False Witness Read online

  An hour later, after joining Chris and the family for hamburgers cooked on the grill, Jamie started making excuses to leave. She loved her brother, but he was an old maid when it came to worrying about her. Instead of the truth, she fed him a line about leaving town for a few days. She wondered if he would mind taking care of Snowball. Feeling a self-imposed double shot of guilt—one for misleading her brother, the other for abandoning her dog—Jamie bent down and hugged Snowball’s neck.

  “It’s for your own good,” she whispered, and Snowball wagged his tail.

  “He’ll be fine,” Chris promised.

  Jamie stood. Getting too sentimental might make everyone suspicious.

  “I know. I’m just going to miss the big lug.”

  Snowball wandered away from Jamie, nonchalantly approaching the kitchen table, where the family had finished their feast a few minutes earlier. He noticed one of the kids’ paper plates, a leftover piece of hamburger calling his name. He peeked over his shoulder to make sure Jamie was engaged in conversation, jumped up and snitched the burger from the plate, swallowed it in one bite, then grabbed the plate itself.

  Table manners had not been his strength in obedience school.

  “Snowball!” Jamie yelled, freezing him in his tracks.

  But when Chris lunged for him, Snowball took off. “You little thief,” Chris said, giving chase. He glanced back at Jamie. “Now’s a good time to go—he won’t even notice.”

  Snowball darted back and forth, the paper plate hanging from his mouth, the girls and Chris giving chase.

  “Hurry back,” Chris shouted to Jamie.

  She smiled, thanked him, and headed for the front door. She would be halfway to the 4Runner before Snowball even knew she was gone.

  On the way home, Jamie stopped at a gun shop in Gainesville and purchased her first handgun. Until today, she had always supported a waiting period for handgun purchases. But with Dmitri and his gang issuing their threats, she suddenly appreciated the wisdom of the instant background check.

  This gun was, according to the clerk, exactly what a young, single woman would need for protection. A .45 caliber, the clerk explained, large enough to stop any attacker with a single bullet. The gun itself had a flat profile—small and sleek. It was single action, according to the clerk, and Jamie nodded as if she had been looking for a single-action, .45-caliber gun all along. “Kimber makes excellent guns,” the clerk bragged, and Jamie nodded some more. When she wrapped her hand around the grip, her finger extended comfortably to the trigger.

  “Think you can handle the recoil?” the clerk asked. “It has a pretty good kick.”

  That was when Jamie knew this gun was for her.

  She passed on the concealed-carry vest the clerk tried to sell her. She would make sure the safety was on and stuff it in her backpack. Not exactly legal, but getting a permit to carry a concealed handgun would take several days, not to mention the fact that her court petition would tip her hand to the men who had accosted her.

  On the way down I-985 from Gainesville, Jamie called Drew Jacobsen. The detective took about five minutes to bring her up to speed on the investigation. He hadn’t made much progress, in Jamie’s opinion, but it was nice to hear his voice anyway.

  She told him that she had dropped Snowball off with a family member and then, somewhat embarrassed, mentioned that she had purchased a gun.

  “A pistol?” he asked.

  “Yeah. It’s a Kimber .45,” Jamie said, hoping she sounded semi-intelligent with her new gun lingo. “A Pro Carry II.”

  “A .45?” Jacobsen hesitated as if he wanted to say something more but decided against it. Instead he asked, “You planning on carrying it concealed?”

  “I was thinking about it.”

  “You know you’ll need a permit.”

  “Of course.”

  “That can take several days.”

  “So I’ve heard.”

  Jacobsen hesitated again, and this time Jamie knew why. He was on thin ice here. “Of course, I’m a big supporter of the permit laws in most circumstances, and I would never counsel anyone to ignore them. But in certain hypothetical cases, I could see where the application process itself might tip off the very people a young lady might be trying to protect herself from.”

  “So you’re saying I shouldn’t get a permit,” Jamie stated, just to get a reaction.

  “I’m just talking hypothetically,” Jacobsen said.

