From There to Here
Chapter 3: For a Few Good Years
"The paint's an exact match, but Cervantes can't put him together with the car." Lennie explained to Jack and Jamie on the outside steps.
"Not exactly a smoking gun," Jack commented.
"No," Rey said, "You had the smoking gun."
"Which was left in a muddy field for three days." Jack replied.
"I guess our screw-up was in finding it."
"Rey, cool it." Lennie interrupted, imploring his partner with his eyes to go a little easier on Jack.
"Come on." Rey said in response to Lennie's look.
"The counselor's right, we messed up," Lennie said, knowing he'd have to explain that to Rey later.
"Group effort, detective," Jack said, "If Salva walks, we're all in for it."
"Unless we turn his fiancée." Jamie suggested.
"As far as I know, they haven't cancelled the wedding." Lennie said.
"She picked out the paint color three days before the car was stolen. She knew what he was up to. It's enough to make her an accomplice."
The four of them all looked at each other, considering.
"At least for a grand jury," Jack agreed, "Pick her up. The charge is murder."
"Mercer wants to meet, first thing tomorrow morning." Jamie hung up the phone and turned to Jack.
"That's what I expected," He said, "We'll see what comes of it. Have you heard from Lucy Sullivan's lawyer lately?"
"Not since his formal request for our evidence," Jamie said, "I'm waiting to hear what he has to say."
Jack nodded and rubbed his forehead.
"All right," He said after a pause, "Let me know."
"This is getting out of hand," Abe Mercer blustered, "Next you'll be warming a bed in the geriatric ward for his grandmother."
"You can't get me, so you go after the women. Does that make you feel like you've got something between your legs?" Fernando Salva, obviously somewhat affected by his lawyer's bravado, sneered at Jack and Jamie.
"It doesn't give me the same rise you got from killing Maureen Rankin," Jack replied, "If you want to spare your fiancée, you know exactly what to do."
"He's not admitting to anything."
"What about you, Ms. Galvez?" Jamie directed her question towards Ana Galvez, Salva's fiancée, who was sitting slumped in her chair, looking at her hands.
"She's not talking either." Mercer answered for her.
"Ms. Galvez," Jack said, "Unless you want to go down the same drain as Mr. Salva, I advise you to get your own lawyer," Jack said as he and Jamie rose to leave.
"Detective Briscoe, Detective Curtis. It's nice to see the two of you again. What brings you down here?" Jamie smiled as she greeted the two detectives, who were wearing sober looks that Friday morning, a few days later.
"We're meeting Jack," Lennie said.
"Oh. He told me he had a court proceeding this afternoon, that he wouldn't be in the office for most of the day."
"We know," Rey replied, "We're going with him."
Jamie nodded, mystified, as Jack came out of his office.
"I'll be back later," He told Jamie, "Hold down the fort."
"I think I can manage a half a day." She smiled, and nodded goodbye to Jack and the detectives as they left, still as bewildered as ever by their tight-lipped attitudes.
"You do understand that your plea in this matter is equivalent to a jury's verdict of guilty?" The Judge asked Michael Kennedy. He hesitated a moment and glanced at Dean Connors, who nodded and nudged him.
"Um, yes, your honor." He said quietly.
"Miss Kendall, do the people wish to inquire?" The Judge looked over at Paige Kendall, who nodded and stood up, glancing nervously back at Jack, then over his head towards the door of the courtroom. When Jack followed her gaze, he saw Adam standing, arms folded, just to the side of the doorway.
"Yes, your honor. Mr. Kennedy, please tell the court exactly what happened." She said.
"Um, well…" He hesitated again. He couldn't have been much older than about nineteen or twenty, and he looked uncomfortable in his suit and tie. He stood at least a foot taller than his attorney, and the contrast between short, pudgy Dean Connors and this lanky defendant would have been laughable had the situation been different.
"Um," He continued, "My friends and I went out drinking that night, and I had a few more than I should have, I was pretty wasted, and I didn't see that red light or that other car. And, um, I'm really sorry about the lady. I guess that's it." He shrugged his shoulders.
"Miss Kendall, are the people satisfied?"
No! No, we aren't. Somebody say something, somebody do something, this can't be all there is! Jack thought, fighting back the urge to stand. Lennie – who had been in the car, yet wasn't mentioned in Kennedy's eloquent allocution – reached over and patted Jack's shoulder.
"Yes, your honor." Paige answered.
"Very well then. In accordance with your plea agreement with the district attorney's office, I hereby sentence you to a term of no less than one year, and not more than three years, in a facility to be determined by the department of corrections. The defendant is remanded, and this court is adjourned."
Jack heard the door of the courtroom open and close as the judge banged her gavel. He watched the bailiff taking Michael Kennedy away.
