Текст книги "Rage of Angels"

Автор книги: Sidney Sheldon

Соавторы: Sidney Sheldon
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Текущая страница: 2 (всего у книги 25 страниц) [доступный отрывок для чтения: 10 страниц]

In Tony’s Place, a restaurant that Michael Moretti owned, a celebration was taking place. There were a dozen men in the room, drinking and boisterous.

Michael Moretti sat alone at the bar, in an oasis of silence, watching Jennifer Parker on television. He raised his glass in a salute to her and drank.

Lawyers everywhere discussed the Jennifer Parker episode. Half of them believed she had been bribed by the Mafia, and the other half that she had been an innocent dupe. But no matter which side they were on, they all concurred on one point: Jennifer Parker’s short career as an attorney was finished.

She had lasted exactly four hours.

She had been born in Kelso, Washington, a small timber town founded in 1847 by a homesick Scottish surveyor who named it for his home town in Scotland.

Jennifer’s father was an attorney, first for the lumber companies that dominated the town, then later for the workers in the sawmills. Jennifer’s earliest memories of growing up were filled with joy. The state of Washington was a storybook place for a child, full of spectacular mountains and glaciers and national parks. There were skiing and canoeing and, when she was older, ice climbing on glaciers and pack trips to places with wonderful names: Ohanapecosh and Nisqually and Lake Cle Elum and Chenuis Falls and Horse Heaven and the Yakima Valley. Jennifer learned to climb on Mount Rainier and to ski at Timberline with her father.

Her father always had time for her, while her mother, beautiful and restless, was mysteriously busy and seldom at home. Jennifer adored her father. Abner Parker was a mixture of English and Irish and Scottish blood. He was of medium height, with black hair and green-blue eyes. He was a compassionate man with a deep-rooted sense of justice. He was not interested in money, he was interested in people. He would sit and talk to Jennifer by the hour, telling her about the cases he was handling and the problems of the people who came into his unpretentious little office, and it did not occur to Jennifer until years later that he talked to her because he had no one else with whom to share things.

After school Jennifer would hurry over to the courthouse to watch her father at work. If court was not in session she would hang around his office, listening to him discuss his cases and his clients. They never talked about her going to law school; it was simply taken for granted.

When Jennifer was fifteen she began spending her summers working for her father. At an age when other girls were dating boys and going steady, Jennifer was absorbed in lawsuits and wills.

Boys were interested in her, but she seldom went out. When her father would ask her why, she would reply, “They’re all so young, Papa.” She knew that one day she would marry a lawyer like her father.

On Jennifer’s sixteenth birthday, her mother left town with the eighteen-year-old son of their next-door neighbor, and Jennifer’s father quietly died. It took seven years for his heart to stop beating, but he was dead from the moment he heard the news about his wife. The whole town knew and was sympathetic, and that, of course, made it worse, for Abner Parker was a proud man. That was when he began to drink. Jennifer did everything she could to comfort him but it was no use, and nothing was ever the same again.

The next year, when it came time to go to college, Jennifer wanted to stay home with her father, but he would not hear of it.

“We’re going into partnership, Jennie,” he told her. “You hurry up and get that law degree.”

When she was graduated she enrolled at the University of Washington in Seattle to study law. During the first year of school, while Jennifer’s classmates were flailing about in an impenetrable swamp of contracts, torts, property, civil procedure and criminal law, Jennifer felt as though she had come home. She moved into the university dormitory and got a job at the Law Library.

Jennifer loved Seattle. On Sundays, she and an Indian student named Ammini Williams and a big, rawboned Irish girl named Josephine Collins would go rowing on Green Lake in the heart of the city, or attend the Gold Cup races on Lake Washington and watch the brightly colored hydroplanes flashing by.

There were great jazz clubs in Seattle, and Jennifer’s favorite was Peter’s Poop Deck, where they had crates with slabs of wood on top instead of tables.

Afternoons, Jennifer, Ammini and Josephine would meet at The Hasty Tasty, a hangout where they had the best cottagefried potatoes in the world.

There were two boys who pursued Jennifer: a young, attractive medical student named Noah Larkin and a law student named Ben Munro; and from time to time Jennifer would go out on dates with them, but she was far too busy to think about a serious romance.