  “Sure. And hypothetically speaking, I was going to carry it in my backpack.”

  “Do you even know how to use the thing? Have you ever had lessons?”

  “I’ve never fired a gun in my life.”

  “Well, in my capacity here on the force, I couldn’t actually give lessons. It just so happens, however, that I’m heading to a shooting range tomorrow on my day off. Might be a good place for you to get a little target practice.”

  “Amazing,” Jamie said. “I was thinking about going to that same shooting range. Can you tell me where it is?”

  Jacobsen laughed and gave her directions. They agreed on a time. “In the meantime,” he said, “please be careful. That piece is nothing to play around with.”

  Jamie liked the fact that he sounded concerned. “I’ll keep that in mind,” she said.

  Jamie arrived at her condo a few minutes after six. As in the Law & Order episodes, she went room to room, pointing the gun in front of her, checking every closet. Nobody was there, but it felt invigorating doing it.

  Until she noticed Snowball’s food and water bowls. Suddenly the house seemed very empty.

  She turned on the television. She locked the dead bolt. She called her brother to check on her dog.

  She slept that night with the bathroom light on and the bathroom door cracked open, the light spilling softly into her bedroom. She kept the loaded gun on the nightstand. Three times she woke up and reached over to touch it. Each time, after feeling the cold steel, she slipped back into a fitful sleep.

  41

  Monday, March 31

  “Can we talk?” The pretty brunette with earnest brown eyes touched Isaiah’s arm.

  A law student? He didn’t think so. She looked to be midthirties. He couldn’t recall seeing her around the law school before. If he had, he would have noticed.

  “Sure.”

  She had short-cropped hair, stylishly spiked. A killer body.

  “Can we go someplace private?”

  “Thought you’d never ask.”

  She didn’t smile. “I’m serious.”

  Isaiah shrugged. Law students passed on both sides of the corridor. “Private like the library or private as in my place at ten?”

  “The library will do fine.”

  “I was afraid of that.”

  She followed him down the hallway, mysteriously quiet. He held out his hand to shake. “Isaiah Haywood,” he said.

  “I know,” she said, shaking his hand.

  Interesting. They kept walking, Isaiah nodding at a few friends passing in the other direction. “A lot of people might take that as a cue to share their name.”

  She let silence be her answer. He noticed her movements out of the corner of his eye—lithe, fluid. Definitely an athlete.

  “Beach volleyball?” he asked.

  “What?”

  “You’re an athlete. I can tell. I’m guessing beach volleyball.”

  “No.”

  He opened the door for her as they entered the library. She had a sleeveless blouse on—strong shoulders, but not bulky. A body-fat ratio that would barely move the needle. “Gymnast?”

  “Nope.”

  “There’re usually some empty tables back and to the right.” He paused a beat to formulate his next guess. “Cheerleading?”

  She gave him a half smile. “Hardly.”

  “What do you mean by that? Cheerleaders are incredible athletes these days.”

  “Yeah. So are poker players.”

  “What’s that I detect?” Isaiah gave her a teasing smile
. “A sense of humor?”

  She shook her head and frowned, the makings of a grin forming on her lips. “Actually, I’m a diver.”

  He stopped and looked her over. “My favorite sport,” he said.

  She brushed some hair in place with her left hand. A wedding ring. Could she be more obvious?

  Isaiah found a private spot at a table isolated among the stacks in a far corner. She sat opposite him and leaned forward.

  “My name is Stacie Hoffman,” she said, her voice soft and secretive. “I need to hire you as my lawyer. Actually, you’d be representing my husband and me. I need to know this will all be confidential and absolutely secret.”

  Her eyes pinned him back. A hint of eye shadow, nice lashes, beguiling . . . if it weren’t for the ring. “The only problem with representing you is that I’m still a law student,” Isaiah offered. “There’s the small matter of graduating from law school, followed by a trivial little thing called a bar exam, and then a nasty little law that makes it illegal to practice without a license.”

