Chapter 25
“Mr. King, please state your name and for the record,” the judge said as Lucius sat down after being sworn in to testify at the trial of Brenda Smith.
“Lucius King,” Luc said with clear precision. He was dressed in one of the suits he reserved for when he had important business meetings with the bank.
“I’m going to get right to the point,” the lawyer for Brenda said as he rose from his side of the courtroom. “Is it true that you cheated on my client to go out on a date with a,” he paused and went back to his notes and flipped through several pages. “Lilith Richards?”
“No.”
“Is it also true, wait, what did you say?”
“I said no. I did not cheat on Ms. Smith, because we were never an item. I met Ms. Smith three hours before my already scheduled date with Lilith.”
“So, you didn’t stand my client up on numerous occasions in order to be with Ms. Richards?”
“No. In case you didn’t hear me a few seconds ago, let me repeat myself so you will hear me.
Ms. Smith and I were never an item.” Lucius looked over at Fred, the Assistant District Attorney and tried not to smirk when the other guy rolled his eyes.
The two of them had grown up together, and to see them now, no one would have believed how their lives turned out.
Back in the day, Fred was the bad boy biker who never cared for school, was always in trouble, and headed down a path of no return.
Lucius, on the other hand, had been a straight A student and never broke one rule.
One night, their lives had crossed paths, and they ended up saving each other.
Now, Fred was a lawyer, and though he had an MBA, and owned his own business, Lucius was the one who had the reputation for being the bad boy.
“Excuse me?” Lucius whipped his head around and looked at Brenda’s lawyer. “I didn’t quite catch that, could you repeat that?”
“Is it true that you refused to pay Ms. Smith’s bail because you wanted her out of the way so you could continue your affair with Ms. Richards.”
Lucius looked around wildly, then turned to the judge, but not before seeing disgust on the faces of the women in the jury.
“Your Honor, may I speak frankly and freely? I don’t want to be charged with contempt of court for what I have to say. This guy,” he said as he threw his hand out toward the lawyer asking the questions. “Can’t seem to hear correctly.”
“I’ll grant it,” the judge said with a nod.
Lucius turned back in his seat and made sure his one brow scowl was in place. Instead of trying to play nice, he morphed into his Lucifer persona.
“First, I have never, not once encouraged Ms. Smith in any way, shape, or form. I told you this not five minutes ago. Since you failed to grasp the understanding of the answers of your own questions, let me point a few things out to you. Are you ready?”
“Your Honor,” the lawyer said in a whiny voice.
“Sustained, let the witness talk, since he’s correct and you’re not listening.”
Lucius nodded and looked directly at Brenda Smith.
“I never dated you, you are not my type. You’re stuck up, entitled, and a nosy bitch.
Oh, and you spread lies in my business with my people.
I met you three hours before I had a date with Ms. Richards.
During the entire meeting, which you were there to learn of the job you had to do, you kept trying to get me to go out with you.
It’s my understanding that no is a complete sentence.
Yet, you failed to understand that. Going to my business and spreading lies, making demands or what you thought your future would hold isn’t the way to get to me.
Let me repeat, you are an ugly person to me, not in looks, but in your soul.
You flat-out told me that I had to like you because you’re beautiful.
Lady, that smacks of entitlement, and someone that needs to grow the fuck up and face the realities of life.
That is also what makes you ugly in my eyes.
If for some reason, once this trial is done, and you’re released, I hope the hell you stay away from me and my family. ” He looked at the judge with a nod.
“Am I done, here?”
Before the judge could answer, Fred jumped to his feet. “May I?”
“Go ahead,” the judge said with a nod.
“Mr. King, where do you work?”
“I’m the sole owner of Hell’s Coffin Bar and Restaurant out on Route 5.”
“What do you do for recreation?”
“I ride a motorcycle. Just because I ride on two wheels, wear leather, to protect myself from assholes that don’t pay attention, doesn’t make me a bad guy. I’m also the sole inventor of Hell’s Coffin motorcycle club. We come from all walks of life, but enjoy the brotherhood of riding.”
“Thank you, you mentioned in your tirade that Ms. Smith came after your people in your business. Could you please explain that?”
“She did this all behind my back, and I don’t know if these people are on your list to testify here, but she went to my bartender and demanded to know how much money the bar made daily.
