A Reasonable Doubt Read online

  Robin was shocked by his appearance. The man sitting opposite her bore only a passing resemblance to the debonair gentleman who had hired her to look into patenting his great illusion. That Robert Chesterfield had radiated health and self-confidence and had dressed in the latest fashions. This Chesterfield seemed like a shrunken version of his former self. He wore old jeans and a threadbare, cable-knit sweater underneath the raincoat. His hair had thinned, there were circles under his eyes, and he’d lost weight. The only thing sophisticated about this new version was his upper-class British accent, which Robin knew was a fake.

  “I saw your ad,” Robin said. “The Great Chesterfield will rise from the dead?”

  “It is a tad melodramatic, but I leave the marketing and PR to Horace.”

  “Why are you resurrecting yourself?”

  “Money problems. Speaking of which, did you bring the cash?”

  “Yes, but I want to know who’s watching my office before I give it to you, and whether I’m in any danger.”

  “You don’t have to worry. I’m the one they want.”

  “Who is ‘they’? Is it Auggie Montenegro’s guys?”

  “Do you have my money?” Chesterfield asked again, sidestepping the question.

  Robin stared at the magician for a moment. Then she handed a thick envelope across the table. “Where have you been hiding?” Robin asked while Chesterfield counted the bills.

  “Here and there,” Chesterfield answered. “You’re better off not knowing.” Chesterfield finished counting the cash, but he didn’t put it back in the envelope. “I need help with a legal matter. Are you still willing to represent me?”

  “I’m not sure after the stunt you pulled.”

  “I don’t blame you. Let me tell you what I’d like you to do for me. If you don’t want to do it, there will be no hard feelings.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “I was down on my luck when I came up with the idea for the Chamber of Death. I was certain that I could get a show if it was as spectacular as I thought it would be, but illusions are expensive to produce, so I needed backers. You remember Joe Samuels?”

  “He showed up at your mansion and caused a scene.”

  “He had every right to. Joe and some other people put up money for the illusion. As I said, I was down on my luck, so I borrowed some of the money my backers had put up and used it for, uhm, living expenses.”

  “Is that another term for gambling debts?”

  Chesterfield flashed a sheepish grin.

  Robin wasn’t amused. “I believe that the legal term for what you did is ‘embezzling,’” she said.

  “You’re right. I won’t deny that what I did could be seen as embezzling, but I was certain I could pay back Joe and the others when the show began. I didn’t think anyone would notice until I started getting paid by the Babylon Casino.”

  “Only Mr. Samuels did notice.”

  “And he was going to go to the police. Horace told me that Joe did file a complaint after I disappeared. I’d like you to negotiate with him. Get him to agree to drop his criminal complaint so I can put on my act without worrying about getting arrested. Then I can pay him back from the proceeds of my new show.”

  Robin thought for a moment. “Fifteen hundred should cover my time. Where can I reach you?”

  Chesterfield handed Robin the money and Horace Dobson’s business card. “I’m not at a fixed address right now, but you can contact me through Horace. And thank you. I can understand why you wouldn’t want to have me as a client.”

  “I’m a lawyer, Robert. My job is helping people in trouble, not judging them.”

  Chesterfield stood up.

  “What about these people who are following you?” Robin asked. “Are you in danger?”

  “I appreciate the concern, but I can take care of myself.”

  There was a back door to the tavern, and Chesterfield disappeared through it. Robin was going to leave by the front door when she hesitated. She was fairly certain that someone had followed her, and she wasn’t certain that she’d lost them.

  Robin turned around. When she opened the back door, she saw Chesterfield standing against the alley wall using a knife to hold two men at bay. One of his attackers looked like a nightclub bouncer. The other man was slender.

  “Don’t be stupid, Bobby,” the slender man said. “That knife won’t protect you.”

  “We’ll soon see, Rafael. I hope you brought a first aid kit with plenty of bandages.”

  Robin pulled out her cell phone. “What’s going on here?” she shouted as she dialed 911.

