usattorney | Entries tagged with character: anthony brennan

devil you know, part 13;
Luke wants to rip Melissa Wallace to shreds. He knows that as he stands in observation, watching Melissa and her lawyer settle into chairs on the far side of the interview room. His job is to stay there and say nothing unless he notices something that can help Michael and Brennan's interrogation. But he's never been able to stand still for very long.

He also knows Janet will give him hell for pushing Michael to be aggressive, but he'll fight her on it. He sees people like Melissa all day long, the ones who think they can manipulate the system, and she deserves the full force of whatever Michael can throw at her. It's all in the file Luke spent hours preparing and the black book sitting in evidence. And Michael deserves it, too; he deserves a chance to show how he really feels, to be pissed at someone treating him like a pawn in a game that should never have been played. He doesn't always have to be the saint, no matter what he thinks. Luke wants him to have the satisfaction and the clear conscience he's damn well earned.

The question is whether or not Michael will take it. "Your client called this meeting, so I think you should start," the FBI agent tells Melissa's lawyer in a tone that Luke knows well as him being less than polite.

"I know who killed my ex-husband," Melissa says. "His name is Thomas Marshall. He'd been calling me for weeks, threatening the both of us. When the police notified me of Mark's death, I knew it had to be him."

"And I presume you're going to say you didn't tell the police because you were frightened for your life?"

"Obviously I had reason to be." Her patronizing tone isn't going to win her any friends. Luke can see Brennan narrow his eyes at it. "And I knew I was going to be considered a suspect given my history of publicly condemning Mark's behavior."

"Yeah, you certainly did that," Michael replies laconically, looking down at the original case file that Brennan had put on the table more for show than anything else. "Everyone remembers your outburst from his parole hearing last year. I was there for that. But here's the thing, Melissa... We've talked to Marshall. And that's not what he says."

He finally settles in his chair, his voice softening into something conversational and almost conciliatory. He doesn't have to tell her what was said, only that something was missing. "I understand exactly how you feel right now," he goes on and it isn't a total lie. He knows the shock and frustration of Mark Wallace being let out of prison. "You asked for me for a reason. When we had to discuss something difficult, we were able to do it. This isn't going to be any easier. But whatever you have to tell me, I'm here to listen."

"I'm saying Thomas Marshall killed my ex-husband."

"What did Marshall tell you?"

"He called me out of the blue one day. I think about three weeks ago," Melissa continued. "He'd found out about Mark's release and said he never should have been let out. He said I must have been responsible so he was going to kill Mark and then kill me for helping him. He kept calling, a couple of times."

"Why would he think you were responsible?"

"I don't know. Maybe because I still have connections. You're asking me to get into the head of a murderer," she replies. "I can't tell you what he was thinking."

"I can." Michael retorts. "One thing you don't know about me, Melissa, is I have a Psychology degree. One of my best friends is a criminal profiler who specializes in serial killers. We've done probably thousands of interviews combined. I can tell you that Marshall was the only other person as pissed about Mark's behavior as you were. I'm sure he had some very strong words when he spoke to you, but I can tell you they weren't threats."

He taps the case file in front of him. "Marshall kept his anger to himself. He was never at the trial or the parole hearing, because I'd never met him before this week. I wondered why that was, until I realized having a public school job means he would've been fired if he threatened you or your ex-husband. So this isn't his M.O. There's also one more thing he's missing. Do you know what it is?"

"What?"

"He was never in contact with your ex-husband. If he killed Mark, he would've had to get him to the crime scene. I can connect Mark to you and you to Marshall, but they were never talking to each other." Michael sighs. "You have to trust me, Melissa. If you dropped a dime on your ex, there's no one in the world who wouldn't understand it. He took everything from you and you spent a decade building it back up again. You did time in prison for him. You have every reason to be angry, and I fully believe you weren't the one that killed him. But I need the truth."

There's a loaded silence after those five words. Melissa's lawyer knows that Michael is saying he believes she's involved, but he's lingering on the edge because he also just heard that Michael believes Marshall is the killer. He's willing to see if this plays out in his client's favor when dealing with one of the most principled agents in the Bureau. Michael isn't looking at him, though; he's looking directly into Melissa's eyes the same way he did nine years ago, giving her the same look to tell her he's being honest. It's up to her if she wants to reciprocate that honesty. To show if she truly believes in him or not.

