“It wasn’t indicated on her application?” I asked.
“As far as I can recall, she was single when she applied,” Monahan said.
I’d be willing to bet a month’s paycheck that when she was hired, he’d made it his business to find out.
“And she never updated her information to indicate she’d gotten married?” I asked, intrigued.
“She should have,” Monahan admitted. “But if she wasn’t trying to get him health-insurance coverage, it wouldn’t have been a pressing concern.”
“And she never brought him to any office functions?” I asked.
Monahan shook his head. “The firm has only one or two office-wide parties a year. There isn’t much opportunity for young associates to bring in their significant others. And they often choose not to. Office talk is boring.”
The explanations were plausible enough, I supposed. But for some reason I wasn’t convinced. Then something else occurred to me.
“Did you ever mention to the detective that you didn’t know Lilah was married?” I asked.
Monahan cleared his throat, the first sign of discomfort. I enjoyed the sight.
“It never came up as far as I can recall,” he said.
He was starting to sound like Oliver North. Memory failure, done right, can be the most effective way to avoid getting pinned with prior inconsistent statements. All lawyers know this.
“Really?” I asked skeptically. “It never occurred to you to tell the detective in charge of the case that you had no idea the suspect was married to the victim?”
Monahan looked down his beaked nose at me. “No, it didn’t, Counsel,” he said coolly. “I had very little interaction with Lilah, and even if I did, I’d have no reason to ask her about her marital status. So the fact that I didn’t know of her marriage was of no import whatsoever.”
Though I was itching to get into it further with this pompous ass, it was a waste of time. The fact that Lilah may have kept her marriage a secret was interesting and possibly germane. But the fact that Monahan had failed to tell the police about it was, at this point, irrelevant.
“Do you have a human-resources type who keeps track of personnel information?” I asked.
Monahan looked annoyed, but he nodded reluctantly. “We do,” he said. “I’ll have someone take you to Audrey’s office. I’ve got to get to my meeting.”
46
But Audrey Wagner, the paralegal in charge of human resources, hadn’t known about Lilah’s marriage to Zack either.
“Don’t the lawyers usually keep you up to speed with their personal information?” I asked.
“Usually,” she said, peering at me through hip-looking black-framed glasses.
She pushed a stray hair back into the bun twisted at the nape of her neck with brisk efficiency. That hair had some nerve.
“Did she have health coverage through the firm?” I asked.
Audrey scrolled through the file on her computer. “Yes, the standard employee deal. Individual, no spouse, no children.”
“Did she leave you any contact information after she got fired?” I asked. “Any place to forward her mail?”
“I never heard a word from her after she got arrested. So, long story short, no.” Audrey thought for a second. “Matter of fact, I don’t even know that I ever had any kind of backup or emergency contact information for her.” Audrey scrolled further, then tapped a few keys. “Well, she did provide her parents’ address.” She frowned at the screen, then looked up at us. “I’m not sure I’m allowed…”
“It’s okay,” Bailey said. “We’ve already got it.”
“Good. Anything else I can help you with?” she asked.
Audrey really seemed to mean it. I appreciated that.
“Can you tell me if anyone else got hired around the same time as Lilah?” I asked.
Audrey peered at the monitor and jotted something down on her notepad, then punched some keys.
“Phyliss Blankmeyer and Joel Carstone,” she read from her screen. “You can find them one floor down.” She gave a wry smile. “Where we keep the ‘help.’ I can give you their numbers,” she offered.
“That’d be great,” Bailey said.
Audrey wrote the information on her notepad, tore off the page, and handed it to Bailey.
“Audrey,” I said, “you’re a breath of fresh air. Thank you.”
“Actually,” she said, shooting a careful look over my shoulder at the hallway, “I’d much rather work with criminal lawyers. So much more interesting. You’re in the DA’s office, aren’t you?”
“I am,” I replied. “And you’re right, we are more interesting.”
Why be modest?
“Do you mind telling me what they pay senior paralegals?” she asked.
I told her.
“Oh,” she said, her eyes widening for a moment. She adjusted her glasses. “Well, good luck. Let me know if you need anything else.”
Once again, the promise of meager financial reward had choked the life out of a budding career in criminal law.
Bailey and I made our way downstairs. Exercising our superior investigatory skills, we quickly succeeded in locating our targets. The nameplates on their office doors did help.
“I haven’t known anyone named Phyliss in a long time,” I remarked.
Bailey nodded. “It fell off the ‘cool baby name’ list a while ago.”
We found uncoolly named Phyliss just as she was pushing away from her desk. No doubt getting ready for the only physical exercise she and all the other young associates would get that day-a trip to the cafeteria for a fast lunch.
“Knock, knock,” Bailey said from the threshold as she held out her ID.
Phyliss, a short-haired, no-nonsense, athletic-looking type, involuntarily stepped back a few feet when she saw Bailey’s badge.
“Whoa,” Phyliss said, holding up her hands. “I know I was a little late with my parking tickets, but isn’t this kind of extreme?”
“Parking is no laughing matter, Ms. Blankmeyer,” I said sternly.
“And you are?” she asked me, looking alarmed.
I pulled out my badge. “Rachel Knight, DA’s office.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” she said, looking from me to Bailey.
“Yeah, I am,” I said with a little chuckle. “Just a little law-enforcement humor. Crushing crime one lame joke at a time.”
Bailey shot me a look. “We’d like to talk to you about Lilah Bayer.”
Phyliss sighed and shook her head. “Okay. But I can’t tell you any more than I told the first guy-”
“Rick Meyer?” I asked.
Phyliss squinted. “I think so…yeah. I haven’t seen Lilah since she got arrested. Man, that was gnarly.”
“You have any idea where she might be now, or how to reach her?” I asked without much hope.
Phyliss shrugged. “Once she got arrested, she was untouchable. All of a sudden, everyone had amnesia. ‘Lilah who?’ I’ve got to admit, I felt a little sorry for her. I mean, we all know it’s bull, but still, whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty?”
“Was there any talk of rehiring her after she got acquitted?” I asked.
“They might’ve talked about it-if she’d ever asked to come back,” Phyliss said.
But she hadn’t even tried. It was somewhat surprising, and it was significant. Her old law firm was the most likely place to forgive her past-and, granted, those odds were long. But any new place where she hadn’t already proven her merit wouldn’t want to take a chance on someone who’d been on trial for first-degree murder. She had to be doing something-and whatever it was had to be way off the radar, because we couldn’t find any trace of it.
“You ever hang out with her when she was an associate?” I asked.
“Yes and no,” she said. “Lilah’d go out with us after work every once in a while.” Phyliss stopped so abruptly, I got mental whiplash.
“But?” Bailey prompted.