"Jack." Lennie nudged him, and he turned to look at Paige, who was standing before him in the aisle, clutching her briefcase to her chest in an almost defensive gesture.
"I'm sorry, Mr. McCoy," She said, "I know it wasn't what you wanted."
He just looked at her before following Lennie and Rey out of the courtroom.
"I don't understand what's taking so long, I mean, you have the right guy, don't you?"
"Yes, we do." Jamie answered patiently. Mr. Rankin had called and asked to meet with Jack, but since he wasn't available, Jamie had asked him to come in anyway and talk to her.
"I see him on television with his lawyer, that superior look on his face, and I want to just… I want that punk dead, Ms. Ross, and I want to do it myself, you know?" He sighed before continuing, "I hate what this is doing to me."
"I understand that feeling, Mr. Rankin. But he's not your responsibility. We'll take care of him." She said.
As Jamie walked Mr. Rankin out of the conference room, she spotted Jack walking up from the elevators. He had his jacket slung over one arm, as if whatever he'd been doing that day had worn him out.
"Someone will call you as soon as we have a trial date." She said to Mr. Rankin.
"I appreciate that. Thank you." He said. Jamie watched him leave and she watched Jack follow her over to her desk.
"The part of the job they don't train you for," Jack said, "Looks like you handled it well."
"It's not hard once you identify with their hate." Jamie said, and the statement took Jack by surprise. He could certainly identify with their hate, especially after what had gone on in that courtroom today, but he wasn't expecting that from Jamie.
"What?" He asked.
"Neil and I had a client. James Karper. A sex murderer? While the DA's describing the crime to the jury, Karper gets an erection Barnum and Bailey could have pitched a tent on. I threw my coat over his lap so the jury wouldn't notice."
"I remember the case," Jack nodded, "Karper walked."
"Yeah, even though his DNA was all over the crime scene." Jamie paused, thinking of her ex-husband, "Neil built his practice on the infallibility of DNA evidence. Then he met Karper's trust fund. New tune? DNA's unreliable. The jury acquits."
"And three months later, Karper killed again."
"I believe in monsters and things that go bump in the night, Jack. May they rot in hell, along with their attorneys."
Amen to that, Jack thought, may they all rot in hell, from Dean Connors and Paige Kendall to Arlene Wolensky and Michael Kennedy. Especially him.
"I got a call from Marcy Wrightman. As of this morning, she represents Ana Galvez." Jack said.
"Looks like the wedding's off." Jamie reached for the phone to call Marcy Wrightman and Jack glanced at her as he walked back into his office, with some new understanding of his new assistant.
But once he was in his office, his concern for Jamie faded. He found himself replaying the plea allocution in his head.
What was it he had told Claire, ages ago, during one of their all-too frequent debates on the death penalty?
"Vengeance is a normal human instinct, and there's no need to apologize for it."
Those words had been so damn easy to say, Jack thought. So easy to stand around and moralize when you are not the one with a gnawing ache in your heart, facing the man who killed one of the most important people in your life. Vengeance is suddenly no longer an abstract concept, and the desire for it means you must use every ounce of strength you have not to strangle that man at the defendant's table.
He knew now how some of the victim's families he had seen over the years felt when they spoke to him – and how he had treated them much the same way Paige Kendall had treated him – with platitudes and manufactured sympathy. The funny thing was, for so long he thought he was sympathetic, he was as understanding as he could be. He now realized just how far off he had been.
Arlene was right, Paige hadn't done anything wrong. From a strictly legal standpoint, the plea bargain was exactly what he would have advised any of his own assistants to do. But sitting there, listening to Michael Kennedy describe how he killed someone – and he didn't even know her name! – he knew for the first time how it felt to sit in a courtroom, knowing that man killed someone – someone beautiful, and smart, and loved – and all he would serve was twelve months in jail. That was less than half a month for each of Claire's twenty-nine years.
It wasn't enough. It wasn't nearly enough.
So what to do now? Jack changed his clothes and said good night to Jamie. There was only one thing he could think of.
"Lennie?" Anita poked her head through the door of her office. Lennie sighed and followed her inside.
"How did the allocution go?" She asked.
"About what you'd expect," Lennie replied.
"How is Jack holding up?"
"About what you'd expect," Lennie repeated, and Anita smiled.
"Go home, Lennie," She said, waving him away, "Have a good night."
Lennie nodded and walked back out to his desk, where Rey was talking on the phone.
"I'll be home soon, sweetheart," He was saying, "Yes, Daddy will read you Goodnight, Moon, again tonight. I promise. All right. Put your mommy back on the phone. Yeah. I'll be home soon. Did you need me to pick up anything?" Rey wrote a few things down on a notepad, "All right, milk, eggs and cereal. See you soon. Love you."