  Rafael turned toward Robin, and Chesterfield struck. Rafael looked at his stomach. Blood was streaming from a cut. “What the fuck!” he screamed as he slapped his hand against the wound.

  The other man stepped forward, and Chesterfield danced away.

  “I’ve just dialed 911!” Robin shouted.

  “You should get Rafael to a hospital,” Chesterfield said to Rafael’s partner. “What will Auggie say if he bleeds out?”

  Rafael doubled over and groaned, “Marco, let’s get out of here.”

  Robin stepped back as Marco helped Rafael out of the alley. She watched them until they rounded a corner. When she turned back to talk to Chesterfield, he’d disappeared again.

  “What’s your emergency?” the 911 operator asked.

  Robin hesitated. Chesterfield and his assailants were gone. What would be accomplished by telling the police what had happened?

  “Sorry. I misdialed,” she said as she ended the call.

  * * *

  Robin knew Rafael was wounded and was probably not following her, but she was spooked and she stayed on high alert during the walk back to Barrister, Berman & Lockwood. The first thing she did was go to Jeff’s office.

  “I just saw Robert Chesterfield stab a man in an alley behind the Stumptown Tavern,” Robin told Jeff, who was sitting behind his desk, looking over a file.

  “You what!?”

  Robin dropped into a seat across from her investigator. “Chesterfield called and asked me to return his retainer. I told him I’d have it here tomorrow, but he said he didn’t want to come to the office, because some people were after him and might be staking it out. He asked me to bring the money to the tavern. Two men were waiting for him when he left.”

  “How bad off was the guy Chesterfield stabbed?” Jeff asked when Robin finished telling him what had happened in the alley.

  “Chesterfield seemed to know what he was doing, so I’m guessing it looked worse than it was. I think he just wanted to scare off his attackers.”

  “Any idea who they were?”

  “Chesterfield called one of the men Rafael, and the other man’s name is Marco. He also mentioned Auggie Montenegro, so I’m guessing they work for him collecting debts. Do you remember Montenegro? He was at the premiere at Chesterfield’s mansion. He owns a casino in Vegas. And he’s rumored to have mob connections.”

  “They were probably leg breakers if Chesterfield felt he had to use a knife instead of his silver tongue.”

  “Chesterfield sounds like he’s in hiding,” Robin said. “He wouldn’t tell me where he’s staying. I have to go through his agent to get in touch with him.”

  “Do you think you’re in danger?” Jeff asked.

  “It’s possible. Like I said, Chesterfield was worried that my office was being watched. If it was, those guys may have recognized me in the alley.”

  “If you thought you might be followed, why didn’t you ask me to go with you?”

  “I wasn’t that worried when I left to meet him. And I can take care of myself.”

  “I know you can,” Jeff said, “but it never hurts to have backup. I think you should go armed until we’re sure you’re safe.”

  Robin had a permit to carry a handgun she purchased after her life had been put in danger a few years ago.

  “The men who went after Chesterfield will assume you know where they can find him,” Jeff continued. “They may t
ry to force the information out of you. I’ll try to watch your back, but don’t take any chances.”

  Robin reached across the desk and touched Jeff’s hand. “Thanks for caring, but I think I’ll be okay.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  “There’s a Joe Samuels on one,” Robin’s receptionist said.

  Finally, Robin thought. She had been leaving messages for him for a week, and she had almost given up hope that he would return her calls.

  “Thanks for getting back to me, Mr. Samuels. I want to talk to you about your disagreement with Robert Chesterfield.”

  “It’s not a disagreement. The son of a bitch stole from me.”

  “Mr. Chesterfield has a contract to perform a magic show at a theater in Portland. He knows that he owes you money and he wanted me to—”

  “No deals,” Samuels cut in. “I want that con artist in jail, where he belongs. You tell Lord Chesterfield that I’m not dropping the criminal complaint. I’ll get my money back when the court orders him to pay me restitution.”

