The Guilty Plea by Robert Rotenberg Page A

that.”
    Kwon dropped the camera on the table. “Get over it,” she said. “I’ve heard this same line for twenty years, and guess what, sales of celebrity magazines keep going up and up. Don’t feel bad for these Hollywood types. They’re the most superficial people in the whole world and they love the attention.”
    “I met her today at her lawyer’s,” Greene said.
    “Piece of work, isn’t she?”
    “Not terribly cooperative.”
    Kwon stood and came to his side. She lowered the back screen of the camera to his eye level and moved her thumb into position. “Tell you what. I’ll play it. You don’t have to look.”
    Greene put his fingers over his eyes, then opened them up a crack to peek.
    She gave him a playful slap on the shoulder. “I’m American. I’m aggressive. Get used it.”
    The image came on the screen. Goodling was holding a cell phone to her ear. Suddenly her face contorted in pain, as if she’d been punched in the gut. With a jolt, she threw the phone out of the camera range and clasped her hands to her stomach. She shouted something. It looked as if her lips mouthed two words, but there was no sound.
    “What did she say?” Greene asked when the short video was over.
    “I don’t know,” Kwon said. “It all happened so fast. The bodyguard whipped the door closed and I landed on the floor. Here, feel this.”
    She took his hand and guided it to the bottom of her chin. He touched the spot where her skin was scraped.
    “I was told Goodling was going to leave today,” Greene said.
    “She did,” Kwon said. “Private flight from the back of Pearson Airport, at one eighteen. See, I’ve got good information for you.”
    “I appreciate it.”
    “This is a huge story now. I’m covering the funeral. The trial, when it happens. Everything. Goodling’s going to come back here at some point, I’m convinced.”
    “Let me know when she does.”
    “It’s a deal. Want to go to one of those bars across the street and have a drink?”
    “I’m heading to the morgue in half an hour for the autopsy,” he said.
    “Sounds like an exciting night,” she said.
    “Comes with the territory.” Greene looked past Kwon to the throng of carefree people strolling along the sidewalk, where a misty darkness had descended amidst the streetlights and shimmering storefronts.

19
    Daniel Kennicott smiled when he saw the white plastic bag on the handle of the side entrance to his second-floor flat. Inside the bag were fresh tomatoes, carrots, and cucumbers, a bright red apple, and a note from his landlords: “In case the store be closed, Mr. and Mrs. Federico.” The couple lived downstairs, and Mr. Federico was an avid gardener who constantly pushed food on his upstairs tenant. Unlike most cops his age, who owned town houses out in the suburbs, Kennicott had rented this place downtown for years. It was on Clinton Street, just north of College and the heart of Little Italy.
    He put the Terrance Wyler file and the plastic bag on his kitchen table and pulled out a carrot. Kennicott had more than enough experience with sleep deprivation, first as a law student, then as a young lawyer in a top downtown firm, and now as a cop. It was important to eat.
    The apartment was stuffy. He opened the windows at the front of the flat, then the back ones too. He tilted his head out into the cool night air. There was a chirp-chirp and a rustle of feet. Two black squirrels chased each other up Mr. Federico’s grapevine, which blossomed into a shaded awning over his concrete back porch every summer. Kennicott took out a bottle of vinegar and a rag from under the sink and wiped his leather shoes clean before he went to his bedroom to change.
    Back in the kitchen in a clean T-shirt and shorts, he sat down. Even though there was a desk in his second bedroom, he liked to work here. He opened the Wyler file and started reading through the legal pleadings to get an overall view of the divorce case. There were long, detailed