He hung up the phone and pulled his jacket on.
"What did you think of what happened today?" He asked Lennie, who shrugged.
"I think it's a joke," Lennie said.
"Me too. You want to come with me? You can read Goodnight, Moon to the girls. That story puts me to sleep."
"Nah, I had some paperwork I wanted to finish before I call it a night. Say hello to everyone for me."
"I will. Good night."
Lennie let a few moments pass before he started in on his forms, enjoying the quiet. It was rare for the squad room to be this quiet, but it was a nice change. As he worked, his mind wandered back to the courtroom scene that afternoon.
"I guess that's it." That was all he had to say? Although the memory was still fuzzy around the edges, Lennie clearly remembered the screeching, the sound of metal against metal, the bright light flashing. And that was all this mope could come up with? "I'm really sorry about the lady?" It was only pure dumb luck that he hadn't killed more people. It was only a trick of a few mathematical equations that meant Lennie was still here and Claire wasn't.
Maybe, Lennie thought, if I'd been sober I would have seen the other car coming. Of course, if I'd stayed out of the bar in the first place, everything would have been different.
The phone rang, echoing loudly in the quiet room. Lennie watched it for a moment, wondering if he should answer it.
The phone rang again.
"Detective Briscoe." He said.
"Yeah, Lennie, it's me," Said the voice on the other end, and Lennie's heart sank. It was Jack's voice, but it wasn't Jack's voice.
"Counselor," Lennie said, "Where are you?"
"Oh, it's a great place, you should come down here and join me. Drink whatever it is you drink these days." Jack slurred into the phone, and Lennie gritted his teeth. Great way to react, Jack, he thought, go and get rip-roaring, stinking drunk.
"Be glad to," He said, forcing cheerfulness into his voice, "Where are you?"
"Oh, you're a detective, you figure it out."
The phone went dead, and Lennie sighed and grabbed his jacket. He had a good idea where Jack was.
The place hadn't changed, Lennie thought as he walked in the door and scanned the crowded room. Of course it hadn't changed – it hadn't been that long. Funny how that night seemed like a million years ago, how everything could change so fast. Somehow he had even been expecting the bar to look different, but of course it didn't.
The Friday night crowd made it impossible to see Jack from the door. Lennie found his way to the bar and signaled for the bartender's attention.
"Yeah, buddy, what can I get you?" The bartender asked.
"I'm looking for someone." Lennie said, and the bartender snorted.
"Yeah, aren't we all. You want a drink or not?"
"Never mind," Lennie said, catching sight of Jack from the corner of his eye, "I found him."
Jack was sitting on a barstool in the corner, talking to someone Lennie didn't recognize. Even at a glance he could tell Jack probably didn't know this guy either – they had just struck up one of those long conversations that happen between strangers who spend Friday nights in bars. By the end of the night they'd be promising lifelong friendship, but on Saturday morning, they wouldn't remember each other's names.
"Lennie," Jack slurred when he saw him, "What are you doing here?"
"You called me." Lennie said.
"I did, didn't I? Forgot all about it. Lennie, meet Joe. Joe, this is Detective Briscoe."
Joe, who was so drunk he had trouble focusing his eyes, held out his hand to Lennie.
"Nice to meet you, detective," He said.
"This man here," Jack said, giving Joe a pat on the back that almost knocked the man off his barstool, "He lost his wife a year ago."
"Cancer," Joe said, looking up at Lennie, "Just like that. You married?"
"Was. Both of my exes are glad it's past tense." He replied, glancing over at Jack.
"She was a bitch," Joe slurred, "Always on me about this, and that… thought I hated her. I'd work all day, come home, have a beer, she'd be on me… then she's gone, and I miss her. Funny how that works." He gazed into his empty glass, bleary eyed.
"Yeah," Jack agreed, "Funny how that works." He took another drink, emptying his glass down his throat.
"Hey, Jack, come on. I'll give you a ride home." Lennie said, placing his hand over Jack's to keep him from ordering again.
"Trying to redeem yourself, detective?" Jack said, nailing Lennie with a drunken stare. Lennie's first instinct was to let go of Jack's hand and let him do whatever he wanted. Let the man drink himself into a coma, who cared? One less lawyer in the world…
No. She was trying to help me, Lennie thought, I owe it to her to do the same.
"Nah," He said to Jack, "I'm just trying to spare some cab driver the joy of listening to you."
Jack gave a sarcastic, snorting laugh, but he reached for his jacket. As Lennie led him, stumbling and weaving, out the door, he sighed.
I'm doing this for you, kiddo, he thought, not for him but for you.
