CHAPTER NINETEEN
JJ parked his Bentley in front of the Scottsdale Police Department and hurried inside. The desk commander was just telling the punch line to a joke he was sharing with another officer. “And then he started stumbling back, with bullet holes everywhere, and he cries out, ‘I need to pee,’ before he dropped dead.” The cop and the commander laughed.
But when the commander saw who had walked into the station, he turned professional again. “Judge Brant, good afternoon.”
It took all JJ had to maintain his cool. “I understand you impounded my automobile.”
“We recovered it, yes sir. And we got the gal that took it too.”
“Where is she?”
“The car or the car thief?”
“She is not a thief!” JJ said between clenched teeth. “She is my assistant. Where is she?”
The commander immediately realized they had a problem. “One moment, sir,” he said and went to the chief’s office just behind his desk. When JJ looked at the young officer still standing there, he quickly saw how impassioned the judge was and walked away. He wanted no parts of that.
Bill Goslin, the chief of police, followed by his desk commander, came out of the office. And the chief came out talking. “Well hello there, JJ. I haven’t seen you in a month of Sundays. Even longer than that. Not since the funeral over ten months ago. How you been holding up?”
But JJ wasn’t there for small talk. “How did my car end up in your possession and my assistant end up in your jail, Bill? Tell me that.”
“So she does work for you?”
“Yes, she works for me. I’m sure she told you that if you were listening.”
“I was listening,” the chief said. “But I was also listening to that 911 caller that said they saw her steal that car. Forgive me for not putting more weight on the alleged thief than I did on the emergency phone call of a concerned citizen.”
JJ wondered why would somebody tell such a falsehood on Tish?
JJ looked at the commander. “Release her and bring her to me,” he said.
The commander looked at the chief, his boss. The chief reluctantly nodded, and the commander left.
JJ then looked at the chief, a man he’d known for over a decade. “I want to hear that 911 call.”
“If it wasn’t true, who would want to lie on her like that?” the chief asked.
“That’s what I want to find out,” said JJ.
The chief nodded. “Come with me,” he said as he began heading back to his office.
But JJ wasn’t going anywhere just yet. “I’ll be there when I retrieve my assistant.”
“Well damn, JJ,” the chief said with a grin, “she’s just an assistant.” But by the way JJ looked at him as if he was offended for him to regard her so lowly, his grin left. “I’ll rack up the tape,” he said and went back into his office.
It took another couple minutes, but the commander did return with Tish in tow.
As soon as Tish saw that the judge was there, which she knew meant she would be released, that ache that had overwhelmed her heart left. And she hurried to him and slammed against him, hugging him. And this time JJ gave her an even tighter embrace than she was giving him. So tight that his eyes closed. So tight that he nor she saw another cop take a video of the embrace on his phone. When they stopped embracing, he hid his phone.
“Are you okay?”
Tish nodded. But JJ was studying her face too hard. He saw an abrasion right by her eyebrow. He took his hand and lifted her chin, to get a better look at it. “What’s this?”
“What is it?”
“An abrasion near your brow.”
“That asshole cop that arrested me slammed my face on the hood. That’s probably how it got there.”
JJ’s jaw tightened. He knew he could yell and scream all day long but those damn cops weren’t ever going to change their tactics. Maybe if they ever ended qualified immunity, they’d clean up their individual acts. But JJ wasn’t holding his breath. “Come with me,” he said to Tish and escorted her into the chief’s office.
“It’s ready,” the chief said as JJ pulled Tish in front of him and, with his hand on her lower back, walked with her to the front side of the desk. “What’s this?” Tish asked.
“The 911 call,” JJ said. “Somebody called in a false theft report on you.”
“But that cop had drove past me and then did a U-turn and pulled me over. He didn’t act like somebody had called in a complaint.”
JJ looked at the chief. “He pulled her over, yes, that’s right,” said the chief, “because he thought she was driving suspiciously.”
JJ and Tish both knew what that meant. “Are you kidding me?” JJ asked.
“But that don’t matter because somebody called it in even as he was pulling her over,” the chief quickly added. “Somebody else thought she was suspicious too.”
JJ shook his head. “Just play the tape,” he said.
The chief pressed a button on his computer and the 911 call was heard.
“911, what is your emergency?”
“I just saw a girl hotwire Judge Brant’s Mercedes and took off up Main Street.”
Hotwired? JJ and Tish could not believe it.
“And you’re sure it’s Judge Brant’s car?”
“I’m absolutely sure. He has that personalized tag: Brant-1.”
“Can you describe the perpetrator?”
