Young sighed. "They found the murder weapon in the kid’s dresser drawer upstairs, wiped clean. That part doesn’t look good for an impulse crime, and you don’t plead self-defense when the vics are laying facedown in their bacon and eggs with their grapefruit spoons still in their hands." I was silent for a second. "What does the kid say about it?" "Says his folks were still alive when he left for school. We’re operating on that assumption, but we’ve got to be ready to go for temporary insanity if we have to. But even for insanity, I need a motive. I need to know what this Dykstra knows." "What? He won’t open up about it? Patient-client privilege?" "Worse. Man wouldn’t answer my calls for about a week, so I started calling around, couple cops I know out there. Doc’s disappeared. Office shut down, condo abandoned, clothes gone. But it’s kind of hinky. Never told his secretary anything, didn’t call any friends, or anything." "What do you think? He got grabbed?" "Jim, I don’t know what to think. But the trial begins in two days, and I’m getting a little desperate. The ADA, guy named Lowe, he’s a true believer, real Cotton Mather law-and-order type. Few months back, he almost got one of my partner’s clients killed. Put it out to the press that the kid had done a gang hit, and that he was potentially armed and dangerous. All this on suspicion – not even enough to formally arrest the boy. So, number one, I don’t want to see him make this a Columbine thing, and, number two, I think he’s gunning for our firm. Find me the shrink, Jim."

The Disappearing Expert and Other Tricks A Rockford/Practice novelette By Martin Ross Some might believe the TV mystery is in its twilight – or at least in a temporary eclipse. Sure, there are a few spy/adventure series such as Alias and 24, and CSI continues to crank out great scientific police mysteries. And if you’re willing to suspend disbelief, the newly staffed X-Files offers up some exotic who- or whatdunits. But Dr. Sloan has hung up his stethoscope and Jessica Fletcher has gone writin’. There hasn’t been a contender or pretender to Jim Rockford’s private eye throne for years. One of the last bastions of the died-in-the-wool, gather-the-suspects mystery is the legal drama. Law and Order and its sibling series consistently baffle viewers from the streets into the courtroom, Philly presents quirky perps and jejeune judges, and Family Law and Judging Amy explore domestic crimes and intrigues and the emotions that fuel them. This trend is a reflection of a Grishamized literary field, and, for my money, the best of the bunch is The Practice, ABC’s Boston-based ensemble drama that can still deliver a jaw-dropping surprise ending after the verdict is rendered. The heart of the show’s legal machine is earnest Bobby Donnell (Dylan McDermot), the janitor’s son turned angst-ridden defender of angels and devils alike. Its muscle is Ellenor Frutt (Camryn Mannheim), who can clobber your lawyer with one subpoena tied behind her back. And its cool, cool head is one Eugene Young (Steve Harris), who may look like a shave-headed prizefighter but whose legal mind is always clicking on all cylinders, ready for the next unsuspected turn or obstacle. Your checking the title graphic, aren’t you? Well, while watching one of The Practice reruns recently on FX, I discovered a tasty bit of character history: Before he learned torts and Latin phrases, Gene Young was a private eye. Not a Rockford-style eye, no doubt. Jimbo is bad knees and throbbing temples wrapped in a checked sports coat; Gene is the picture of composed calm draped in an all-business suit. Rockford vents; Gene contains. Rockford would rather be out fishing on the pier; Gene baits witnesses in the court dock. In the TV world, a match made in heaven. So here it is: The first-ever, bicoastal, dual-track adventure of Jim Rockford and Gene Young. Half courtroom drama, half P.I. casefile, all trails leading to a shocking conclusion. I hope you’ll enjoy this tale of two of my favorite television practitioners. Martin Ross is the author of several X-Files, Columbo, and Rockford fanfics, as well as an agricultural policy writer with Illinois FarmWeek.

"Yeah, Jim, don’t know if you remember me, but this is Eugene Young. Used to P.I., out of Boston? We worked together on the Randolph case back in ’94? Anyway, I’d appreciate it if you’d give me a call. I’m an attorney now, and I may have some solid work for you..."

**

"Jim? Gene Young. It’s about seven now – five your time, right? Hey, call me back, you get a chance? Major profit opportunity, man..."

**

"Yo, Jim! Jim, you there, man? (Sigh) Look, call me. I don’t hear from you end of business today, I’m gonna have to farm this out somewhere else. Rather work with somebody I know, but we’re on a tight timetable out here. Um, it’s 8 a.m., uh, six your time, or is that five? Oh, sh—(click).

Jim Rockford

It went on like that for a couple more rounds, with an escalating level of exasperation and urgency. Gene Young had never cared much for my professional style – if it indeed could be called a style -- and I decided to tell him I’d been chasing a lead south of the border, rather than stalking grunion and Quervo on the Baja. That last bottle had been my major reason for extending an already long weekend. Actually, waking up some 24 hours later than I’d planned had been the sole reason I’d extended my long weekend.

Gene and I had crossed paths for a week nearly seven years ago, but it had been a memorable encounter that had left me in a leg cast for six weeks and Gene facing indictment and loss of his Massachusetts license. But young Mr. Young had been studying for the bar, and he fast-talked his way out of a stay at the state Holiday Inn. I still have a slight limp.

It was hard to picture Eugene Young as a member of the bar. Don’t get me wrong: He was smart, and he could talk the talk with the best of them. But Gene looked more like somebody who inflicted personal injury than one who defended its victims: A thick, hulking man with a bald bullet head and eyes that could go from 98.6 to 0 degrees in a nanosecond. When we were working the Randolph case, I’d seen him quietly talk an eight-figure Beverly Hills lawyer into spilling the beans on his Mob client and then toss said Mob client through a patio window. The leg cast had been a result of the latter episode.

But Gene was all pinstriped business now. "Assume you’ve heard about the Kelleher case out there? Boy allegedly kills his folks, calmly goes off to school, housekeeper finds the bodies?"

"Yeah, saw it on CNN. Quit watching about the 90th time they showed that clip of the kid coming up the courthouse steps with that Norman Bates smile on his face."

"Public’s right to know," Gene murmured drily. "Been making my job a lot harder, though."

I whistled unconsciously. "Wow, Gene. You got the kid? You have been coming up in the world."

He grunted. Gene wasn’t much for puffery, and I imagine it was likely this case was a mixed blessing for him. "Friend of a friend of an associate, Jim. Anyway, I need you to find an important witness in the case."

I was silent for a second, feeling a twinge in the leg. "Gee, Gene, that’s flattering, but I’m sure you can find somebody just as good in your own neck of the woods. Guy named Spenser, or John Francis Cuddy down on..."

"Be my first choices were my witness out here. But he’s out there in La-La Land with you and the rest of the whackos. Psychiatrist named Theo Dykstra. Was Bryan Kelleher’s shrink before the father got transferred to Boston. Dad was VP with Icon Insurance, and when they lived in L.A., the boy saw Dykstra for about six months."

"What for?" I popped. "Sorry, Gene. None of my business."

"No, Jim, that’s OK," Young assured me. "Just I have no idea what Bryan’s problem was. He’s clammed up about it. Bright kid, ultra polite in a creepy kinda way, but he won’t say a word about Dykstra."

"So your thought is it must be something pretty dark," I hazarded. "Something that might explain why the kid would blow his parents away."

Young sighed. "They found the murder weapon in the kid’s dresser drawer upstairs, wiped clean. That part doesn’t look good for an impulse crime, and you don’t plead self-defense when the vics are laying facedown in their bacon and eggs with their grapefruit spoons still in their hands."

I was silent for a second. "What does the kid say about it?"

"Says his folks were still alive when he left for school. We’re operating on that assumption, but we’ve got to be ready to go for temporary insanity if we have to. But even for insanity, I need a motive. I need to know what this Dykstra knows."

"What? He won’t open up about it? Patient-client privilege?"

"Worse. Man wouldn’t answer my calls for about a week, so I started calling around, couple cops I know out there. Doc’s disappeared. Office shut down, condo abandoned, clothes gone. But it’s kind of hinky. Never told his secretary anything, didn’t call any friends, or anything."

"What do you think? He got grabbed?"

"Jim, I don’t know what to think. But the trial begins in two days, and I’m getting a little desperate. The ADA, guy named Lowe, he’s a true believer, real Cotton Mather law-and-order type. Few months back, he almost got one of my partner’s clients killed. Put it out to the press that the kid had done a gang hit, and that he was potentially armed and dangerous. All this on suspicion – not even enough to formally arrest the boy. So, number one, I don’t want to see him make this a Columbine thing, and, number two, I think he’s gunning for our firm. Find me the shrink, Jim."

"I don’t know, Gene," I drawled. My mind flooded with memories of the news footage from San Diego not too long ago, kids with guns, kids blathering rumors and speculation to slavering TV reporters, shrinks and sociologists dissecting the whole thing to death.

Gene’s voice came back frosty but composed. "Boy’s entitled to a defense, Jim – that’s the way the system works, at least maybe before Columbine and Sept. 11. I need Dykstra to tell me if this kid cracked, if he was being abused by the parents, whatever. I’m looking for the truth as well as the testimony. If that violates your ethical code— "

"Hey, Gene," I snapped, harder than I’d intended. My ethics might rattle a little from time to time, but I could still shave myself without the need for a seeing eye dog. Then again, it’d been a while since I’d been awarded a Nobel Prize. I breathed deeply. "Look, you’re right. I’ll give it a shot, Gene. No promises, but I’ll try."

"Thanks, Jim. Now, here’s the other part. If Dykstra rabbited, there’s no guarantee he won’t again. I got the subpoena work going through a firm out your way – McKenzie, Brackman, and Becker – and when you catch up to Dykstra, I want you to ride with him on the plane, hold his hand ‘til he’s safely in the witness chair."

I nearly fell back in my chair. "Held that back for the closing, huh, Gene? Who you think I am, anyway – Steven Seagal? I can’t just strong-arm the guy onto a plane and hijack him to Boston."

"Jim, Jim. The man’s got a professional reputation. He doesn’t want to duck the courts and risk the bad press. You serve him, he’ll come out. Or I’ll have his ass thrown in jail. Lotsa folks with issues in THERE, lemme tell you. ‘Cept I’m guessin’ Doc prefers to keep his counseling in a more controlled environment. What do you say, Jim? I need you, man."

There it was. The line they always used to reel in the mark, the sucker. Playing on ego and the universal need to feel significant.

"Sure," I sighed.

**

When they first launched men into cyberspace, I’d been fishing and had missed the shuttle. But they got to me eventually with their dot.coms and urls and black slashes and whatever. So I bought a reconditioned laptop and hired a kid from UCLA I’d cleared of a DUI to teach me how to use the spacebar. He ran out of the trailer screaming one day, but I’d learned to surf without falling off my board.

In terms of Internet history, Dykstra had led two lives. I found a lot of old papers and symposium proceedings from when he’d been at UC-Berkeley on audiology, which I quickly realized was speech therapy. In the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, he’d pioneered in ways to help kids – especially teenagers – deal with their stuttering and other speech defects. From the way he told the kids’ stories, it was plain that he really cared about them. But somewhere around ’92, he’d started getting disillusioned, said he was tired of focusing entirely on the "organic causes" of speech disorders – that it was a dead end. Three coffees later, I worked out that he was talking about physical things – brain centers and uvulas and all that happy horsecrap. He got a second doctorate in psychiatry, and traded his tongue depressors for a couch.

Then, the inevitable happened. Or should I say California happened? The good doctor discovered that in La-La-Land, he was selling a hot commodity. A network newsmagazine featured his work with Watts high-schoolers, and before you knew it, William Hurt was playing him in some socially relevant Hallmark movie-of-the-week. A consulting spot on a local morning show had led to frequent appearances with Oprah. Dr. Dykstra began seeing fewer and fewer kindergartners with cleft palates and more and more Lakers games with Nicholson.

His office in Beverly Hills occupied its own fashionable glass-and-stone quarters, with a modest brushed steel nameplate set into the stone next to the glass doors. Inside was what looked like a Scandinavian furniture showroom, but just a little more cold and sterile, if that’s possible. I squinted inside; there was just enough L.A. sunlight filtering through the smog to make out the name on the plaque on the receptionist’s fashionable kiosk: L. PETROVANOSK. Thank God for our nation’s cultural diversity, or I’d have been forced to call half the Smiths or Browns in the surrounding five counties.

"You a friend of the doc’s?" a voice behind my shoulder asked too loudly. As my heart rate slowed, I turned to find a smiling, rail-thin man with a Santaload of beard and three parkas draped on his coatrack shoulders. Even if I’d been blind, deaf, and in a drunk stupor, I’d have detected his presence. I tried to grin without grimacing, and to talk without inhaling.

"Ah, you know Dr. Dykstra?"