Jack was lucid enough to give Lennie directions back to his apartment, but not nearly coordinated enough to figure out how to get his key in the front door lock – Lennie had to do that for him.
"All right, Jack, here we are," Lennie opened the door, and Jack fumbled with a light switch, turning the living room light on and then off again. Lennie followed his hand and flipped the switch back on.
"Thank you for the ride, detective," Jack slurred, "I appreciate it. See, now, we both made it here alive. That's an improvement, isn't it?"
Lennie decided not to say what he was thinking. Why make trouble?
"Well, if you're all right I'll say goodnight, then." Lennie said, starting for the door.
"What did you think about it?" Jack sat down on one of the chairs in the living room and attempted – with some difficulty – to take off his shoes, "What did you think of what you saw today?"
"The plea-bargain, you mean?"
"What else?"
"I didn't think it was right." Lennie admitted, "But I usually don't."
"Believe it or not, I don't either. You do the best you can with what you've got, all that crap." He leaned his head against the side of the chair.
"Part of your job." Lennie replied. Jack looked up at him, clear eyed for a moment.
"He took everything from me, Lennie. Everything."
With that, Jack stood up and unsteadily made his way to an open door on the other side of the room – Lennie hadn't been in his apartment before, but he could guess the door led to a bedroom – and shut it behind him, leaving Lennie alone in the living room. Lennie knew the proper thing to do would have been to just call goodbye and leave, but he couldn't resist the opportunity to look around.
It was just as he'd expected, really – small, somewhat cluttered, with bookshelves everywhere. A bachelor's apartment, much like his own, a place no one spent or expected to spend that much time in.
Lennie noticed a shelf along one side of the room that had been decorated with family photographs, one of the few personal touches visible in the apartment. He glanced at the photos, which were carefully arranged in their frames. One was of a smiling young woman, a posed portrait. Lennie had seen the similar photographs of his own daughters, the ones they'd had him shell out three hundred dollars for when they graduated high school. He had two of them in his wallet right now, as a matter of fact. This girl was obviously Jack's daughter – she had his eyes, his smile. The photo next to her was a 1940's-vintage portrait of another young woman. Lennie guessed that face belonged to Jack's mother, also going by the resemblance. A few more nondescript family photos could be any number of anonymous relatives.
The careful layout of the frames on the shelf was somehow asymmetrical, Lennie noticed, as if a picture had been moved, a gap in the perfectly organized display. A quick glance at the bookshelf under the photographs revealed the missing frame – it was tucked, face down, on top of a row of books.
The detective in Lennie reached in and pulled the frame from it's hiding place. He turned it over and looked at the picture.
At first glance it looked like a vacation snapshot – he saw Jack, dressed casually, leaning his weight back against a fence surrounding a fountain. Where it was exactly, Lennie had no idea. He was pretty sure the photo hadn't been taken in New York, but there was a whole world outside the borders of Manhattan. Jack's attention, in the photo, was not directed towards the camera, but towards the person standing next to him – a woman, her mouth open in such a wide smile it looked as if someone had told her a joke at the exact moment the shutter snapped. She was brushing her black hair away from her face with one hand, but her eyes were focused on the camera.
It took Lennie a moment to recognize her – she looked so different than he was used to seeing her, all polished and done up perfectly in those lawyer suits she had to wear. Claire's eyes were hard to miss, though, and Lennie felt a tightness in his throat as he looked at her.
The photo, Lennie realized, was the only obvious sign of their relationship, and Jack had taken special care to turn it upside down and shove it into a bookshelf. Except for what he had just said, he hadn't even mentioned Claire – even in his anger over Michael Kennedy's plea-bargain, he hadn't said her name once.
Lennie had guessed at their relationship long before he'd said anything about it – he could see it in the way they looked at each other. But he had never seen Jack look at Claire the way he was looking at her in that photo – with a sense of awe, almost, as if he couldn't believe this woman was standing next to him.
Lennie knew that look, and he knew men didn't look at women that way without a good reason. Had he ever looked at his wives that way? Maybe a girlfriend, maybe once.
Lennie slid the frame back on top of the books, in between Supreme Court Decisions, 1965-1969 and New York State Appellate Division Rulings, 1994. He felt a little uneasy about taking advantage of Jack's condition to snoop around, and he decided the best thing to do would be to leave, now. He made sure the door locked behind him as he left.
Once he was back out on the street, Lennie had to stop to take a breath. Until now he hadn't honestly considered the possibility that Jack's anger may have come from something other than a person he cared about being smashed into by a drunk and getting no significant jail time, as if that wasn't enough. Now he understood more than he wanted to know – whatever had been going on between those two, it was more than he had ever suspected. No matter how drunk Jack was, he meant what he had said. Michael Kennedy had taken everything from him.