The seasons were crisp and wet and windy and it seemed to rain all the time. Jennifer wore a green-and-blue-plaid lumber jacket that caught the raindrops in its shaggy wool and made her eyes flash like emeralds. She walked through the rain, lost in her own secret thoughts, never knowing that all those she passed would file away the memory.

In spring the girls blossomed out in their bright cotton dresses. There were six fraternities in a row at the university, and the fraternity brothers would gather on the lawn and watch the girls go by, but there was something about Jennifer that made them feel unexpectedly shy. There was a special quality about her that was difficult for them to define, a feeling that she had already attained something for which they were still searching.

Every summer Jennifer went home to visit her father. He had changed so much. He was never drunk, but neither was he ever sober. He had retreated into an emotional fortress where nothing could touch him again.

He died when Jennifer was in her last term at law school. The town remembered, and there were almost a hundred people at Abner Parker’s funeral, people he had helped and advised and befriended over the years. Jennifer did her grieving in private. She had lost more than a father. She had lost a teacher and a mentor.

After the funeral Jennifer returned to Seattle to finish school. Her father had left her less than a thousand dollars and she had to make a decision about what to do with her life. She knew that she could not return to Kelso to practice law, for there she would always be the little girl whose mother had run off with a teen-ager.

Because of her high scholastic average, Jennifer had interviews with a dozen top law firms around the country, and received several offers.

Warren Oakes, her criminal law professor, told her: “That’s a real tribute, young lady. It’s very difficult for a woman to get into a good law firm.”

Jennifer’s dilemma was that she no longer had a home or roots. She was not certain where she wanted to live.

Shortly before graduation Jennifer’s problem was solved for her. Professor Oakes asked her to see him after class.

“I have a letter from the District Attorney’s office in Manhattan, asking me to recommend my brightest graduate for his staff. Interested?”

New York.“Yes, sir.” Jennifer was so stunned that the answer just popped out.

She flew to New York to take the bar examination, and returned to Kelso to close her father’s law office. It was a bittersweet experience, filled with memories of the past and it seemed to Jennifer that she had grown up in that office.

She got a job as an assistant in the law library of the university to tide her over until she heard whether she had passed the New York bar examination.

“It’s one of the toughest in the country,” Professor Oakes warned her.

But Jennifer knew.

She received her notice that she had passed and an offer from the New York District Attorney’s office on the same day.

One week later, Jennifer was on her way east.

She found a tiny apartment ( Spc W/U fpl gd loc nds sm wk,the ad said) on lower Third Avenue, with a fake fireplace in a steep fourth-floor walk-up. The exercise will do me good,Jennifer told herself. There were no mountains to climb in Manhattan, no rapids to ride. The apartment consisted of a small living room with a couch that turned into a lumpy bed, and a tiny bathroom with a window that someone long ago had painted over with black paint, sealing it shut. The furniture looked like something that could have been donated by the Salvation Army. Oh, well, I won’t be living in this place long.Jennifer thought. This is just temporary until I prove myself as a lawyer.

That had been the dream. The reality was that she had been in New York less than seventy-two hours, had been thrown off the District Attorney’s staff and was facing disbarment.

Jennifer quit reading newspapers and magazines and stopped watching television, because wherever she turned she saw herself. She felt that people were staring at her on the street, on the bus, and at the market. She began to hide out in her tiny apartment, refusing to answer the telephone or the doorbell. She thought about packing her suitcases and returning to Washington. She thought about getting a job in some other field. She thought about suicide. She spent long hours composing letters to District Attorney Robert Di Silva. Half the letters were scathing indictments of his insensitivity and lack of understanding. The other half were abject apologies, with a plea for him to give her another chance. None of the letters was ever sent.

For the first time in her life Jennifer was overwhelmed with a sense of desperation. She had no friends in New York, no one to talk to. She stayed locked in her apartment all day, and late at night she would slip out to walk the deserted streets of the city. The derelicts who peopled the night never accosted her. Perhaps they saw their own loneliness and despair mirrored in her eyes.

Over and over, as she walked, Jennifer would envision the courtroom scene in her mind, always changing the ending.

A man detached himself from the group around Di Silva and hurried toward her. He was carrying a manila envelope.

Miss Parker?

Yes.

The Chief wants you to give this to Stela.

Jennifer looked at him coolly. Let me see your identification, please.

The man panicked and ran.

A man detached himself from the group around Di Silva and hurried toward her. He was carrying a manila envelope.