"He’s gonna get Harry Dean Stanton t’play me in the movie. Said Mr. Stanton would be a natural. I saw him once, you know. Down on Wilshire, havin’ a burger down at that place, you know the one…"

"Dr. Dykstra’s going to make a movie?" I asked, mentally kicking myself for wasting the time.

"Someday, someday," he beamed. "That other one, with the guy from the show, you know, Alex and Mallory’s daddy? That was all wrong – they need t’get that fella from Jeopardy to play the doc."

"Ah huh. So where is the doc, anyway? Haven’t seen him anywhere around the past few days."

"You a friend of the doc’s?" Harry Dean inquired, bringing us full circle. "He OK? Ain’t seed him since the drive-by."

"Drive-by?"

My new buddy scratched his side. "Well, not so much a drive-by as a drive-up, stop, and shoot. Guy pulled up in the slot next to the doc’s, pulled out his gun, and bang, put one through the window. I was back there, by the dumpster – ripped my sneaker on a nail few days afore, and the doc throws away a lot of those nice, thick shrink magazines. Great for the insole."

"So this guy parks his car, shoots the window, and leaves? This was during the day? Didn’t anybody else hear the shot?"
"Din’t make no noise. Just aims, bang, one right through the window. This was two or so – everybody back in their offices."

A silencer. No drive-by, the shooter just pulled up and emptied one shot into the car. No anger; waited until the area was almost deserted. Like he was sending a message to the good doctor.

"Get any details on the car?"

He nodded eagerly. "It was a car, awright."

"License plate?" I ventured, overly optimistic.

The man’s eyes went wide. "Hey, guy hauls out that gun, I kept outta sight. I din’t see no plate."

I pulled out a card, a ten, and a handful of change. "I’ll tell you what – if you think of anything about that car or the driver, you call me at the number on the card, OK?"

"You betcha," he said, almost leaping for the cash. "You see the doc, you tell ‘im Ol’ Harry says hey. Harry, OK? It’s like a joke."

"And a fine one, too."

Gene Young

"So?" Bobby asked, his earnest face popping around my doorway. "How you feeling?"
I looked up from the M.E.’s report on Gerald Kelleher. One point-blank shot to the back of the skull, death likely instantaneous. He’d been found at the breakfast table, with his brains blended with his plate of veggie soy sausage and Egg Beaters. It had taken two bullets to take down Rachel Kelleher, who’d come in from the kitchen after the husband was shot.

"I feel pretty good," I responded. "All Lowe’s really got are some scary headlines and the weapon in the kid’s room. Jury isn’t gonna buy Bryan offing his folks, then shoving the .38 under his Fruit-of-the-Looms."

Bobby Donnell, my partner, took the visitor’s seat. "Eugene, I know we’ve went over this, but you’re absolutely sure –"

I held up a hand. "Bobby, insanity’s not the way to go here. Folks’ minds are still full of Columbine and shit. Straight-A kid, athlete, looks like Ozzie and Harriet’s oldest. Wealthy family, trust fund. Jury’s not gonna exactly warm to an insanity out. We have to go for a straight-out acquittal. We got a case, Bobby. I can do this. And I finally got in touch with my guy in L.A. to find the kid’s shrink, just in case we have to change strategy. Guy’s a little low-maintenance, but he’s dependable."
Bobby exhaled, glancing out my window. "Plan B?"

Plan B was our firm’s most infamous strategy: Find somebody who looked good – a friend, lover, relative, co-worker, get them up on the stand, and drop the hammer. It seldom stuck, and we usually pissed off a few folks, so what else was new. But if we successfully Plan B’ed somebody, we planted the reasonable doubt necessary to get our client off.

Problem was, we seemingly had nobody to sandbag, ambush, corner, or otherwise savage. The Kellehers had been in Boston for only about five months, and where Rachel was active at her adopted church and dished soup a few times a week at one of the local missions, I’d begun to piece her husband together as one of those guys who was plugged into the corporate modem pretty much 24/7. No clubs, not a golfer, did his drinking at home. At work, Gerald Kelleher was professional, cordial, but little more.

Bryan went to Winslow High, a culturally mixed school that had had a few problems with gangbangers, but he’d apparently gotten along with everyone, or at least stayed off the radar screen. Junior varsity football, high-B average, no steady girl but reportedly strong interest from the opposite sex.

The family had no relatives on the East Coast, had left no obvious bad blood on the Left Coast. Plan B might just as well be Plan Nine from Outer Space.

"I’m comfortable with our case," I told Bobby.

He nodded uncertainly, then searched the room for his next question. "You—You and Jimmy all right? Lindsay’s piled up with depositions in that pharmaceuticals case, and Ellenor’s got at least another week with the Broughton trial. I could’ve asked Rebecca to take second chair, but she’s really stacked up—"

"Jimmy’s doing just fine," I said, neutrally. "Between the big black lawyer and the little blue-collar underdog, we ought to be able to draw the jury’s attention away from Bryan’s, um…"

"Whiteness?" Bobby ventured, a smile playing at his lips.

"Precisely."

**

"Mrs. Wisden," I began, hands clasped deferentially before me. "Now, on the morning Gerald and Rachel Kelleher were shot, what were you doing?"

Vera Wisden fingered the pearls around her thick, wattled neck. "I was watching Good Morning America, as I do every morning. Every weekday morning. And fixing my breakfast."

"And where were you watching the show, if I may ask?"

"I watch in my front living room, with a TV tray. It’s just me, since my husband died." The old lady smiled wanly at the jury.

"Of course. Now, you were watching Good Morning America during what time?"

"From 7 a.m. to 9 a.m. I’d run into the kitchen during the advertisements to get breakfast or refill my coffee."

"The morning of the shootings, do you recall seeing Bryan Kelleher leave his home?"

"Yes."

"And do you know what time that was?"

Mrs. Wisden nodded eagerly. "About 7:30. It was the third commercial break after the show started, and that’s when I normally refill my coffee. I was getting up as Bryan crossed in front of my bay window. I waved to him, and he waved back with a big smile. Always such a nice boy. He’d never kill a living soul—"

"Objection," Alan Lowe called. The young assistant D.A. didn’t even leave his seat.

"Mrs. Wisden, if you would please confine your answers to the attorneys’ questions," Judge Zoey Hiller requested quietly. Mrs. Wisden nodded soberly at the diminuitive judge.

I moved a step closer to the witness stand. "Mrs. Wisden, did Bryan seem agitated, disturbed, upset."

"Oh, no. He had on some earphones, and I could tell he was singing along with his CD thingie or whatever. Not a care in the world."

"Now, this is extremely important, Mrs. Wisden. Prior to seeing Bryan leave for school, did you hear anything unusual? Specifically, a gunshot?"

She fixed Lowe with a piercing eye. "Absolutely not."

"Thank you, ma’am. That’s all." I strode back to the defense table, where Bryan was seated in a sports shirt and a pair of khakis. The jury had a heavy blue collar and minority profile, and we didn’t want him to come across as Bonnie Prince William.

Alan Lowe stood abruptly and stepped to the front of the jury box. He nodded to the witness from about 15 feet away, the prototype Polite Young Man. "Good morning, Mrs. Wisden. I’d like to ask you a few more questions, if you don’t mind. First, did Bryan Kelleher--"

I craned to hear.

"What?" Mrs. Wisden inquired.

"I’m sorry," Lowe moved closer to the witness and notched his voice up. "I was wondering if Bryan ever--."

"Object," I called, trying to sound as bored as possible.

"I haven’t even repeated the question yet," Lowe protested.

"How do you know I didn’t hear it the first time?" I challenged. "Your Honor, the prosecution’s trying to bias the jury against this witness by planting the completely erroneous idea that she’s hard of hearing. This cheap stunt--"

"Cheap?" Lowe sputtered. "Your history, and you’re calling me cheap?"

"You saying I’m calling the kettle black?"

"That is quite enough, both of you," Judge Hiller snapped, with quiet, icy disdain. She was perhaps the ugliest woman ever admitted to the bench, no taller than a fourth grader, but she could stop a rhino at 300 feet with one dingified, subthermal word. "Congratulations – this is merely the first day of these proceedings, and you’ve both managed to embarrass the court and yourselves. Mr. Lowe, talk to the witness, not the jury, in a normal conversational tone. Mr. Young, if you wish to turn Mr. Lowe’s words against him, wait at least until he has spoken them. Sustained. Proceed, Mr. Lowe."

"Let me be direct, Mrs. Wisden," the ADA stated. "I see that you are now wearing a hearing aid."

The woman, now hostile to Lowe for being characterized as somehow feeble, fingered her earlobe under the flesh-colored plastic plug I’d spotted earlier. "Oh, yes. It’s a Beltone."

Lowe interrupted her, and I suppressed a smile. I nudged Jimmy under the table; he swallowed his grin. "Do you wear it all the time?" Lowe asked.

"Only when I go out. Let me explain--"

"So you don’t wear your hearing aid when you’re asleep. Or around the house."

"That’s what I’m trying to expl--"

Lowe held up a hand. "Please. Just answer my questions."

Mrs. Wisden took a deep breath, then smiled and relaxed.

"The morning Gerald and Rachel Kelleher were killed, when you spotted Bryan Kelleher outside your window, you weren’t wearing your Beltone, were you?"
"No," she replied, simply.

"What type of windows do you have in your home, ma’am? Are they insulated?

"They are double-paned. My husband had them replaced four years ago."

"And your home is located how far from the Kelleher brownstone?"

"My side yard is about 10 feet wide, and there’s a few more feet between the edge of their lot and their house."

Lowe nodded thoughtfully. "And so you are telling the court that you would have heard a gunshot from your well-insulated living room, without your hearing aid and with the television going full blast?"

"It wasn’t going full blast," Wisden breathed. She turned to Judge Hiller. "May I please explain my hearing aid?"

"You may," Hiller granted politely.

"Thank you," the witness said, glaring at Lowe. "You see, my husband did all the driving , and so when I go out, I take a taxi or bus or subway. When I first started taking the subway, I was frequently accosted by, er, panhandlers, I guess you’d call them. If you simply tell these gentlemen you don’t have any money, or to leave you alone, they persist. So I began wearing this hearing aid. If I explain that my battery’s died and that I can’t hear a word they’re saying, they realize they’re wasting their time, and move on."

The courtroom tittered. Lowe’s jaw ratcheted a dangerous notch tighter.

"Would the court instruct the witness to remove her hearing aid?" he asked, looking directly into Mrs. Wisden’s eyes.

Before Judge Hiller could issue the instructions, the elderly lady plucked the instrument from her ear. "It isn’t even mine," she told the judge. "It was Mr. Wisden’s." She smiled broadly at Lowe and turned to the press gallery. "Dear, your tape recorder just stopped. You might want to turn your cassette before we continue."

The man, one of the radio guys, reached unconsciously for his jacket pocket, then looked swiftly up at Hiller. Recorders were definitely verboten in her courtroom.

"Mr. Lowe, do you have any more questions for this witness?" the judge asked congenially. "If not, I would like to have a word with our ladies and gentlemen of the media."

"Just one," Lowe said. "Mrs. Wisden, did you finish your Today show the morning of the murders?"

Wisden smiled beatifically, having scored one off the impertinent Yuppie. "Yes."

"You hear any gunshots during the duration of the show?"

The smile vanished. "No."

**

"That seemed promising," Harold Bromfield said, almost eagerly. "Don’t you think so, Mr. Young?"

"I’d say we won that round," I replied cautiously as we settled in at the conference room table. Jimmy smiled encouragingly at the man and his grandson. "But we’ve just begun. How you holding up, Bryan?"

"I’m OK," the boy nodded, stuffing his hands in his pant pockets. "Least, now that you got me moved."

"Yes, thank you, Mr. Young." Harold was definitely old money, but the trial, the violent death of his son and daughter-in-law, and his grandson’s potential fate all had left him frayed and looking all of his 76 years. He’d been "temporarily" in Boston since Bryan’s arraignment. "What do they have next?"

"Lowe’s supposed to call some forensics experts, the medical examiner’s man, ballistics, to demonstrate that Bryan could’ve shot…could have done what they say."

"But there were no fingerprints on the gun," Harold repeated, for the twentieth time since arriving in Boston from L.A. "Even if Bryan had been foolish enough to think the police wouldn’t search his room, why would he then wipe the gun free of prints?"

I shook my head. "I wish I could get a line on who would’ve planted the gun there. Or even who would’ve killed your son. I can’t find anyone with any kind of motive at his office. Bryan, are you absolutely certain nobody at the school might’ve had it in for you? Maybe might’ve killed your folks out of revenge, then set you up?"

Bryan looked at the table. "I told you a million times. Nobody."

"Bryan," Harold barked. "You sit up and you tell Mr. Young here everything he wants to know. He’s trying to keep your ass out of prison."

