be the mouth that roared. Publicity is sometimes good for defense counsel.”
“I hardly think premature publicity is going to help Glory’s case,” she said with some sarcasm. “Besides, the entire article is slanted against her.”
“Oh, now I think that’s an exaggeration.”
“What I’d really like to know is why the reporter interviewed the prosecution attorneys and didn’t even try to make contact with me so I could present something positive about my client.”
“Do you have something positive to present?”
“Did you call at this most inconvenient time to insult my intelligence? Look, I’m dripping on the carpet. If you still feel the need to add insult to injury later on, call me at work.” Lisa slammed down the phone and ran back to the bathroom. She was seething on the inside and shivering on the outside.
Damn Sandoval and all married men who thought they were so damned cute that they could get away with anything, she thought resentfully as she turned on the hot water again.
Because it was a Saturday and everyone who had to go in to the firm on a weekend dressed casually, Lisa put on a pair of freshly cleaned and pressed jeans and an ivory-colored cotton sweater. High-heeled light tan leather boots, for which she’d paid a small fortune, and a luscious pink suede jacket completed her ensemble for the day.
But she didn’t waste time in admiring herself, and she gathered her purse and briefcase—in which she’d stashed the newspaper—and left the house to hurry to the nearest bus stop to catch a downtown bus.
The ride was about thirty minutes long and she noticed at least a dozen newspapers in the hands of wide-eyed passengers. Wishing she’d thought to put on a hat with a brim she could pull down over her face, she settled for her dark glasses and dug them out of her purse.
Then she thought of the case and the discomfort of unwanted publicity. Why in God’s name would anyone deliberately seek the public’s eye, she wondered uneasily. Obviously Sandoval had believed that was precisely what she’d done. He might flirt with her and even leer at her at times, but he sure as hell didn’t know her!
“And he never will,” she vowed, renewing her postdivorce pledge to never take up with a married man because of the pain it would cause his wife, which she’d felt firsthand with Bobby’s sexual escapades.
Lisa was at her desk, trying to better organize the notes she was amassing on Glory’s case. She also had a copy of the coroner’s autopsy report, and she studied again the few lines citing the cause of death. A .32 caliber slug had been removed from the body. The bullet had lodged in the upper torso and entered through the victim’s back.
Sitting there pondering the