I Lie Well

Matt stood in the doorway of his best friend’s bedroom. They’d met a few years ago because their fathers worked in a similar business.

“So when do I get to meet your sister?” Matt asked Jimmy, laughing. “You’ve kept her away from us for three years now.”

“Never.” Jimmy said. Matt admired how protective Jimmy was of his twin sister. Matt felt the same way about his own sister though they weren’t twins. “I don’t want her mixed up in anything.”

“Why would she get mixed up in anything by meeting me?”

“Because we’re all apart of what our father’s do.”

“Well you two have the same father… So really isn’t it your fault she’s getting mixed up in all this?”

“No. My family and I have done a pretty good job keeping her out of almost everything we do. Don’t get me wrong, she’s seen some fucked up shit. But if she gets mixed up in my friends, there’s no way we’ll keep her out of it.”

Matt sighed. What Jimmy was saying seemed a little far fetched. But he wasn’t sure he’d want his sister mixed up in everything they did either.

“Jay Jay!” I soft voice came from down stairs. Jimmy’s eyes went wide, and Matt started laughing.

“”Jay Jay?” He mouthed to his friend.

“Shut the fuck up.” Jimmy said, rolling his eyes. “Guess you’re going to meet her today after all.” Matt could tell that his friend really wasn’t happy about that.

“Up here, Bee.” He said.

Matt could hear soft footsteps as Jimmy’s sister came running up the stairs. As she turned the corner to walk towards Jimmy’s room, Matt felt like all of the air had left his lungs. Jimmy’s sister stood in front of him. They obviously weren’t identical, not including the fact that they were opposite genders. Jimmy stood over six feet tall while his twin sister was maybe 5 foot 5. But besides that they both had black hair and crystal blue eyes. While Jimmy stood as thin as a bean pole, his sister wasn’t. She wasn’t fat in the slightest, but she wasn’t one of those girls that looked like she starved herself. She looked healthy. She had big boobs too, and Matt wouldn’t complain about that. And she was definitely in shape. She wore a tank top and a pair of skinny jeans, that hugged her hips just right. And you could tell she was part of an active life style, without being overly muscular. She was perfect.

Jimmy punched Matt in the arm. “Stop staring at my sister please.”

Matt felt a little embarrassed but he didn’t say anything.

“Beth this is my friend Matt,” Jimmy said. “Matt this is my little sister Beth.”

“Little in height maybe,” She said, laughing. “I’m actually ten minutes older than him.”

Jimmy rolled his eyes. “Always have to be exact.”

Beth laughed. “It’s nice to meet you Matt,” She said.

Matt loved her laugh the second he heard it. “It’s really nice to meet you too,” He said.

“What did you need?” Jimmy said.

“Can you drive me to the mechanic shop? I have to pick up my car.”

“You know I can’t,” Jimmy said. “Dad said I have to stay here until he gets back.”

“But Jim I need my car!” Beth said.

“I can take you,” Matt offered.

“No, you can’t,” Jimmy said.

“Why not?” Beth asked, putting a hand on her hip.

“Because I said so.”

Beth started laughing. “That never worked for mom and it definitely doesn’t work for you. Matt, are you sure you don’t mind?” Beth asked turning her baby blues onto Matt.

“Not at all,” Matt said, being genuinely sincere.

“You’re the best!” Beth said, raising her hand for a high five.

Matt laughed as he high fived her.

Matt sighed. It seemed that the more Matt tried not to think about Beth, the more the flash backs came flooding back to him. But he was happy that he could remember the day he had met her. Because he considered that to be one of the best days of his life.

“Hey man,” Matt jumped at the sound of Zack’s voice.

“Hey,” He said. “I didn’t hear you come in.”

“Sorry,” He said. “Everything okay?”

Matt shrugged. “Good days and bad.”

“You going to be ready for court tomorrow?”

“Yeah,” Matt said. “But let’s go over some stuff. I just want to make sure I’m covered.”

