The Guardians: The explosive new thriller from international bestseller John Grisham - John Grisham Page 0,78

for help. He was loaded into an ambulance and taken to the nearest hospital and from there was rushed to Mercy Hospital in Orlando. Tests revealed a fractured skull, swollen brain, broken jaw, splintered shoulder and collarbone, missing teeth, and so on, and three deep stab wounds. He was given six pints of blood and put on life support. When the prison finally called our office in Savannah, Vicki was informed that he was “critical” and not expected to survive.

I was on the Jacksonville bypass when she called me with the news. I forgot all the other clutter in my brain and turned around. Quincy has no family to speak of. Right now, he needs his lawyer.

I have spent half of my career hanging around prisons, and I’ve become accustomed to the violent culture but not calloused by it, because caged men will always invent new ways to harm one another.

But I’ve never considered the possibility of an innocence case being derailed from inside the prison by rubbing out the prospective exoneree. It’s a brilliant move!

If Quincy dies, we close the file and move on. This is not an established policy at Guardian because we’ve never been confronted with such a death, but with an endless supply of cases to choose from, we cannot justify our time in trying to exonerate anyone posthumously. I’m sure they know that. Whoever “they” might be. For purposes of my own lengthy monologues behind the wheel, I suppose I could refer to them as the Saltillo gang, or something like that. But “they” works better.

So they are watching our court filings. Perhaps they are trailing us occasionally, maybe hacking a bit and eavesdropping. And they certainly know about us and our recent victory in Alabama. They know we have a track record, that we can litigate, that we are tenacious. They also know that Quincy did not kill Keith Russo and they don’t like us digging for the truth. They do not want to openly confront us, or frighten or intimidate, not now anyway, because that would verify their existence, and it would probably require them to commit another crime, something they would like to avoid. A fire, or a bomb, or a bullet could make for a mess and leave clues.

The easiest way to stop the investigation is to simply take out Quincy. Order a hit from inside the prison where they already have friends or know some tough guys who will work cheap for cash or favors. Killings there are so routine anyway.

I rarely spend time reviewing the prison records of my clients. Since they are innocent, they tend to behave themselves, avoid gangs and drugs, take whatever educational courses are available, work, read, and help other inmates. Quincy finished high school in Seabrook in 1978 but could not afford college. In prison, he has accumulated over a hundred hours of credits. He has no serious disciplinary violations. He helps younger inmates avoid gangs. I can’t imagine Quincy making enemies. He lifts weights, has learned karate, and in general can take care of himself. It would require more than one healthy young man to bring him down, and I’ll bet he inflicted some damage of his own before he fell.

Sitting in Orlando traffic, I call the prison for the fourth time and ask to speak to the warden. There is no way he’ll take my call, but I want him to know I’ll be there soon enough. I make a dozen calls. Vicki is hounding the hospital for information, of which there is little, and she relays this to me. I call Frankie and tell him to head south. I finally get Quincy’s brother, Marvis, who is working construction in Miami and can’t get away. He is the only relative who cares about Quincy and has visited him regularly for the past twenty-three years. He is shaken and wants to know who would do this to Quincy. I have no answers.

The collar usually works in hospitals so I put it on in the parking deck. ICU is on the second floor and I bluff my way past a busy nurse. Two huge young men—one white, the other black—are sitting on stools next to a room with glass walls. They are prison guards and wear the gaudy black-and-tan uniforms that I’ve seen around the Garvin Correctional Institute. They are bored and seriously out of place. I decide to be nice and introduce myself as Quincy’s lawyer.

Not surprisingly, they know virtually nothing. They were