The Beach House

Chapter 55

"WAKEE, WAKEE."

A tin cup rattling over steel bars startled me from a dream in which I was trying to save Peter and Sammy. I jumped up and frantically sca

"Get out of bed, you lazy so-and-so. I just bailed you out."

"Good to see you, Macklin. And thanks for that little prison-riot vignette."

I threw on my clothes, and Paul Infante, the cop who'd worked the overnight shift, appeared in front of the cell. He extended a key attached to his belt by a long, thin chain, and the big bolt toppled over with an echoing clang. He pulled the heavy door toward him, and I stepped back out into the world.

"Jack 'Hurricane' Mullen," said Macklin, clapping me on the shoulder. "Not even six hours in the East Hampton Hilton could break this man."

"Can it, Macklin."

Upstairs, Infante gave me an envelope with my watch and wallet in it, and I signed a summons pledging to appear in court for interfering with a police investigation. The assault charge had been dropped.

"We should go visit Sammy's mom this afternoon," Mack said somberly. "We're the only ones who know how she feels."

"I suppose they're going to say that was an accident, too," I said. "Maybe a suicide." I described the visit from Volpi and Jordan, how unbelievably brazen and cocky they'd been.

"Can they get away with it?" I asked him.

"Sure. Looks like they just did."

As I pulled out of the driveway, I plucked the bag of Dreesen's doughnuts off Mack's lap. There were three inside – dark, soft, and sprinkled with ci

"So, tell me something," said Mack, snatching the last doughnut before it reached my lips, "you still feel like the man who's going to bring the goddamned system to its knees?"

Chapter 56

I WAS ABOUT TO FIND OUT. The inquiry into my brother's death was held in the gymnasium of the Montauk Middle School. They couldn't have picked a worse spot. For years Peter and I used to play Sunday pickup games there. Every Sunday. Walking to my seat with Mack, I could still hear the deep smack of basketballs echoing off the whitewashed cinder block.

As I took a seat, I remembered the very first weekend we ever snuck inside the gym as kids. Fenton got hold of a key, and after stashing our bikes in the woods, we crowded around him as he slipped it into the lock. Miraculously, it fit. We stepped through the small side door into the hushed, voluminous darkness more awed than if we'd just snuck into St. Patrick's Cathedral. Hank found the switch, and the entire trespassed interior, with its gleaming hardwood floor and white fiberglass backboards, lit up like a Technicolor dream.

On the morning of the inquest, at least two hundred folding chairs were set up in long rows across the court. The people who sat in them had all been there before, as either graduating students or proud parents, or both.

Marci had saved Mack and me the last two seats in the front row. I looked around and saw Fenton and Molly, Hank and his wife, an incredible number of friends from town. But not poor Sammy Giamalva, of course. We didn't have to wait very long for the action to begin.

"Hear ye! Hear ye!" proclaimed the bailiff who had driven up that morning from Riverhead. "All persons having business before the Supreme Court of Suffolk County, please give your attention to the Honorable Judge Robert P. Lillian."

In his stark black robe, the judge looked like a commencement-day speaker. He entered the gym from the small cafeteria directly behind it and took his elevated seat. Spectatorwise, it may have been a local crowd, but at the business end, the manpower balance tilted heavily in the opposite direction. Sitting shoulder to shoulder at a long, thin table facing the judge were three Nelson, Goodwin and Mickel senior partners, led by none other than Bill Montrose. Sitting behind them, like proud sons, were three of the firm's most promising associates.

At the opposing table sat twenty-four-year-old assistant district attorney Nadia Alper. And four empty chairs. Alper sucked at a jumbo Coke and jotted notes on a yellow pad.

"She doesn't even have a cut man," observed Mack.

Lillian, a short, sturdy man in his late fifties, informed us from his judicial pulpit that although there was no defendant, the daylong inquest would proceed like a juryless trial. Witnesses would be called to testify under oath; limited cross-examination would be permitted as he deemed relevant. In other words, he was God.

Lillian turned the floor over to Neubauer's legal team, and Montrose summoned one Tricia Powell, a blowsy, dark-haired woman in her twenties.

I had never seen Powell before, and wondered where she fit in.

With Montrose's guidance, Tricia Powell testified that she had been a guest at the Neubauers' Memorial Day weekend party. Near the end of the evening she had strolled down to the water.

"See anyone on your walk?" questioned Montrose.

"Not until I got to the beach," said Powell. "That's when I saw Peter Mullen."

I flinched in my seat. This was the first indication in two months that anyone had seen Peter after his di

"What was he doing when you saw him?" asked Montrose.

"Staring into the waves," said Powell. "He looked sad."

"Did you know who he was?"

"No, but I recognized him as the man who had parked my car. Then, of course, I saw his picture in the paper."

"What happened that night? Tell us exactly what you saw."

"I smoked a cigarette and started to head back. But as I did, I heard a splash and turned to see Peter Mullen swimming through the waves."

"Did that strike you as unusual?"

"Oh, absolutely. Not only because of the size of the waves, but also how cold the water was. I had stuck my toe in and was shocked."

So was I. This woman, whoever she was, was lying her ass off. I leaned toward Nadia Alper and whispered a quick message.

When Montrose finished, Alper got up to question Powell.

"How is it that you know Barry Neubauer?" she asked.

"We're colleagues," she said, cool as could be. I wanted to go up there and slap her.

"You're also in the toy business, Ms. Powell?"

"I work in the Promotions Department at Mayflower Enterprises."

"In other words, you work for Barry Neubauer."

"I like to think we're friends, too."

"I'm sure you will be now," said Nadia Alper.

The derisive laughter in the gym was cut off by a sharp reprimand from Lillian. "I trust, Ms. Alper, that I will not have to ask you again to refrain from editorial asides."

She turned back to the witness. "I have a list here of everyone who was invited to the party that evening. Your name isn't on that list, Ms. Powell. Any idea why?"

"I met Mr. Neubauer at a meeting a couple of days before. He was kind enough to invite me."

"I see, and what time did you arrive?" asked Nadia.

"Unfashionably early, I confess. Seven o'clock, maybe five after at the latest. With all the celebrities, I didn't want to miss a minute."

"And it was Peter Mullen who parked your car?"

"Yes."

"You're absolutely positive, Ms. Powell?"

"Positive. He was… memorable."

Alper went to her desk, grabbed a folder, and approached the bench. "I would like to submit to the court written statements from three of Peter Mullen's coworkers that evening. They state that the deceased got to work at least forty minutes late. Therefore, it was impossible for him to have parked Ms. Powell's or anyone else's car before seven-forty."