Bryan looked up sharply, and straightened. "I really can’t think of anybody, Mr. Young. I hardly knew anybody well enough to have any enemies or friends at Winslow."

I rubbed my chin. "OK. By the way, you think any more about Dr. Dykstra?"

Bryan stared at me, his eyes narrowing. "I told you, that was nothing. It doesn’t have anything to do with anything. Why don’t you just leave it alone?"

The boy was agitated, and again, I wondered why. He was adamant about not wanting Dykstra on the stand. What psychological secret was worth spending the rest of his life in prison for?

I hoped Rockford could help us answer that one.

Jim Rockford

Dykstra’s pricey ranch house in the Hollywood Hills was as devoid of life as his office had been, if you didn’t count the koi pond in the backyard. I suspected the doctor’s Jimmy Hoffa act was motivated by whoever had ventilated his driver’s side window.

After unsuccessfully trying to raise anybody at the front door, I was peering in the back kitchen window when I was prodded in the back with what felt like the bad end of a shotgun. Actually, neither end’s all that much to break out the Dom Perignon for.

"And who might you be?" an older voice asked. He poked me again in the kidneys with the gun.

"Hey," I said, crossly, putting my hands on the windowsill. "Why don’t you give it a rest? I haven’t pissed blood for a few months now, and I can’t say I miss the experience."

"I said, who are you?"

"You mind if I reach for my wallet? I’m a private eye. I’m looking for the doctor on behalf of a client."

"All right," the man behind me growled. "But you go slow, now."

I tugged my wallet out of my back pocket, fumbling it to the ground. I felt the gunbarrel droop, and I pivoted, knocking the weapon from his hands. I had mine out in a second, ripping the seam of my jacket pocket, and leveled it at the guy’s gut.

The "shotgun" was a rake. "D-don’t like g-g-guns," the man stammered as he backed up, unnerved. He closed his eyes, took a long breath. "Let’s just start over, OK? I saw you coming up the road – I live on the next property, and I was curious what you were doing here with Doc Dykstra gone. Name’s Lemanager – George Lemanager."

"Rockford, Jim Rockford," I muttered, irritated at being taken in by a gardening implement. "You know where the doctor went? My client really needs some information from him."

Lemanager, who was sporting a pair of aviator sunglasses, a crisp new Dodgers cap, and a thick salt-and-pepper beard, pulled a folded L.A. Times from under his arm. "Just picking up his paper and mail. Didn’t say where he was going; didn’t figure it was my business."

"Who might know? I’ve been trying his secretary, but I haven’t had any luck so far."

He turned and started ambling away, rake and newspaper in hand. "Well, looks like your luck’s running true to form. See you to your car, or you want me to call the sheriff?"

**

Dennis was a nice counterpoint to the irascible Mr. Lemanager. "I ain’t the World Wide Web, case you haven’t noticed, Jim," Lt. Dennis Becker whined as he kicked the cop shop candy machine where it counted. "Who you need this information for, anyway? Unless that’s privileged, like it usually is. It’s always a one-way street with you, you know that?"

"Hey, Blanche DuBois," I frowned, looking up and down the hallway for any sign of my old buddy, Lt. Chapman. "You wanna knock off the persecution complex? What happened? The Krispy Kreme down the street cancel the LAPD cruller discount?"

Dennis turned from the Snicker he’d been stalking, jaw opened for a snappy comeback. None came, and after a second of attempted improvisation, he sighed and shrugged.

"Ah, I’m sorry, Jimbo," Dennis grunted. "Peg’s been on my ass to put in my papers, leavin’ brochures for some Miami condo complex on the kitchen table. I look like I’m ready to start playin’ shuffleboard, Jim?"

"Prime of your life, Dennis."

The Snickers dropped on its own, and Dennis retrieved it. "So, anyway, who you working for?"

"Can’t tell you. Hey, hey, I’m kidding," I called to the cop as he stalked down the hall. "Geez, Dennis, have a sense of humor. Look, all I want to know is if this guy filed a report on some property damage, maybe a threat on his life."

"Yeah, sure, c’mon." I followed him into his office, where he began hunting and pecking on his PC. He finally nodded with satisfaction. "Yeah, here it is." I moved around his desk; Dennis turned the monitor and shooed me back to Civilian Territory. "Theodore Dykstra, called in a broken car window about two weeks ago; responding officer found a .38 slug in the passenger door panel. Investigation still open – doctor lost interest, and he didn’t want to rat out any of his more psychotic clients. Why?"

"Dykstra appears to have taken a flyer," I murmured. "Any witnesses?"

"Just some old homeless guy," Dennis said. "You say this Dykstra’s missing? How long?"

"Cool your jets, Dennis. I think he took off on his own. The neighbor’s watching his place, picking up his paper, but he couldn’t tell me anything."

Dennis leaned back in his chair. "Look, Jimbo, I probably shouldn’t be telling you this, but you might want to watch where you’re walking on this one. You know Larry Brookheiser, the big-time director, did all those Deadly Weapon movies, lotsa noise and car crashes?"

"I’ve caught a few on a cable. Usually get a pounding migraine from the experience."

My buddy leaned forward. "Well, the investigating team found out Brookheiser and Dykstra mixed it up outside some Hollywood sushi joint, few months back. Brookheiser’s lawyer shut us down, and the whole thing’s just kind of petered out. If there’s anything fishy about Dykstra’s disappearance, you better come clean, cause there’s some heavy hitters involved."

"I’ll watch out for the high, hard ones," I assured Dennis as I headed out the door.

**

"Theo Dykstra," Meghan Dougherty murmured with a Mona Lisa smile, looking somewhere in my direction. "Is this the reason for the five-star treatment? Of course, I only have it on your word and the smell of tarragon that we’re actually at Chez Gilda’s instead of Jack-in-the-Box."

"Hey, we hadn’t had lunch for awhile, and I thought maybe we might catch up over some snails and Beaujolais," I told the blind psychiatrist as I surveyed the cheap side of the menu. Chez Gilda was no-frills French, if there is such a thing – the owners gave generous servings, and had stayed out of the celebrity limelight. "And I thought you might enjoy dishing your professional colleagues."

Meghan shook her head in amusement as we ordered. Meghan Dougherty and I had drifted hot and cold through several ill-fated attempts at romance, but over the last few years, we’d settled into a solid, if slightly melancholy, friendship. "Theo and I don’t really travel in the same circles – particularly since he went Hollywood – but the L.A. psychiatric community’s a pretty close one. Claustrophobiac, actually. Theo makes all the rounds, the clubs, the network morning shows, the occasional Oprah or Rosie, spouts pop hybrid Mars and Venus/Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff psycho-crap.

"But he also does a lot of private pro bono: Speech therapy for reconstructive surgery patients and developmentally challenged children, fundraising for mental health causes. And every once in a while, his name pops up in some scholarly journal with no flashy graphics. If I had to be overanalytical, I’d say the showbiz stuff is his bid for public acceptance. I heard he got into speech therapy because of a childhood problem. It could be that his getting away from speech therapy was his rejection of his own past. I’m not helping, am I?"

"Sorry," I said. "But I’m not as interested in getting into Dykstra’s head as I am in locating his body. You know if he has any hobbies, a cabin up in Oregon? Does he like to ski? He and Gwyneth Paltrow holed up in Cancun?"

"I only know the man’s psyche, Jim," she shrugged. "Want me to pick up my own escargot now?"

"No, I’ll charge it back to the client," I assured her. "OK, I’ve got another psyche for you to probe. What would make a good kid with apparently good parents commit, uh, kill his parents?"

Meghan’s eyebrows arched. "Jim, you’re not working on the Kelleher case, are you? Was that boy Theo’s patient?"

I fought back a defensive response. I guess I still felt a little funny trying to gather evidence that could clear a probably murderer. One who’d killed his parents. "Ah, I guess there’s no reason not to tell you. Before the Kellehers moved to Boston, Bryan Kelleher was seeing Dykstra for some reason. His folks never told his grandfather, who’s the only surviving relative, and apparently, the kid won’t tell Gene – his lawyer, old fr--, uh, acquaintance of mine – what it was about. Gene’s trying to prove the kid didn’t do it, but he wants to know what the shrin--, uh, sorry, Meghan – what Dykstra might know about Bryan. You know, in case he has to switch to an insanity defense."

Meghan was silent. I’d met her years ago when she was being stalked, as it turned out, by a hit man who was working to develop a psycho defense in case of his arrest. She took a sip of her wine. "All right. Not knowing anything about the young man, it’s kind of tough to analyze his possible motives. From what I’ve heard on CNN, Bryan and his parents appears to have had a strong relationship with his parents. Of course, who knows what goes on behind closed doors.

"But let’s say that’s true. What might trigger such a violent action? Could his parents have done something he viewed as an act of betrayal, as a violation? Remember, he’s an adolescent, so what you or I view as a minor infraction, he might see as a major parental felony. How’d he feel about leaving California for what must have been a totally foreign environment?"

I considered as the waiter placed a steaming casserole of white beans, meat, and pastry before me. "Well, he was a good student, from what Gene’s told me. An athlete. Didn’t have a girlfriend, which seems a little odd to me, good-looking jock kid."

"It’s a different generation, Jim," Meghan smiled. "Teens today tend to travel as much in packs as in pairs. Not necessarily unusual. However, it might be illuminating to find out what – or who – he left behind when he moved out east.

"But what if he committed the murders not out of vengeance or anger, but for a more practical reason. The Kellehers were wealthy, right?"

"Trust fund, as I understand it," I mulled. "But the grandfather’s administrating it, at least ‘til the kid reaches 21. I don’t know, Meghan; if he did it for the money, you’d think he’d have covered himself a little better…"

Meghan poked at her coq au vin. "All right. What else happens now that the Kellehers are dead? I mean, if Bryan were acquitted?"

I sighed. "Well, I don’t know… I guess he’d have to come back to L.A. to live with his grandfather… Otherwise, I guess I’m having a senior moment here."

"Well," Meghan said, finding my hand and squeezing it, "Just enjoy your cassoulet, and maybe the moment will pass."

**

A call to a buddy of mine with the Times entertainment staff pointed me toward the La Brea Tar Pits, where Larry Brookheiser this day was creating magic and mayhem for a hungry moviegoing public. Hungry, maybe, but not selective. Pretending to gawk at take after take of the hero rough-housing with some martial arts genius, I reconnoitered the location.

A half hour later, armed with a cardboard box and some inside knowledge supplied by my reporter friend and aided by some aggressive tourists who temporarily distracted studio security, I made a beeline for the biggest trailer on the scene. After the obviously hungover star of Brookheiser’s classic demanded a pharmaceuticals break, I’d seen the director retreat to the trailer.

"Where you think you’re going?" A beefy guy in a promotional T-shirt and cap asked lazily as he stepped between me and Brookheiser’s mobile cabana.

"Calzone emergency, apparently," I smiled, shrugging and flipping the box open to reveal a hot pocket of cheese and sausage.

"Jeez, another one?" the guard snorted one. "Must be the drugs keep him so skinny."

"You wanna take it to him?" I asked. "My delivery boy got a case of the trots, and I need to get back for the oven repair guy. Looks like an army working here – don’t know why he couldn’t have sent one of you to pick it up. If it wasn’t some bigshot, I wouldn’t even mess with an order under $10…"

Mr. Universe gave me a stone face. "I ain’t no gofer, bub. Trailer right over there."

"Yeah, yeah," I grumbled. Guys like that had to flex their biceps at somebody every few hours, or they began to atrophy.

I rapped on the metal door. "Yeah?" a flat male voice snapped uninvitingly. I rapped again, and soon the door flew open. A tall, thin man with wiry hair, designer glasses, and a Hawaiian shirt squinted out. I detected a trace of Tennessee sipping whiskey in the air. "What?"

I smiled. "Got your calzone, Mr. Brookheiser."

"I didn’t order any fucking calzone," he said blankly. "Fuck, though, it’s been a long afternoon, and I’ve got a blood sugar migraine. How much?"

"$7.95."

"C’mon in a second while I get it."

I followed the director into the darkened trailer, which was far better appointed and stocked than my portable condo in Paradise Cove. Brookheiser riffled through a sports coat hanging near the kitchenette, and handed me a $20.

"All I got," he said. "Naw, keep it. Go buy a Lexus."

"Hey, thanks," I said, heading toward the door. I turned. "By the way, Theo Dykstra sends his regards."

Brookheiser dropped the box with the calzone on the thick trailer carpet. "The fuck are you, asshole? How’d you get past security? Oh fuck, like I need to ask, this bunch of mental defectives. What’s your scam?"

I leaned against the door. "No scam. I’m a private investigator looking into a case where Dr. Dykstra might be involved. I understand you’re a dissatisfied customer of the doctor."

