Lassiter 06 - Fool Me Twice (40 page)

Again, I rewound the tape and listened. This
time I closed my eyes and saw the scene. I was on my back, my hand
curling around the nail gun and lifting it toward his chest. I
remembered his hand grabbing it and my pulling the trigger, hoping
for the blast and hearing nothing but a . . .

Click
.

Then the sound of my own head being snapped
against the floor by Cimarron’s fist.

A thud like a baseball smacking into the
catcher’s mitt.

Followed quickly by a grunt.

I couldn’t place the sounds. I would have
been already close to unconsciousness. Seconds passed. What was
happening?

Whomp
.

Silence.

I stopped the tape, rewound just a bit, and
played the last few moments yet again.

I counted, a-thousand-one,
a-thousand-two, a-thousand-three. From the time I was hit, three
seconds, then the thud and grunt. Seven more seconds until the
final
whomp
.

Ten seconds from the time I was hit! I
couldn’t have fired it. At the time, I was drifting toward
dreamland, having been battered into a fair-to-middling
concussion.

I tried to figure it out.

Ten seconds.

What happened when I was sailing somewhere
between pain and coma?

I was still thinking about it as the tape
ran on. This time, I didn’t stop it.

Then I heard the voice. And I knew.

CHAPTER 27

A LOUSY JUDGE OF
CHARACTER

I didn’t have time to shower and change. I
rushed to the sheriff s department in the basement of the
courthouse and found Detective Racklin at his desk. I told him what
I needed. “A dummy?” he asked.

“
Two dummies, like they use
in the crash tests.”

“
What for?”

“
Come to court, and you’ll
see.”

* * *

I barged through the courtroom door carrying
a brown paper sack from the City Market, and everyone turned toward
me. Why were they looking at me that way? H. T. Patterson stood at
the lectern, peering over his shoulder. Jo Jo Baroso was on the
witness stand, and the jurors were in their places. The clock said
nine-forty.

“
Ah, here you are,” Judge
Witherspoon announced from the bench. “I was about to issue a bench
warrant, but if you’ll take your seat, Mr. Lassiter, perhaps we can
continue. Next question, Mr. Patterson.”

“
No!” I called out, plowing
through the gate that separates the spectators from the
gladiators.

“
I beg your pardon,” the
judge said.

“
I mean, no, Your Honor.
Respectfully, may we approach the bench?”

“
We
, as in the lawyers and
you
?”

“
Yes, Your Honor. I’m an
attorney duly admitted to the Florida Bar, attorney number 163327.
Additionally, I believe I have a constitutional right to be heard
in my own defense. I wish to be associated as
co-counsel.”

Patterson hustled over and grabbed me just
above the elbow. He had a good grip for a little guy. “Jake,” he
whispered, “what the hell are you doing?”

“
Trust me.”

“
Trust you? You have straw
in your hair, you look like you slept on a park bench…and what’s
that on your shoes?”

I looked down. Oops. Never wear wing tips in
the morgue or a horse barn.

“
Gentlemen,” the judge
called out, a note of irritation creeping into his voice. “Would
you please step forward?”

I put my paper sack on the defense table and
joined Patterson, McBain, and the stenographer on the side of the
bench away from the jury.

“
Your Honor,” I began, “I
wish to take over the cross-examination of Ms. Baroso.”

The judge wrinkled his forehead. “Surely you
know the old saw about a man representing himself having a fool for
a client.”

“
This is different, Your
Honor.”

“
Why?”

“
Because there are only two
people in this courtroom who know what happened in the barn that
night. One is sitting on the witness stand, and the other is me,
and I only learned it this morning.”

“
That’s not good enough.
The client always knows more than the lawyer about the case. I’ll
give you fifteen minutes to consult with Mr. Patterson, then we
continue.”

“
No, Your Honor. I have to
do it myself. I’m the only one who can.”

The judge studied me a moment, his jaw
muscles tightening. “I am cognizant of your right to defend
yourself, but I have a duty to protect defendants from themselves.”
He seemed to ponder the question of my competence, then sniffed the
air, before turning to the clerk. “What is that godawful smell?
Would someone ask the bailiff to check on the furnace?”

H. T. Patterson cleared his throat. “For the
record, Your Honor, I have no objection to Mr. Lassiter joining as
co-counsel, although I do not join in his motion.”

In other words, don’t blame jour lawyer if
you screw it up.

“
What about you, Mr.
McBain, any objection?” the judge asked.

“
Yes, sir. Yes, indeed.
Cheap theatrics and a trick for the appellate court. Mr. Lassiter
sees which way the wind is blowing, and he’s trying to build error
into the record. He’s going to take over, and when he’s convicted,
claim ineffective assistance of counsel. If he loses the appeal,
he’s got a federal constitutional claim for habeas corpus. It’s all
a ruse, Judge, a slick ploy.”

“
But if I deny the request,
that’s an issue for appeal, too,” the judge mused, smiling
ruefully.

He thought it over some more, and I
remembered one of my first clients in the P.D.’s office. He
insisted on representing himself, but he had no legal training, so
the judge appointed me to sit as co-counsel and offer advice, none
of which was taken. The client was cross-examining a man he
supposedly mugged in a dark alley. “How can you identify me when I
knocked you cold from behind?” the budding barrister asked.

Finally, Judge Witherspoon shrugged and
said, “Well, I’m going to let you have a go at it, though I wonder
if you might show the court some respect by pulling your tie up to
your collar before you address the witness.”

