“Daddy!” she screamed.
“He’ll be all right!” Dick said, trying to control her and order an ambulance at the same time. “He hit his head on the desk when he fell and he’s bleeding like a stuck pig!”
66
THREE LAWYERS STOOD UP FROM the conference table. The one closest to Emily reached out, taking her clammy hand in his own, squeezing it. “I know how hard this has been for you, Miss McDaniels, and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate the trouble you went to this morning in order to find out that we’re representing Zack Benedict and to come to us without delay.
“It was no trouble,” she said, her voice taut with stress and anguish. “I remembered what law firm used to represent him, and when I called them this morning, they referred me to you.”
“When Mr. Benedict was charged with murdering Tony Austin, a close friend of Mr. Benedict’s decided he would be better represented this time around by us.”
Pulling her hand free of his grasp, Emily squeezed her palms together. “Can you get him out of prison today?”
“I’m afraid not. However, if you’re willing to accompany me to the police department this morning and give them the same statement you just gave us, that will go a long way toward hastening his release.”
Emily nodded, but her tormented mind was on the old films she’d seen of Zack being taken away from his trial in handcuffs and the new one she’d seen repeatedly during the last few weeks of him being beaten in Mexico . . . all for a crime he’d never committed . . . a crime she was indirectly responsible for. “I don’t see why they can’t let him out of jail today,” she said, fighting to keep herself from crying out with guilt and shame. “We’ll wait in the reception room.”
When she left with her husband, John Setting looked around at his grinning law partners and reached for the telephone. “Susan,” he said to his secretary, “Get Captain Jorgen on the phone, then put a call in to Matthew Farrell in Chicago and tell his secretary it’s an emergency. After that, get ahold of William Wesley in the prosecuting attorney’s office in Amarillo, Texas. Next, get all three of us reservations on a flight to Amarillo in the morning.”
Five minutes later, his secretary buzzed the conference room. “Captain Jorgen is on line one.”
“Thank you,” he said, then he pressed the button for line one. “Captain Jorgen,” he said jovially, “how would you like to clinch your chances to become our next police commissioner and at the same time become a hero in the media?” He listened, his smile widening. “All I need is someone there who can take a statement regarding the death of Tony Austin and Rachel Evans and keep their mouth shut about what they hear until I give you the word in a day or two.” He listened again and said, “I thought you’d be able to handle that. We’ll be there in forty-five minutes.”
Two more lights were already lit on the telephone when he hung up, and his secretary’s voice came over the intercom. “Mr. Farrell is on line two, and William Wesley, the prosecutor in Amarillo, is on line three.”
Seiling took the call on line two, and when he spoke, his voice lost its impersonal note. “Mr. Farrell,” he said in a respectful voice, “you asked us to keep you informed of any progress, and I’m calling you to report we’ve had an unexpected breakthrough in Zack Benedict’s case this morning.”
In his Chicago office, Matt turned his back on the meeting of Intercorp’s executive committee taking place around his desk and said, “What sort of breakthrough?”
“Emily McDaniels. Last night, her father admitted killing Rachel Evans and Tony Austin. He’s in a local hospital right now, undergoing a mental evaluation, but he’s confessing to everything. Emily herself has given us a statement as well as the murder weapon used on Austin.”
“You can give me the details later. How soon can you get Zack released?”
“We’ll go to the prosecutor in Texas tomorrow, show him Emily McDaniels’s statement, and hand him a writ of habeas corpus, which we will then convince him to take before a trial judge without delay. With luck, the judge will agree to sign it, then it will go to the state capital in Austin to be signed by an Appeals Court judge, and Mr. Benedict should then be released on bail.”
“Bail,” Matt repeated in a low, scathing voice, “for what?”
Seiling flinched at the tone of voice that had reportedly reduced Farrell’s business adversaries to a state of sweating incoherence. “Whether he was innocent or not, when he escaped from prison, he broke Texas escape laws. Technically, he committed an offense against society. Unless we’re very lucky and very persuasive, the county prosecutor in Amarillo can, and probably will, want to take some time to decide what to do about that problem. We’ll point out that the well-publicized physical beating he took in Mexico City was more than punishment for that. Depending upon the prosecutor’s mood, he can either agree and recommend the trial judge forego bail and dismiss the whole thing, or else he can dig in his heels.”
