“Tony would,” I say.

She smiles a little concession. Talia’s no stranger to the jokes at Tony’s expense that have, over the years, made the rounds at the firm.

“But I have no money,” she says.

“What?”

Well, you know I’ve sunk everything I have into those partnerships in commercial real estate you helped me with. And now with Ben’s death everything else I own is tied up.”

“What about the interest in the firm?”

“Tony’s willing to buy,” she says, “but I can’t make a sale “til probate’s finished.”

“What about the house?”

“Community property,” she says. “I can maybe borrow against my half, that’s all. That’s why I had to go to Tony. He was the only one who could help. Ever since Ben died, I’ve barely been making it on the money from my commissions. Now this. I have no money for legal fees.”

With the widow in a fix, Skarpellos has been busy setting up his table and playing money-changer.

“Tony’s paying for Cheetam?”

She nods. “It’s a loan. He says I can pay him back from Ben’s interest in the firm when this is over and …” Her voice trails off as if she’s suddenly considered some other scenario, one without a happy ending.

We’re wandering in the dark office now, pacing like shadow-boxers in opposite corners.

“You don’t really believe it?”

I look at her, my head cocked, like a dog that’s heard a strange sound.

“That I did it?” she says. “That I could be capable of such a thing?” This is important to her, my belief in her innocence.

I shake my head, quickly, without hesitation. It’s the truth, I don’t believe it. But even if I did, I wouldn’t say so, not to Talia, not to anyone. To do so would be to suborn perjury in the event it becomes necessary to put Talia on the stand in her own defense. I’ve learned the credo of the good defense lawyer: It’s better not to know.

“Then you’ll help me?”

I nod.

She smiles broadly and suddenly she closes the distance. Her arms are around my neck, her warm cheek pressed to mine.

“Thank you,” she says. “I didn’t know who else to trust.”

There’s a warm wetness on my face, like blood-Talia’s tears. A feminine hand caresses the nape of my neck, long slender fingers. As she leans against me I can feel the point of her knee flexing, probing at my thighs, her body molded to my own.

My arms are at my sides, loose, limp. She senses an uneasiness. It’s conveyed in my lack of response.

She moves away from me now, a show of reserve, a little quick composure. “I don’t know how to thank you.” She’s retreating as if in defeat. Her back is to me now. She’s rummaging through her purse. She turns, dabbing her eyes with a Kleenex. For our relationship, this is a first, Talia at a loss about how to show her gratitude.

‘Tell me,” she says. “What do you really think? What are my chances?”

“Ask me in a week, after I’ve seen the evidence.”

“I know you’ll tell me the truth.” She’s applying a little makeup from the compact taken from her purse.

“You can bank on it,” I say.

She looks at me as if this assurance is a little harsh.

I tell her that she will not get sugar coating, not from me, that this is serious business.

It’s a stiff upper lip from Talia. “Absolutely,” she says. “That’s the way I want it.”

“It’s the only way it’ll work.”

She nods, a stoic demonstration of her assent. But her eyes are two tiny slits of resentment. Talia’s never seen this from me before. I have, for the first time since we’ve known each other, challenged her feminine wiles, her ability to fire my libido, to paralyze my reason with passion.

“You’ll tell Mr. Cheetam,” she says, “that you’ve agreed to help?”

“I’ll tell him.”

She starts for the door.

“One more question,” I say.

Talia turns.

“I don’t understand. Why don’t you have free access to Ben’s estate?”

“There’s a prenuptial agreement,” she says. “The executor won’t allow me to touch any of Ben’s holdings until all of this is cleared up.”

Before I can say more she’s gone, like a wisp in the wind. There’s only the shadow of the closing door, and the knowledge that at least in reviewing the evidence against her, I will not have to search far for a motive.

CHAPTER 13

I’m rummaging through the house trying to pick up before Sarah’s birthday party. Nikki has graciously consented to have the festivities here at the house with all of my daughter’s little friends. I am dusting the sofa-back table and my gaze fixes on it, the picture of Nikki and me in happier days, before we were married.

I think back to the first time I saw her, standing there next to the campus pool, a biology text under her arm, wearing a skimpy bikini that left little to the imagination. I knew I was in love. I listened to her animated conversation, watched the tilt of her head in the bright sun as she talked with friends, and felt a charge of hormones whenever she giggled.

Then, her hair was light, streaked with gold from the sun, not the salt-and-pepper that came later, after years of marriage and a child. She wore it long and straight, flipped under at the ends, her fingers constantly sweeping it back behind one ear. She cut an image of unmistakable class. Nikki, tanned like a bronze goddess, just a few freckles on the cheeks like the dappled spots on a fawn.

Word was out in the circle in which I ran that I was smitten. I would follow her to the library and jockey for a study carrel close so I could watch her. One evening I saw her return to the dorm after a date with another guy. He was tall and poised-and rich. I watched as he walked her from his gleaming Corvette to the door. Then I saw her peck him on the lips, a good-night kiss. I felt a great weight sagging in my chest, as if my heart were suddenly pumping lead.

One evening, after weeks of watching in silent pain, I gathered my courage, marched to the library, to the inside bridge over the foyer, approached Nikki and asked, in a voice that cracked with indecision and the fear of failure, if anyone was occupying the lounge chair beside hers. She looked at me, confident, and said simply, “No.” Then, smiling, she patted the seat with her hand, offering me a place to sit as if somehow I was expected.

That evening we walked back to the dorms together under a canopy of redwoods sprinkled with openings revealing stars and the night-sky haze of the Milky Way. We stopped at the coffee house by the bookstore. I gained more confidence as she laughed, seemingly amused by the innocuous little things I said. And as we left the place, odors of spice and espresso mingling with the fragrance of cedars and redwood, my hand found hers, waiting and warm.

In the days that followed I sensed, in the titter of her female friends when we were together, that I’d been an item with this group of giddy girls before my campaign with Nikki in the library. In this thought there was pleasure, a satisfaction that my long-laboring fantasies of this golden girl had in fact been mutual.

Not all of this mystery and desire is gone. Even now, Nikki is her most sensual when she’s angry, as she is this moment with me.

“How can you do this? You’re a bastard, you know that?” Her hands are on her hips; her legs still slender and strong, she stands in front of me blocking the hall to the kitchen, her lower body molded in a pair of skin-tight jeans.

I jockey to get around her. My hands are filled with paper plates of half-eaten birthday cake and dribbling ice cream.

“She’s a client,” I tell her, my voice low so the others out in the living room won’t hear.

“Spare me,” she says.

My peace offering, it seems, has gone sour. My invitation to have Sarah’s birthday party here in the more spacious house which had been our home before Nikki left me is being wrecked by the news that I’m now representing Talia. It hit the papers that morning, and Nikki’s been on my case like a heat-seeking missile since she arrived.