The Empty Chair (Lincoln Rhyme 3)

"It's obvious why," Rhyme grumbled. He had little patience for irrelevant questions and Geberth was deviating from his script.

"Share that with us, if you would."

"Billy had no romantic relationship with Mary Beth of any kind. He wasn't involved in the murder of Garrett Hanlon's family. He didn't even know her. So he'd have no motivation to kill her other than financial profit."

"Go on."

Rhyme continued, "Whoever hired him wasn't going to pay by check, of course, but in cash. Deputy Kerr went to the house of Billy Stail's parents and was given permission to search his room. She discovered ten thousand dollars hidden beneath his mattress."

"What was there about this--"

"Why don't I just finish the story?" Rhyme asked the lawyer.

The judge said, "Good idea, Mr. Rhyme. I think counsel's laid enough groundwork."

"With Officer Kerr's assistance I did a friction ridge analysis--that's a fingerprint check--of the top and bottom bills in the sucks of cash. I found a total of sixty-one latent fingerprints. Aside from Billy's prints, two of these prints proved to be from a person involved in this case. Deputy Kerr got another warrant to enter that individual's house."

"Did you search it too?" the judge asked.

He replied with forced patience, "No, I didn't. It wasn't accessible to me. But I directed the search, which was conducted by Deputy Kerr. Inside the house she found a receipt for the purchase of a shovel identical to the murder weapon, eighty-three thousand dollars in cash, secured with wrappers identical to the ones around the two stacks of money in Billy Stail's house."

Dramatic as ever, Rhyme had saved the best till the last. "Deputy Kerr also found bone fragments in the barbecue behind that premises. These fragments match the bones of Garrett Hanlon's family."

"Whose house was this?"

"Deputy Jesse Corn's."

This drew some loud murmurs from the courtroom pews. The prosecutor remained unfazed but sat up slightly, his shoes scuffling on the tile floor, and whispered to his colleagues as they considered the implications of the revelation. In the gallery Jesse's parents turned to each other, shock in their eyes; his mother shook her head and started to cry.

"Where exactly are you going, Mr. Rhyme?" the judge asked.

Rhyme resisted telling the judge that the destination was obvious. He said, "Your Honor, Jesse Corn was one of the individuals who had conspired with Jim Bell and Steve Farr to kill Garrett Hanlon's family five years ago and then to kill Mary Beth McConnell the other day."

Oh, yeah. This town's got itself a few hornets.

The judge leaned back in his chair. "This has nothing to do with me. You two duke it out." Nodding from Geberth to the prosecutor. "You got five minutes then she accepts the plea bargain or I'll set bail and schedule trial."

The prosecutor said to Geberth, "Doesn't mean she didn't kill Jesse. Even if Corn was a co-conspirator he was still the victim of a homicide."

Now the Northerner got to roll his eyes. "Oh, come on," Geberth snapped, as if the D.A. were a slow student. "What it means is that Corn was operating outside his jurisdiction as a law enforcer and that when he confronted Garrett he was a felon and armed and dangerous. Jim Bell admitted they were planning on torturing the boy to find Mary Beth's whereabouts. Once they found her, Corn would've been right there with Culbeau and the others to kill Lucy Kerr and the other deputies."

The judge's eyes swept from left to right slowly as he watched this unprecedented tennis match.

The prosecutor: "I can only focus on the crime at hand. Whether Jesse Corn was going to kill anybody or not doesn't matter."

Geberth shook his head slowly. The lawyer said to the court reporter, "We're suspending the deposition. This is off the record." Then, to the prosecutor: "What's the point of proceeding? Corn was a killer."

Rhyme joined in, speaking to the prosecutor. "You take this to trial and what do you think the jury's going to feel when we show the victim was a crooked cop planning to torture an innocent boy to find a young woman and then murder her?"

Geberth continued, "You don't want this notch on your grip. You've got Bell, you've got his brother-in-law, the coroner...."

Before the prosecutor could protest again Rhyme looked up at him and said in a soft voice, "I'll help you."

"What?" the prosecutor asked.

"You know who's behind all this, don't you? You know who's killing half the residents of Tanner's Corner?"

"Henry Davett," the prosecutor said. "I've read the filings and depos."