The director feigned bored contempt. "What, you with one of the tabloids or

something? Get paid per clod of dirt you dig up?"

"Nah, that’s just my beady eyes," I smiled. "I’m checking into who might have wanted to detail the doctor’s car with a couple of .38 slugs. You’d probably use a Glock, though; more overkill."

Brookheiser smirked. "Jeez, even sleazeball gumshoes watch Bravo these days."

"Actually, I’m more partial to American Movie Classics," I informed him. "Just thought as long as we’re trading cheap shots…"

The moviemaker signaled a time-out. "OK, Ok. At least you got a set on you, unlike most people around this set. I wanna get back to work in about five more minutes. Give me the Siskel and Roepper version."

I filled him in on the parking lot vandal, Dykstra’s disappearance, and left out the Kelleher case.

"True to typecasting the guy would head for the hills at the first sign of trouble," Brookheiser snorted. "Look, I’m not gonna tell you shit about Dykstra and I’s business, cause it’s none of yours. But just so you’ll quit barking up my tree, I’ll tell you this much. You ever see that lame TV movie they made about Dykstra and the little stuttering kids?"

A lesson in political correctness would’ve gotten me a couple of Gold’s Gym studio security types, so I kept it to myself. "Heard about it. Feelgood, Patch Adams-type stuff, right?"

"Patch Adams, my ass. Guy was the biggest groupie wannabe I ever met. He wrote, get this, a script for a movie he wanted me to do. All about guess-who. From stammering little nerd kid to Dr. Schweitzer in Armani. Saw Pacino playing him. Figured people ‘needed something like this’ after Sept. 11. I told him it wasn’t my gig; he wanted me to call some people, hook him up. All the time, reminding me how much he’d helped us, how discreet he was. A shrink trying to extort his patients for a movie deal. If I wanted the hassle, I’d call the state AMA on him."

"Actually, I think there’s a different group for psych--"

"Whatever. Anyway, I tell him I will call the Shrink Complaint Line if he wants to try and strongarm me, and that if he busts my chops, I’ll make a few calls and the only people who’ll do his script’ll be the Scholastic Filmstrip Co. That was a month or so ago, and I haven’t heard a peep since. Anything else you want?"

"Autographed shell casing?"

Brookheiser nudged me out the trailer door. "The Burt Reynolds smartass thing ever comes back, I’ll have my people call," he said cordially as he yanked it shut.

**

"I don’t know, Gene," I told the lawyer, who’d grudgingly accepted the collect call. "How much you need this guy?"

"I don’t know that I do, Jim," Gene said tightly. "But I might. Look, you want to bail…"

"I don’t want to bail," I said through my teeth as I shoved a Lean Cuisine chicken piccata in the microwave. "I’m going to drive out to the secretary’s house after dinner – she’s not been picking up any of my calls. That washes out, I can try to contact some more of his shrink friends. But let me ask you something, Gene."

"Shoot."

"Are you getting any kind of mob vibe off your murders? I mean, like maybe it was some kind of pro job?"

The line was silent. "What makes you think it was."

"Ah, I don’t. Not yet, anyway. But there’s something hinky here. Just as one of his patients is heading into a big splashy double murder trial, Dykstra pulls a David Copperfield. From what people are telling me, he’s not exactly shy around the media. Wouldn’t this be just the kind of thing he’d want to be in the middle of?"

"Maybe not, if he screwed up with the kid’s therapy and this was the result. Which makes it doubly important we track him down. And of course, there is such a thing as professional ethics, Jim. Maybe he just feels like a confidence is a confidence."

"I do understand the concept," I said, drily, starting to feel a little pissed-off.

"I didn’t imply that you didn’t," Gene countered. "Jesus, Jim; what’s with the defensive attitude?"

"Oh, nothing, really. Just that this is about the second or third time you’ve brought the subject up, and it starts to get a little boring after awhile. You think that bar card gives you a monopoly on noble sentiments, Gene?"

It had just kind of slipped out, and I immediately regretted it. Gene was just being logical, but something was eating at my gut. Maybe I felt like Gene was the Rockford I could’ve been – private eye to attorney all before 40, handling life-or-death issues instead of shadowing personal injury scam artists and reeling in deadbeat husbands.

"Look, Jim," Gene came back quietly after a beat. "This case has got me kind of defensive myself. My firm handles drug dealers, rapists, even a few stone cold killers, and we often as not get them off. But this one bothers me in a different way.

"See, a few years back, my ex brought home some guy, and he wound up dead in her bed. They thought my boy’d done it – hell, I thought my boy’d done it. Turned out some business associate of the victim saw his opportunity. But I remember how I felt when I thought maybe my son was some kind of monster. I’m kind of torn – I don’t want to assume this kid’s guilty, not that it’ll interfere with my zeal to get him off. But I look at Bryan, and I wonder if this fresh-faced kid, this A-list kid is some kind of sociopathic monster. And me, trying to put him back out there. I mean, this is my job; I’m part of the system. If I don’t—"

"Gene," I broke in. "Gene. Take a breath. Let me find Dykstra, then we can figure out just how much of the world you have to haul around on your shoulders. OK?"

"I’m just saying, I’m not about to go preaching ethics to anybody, Jim," Gene said softly. "Thanks for sticking with it. Give me a yell, you find anything, OK?"

He clicked off. I felt a little better about my cheesy Yellow Pages ad and my ersatz office by the beach, and I wished there was something I could offer Gene Young in the way of profound insight or comfort.

But the guy still had the warmth of a Siberian gulag. That reminded me to retrieve my nuked entrée, and I snagged a beer on the way back to the TV – the perfect accompaniment for fish or fowl. My ass was about three-quarters onto the couch when the face on the screen froze me on my tracks.

"It’s all about facing up to the violence that’s so pervasive in our society and our world," Larry Brookheiser told the Entertainment Tonight cameras. He’d added a Deadly Weapon cap to this afternoon’s ensemble. "I view my new film as a vehicle for public catharsis. Let’s look at our darker instincts honestly, and thus exorcise them."

"Yikes, Larry," I muttered.

The blow-dried anchor and his leggy partner popped onto the screen. "Warm for Mayhem is expected to hit the theaters this Christmas. Meanwhile, Brookheiser’s bride, diva and would-be leading lady Kerri Mullins, is warming up her pipes and her one-liners for hosting duties at the MTV Music Awards. After last month’s notorious and still unexplained walkout on the set of Saturday Night Live, Mullins told ET she hopes her latest hosting gig will help remove the perception that she’s, in her own words, a ‘megabitch.’ We visited Mullins as she was laying down the vocals for her new album…"

Two star-crossed pains in the ass. That crazy little thing called love, I thought, zapping the set silent with the remote. I grunted as I rose – I’d forgotten to grab the paper from the front stoop when I’d heard the phone ringing inside.

The stoop was empty. One of those damned kids down on the beach likely had decided to score themselves a free Times sports section. I cursed as I shut the door, and then something snapped into place. And it wasn’t my floating kneecap.

Gene Young

"Give me a yell, you find anything, OK?" I asked Rockford, hastily cradling the phone. I sat back, studied the light fixture for a few minutes before I got back into the Kelleher files.

Lowe hadn’t hurt us too badly today. Det. McGuire, as expected, gave a straight account of the body’s discovery by a UPS man who’d spotted the dead Kellehers through a side window; the removal of the seemingly calm Bryan from his history classroom; the discovery of the .38 in Bryan’s dresser. No embroidery; no snide opinions about Bryan’s guilt. I’d went easy on him, beyond confirming that there were no witnesses to the gunshots that had killed the Kellehers.

The prosecution’s psychiatric expert had tried to plant images of Harris and Kleibold in the jury’s minds, but I pretty well managed to nullify him as a hired gun with a civil service mentality. My guy, who’d counseled a couple of the kids at Columbine and who’d written several scholarly but low-key pieces in psychiatric journals, came across a lot better, at least after I’d coached him to speak in plain English. He portrayed Bryan as a good but not perfected kid, as devoted to his parents as any adolescent healthily battling their hormonal demons. Bryan showed all the routine grief of the orphaned son and none of the stress or rationalization of the sociopathic teen killer, according to my hired gun.

But I’d rather have known what Theodore Dykstra knew about Bryan Kelleher. Had there been any history of parental abuse that could have spurred a double homicide? That could cut both ways in court: The Burning Bed Defense didn’t play as well as it had when Farrah first offed her TV-movie husband, especially when the defendant waited until breakfast to put a pill in the offending parent. Had he been lured into some "kill-your-family" cult on the Web or something. The BPD had confiscated and scoured Bryan’s hard drive only to uncover a series of mournful but seemingly innocuous e-love letters between Bryan and his California girlfriend and an Internet trail diverting fleetingly from college and sports sites to Pamela Anderson and Jasmine Bleeth. If I had to go the insanity route, I absolutely would need Dykstra.

Lowe’s case remained overwhelmingly circumstantial, focusing on a lack of available suspects. But my case was hampered by the lack of any eye- or earwitnesses to the Kellehers’ murders. Soon after Bryan would’ve left for school, most of the neighborhood would have evacuated for offices, coffee shops, and errands. I’d searched for any passing mailmen, census takers, or Jehovah’s witnesses who might’ve heard what they’d interpreted as a backfire, but the UPS guy had been the first stranger in the Kellehers’ hood.

I heard the main office door clatter open in a manner that could only signal Ellenor’s return from court. I witnessed her bulk through my blinds, flinging her briefcase at her desk. Beyond her, I caught glimpses of Lindsay, who’d been second-chairing Ellenor in an embezzling case.

"You hear her sarcasm when she squelched my motion to suppress?" Ellenor growled.

"Yes, Ellenor," my other partner, Bobby’s wife, sighed. "For the eighteenth time, Judge Kittleson was unnecessarily sarcastic with you. Perhaps you shouldn’t have deemed Helen’s arguments ‘the fragrant flatulations of a Dirty Harriet.’ That didn’t seem to endear you to Helen or the judge."

"Sure, take your old sorority sister’s side," Ellenor exclaimed. I endeavored mightily to tune out my colleagues, failing miserably. "Kittleson let her personal pique influence what should have been a no-brainer ruling. They should have suppressed that testimony with extreme prejudice and a .44."

Lindsay was now giggling, and Ellenor bellowed after her back into the hallway. I turned back to the files, riffling through the ballistics report. I was re-reviewing the technician’s chicken scratch when my partner’s words hit me again. I called Lucy at home, gave her her marching orders for the next morning, and headed home a half-dozen calls later with a renewed sense of hope and energy.

**

"This is your report?" Jimmy asked Dan Greevey, the BPD ballistics expert, who was seated comfortably in the witness chair. We’d decided unassuming, deferential Jimmy was the right man for this particular job. "Remember, you are under oath."

It was a bizarre admonition, and Greevey’s thick black brows arched. "Yes, as I already stipulated two days ago."

"Thank you. Now, would you please refer to the passage I’ve indicated on the second page of this report?"

"Sure," he said, accepting the stapled report. "It’s my personal comments on the murder weapon."

"All right, now keeping in mind that you are under oath, could you recall what observations you had about the weapon that might reflect its use or ownership."

"Well, as I said, we haven’t been able to trace ownership, so I’m guessing it was purchased illegally. There were minute traces of paper fibers trapped in the trigger, in the hammer. Otherwise, it had been wiped clean of prints."

"Now, do you notice the passage that’s been scratched out?" I asked, steepling my fingers. "Remember, you are under oath."

"Ob-jection," Lowe sputtered.

"To what?" Judge Hiller inquired. "Surely the witness is aware that he was administered an oath."

"Counsel is…counsel is attempting to cast doubt on Mr. Greevey’s credibility."

Jimmy spread his hands. "Your honor, I’m merely reminding Mr. Greevey that the veracity of his answers is crucial."

"Objection!"

"Sustained and sustained," Hiller sighed. "Mr. Berluti, we are now aware that Mr. Greevey is under oath. Proceed."

"Yes, Your Honor. Mr. Greevey, could you recall what you originally intended to write in the comment space, what you crossed out here?"

Greevey stared at Jimmy, then at Lowe. "That was months ago. I, uh…"

"Let me help you," Jimmy offered. "We were able to make out the letters S-C-R-

A-T by examining the impressions on the back side of the original report. Does that jog your memory? No? Let me ask you this? If we had an independent lab inspect the murder weapon, might we find scratches on the inside of the barrel?"

Greevey’s jaw tightened. "That’s possible. Yes."

"And might those scratches be consistent with those found when a suppressor has been used?"

"Um, possibly…"

Jimmy turned to a curious Hiller. "Mr. Greevey, did you originally intend to include in your ballistics report that you had found indications that a suppressor, a silencer, might have been attached to the barrel of the murder weapon?"

