Inadvertent Disclosure (29 page)

Authors: Melissa F Miller

CHAPTER 45

Two weeks later

Harrisburg, Pennsylvania

Day two of grand jury testimony
of Sasha McCandless, Esquire

Sasha paused after she
described the wall, covered with Commissioner Price’s brain matter and bits of
skull. She took a slow sip of water from the heavy glass on the witness table
before continuing.

“At that point, Special Agent
Connelly and Deputy Russell secured the scene and called the state police to
take Sheriff Stickley and Doctor Spangler into custody.”

She caught the eye of her
attorney, Will Volmer, and he nodded his reassurance. Although Chief Justice
Bermann himself had promised her she didn’t need counsel and, under the
Investigating Grand Jury Act, her attorney wasn’t permitted to make objections
or address the grand jurors, Sasha had known from the minute she’d received the
witness subpoena that she wouldn’t be walking into the grand jury room alone.
When the head of Prescott & Talbott’s white collar crimes practice had
volunteered for the role, she’d agreed in a heartbeat.

The special prosecutor,
Aroostine Higgins, looked down at her notepad and then asked, “Why do you think
Heather Price killed herself?”

“I don’t know. Her sister had
just implicated her in the murder of a sitting judge; maybe she didn’t want to
face the scandal and criminal proceedings that would follow. Maybe she couldn’t
stand the thought of losing everything she’d worked for. Maybe there’s a
suicide gene, and she had it. I honestly don’t know. I just know that she did
it, and she did it too fast for any of us to have prevented it.”

Aroostine had made it clear to
Will that she just wanted information from Sasha so she could develop her case
against Griggs and Stickley. Spangler was Drew Showalter’s problem, as he had
been appointed special prosecutor by Judge Canaby to investigate the Orphans’
Court issues in Clear Brook County.

Will trusted the young Native
American attorney who Chief Justice Bermann had appointed to dig into the misuse
of the Attorney General’s Office and the county sheriff’s office. That was good
enough for Sasha.

“She’s a real up-and-comer,”
Will had told Sasha. “And her name means sparkling water.”

Sasha figured it was only
fitting that someone named sparkling water was responsible for cleaning up the
mess in Clear Brook County.

“Ms. McCandless, let’s go back
to the tape and the declaratory judgment action. Can you explain to the grand
jurors what the judge’s opinion held and why it was important?”

“Sure, after the county
commissioners fast-tracked Springport Hospitality Partners’ request for a
liquor license for the café, Commissioner Price realized how easily she could
control the process. Keystone Properties owns a large parcel of land in
Firetown that it rented to a nutritional supplement company as a distribution
center. When the landlord hosted a campaign event for Commissioner Price, she
recognized the value of the land. But, it was too late. Keystone had already
signed a memorandum of understanding with Big Sky. They were going to work out
a way for Big Sky to tap the shale below while VitaMight continued to operate
the distribution center above.”

“And VitaMight was your
client?” Aroostine prompted her.

“Right. The client whose
discovery motion I had just argued when Judge Paulson appointed me to represent
Mr. Craybill.”

“Thank you. Please go on.”

Will patted a hand on the
table. His signal that she should slow down, walk the grand jurors through it
step by step.

Sasha took a long breath before
she continued. “She wanted that land, though. She and her sister, the two
partners in Springport Hospitality Partners drew up a bid to buy it outright
and build a resort hotel. The kind of place that would appeal to all the
outsiders coming to Springport for the gas. It would be a cash cow.”

“Go on.”

“Keystone Properties wasn’t
interested. So, when Danny Trees showed up with his petition, Commissioner
Price pushed it through, then used it to convince Keystone Properties to break
its lease with its tenant, back out of the mineral rights deal, and sell the
land to her. And, of course, she also pushed the hotel plans through and got
her fellow commissioners to approve them. She wasn’t counting on Big Sky suing,
though. It asked Judge Paulson to declare the approval of the hotel plans
invalid and to reinstate the deal it had with Keystone Properties.”

Aroostine asked, “So, first she
had someone threaten Judge Paulson to try to get him to rule against Big Sky?”