“Then put him in a good mood or bring a shovel,” Matt warned implacably.
“Right,” Seiling said.
“If we don’t get instant cooperation from the authorities, I want the media notified of everything. They’ll get action.”
“I agree. My partners and I are leaving for Amarillo tomorrow morning.”
“Tonight, not tomorrow,” Matt said. “I’ll meet you there.” He hung up before Seiling could list his objections and pressed the button on his intercom. “Eleanor,” he said to his secretary, “cancel all my appointments for tomorrow and the next day.”
In Los Angeles, the lawyer dropped the phone in the cradle. Raising his brows, he told the other two men, “If you’ve ever wondered what Benedict and Farrell have in common, I just found it out—they are two cold customers.”
“But they pay big retainers,” one of the attorneys joked.
Seiling nodded, turning brisk. “Let’s start earning ours, gentlemen,” he said and pressed the button for line three. “Mr. Wesley,” he said, modulating his voice so that it was both firm and pleasant. “I realize your predecessor, Alton Peterson, prosecuted the Zachary Benedict case five years ago, and I understand none of this is your fault, however, there seems to have been a vast miscarriage of justice. I need your help to rectify it as quickly as possible. In return, I will be certain the media understands you yourself acted swiftly to right a wrong. Regardless of what you do, Zack Benedict is going to come out of this as a martyr and hero. The media’s going to want someone’s blood for the injustice done to him, and I’d hate to see it be your blood.” He paused, listening. “What the hell am I talking about? Why don’t we discuss that over dinner at seven o’clock tonight?”
67
KATHERINE SLAMMED ON HER BRAKES and brought her car to a screeching stop in front of Julie’s house, cursing when she saw a bicycle in the front yard, which meant Julie was tutoring. Leaving her purse in the car, she ran up the sidewalk, opened the front door without knocking, and walked into the dining room where Julie was seated at the table with three little boys. “Julie, I have to talk to you,” she said breathlessly, “in the living room.”
Laying her reading primer aside, Julie smiled at her students and said, “Willie, keep reading aloud. I’ll be right back.” Sensing that something exciting was going on, Willie Jenkins read until she was out of hearing, then he grinned at his two companions. “Something’s up,” he told them lowering his gravelly voice to a whisper, leaning sideways in his chair for a better view of the living room.
Johnny Everett looked over his shoulder as he turned his wheelchair sideways, peering in the same direction. Tim Wimple, whose right leg had been amputated at the knee, swiveled his own wheelchair into place and nodded. “Somethin’ big, I’ll bet.”
Appointing himself as moderator and spy, Willie tiptoed to the doorway. “Miss Cahill’s turning on the television set . . .” he told them over his shoulder, then he turned back to the living room.
“Katherine?” Julie said shakily, sensing that her friend’s tense face
and the way she was frantically searching for a particular television channel both had something to do with Zack. “Don’t do this to me! Tell me what’s happened! It’s Zack, isn’t it? Is it bad?”
Shaking her head, Katherine stepped back from the set. “It’s all over the newscasts. They’re interrupting the regular programs to announce it. NBC said they’d have a videotape of it to show at four-thirty.” She glanced at her watch. “That’s right now.”
“What is it!” Julie burst out.
“It’s good news,” Katherine said with an anguished laugh. “Or it’s bad, depending on how you take it. Julie, he’s—” She broke off and pointed to the set as the announcer said they were interrupting their regularly scheduled programming for a special news bulletin. Tom Brokaw’s face appeared on the screen. “Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen,” he said. “One hour ago, in Amarillo, Texas, Zachary Benedict was released from Amarillo State Penitentiary, where he was serving a forty-five-year sentence for the murder of his wife, actress Rachel Evans. Benedict’s lawyers obtained his release as a result of a formal statement provided by Emily McDaniels, who costarred with Benedict, Evans, and Tony Austin in Destiny.”