I grabbed a yellow pad and a pen just to
look official, adjusted my tie, ran a hand over a two-day growth of
beard and got as close to the witness stand as I could without
asking for permission to get closer.

“
Good morning, Jo Jo,” I
said.

“
Good morning, Mr.
Lassiter,” she replied.

“
Mr.
Lassiter
. Yesterday, it was Jake. And a
few months ago in Miami, it was
mi
á
ngel
, was it not?”

“
No. That was a long time
ago.”

I gave her a little smile. “It must have
been before I started stealing, raping, and killing?”

“
I don’t know when your
life swerved off its path.”

“
Nor I, yours.”

“
Objection, argumentative!”
McBain stayed on his feet. He didn’t want to waste time leaping up
for the next objection.

“
Sustained. Mr. Lassiter,
you know better than that. I caution you to adhere to the rules of
evidence, or you may resume your seat.”

“
Ms. Baroso, or should I
say, Mrs. Cimarron?”

“
Either one.”

“
But you obviously prefer
Ms. Baroso, correct?”

“
That’s what I go
by.”

“
In fact, you never told
anyone you were married, isn’t that right?”

She paused, then nodded and said, “That’s
right.”

“
Except your brother, Luis,
who prefers to be called Louis, and is known affectionately
throughout the justice system as Blinky?”

I was smiling at her
confidently, and for the first time, her look changed. Just the
first hint of apprehension. She knew me well enough to know my
sarcasm usually preceded the baiting of a trap. Her look seemed to
ask:
What does he know?

“
Let me think,” she
said.

“
Think? You need to think
whether you told your only sibling you were married?”

“
I believe I did tell
Luis,” she said, a bit too quickly.

“
So you did tell
someone?”

“
Yes, I suppose I
did.”

“
Then a moment ago you were
mistaken when you said you never told anyone?”

“
I suppose I
was.”

“
Ever tell anyone
else?”

“
No.”

“
So you never told me, did
you?”

After all of that, she had to say no.

“
No,” she said. “I never
told you.”

“
Not when you and I were
alone in your house in Miami last June?”

“
No.”

“
Not when your husband
showed up that night?”

“
No.”

“
And not when you say I
attacked you in the barn?”

“
No.”

“
You didn’t say, ‘Jake,
please, I’m a married woman, and my husband is in the house over
yonder?’ “No.”

“
You didn’t think that
information was important?”

“
I didn’t think it would
stop you.”

Ouch. I had committed the cardinal sin on
cross, one question too many. It was the equivalent of the “why”
that will always burn you with a smart, hostile witness. Time to
move on.

“
Mrs. Cimarron, what were
the terms of your late husband’s will?”

“
Objection,” McBain said,
still standing at the prosecution table. “Irrelevant.”

“
He wouldn’t say that if I
was the beneficiary,” I told the judge. “Relevant to the issue of
who wanted the decedent dead.”

Motive, motive, motive.

“
Overruled, but move it
along, Mr. Lassiter.”

“
Simmy left no will,” Jo Jo
said. “He died intestate.”

“
So as the surviving
spouse, you receive one hundred percent of the estate, free and
clear of all federal taxes?”

“
I really don’t know the
law in that area.”

“
Oh come now, Mrs.
Cimarron, you’re a lawyer.”

“
I’ve spent my entire
career prosecuting criminals, not writing wills.”

Gonna wing it now.
“But surely you have retained probate counsel and
have prepared to file the appropriate papers with the
state.”

Her eyes flickered almost imperceptibly.
“Yes, I’ve retained a local probate lawyer.”

“
Who explained to you that
you were the sole beneficiary and would receive one hundred percent
of the estate, free and clear of federal taxes?”

“
I believe it was
mentioned.”

“
So the ranch goes to
you?”

“
Yes.”

“
And all personal
property?”

“
Yes.”

“
And the mining claims, the
treasure maps, the artifacts and products of Mr. Cimarron’s years
of work?”

“
Yes.”

“
Life
insurance?”

“
No.”

“
But there is a policy,
isn’t there, with two million in death benefits?’’

“
I believe my brother is
the beneficiary, just as Simmy was the beneficiary of Luis’s
policy.”

“
Ah yes, your brother.
Where is he?”

“
Nobody knows.”

“
When did you see him
last?”

She studied me a moment
before answering. The jurors were watching her, so I risked a
little smirk.
What does he know?
“In June, just before he disappeared.”

“
And you’re sure you
haven’t seen him since?”

“
Objection, repetitious as
well as irrelevant.” McBain didn’t have the slightest idea where I
was going, but he would soon.

“
Your Honor, I’ll tie it up
shortly.”

“
All right,
overruled.”

“
I’m sure I haven’t seen
him,” she answered.

I paused to make a note on my legal pad as
if this was testimony of great import, and of course, it was. Then
I told the witness to take us through the events that night, and
she did it all again, starting with my tearing off her clothes, and
ending with my plugging Cimarron.

“
Was anyone else in the
barn besides your husband, you, and me?”

“
Yes, the boy, your nephew,
but he ran out when the fighting began. I’ve already testified to
that.”

“
No one else?”

“
No, Mr. Lassiter. No one
else.”

“
My nephew. What did he
have with him?”

“
What do you mean?” A look
of uncertainty in her eyes.

“
Did he have a video
camera?”

She paused a moment.
What does he know?
“Yes,
he did.”

I went to the defense table and pulled
opened the paper sack. “This camera?”