Page 84 of Exposed

“She’s helping on your case. We went to the crime scene together today.”

“But what about the conflict of interest and all?”

Mary had wanted to gloss it over but Simon was owed an explanation. “We back-burnered that matter and also your civil cases for now. The criminal case takes front and center.”

“Good.” Simon leaned over and shook Bennie’s hand. “Thank you, Bennie. I really appreciate you coming on board. This murder case scares the crap out of me. I can’t believe it’s even happening. It’s like a nightmare, and I thought I had a high tolerance for nightmares.”

“I bet.” Bennie nodded. “I’m sorry to hear about the setback with your daughter’s donor. In that regard, there’s something we should talk about before we get to your case.”

Mary hid her puzzlement. She had no idea what Bennie meant.

Bennie dug in her messenger bag. “Simon, I’m concerned that you need to assign someone your power-of-attorney, in case medical decisions need to be made for Rachel’s care and you’re arrested. I pulled some papers for you to look over.”

Mary cringed. “Bennie, really? You drew up papers? Can’t this wait?”

“No, it shouldn’t. I had some form POAs in my file. I’m sure we can get them notarized in the hospital.” Bennie handed the papers to Simon, who accepted them with a resigned nod.

“Thanks, I get it. Plan B. I was saying that to my father this morning. I’ll give him my power-of-attorney.” Simon handed Feet the papers. “Dad, will you hold on to these? We’ll have to deal with them.”

“Okay, I heard.” Feet adjusted his glasses on his nose, beginning to read the POA forms.

Mary breathed an inward sigh, relieved that Simon hadn’t been hurt or offended. “So, Simon, we need to talk to you about Todd’s murder case. We have a few questions.”

Bennie looked over with a slight frown. “Mary, should we do this all together?”

Mary didn’t get it. “What do you mean? Do you need to leave?”

Bennie’s gaze shifted to Feet and back to Mary. “No. I meant, shouldn’t we have this conversation with Simon in private?”

Mary grimaced, hoping that Feet hadn’t understood what Bennie meant, which was likely since his hearing was almost as bad as her father’s. “No, this is fine.”

“Go ahead.” Simon glanced out the open door. “We don’t have much time. Meanwhile, the nurses, our pediatric oncologist, and our social worker, they all know I was taken away yesterday. They’re trying to be nice but I know what they’re thinking. They think I’m a murderer.”

Feet shook his head, still looking down at the forms. “My son would never kill nobody. Never. They can’t arrest him. He didn’t do it.”

“Try not to think about it, Feet.” Mary took out her laptop, fired it up, and turned to Simon. “To begin, did you know that Ray’s brother-in-law plays golf with Todd? I think his name is Mo Nustrall.”

“I didn’t know they golfed together, but it doesn’t surprise me. Todd was friendly with Mo.”

“Do you know Mo?”

“I met him once or twice. He comes around the office sometimes. He’s at PowerPlus.”

“To see Todd?”

“Yes.”

“Obviously, Ray, too.”

“Yes.”

“Did you ever play golf with them?”

“I can’t remember the last time I played golf.” Simon shook his head, pained. Feet paged through the power-of-attorney forms, slumped in the chair, and said nothing.

Mary continued, “Okay, so when I went through your emails, I saw a lot of email that you wrote on quality issues.”

“I know, it drives them crazy. They roll their eyes. They call me The Mad Emailer. But it’s important to keep the consistency of quality. It affects sales. They seem not to want to acknowledge that, but to me it’s obvious.” Simon frowned. “The interesting thing about cubicle manufacture is that there’s no building code that applies to them if they’re under sixty-seven inches like ours. There’s no inspection like an office building. But for all intents and purposes, a cubicle becomes a wall not subject to code. It’s the industry’s dirty little secret. Now, I pitch the high quality of our units to my accounts. So I monitor it. It drives me nuts when production lets down. My word matters to me.”