Without realizing it, Julie reached for Katherine’s hand, squeezing it in a death grip as Brokaw continued, “NBC has learned that Miss McDaniels’s statement apparently contained sworn testimony that two days ago, her father, George McDaniels, confessed to her that he had murdered Rachel Evans and actor Tony Austin, who was found dead in his Los Angeles home last month.”
A moan of pleasure, of torment, and of crushing guilt, tore from Julie’s chest. She grabbed at the back of a chair with both hands to hold her upright as the screen switched to the gates of Amarillo State Penitentiary and she saw Zack walking out, clad in a dark suit and tie, escorted through the rain to a waiting limousine, while Brokaw said, “Benedict left prison a free man, accompanied by his California attorneys. Waiting for him in the limousine was his long-time friend, industrialist Matthew Farrell, whose unswerving faith in Benedict’s innocence has been no secret from the media or the authorities. Also standing on the sidelines was a young woman with a familiar face, though her famous dimples weren’t in evidence at this moment. From the looks of this videotape, it’s clear that she didn’t expect to be seen but had come to assure herself of Benedict’s safe release.” Julie watched as Matt walked swiftly toward the limo then stopped, looking off to his left, where Emily McDaniels was standing beneath an umbrella with her husband, her face a mask of sorrow. For a moment Zack stood there, looking at her, then he slowly walked over to her.
Tears raced down Julie’s cheeks as she watched Zack pull Emily McDaniels into his arms. He let her go, handing her over to her husband, then he vanished into the limousine, which sped away while Brokaw added, “Amarillo reporters who’d discovered Benedict’s release raced to Amarillo’s airport terminal in hopes of getting a statement. However, he left with Farrell aboard the latter’s private jet. NBC has learned that the flight plan filed by Farrell’s pilot lists their destination as Los Angeles, where Farrell owns a home, although it is currently leased to movie star Paul Resterman and his wife.”
Choking on her tears, Julie looked at Katherine and said hoarsely, “Matt Farrell never stopped believing in him. At least Zack had one loyal friend.”
“Don’t start torturing yourself,” Katherine warned, but her own voice was strained with emotion and Julie wasn’t listening anyway. She was staring at the screen and listening as Brokaw said, “Amarillo Prosecuting Attorney William Wesley is about to make a statement from the courthouse there—”
The picture switched to the steps of the courthouse, where a dark-haired man in his thirties was walking out the doors and addressing a mob of reporters waving microphones and shouting questions at him. “Hold your questions,” he warned them, putting on a pair of glasses, “until I’ve made my statement, and then I’ll answer what I can.” When the furor died down, he raised the paper he’d been holding in his hand and began to read: “Yesterday, Zachary Benedict’s California attorneys requested a special meeting with my office here in Amarillo. During that meeting we were provided with a sworn statement from Miss Emily McDaniels testifying to the fact that her father, George Anderson McDaniels, had admitted to the murders of Rachel Evans and Anthony Austin. Miss McDaniels, who dictated her statement before Police Captain John Jorgen in Orange County, California, also provided a .45-calibre automatic weapon belonging to her father. Preliminary ballistic tests performed this morning, indicate that the bullets that killed Mr. Austin were fired from that weapon. Immediately following our meeting with Mr. Benedict’s attorneys, they filed a writ of habeas corpus here in Amarillo, demanding the release of their client from Amarillo State Prison. The writ was signed, with no objection from my office, by Judge Wolcott and then forwarded to the state capitol in Austin for signature by an Appeals Court judge. That signature was granted this morning, and Zachary Benedict has been duly released. There are still some legal formalities to be dealt with regarding his escape from Amarillo State Penitentiary two months ago, which technically violates Texas law. However, it is the opinion of this office that Mr. Benedict has already paid a high price for his brief illegal freedom at the hands of the Mexican police, as well as five years imprisonment for a crime he appears not to have committed. Any questions?” he asked, looking up at the reporters. There were dozens of them, but the one that came across the loudest was the one he answered: “What about Zack Benedict’s kidnapping of Julie Mathison? Will he have to stand trial for that?”