  “Don’t you work in the legal aid clinic?”

  “Yes.”

  “Don’t you represent clients there?”

  “Yeah, but that’s done under a third-year practice rule. Technically, we’re being supervised by one of our professors, even though he’s never actually there.”

  “All right, I’m hiring you as my legal aid lawyer.”

  Isaiah shifted in his seat, torn between liking the spunk of this woman and feeling like she might be playing him. Real clients paid real cash. One of the things that got old fast in law school was having friends and family members, and friends of family members, all hit you up for free legal advice. At first it was flattering. But by his third year, Isaiah had had more than his fill. Plus, this woman was married.

  “There are forms to fill out. We can’t just represent clients who walk up to us in the hallway. Besides . . .”

  Stacie put a hand on his arm. “Just hear me out.” Her gaze sizzled with intensity. “Please.”

  “No promises.”

  “I know.”

  He shrugged and slouched a little lower in his seat. What could it hurt?

  “You don’t want to take notes?”

  Isaiah tapped his skull. “Steel trap, baby.”

  Her look said she was not impressed. “My husband is being represented by your colleague, a law student named Jamie Brock. We can’t go directly to Jamie because we think they might be watching her. My husband saw you argue a case in court the other day and thought maybe you would help us.”

  “Who is ‘they’?”

  Stacie lowered her voice. “The triads. Chinese mafia.”

  Isaiah gave her a skeptical nod. I see. The crazy thing was that she actually looked sane.

  “My husband attended court with Jamie Friday on a Class 5 felony—impersonating a police officer. But before his case was called, David—that’s my husband—saw a member of the mafia he recognized from several years ago. They’re trying to kill us, Isaiah. David set up a diversion and bolted from the courtroom. He ditched the guy and then circled back and picked up his car. We’ve been in hiding all weekend.”

  As she talked, Isaiah tried to assess her credibility. She was educated and compelling, not the kind who might typically imagine false mafia figures. Though she occasionally glanced around the library, she didn’t appear to be overly paranoid. It was hard not to take her seriously.

  “So what do you want me to do? Why not just go to the cops?”

  Stacie leaned forward a little more, and the movement had a kind of magnetism to it. Isaiah found himself sitting up a little straighter, drawn by the captivating pull of a nice-looking woman who needed him. Even if she was married.

  “David and I are part of the federal witness protection program. We testified against some leaders of the Chinese mafia four years ago in Nevada. But now they’ve done something the federal agents said would never happen—they’ve found us here in Atlanta. We need you to approach an FBI agent we think we can trust and let him know our identities have been compromised. We need to start over with new identities.”

  Snead had briefly touched on the witness protection program about a month ago in crim pro class. Isaiah didn’t remember much from that discussion, but he thought he recalled some basics. “Isn’t the U.S. Marshals Service supposed to supervise the witness protection program?”

  “Yes. But somebody in that office compromised our location, Isaiah. Or somehow it leaked out. Until we find out how—we want to deal only with this one FBI agent. No marshals.”

  “Why don’t you just go to him yourself?”

  “We don’t even want the FBI to know where we are unless we know for sure that this guy’s willing to help us. We’re a little spooked right now, Isaiah. And we’re not willing to trust these federal bureaucrats until we can get a new protection deal in place—one that severely restricts the number of people who know about our new identities. We need an intermediary to negotiate that deal so that David and I can stay in hiding until it’s in place.”

  The whole thing sounded intriguing to Isaiah, but it had a serious downside. “So you want me to talk to this FBI agent so the mob can put me on their hit list.”

  “They won’t even know you’re representing us. That’s why we didn’t approach Jamie. Like I said, she’s probably being followed.”

  Suddenly Isaiah found himself whispering. “Why not go to a real lawyer? Why me?”

  “We need someone who hasn’t been compromised by the system. Someone young and idealistic. We’ve been burned by lawyers in the past.” Stacie reached into her purse and pulled out a white legal envelope. She handed it across the table. “My husband is a little unorthodox, but he’s a pretty good judge of character. And we’re not asking you to do this for free.”

