“You don’t look good,” she informs me. “You haven’t.”
“Flattery will get you nowhere.” I pick up a stack of envelopes. “Mail already?”
“That’s yesterday’s mail.”
“Oh, goody.” I put it down and massage my temples, not unaware of a very disapproving look being cast in my direction. “Aspirin, Betty. Your boss needs aspirin.” When I sense the utter lack of response from her, I look up at her. Her arms are crossed, one foot eagerly tapping the carpet. “What?”
“The present,” she says. “And the card.”
“Okay, right.”
“You don’t remember what the present is, do you?”
“Of course I do,” I say, falling back in my chair. “It was a basketball signed by the ‘84 Celtics after they took the Lakers in seven. Bird, Parrish, McHale, Johnson, Maxwell, Ainge, Hen derson…”
Betty frowns. “It was a pinot noir from Willamette Valley.”
“That was my next guess.”
Her eyebrows lift. “And where’s the pinot?”
“Lightner and I drank it the other night.”
She shakes her head and waves me off. Instead of leaving, she stops, considers something a moment, pivots and stares at me. “I’m going to ask you a question. And I want an honest answer.”
“Thanks for the heads-up.” I root around my desk drawers for a painkiller. Again, a pregnant pause from my assistant, meaning she wants my attention. “The question, Betty, the question. The suspense is killing me.”
“You should go home and sleep.”
“That’s not a question. That’s an opinion.” Here we go, a bottle of Excedrin. I pop four out of the bottle and swallow them dry just as I remember that I have a bottle of water in my private fridge, about three feet away from me.
Betty asks, “How many days has it been since you and Shelly broke up? And don’t tell me you don’t know.”
I shrug. “Couple months, maybe.”
She raises her eyebrows.
“Sixty-three days,” I concede.
“Can you name a single day, out of those sixty-three, when you didn’t have a drink?”
“You already used up your question.” I swallow half the bottle of water in a single gulp, then press the cold, sweaty plastic against my cheek. “You’re not my mother, Bettina; you’re my assistant. So go and assist me, please.”
Jerry Lazarus, one of the young partners at the firm, sticks his head into my office. “Can I interrupt?”
“Oh, please do, Laz. For God’s sake, please do.”
Betty walks off after giving me a stare that would freeze the sun.
“We’re ready on Lysinger. Local counsel’s ready to find a judge.” Lazarus nods at my desk. “You see the brief?”
“Oh. No,” I admit, leafing through a small pile on my desk. One of the many subsidiaries owned by Harland’s BentleyCo is a company called Bentley Manufacturing, which makes industrial equipment for fast-food restaurants. A restaurant chain in Texas is looking to break the contract, so we’re beating them to the punch, seeking an injunction that keeps them from doing so. Blah, blah, blah. Civil litigation sucks.
I find the brief and wave it. “How different is this from the last draft?”
“Not much,” Jerry says. “We added the tortious interference count.”
“Who did?”
“Lance.” Jerry nods. “But I looked it over. We’re good.”
One of our associates-the grinder-drafted it, and probably researched through the night before doing so. Then my young partner here, Jerry-the minder-thoroughly reviewed it. Now I-the finder, meaning it’s my client-will look it over as well before we send it out. And Harland Bentley will gladly pay the tab for all of the overlap. Civil litigation is the best.
“We hooping tomorrow?” I ask Jerry. Our regular game, every Wednesday at lunch.
He shrugs. “Not sure about that, boss. I’m a little worried about it.”
“Worried? Your wife didn’t give you permission?”
“Worried,” he says, “because my future here might be in jeopardy if I keep taking you to school like last week. I think your jockstrap is still on the court.”
“Lazarus.” I finish my water and smack my lips in satisfaction. “If you could post up half as well as you sling bullshit, you might get a shot off once in a while.” I wave him off. “Now, go practice law. Or practice your outside jumper. Something that doesn’t involve you being in my office.”
“See you in-five minutes,” he says.
Yeah, shit, I have to go to that meeting. At this point in my career, it’s ninety-five percent oversight on this work. The lawyers under me are more than capable. I guide them with strategy, but this stuff isn’t rocket science. I’m there for the profile stuff-major hearings and the very rare instance that we go to trial, but the only thing that involves me personally much anymore is the criminal stuff.
I do a quick run through the mail. Much of it is obviously junk mail or requests for money from charitable foundations. I set the charity mail to one side, because we have a committee that decides where we direct our money. We have committees for everything.
But then there is another letter with a handwritten address-looks generally like the same penmanship, same thick ink pen. Local postmark again. I turn the envelope upside down and let the letter fall out. For some reason, I open it carefully, touching only the corner of the paper:
I will inevitably lose life. Ultimately, sorrow echoes the heavens. Ever sensing. Ever calling out. Never does vindication ever really surrender easily. The immediate messenger endures the opposition, but understanding requires new and loving betrayal and new yearning.
My laugh is uncomfortable. There is no doubt this is the same handwriting as the last one. Creepy, this guy. I guess it’s the anniversary of Burgos. Is that what this is about? Sorrow echoes the heavens? Understanding requires new and loving betrayal and new yearning? Who the hell is this guy?
I pull out the other letter, which I’ve kept, for comparison:
If new evil emerges, do heathens ever link past actions? God’s answer is near.
Yep. Same precise handwriting. Same freakish, pseudoreligious spiritual drivel. It rings familiar, too, but I can’t place it.
My intercom buzzes. “Yeah, Betty?”
“Mr. Bentley for you.”
“Sure.” She rings the call through and I answer. It’s Harland’s assistant-or one of them, he has three-asking if I can meet him tonight. I say yes and get the details, without asking why Harland couldn’t call me himself.
As I hang up the phone, I notice the blinking message light on my phone. The first message is from that reporter, Evelyn Pendry, reiterating that she’d like to speak with me. When I play the second message, my breathing halts. It is the voice of my one and only, speaking in a hushed tone, with the sounds of the office in the background.
“I thought we could have that conversation.” Shelly, in a soft, workplace voice. “The usual place and time?”
THE KEY, see, is to get along, go along, live in their world, pretend that all you see is what they see. Walk up to a hot dog vendor and order, just like anyone else, Polish with relish, bottle of water, put your face up to the sun like you enjoy it.
Here he is. Coming through the revolving door, no briefcase, bouncing down the stairs with a purpose, the great Paul Riley, the man given credit for stopping Terry.
Leo tosses the hot dog into a trash can, takes a swig from the water bottle, tosses that, too, follows Riley on foot, moving from a warm, sunny spot into the shadows of the high-rises. He looks up to the rooftops, but it’s not like they’d show themselves.