Miss Parker?

Yes.

The Chief wants you to give this to Stela. He thrust the envelope into her hands.

Jennifer opened the envelope and saw the dead canary inside. I’m placing you under arrest.

A man detached himself from the group around Di Silva and hurried toward her. He was carrying a manila envelope. He walked past her to another young assistant district attorney and handed him the envelope. The Chief wants you to give this to Stela.

She could rewrite the scene as many times as she liked, but nothing was changed. One foolish mistake had destroyed her. And yet—who said she was destroyed? The press? Di Silva? She had not heard another word about her disbarment, and until she did she was still an attorney. There are law firms that made me offers, Jennifer told herself.

Filled with a new sense of resolve, Jennifer pulled out the list of the firms she had talked to and began to make a series of telephone calls. None of the men she asked to speak to was in, and not one of her calls was returned. It took her four days to realize that she was the pariah of the legal profession. The furor over the case had died down, but everyone still remembered.

Jennifer kept telephoning prospective employers, going from despair to indignation to frustration and back to despair again. She wondered what she was going to do with the rest of her life, and each time it came back to the same thing: All she wanted to do, the one thing she really cared about, was to practice law. She was a lawyer and, by God, until they stopped her she was going to find a way to practice her profession.

She began to make the rounds of Manhattan law offices. She would walk in unannounced, give her name to the receptionist and ask to see the head of personnel. Occasionally she was granted an interview, but when she was, Jennifer had the feeling it was out of curiosity. She was a freak and they wanted to see what she looked like in person. Most of the time she was simply informed there were no openings.

At the end of six weeks, Jennifer’s money was running out. She would have moved to a cheaper apartment, but there wereno cheaper apartments. She began to skip breakfast and lunch, and to have dinner at one of the little corner dinettes where the food was bad but the prices were good. She discovered the Steak & Brew and Roast-and-Brew, where for a modest sum she was able to get a main course, all the salad she could eat, and all the beer she could drink. Jennifer hated beer, but it was filling.

When Jennifer had gone through her list of large law firms, she armed herself with a list of smaller firms and began to call on them, but her reputation had preceded her even there. She received a lot of propositions from interested males, but no job offers. She was beginning to get desperate. All right, she thought defiantly, if no one wants to hire me, I’ll open my own law office.The catch was that that took money. Ten thousand dollars, at least. She would need enough for rent, telephone, a secretary, law books, a desk and chairs, stationery…she could not even afford the stamps.

Jennifer had counted on her salary from the District Attorney’s office but that, of course, was gone forever. She could forget about severance pay. She had not been severed; she had been beheaded. No, there was no way she could afford to open her own office, no matter how small. The answer was to find someone with whom to share offices.

Jennifer bought a copy of The New York Timesand began to search through the want ads. It was not until she was near the bottom of the page that she came across a small advertisement that read: Wanted:/Prof man sh sm off w/2 oth/prof men. Rs rent.

The last two words appealed to Jennifer enormously. She was not a professional man, but her sex should not matter. She tore out the ad and took the subway down to the address listed.

It was a dilapidated old building on lower Broadway. The office was on the tenth floor and the flaking sign on the door read:

KENNETH BAILEY

ACE INVEST GA IONS

Beneath it:

ROCKEFELLER C LLECTION AG NCY

Jennifer took a deep breath, opened the door and walked in. She was standing in the middle of a small, windowless office. There were three scarred desks and chairs crowded into the room, two of them occupied.

Seated at one of the desks was a bald, shabbily dressed, middle-aged man working on some papers. Against the opposite wall at another desk was a man in his early thirties. He had brick-red hair and bright blue eyes. His skin was pale and freckled. He was dressed in tight-fitting jeans, a tee shirt, and white canvas shoes without socks. He was talking into the telephone.

“Don’t worry, Mrs. Desser, I have two of my best operatives working on your case. We should have news of your husband any day now. I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you for a little more expense money…No, don’t bother mailing it. The mails are terrible. I’ll be in your neighborhood this afternoon. I’ll stop by and pick it up.”

He replaced the receiver and looked up and saw Jennifer.

He rose to his feet, smiled and held out a strong, firm hand. “I’m Kenneth Bailey. And what can I do for you this morning?”

Jennifer looked around the small, airless room and said uncertainly, “I—I came about your ad.”