"I don't know any more than I'm telling you, Michael," she replies.

In that moment Michael's entire demeanor changes. He pushes back from the table and gets back to his feet, and when he turns his head to look at his boss Luke can see the darkness in his eyes. He's never seen that look before and it legitimately makes a chill run down his spine.

"Get out," Michael tells Brennan and it's not a request. He's never used that tone with his boss before and he never will again. Brennan knows that and simply joins Luke in the observation room. "What do you think he's planning?" he asks the U.S. Attorney. "I hope he's about to eviscerate her," Luke replies truthfully. "But I'm not sure he can go that far." The outcome is now in Michael's hands—which to Luke is exactly where it should have been all along. All they can do is watch.

Current Mood: aggravated

devil you know, part 11;
They're running out of time. Both Luke and Michael know that as they look at each other across the desks in the FBI financial crimes bullpen. Tomorrow morning Michael will go head to head with Melissa Wallace and he only gets one shot to prove she had her ex-husband killed. That's why they'll stay here all night reviewing the evidence if they have to.

Luke doesn't even know what to say to Michael, but he doesn't have to. "Usually this is the kind of obsessive behavior I see from you and Janet," Anthony Brennan interrupts as he appears seemingly out of nowhere. Michael snorts. "I didn't plan on this and he's not as good-looking," he retorts and Luke can only chuckle at what's meant to be an insult but is also actually true. "How much do you have?" Brennan asks. "We're sure Melissa was plotting Mark's murder and got Thomas Marshall involved in it," Michael replies. "We can put her at the scene but not that she did anything. We need his records to put him there—but Luke got a DNA sample we can test against the body."

This gets Brennan to turn and give Luke a skeptical glance and the U.S. Attorney shrugs. "He needs to quit smoking," he says by way of explanation before something else occurs to Michael and he slams his hand down on the desk. "We need a second test," he declares. "We have her DNA from when she was booked in nine years ago. We can get results on that right now."

"Call the crime lab." Luke's eyes widen at the clue he hadn't even thought about. Brennan's already picking up the cigarette butt—long since properly transferred to an evidence bag—off the desk and reaching for his keys. "I'll take it down there," he says. "I can get them to rush the tests." No one has any idea how and they know better than to ask. Brennan has a way of getting what he wants. "Just don't do anything else potentially illegal while I'm gone," he adds as he leaves, because he always has to have the last word.

Michael exhales as soon as his boss has left the bullpen. It's all starting to come together in his mind and he feels that adrenaline rush along with another wave of frustration at how the victims in his case became no better than the person who victimized them. Luke can see that look on his face and gestures toward him. "Say it," he says, knowing it needs to come out now while they can still do something about it.

"Mark goes to Melissa trying to restart his career. She finds out he's double-crossing her again and kills his loan chances. He threatens her with blackmail so she decides to put him down. When Marshall calls, that's the perfect opportunity for her to enlist a patsy. She plays on his anger to get him to commit the murder - and thinks she can sell him out to us. After all, even if he tries to implicate her, there's nothing to suggest her involvement except for the phone call. But her DNA under his fingernails is a massive mistake."

"Smart criminals just make smarter mistakes." Luke replies. "He thought he had it all figured out and you got him, too."

"I know." Michael nods, taking a deep breath. "It also means she's not any better than he is."

Luke knows better than to answer that. The retort on his tongue is that Melissa Wallace was married to Mark for over a decade, so Michael was naive to think she didn't know what she was getting into. She simply wasn't as flawed as her ex. But he understands why Michael would feel that way or want to feel that way—he wants to believe there's some good in people. Luke's moral standards are much less forgiving. He drops his eyes to the paperwork in front of him and starts thinking about what they'll need for trial. "What about the address?" he asks again.

"We never cross-checked it with Marshall." Michael relaxes and settles back into his chair. He turns to the nearest computer and starts searching their databases. After a few minutes of coming up empty, he mentally reviews their conversation with the suspect and something else comes to mind. A glance at the middle school's website and he finds what they've been debating for days. "The guy who owns that home is listed as an assistant football coach at Moriarty Middle School. Marshall chose the location for the murder."

