The Associate (29 page)

Kate froze. Then she smiled.

“What?” Daniel asked.

She started toward the door to her basement workshop.

“Come on. We’re going to take a trip in cyberspace.”

Daniel followed Kate downstairs. She flipped on the light and headed to one of her computers.

“One of the reasons Reed, Briggs hired me was to advise them on computer security. If you want to know how to protect files, you have to know how to invade them. I’m going to hack into Flynn’s computer.”

Kate checked her watch. “Flynn’s employees should be home by now, so we’re good to go.”

“What are you looking for?” Daniel asked as Kate started pounding her keyboard.

“If he operates like most lawyers, Flynn posts his time sheets to his law office server,” she answered while focusing her attention on her monitor. “They stay there until his secretary uploads them to her workstation when she does his billing. I should be able to access the time sheet for the fifteen minutes when Gene Arnold called Flynn’s office. If someone was with Flynn when Arnold’s call came in, we’ll soon know.”

“How are you going to get in?”

“That’s simple. I’ll access the files at Reed, Briggs and get Flynn’s E-mail address. That’ll give me his Internet Protocol address. Once I log onto Flynn’s server, I’ll use the software that found Kaidanov’s password to get the password for Flynn’s law office server. When I’m in, I can go to any file in the server and download any information in the file to my computer.”

“It can’t be that easy. What if Flynn has security?”

“He might have installed a firewall to block unauthorized intruders, but I doubt it’s one I can’t circumvent. The best defensive software has weaknesses. Even Microsoft has been hacked. I doubt Flynn put a lot of money into his security system. Most law firms don’t.”

“Can this be traced back to you?”

Kate laughed. “I’m going to give Flynn’s server a frontal lobotomy when I’m through. I’ll erase the transaction. It’ll look like someone randomly logged on by mistake and was kicked off.”

“You’re sure about this?”

“Relax. This is what I do. In three to four hours we’ll know the name of the person Flynn was with when Gene Arnold called.”

Alice Cummings lived in a cheap garden apartment behind a strip mall and a car wash a few blocks from Portland’s worst commercial avenue. Daniel remembered how tired she had looked wheeling Patrick’s stroller into Aaron Flynn’s lobby on the day he delivered the boxes containing the discovery documents. She looked worse today.

When Cummings visited Flynn she’d been wearing makeup and a dress. When she opened the door, she was in soiled jeans and a stained sweatshirt and there was no mascara or pancake makeup to hide the lines that the pressure of raising a handicapped baby had etched in her face.

“Hi,” Daniel said, flashing a pleasant smile. “You probably don’t remember me, but Aaron Flynn introduced us about a month ago.”

Alice examined Daniel’s face. Her eyes lingered on the bandage that covered his head wound, but only for a moment. He hoped that she did not recognize him from one of the television news programs that had filmed him at the courthouse.

“We met in the lobby of Mr. Flynn’s office. I was just leaving as you came in for your appointment.”

Alice brightened. “Oh, yes. Now I remember. Did Mr. Flynn send you?”

“Can I come in?” Daniel answered, finessing the question.

Alice stepped aside and let Daniel into a small front room.

“How’s Patrick?” he asked.

“He had a bad night, but he’s sleeping now.”

Daniel heard the resignation and exhaustion in Cummings’s voice. Kate had looked up Alice in the records at the courthouse. Daniel knew that her husband had filed for divorce soon after Patrick’s birth, which meant that she was raising her son alone.

“When he has a bad night yours must be rough, too,” he said.

“My nights are never as bad as my baby’s. Sometimes I wonder how he goes on, but he’s never known anything else.”

Alice rubbed her hands on her jeans and surveyed her front room. There was laundry on the sofa. She took a toy off an armchair and motioned Daniel toward it.

“Please, sit down. Can I get you some coffee?”

“I’m fine,” Daniel said, waiting for Alice to push some of the laundry aside and take a seat before he sat down.

“Has Mr. Flynn heard anything?” she asked anxiously. “We’re really counting on him.”

“I’m not here about your case.” Alice looked confused and Daniel felt horrible about deceiving her. “It’s something Mr. Flynn wanted me to ask you about. Do you remember visiting his office in early March?”

She nodded. “That was my first time. I . . . I read about the Moffitts. I wanted to see if he could help me, too.”