“Oh.” There was surprise in his blue eyes.

The bald-headed man was staring at Jennifer.

Kenneth Bailey said, “This is Otto Wenzel. He’s the Rockefeller Collection Agency.”

Jennifer nodded. “Hello.” She turned back to Kenneth Bailey. “And you’re Ace Investigations?”

“That’s right. What’s your scam?”

“My—?” Then, realizing, “I’m an attorney.”

Kenneth Bailey studied her skeptically. “And you want to set up an office here?”

Jennifer looked around the dreary office again and visualized herself at the empty desk, between these two men.

“Perhaps I’ll look a little further,” she said. “I’m not sure—”

“Your rent would only be ninety dollars a month.”

“I could buythis building for ninety dollars a month,” Jennifer replied. She turned to leave.

“Hey, wait a minute.”

Jennifer paused.

Kenneth Bailey ran a hand over his pale chin. “I’ll make a deal with you. Sixty. When your business gets rolling we’ll talk about an increase.”

It was a bargain. Jennifer knew that she could never find any space elsewhere for that amount. On the other hand, there was no way she could ever attract clients to this hellhole. There was one other thing she had to consider. She did not have the sixty dollars.

“I’ll take it,” Jennifer said.

“You won’t be sorry,” Kenneth Bailey promised. “When do you want to move your things in?”

“They’re in.”

Kenneth Bailey painted the sign on the door himself. It read:

JENNIFER PARKER

ATTORNEY AT LAW

Jennifer studied the sign with mixed feelings. In her deepest depressions it had never occurred to her that she would have her name under that of a private investigator and a bill collector. Yet, as she looked at the faintly crooked sign, she could not help feeling a sense of pride. She was an attorney. The sign on the door proved it.

Now that Jennifer had office space, the only thing she lacked was clients.

Jennifer could no longer afford even the Steak & Brew. She made herself a breakfast of toast and coffee on the hot plate she had set up over the radiator in her tiny bathroom. She ate no lunch and had dinner at Chock Full O’Nuts or Zum Zum, where they served large pieces of wurst, slabs of bread and hot potato salad.

She arrived at her desk promptly at nine o’clock every morning, but there was nothing for her to do except listen to Ken Bailey and Otto Wenzel talking on the telephone.

Ken Bailey’s cases seemed to consist mostly of finding runaway spouses and children, and at first Jennifer was convinced that he was a con man, making extravagant promises and collecting large advances. But Jennifer quickly learned that Ken Bailey worked hard and delivered often. He was bright and he was clever.

Otto Wenzel was an enigma. His telephone rang constantly. He would pick it up, mutter a few words into it, write something on a piece of paper and disappear for a few hours.

“Oscar does repo’s,” Ken Bailey explained to Jennifer one day.

“Repo’s?”

“Yeah. Collection companies use him to get back automobiles, television sets, washing machines—you name it.”

He looked at Jennifer curiously. “You got anyclients?”

“I have some things coming up,” Jennifer said evasively.

He nodded. “Don’t let it get you down. Anyone can make a mistake.”

Jennifer felt herself flushing. So heknew about her.

Ken Bailey was unwrapping a large, thick roast-beef sandwich. “Like some?”

It looked delicious. “No, thanks,” Jennifer said firmly. “I never eat lunch.”

“Okay.”

She watched him bite into the juicy sandwich. He saw her expression and said, “You sure you—?”

“No, thank you. I—I have an appointment.”

Ken Bailey watched Jennifer walk out of the office and his face was thoughtful. He prided himself on his ability to read character, but Jennifer Parker puzzled him. From the television and newspaper accounts he had been sure someone had paid this girl to destroy the case against Michael Moretti. After meeting Jennifer, Ken was less certain. He had been married once and had gone through hell, and he held women in low esteem. But something told him that this one was special. She was beautiful, bright and very proud. Jesus! he said to himself. Don’t be a fool! One murder on your conscience is enough.

Emma Lazarus was a sentimental idiot, Jennifer thought. “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free…Send these, the homeless, tempesttossed, to me.” Indeed! Anyone manufacturing welcome mats in New York would have gone out of business in an hour. In New York no one cared whether you lived or died. Stop feeling sorry for yourself!Jennifer told herself. But it was difficult. Her resources had dwindled to eighteen dollars, the rent on her apartment was overdue, and her share of the office rent was due in two days. She did not have enough money to stay in New York any longer, and she did not have enough money to leave.

