I continued, "We all know who stood to benefit from that plane going down. Jerry Blum has not only escaped prosecution, he is now a free man. With no witnesses and no case, all charges have been dropped against him."
Stuart nodded; his jawline rippled slightly.
"The plane crash investigation is still ongoing," I said after a few minutes. "The investigation could take years. Even if the authorities do find out who took it down, or sabotaged it, I suspect there will be very little evidence linking the attack to Jerry Blum."
He set his frosted glass down on the dusty, round glass table that sat between us, and turned and looked at me.
Stuart said, "And even if evidence is found indicating Jerry Blum was responsible for my wife's crash, who's to say that the next batch of witnesses won't be killed as well."
"It's a sick Catch-22," I said.
"This could go on forever."
I nodded.
"I may never see justice," he added. "Ever."
"There is still a chance they could find damning evidence linking Jerry Blum to the downed aircraft," I said.
"Or not," said Stuart.
I nodded. "Or not."
"More than likely he's going to get off, again, and meanwhile my wife...." Stuart's voice trailed off and he suddenly broke down, sobbing hard into his hands. I reached over and patted his shoulder and made sympathetic noises. He continued crying, and I continued patting.
When he finally got control of himself, he said, "I have something I want you to listen to."
Chapter Sixteen
Stuart got up and went through the sliding glass door. He came back a moment later holding a Blackberry phone. He sat next to me again and pushed a few buttons on the phone. A moment later, the phone was ringing loudly on speaker mode. An electronic voice answered and asked Stuart if he wanted to listen to his voice mail. Stuart pressed a button. I assumed his answer was yes. The voice then asked if Stuart wanted to listen to his archive. He pressed another button, and he held the phone out between us, face up, above the round table and above his beer.