Page 101 of The Devil's Advocate

Kate leaned over, whispered, ‘I’m going to have to start charging you, Eddie.’

‘Don’t worry, this is the last time.’

Chandler cleared his throat, and Kate began to talk. He waved her words away into silence then said, ‘The disrespect you have shown this court requires a levy. There will be a fine of a thousand dollars, or ten days’ incarceration. Can you pay that, Flynn?’

‘Cash or card, Your Honor?’ I said.

‘I think you like those cells,’ said Harry.

‘I’m getting a lot of thinking done,’ I said, putting on my jacket as we went outside to the parking lot. ‘I’m not sure, but I have a working theory on the DA’s forensic evidence. Where’s Andy and Patricia?’

‘Bloch came and took Andy and Patricia back to the hotel. She tailed someone from the court, and she needs you to call her right now so she can explain. She says we are in way over our heads and she wants you to call in the cavalry,’ said Kate.

‘Last time I checked we don’t have a cavalry,’ I said as Harry handed me back my cell phone. Soon as it switched back on, I saw the text message from Bloch.

CALL ME. RIGHT NOW.

As we drove back to the hotel I spoke to Bloch on the phone. She filled me in on the details of who she had followed, and what she had found. We had already parked outside the hotel, and I was on my way up the stairs to Andy’s room while she was still talking.

‘There’s an imminent threat. We have to bring in the FBI,’ she said.

‘We’re outside the room, come into the hallway and we’ll talk.’

The door opened and Bloch came out, closed it behind her and we stood there, in a hallway so hot and humid the condensation was running down the walls as if the building was sweating. We kept our voices as low as the pale wall lamps whose light didn’t reach the floor.

‘You need to call the feds,’ said Bloch.

‘I’m going to call Alexander Berlin. If he wants to bring in the FBI, great. We can only fight so many battles here. Andy is our priority. We get him off, we’ve got a chance at taking down Korn. I didn’t come here to take on the Nazis,’ I said.

‘White supremacists,’ said Bloch.

‘Same thing. I don’t want anyone to get hurt, and certainly not by these assholes, but if their immediate target is the governor, at least it takes some of the heat off Andy. All we have to do is keep him and his mom safe until we get through this. After that, the FBI, Homeland Security, ATF, Delta Force and the goddamn Avengers can level that building for all I care. We don’t want to fight too many battles. They may have killed Cody and Betty, and you can bet I want them to pay, but we can’t take them on now. Francis Edwards lost his daughter and his wife and he’s hurting. It’s easy to see why he’s involved with those guys, and I bet he’s right on the edge of losing it. Denvir, the guy from the protest the other day, he’s just looking for an excuse to shoot somebody. I don’t know this other guy Gruber, the university profess—’

Something hit me. I could almost hear theclickin my head as I made the connection.

‘You said Gruber was the head of the Chemistry Department in the University of—’

‘Alabama …’ said Bloch, and I saw her expression change, the skin on her forehead tightened and her eyes shimmered, as if she had just caught a glimpse of a lodestar in the distance.

‘Skylar Edwards was a Chemistry major …’ she said.

‘He probably knew her,’ said Harry.

‘But he knows her father, too,’ said Kate. ‘Could be he knew Francis Edwards for years through this hate group, long before Skylar even went to college.’

‘Not likely,’ said Harry. ‘Andy didn’t have a bad word to say about Skylar’s father, and Francis would occasionally give Andy a ride home. I don’t think anyone involved in one of those groups would let their daughter have a friend like Andy. That just doesn’t happen.’

‘So you think Francis got involved in this group after Skylar’s murder?’ I asked.

Nodding, Harry rubbed his chin, said, ‘Makes sense. A man in that much pain, unable to deal with the loss of his child. I’d say he sounds exactly like the kind of angry, lost soul to get recruited by a hate group. They probably reached out to him.’

‘Then what happened to his wife?’ asked Kate. ‘You said it looked like homicide. You think he killed her?’

‘I don’t think so,’ I said. ‘I watched him in the back of that sheriff’s cruiser. He was totally lost in grief. Crying uncontrollably, his sobs shook the whole car. To me, that didn’t look like a performance. He didn’t kill his wife.’

‘Then who did? Why was she killed? Why was Skylar murdered?’ asked Kate.

Harry and I shook our heads. It was possible Skylar was murdered simply because she was a beautiful young woman who fell under the red gaze of a monster. It happens, and there’s no motive, no reason. There is evil in men and women. Some people disagree. There are any number of reasons that a human being might kill another – revenge, drugs, alcohol, mental illness, even money. Sometimes, it is beyond all of those things. Sometimes people kill because they enjoy it. And if that is not evil, then I don’t know what is.