Chapter 3: For a Few Good Years
"The paint's an exact match, but Cervantes can't put him together with the car." Lennie explained to Jack and Jamie on the outside steps.
"Not exactly a smoking gun," Jack commented.
"No," Rey said, "You had the smoking gun."
"Which was left in a muddy field for three days." Jack replied.
"I guess our screw-up was in finding it."
"Rey, cool it." Lennie interrupted, imploring his partner with his eyes to go a little easier on Jack.
"Come on." Rey said in response to Lennie's look.
"The counselor's right, we messed up," Lennie said, knowing he'd have to explain that to Rey later.
"Group effort, detective," Jack said, "If Salva walks, we're all in for it."
"Unless we turn his fiancée." Jamie suggested.
"As far as I know, they haven't cancelled the wedding." Lennie said.
"She picked out the paint color three days before the car was stolen. She knew what he was up to. It's enough to make her an accomplice."
The four of them all looked at each other, considering.
"At least for a grand jury," Jack agreed, "Pick her up. The charge is murder."
"Mercer wants to meet, first thing tomorrow morning." Jamie hung up the phone and turned to Jack.
"That's what I expected," He said, "We'll see what comes of it. Have you heard from Lucy Sullivan's lawyer lately?"
"Not since his formal request for our evidence," Jamie said, "I'm waiting to hear what he has to say."
Jack nodded and rubbed his forehead.
"All right," He said after a pause, "Let me know."
"This is getting out of hand," Abe Mercer blustered, "Next you'll be warming a bed in the geriatric ward for his grandmother."
"You can't get me, so you go after the women. Does that make you feel like you've got something between your legs?" Fernando Salva, obviously somewhat affected by his lawyer's bravado, sneered at Jack and Jamie.
"It doesn't give me the same rise you got from killing Maureen Rankin," Jack replied, "If you want to spare your fiancée, you know exactly what to do."
"He's not admitting to anything."
"What about you, Ms. Galvez?" Jamie directed her question towards Ana Galvez, Salva's fiancée, who was sitting slumped in her chair, looking at her hands.
"She's not talking either." Mercer answered for her.
"Ms. Galvez," Jack said, "Unless you want to go down the same drain as Mr. Salva, I advise you to get your own lawyer," Jack said as he and Jamie rose to leave.
"Detective Briscoe, Detective Curtis. It's nice to see the two of you again. What brings you down here?" Jamie smiled as she greeted the two detectives, who were wearing sober looks that Friday morning, a few days later.
"We're meeting Jack," Lennie said.
"Oh. He told me he had a court proceeding this afternoon, that he wouldn't be in the office for most of the day."
"We know," Rey replied, "We're going with him."
Jamie nodded, mystified, as Jack came out of his office.
"I'll be back later," He told Jamie, "Hold down the fort."
"I think I can manage a half a day." She smiled, and nodded goodbye to Jack and the detectives as they left, still as bewildered as ever by their tight-lipped attitudes.
"You do understand that your plea in this matter is equivalent to a jury's verdict of guilty?" The Judge asked Michael Kennedy. He hesitated a moment and glanced at Dean Connors, who nodded and nudged him.
"Um, yes, your honor." He said quietly.
"Miss Kendall, do the people wish to inquire?" The Judge looked over at Paige Kendall, who nodded and stood up, glancing nervously back at Jack, then over his head towards the door of the courtroom. When Jack followed her gaze, he saw Adam standing, arms folded, just to the side of the doorway.
"Yes, your honor. Mr. Kennedy, please tell the court exactly what happened." She said.
"Um, well…" He hesitated again. He couldn't have been much older than about nineteen or twenty, and he looked uncomfortable in his suit and tie. He stood at least a foot taller than his attorney, and the contrast between short, pudgy Dean Connors and this lanky defendant would have been laughable had the situation been different.
"Um," He continued, "My friends and I went out drinking that night, and I had a few more than I should have, I was pretty wasted, and I didn't see that red light or that other car. And, um, I'm really sorry about the lady. I guess that's it." He shrugged his shoulders.
"Miss Kendall, are the people satisfied?"
No! No, we aren't. Somebody say something, somebody do something, this can't be all there is! Jack thought, fighting back the urge to stand. Lennie – who had been in the car, yet wasn't mentioned in Kennedy's eloquent allocution – reached over and patted Jack's shoulder.
"Yes, your honor." Paige answered.
"Very well then. In accordance with your plea agreement with the district attorney's office, I hereby sentence you to a term of no less than one year, and not more than three years, in a facility to be determined by the department of corrections. The defendant is remanded, and this court is adjourned."
Jack heard the door of the courtroom open and close as the judge banged her gavel. He watched the bailiff taking Michael Kennedy away.