“Not exactly threaten. As I
understand it, she harassed the county solicitor, Drew Showalter, to ‘do
something’ to convince the judge he had to uphold the hotel deal. To be honest,
I think Mr. Showalter was actually trying to warn Judge Paulson with his quote
from
The Godfather
. He was signaling that this was a money grab. He was
in a difficult spot, with a difficult client, but he did try to let people know
that she had a hold on the commissioners.”

“He also did this by asking you
to return a document?”

“Yes, by raising the issue of
inadvertent disclosure, he drew my attention to a flyer that showed Keystone
Properties had held a fundraiser for Commissioner Price on the property at
issue. Again, he had ethical obligations, and perhaps legitimate fears, that
were boxing him in. So, there were limits to what he could do.”

“So, we’re in agreement that he
was no Atticus Finch?” Aroostine smiled.

“Right.” Sasha smiled back.
“Not a Sir Thomas More either, for that matter.”

Showalter would be okay. The
citizens of Springport understood what it had meant to be under Heather Price’s
thumb. After her death, the stories about her hard-nosed negotiating tactics
and fondness for arm-twisting started to flow forward from all corners of the
county.

And, according to Russell, Showalter
was doing a decent job of investigating Shelly Spangler.

“Moving on, despite the
warnings, Commissioner Price feared Judge Paulson might rule against her?”

“Yes. And, Drew had explained
the judge’s routine. So, she decided to preempt the opinion by killing him. She
set up in the alley, shot him through the window, and drove away, unseen by
anyone except her sister. Sheriff Stickley’s job was to get the tape with the
judge’s opinion on it. But, when he got to chambers, the dictaphone was empty.
So Attorney General Griggs, stepped in to help cover up the murder and get that
tape.”

“Why would he do that?”

“Apparently, Heather Price had
determined she needed to have someone high up in her pocket. Her sister said
she bought off the attorney general once she realized all the state
representatives were bought and paid for by Big Sky.”

“How did he try to cover up the
murder?”

Sasha cleared her throat. “He
convinced the chief justice to appoint an outsider to investigate the judge’s
murder. Someone with no prosecutorial experience and no understanding of the
town’s culture. Someone he was certain would fail.”

Aroostine smiled again. “And
who was that?”

“That was me.”

“How’d that work out for Mr.
Griggs?”

“Not as planned,” Sasha said.

A soft chuckle rose from the
grand jurors.

“Where was the missing tape?”

“Gloria Burke, the judge’s
secretary had it.”

Sasha and Will had rehearsed
this part of her testimony carefully. Sasha wasn’t willing to say anything that
would implicate Gloria. So she hoped to gloss over how Gloria came to possess
the tape without lying.

“For safekeeping, would you
say?”

“I would.”

Sasha shot Will a grateful
look. She didn’t want to know what conversations he and the special prosecutor
had had, but they’d worked.

“So, this decision that
Commissioner Price was so desperate to prevent? I take it in his opinion, Judge
Paulson granted Big Sky’s motion and unwound her precious deal?”

Sasha turned to face the grand
jurors directly. “No. In a reasoned, detailed opinion, Judge Paulson denied Big
Sky’s motion and affirmed the council’s decision to approve the hotel plans.”

Aroostine let that statement
ring through the room for a full minute before she said, “Thank you, Ms.
McCandless. You’re excused.”

CHAPTER 46

One week later

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Connelly’s question weighed on
Sasha. She thought about it when she was running, sparring, and doing yoga.
When she was showering, driving, and falling asleep. She just didn’t have an
answer.

It was time to do the decent
thing and let him know. Face whatever the consequences would be.

She spent the morning working
out—running, punching, and kicking until every bit of nerves had drained out of
her, replaced by the welcome calm that accompanied physical exhaustion.

After a very long, very hot
shower, she dressed in yoga pants and her softest hooded sweater and headed to
the Strip District. She wandered the wholesalers’ stalls and picked out a good
Italian cheese, some fresh pasta, a handful of earthy mushrooms, and a bar of
dark chocolate.

Then she walked along the
cobblestone streets, dodging shoppers and tour groups, until she came to
Wholey’s Fish Market. She considered the live lobsters, but they waved their
long antennae at her like they were greeting a friend and she didn’t have the
heart. The containers of lump crabmeat elicited no feelings of guilt, so she
had the fishmonger dig one out of the ice for her.