Greevey sat dead still, then only his lips moved. "I started to, but…"

"What, Mr. Greevey? But that wouldn’t have been consistent with the case the prosecution was trying to build?"

"OBJECTION!"

"Did the district attorney suggest that you omit that finding—"

"Your Honor!" Lowe shouted, leaping to his feet.

"All right, Mr. Berluti, that is enough," Hiller said softly but with menace. "I want all attorneys in chambers, now."

**

"It’s simple, Your Honor," I told the judge as she considered the three of us as a principal would a trio of juvenile miscreants. "We believe Greevey falsified his report to fit the circumstances of Mr. Lowe’s case. The only question is, did Mr. Lowe play a role in this deception?"

"Oh, come on," Lowe snapped. "You know better than that. If Greevey misrepresented the ballistics evidence – and I’m not yet willing to stipulate that he did – then that was his own independent action. Your Honor, this is one of Mr. Young’s theatrical tactics. He can’t find some sucker to Plan B, so he’s trying to create a mysterious assassin with a silencer out of thin air."

"Your Honor," I said, "If a silencer was used in these murders, and none was found, it casts a new light on Bryan Kelleher’s guilt or innocence. Also explains why Rachel Kelleher would’ve went into that dining room after her husband had been shot – all she would’ve heard was a zip or a pop. Probably never even heard a suppressor before. I want to bring in an independent lab to check that weapon."

"It’s a stall," Lowe protested.

"Silence," Hiller said coldly. "There is every indication your man intentionally concealed evidence in a murder case. At the very least, he displayed a negligent lack of judgement. I am aware of your own prosecutorial zeal, Lowe – a few short months ago, you essentially placed a death warrant on an innocent young man to extort a plea bargain. Well, I will instruct you to subordinate that zeal to the pursuit of the truth in this case. Mr. Young, will 48 hours be sufficient to conduct your tests?"

"I’d rather have 72…"

"I’ll give you 48."

"Thank you."

Hiller leaned back in the leather chair that dwarfed her and studied us, shaking her head gently.

"Please leave," she ordered.

**

"OK, so what now?" Jimmy asked.

"We get that guy in Cambridge we used in the Brogden case, Hemmings," I said, watching the stream of lawyers, clerks, perps, and victims flooding the courthouse corridors. "We’ll put him up first, then recall McGuire to confirm that no silencer’s found. Check recent cases where a silencer was used – we want the jury to see that this doesn’t fit the crime."

"OK."

"And we need to reevaluate Gerald Kelleher’s office relationships. This puts a whole new light on the case."

"Plan B?"

"I don’t even know if we’ve got any workable candidates, but if we can get doubt, it might turn this thing."

Jimmy stopped. "Turn it around? Hey, I thought we were doing pretty good here. Everything they’ve got is circumstantial. They don’t even have a motive."

"I don’t know if they need a motive, Jimmy. We got a teenager and two dead parents. That may be enough for some people these days. We have to show the jury another way this could’ve happened."

"What do you think that was?"
"Let’s not go there right now."

My cell phone vibrated. "Gene Young," I snapped, thumbing it on.

"Hey, Gene; it’s me," Rockford said. "I got your shrink."

"Dykstra?" I breathed. Jimmy perked. "How quick can you get him out here?"

"We’re at the gate right now. Look, Gene…"

"What? C’mon, Jim."

"Well," Rockford drawled. "it’s just I don’t know how much good he’s going to do you."

Jim Rockford

"Mr. Lemanager?" I asked with a twang for the fifth time. "George Lemanager?"
A pause on the line. "This is Don. George is my father."

"Aw, shoot, I’m sorry. I lost Mr. Lemanager’s number, and I guess I called you by mistake. You know how tiny the print is in these phone books…"

"Wait." A tone of irritation. Good. "What exactly is your business with my father?"

"Aw, hell, sorry again. I’m Jim Taggart, with Taggart Asphalt and Paving. Your dad’s thinking about havin’ his driveway done, and I just wanted."

"Hold on." Now the voice was tense. "My father just had that driveway tarred two years ago. What are you trying to pull here, friend?"

"Well, I was tellin’ your dad about our special lifetime guarantee, with sealer."

"You listen here." The sealer always does the trick. "My father’s been fishing in British Columbia for the last three weeks. You think because he’s 84 you can pull some kind of sleazy scam…"

"Whoa, now, pal," I backpedaled, choking back a grin. "I guess maybe you wanna think about that driveway, huh?"

I held the handset a foot from my ear. The loud crash justified my caution.

I lifted my beer in a toast to myself. "Gotcha."

**

I twitched awake again and checked my watch with the mag light. Only lost five minutes that time. I never liked the indignity of peeing into a milk jug, so I passed on the coffee on stakeout. But I’d been sitting here in the blackness for the last two hours, just beyond the Dykstra house. I would’ve made my approach an hour earlier, but the tail I’d picked up on the freeway had settled about fifty yards further up the road, trying to be inconspicuous in the middle of a deserted road in the Hollywood Hills. My curiosity was unbounded.

I light glared in my peripheral vision – Lemanager’s porch light had come on, and the old crank came out. He glanced into the darkness – I was sure he couldn’t see my car – and started toward the Dykstra house. I eased my door open, slid out, and quietly clicked it shut. I crept toward the doctor’s home.

He’d left the door ajar, and I pushed in carefully. I heard some rustling in the next room, and I leaned on the doorjam.

"What’s up, Doc?" I asked. Dykstra, AKA George Lemanager, who’d been rooting through his desk, jumped a foot.

"Jesus, you took five years off my life," he gasped, plopping into a chair. "You better get out of here, or I’ll call the sheriff’s department."

"Tell you what, Theo. You call the cops, and I’ll go in the other room and see if there’s anything good on HBO while we wait. See, I got to wondering why, if you saw me coming up the road to snoop around at your neighbor’s house, you’d first grab Dr. Dykstra’s newspaper and then come around back to apprehend a potentially dangerous stranger with your gardening implement. Then I remembered that when I’d tried the front door, there wasn’t any paper on the porch. That’s the only reason I thought he – I mean you – might be home. The paper was just windowdressing to make you look like the conscientious neighbor. Then I remembered how when I ‘disarmed’ you, you began to stutter. Was that what got you into speech therapy, Doc?"

Dykstra glared at me, then pouted. "There’s no crime in impersonating one’s self. For I know, you could be working for…"

"Who? Larry Brookheiser? Is that who you think’s been threatening you?"

Dykstra’s jaw dropped opened, as if I’d just pulled an elephant out of Siegfried and Roy’s Volkswagen. "How in the world--"

"Talked to Harry Dean down at your office."

"Harry? Oh, yes. If you’ve talked to him, then you know he didn’t see the shooter."

"Ee-yeah, but it isn’t too hard to put together a theory. You use your psychiatric relationship with Brookheiser to leverage a script, and when he doesn’t bite, you very subtly suggest you might go public with his neuroses. Not surprising he might add some .38 caliber detailing to your Lexus."

"And leave me several messages telling me to get out of town for a couple of months. He’s one of the most powerful men in this town – what was I supposed to do?" Brookheiser tugged his beard. "So I temporarily closed the office – at a cost of several thousand dollars, I might add, made up a story for my secretary and colleagues, grew this oppressive facial hair, and moved into George’s house. He’s out of country, anyway. That way, I could keep in touch, see what was developing without putting myself in harm’s way. That is until—"

"Me and Shaggy and the rest of us meddling kids caught onto your nefarious scheme," I sighed. "Doc, you’ve been watching too much Mystery. Problem with our theory is that Brookheiser was entirely too open with me about your attempts to hustle him, and he seemed pretty convinced he’d scared you off."

"Not to mention…"

"What?"

"Well, I shouldn’t betray a client’s confidence. Ethics, you know."

"Doc, I’d say that ship’s already to Honolulu by now. Give."

Dykstra frowned. "Well, I didn’t even see Brookheiser, not really. It was his wife, Kerri. You know, she’s been recording for awhile, done some hit videos? She’s about ready to break out, but she has a morbid phobia about performing live. A sort of agoraphobia -–she can dance in a teddy before the camera, but getting up there on stage terrifies her. Well, at least it did. Or I thought it did. We – Larry and I – thought SNL was her big chance to conquer her phobia."

I rolled my eyes. "Let me guess. You paid a little visit to the SNL set – you’re enough of a hanger-on celeb to get in – and tried to leverage Mullins into getting her husband to use his pull for you. Then she locks up. You’re a real piece of work, aren’t you, Doc?"

Dykstra stiffened, opened his mouth, then closed it.

"I thought so. That explains why your anonymous pal wanted you not only to shut up but disappear as well: Mullins’ got this MTV gig coming up, big career-maker, and she didn’t need you coming around souring her groove. So she comes around to your office – or more likely sends somebody – and invites you to take a powder. Well, here’s your chance to win back a few ethics points and make Mullins happy, too. We’re taking a morning flight to Boston."

"Boston?" Dykstra squeaked. "Why in the world would I want to go to Boston?"

"Doc, have you been watching TV? Or reading the papers?"

The psychiatrist straightened. "I don’t allow the media to shape or inform my perceptions of modern reality."

"Of course. Well, you’ve got a former client who needs some help. Bryan Kelleher?"

Dykstra looked thoughtfully, nodded, and stood. "Who?"

Great. "You don’t know Kelleher’s up on a double murder beef? His lawyer’s been trying to call you for days, now."

"That’s what that was about? I heard ‘attorney,’ and punched Erase. So did he do it? This Kelleher?"

"That’s what we need you to tell us. Get your coat, Doc; we’re going to go take a look at your files."

Dykstra began vigorously shaking his head. "Absolutely not. It violates every canon of patient-doctor confidentiality—"

"Doctor Dykstra," I said through my teeth. "I’m going to violate your confidentiality to Larry Brookheiser and his wife, who I suspect may be interested in violating a few precious bones in both legs…"

"Then again, if this person is in legal jeopardy…"

I smiled sourly. "Just think what a great scene this’ll make in your next movie."

It wasn’t until we were back on the main highway that Dykstra spotted the tail.

"There’s someone following us," he informed me. "Should we attempt to, uh, ‘lose’ them?"

"Whatever for?" I asked pleasantly, hunting for a good oldies station.

**

"Ah, yes, Bryan Kelleher," Dykstra breathed as he pulled a folder from his files. "A most unusual case. I remember now."

I sat on the edge of the doctor’s desk. "What was his problem?"

The psychiatrist shook his head. "No, that’s exactly what was unusual about the case. Kelleher was one of the most well-adjusted, centered young men I’d ever treated. The parents brought him in because of a fairly minor speech problem. I wasn’t doing that kind of practice much anymore, but the Kellehers were friends of a friend, so I agreed to meet him. A few sessions, he’d conquered the speech problem. Wasn’t anything, really – the father was domineering sort, wanted the boy to go on to great things, and didn’t think a problem with sibilants and labials would get him there."

"So you didn’t really treat him psychologically?"

"Oh, of course I interviewed him about school, home, girls. But everything seemed OK, and we rather quickly terminated our sessions."

"You think he would’ve murdered both of his parents?"
"No…" Dykstra paused. "Not Bryan…"

A piece of furniture crashed in the reception area, and Dykstra and I turned simultaneously at the sound of a man grunting in pain.

"Hello?" the shrink called, moving toward the doorway.

"Doc," I moaned, leaping to my feet. By the time I made it into the office foyer, Dykstra was being held at bay by the studio muscle boy who didn’t deliver calzones.

"You too, Pop," the muscle ordered, jerking his gun at me. That hurt. "What, sleazeball, you hire a P.I. to help you get some more dirt on Ker--, I mean, Mrs. Brookheiser?"

Dykstra looked outraged. "Emotional issues are not ‘dirt,’ my friend. And I resent the implication--"

"Just shut up," Brookheiser’s goon said.

We all stood there formulating witty banter for a while, until we heard a car pull up alongside the building. A minute later, a striking, familiar face appeared at the glass doors. The goon admitted Kerri Mullins, who glared at Dykstra.

"You fucking bastard," the fledgling starlet spat. "You’re supposed to help me, you dickhead, and instead you’re fucking up my whole career. What do I have to do with you?"

"That’s good," Dykstra said, beaming. "Let that anger go, though perhaps using a less aggressive mode of expression."

"Hoo boy," I murmured.

Mullins stared blankly at her counselor, then at the muscle. "I should’ve punctured more than his window. Shoot his fucking balls off."

"Ah," I interjected. "Can I offer an alternative resolution?"

"This the dick?"