"Jack." Lennie nudged him, and he turned to look at Paige, who was standing before him in the aisle, clutching her briefcase to her chest in an almost defensive gesture.
"I'm sorry, Mr. McCoy," She said, "I know it wasn't what you wanted."
He just looked at her before following Lennie and Rey out of the courtroom.
"I don't understand what's taking so long, I mean, you have the right guy, don't you?"
"Yes, we do." Jamie answered patiently. Mr. Rankin had called and asked to meet with Jack, but since he wasn't available, Jamie had asked him to come in anyway and talk to her.
"I see him on television with his lawyer, that superior look on his face, and I want to just… I want that punk dead, Ms. Ross, and I want to do it myself, you know?" He sighed before continuing, "I hate what this is doing to me."
"I understand that feeling, Mr. Rankin. But he's not your responsibility. We'll take care of him." She said.
As Jamie walked Mr. Rankin out of the conference room, she spotted Jack walking up from the elevators. He had his jacket slung over one arm, as if whatever he'd been doing that day had worn him out.
"Someone will call you as soon as we have a trial date." She said to Mr. Rankin.
"I appreciate that. Thank you." He said. Jamie watched him leave and she watched Jack follow her over to her desk.
"The part of the job they don't train you for," Jack said, "Looks like you handled it well."
"It's not hard once you identify with their hate." Jamie said, and the statement took Jack by surprise. He could certainly identify with their hate, especially after what had gone on in that courtroom today, but he wasn't expecting that from Jamie.
"What?" He asked.
"Neil and I had a client. James Karper. A sex murderer? While the DA's describing the crime to the jury, Karper gets an erection Barnum and Bailey could have pitched a tent on. I threw my coat over his lap so the jury wouldn't notice."
"I remember the case," Jack nodded, "Karper walked."
"Yeah, even though his DNA was all over the crime scene." Jamie paused, thinking of her ex-husband, "Neil built his practice on the infallibility of DNA evidence. Then he met Karper's trust fund. New tune? DNA's unreliable. The jury acquits."
"And three months later, Karper killed again."
"I believe in monsters and things that go bump in the night, Jack. May they rot in hell, along with their attorneys."
Amen to that, Jack thought, may they all rot in hell, from Dean Connors and Paige Kendall to Arlene Wolensky and Michael Kennedy. Especially him.
"I got a call from Marcy Wrightman. As of this morning, she represents Ana Galvez." Jack said.
"Looks like the wedding's off." Jamie reached for the phone to call Marcy Wrightman and Jack glanced at her as he walked back into his office, with some new understanding of his new assistant.
But once he was in his office, his concern for Jamie faded. He found himself replaying the plea allocution in his head.
What was it he had told Claire, ages ago, during one of their all-too frequent debates on the death penalty?
"Vengeance is a normal human instinct, and there's no need to apologize for it."
Those words had been so damn easy to say, Jack thought. So easy to stand around and moralize when you are not the one with a gnawing ache in your heart, facing the man who killed one of the most important people in your life. Vengeance is suddenly no longer an abstract concept, and the desire for it means you must use every ounce of strength you have not to strangle that man at the defendant's table.
He knew now how some of the victim's families he had seen over the years felt when they spoke to him – and how he had treated them much the same way Paige Kendall had treated him – with platitudes and manufactured sympathy. The funny thing was, for so long he thought he was sympathetic, he was as understanding as he could be. He now realized just how far off he had been.
Arlene was right, Paige hadn't done anything wrong. From a strictly legal standpoint, the plea bargain was exactly what he would have advised any of his own assistants to do. But sitting there, listening to Michael Kennedy describe how he killed someone – and he didn't even know her name! – he knew for the first time how it felt to sit in a courtroom, knowing that man killed someone – someone beautiful, and smart, and loved – and all he would serve was twelve months in jail. That was less than half a month for each of Claire's twenty-nine years.
It wasn't enough. It wasn't nearly enough.
So what to do now? Jack changed his clothes and said good night to Jamie. There was only one thing he could think of.
"Lennie?" Anita poked her head through the door of her office. Lennie sighed and followed her inside.
"How did the allocution go?" She asked.
"About what you'd expect," Lennie replied.
"How is Jack holding up?"
"About what you'd expect," Lennie repeated, and Anita smiled.
"Go home, Lennie," She said, waving him away, "Have a good night."
Lennie nodded and walked back out to his desk, where Rey was talking on the phone.
"I'll be home soon, sweetheart," He was saying, "Yes, Daddy will read you Goodnight, Moon, again tonight. I promise. All right. Put your mommy back on the phone. Yeah. I'll be home soon. Did you need me to pick up anything?" Rey wrote a few things down on a notepad, "All right, milk, eggs and cereal. See you soon. Love you."