“Honestly, the more you keep your mouth shut, the better off we’ll probably be. They’re going to try to pin this on you.” Zack stopped talking and his eyes met Matt’s before they started laughing. They laughed not because the situation was funny, but because the murder they were trying to pin on Matt, Matt had committed. “But the chief of police is coming to testify on your behalf.”

It wasn’t known to many that Matt paid off a lot of the cops in the general area that he lived in. Most cops wouldn’t turn their head in this situation, but Matt had had an alibi. It wasn’t rock solid, in the slightest. But one of the shop owners in the city was going to testify that Matt had been in his shop all night helping him to arrange a big party for his daughter. The story was that they were drawing up plans for Matt to rent out one of the buildings he owned so that the shop owner could house a sweet sixteen party for his daughter. Matt and Zack had managed to convince the chief of police that their story was in fact true. The alibi may not be one hundred percent rock solid, but it was solid enough to help them win this case.

“Perfect. So will they call me as a witness?” Matt knew the answer though.

“Most likely. But just keep your answers short and to the point. You know your story so just stick to your guns. There’s no way you’re going away for this.”

“Good. I can’t really afford to spend any more time in prison, especially considering the things I have in the works right now.”

A couple of years prior, actually right after he’d started dating Beth, Matt had spent a year in prison. He had taken the fall for his father then, and lucky he was able to strike a deal, and only had to spend a year in prison. But it wasn’t something he was willing to do again. And if he was pinned for a murder, it would be much more than a year he’d be spending behind bars.



The next morning Matt looked himself over in the mirror. He had a black suit on, with a red tie. It was his court suit that he was wearing. And he was waiting for Zack to show up to take him to court. Most people under investigation for murder spent their time waiting for the case to go to court, inside of a jail cell. But that was one of the bright sides to being a mafia leader. He had connections everywhere. And one of those connections kept him out of jail even before his arraignment.

Zack and Matt were both quiet during their drive to the court house. It was ten o’clock on Monday morning, so there wasn’t much traffic on the highways. They made it to the court house fairly quickly and were almost a half hour early for the court appearance.

“Anyone else would’ve been locked up all this time,” A voice came from behind the two men. Matt didn’t turn though; he knew who the voice belonged too.

The man who had spoken was short; probably only around 5 foot 7. He was tan with black hair that was combed from the light side of his head to the right. He had a full head of thick dark hair and his eyebrows matched. Matt knew if he turned around he’d see a pair of dark brown eyes glaring at him, and that wasn’t something he cared too much about.

The man who was murdered was a part of a rival family, if you will. The family had bad blood with Matt’s family for as long as anyone could remember. Matt wasn’t a fan of holding onto grudges that belonged to his grand father and his great grandfather, but this guy just got under his skin. He had been the same age as Matt, seeing as they’d gone to school together. But he’d always had it out for Matt. Though he was in a rough business, Matt liked to think of himself as a more passive type of person. But when he’d heard that Marco DeVito had a part in his wife’s death, he went after him. He’d gotten all of the information he could out of him before he killed him. And of course, once the news of Marco’s death hit the papers and the social media, his family looked right at Matt.

Though Matt was guilty of his crime, he looked at it as a good dead to society. Marco had a record. It was common knowledge that he’d been charged with rape at least once before, and that was something that hadn’t sat too well with Matt.

“I will advise you not to instigate anything with my client.”

“Your client or your boss?” Marco’s brother Vinnie sneered.

“I said my client didn’t I? You know you could get into a lot of trouble for trying to mess with him right now. Especially since your family is a big part of this investigation.”

“I’m not afraid of you.”

“I don’t expect you to be,” Zack said honestly. “But I would hope you’d be afraid of jail time, considering the fact that you’ve recently got out.”

Vinnie didn’t say anything after that.

Time went quickly, and before Matt could blink he was seated at his seat in the court room facing the judge. He knew his family and friends wouldn’t come to the court room today. They knew he would fine, and he knew it was better if they didn’t show up anyway. Although it was common knowledge to most in the city that Matt was the head of the Mafia in the state of California, bringing your men to court with you looked like you were trying to threaten the judge or something.