She almost never cooked. And
when she did, it was always from a recipe that she followed religiously, more
like it was the instructions for deactivating a bomb than the steps for making
a casserole or a roast. But, today, she had no recipe, no shopping list.

She floated from store to
store, staying present in the smells and sounds of the Strip. Using them to
keep her nervous worry about the upcoming talk with Connelly at bay.

She finished her shopping at
Prestogeorge for some coffee. Russell’s face flashed in her mind unbidden, as
she inhaled the scent of the oily dark beans. She dismissed him from her mind
and picked out some espresso beans.

On a whim, she stopped outside
the coffee roaster’s shop to buy a bouquet of tulips from a street vendor.

Finally, she headed for the
car, her arms laden with packages, and tried to come up with a menu for the
night’s dinner. She was about twenty-five yards away when, without warning, the
skies opened up and fat drops of rain pelted her. She broke into an awkward
half run, the best she could manage with all her groceries.

The rain picked up as she
reached the car and fumbled for her keys. She tossed her soggy bags and
now-wilted flowers in the back seat and hurried into the driver’s seat.

She was soaked. Water streamed
off her hair and ran down her face. She flipped on the wipers. A scrap of paper
stuck under the left windshield wiper waved wildly.

Great.
She hopped out and freed it
from the wiper. It was a parking ticket. Of course.

She returned to the car, tossed
the ticket into her center console, and wiped her hands on her pants. She
turned up the heat to stave off the chill and cranked the radio. A jagged line
of lightning zigzagged across the sky and, almost immediately, a tremendous
boom of thunder shook the car. April in Pittsburgh. The weather could turn in
an instant.

Just as she popped the car into
gear, someone banged a palm on her driver’s side window. She jumped. Connelly’s
face peered in through the glass. She unlocked the passenger side and motioned
for him to go around.

He ran around the front of the
car and jumped in, slamming the door shut behind him.

“Hi,” he said. He gave her a
watery kiss then shook his head like a wet dog.

“What are you doing here?”

He’d planned to spend his day
in the office, catching up on paperwork.

“Getting drenched, mainly. I
finished up early and decided to grab lunch. It seemed like a nice day for a
walk, so I thought I’d get a bite here. Glad I ran into you.”

The sky was dark now, and the
rain came in steady sheets.

“Me, too. I’m not driving
anywhere until this lets up, though.”

Connelly twisted in his seat
and eyed the ripped and sopping wet bags on the back seat.

“Did you get anything good?”

Her earlier confidence in her
ability to whip up a meal evaporated as she looked back at the random
collection of food.

“I don’t know. Maybe?”

She reached back and dug out
the chocolate bar. She unwrapped it and snapped it in half.

“Want some?”

They ate the dark squares in
silence and watched the rain cascade off the front of the car. A PAT bus rolled
by, sending up a wave of standing water that splashed over the hood.

“What’s the occasion, anyway?”
He waved a hand at the groceries.

Her cheeks burned through the
damp cold. What could she say? I was going to make a special dinner and then
tell you I don’t know if I love you? The idea, which had seemed flawless just
that morning, suddenly struck her as lame, if not cruel.

“Ummmm…”

Connelly’s eyebrows shot up.

“Sasha McCandless, at a loss for
words? Inconceivable!”

She attempted a weak smile. Her
stomach flipped. Just get it over with, she thought. She gripped the steering
wheel with both hands and stared hard at the dashboard.

“Connelly, I’ve thought really
hard about your question. You know, where this is going and how I feel about
you. And, I’m sorry, but I just don’t know.”

Forcing the words out flooded
her body with relief. He’d take it however he took it.

She peeked over at him. He was
staring at her.

She opened her mouth, planning
to tell him what they had did matter to her, but stopped when he burst into
loud laughter.

He was laughing at her. Really
laughing, like it was hilarious.

“Ummm?”

He tried to stop. Wiped a tear
from his eye and caught his breath.

“I’m sorry, but you do know.”

A spark of anger flared in her
stomach.

“No, Connelly, I don’t know.”

He reached over and took her
chin in his hands.

“Actually, you do. Ever since
we got back from Springport you’ve been talking in your sleep.”

“What?”