He hung up the phone and pulled his jacket on.
"What did you think of what happened today?" He asked Lennie, who shrugged.
"I think it's a joke," Lennie said.
"Me too. You want to come with me? You can read Goodnight, Moon to the girls. That story puts me to sleep."
"Nah, I had some paperwork I wanted to finish before I call it a night. Say hello to everyone for me."
"I will. Good night."
Lennie let a few moments pass before he started in on his forms, enjoying the quiet. It was rare for the squad room to be this quiet, but it was a nice change. As he worked, his mind wandered back to the courtroom scene that afternoon.
"I guess that's it." That was all he had to say? Although the memory was still fuzzy around the edges, Lennie clearly remembered the screeching, the sound of metal against metal, the bright light flashing. And that was all this mope could come up with? "I'm really sorry about the lady?" It was only pure dumb luck that he hadn't killed more people. It was only a trick of a few mathematical equations that meant Lennie was still here and Claire wasn't.
Maybe, Lennie thought, if I'd been sober I would have seen the other car coming. Of course, if I'd stayed out of the bar in the first place, everything would have been different.
The phone rang, echoing loudly in the quiet room. Lennie watched it for a moment, wondering if he should answer it.
The phone rang again.
"Detective Briscoe." He said.
"Yeah, Lennie, it's me," Said the voice on the other end, and Lennie's heart sank. It was Jack's voice, but it wasn't Jack's voice.
"Counselor," Lennie said, "Where are you?"
"Oh, it's a great place, you should come down here and join me. Drink whatever it is you drink these days." Jack slurred into the phone, and Lennie gritted his teeth. Great way to react, Jack, he thought, go and get rip-roaring, stinking drunk.
"Be glad to," He said, forcing cheerfulness into his voice, "Where are you?"
"Oh, you're a detective, you figure it out."
The phone went dead, and Lennie sighed and grabbed his jacket. He had a good idea where Jack was.
The place hadn't changed, Lennie thought as he walked in the door and scanned the crowded room. Of course it hadn't changed – it hadn't been that long. Funny how that night seemed like a million years ago, how everything could change so fast. Somehow he had even been expecting the bar to look different, but of course it didn't.
The Friday night crowd made it impossible to see Jack from the door. Lennie found his way to the bar and signaled for the bartender's attention.
"Yeah, buddy, what can I get you?" The bartender asked.
"I'm looking for someone." Lennie said, and the bartender snorted.
"Yeah, aren't we all. You want a drink or not?"
"Never mind," Lennie said, catching sight of Jack from the corner of his eye, "I found him."
Jack was sitting on a barstool in the corner, talking to someone Lennie didn't recognize. Even at a glance he could tell Jack probably didn't know this guy either – they had just struck up one of those long conversations that happen between strangers who spend Friday nights in bars. By the end of the night they'd be promising lifelong friendship, but on Saturday morning, they wouldn't remember each other's names.
"Lennie," Jack slurred when he saw him, "What are you doing here?"
"You called me." Lennie said.
"I did, didn't I? Forgot all about it. Lennie, meet Joe. Joe, this is Detective Briscoe."
Joe, who was so drunk he had trouble focusing his eyes, held out his hand to Lennie.
"Nice to meet you, detective," He said.
"This man here," Jack said, giving Joe a pat on the back that almost knocked the man off his barstool, "He lost his wife a year ago."
"Cancer," Joe said, looking up at Lennie, "Just like that. You married?"
"Was. Both of my exes are glad it's past tense." He replied, glancing over at Jack.
"She was a bitch," Joe slurred, "Always on me about this, and that… thought I hated her. I'd work all day, come home, have a beer, she'd be on me… then she's gone, and I miss her. Funny how that works." He gazed into his empty glass, bleary eyed.
"Yeah," Jack agreed, "Funny how that works." He took another drink, emptying his glass down his throat.
"Hey, Jack, come on. I'll give you a ride home." Lennie said, placing his hand over Jack's to keep him from ordering again.
"Trying to redeem yourself, detective?" Jack said, nailing Lennie with a drunken stare. Lennie's first instinct was to let go of Jack's hand and let him do whatever he wanted. Let the man drink himself into a coma, who cared? One less lawyer in the world…
No. She was trying to help me, Lennie thought, I owe it to her to do the same.
"Nah," He said to Jack, "I'm just trying to spare some cab driver the joy of listening to you."
Jack gave a sarcastic, snorting laugh, but he reached for his jacket. As Lennie led him, stumbling and weaving, out the door, he sighed.
I'm doing this for you, kiddo, he thought, not for him but for you.
