Justice Lost (Darren Street #3)(40)

“This is all great. Thank you. I really appreciate everything you’re doing. I mean that. The only problem is that I’ll have absolutely no idea what I’m doing when I go into the office. I mean, I wonder how many of the lawyers will quit, how many of them will give me a hard time, how many of them will have had problems with Morris and expect me to remedy them immediately.”

“He’s run a pretty loose ship,” Claire said. “You’ll have some work to do. Have you been studying how other district attorneys organize?”

“I have. I think I’ll figure it out pretty quickly. I just don’t think that part of it is going to be much fun.”

“Delegate, delegate, delegate,” she said.

“Need a job?” I said. “I’m going to fire the bagman the first day if he doesn’t quit. You can take his place and get things organized.”

“Thanks,” she said. She had a beautiful smile. “I think I’ll head back to Washington when I’m finished here. I miss the swamp. Listen, Darren, there’s something we need to talk about.”

I set the glass down on the table and looked at her.

“Do you realize that’s the first time your stuffy ass has managed to chill out enough to call me Darren?” I said.

“I think it’s time we can become a bit more familiar,” she said. “Not too familiar, of course. And I don’t appreciate you calling me a stuffy ass.”

Not that I wanted to become too familiar with her. Grace was still too close, her memory too fresh. Claire was attractive, though. Damned attractive.

“I apologize,” I said, “but I’m glad you’ve decided to call me Darren. Mr. Street makes me feel old. What do we need to talk about?”

“Gary Brewer.”

“The marine? I thought I had been deemed too unstable for that assignment.”

“Janie Schofield is terrified. She’s making absolutely no progress. Grandfather wants you to get involved.”

“Okay,” I said. “What do I need to do?”

“Meet with the US attorney.”

Stephen Blackburn had been the US attorney for the Eastern District of Tennessee when the feds put me in jail. But Blackburn was gone. There had been a presidential election, and the new president, as was his right, had fired all the US attorneys. Blackburn had been replaced with a man named Thomas Henshaw. I knew nothing about him other than he was well connected, like all US attorneys, and he had a reputation for enjoying old Scotch and expensive cigars. Henshaw was to the feds what I would be to Knoxville, only he had a hell of a lot more on his plate. He oversaw the office that prosecuted all the criminal cases in federal court in forty-one counties in Eastern and part of Middle Tennessee. He also had many other duties. I didn’t envy the man at all.

“When are we supposed to meet him?”

“Tomorrow at two, his office.”

“So you’ve already made the appointment. You coming?”

“Wouldn’t miss it.”





CHAPTER 21

I could tell US Attorney Thomas Henshaw was unhappy that I was in his office. He was unhappy that the granddaughter of the chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee was in his office, and he was unhappy that a deputy director from the FBI office in Washington and a deputy director from the Department of Justice had gotten him on a conference call and basically ordered him to meet with us and devise a plan to end the corruption that was going on in Knox County, and to find out what happened to Gary Brewer in the process.

Henshaw was a husky man, around sixty, with silver hair, brown eyes, and bushy, dark eyebrows. He had the jowls of a bulldog. An unlit cigar dangled from his lips, and deep lines etched his forehead. He was scowling. His eyebrows were arched and his thin lips were tight, almost pouty.

The office was typical of a US attorney—a framed photograph of the president hung on the wall behind his desk, American and Tennessee flags stood in the corners, there were shelves of law books, photos of dignitaries, and a large seal of the Department of Justice with its Qui Pro Domina Justitia Sequitur motto, which means “who prosecutes on behalf of the Lady Justice” on the front of Henshaw’s desk. I looked at the seal for a few minutes, studying it. It depicted a bald eagle rising above a shield of red, white, and blue and holding an olive branch in its right talon and thirteen arrows in its left. I supposed the significance of the olive branch and the arrows had something to do with tempering justice with mercy.

Also in attendance was Bradley Kurtz, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI office in Knoxville. All the agents who were there when I was framed and convicted of murder had been reassigned to other parts of the country. Kurtz was around forty-five, tall and lean, and looked like his face should be on a recruiting poster for the Gestapo. He had crystal-blue eyes, blond hair, and a face that was all sharp angles and thin lines.

“Thank you for meeting with us,” Claire said after everyone settled in and it became obvious that Henshaw wasn’t going to say a word.

“I didn’t vote for your father, Ms. Tate,” Henshaw said. “I hold this office by appointment of the president, but I’ve been told that you need our assistance and that I am to be at your service. I’m not accustomed to being at anyone’s service.”

“We don’t want you to be at our service,” Claire said. “You serve the people of the Eastern District of Tennessee, correct?”