Jennifer had gone through the Yellow Pages, calling law offices alphabetically, trying to get a job. She made the calls from telephone booths because she was too embarrassed to let Ken Bailey and Otto Wenzel hear her conversations. The results were always the same. No one was interested in hiring her. She would have to return to Kelso and get a job as a legal aide or as a secretary to one of her father’s friends. How he would have hated that! It was a bitter defeat, but there were no choices left. She would be returning home a failure. The immediate problem facing her was transportation. She looked through the afternoon New York Postand found an ad for someone to share driving expenses to Seattle. There was a telephone number and Jennifer called it. There was no answer. She decided she would try again in the morning.

The following day, Jennifer went to her office for the last time. Otto Wenzel was out, but Ken Bailey was there, on the telephone, as usual. He was wearing blue jeans and a veeneck cashmere sweater.

“I found your wife,” he was saying. “The only problem, pal, is that she doesn’t want to go home…I know. Who can figure women out?…Okay. I’ll tell you where she’s staying and you can try to sweet-talk her into coming back.” He gave the address of a midtown hotel. “My pleasure.” He hung up and swung around to face Jennifer. “You’re late this morning.”

“Mr. Bailey, I—I’m afraid I’m going to have to be leaving. I’ll send you the rent money I owe you as soon as I’m able to.”

Ken Bailey leaned back in his chair and studied her. His look made Jennifer uncomfortable.

“Will that be all right?” she asked.

“Going back to Washington?”

Jennifer nodded.

Ken Bailey said, “Before you leave, would you do me a little favor? A lawyer friend’s been bugging me to serve some subpoenas for him, and I haven’t got time. He pays twelve-fifty for each subpoena plus mileage. Would you help me out?”

One hour later Jennifer Parker found herself in the plush law offices of Peabody & Peabody. This was the kind of firm she had visualized working in one day, a full partner with a beautiful corner suite. She was escorted to a small back room where a harassed secretary handed her a stack of subpoenas.

“Here. Be sure to keep a record of your mileage. You do have a car, don’t you?”

“No, I’m afraid I—”

“Well, if you use the subway, keep track of the fares.”

“Right.”

Jennifer spent the rest of the day delivering subpoenas in the Bronx, Brooklyn and Queens in a downpour. By eight o’clock that evening, she had made fifty dollars. She arrived back at her tiny apartment chilled and exhausted. But at least she had earned some money, her first since coming to New York. And the secretary had told her there were plenty more subpoenas to serve. It was hard work, running all over town, and it was humiliating. She had had doors slammed in her face, had been cursed at, threatened, and propositioned twice. The prospect of facing another day like that was dismaying; and yet, as long as she could remain in New York there was hope, no matter how faint.

Jennifer ran a hot bath and stepped into it, slowly sinking down into the tub, feeling the luxury of the water lapping over her body. She had not realized how exhausted she was. Every muscle seemed to ache. She decided that what she needed was a good dinner to cheer her up. She would splurge. I’ll treat myself to a real restaurant with tablecloths and napkins, Jennifer thought. Perhaps they’ll have soft music and I’ll have a glass of white wine and—

Jennifer’s thoughts were interrupted by the ringing of the doorbell. It was an alien sound. She had not had a single visitor since she had moved in two months earlier. It could only be the surly landlady about the overdue rent. Jennifer lay still, hoping she would go away, too weary to move.

The doorbell rang again. Reluctantly, Jennifer dragged herself from the warm tub. She slipped on a terry-cloth robe and went to the door.

“Who is it?”

A masculine voice on the other side of the door said, “Miss Jennifer Parker?”

“Yes.”

“My name is Adam Warner. I’m an attorney.”

Puzzled, Jennifer put the chain on the door and opened it a crack. The man standing in the hall was in his middle thirties, tall and blond and broad-shouldered, with gray-blue inquisitive eyes behind horn-rimmed glasses. He was dressed in a tailored suit that must have cost a fortune.

“May I come in?” he asked.

Muggers did not wear tailored suits, Gucci shoes and silk ties. Nor did they have long, sensitive hands with carefully manicured nails.

“Just a moment.”

Jennifer unfastened the chain and opened the door. As Adam Warner walked in, Jennifer glanced around the oneroom apartment, seeing it through his eyes, and winced. He looked like a man who was used to better things.