“So you remember the consultation?”

“Of course.”

“Because a matter came up in another case I need your help with. It has to do with a phone call that Mr. Flynn insists that he received while you were with him. Another lawyer is claiming that the call never took place. Mr. Flynn’s time sheets indicate that he was meeting with you when the call came in. Do you remember a call interrupting your meeting? Or the receptionist talking to Mr. Flynn over the intercom while you were with him?”

Alice thought about it for a moment. “Yes, I do. There was a call. Mr. Flynn apologized when his receptionist interrupted the meeting. And . . . Of course! Now I remember. Mr. Flynn was upset when his secretary buzzed him. He told her that he didn’t want our meeting interrupted. She was speaking on an intercom and I heard her. She said the man was calling about a murder and was very insistent. That’s one of the reasons I remember the call. I don’t hear people discussing a murder very often.”

“That’s the call I need to know about,” Daniel said, trying to sound businesslike. “Do you happen to remember the caller’s name? That would be very helpful.”

“His last name was Arnold,” she said with a laugh. “My father’s first name is Arnold, so I remember it perfectly.”

Daniel laughed, too, even more enthusiastically than Mrs. Cummings.

“Wow,” he said, “that was easy. Thanks.”

“I’m glad I could help. Mr. Flynn has been so good to Patrick and me. I don’t know what we’d do without him. He’s going to get us the money for Patrick’s operations. I don’t have health insurance and my husband walked out when Patrick was born.” She looked down. “He couldn’t take it. He couldn’t even look at Patrick,” she said softly. “If Mr. Flynn wasn’t fighting this case for us . . .”

Daniel felt sick inside, both for her plight and for deceiving her. He couldn’t imagine how she would feel when Flynn was arrested and she learned that her suit against Insufort was baseless. Daniel said good-bye, feeling like the worst kind of traitor. Partway down the block he looked back. Alice Cummings smiled and waved hopefully from her front door. Daniel couldn’t bring himself to wave back.

Susan Webster looked up when Kate Ross walked into her office and closed the door behind her.

“Yes?” Susan said.

Kate sat down without being asked and laid the envelope she was carrying on Webster’s desk.

“It’s Kate, right?” Webster asked after a moment of silence, annoyed when Kate continued to sit and stare.

“That’s right.”

“Why are you here?” Susan demanded.

“Show-and-tell,” Kate said, opening the envelope and handing Susan a picture of her and Aaron Flynn standing outside the Midway Café.

Susan flushed, then glared at Kate. “How dare you follow me.”

“If you don’t like it, why don’t we both go up to J. B. Reed’s office? You can complain that I’m harassing you and I’ll tell J.B. about your clandestine meeting with Aaron Flynn.”

Susan gave herself time to calm down by looking at the photograph again.

“Why are you showing me this?” she asked.

“I want you to know that I’m onto your arrangement with Flynn.”

“Aaron and I don’t have an arrangement.”

Kate smiled. “Beer and fried chicken never struck me as your cuisine of choice. I always pictured you as more the Pinot Noir and coq au vin type.”

“Cute,” Susan answered sarcastically, “but I didn’t pick the restaurant. Aaron wanted to meet where no one would see us. He chose the Midway Café. As you said, I don’t usually do business over fried chicken and beer. Neither does anyone else at Reed, Briggs, so we knew we’d be alone when we discussed settling the Geller case.”

“Why would Flynn discuss a settlement with you? Brock Newbauer is the lead attorney.”

Susan laughed. “Brock is clueless in a case of this complexity. Flynn knows I’m running the show. And he didn’t want Brock around when he tried to bribe me.” Kate’s eyebrows went up. “Aaron offered me a job at his firm at significantly more than I’m making if I convince Geller to settle.”

“Which I assume you’re trying to do.”

“Of course, but not because I plan to leave Reed, Briggs. The Insufort case is a sure loser in court. We have to settle to save the company.”

“Was Arthur Briggs murdered so you could control the Insufort litigation?”

“What!”

“You can stop the act, Susan. I know you’re helping Flynn fix the Insufort and Fairweather cases.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Before Kaidanov died, he told Daniel that his study is a hoax. Flynn’s plan is going to fail and you’re going down with him.”