  “Which he won’t be able to do if he’s locked up.”

  “You don’t get it. I don’t care about the money anymore. I’ve got more money than I know what to do with. What I want is revenge. The old-fashioned, biblical eye for an eye. I want the world’s greatest escape artist trying to escape from a prison cell. Have I made myself clear?”

  “Definitely, and I understand why you’re upset. I wasn’t too happy with my client when he pulled that disappearing act, either. All I ask is that you count to ten, take a few deep breaths, and try to put what Robert did to you in perspective. I can see that this is a matter of principle, but—if I’ve got this right—the amount he took from you was around ten thousand dollars. That’s not chicken feed, but I don’t see an Oregon court sending Mr. Chesterfield to jail for this type of nonviolent first offense.”

  “Que será, será, Miss Lockwood. Seeing that son of a bitch sweat will bring me great pleasure.”

  Samuels hung up and Robin sighed. She wished that she’d been able to solve Chesterfield’s problem with Samuels, but she could appreciate the investor’s position.

  * * *

  Deputy District Attorney Lorna Waxman learned about her promotion to the Homicide team when she went to work. Waxman’s desk was next to Peter Ragland’s, so he knew about some of the felony cases she was handling. Peter had a stack of open files and was reluctant to add more cases to his load, but Lorna had told him about a case involving Robert Chesterfield. The anger that surfaced when Ragland thought about the magician had never diminished, and he saw Samuels’s criminal complaint against his nemesis as a chance to exact a small measure of revenge.

  After the Sophie Randall–Arthur Gentry fiasco, not even his father’s reputation could save Peter Ragland from being demoted from the team that handled death penalty cases. Then Jasper Ragland died and many of the politicians who owed him favors retired or followed Jasper to the great law firm in the sky, leaving Peter to fend for himself.

  Over the twenty-some years since Regina Barrister had made a fool of him, Ragland’s hairline had receded, he’d put on sloppy weight, he’d lost his self-confidence and become a ghost in the district attorney’s office, drifting through it followed by the foul odor of failure. Some people wondered why Peter didn’t leave, but he knew that no decent firm would hire him after his father died, and he had no faith in his ability to make a living if he hung out a shingle.

  Vanessa Cole, the Multnomah County district attorney, was a slender, fifty-three-year-old black woman with sharp features and fierce brown eyes. She’d grown up in a wealthy area of Portland’s West Hills and had gone to Stanford for college and law school. Cole was known for her smarts and high ethical standards, and she’d been a shooting star from the moment she joined the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office, moving quickly from trying misdemeanors to trying felonies to handling murder cases, then death penalty murder cases. When her predecessor retired for health reasons, Cole had been appointed to the post, and she won the position in the next election when she ran unopposed.

  Vanessa was reviewing the office budget when her secretary buzzed to tell her that Peter Ragland wanted to talk to her. Over the years, Vanessa had had very little contact with Ragland. He had a reputation as someone competent to handle run-of-the-mill cases, and there were rumors about some problem with an old case that had kept him from being promoted during her predecessor’s reign. Vanessa had gone from law school to a judicial clerkship to a stint in a law firm before joining the Multnomah District Attorney’s office, so she had not been a DA when Ragland had tried the case that kept him from promotion.

  “What’s up, Peter?” Vanessa asked when Ragland was seated across from her.

  “I just had a chat with a man named Joseph Samuels. He filed a criminal complaint alleging theft, and I’d like the case.”

  Cole frowned. “Does someone else have the case now?”

  “It was originally assigned to Lorna Waxman, but she was just promoted to Homicide.”

  “What’s so special about this case?”

  “The defendant is Robert Chesterfield. He was charged with murder in 1998. The case was solid, but Regina Barrister was his lawyer and she got the key evidence thrown out on a technicality.”

  Cole’s brow furrowed. “Is he the magician?”

  “Yeah. He pulled a disappearing act a few years ago, when we were ready to go after him on this theft thing.”

