Page 113 of Nightshade

“You’re the same age,” he said. “The story said you survived growing up in a gang neighborhood in East Bakersfield to get to college and then to law school up at Davis. I figure you two knew each other from back then. Was it in high school or in a gang? Maybe both? The article in theCalldidn’t say.”

It was a guess, but an educated one.

“Look,” Juarez said. “I know you’ve probably been under a lot of stress, but be very careful about what you say here.”

“Same back at you, Monika,” he said. “I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt. I’m actually hoping I can help you and you can help me, and we can maybe keep this between us.”

He said it but wasn’t sure he could keep any of it quiet. It was all he could do to contain the fury he felt.

“What is ‘this,’ Stilwell?”

“I think you know what it is, and you need to talk to me, or you leave me no choice but to go down the official road with it. If I put it in my formal statement and it goes to CAPO, then you’ll end up in front of the justice integrity unit explaining it.”

Juarez pushed back her chair and stood up.

“I’m not going to listen to this,” she said.

She started gathering her files.

“Sit down, Monika,” Stilwell said. “Spivak told me you were the leak to Terranova. Right before I killed him. He said you two were homeys from back in Bakersfield. For now, I’ve left what I know about you out of the investigation. And I can keep it that way.”

It was a bluff. Juarez stared at him from her standing position. Then she slowly sat back down. It was as good as a confession.

“You are the only one I told that I hadn’t sent the saw handle to the lab yet, that it was still on the island,” he said. “That’s why they grabbed Tash. You told them it was locked up at the sub.”

As Stilwell talked, Juarez looked off toward the other tablesas though watching her career run away like a fleeing felon. But Stilwell was more interested in using her to get to the bigger fish.

“Where is he, Monika?”

“I don’t know.”

“Talk to me. I can help you. We can help each other.”

Juarez folded her arms the way Tash had the night before. Stilwell waited. He knew she was about to break.

“Look, I made a mistake, okay?” she said. “He asked me how long the lab would take to analyze it, and I was stupid. I said the lab didn’t even have it yet. That’s all. I had no idea what he was going to do. It was just… conversation.”

“Conversation with the primary focus of an investigation,” Stilwell said. “Conversation that led to an innocent woman being abducted and terrorized by a killer who’d cut somebody’s throat twenty-four hours earlier.”

“You don’t think I feel guilty about that? But I didn’t think in a million years that that would happen.”

“You’re not that stupid, Monika. You gave inside information to a fucking killer.”

“Iknow!”

She shouted it, causing others in the courtyard to turn from their conversations and look. Juarez took a deep breath and continued in a calm and quiet voice.

“He told me he didn’t do it—kill Gaston. That it was somebody else.”

“When did you talk to him?”

“He called me Friday morning and he was just as surprised as I was. He said somebody else set it up.”

“Who?”

“He wouldn’t say. He said it was his ace in the hole. He’d only reveal who it was if I made him a deal.”

“What did you tell him?”

---