“You better think twice before you threaten me, Ross.”

“I don’t make threats,” Kate said. “Either you go to the police and confess or I’ll make sure that J.B. and the DA learn about your deal with Flynn.”

Susan shot to her feet. “Listen, you bitch. If you say one word of this to anyone, I’ll sue you for slander and see that you’re fired. Joe Molinari can’t keep a secret. Everyone knows that Ames is staying with you. Why don’t you tell J.B. your ridiculous theory and see if he believes you? But don’t forget to tell him you’re fucking the man who killed his best friend.”

Kate colored, but she held her temper.

“I’ll give you until the end of the day to decide what to do. After that, you’re on your own.”

Kate walked out and Susan slammed her hand on the desk. Was Ross bluffing, or would she really go to J. B. Reed? Then she suddenly realized that Kate had said that Daniel Ames could testify that Sergey Kaidanov’s study was a hoax. She sat down heavily. Before he died did Kaidanov give Ames hard evidence to back up his claim?

Susan tried to calm down so she could think more clearly. After a moment she dialed Aaron Flynn’s office.

There was an urgent message from Amanda Jaffe for Daniel on the answering machine when Daniel returned to the house. He called her office immediately

“We have a problem,” Amanda told him as soon as they were connected. “Mike Greene wants to reopen your bail hearing.”

“How can he do that? The judge already ruled I could stay out.”

“Mike has a witness who can corroborate April Fairweather’s testimony.”

“Who?” Daniel asked, alarmed.

“Did you call Renee Gilchrist after you heard Arthur Briggs’s message on your answering machine?”

Daniel’s face fell. “Oh, shit.”

“I take it that’s a yes?” Amanda said sharply. Daniel could tell that she was upset and disappointed in him. “It would have been nice if you’d let me know that there was a land mine right in front of us.”

“I knew they’d interviewed Renee once. I didn’t figure they would talk to her again.”

“Well, they did. Someone dropped a dime on you.”

“What’s that mean?”

“An anonymous caller told Zeke Forbus to ask Gilchrist about a call you made to her on the day Briggs was shot. She told Forbus that you said Briggs wanted to meet that evening at the cottage where he was killed to talk about the Insufort case.”

Daniel felt sick. “Greene let me go at the cemetery. He saw my head wound. I thought he was convinced that I’m innocent.”

“No. He just had some reservations about last night’s shooting, and Forbus is still certain that you killed Arthur Briggs. He’s the one who’s pushing Mike. Now tell me what happened with Renee Gilchrist.”

“I couldn’t figure out why Briggs wanted to see me,” Daniel said, “so I called to talk to him. Only he’d left. So I asked Renee if she knew about a new development in the Insufort case that involved me. When she asked why I wanted to know, I told her about Briggs’s call.”

“You know what you said to her is admissible as an exception to the hearsay rule because you’re the defendant,” Amanda said. “The judge can consider your statements as proof that you intended to meet with Briggs.”

“Do you think that’s enough to change Judge Opton’s decision on bail?”

“Come on, Daniel, be smart about this. Bail could end up being the least of our problems.”

When Kate walked into her house, Daniel was sitting on the couch in the dark. One look told her that something was wrong.

“What happened?” she asked.

Daniel told her about Amanda Jaffe’s call.

“I don’t think Renee’s testimony will be enough to convince the judge to deny bail,” Kate said. “They still can’t prove that you killed Briggs. The best they can do is place you at the crime scene.”

“Renee can also corroborate Fairweather’s testimony about my argument with Briggs after he fired me.”

“How did things go with Cummings?” Kate asked to change the subject.

“I can prove that Flynn got a call from Gene Arnold,” Daniel answered without looking at her. “Alice Cummings was in Flynn’s office when Arnold called. She even remembers Arnold’s name.”

“That’s great!”

“Yeah.”

Daniel should have been thrilled, but he sounded depressed.

“What’s going on, Dan?” Kate asked with concern.

“When we bring down Flynn, we’ll also be destroying his suit against Geller.”

“So? The suit shouldn’t have been brought in the first place.”

“But Flynn convinced Alice Cummings that it should. She lives in this tiny apartment. She has nothing. Her son, Patrick, desperately needs medical attention, and he’s not going to get it because of us.”