"Private inves--, ah, yeah, I would be the dick, James Rockford," I smiled. "Look, Dr. Dykstra is about ready to jump on a flight to the East Coast. If he agrees to make this a sabbatical…"

Mullins mouthed ‘sabbatical.’ "You saw my husband today. What’d you tell him?" Her eyes flicked at the goon. Then I remembered his earlier near-slip.

"I was after information, Ms. Mullins," I assured her. "We didn’t discuss any of your personal business." I glanced at Muscle Boy, who looked startled and defensively. "Tell you what, why don’t I put Sigmund here on an eastbound jet, he gives you a 100 percent discount on all services rendered to you, you wow ‘em at the awards show, I don’t drop by your husband’s set anymore, and we all just get on with our lives?"

"Yeah, right," Mullins frowned. "And you don’t want anything else to shut your mouth? Nothing at all."

"Just meeting you was compensation enough. What do you say?"

"I think you think you can cash in better with the tabloids, is what I think," Mullins growled. "What do we do here?"

Her boyfriend/protector shrugged. "Whack ‘em?"

"Dennis?" I called.

"Who you talking to?" the goon demanded.

"Dennis?" I half-shouted, more urgently.

"Your imaginary buddy don’t appear to be listen—" Mullins mused, before her eye caught the activated cell phone I’d placed on the counter.

"Drop it, pal," a familiar voice shouted from Dykstra’s office. Dennis, Billings, and a couple of other uniforms clattered in. I’d left the service entrance open for them.

"Made a little call on the way over here while Lover Boy was tailing us," I explained. "Lieutenant Becker loves a good Hollywood wingding, and I owed him one for last week’s cookout. Though promptness may not be one of your chief virtues, Dennis."

"This ain’t 30 minutes or your pizza’s free," Dennis grunted. "Peg and I had guests over. The deputy chief and his wife, Jim. The deputy chief."

"Hey, just saying," I backpedaled.

"You ain’t got nothin’," Muscleman whined as Billings cuffed him.

"Nothing but a confession to shooting out the doctor’s car window and offering to neuter him for free," I reminded him.

The singer/actress set her jaw and turned to Dennis, suddenly turning into Grace Kelly. "Shut up, Andre’. Lieutenant, we’re not saying anything until my attorneys get here. And then maybe you can tell us what the penalty is for blackmail."

"Blackmail?" Dykstra exclaimed, hurt. "I never asked you or your husband for anything but to look over what I’m sure could be a profitable property for both of you."

"Theo?" I inquired. "Why don’t we enjoy our god-given right to remain silent, too? Huh?"

Becker held up a hand for silence. "I think we all oughtta go downtown and sort this out."

"Uh, Dennis, Dr. Dykstra and I really need to catch—" I stopped as Dennis’ face clenched tighter than Mary Tyler Moore’s. "I’ll drive the doctor." Then I looked at Mullin’s muscle boy.

"Andre’?" I posed.

**

"This is outrageous," Larry Brookheiser raged, echoing off the squadroom walls. "It sounds like some deranged scenario from…"

"One of your own movies?" I ventured, nodding to Billings as he placed a styrofoam cup at my elbow.

Capt. Diehl sighed, shaking his silver head of immaculately groomed hair. "Rockford, why don’t we for once pretend its not Low-Rent Private Eye Night at the Improv? Now, let me get this straight, Mrs. Brookheiser, Mullins, whatever. Dr. Dykstra and ‘Mr.’ Rockford here say you and Mr. Phasbinder threatened them at gunpoint? And you want to charge Dr. Dykstra here with extortion."

"Yeah, he tried to extort me," Mullins charged, jabbing a finger at the psychiatrist.

"C’mon, lady," I protested. "Marcus Welby he isn’t – no argument there. But just how did he try to extort you? By asking you or your husband to read a script? Did he ever threaten to go public with your therapy?"

"He didn’t have to," Brookheiser piped up, slamming Dennis’ desk with his palm. "The threat was explicit."

"Uh, implicit," Dennis mumbled, tearing shreds from his empty coffee cup behind me. We all turned. "I think maybe you mean implicit, Mr. Brookheiser. Like it was implied, in so many words."

Diehl rubbed his mustache. "Thank you, Lieutenant. I have to say, Mr. Brookheiser, that it doesn't sound like Dr. Dykstra did anything more than exercise poor judgment and ethics. Whereas your wife at the least committed property damage with a deadly weapon and threatened the doctor with bodily harm."

The director crossed his arms. "I’ll be interested to see what our lawyers make of a scratchy, half-heard cell phone conversation and the word of a seedy private eye and a two-bit shrink who tries to leverage his patients."

"Uh," Dennis interrupted, "We got a little more than that, Mr. Brookheiser. Billings, you wanna bring him in?"

The officer nodded curtly, and retreated into the hall. A second later, he was back with a fragrant gentleman who had more than a passing resemblance to the star of Repoman and Paris, Texas.

"Hey, Doc, how they shakin’," the man said, delighted. Then he caught sight of Andre’ and glowered. "Hey, Buckaroo, you owe the Doc here for a new car window. That’s the reason somebody oughtta tell Mr. Heston we need gun control. Bet your ass."

Muscleboy sagged. I grinned at Mullins and Brookheiser as I reached for my jacket. "Explicit enough for you, Larry?"

**

"I find it staggering that Kerri could vandalize my property and threaten me with violence, and just walk away," Theo Dykstra huffed as I adjusted my aisle seat. Last night, I’d lucked onto a couple of Boston-bound tickets through a travel agent whom I’d helped rescue from a gambling-related kneecapectomy, but I hadn’t counted on Diehl busting our chops for nearly three hours. We’d had to high-tail it to the airport to make the discount flight, and I just had time to call Gene before boarding.

"Consider yourself lucky, Doc," I said. "Neither Brookheiser nor his wife want or need the publicity at this point in their careers, and Andre’s probably willing to keep his yap shut about him and Kerri as well as his impoliteness toward you just so he can continue to work in this town. You don’t have to answer any tough questions in front of the state psychiatric board. And I get a free trip to Boston in the middle of winter with one of L.A.’s pre-eminent psychiatrist/docudramatists. I’d say it’s been a win-win morning, Doctor."

Dykstra leaned back against his headrest. "Well, I suppose it’s the least I can do. I can’t believe that young man would’ve done the things they say. Although it’s amazing he turned out as well as he did..."

I was wearying of the doctor’s pregnant pauses, but even worse, a wary feeling began to play at my gut. "What do you mean by that, Doctor? You said something back at your office, right before Sonny and Cher broke in, that bothered me. When I asked if you thought Bryan could’ve killed his folks, you said ‘Not Bryan.’ Like it would’ve made sense if someone else had done it. Why is it amazing that Bryan turned out as well as he did."

Dykstra sighed heavily and looked out his window at the Rockies. "It really is a slippery slope, isn’t it? You give an inch in your ethical responsibilities, and before you know it… Well, I suppose the damage is done." He turned back to me. "You see, I could tell when Rachel Dykstra first brought Bryan in that she was holding something back. She was inordinately concerned about the therapy process, about patient/therapist confidentiality – even for a concerned mother. After a few sessions with Bryan, I came out and asked Rachel if there were any issues she wished to address. After I was done with Bryan, she began to consult with me, I believe without her family’s knowledge.

"She was deeply troubled about her marital relationship. Control was an issue for her husband – he insisted on a traditional breadwinner’s role, with Rachel the dutiful stay-at-home wife and his social representative. He flatly refused her request to find a job, and seemed constantly to dig away at her self-esteem. Gerald never physically abused her, but the emotional battering had taken its toll: Rachel blamed herself for every misfortune that befell her family, while at the same time she engaged in some inappropriate, almost exhibitionist behavior."

"Exhibitionist?" My gut sank, and not from the turbulence.

Dykstra eyed a family seated across the aisle, and leaned in. "Rachel had entered into a series of sexual relationships with men she’d met through social organizations, through Bryan’s school, even through Gerald’s work. These relationships were becoming increasingly more brazen, more risky.

"Well, of course, there had to be a reason for this behavior – something deeper than simply an unhappy marriage. And after several weeks of intense therapy, I managed to uncover it."

Dykstra was now glowing with pride in his professional acumen. "And that was?" I prodded.

As soon as he finished his tale, embroidered with complex psychospeak, I ripped the airphone from the back of the seat in front of me, commandeered Dykstra’s Platinum MasterCard, and fumbled for 15 minutes with the gadget before realizing it, not me, was out of service. I waved down a stewardess.

"I’m sorry, sir," she cooed with a plastic smile they’d taught her at Karen Black College. "We’ve had some technical problems, and the phones won’t be up for the rest of the flight."

"Can I use my cell phone?" Dykstra’s, that is.

The smile deepened, her eyes saddened. "I am sorry, sir."

I sighed, sinking back into my seat. "Ah, well, could you bring me some scotch?"

Her smile turned poignantly tragic. "I could bring you another bag of Eagle snacks, sir."

"That oughtta help. Thanks." The stew swiveled off, and I turned to Dykstra, absorbed with his earphones. "Why didn’t you tell me all this earlier. Whoops, scratch that. Didn’t ask, right?"

He smiled apologetically, and closed his eyes.

**
"Gene?" I practically yelled into the cell phone.

"Jim?" Gene practically yelled back. Behind me, a college basketball team and about 50 hyperactive parents and alumni were practically yelling.

"Yeah, I’m at O’Hare, in Chicago, Gene," I said. "Flight’s been delayed for at least two hours, but we should be in by nine."

"Shit," the attorney spat.

"That ain’t the half of it," I yelled.

Gene Young

"My god," Bobby breathed as I finished relating Dr. Dykstra’s revelations and offering my interpretation of them. "This is dynamite, Eugene."

I looked glumly across the conference table at my friend. "Yeah, if I can figure out how to introduce it, and get it past Hiller, and sell it to the jury."

"You have to get the boy on the stand," Ellenor insisted. "You have to break his testimony."

"Testimony he’s stuck with since he was arrested, under the threat of a murder charge," Jimmy noted, playing with his pen. "Seems to me this is all about timing. We have to systematically break down Bryan’s story. You think he knows the whole thing? About his mother, I mean?"
"I would doubt it," I said. I sank into silence, looking up into the inquisitive and concerned stares of my colleagues. "Sorry. Jimmy, that character witness we were saving for sentencing. The principal at Bryan’s school."

Jimmy began turning his pen nervously in his fingers. "Assistant principal. Scott Guber. We went up against him when Winslow fired Ellenor’s friend, that coach who wouldn’t rat out his friend’s affair with a student. I don’t know, Gene…"

"He seemed willing to help Bryan when we interviewed him."

"Yeah, but, well, Gene, I just don’t know how he’ll do with the jury. Guber’s, well, I guess I’d have to say he’s kind of retentive. Anal retentive."

"And prissy," Ellenor added with vigor.

"And prissy," Jimmy concurred. "I don’t think the jury would take to him."

I held up a hand. "They don’t have to love him. They just have to believe him. He’s a real boy scout, right? Then let’s get him up there first. Then Dykstra. Then Bromfield. No, wait – wasn’t there some woman Rachel Kelleher palled with?"
"Donna Truslow," Rebecca supplied.

"Gene," Lucy, our receptionist called from the doorway. "Harry Bromfield’s here."

I exchanged looks with my partners. "Send him back to my office, and get me Donna Truslow’s number – you know, the woman Rebecca interviewed after Kelleher was indicted."

Lucy disappeared. "What are you going to tell him?" Bobby asked, a note of extreme caution in his hushed voice.

"He is paying our retainer," Lindsay reminded me.

"Client’s interest rules," Ellenor dismissed.

"We aren’t even telling the client," Jimmy fretted. "We tell him who we’re planning to Plan B, and the whole game’s over."

My chair squeaked back from the table. "We may not even get past the tipoff."

**

Harold Bromfield sat before me as if we were discussing his mutual fund, right leg crossed European-style over his left, hands folded neatly in his lap. "This should be a major turning point, shouldn’t it, Mr. Young? I mean, that judge should be able to see the absurdity of the idea of Bryan not disposing of the gun if he disposed of a silencer. What would be the point?"

"The problem, Mr. Bromfield, is that it doesn’t matter whether Judge Hiller sees anything. We have to sell the jury. The more convoluted the story, the more likely we are to start losing jurors."

The old man inhaled. "And what is the story? Who would have murdered my daughter and her husband? Do you think Gerald might have run afoul of organized crime, or perhaps a work associate?"

"Mr. Berluti has uncovered at least a dozen death threats against your son-in-law from disgruntled policyholders and beneficiaries. Apparently, it’s very common with insurance executives, what with high-profile litigation and every company executive listed on the web. See, we don’t have to hand anyone over on a silver platter – we just have to give the jury a few suspects to focus on besides Bryan."

Bromfield nodded soberly. He scratched his left hand absently. "So what is your strategy for tomorrow?"