“What can I do for you, Mr. Warner?”

Even as she spoke, Jennifer suddenly knew why he was there, and she was filled with a quick sense of excitement. It was about one of the jobs she had applied for! She wished that she had on a nice, dark blue tailored robe, that her hair was combed, that—

Adam Warner said, “I’m a member of the Disciplinary Committee of the New York Bar Association, Miss Parker. District Attorney Robert Di Silva and Judge Lawrence Waldman have requested the Appellate Division to begin disbarment proceedings against you.”

4

The law offices of Needham, Finch, Pierce and Warner were located at 30 Wall Street, occupying the entire top floor of the building. There were a hundred and twenty-five lawyers in the firm. The offices smelled of old money and were done in the quiet elegance befitting an organization that represented some of the biggest names in industry.

Adam Warner and Stewart Needham were having their ritual morning tea. Stewart Needham was a dapper, trim man in his late sixties. He had a neat Vandyke beard and wore a tweed suit and vest. He looked as though he belonged to an older era, but as hundreds of opponents had learned to their sorrow through the years, Stewart Needham’s mind belonged very much to the twentieth century. He was a titan, but his name was known only in the circles where it mattered. He preferred to remain in the background and use his considerable influence to affect the outcome of legislation, high government appointments and national politics. He was a New Englander, born and reared taciturn.

Adam Warner was married to Needham’s niece Mary Beth, and was Needham’s protégé. Adam’s father had been a respected senator. Adam himself was a brilliant lawyer. When he had been graduated magna cum laudefrom Harvard Law School, he had had offers from prestigious law firms all over the country. He chose Needham, Finch and Pierce, and seven years later became a partner. Adam was physically attractive and charming, and his intelligence seemed to add an extra dimension to him. He had an easy sureness about himself that women found challenging. Adam had long since developed a system for dissuading overamorous female clients. He had been married to Mary Beth for fourteen years and did not approve of extramarital affairs.

“More tea, Adam?” Stewart Needham asked.

“No, thanks.” Adam Warner hated tea, and he had been drinking it every morning for the last eight years only because he did not want to hurt his partner’s feelings. It was a brew that Needham concocted himself and it was dreadful.

Stewart Needham had two things on his mind and, typically, he began with the pleasant news. “I had a meeting with a few friends last night,” Needham said. A few friendswould be a group of the top power brokers in the country. “They’re considering asking you to run for United States senator, Adam.”

Adam felt a sense of elation. Knowing Stewart Needham’s cautious nature, Adam was certain that the conversation had been more than casual or Needham would not have brought it up now.

“The big question, of course, is whether you’re interested. It would mean a lot of changes in your life.”

Adam Warner was aware of that. If he won the election, it would mean moving to Washington, D.C., giving up his law practice, starting a whole new life. He was sure that Mary Beth would enjoy it; Adam was not so sure about himself. And yet, he had been reared to assume responsibility. Also, he had to admit to himself that there was a pleasure in power.

“I’d be very interested, Stewart.”

Stewart Needham nodded with satisfaction. “Good. They’ll be pleased.” He poured himself another cup of the dreadful brew and casually broached the other subject that was on his mind. “There’s a little job the Disciplinary Committee of the Bar Association would like you to handle, Adam. Shouldn’t take you more than an hour or two.”

“What is it?”

“It’s the Michael Moretti trial. Apparently, someone got to one of Bobby Di Silva’s young assistants and paid her off.”

“I read about it. The canary.”

“Right. Judge Waldman and Bobby would like her name removed from the roster of our honorable profession. So would I. It reeks.”

“What do they want me to do?”

“Just make a quick check, verify that this Parker girl behaved illegally or unethically, and then recommend disbarment proceedings. She’ll be served with a notice to show cause and they’ll handle the rest of it. It’s just routine.”

Adam was puzzled by something. “Why me, Stewart? We have a couple of dozen young lawyers around here who could handle this.”

“Our revered District Attorney specifically asked for you. He wants to make sure nothing goes wrong. As we’re both aware,” he added dryly, “Bobby’s not the most forgiving man in the world. He wants the Parker woman’s hide nailed up on his wall.”

Adam Warner sat there, thinking about his busy schedule.

“You never know when we might need a favor from the D.A.’s office, Adam. Quid pro quo. It’s all cut and dried.”