Soon enough, Matt was called to the stand. He swore upon the bible to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth so help him god, and then the questions began.

“Mr. Sanders,” The DeVito family had hired a very renowned lawyer to represent their son’s case. “Is it true there was, for lack of a better term, bad blood between you and the deceased?”

Matt didn’t blink. He looked right at the lawyer as he spoke. “It was true that there was bad blood between the DeVito family and the Sanders family maybe fifty or more years ago. I never personally held a grudge again Marco for anything. He’d never done anything to harm me or my family.” Matt bit his tongue after he said it. Because that wasn’t true. Marco had been a part of the attack that killed his wife.

“I see,” The lawyer said. As the lawyer paced back and forth between Matt and the jury, he felt his phone buzz in his pocket. He couldn’t check it though, and that bothered him. “Is it true you had recently been seen and heard by the defendants brother, threatening Marco DeVito?”

“The only conversation between Marco and myself that has happened recently was when I asked him to leave me and my-“ Matt almost couldn’t say the word. “Wife… alone.”

“Did you threaten him?”

“I told him if he didn’t stop harassing us, I was going to force him to stop.”

Matt noticed Zack roll his eyes. That wasn’t something Matt should've said.

“And where is your wife now?”

“Objection, your honor!” Zack said from his seat, though he was standing now. “I don’t see what this has to do with anything.”

The judge didn’t look at Zack. “Overruled,” He said. “Answer the question, Mr. Sanders.”

“She’s dead.” Matt said. “But you already knew that. As does everyone else in this town.”

“How did she die?”

“Objection your honor!” Zack yelled.

“Counsellor?” The judge said looking at the lawyer.

“There is a point to all of this.” He said.

“Very well,” The judge replied. “Overruled.”

“She was in a car accident.”

“And isn’t it true that you blamed Marco for her death?”

Matt was getting angry. “No,” He said. “I never blamed Marco for her death. I simply wanted to speak with him in the hopes that maybe he would know something.”

“And why would he know something?”

“Because it was a thought that some of his family was involved in the accident.”

“And I’m sure that made you angry Mr. Sanders. As most people know, you are a violent man. In fact, you spent a year in prison not too long ago didn’t you?”

“It was almost eight years ago, but yes I did spend a year in prison?”

“And what was that for Mr. Sanders?”

“Assault with a deadly weapon.”

“No further questions.”

Zack stepped up next.

“Matt, could you explain to us what you were doing the night that Marco DeVito was murdered?”

“I was downtown at the pawn shop on Main Street. I was speaking with the owner about renting out one of the buildings I own so that he could throw a sweet sixteen party for his daughter.”

“And will Mr. Johnson agree with that?”

“Yes, sir,” Matt said.

“I apologize for bringing this up, but when your wife passed away, why did you think that the DeVito family had something to do with it?”

“They all have the same car. They all drive a ’69 Camaro GT. I am sure they aren’t the only ones in California that drive them, but they all have the same one. It’s orange. There was one involved in the accident with my wife, so I wanted to speak with Marco to see if he knew anything about that.”

“So you did’t accuse him of having a part in your wife’s death because you held a grudge against him?”

“No,” Matt said, which was mostly true. “I actually didn’t believe Marco had anything to do with it at all. I just knew that someone in the family may have known or seen something.”

“Thank you Matt,” Zack said. “That is all.”

Once Matt was finished being questioned, Zack and the Devito family’s lawyer took turns interviewing Vinnie DeVito, the police chief, and the owner of the pawn shop, Steven Johnson.

Once they were finished, Zack sat back down with Matt, and the jury left the court room to deliberate.

“How do you think it went?” Matt asked his friend.

“Pretty good, I would say. Apart from you pretty much flat out telling them court room you threatened Marco, everything was perfect.”

“Good.” Matt said.

In the end, though Matt couldn’t even tell you how long they waited for the jury to return to the room, Matt was found not guilty, and he was free to go.

As the walked back to Zack’s car, gun shots sounded, and Matt and Zack both ducked to the ground.

Vinnie DeVito was holding a gun, and pointing it straight at them.