"If I can line it up, we’re going to call Bryan’s assistant principal – he worked with your grandson to help him win a scholarship competition, and he can paint Bryan’s basic character. I want to call one of your daughter’s close friends to establish Bryan’s relationship with Gerald and Rachel. And I want you to testify."

Bromfield’s silver brow rose. "Whatever for? I never even visited Rachel and Bryan after they moved here."

Significant, his omission of Gerald, or at least it seemed so. "I want you to testify that all was well between Bryan and his parents, at least as far as you could tell. Oh, yeah, I’ve got Bryan’s therapist from Los Angeles, Theo Dykstra. We’re putting him up at the Omni Netherland, but he’s getting in too late to prep for tomorrow."

Bromfield was motionless for a few moments. "What will this doctor say about Bryan?"

I waved it away. "Not to worry. He told my private investigator out there that Bryan’s a solid kid, not the homicidal type. Just some more character testimony."

Bryan’s grandfather pursed his lips and rose. "Well, I suppose I’d better get back to my hotel. Once again, I thank you for working so tirelessly on Bryan’s defense."

"No problem," I assured him. "No problem," I muttered as I watched him wave to Lucy.

**

"Now, Mr. Guber, in addition to being assistant principal at Winslow High School, you’ve had occasion to personally interact with Bryan Kelleher. Is that correct?"

"Yes," Guber answered crisply. He was all spit-and-polish, a properly grave expression on his microscopically shaven face, his back straight, his hands on his knees as if he were playing a scene from The Caine Mutiny Court Martial. Back at my old school, his pants would’ve been flying from the flagpole first day of the fall semester, and he’d’ve been dumped somewhere in the Deuce without them. But he was crucial to the case I was going to build. "We’ve been experiencing some serious staff shortfalls at Winslow, and both Principal Harper and myself have been forced to take on some counseling chores with a few of the students. Bryan Kelleher among them. Mr. Kelleher requested my assistance in preparing his application to compete in the Daniel Auschlander Memorial Academic Excellence Program. It’s a sort of scholarship program recognizing --"

"Your Honor," Alan Lowe called. "This is fascinating, but isn’t this sort of testimony better suited to the sentencing phase?"

I pivoted to Judge Hiller. "I’m trying to establish a basis in character that may explain the nature of Gerald and Rachel Kelleher’s deaths."

Hiller studied me. "I will allow you reasonable leeway. But proceed quickly and with a minimum of digression, Mr. Young."

"Thank you. Mr. Guber, as part of Bryan’s application for this Auschlander award, wasn’t he required to submit an essay?"

"Yes. The Auschlander Academic Excellence Program emphasizes character as well as scholastic performance. Mr. Kelleher submitted a sterling essay on trust and familial loyalty. I was taken by his sense of fidelity – very unusual in today’s adolescent."

"So your impression was that Bryan Kelleher felt an intense sense of family honor."

"Leading the witness," Lowe chimed.

"Withdrawn. What impression did you gain from Bryan’s essay?"

Guber smiled tightly, glancing at Bryan sitting beside to Jimmy. "That honor was everything to this young man. That he was willing to make unusual sacrifices for family and community. Very rare traits for his generation."

"Thank you, Mr. Guber. That’s all."

"Mr. Lowe?" Hiller asked. "Have you any questions for this witness?"

Lowe peered at the assistant principal. "Mr. Guber, did Bryan ever comment on his leaving California, his friends?"

"We talked of his adjustment to Winslow," Guber stated. "Despite the geographical and cultural changes Bryan had made, I would say he had adjusted admirably."

"How did he seem to get along with his parents?"

"He clearly was quite devoted to his mother and had a great deal of respect for his father."

Oh oh.

"Respect? Did Bryan fear his father?"

"No; quite the opposite. He wanted to emulate—"

"Thank you. I’m finished, your honor."

"Mr. Young, would you like to redirect?" Judge Hiller invited.

"Thank you, Your Honor. Mr. Guber, did Bryan make any reference in your conversations to his grandfather, Harold Bromfield?"

"Briefly. He had missed him greatly since moving to Boston. Obviously, the man had had a great impact on his upbringing."

"Thank you again, Mr. Guber."

**

"Rachel and I hit it off almost immediately. She was a very intelligent woman, very dynamic, and she contributed a lot of really great ideas for our children’s outreach program at St. Eligius Church. We began having lunch about three times a week, meeting for the occasional tennis match, catching a movie here and there."

I smiled at Donna Truslow, an attractive brunette with the scrupulously tasteful makeup and not-too-high-end wardrobe of the upper middle class. "And did Rachel discuss her home life, her relationship with her husband and son with you?"

Truslow beamed at Bryan as if we were at a senior honors program rather than a murder trial. "Oh, yes, she was very proud of Bryan. Things were a little rougher at that high school of his…" She paused momentarily, white guilt flashing fleetingly across her face. "You know, moving to a new school’s always rough. But Bryan was keeping his grades up and making all kinds of new friends."

"And Gerald Kelleher?" I probed. "How did Rachel speak of her husband?"

Her teeth vanished for a second, then reappeared. "Well, he was a wonderful provider, she expected him to move up in his company within a few years."

"What about their personal relationship? Did they get along well? Specifically, did Mrs. Kelleher resent her family’s move to Boston?"

"I don’t…Resent?" The costly bridgework now had submerged, and Truslow’s eyes were fixed on mine.

"Yes. Did she want to move here from Los Angeles?"

Truslow laughed nervously. "Well, she wasn’t crazy about the snow and ice, and I’m sure the shopping has to be a disappointment…"

"Ms. Truslow, did Rachel Kelleher indicate to you whether she has happy with her move to Boston?"
Truslow’s hazel eyes now smouldered. "No. I mean, she wasn’t happy with the move."

"And why not?"
"Objection," Lowe complained. "Where is the defense going with this?"

"Where indeed, Mr. Young?" Judge Hiller inquired of me.

"I’m about there, with your indulgence," I informed her.

"I am beginning to run short of indulgence, counselor. However, overruled."

I turned back to Truslow. "Why wasn’t Rachel Kelleher happy with her move to Boston? I had assumed it was a mutual decision between her and her husband."

Truslow’s eyes flicked toward the jury, toward Hiller. "I suppose it was largely Gerald’s decision."

"Would you say, in fact, that the decision was entirely Gerald Kelleher’s?"

Her eyes were blazing. Her lips moved.

"Ms. Truslow, you must answer audibly," Hiller said.

"I said, yes, I would suppose Gerald Kelleher made the decision to move to Boston." Each word was clipped and terse.

I raised an eyebrow. "You describe Mrs. Kelleher as a dynamic woman. She didn’t want to move here, but her husband could just order her to pack up and travel across the country?"

"I don’t know that I’d characterize it that way."

"Did Bryan know about her affair, too?"

"Of course no—" Truslow’s hand flew to her mouth, and she stared, horrified, at me.

It took Lowe a shocked second to fly to his feet. "Objection! He’s trying to Plan B the victim!"

"I resent that!" I shouted.

"I resent this," Lowe countered, punctuating the pronoun by punching the prosecution table.

"Aw, cut the histrionics," I groaned. "If your guy hadn’t bobbled the ballistics evidence…"

A crack like a shotgun blast cut the dense air of the courtroom. "THAT IS ENOUGH. Both of you, approach NOW! You too, Mr. Berluti."

Given the fire in Judge Hiller’s eyes, I was slightly concerned she would rap my skull or Lowe’s with the gavel wrapped in her white knuckles. "Now," she rasped. "I would like Mr. Berluti – not you, Mr. Young – to explain just where the hell this is going. And, Mr. Berluti, sotto voce’. If we have to adjourn to my chambers again, you will all soon regret it."

Jimmy moved forward; Hiller leaned over. "We have an alternative scenario for the Kellehers’ murders, Your Honor. We want to explore a theory of the crime that would explain the unusual ballastic evidence and provide a far more plausible motive than that which Mr. Lowe has offered for our client. To do that, I’m afraid we’re going to have to look at the victim’s history."

"He’s trying to slime the victim of a murder," Lowe protested. "He’s trying to establish reasonable doubt over the reputation of a dead woman."

"Voices down, Mr. Lowe," Hiller whispered harshly. She turned to me, removing her glasses. "Mr. Young. Is this your legitimate theory of the crime?"

"Yes, Your Honor."

"And it is absolutely essential to support this theory by eliciting this information about the victim’s sexual conduct?"

"Yes, Your Honor."

Hiller sighed. "Eugene, I’m inclined to grant you some leeway here. However, if I have any reason to believe that this has all been some shoddy sleight-of-hand designed to confound the jury, I will immediately call a halt to these proceedings and order you taken into custody for contempt. Betraying my trust will carry heavy consequences. Do you understand that, Eugene?"

"Yes," I answered hoarsely. "Yes, Your Honor."

"Step away," Hiller ordered wearily.

I moved slowly back to the witness box, where Donna Truslow was clasping her hands in her lap as if she were freezing. Her eyes were murderous.

"Was Rachel Kelleher engaged in an extramarital affair in California?"

"Yes," she answered through her teeth.

"Did Gerald Kelleher know about this affair?"

"Yes."

I moved a step closer. "Did Rachel Kelleher indicate that her husband had accepted a position in Boston to separate her and the man with whom she had had the affair?"

"Yes," Truslow said, her eyes now wet. She opened her mouth, shut it, then set her jaw. "Plus, California was a community property state, and the bastard told her if she wanted a divorce out here, he’d take her for everything."

"Object."

"That last sentence will be stricken," Hiller ordered the jury. "You are to give it no weight in your deliberations. Mr. Young?"

"I’m done," I said, looking at the witness I’d just traumatized. As I turned toward my table, I saw Bryan sitting bolt-upright, tears streaming down his cheek, Jimmy’s hand squeezing his shoulder. Harold Bromfield was seated behind him, a study in stone.

Good result, I reminded myself.

**

"What in the hell purpose did that filth serve?" Bromfield shouted, the lawyer’s conference room door clattering behind him. "Why was it necessary to sully my daughter’s reputation that way? Not to mention Gerald’s. If you have an explanation, I want it now, Young."

I held up a palm. "I understand your anger, Mr. Bromfield, but my duty’s to my client, your grandson."

The old man stepped forward; Jimmy moved toward him. "I’m paying your goddamned bill, mister. You tell me what you’re up to."

"I am attempting to cast reasonable doubt on your grandson’s guilt, and at this point, this is the only way to do that," I said softly. "Look, we’ve got Dykstra up next, if I can get to him. He’s holding back something about your daughter, but I’m going to apply some pressure tomorrow morning. I’m going to ask you to trust me."

Bromfield’s nostrils flared. His white hair was up in ragged crests. Finally, his breathing returned to normal, and he strode back into the crowded corridor.

Jimmy shut the door. "Trust us?"

I said nothing.

**

McGuire listened patiently before declaring me insane.

"You’re nuts," he said, taking a messy bite from his Big Mac. We’d met on neutral ground, in the anonymous chaos of Mickey D’s.

"Why?" I challenged. "It checks with the evidence, it explains the inconsistencies in the case. It makes a lot more sense than Bryan Kelleher getting up one morning, scarfing down a Pop Tart, and blowing his folks away."

McGuire wiped a spot of Special Sauce from the corner of his mouth. "Save your closing for the jury, Gene. Should we even be sitting here discussing this?"

"Look," I said, swiping one of his French fries, "I’m just asking you to investigate a heretofore unexplored aspect of this case."

The cop plopped his burger down. "You saying we screwed up here?"

I spread my hands. "Not at all. Your guys couldn’t have been expected to anticipate this possibility. I had a little trouble buying it. But I truly believe this is the only plausible explanation for what happened."

McGuire sucked the dregs of his shake. "So. What do you want from me?"

"Just keep looking for that silencer," I said. "Only keep your options open. Show ‘em this picture, too." I slid the wallet-sized studio shot toward him. "Probably was a middleman in this – I’ve got a few ideas in that direction."

McGuire slid the photo into his jacket pocket. "Long as we’re making the rounds anyway."

"Thanks. There is just one more thing…"

The detective started chuckling, shaking his head, and got up. I pushed my chair back.

"Stay put," he ordered. "Got a feeling I’m gonna need a hot apple pie for this."

**

I loosened my tie and propped my heels on the hotel coffee table. "So, Jim; you get to see any of the sights this morning."

Rockford grinned wryly from the facing armchair. "Started out for Boston Harbor, but by the time I’d got my bearings, I was halfway out in the country. So-o-o I decided to do a little more constructive work, long as I’m on the clock. Friend of mine who hangs with the country club crowd ID’ed Rachel Kelleher’s West Coast boyfriend. Architectural designer she met at some charity thing. I guess things were getting pretty hot and heavy between them – he said there was some talk of a divorce."

