The Lincoln lawyer - By Michael Connelly Page 0,83

a prospective buyer she was supposed to meet there,” I said. “He was already in the house?”

He brought his eyes up to mine.

“Yes. Somehow he had already gotten in and was waiting for her. It was terrible.”

I nodded. I didn’t want to go further with him at the moment. I wanted him out of my house.

“Listen, thank you for your offer, Louis. Now if you would excuse me, I want to go to bed. It’s been a long day.”

I gestured with my free hand toward the hallway leading to the front of the house. Roulet got up from the desk chair and came toward me. I backed into the hallway and then into the open door of my bedroom. I kept the knife behind me and ready. But Roulet passed by without incident.

“And tomorrow you have your daughter to entertain,” he said.

That froze me. He had listened to the call from Maggie. I didn’t say anything. He did.

“I didn’t know you had a daughter, Mick. That must be nice.”

He glanced back at me, smiling as he moved down the hall.

“She’s beautiful,” he said.

My inertia turned to momentum. I stepped into the hall and started following him, anger building with each step. I gripped the knife tightly.

“How do you know what she looks like?” I demanded.

He stopped and I stopped. He looked down at the knife in my hand and then at my face. He spoke calmly.

“The picture of her on your desk.”

I had forgotten about the photo. A small framed shot of her in a teacup at Disneyland.

“Oh,” I said.

He smiled, knowing what I had been thinking.

“Good night, Mick. Enjoy your daughter tomorrow. You probably don’t get to see her enough.”

He turned and crossed the living room and opened the front door. He looked back at me before stepping out.

“What you need is a good lawyer,” he said. “One that will get you custody.”

“No. She’s better off with her mother.”

“Good night, Mick. Thanks for the conversation.”

“Good night, Louis.”

I stepped forward to close the door.

“Nice view,” he said from out on the front porch.

“Yeah,” I said as I closed and locked the door.

I stood there with my hand on the knob, waiting to hear his steps going down the stairs to the street. But a few moments later he knocked on the door. I closed my eyes, held the knife at the ready and opened it. Roulet raised his hand out. I took a step back.

“Your key,” he said. “I figured you should have it.”

I took the key off his outstretched palm.

“Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.”

I closed the door and locked it once again.

Tuesday, April 12

TWENTY-TWO

T he day started better than any defense attorney could ask for. I had no courtroom to be in, no client to meet. I slept late, spent the morning reading the newspaper cover to cover and had a box ticket to the home opener of the Los Angeles Dodgers baseball season. It was a day game and a time-honored tradition among those on the defense side of the aisle to attend. My ticket had come from Raul Levin, who was taking five of the defense pros he did work for to the game as a gesture of thanks for their business. I was sure the others would grumble and complain at the game about how I was monopolizing Levin as I prepared for the Roulet trial. But I wasn’t going to let it bother me.

We were in the outwardly slow time before trial, when the machine moves with a steady, quiet momentum. Louis Roulet’s trial was set to begin in a month. As it was growing nearer I was taking on fewer and fewer clients. I needed the time to prepare and strategize. Though the trial was weeks away it would likely be won or lost with the information gathered now. I needed to keep my schedule clear for this. I took cases from repeat customers only—and only if the money was right and it came up front.

A trial was a slingshot. The key was in the preparation. Pretrial is when the sling is loaded with the proper stone and slowly the elastic is pulled back and stretched to its limit. Finally, at trial you let it go and the projectile shoots forward, unerringly at the target. The target is acquittal. Not guilty. You only hit that target if you have properly chosen the stone and pulled back carefully on the sling, stretching it as far as possible.

Levin was doing most of the stretching. He had continued to