She, Ms. Smith, later told the ladies of the club that once I ask her out and start dating her, then they will have to cater to her every whim, because with me being the President of the club, that would make her the First Lady, and made her more important than everyone else. ”
“When you found this out, what did you do.”
“Called my sister,” he snickered, and went on to explain his reasoning for that. It took at least fifteen minutes to get those questions answered, and Lucius saw the ladies who had looked at him with disdain before turning that onto Brenda.
“Thank you, Mr. King,” Fred said, and walked back to his table. When Lucius could step down, he ignored Brenda as he walked past her, but he saw the lawyer lean over and whisper frantically in her ear.
Since he was done for the day, he walked out of the court room and never looked back, hoping to never return, but that only lasted for six weeks before he had to return for her sentencing.
The three people involved in trashing Lilith’s home, and kidnapping her were being tried separately.
According to Fred, he only had to testify in Brenda’s case, but might be called up for Sally’s, if her employment with his business was brought into question.
Fred thought with the documents he had Luc wouldn’t have to return.
Things changed three days later when Lilith got a call to go to Fred’s office. Luc refused to allow her to go by herself, so he stood beside her as they entered the office in question.
They were escorted to a conference room, and Luc felt his eyebrows disappear when the table was laden with stacks and stacks of files.
“Fred,” Luc called out, and saw the minute the other man’s face cleared.
“Thank you for coming,” Fred said as he jumped to his feet. “I’m preparing for Wesley’s trial, and Ms. Richards, your name keeps coming up.”
“Who? And why?” Lilith asked, and took the cup of coffee the assistant offered, along with a chair on a relatively clean side of the table.
“Wesley Quinn.”
Lilith looked at Luc, who shrugged, so she turned back to Fred. “I’m sorry, am I supposed to know who that is?”
Fred sighed and scrubbed his face with his hands. He waved it to the stack of papers on the table, and asked, “This, all this, has your name on it. I called you in to see if you could nutshell what the hell I’m supposed to be reading.”
“Well,” Lilith said after her initial shock. “If it has to do with a Wesley Quinn, I can’t help you. I’ve never heard the name before.”
An older gentleman walked into the room then, and went right to Lilith with his hand out. “Hi, I’m Thomas, his boss. That’s my first name. I have a feeling we will be seeing a lot of each other in the next few weeks. What if I gave you another name, would that help?”
“Maybe, I don’t know.”
“Merril Wilson.”
“That fucking asshole? Last I heard he was dead. I hope he’s burning in hell now.” She glanced at the files and shook her head. “Is that what all this is?”
“Yes, it’s the case files against Wilson.”
“Who’s that?” Lucius asked quietly. He sat back when Lilith jumped to her feet to pace. She pointed to the table and while looking between the three men took the next thirty minutes to tell them about her part in the case against Merril Wilson.
“Holy shit,” Lucius said when she sat back down and drank half a bottle of water after her rant. He looked at Fred and Thomas. “What does Wilson have to do with Quinn?”
Fred scrubbed his face after learning Lilith’s involvement in the old case, and looked at his boss. It was Thomas that turned to Lilith with an explanation.
“First, thank you for telling us what happened. I know you don’t know this, but it might be important now.”
“What?” Both Lilith and Luc asked.
“After Wesley was released from the hospital, he was taken to the jail. However, Paul’s boss became concerned, and put him on suicide watch.”
“Who’s Paul?” Lilith looked around in confusion.
“Bandit,” Luc said.
She wrinkled her nose at him. “That’s his real name?”
“Yeah,” Luc chuckled and turned back to Thomas. “Please continue.”
“Anyway, Paul’s boss didn’t like how Wesley was reacting, so he called in the department shrink.
After talking for only fifteen minutes, they took him back to the hospital and had a psych evaluation done on him.
He was immediately admitted to the psych ward at the hospital.
He spent six weeks there, and was released back to police custody. ”
“Why?” Lilith asked in shock.
“The only thing we were told was that he summoned the devil to take the evil away, and he swore that Lucifer himself arrived and took Lilith away from him. He realized that he was an all-powerful god that could summon demons and started trying to summon him again.”
Lilith looked at Lucius, and he couldn’t hold in his laugh. With his arm cradling his stomach he burst out laughing. It was Lilith who retrieved his phone from his pocket and accessed the video.