"Good," I murmured. "May have to bring him in to corroborate. Don’t mind telling you, Jim, I’m a little nervous about trying to sell this this late in the game."

"You bait the hook?"

I rubbed my eyes. "Yeah, yeah. Though I can’t see something like this working outside an old McMillan and Wife episode."

Rockford shrugged. "Well, even if he doesn’t nibble, you’ve got Dykstra up tomorrow, right. Then the kid?"

"Yeah."

The private eye allowed me a moment of silence, then leaned forward, elbows on knees. "Gene? You know you gotta do this for the boy."

"Yeah, I know," I sighed. "Doesn’t make it any easier pulling the floor out from under him, though, does it?"

Rockford leaned back. "You know, Gene, I remember when Rocky – my dad – picked me up from prison after my pardon came through. I was all full of righteous resentment, toward the cops, toward the courts, the whole deal. Well, Rocky sat there, patiently listening to me rant and rave and tear my chest hair out, until we got back to the trailer he’d kept up for me while I was away. Didn’t say anything, just went straight back to my storage closet and got out my toolbox – you know, one of those old red enameled Sears jobs. He plunked it down in front of me and said, ‘Jim, you got a whole lot of fixin’ to do, and now you’ve got all the time to do it.’ I got the point pretty quick and shut my yap.

"Truth is, Gene, that boy’s going to have a lot of fixing to do in his life, one way or another. You can give him the time and freedom to do it. Hey, how about I order up a pitcher of martinis or whatever you Boston bluebloods drink, on your firm, of course."

"Actually, couple of Pilsners’d go down pretty good right—" The room phone rang, and Rockford signaled silence. He crossed his fingers and lifted the handset.

"Yes, this is he," he responded. "Yes, I know who you are… Well, I don’t know… All right, I suppose it couldn’t hurt. Seven-thirty. Yes, I know the place – I’ve been out here before. Yes, well, good afternoon."

Rockford looked up with a broad smile as he cradled the phone. "He bit. Just have to reel him in."

"Anybody ever tell you you’re somewhat obsessive about this fishing thing?" I asked.

Jim Rockford

"I have to say," Harold Bromfield began, after the drinks were served, "you don’t precisely fit my conception of a psychiatrist."

"Well, typecasting is one of the barriers we throw up to avoid making human contact," I suggested. Sounded like something the doc would’ve said.

Bromfield grunted. I’d gotten a good feel for his views on the psychiatric trade – I imagined for good reason. "So my daughter went to you for help. I knew they’d made Bryan go. So, what’d she tell you? If it’s all right, that is – know you’ve got a thing about confidentiality."

I sipped my martini, choking back a grimace. They’d always tasted like Pine Sol to me. "I believe confidentiality ends with your daughter’s death. We talked at great depth about a number of things. Including her upbringing."

Bromfield sat silently, attempting to analyze my expression, my tone. "So. What were your conclusions?"

"That Rachel was a very troubled woman who’d managed to repress most of her childhood traumas but who unconsciously acted out in a host of other self-destructive ways." Dykstra had given me that one. "Had I more time with her, maybe we could’ve worked toward establishing an honest dialogue between the two of you."

"As soon as that little prick husband of hers found out she was screwing around on him, he uprooted her and Bryan and brought them to this Arctic wasteland," Bromfield seethed. "Guess in your view, I shouldn’t be casting stones, should I?"

"I try not to judge," I murmured, checking the menu. Bromfield yanked it down and looked me straight in the eye. Despite his advanced age and stiff manner, it chilled me.

"What I hate about people like you – no moral backbone." At that, I wanted to chuckle, even though there was nothing amusing here. "Look, let’s just cut the crap, Dykstra. I’m a wealthy man, and I’m willing to share the wealth. You just pull your client-patient confidentiality crap in court tomorrow, and you’ll find $150,000 in your favorite L.A. or Caribbean bank when you get home. $150,000 just to do your professional duty to your client’s memory."

I smirked at the old man. He didn’t like it. "And is keeping your little secret doing my sacred duty to your daughter’s memory?"

Bromfield’s face went purple, and he swept his wine glass from the table. He fumed silently as the busboy cleaned up and brought him a fresh Pinot Noir. "You effete piece of sanctimonious crap," he choked when we were alone. "You don’t judge me, you hear? I had trouble at that point in my life, both professional and personal. My wife and I hadn’t had relations in years – she was a frigid, vindictive parasite – and if my behavior with Rachel became excessive or inappropriate, well, I was under intense pressure. Look, I’m getting tired of rationalizing myself to you. If you keep your mouth shut tomorrow, I’ll make you $250,000 richer."

"What about your grandson?" I mused.

Bromfield’s eyes were dangerous. "My grandson understands the concept of family honor. I have every expectation Mr. Young will win an acquittal for Bryan, but even if he doesn’t, we’ll appeal. We have options. But that’s none of your concern. In fact, had you done your job properly, we might not be sitting here now."

"He’s done his job just fine," said Gene from behind Bromfield’s shoulder. The old man snapped around.

"Got it?" I asked.

Gene displayed a minicassette recorder with the receiver his cop friend had loaned him. "Every word." The lawyer pulled out a chair.

"This is outrageous," Bromfield rasped. "What the hell are you trying to pull here?"

Gene’s face was smooth stone. "I’m attempting to give your grandson the best chance he has at an acquittal. That means, you evil old abomination, that you’re going to get up on the stand tomorrow and tell the truth about what happened to your daughter and son-in-law, and tell Bryan it’s OK to tell the truth. Or I put Dr. Dykstra up there, and he tells the truth about your relationship with your daughter. And I guarantee you that in that event, Bryan will come across with the truth in this case. Plus he’ll know. He will know, everyone in that courtroom will know."

"You can’t use that tape," Bromfield tremored. "It was illegally obtained. No judge would admit it."

"I have no intention of playing it for a judge," Gene said calmly. "I plan to play it for your grandson, if you don’t play ball. Of course, it’s your choice, Mr. Bromfield."

Bromfield held his napkin tightly in his fist, breathing deeply. Finally, he threw the napkin to the table. "They won’t buy it. That Lowe will want to know…why."

Gene blinked serenely. "That’s a risk you’ll have to take." He held up the recorder. "Your decision, your risk."

Bryan Kelleher’s grandfather rose abruptly. "I have no choice, do I? I’ll testify, you son-of-a-bitch." He laughed harshly. "Look at the both of you, passing judgment on me as you blackmail me."

"Hey, I’m a private eye," I shrugged. "He’s a lawyer. You want ethics?"

Bromfield’s brow rose, then he stalked out of the room.

I sighed and picked up my menu. "I hear the filet mignon’s excellent here," I suggested, trying to lighten the mood.

Gene smiled. "Not hungry, Jim."

I nodded and placed the menu down. "Yeah."

**

"I got the call at about 5:45 a.m., Pacific time, of course," Bromfield told Gene and the court, his eyes fixed directly forward. "It was Bryan. He was hysterical, and he told me there’d been an accident…"

**

"I’d forgot my paper for Mr. Lipschitz’ history class," Bryan explained, licking his lips and looking to his grandfather for support. I was seated two rows behind Bromfield, and I saw him nod slightly. Gene stood silently in front of the witness stand. "So I had to go back to the house. Mom and Dad’s cars were still there, so I thought it was kind of weird that everything was so quiet, you know, in the house. Usually, Dad would watch a little CNN or listen to the radio before leaving for work.

"So I went into the…the dining room to see what was up, and that’s, uh, that’s…"

"Take your time, Bryan," Gene encouraged.

"N-no," Bryan said decisively, as if he’d startled him awake. "Dad was, um, his head was on the dining room table, and there was blood everywhere… Then Mom walked in. She had on this plastic poncho – you know, the kind you throw away, covered up most of her. And there was blood on it…

"I guess she didn’t see me at first. She had a gun in her hand, with that, uh, silencer thing on it. Then Mom saw me. I asked her what the hell happened, like I couldn’t figure it out. I guess maybe I was in shock. She didn’t say anything to me – she just looked at me, with this really weird look on her face. Mom came toward me, and all of a sudden, she starts crying – no sound or anything, just tears rolling down her face. And she kept coming closer, and I can’t move. Like I’m paralyzed. And then I realize why she’s crying."

Bryan looked past Gene to his grandfather again. Bromfield’s head bowed almost imperceptibly.

"Bryan," Gene prodded, gently. "Why was your mother crying, Bryan?"

The boy looked at Gene with an astonished expression. "’Cause she was going to kill me. She didn’t want to, but she was going to shoot me like she’d shot Dad. She came up like right in front of me, and I knew she was going to kill me. I don’t know what made me do it, but I reached down and grabbed for the gun. She started wrestling for it, and I knocked her onto the floor. Then, then…"

He was practically hyperventilating, and the judge leaned toward Gene. "Counselor," she said, her voice tinged with concern. "Perhaps we should take a break. We can reconvene this afternoon…"

Bryan turned toward her. "No. I want to get this over with. Please."

Gene shrugged. The judge nodded soberly, and leaned back.

"What happened, Bryan?" Gene asked.

Bryan took a deep breath. "Mom got up and told me to give her the gun. I asked her what she did to Dad, why. She didn’t say anything – just suddenly ran toward me. Grandpa had taken me hunting a few times when I was younger, and I guess I just went on, you know, automatic. I shot her twice. They were just little pops, but she flew b-b-back and, and, and…"

"All right, Bryan," Gene interrupted. "All right. What did you do then?"

"I couldn’t think what to do – I thought about calling the cops, but I couldn’t just tell them Mom killed Dad, especially like that."

"In cold blood."

"Yeah," Bryan said hollowly. "And I didn’t think the police would believe me, you know, after all that shit – sorry – all that stuff on TV about teenagers shooting up schools and like that. But I figured Grandpa would know the right thing to do, so I got Mom’s cell phone out of her purse and called him. I knew they could trace a regular phone, but I didn’t know if they could do that with a cell phone."

Gene walked back to the defense table and plucked a sheet of paper from in front of his chair. He handed it to the clerk. The clerk handed it to the judge. "At this time, I’d like to enter into evidence a faxed copy of a CalBell bill for services rendered Harold Bromfield, the defendant’s grandfather. CalBell is Fed-Exing an original to my office. Note the 17-minute call I’ve circled, which was received by Bromfield the morning of the murders. Now, Bryan, what did your grandfather tell you to do?"

"He told me to wipe my fingerprints off the gun and use a dishtowel to unscrew the silencer. Grandpa said there was too much risk trying to get rid of the gun, so he told me to put it in my drawer upstairs. If the cops found it, he said it wouldn’t make sense that I’da hidden the gun in my own drawer. He said the silencer would look bad, and if I got rid of it near the house, in some garbage or something, then the cops would be looking for somebody who’d heard a gunshot.

"The rough part was when he told me to get the poncho off Mom. It was all bloody, but I turned it inside out and made sure I hadn’t got any blood on my clothes. I put it in a bag from the grocery with the silencer. Then I was supposed to just go to school, avoid people, don’t say anything. Grandpa said I should expect the cops to show up at school, but to give him a call if they didn’t before school let out. If the cops took me in, I was supposed to call him so he could get a lawyer."

"And what did you do with the poncho and the silencer?" Gene asked.

"Uh, I went out of the house the alley way – I checked to make sure nobody saw me – and I shoved the stuff down a storm drain about a block or two down the street."

"At my suggestion, Det. Michael McGuire has assigned a squad to search the drain identified by the defendant," Gene told the judge. "Thank you, Bryan. That’s all."

The prosecutor, Lowe, sat silently, considering the boy on the stand. Finally, he pushed up with both hands. "Bryan, why didn’t you just simply call the police after you witnessed your mother shooting your father. Clearly, had you killed your mother as you said, in self defense, it would have been obvious to the investigating officers that she, and not you, had murdered your father. Why hide evidence, frame yourself?"

Bryan looked to the ceiling. "’Cause, cause Mom was sick, crazy, you know. She would’ve had to be to just shoot Dad in the back of the head that way, like some kind of execution. I didn’t want people to think Mom was crazy, a killer. I didn’t want people to remember her that way."

Lowe nodded slowly. "So why are you telling us this now? "

"Objection," Gene shouted.

"Overruled," the judge said calmly.

Even from where I was sitting, I could see tears puddling in Bryan’s eyes. "’Cause Grandpa said it was OK, and he’s her dad. S-so--" The rest was lost as Bryan collapsed in heaving sobs.

"That’s all," Lowe said.

**

We’d gotten lucky: The silencer had snagged in a fragment of the plastic poncho and the poncho fragment on a projection from the sewer wall a few feet beyond the storm drain opening.

"We pulled one pretty good partial from the suppressor," McGuire told Lowe. He was ensconced in his