  Isaiah’s instincts told him not to grab it. Stacie laid it on the table, and Isaiah stared at it for a second before sliding it back toward her.

  “It’s a retainer,” she protested.

  “Legal aid clients don’t pay.”

  Stacie frowned, and the brown eyes turned soft . . . pleading. “Look, I don’t want you to get in trouble for us. And if you can’t take the money, I understand. But we both know this is not a legal aid case, Isaiah. We’re not really asking you to practice law; we just need you to serve as a go-between with this FBI agent. David and I really struggled with whether we should even ask you to get involved in something like this. If you choose to help us, paying for your services is the least we can do.”

  She nudged the envelope back toward the middle of the table, and this time Isaiah picked it up. He slit open the end and peered inside. Cash. A stack of hundreds.

  “How much?”

  “Two thousand for starters. If we get the new identities and a new start, we’ll pay another twenty.”

  Isaiah wondered where they got that kind of money, especially in cash, but he was going to be a lawyer soon. That was one question real lawyers never asked.

  He still thought he should reject the money. On the other hand, this case—and Stacie in particular—had already drawn him in. How often did a young lawyer have a chance to do something this meaningful? David Hoffman was right about one thing: this case fit Isaiah’s personality, his passion. The Hoffmans needed somebody to take on the system. Somebody who wasn’t afraid to color at the edges of the box, maybe even a little outside it.

  Plus, though this was definitely a secondary point, he had more than fifty thousand in student loans. He gently riffled the bills with his thumb. They seemed real.

  “One more thing,” she said. “You can’t tell your instructor. Nobody but you and Jamie can know about this. David doesn’t trust your professor.”

  “How does your husband know Professor Snead?”

  “He knows a lot of things.”

  “That’s a reply straight out of a James Bond movie.” Isaiah lowered his voice and did an imitation. “‘He knows a lot of things.’” Then he gave her his best ser
ious-lawyer look. “Problem is—that doesn’t tell me anything. If you want me to be your lawyer, I’ve got to know what you know.”

  Stacie didn’t shrink back. If anything, she got more intense, her eyes becoming lasers. “That’s where you’re wrong, Isaiah. This is not a game. We’re dealing with the mob here—the Manchurian Triad. The less you know, the better. This is dangerous. And if you’re not up to it, we’ll get somebody who is.”

  “Now you’ve done it.”

  “What?”

  “Threatened my manhood.” He leaned forward and raised his hushed voice an octave. “If you’re not man enough, we’ll get somebody who is.” He waited for a smile, a flicker in her eyes, a slight loosening of her tense neck muscles.

  She sat stone-faced. Not even a courtesy grin. This woman had a serious humor deficiency. But then, she had the mob after her. A damsel in distress. A good-looking damsel. Plus, she had money.

  “What’s the agent’s name?” he asked.

  “Sam Parcelli.”

  42

  The shooting range was not at all what Jamie expected. It felt sterile, hollow, and loud. She wore bulky safety glasses and large earmuffs, her hair pulled up inside a baseball cap. There were six shooting lanes about fifty yards long with paper targets at the end. All but two of the lanes were occupied. Bullet casings lay scattered on the floor.

  She didn’t feel the intoxicating allure of firearms that she had seen in the eyes of some men she had known. Nor did her new friend, Detective Jacobsen, wrap his arms around her and gingerly show her how to hold her new weapon of destruction. Which was fine with Jamie. She wasn’t the type to be treated like she might break at any minute.

  To his credit, Jacobsen kept the contact to a minimum. When he first inspected the gun, he shook his head a little as if maybe Jamie had more guts than brains. “Nice piece,” he said, turning the gun over in his hand. “It’ll have a little kick.”

  “So I’ve heard.”

  He walked her through a whirlwind gun-safety course. The Kimber had a narrower grip than Jamie expected, and it fit comfortably in her hand. Plus, she had to admit, she felt powerful holding the thing. And a little more secure.