“That will depend upon whether or not Miss Mathison wishes to press charges against him in criminal or civil court. Our office has nothing to do with that, however.”
In the doorway, Willie dragged his gaze from his teacher’s agonized face and returned to his companions at the dining room table, who hadn’t been able to hear or see the television program. “It’s that jerk Benedict again,” he whispered furiously. “He’s out of jail, and she’s cryin’ over him.” Picking up his books, he began shoving them into his gym bag. “We might as well pack up and get out of here. Miss Mathison ain’t gonna want us to see her cryin’ over him, and from the way she’s bawlin’, she ain’t gonna be able to stop for a long time.”
The other boys hastily obeyed their leader’s command, but Johnny Everett lifted his worried, freckled face to Willie’s. “Why does seein’ Benedict on television make her cry, Willie?”
Grabbing his gym bag, Willie automatically gave Tim a hand with his wheelchair. “My mom says he broke her heart, that’s why. My mom says the whole town knows it, too.”
“He’s a jerk,” Tim said.
“A big,” Johnny agreed, backing his wheelchair away from the table and heading it toward the kitchen where a specially constructed ramp led from the back door to the driveway.
On the sidewalk in front of the house, the three boys paused, looking through the open curtains at their teacher, who was blowing her nose while Miss Cahill patted her shoulder. She glanced up and saw them standing there and she smiled reassuringly, waved, and nodded that they were right to leave.
In helpless consternation, they started down the street. “I hate Zachary Benedict,” Johnny announced.
“Me, too,” Tim said.
“Yeah, me, too,” Willie said, pushing his bike. With a combination of protectiveness and practicality, he added, “Johnny, you and me will get to school early in the morning. We’ll warn the kids in our class to take it easy on Miss Mathison for a while. No spit balls. No cutting up. No stuff like that. Tim, you don’t gotta worry about your class, ’cause Miss Mathison doesn’t teach it. Your job is to spread the word to the kids on the teams she coaches. Tell everybody to go real easy on her.”
“They’re gonna ask me why,” Tim said, expertly maneuvering his chair around a dead branch lying partially across the sidewalk.
“Tell ‘em Benedict broke her heart again and made her cry. It ain’t no secret if all the grown-ups in town already know
it.”
68
WELCOME BACK, MR. BENEDICT!” THE manager of the Beverly Hills Hotel rushed forward when he saw Zack registering at the lobby desk the afternoon of his release from prison. “I’ve put you in our best cottage, and the entire staff is at your disposal. Mr. Farrell,” he said politely as Matt signed in at the desk beside Zack, “your secretary told me you’ll only be with us for tonight. Please let me know if I or my staff may be of service to you.”
Behind them, a lobby full of people were turning to stare, and Zack heard his name being whispered like wind rustling through the trees. “Send a magnum of champagne to my cottage,” he instructed the obsequious desk clerk, shoving the registration form forward. “Then send dinner for two at eight o’clock. If any calls come in through the switchboard for me, tell the callers I’m not registered here.”
“Yes, Mr. Benedict.”
With a curt nod, Zack turned around and almost collided with a beautiful blonde and a stunning brunette who were holding out cocktail napkins and pens to him. “Mr. Benedict,” the blonde said with a dazzling smile, “may we have your autograph?”
With a brief smile that didn’t reach his eyes, Zack obliged, but when the brunette handed him her napkin to sign, he saw a room number written on the corner of it, and he felt the unmistakable impression of a key being pressed into his palm beneath it. He scribbled his name on the napkin and handed it back to her.
From the corner of his eyes, Matt watched the familiar tableau occur just as it had hundreds of times in their past. “I take it,” he said dryly as they followed the manager out of the lobby toward the cottages that surrounded the hotel, “that I’m on my own for dinner tonight?”
In answer, Zack glanced at the key in his palm, flipped it into the shrubbery, and looked at his watch. “It’s four o’clock. Give me two hours to make some phone calls, then we’ll continue celebrating my release.”