Page 91 of The 1 Lawyer

“Actually, I didn’t sleep much in here. This couch isn’t particularly comfortable.” My neck was stiff. I rolled my head and listened to the cracking noises that the movement made. “But the cops tore my house apart with their bogus search, and I just couldn’t stand to be there.”

I grabbed a sheaf of papers sitting on the end table and held it out to her. “This is the inventory from the search. It’s crazy, what all they took. You want to see it? I swear, you’re not going to believe it.”

Jenny reached out for the inventory with her good arm, the one that hadn’t been dislocated. But she took the pages and set them back on the table without bothering to read them. I noticed that something was different about her that morning. “Hey, Jenny, where’s your sling? Aren’t you supposed to be wearing it?”

“I’m not fooling with it anymore. It slows me down.”

That bothered me. “What did the doctor say? Hey, you’re not driving, are you? The doctor gave you specific instructions about that. I was there.”

She shrugged one shoulder—the undamaged one. “Don’t worry about it. Look, I brought you some breakfast.” She handed me the paper bag. An Egg McMuffin was inside. I unwrapped the sandwich and viewed it without enthusiasm. I wasn’t hungry.

But Jenny was watching me like a hawk, so I took a couple of bites so I wouldn’t look ungrateful.

She said, “There’s a hash brown in there, did you see? You like those, right? You gonna eat it?” She was talking about a fast-food breakfast, but her voice had a definite edge. It made me take a closer look at her. Under the bruises on her face, Jenny was pale and seemed tense. She had something on her mind other than McDonald’s. I wadded up the bag and tossed it at the trash can. My aim was off—it hit the floor.

I was inclined to let it sit there, but Jenny picked it up and dropped it into the can. Then she dragged a chair up to my makeshift bed, sat beside me, and took my hand.

She said slowly, as if she’d carefully thought out the words in advance, “I got a call this morning from my friend who works in the crime scene unit.”

“Did you tell her they’re wasting their time? Dragging Rue out of class in handcuffs and kicking in the door of my house—I’d appreciate it if you’d inform her that the Biloxi cops have lost their freaking minds. They’ve gone batshit-crazy on this case.”

She pressed her lips together. I knew Jenny; she was flipping out about something and struggling to hide it. “She said they found something. There’s evidence that was taken from your house. And they think that forensics can tie it to evidence from the Iris Caro murder scene.”

I jerked my hand away from her icy grip. “Bullshit. Impossible. Don’t even try to go there, Jenny. I don’t want to hear it. There’s no way that Rue is capable of murder.”

Jenny rubbed her eyes as if they were full of grit. Her lips trembled. “It’s not just that.” She took a breath. “Stafford Lee,” she began. Her voice was soft, almost inaudible. I braced myself. I knew how Jenny acted when she was breaking bad news. Really bad news.

“She says they’ve got something on you, Stafford Lee. They think you were in on it with her.”

I felt like I blacked out for a moment, like my brain lost the capacity to function. “What the hell are you trying to say? What do they think I was in on?”

She whispered the words. I guess she thought they were too horrible to speak in a normal tone.

“That you were in on killing Iris Caro.”

PART III

OCTOBER

CHAPTER 72

TWO DAYS had passed since Jenny informed me that the Biloxi PD was eyeing me as a possible suspect. But I couldn’t get anyone to confirm it because no one in law enforcement would talk to me.

I’d tried to reach out to Henry Gordon-James, had called him repeatedly over the past forty-eight hours to ask what the hell was going on. He wouldn’t take my calls. I left urgent messages. He didn’t acknowledge them.

Meanwhile, Rue was still locked up tight. She was being held at the county jail in Gulfport. The police considered her to be a primary suspect in the murder of Iris Caro. They said as much in a statement to the press. The police chief said in an interview that the community wasn’t in danger, that they knew who the perpetrator was. When pressed for details, he would say only that they were on the case.

Whether the community was reassured by his statements, I couldn’t say. But I sure as hell wasn’t. Because I knew for certain that Rue Holmes hadn’t killed Iris Caro. The killer was still at large, and the police weren’t looking.

The previous day, Rue had made an initial appearance before a judge in Biloxi. I stood beside her as he informed her of the murder charge. They gave us a copy of the charging affidavit. Her bail was set at seven hundred fifty thousand dollars. That’s a fortune in Mississippi—well, it’s a fortune anywhere. She’d never be able to come up with that much money. They wanted to make sure she stayed put.

In the courtroom, I kicked up a fuss, stormed the bench, argued the lack of probable cause, protested the bond amount as unreasonable. Rue hadn’t been indicted by a grand jury yet, and there was no telling when an indictment might be handed down. The judge informed her that she had a right to a preliminary hearing to determine whether there was probable cause that Rue had committed the crime. But she had to formally ask the court for a prelim if she wished to receive a hearing.

And now I was sitting in my office, fine-tuning the written request. The rule stated that the hearing had to be held within fourteen days, but I knew how the game was played. After the hearing date was set, the district attorney would try to postpone it, claiming they needed to wait for evidence or results from the crime lab. The delay could stretch out for months while Rue remained locked in a cell.

I’d already called the DA on the issue, trying to get a firm date for the preliminary hearing. But no one would talk to me about that either. Not Gordon-James, not any of his assistants. The silence was deafening.

My fingers flying on the keyboard, I pumped more fire into the request to the court. I needed to submit it that day, because as soon as it hit the court file, the clock would start ticking. And I intended to hold everyone’s feet to the fire on Rue’s behalf.

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