Sedona Law 4 by Dave Daren (ready to read books TXT) 📕

“I’m sorry, I can’t hear you, what’s that, Kate?” I responded.

She laughed, and I smoothed my suit and raised my eyebrows at her. Then, with long confident strides, we strolled up to the courthouse, Vicki beside me, her black Loubotins clicking against the concrete in a stacotta rhythm. We were halfway through the lot before they noticed us.

We did have an online presence, AJ managed all of that for us. So any mediocre reporter could have figured out who we were with a quick search. This made us instant targets, and targets we were.

We were immediately surrounded by close to two dozen reporters, who penned us into a circle. It was chaos. There was shouting, and everywhere I looked, either a voice recorder was being shoved into our faces, or a video camera stared us down. We tried to keep walking, but they followed us.

“Mr. Irving, how does Julianna Spencer intend to plead today?”

“What can you tell us about the murder investigation?”

“Early reports claim that state Senator John Malone may or may not be involved. Can you confirm or deny that?”

“We’re here with defense attorneys Henry Irving and Vicki Park and--”

“Mr. Irving, Mr. Irving, over here, do you expect this to go to full trial, or will you push to get the charges dropped?”

“There is an unconfirmed rumor that the case may be the tip of the iceberg on a drug trafficking ring. What can you tell us about that?”

“Ms. Park, what is your take on the women’s issues at the heart of this case? Can you give us a quote about Judith Klein?”

“Mr. Irving, is it true that you previously had a romantic relationship with Ms. Spencer?”

“Ms. Park, where do you buy your suits?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Gabriel’s Prius pull into the parking lot. In all the chaos, I whispered into Vicki’s ear.

“I’ll handle the press, you go get the clients,” I said.

She nodded, and I stopped and turned to the cameras and gave them a winning, charming smile. I saw the Prius park.

“Thank you all for coming out,” I said, and I couldn’t deny there was a certain rush of having half a dozen cameras trained on me. “I’ll give you a couple of quotes.”

Now that the reporters had my undivided attention, Vicki smiled and slipped out of the crowd undetected. I looked into the lenses and then borrowed from Senator Malone’s placating comments.

“We are deeply saddened by the tragic events that followed the dance performance last month,” I spoke into a trio of microphones shoved at me. “Our thoughts and prayers go out to the victim’s family. Experiencing a death is a traumatic event for any family, and we hope to get these people some answers as soon as possible.”

It occured to me, then, that I hadn’t seen a shred of Beyo’s actual family, other than a third-hand reference to an estranged ex-wife. Was this guy such a reprobate that not even his own family wanted to claim him after his death? I hoped that the police and coroner had a different experience on that than I had.

“Julianna Spencer does intend to plead not guilty, then?” a reporter asked. She shoved a voice recorder so close to me, she almost hit me in the face. I winced and instinctively pulled away.

“I cannot tell you that at this time,” I said. “I can only tell you that we are conducting a full investigation on the death of Beowulf Vandergarten, and we are talking to everyone involved. Anyone that has any knowledge of the crime, is urged to contact our office, or local law enforcement as soon as possible.”

The last part surprised me even as it came out of my mouth, but I liked the way it sounded.

“Do you think Senator Malone is involved?” a reporter asked me on camera.

“I have no reason to believe that, no,” I lied. “We have a great relationship with the senator. He has served this district tirelessly for many years, and we intend to honor his reputation and give him the respect he deserves.”

Bullshit. Bullshit. Bullshit.

Through the crowd, I could see Vicki had reached Julianna and Gabriel, and Chloe and Olivia were with them. Vicki briefly conferenced with all of them, and they looked in our direction before power walking toward the doors.

“Some have said that there is a drug trafficking ring at the center of this controversial murder. What do you know about that?” another reporter asked.

“Drug trafficking?” I repeated. I didn’t know where that rumor came from. “No, nothing in our investigation hints in any way at drug trafficking.”

“What do you think was the reason behind the murder?” another reporter asked.

Vicki and the clients talked to a security guard who escorted them up the steps.

“I cannot comment on that,” I said.

“As you might know,” another reporter said with a video buzzing at me. “We are a Starbright station.”

I nodded as I followed where this question was going. I rapidly formed our firm’s official position on Marvin Iakova.

“What role, if any, do you think Marvin Iakova had in this crime,” he asked. “And what potential impact do you think that would have on media in this state?”

“I do not have any evidence at all that Marvin Iakova was involved in the murder,” I said. “I only know that he was there the night of the murder, which is public knowledge. As far as the impact it would have on local media, I couldn’t say. You would know those figures better than me.”

“There is an unconfirmed rumor that you were with Marvin Iakova when he learned of the murder,” another reporter stated.

“That is correct,” I said.

I wasn’t sure if there was wisdom in admitting to any further association with Iakova, so I