"Which means he can't argue that he wasn't a co-conspirator." Luke nods. "We have to establish the chain of communication. Because you noticed she never texted any of this—so nothing we could recover. Establish a timeline and prove there's no way that there wasn't something going on."

Right after the words leave his mouth, he's getting up to do exactly that. There's a reason there's a white board in the bullpen. Now his expertise is coming in handy; this is going to be a circumstantial evidence case, probably always was if he was honest with himself. He needs to build something logically strong enough so that any DNA is just the cherry on top and that a jury overlooks the ongoing question of the murder weapon. He's writing for several long minutes, knowing Michael's watching him but locked into his own mind. He doesn't stop until he has the entire board full with everything they know or think happened in the last month.

"Fuck," Michael says when Luke steps back. Because the totality of evidence amounts to exactly what he's been saying but hoping wasn't true all along. Nothing ever changed. Mark Wallace never learned his lesson and his wife turned out to be just as ruthless. He feels like the conviction he earned nine years ago didn't mean anything at all.

Luke glances at him because he can guess that feeling. He doesn't want Michael to feel that way. Especially now that he has a better idea of what Michael and Janet went through back then, he knows how much they put into that win. But saying that out loud requires emotions that Luke isn't great at tapping into, and he doesn't want them to come out wrong. "You should get out of here," he demurs. "You can't be working all night when you have to interrogate her in the morning. You've got to be at your best."

Michael knows he has a point, but: "Someone has to be here to wait for the DNA results and pull all this together."

"I'll do it," Luke says with a confidence he's surprised he feels.

The look they exchange is loaded with questions in both directions. Luke has been leaning on Michael to tell him what to do and not to do as an investigator and now he has to trust he can get it right without that security blanket. Michael has to trust Luke with the preparation of a case that he can use to make an arrest. By the time he comes to work in the morning, he'll have only a few hours to go over the details before he meets with Melissa and her lawyer. Their only way through is to completely trust each other.

"Go on, get out of here," Luke repeats. "I'll call you if anything major comes up. And you call me if you need me. But your responsibility is tomorrow. This is on me tonight."

Michael nods and gathers his belongings, silently tossing Luke his keys to the office before he walks out. Luke settles back into his chair to stare at the white board and then turns his attention to the paperwork splayed in front of him to start a new page of notes. That's where Brennan finds him two hours later and leaves him an hour after that. Luke is going to stay in that office as long as it takes to make right what should have never been put wrong in the first place.

Current Mood: awake

devil you know, part 5;
While Brennan is giving Michael his version of a pep talk, Luke is getting search warrants signed and executed. The former is easy enough; the latter requires a call to Mark Wallace's cell phone company that turns into an argument with their subpoena compliance department. "I don't care how you get it done," he says tersely, "but you're going to get me those records. If those cell phone records aren't here tomorrow morning, there's a fair chance I don't find a killer, and you can personally explain to your boss, the U.S. Attorney and every major media outlet why you obstructed a murder investigation."

He'd have no problem filing obstruction of justice charges either, though he'd likely find a way to screw them without having to prosecute. But the person on the other end of the phone doesn't know that. Luke extracts a promise to prioritize his request before he ends the call, finally glancing up to see Tayshia Grant and Adam Lydon having unintentionally heard the whole thing. "What?" he says. "Someone's in a mood today," Adam quips sarcastically. "I'm in a mood every day," Luke retorts. "I just usually keep it to myself."

He passes Brennan on his way back into the office, where Michael is still lost in thought. "I've got your warrants," he says, holding up the paperwork he pulled from the printer. "Cell records are going to take a few hours but we can hit the apartment now." As he's saying it, he's already grabbing his jacket off the back of Janet's chair and fixing his tie. If he's going to be seen in public then he has an image to uphold. Especially when the media or someone connected to Melissa Wallace may be watching. He still wants to know how she found out about her ex-husband's death so fast.

"I'll get Brennan." Michael agrees. "Finish your thought from earlier. You think this is a new suspect?"

"I think the timing of it is suspect." Luke replies as he picks up his briefcase. "If it was a retributive killing for what he did nine years ago, someone could have done that the night he got out of prison. Or later that week. I'm not saying it isn't someone he already knows—I'm saying he could have done something new to piss them off." A humorless smirk. "That's something I know a lot about."

"You're an asshole with a conscience," the other man replies. "Don't compare the two of you."