Jack was lucid enough to give Lennie directions back to his apartment, but not nearly coordinated enough to figure out how to get his key in the front door lock – Lennie had to do that for him.
"All right, Jack, here we are," Lennie opened the door, and Jack fumbled with a light switch, turning the living room light on and then off again. Lennie followed his hand and flipped the switch back on.
"Thank you for the ride, detective," Jack slurred, "I appreciate it. See, now, we both made it here alive. That's an improvement, isn't it?"
Lennie decided not to say what he was thinking. Why make trouble?
"Well, if you're all right I'll say goodnight, then." Lennie said, starting for the door.
"What did you think about it?" Jack sat down on one of the chairs in the living room and attempted – with some difficulty – to take off his shoes, "What did you think of what you saw today?"
"The plea-bargain, you mean?"
"What else?"
"I didn't think it was right." Lennie admitted, "But I usually don't."
"Believe it or not, I don't either. You do the best you can with what you've got, all that crap." He leaned his head against the side of the chair.
"Part of your job." Lennie replied. Jack looked up at him, clear eyed for a moment.
"He took everything from me, Lennie. Everything."
With that, Jack stood up and unsteadily made his way to an open door on the other side of the room – Lennie hadn't been in his apartment before, but he could guess the door led to a bedroom – and shut it behind him, leaving Lennie alone in the living room. Lennie knew the proper thing to do would have been to just call goodbye and leave, but he couldn't resist the opportunity to look around.
It was just as he'd expected, really – small, somewhat cluttered, with bookshelves everywhere. A bachelor's apartment, much like his own, a place no one spent or expected to spend that much time in.
Lennie noticed a shelf along one side of the room that had been decorated with family photographs, one of the few personal touches visible in the apartment. He glanced at the photos, which were carefully arranged in their frames. One was of a smiling young woman, a posed portrait. Lennie had seen the similar photographs of his own daughters, the ones they'd had him shell out three hundred dollars for when they graduated high school. He had two of them in his wallet right now, as a matter of fact. This girl was obviously Jack's daughter – she had his eyes, his smile. The photo next to her was a 1940's-vintage portrait of another young woman. Lennie guessed that face belonged to Jack's mother, also going by the resemblance. A few more nondescript family photos could be any number of anonymous relatives.
The careful layout of the frames on the shelf was somehow asymmetrical, Lennie noticed, as if a picture had been moved, a gap in the perfectly organized display. A quick glance at the bookshelf under the photographs revealed the missing frame – it was tucked, face down, on top of a row of books.
The detective in Lennie reached in and pulled the frame from it's hiding place. He turned it over and looked at the picture.
At first glance it looked like a vacation snapshot – he saw Jack, dressed casually, leaning his weight back against a fence surrounding a fountain. Where it was exactly, Lennie had no idea. He was pretty sure the photo hadn't been taken in New York, but there was a whole world outside the borders of Manhattan. Jack's attention, in the photo, was not directed towards the camera, but towards the person standing next to him – a woman, her mouth open in such a wide smile it looked as if someone had told her a joke at the exact moment the shutter snapped. She was brushing her black hair away from her face with one hand, but her eyes were focused on the camera.
It took Lennie a moment to recognize her – she looked so different than he was used to seeing her, all polished and done up perfectly in those lawyer suits she had to wear. Claire's eyes were hard to miss, though, and Lennie felt a tightness in his throat as he looked at her.
The photo, Lennie realized, was the only obvious sign of their relationship, and Jack had taken special care to turn it upside down and shove it into a bookshelf. Except for what he had just said, he hadn't even mentioned Claire – even in his anger over Michael Kennedy's plea-bargain, he hadn't said her name once.
Lennie had guessed at their relationship long before he'd said anything about it – he could see it in the way they looked at each other. But he had never seen Jack look at Claire the way he was looking at her in that photo – with a sense of awe, almost, as if he couldn't believe this woman was standing next to him.
Lennie knew that look, and he knew men didn't look at women that way without a good reason. Had he ever looked at his wives that way? Maybe a girlfriend, maybe once.
Lennie slid the frame back on top of the books, in between Supreme Court Decisions, 1965-1969 and New York State Appellate Division Rulings, 1994. He felt a little uneasy about taking advantage of Jack's condition to snoop around, and he decided the best thing to do would be to leave, now. He made sure the door locked behind him as he left.
Once he was back out on the street, Lennie had to stop to take a breath. Until now he hadn't honestly considered the possibility that Jack's anger may have come from something other than a person he cared about being smashed into by a drunk and getting no significant jail time, as if that wasn't enough. Now he understood more than he wanted to know – whatever had been going on between those two, it was more than he had ever suspected. No matter how drunk Jack was, he meant what he had said. Michael Kennedy had taken everything from him.