“Smallish black girl. Somewhere in her twenties. She had on a pair of too-tight jeans and a sleeveless blouse. Her hair is in a ponytail.”
“We’re put the call out to the officers. Thank you for your call. May I ask your name, sir?”
But he had already left the line.
JJ looked at the chief.
“Before you ask, the answer is no,” the chief said. “He apparently was using one of those burner phones. We couldn’t trace him to it.”
JJ exhaled.
“Why would somebody lie on me like that?” asked Tish.
“Did you speak with anybody while you were out and about?”
“Just those Chinese people in that drycleaners. And this one guy telling me where I can find a black church in town.”
JJ looked at her. “What guy?”
“He came up to me while I was outside of the cleaners to introduce himself. He said his name was Rodney somebody. Smith. Rodney Smith. He said he was a doctor with a practice in Jacksonville.”
“I know Rodney,” said the chief. “And he does have a practice in J-ville. That’s not Rodney’s voice. I know his voice.”
“That’s why it doesn’t make sense. I only dealt with those Chinese and that one black man. That’s it.”
“I’ll ask around,” said the chief, “and see if anybody heard anything. That’s the best I can do.”
“Where’s my car?” JJ asked.
“It’s out back. I’ll have one of the officers bring it around front. And sorry about that, Miss. As you just heard, we were only doing our job.”
“You see this,” JJ said, showing the abrasion. “Is that doing your job too?”
The chief could barely see the tiny nick. “I’ll talk to my officer,” he said.
JJ knew the chief wasn’t as bad as most, but he wasn’t great either. But it was the best he was going to get out of it. “Thank you,” he said and then he and Tish left the building.
Once outside, Tish looked at JJ. “I didn’t want to mention it in there,” she said, “but there was one other person I spoke to today. Your next door neighbor.”
“My neighbor?”
“A skinny white woman next door. She was shaking her head at me when you left this morning.”
“Why would she be shaking her head?”
“Because I was only wearing your shirt I guess. And maybe she saw me hug you. I don’t know. But she wasn’t pleased.”
“She never is,” said JJ. “She hates everybody. Don’t worry about her. She’s not behind that tape.”
“Then who is?” asked Tish.
“Some people are so jealous and hate their own lives so entirely that all they do is find ways to get you to hate yours too. Sometimes it’s just that simple,” JJ said.
Tish nodded. It was stupid, but it was possible too.
When the Mercedes came around and the officer handed Tish the keys, JJ helped her inside the car. When he closed the door, she pressed down the window.
“I’m going to go back to the courthouse to finish up my cases today. I had farmed them out, but that would have overloaded a couple of my judges. I want you to go home, lock the door, and stay put until I get there.” Then he stared at her. He could see the pain in her eyes. And it pricked him. So much so that he leaned in, pressed his lips against hers, and gave her a kiss that wasn’t supposed to linger, but did.
When he stopped kissing her, he squeezed her beautiful little button nose. “I’m sorry this shit keeps happening to you,” he said. “But this will be the last time. I promise you that.”
Tish tried to smile but couldn’t pull it off. “It reminded me of when I was in jail for all those months. I’m just glad I had somebody like you to get me out of there. When I got locked up behind Shake’s mess, I had nobody. I like it better this way.”
JJ smiled. Then he backed up. “Drive safely,” he said.
“You too,” she said as he began walking toward his Bentley. But then he suddenly stopped in his tracks. Tish saw him stop and didn’t drive away.
JJ was thinking. Coincidences happened. He believed in serendipity because he’d seen it too many times before. But first somebody broke into her motel room and tried to harm her. Now somebody phoned in a false report on her and got her arrested. It could all be coincidental. He understood that. It could all just be because she was in the wrong place at the wrong time and some criminal that hung around that motel tried to take advantage of her situation. It could be that some jealous racist saw her in a nice-looking car and wanted to spoil her fun. Or it could be even more calculated than that.
He turned around and walked back over to her car. His sayonara-her-ass plan to help get her back on her feet and then get rid of her, was tanking right before his very eyes.
But Tish never knew about that plan. All she knew was that he had stopped walking and was now heading back her way. “What’s wrong?” she asked him when he walked up to the car.
“I’ll follow you home.”
Tish was confused. “But I thought you said you were going back to the courthouse.”
“I was. But I’ve changed my mind. I’ll follow you home,” he said again and went back toward his Bentley.
Tish wasn’t sure what to make of it. Why did he need to follow her home? And was he going to stay when they got there? Was it because she had gotten arrested? Could he be that concerned about her? She wasn’t sure. But she drove off, made sure he was in his car and following her, and made her way to the only place on this earth she could truly call home.