Luke recognizes the compliment for what it is. He's always been aware that he can be a difficult person, and sometimes he's done it on purpose. However, he just as often hasn't, and he knows Michael is saying he sees both sides. It's something that stays in his mind as he goes with the FBI agents to search Mark Wallace's apartment, which is a far cry from his former mansion. In fact, it's hardly been furnished. "This must have fucked with his head," he comments dryly as he moves through the living room, looking for anything incriminating.

"Remember that he still got elected to Congress," Brennan points out. "He had plenty of enablers until he got caught."

He had put his faith in Michael and Janet, two relatively untested agents, to be able to break down that defense. Wallace had all the power and a circle of equally powerful friends, so it was a terribly unbalanced case, but Brennan believed that Janet and Michael's talent and their determination would make the difference. That was exactly what had happened. Anyone who knew him back then has to know what's coming for them now—moreso since Michael is older, wiser and no longer scared of making high-profile enemies. He's not even listening, going into Wallace's bedroom to see what he can uncover. What he finds still manages to surprise him. "This may answer your question," he tells Luke, emerging with the composition book in hand. "Wallace was compiling material on everyone he'd worked with."

"He had a black book?" Luke says with an equal incredulity, walking over to take a look at it and seeing what Michael just saw: the pages upon pages of what appears to be possible blackmail material. "Son of a bitch. There really wasn't anything he wouldn't do."

"Maybe that's why no one killed him immediately. They didn't know about the book, or they did and had to find it."

"But they didn't find it," Brennan interjects. "If they wanted to get their hands on it, they would have gotten him to bring it to the crime scene. His car is here, so somebody drove him to someone else's random lawn and killed him."

"Which lends credence to the first idea. Wallace is exactly the kind of guy who'd go to someone for help and then threaten to turn them in if he didn't get it."

"And then that person stabs him to death in a fit of rage?" Luke comments. It's not out of character, but it still doesn't explain the location of the crime scene. His political instincts, fairly honed by years of being Bryan Alexander's involuntary guest at any number of parties or functions, are telling him there's something else they're missing. "I don't know if it's that simple, but this might explain why his ex-wife wants to talk to us. Maybe she knows about it and she's trying to protect herself. Benton got her to plead to a lesser, but that doesn't cover any different allegations."

"Read it and find out," Brennan says flippantly as he bags the book and then hands it right back to Luke, who realizes the ex-high school teacher has just given him homework. He's not even going to try to argue. Instead, he looks at Michael. "We need to cross-check the names in here versus the cell phone records and the original case file." Which is exactly what he'll be doing, sitting at his kitchen table with a highlighter and a six-pack of Coke until some late hour of the evening.

Michael nods. "And then find out which of those names has any connection to the people who live at that house," he adds. "I fully believe them when they say they had no clue, but that doesn't mean they don't know the suspect. Truth be told, the fact that they were gone makes it a pretty good place to dump a body." His eyes flick to his boss. "How much can we afford to keep from the press?"

"As much as we can," Brennan says. "Even the rumor of this thing existing will be all over the news. Then we'll have rampant speculation being tossed around and an even bigger pool of reasonable doubt."

Luke has stayed quiet in all this because he knows that's the paramount truth. Wallace had plenty of enemies and there could be even more in the pages of that book. Adding more suspects to the list they hadn't even managed to narrow down could create the kind of reasonable doubt he'd warned Bryan about. In that moment he makes a risky decision, but the only one he can see. "We don't need to say anything about it. We can talk about the murder in relation to the old case," he tells them. "This stays between us."

Luke and Michael share a look between themselves. Neither of them are comfortable with lying about a key piece of evidence, but this is a secret that may have killed one person and could endanger several others. If they weren't on the same page before, they have no choice but to completely trust each other now. Michael can't help but wish again that it was Janet standing next to him; Luke is thinking about Bryan. He's never lied to his boss, but it's entirely possible some of Bryan's friends or acquaintances are in that book. In that moment he puts his loyalty to Michael and to justice above his friendship with Bryan and maybe even his chances at making U.S. Attorney someday. What does he want to stand for?

"We could fucking blow up Washington," he adds as that sinks in. Michael shakes his head. "The only thing I care about is catching this killer. That's my job, and the rest of this is bullshit."