“I remember,” Lassiter said. “You were the only one who thought to look at the intravenous tube.”
“Hard to miss under the microscope, a hole made by a syringe. Then I checked the spinal fluid. Sugar count way too low. The attending nurse had a locker stashed full of insulin and a psychiatric history as long as your arm.”
Jake Lassiter smiled. “You’re the best canoe maker… sorry, coroner, this town has ever had. No one can speak for the dead like you.”
Doc Riggs gave Lassiter an affectionate shoulder squeeze.
“I remember when you saved my ass in Dr. Salisbury’s murder trial,” Lassiter continued, “figuring out what ruptured Philip Corrigan’s aorta.”
“Kind of you to mention it.”
“My adrenaline was pumping then, Charlie. Just like the old days in the PD’s office.”
Charlie Riggs took the cold pipe from his mouth and jabbed it toward Lassiter’s chest. “You were alive then. Bring it back, Jake, that same fervor. Even when we were on opposite sides, I always respected you. You defended vigorously, hell, you were tough, but you never manufactured evidence or suborned perjury. You were also a great cross-examiner.”
“A left-handed compliment, Charlie. Telling me my life’s not worth a hot damn anymore.”
“Someday you’ll thank me for helping you out. Defending DES cases, for crying out loud! What’s next, representing asbestos manufacturers?”
Charlie Riggs tamped some fresh tobacco into his pipe and struggled to light it. “I’m sorry to be so tough on you, Jake. It’s only because we’re friends. Now, better get back in there. That little prick — doctus cum libro, nothing but book learning — is liable to say anything.”
That was it, Lassiter thought. Winston Prick Hopkins.
When Lassiter eased back into the Brazilian leather chair, he found Winston Hopkins trying to chisel away at the widower’s damage claim.
“Prior to her death, weren’t you and your wife contemplating divorce?” Hopkins asked in the smart-ass tone young lawyers mistake for toughness.
The sergeant’s eyes shot to his own lawyer, then to Hopkins. “No, of course not. We have a baby.”
“But you sought marriage counseling?”
“We sought counseling from our minister after Gladys became ill.”
“For marital problems.”
“No. She was depressed. We needed to — “
“To discuss a divorce.”
The sergeant’s closely shaved cheeks flushed just below his ears, and the muscles of his jaws tensed. “Hell no!”
Stuart Zeman, wide awake now, slapped the table and leaned toward the court reporter, who was bent over her silent machine. “Objection. I think we’ve heard just about enough on that subject, Mr. Hopkins. Please move on.”
“Well, Mr. Zeman, your client here claims a ton of money for mental anguish at his wife’s death, and if I can demonstrate that this marriage was washed up, that’s a relevant line of inquiry…”
Lassiter figured he should tell the jerk there’s a difference between being aggressive and being an asshole, but he didn’t have time. The sergeant had a lot of quick for a big man. He flew across the conference table and grabbed the Ivy Leaguer by his noodle neck. There was that moment of disbelief when everything stops dead, Lassiter watching Hopkins’s eyes bulge, the sergeant’s hands — powerful, working-guy hands — squeezing, then the moment when Lassiter could have stepped in but didn’t, silently hoping the sergeant would extract Hopkins’s Adam’s apple with his bare hands. Then, and it all took no more than five seconds, Lassiter moved, coming up behind them. They were wedged into a corner of the room, Hopkins bent backward, his buttocks hanging over a rubber plant, his head being smacked repeatedly — thwack, thwack — against the herringbone fabric of the deposition room wall.
Lassiter put one hand on the sergeant’s meaty shoulder and squeezed hard, just to let him know he was there. “Okay, fun’s over. Let’s everyone sit down.”
The sergeant let go with his right hand, and Hopkins toppled into the rubber plant, a gurgling sound stuck in his throat. Lassiter relaxed and never saw it coming, a lightning Yoko Hijiate, the sergeant’s elbow smashing into his ribs from a foot away. The pain shot through Lassiter’s chest, and he gasped.
The sergeant turned to face Lassiter head-on. “You peckerhead lawyers, with all your fancy words and fancy cars and fancy watches…”
Lassiter was holding his side, sucking in shallow breaths. “Sergeant, I drive a twenty-six-year-old convertible with leaky canvas, my vocabulary is limited, and my watch is forty bucks, though it’s good to a depth of a hundred feet. I’m just an ex-second-string linebacker trying to do my best in an imperfect world.”
The sergeant laughed, but there was no pleasure behind it. “Linebackers! Standing up straight, roaming around like they was posing for the cheerleaders. Not like in the pits. Real men gouging, cursing, eating bucketfuls of mud, ending up with your face in some nose guard’s crotch.”
“Given a choice,” Lassiter said, “I’ll take the cheerleaders.”
The sergeant growled and dropped into a three-point stance, his thick right hand sinking into the plush, burgundy carpet. “Strong side tackle. Blew out a knee my second year at Clemson. Coulda been All-ACC. Maybe it’s time for a comeback. C’mon. Let’s go.”
“Nah, I always hated practice.”
“C’mon. You know the one-on-one, nutcracker drill.”
“Sure, but it’s done with a ballcarrier behind the offensive lineman. The linebacker plays off the block and makes the tackle.”
“Shitface there can carry the ball,” the sergeant said, moving his head in the direction of the prone Winston Hopkins.
Hopkins whined something unintelligible.
Lassiter said, “Winnie, want to grab your dainty Italian briefcase and pretend it’s a ball?”
Hopkins shook his head and mouthed the word “no.”
“He’s taking a medical redshirt,” Lassiter said. “Probably has fumbleitis anyway.”
The sergeant was still in a three-point stance, head up, waiting for some imaginary quarterback to call the signals. “Then it’s just you and me, Mister Linebacker.”
Lassiter studied him, planning to keep talking until the sergeant returned to Planet Earth. But the man’s eyes were glazed and his breath was coming hard. A little extra baggage around the waist, maybe 250, but a meaty chest and granite shoulders, arms straining against his government-issue shirt, epaulets stretched tight.
Lassiter moved close and stood facing him, legs spread, arms hanging slightly in front of his body, knees flexed. No one cheered.
“Let the record reflect we have taken a short recess,” Lassiter said to the court reporter, who looked at her watch, and dutifully recorded the time of the break.
“Jake, I don’t think you should…” Stuart Zeman was saying, fiddling with a Lady Justice cuff link of gold, black onyx, and diamonds.
“Fifty-two, gap tough rotate,” Lassiter heard himself say, signaling a short yardage defense.
“Set, hut-hut-hut…” the sergeant intoned.
“Stand ‘em up!” a voice thundered in Jake Lassiter’s mind, Coach Shula shouting instructions from a distant sideline.
“Hut-hut,” the sergeant barked, then fired out straight and low.
Lassiter squared up and delivered a shoulder-high blow with open palms. His wrists howled with pain, but he stood the sergeant straight for a moment. It wouldn’t last. Using his weight advantage, the sergeant ducked low, put a shoulder into Lassiter’s gut, and slammed him into the cushioned wall with a thud.
Lassiter grunted, shook it off, and said, “Okay, you win.”
“Again,” the sergeant said.
Zeman groaned. Hopkins whimpered. Lassiter shrugged as if to say why not. This time, the sergeant fired out and hooked an arm around Lassiter’s elbow — offensive holding — and was about to drive him in the general direction of Key Largo when Lassiter slid to the right, caught the sergeant off-balance, and slung him sideways against the wall. The crash left two Frederic Remington originals dangling cockeyed.