  “I read a story about him in the paper.”

  “Right. Anyway, he’s got a show at the Imperial, and we can arrest him there.”

  Vanessa didn’t want to waste any more time on a theft case. “Okay. You’ve got the case,” she said, impatient to get back to the budget.

  Peter left before his boss could ask any more questions about Chesterfield. From her reaction, he figured that Cole probably didn’t know much about what had happened in the Randall, Gentry, and Moser cases. But he remembered everything about the cases that had led to his disgrace, and he was eager for a second chance to put Robert Chesterfield behind bars.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  “I have good news, Jimmy,” Robin told her client when they were sitting across from each other in a contact visiting room at the jail. “The DA is dropping the charges. You’ll be free by the end of the day.”

  “How can they do that when I confessed?”

  “Under Oregon law, a person can’t be convicted based only on a confession unless there is evidence to support the story the person tells the police. That’s the law because some people confess to crimes they didn’t commit.”

  “But I did try to kill Tim.”

  “That’s not what he says. Tim told the police that you made up the story about shooting him. And the police don’t have a gun or those bullets you say bounced off his chest.”

  Jimmy thought for a moment. Then he smiled. “This is all God’s doing. God saved Tim by making those bullets bounce off his chest, and now God has saved me by making the gun and the bullets disappear.”

  Robin didn’t want to disillusion her client, so she didn’t tell him what she’d learned about the gunpowder. “I’ve done some digging, Jimmy. Peter Knox thought Timothy Rankin ratted him out to the police, but he didn’t. I know some people in Narcotics. They wouldn’t tell me who informed on Knox, but they assured me it wasn’t Timothy. I also found out that Loretta moved out of state two years ago, so Timothy couldn’t have been having an affair with her. Knox made that up, hoping you would go after Timothy. So, I have to ask you, are you going to try to hurt Rankin when you’re released?”

  “I’m never gonna hurt nobody again. God gave me a chance to be redeemed, and I’m gonna prove he wasn’t wrong to do it.”

  “That’s good to hear. You’re going to be released in the next half hour. Do you have someone who can drive you home?”

  “My brother, but he’s working a late shift.”

  “When does he get off?”

  “Around midnigh
t.”

  Robin hesitated. She usually kept her relations with clients to legal assistance, but she liked Jimmy. “Where do you live?”

  Jimmy told her. The address was a twenty-minute ride away, and she’d brought her car to work because she’d had an appearance in Salem that morning.

  “I can give you a ride home. I’ll wait across the street in the park for you.”

  Robin rode down in the jail elevator and walked to the park that was across from the Justice Center. She found an empty bench, opened her attaché case, and took out a respondent’s brief that the attorney general had filed in one of her appeals. She’d been reading it for twenty-five minutes when a shadow obscured the page.

  Robin looked up. Looming over her were the men who had attacked Robert Chesterfield behind the tavern. Robin’s primitive brain sent her body into fight-or-flight mode. When she started to stand, Marco pressed his meaty fingers into her shoulder and forced her back onto the bench. Rafael sat beside her and winced. Robin guessed that he was still hurting from his stab wound.

  “Can I help you?” Robin asked, trying to stay calm.

  “You can help yourself by telling me where I can find Bobby Chesterfield,” Rafael said.

  Robin was certain that the two men wouldn’t expect a woman to know how to fight, and that was her advantage. She visualized smashing her fist into Rafael’s groin before springing up and spearing Marco in the throat. An elbow strike to Rafael’s temple and a punch or kick to Marco’s crotch would disable the pair long enough for her to run back to the Justice Center and its police presence.

  While that course of action would help her in the park, she realized that more problems would come later when the men came after her to avenge their beating. Robin decided that violence would be plan B, and she opted to use her brain to defuse the situation.

  “I don’t know where he is,” she said.

  “We both know that’s not true. You’re Bobby’s lawyer, so you have to know how to get in touch with him.”