Blood Defense | страница 9
Deshawn’s shoulders drooped and he gave me a glum look. He motioned to the others. “Come on. Let’s go.”
Lil’ J leaned toward me. “Hey, uh, you got a card or something?” The others chimed in. “Yeah.” “I’ll take one.” “Me, too.”
I passed my cards around. “Cash retainers only, no checks, no credit cards.” I doubted that they’d be able to swing my fee, but I didn’t want to discourage what was probably the only responsible thing they’d manage to do that month-or that year.
They started to walk away, but Deshawn paused. He looked up and down the street, stepped back, and whispered, “Anybody else gives you trouble, you call me. Hear?”
THREE
The next day, I finished my morning round of court appearances early and got back to the office in time for lunch. Michelle had brought in my favorite: coffee.
I pulled up the old secretary’s chair I’d liberated from the public defender’s office when I quit to go into private practice and sat next to her desk. “Nice Scünci.” This one was red and blue-color coordinated with her cobalt-blue sweater. She always wore her hair up in a ponytail, and I always gave her shit about it. Michelle has the kind of fresh-faced, cheerleader-y looks that still gets her carded at bars. And the tiny scar over her left eye-courtesy of the mugger who’d pistol-whipped her nine years ago-only heightened the effect.
Michelle shot me a look. “Shut up. Jury on Ringer still out?” I nodded. “They asking any questions?”
“Not a peep.” Which was not a good sign. A quiet jury is a convicting jury.
The whomp whomp of a ghetto bird fired up. A daily-and nightly-occurrence in this ’hood. I picked this office because it was cheap and close to the Van Nuys courthouse. It seemed like a win-win, until I found out the building was smack-dab in the heart of Barrios Van Nuys turf, one of the biggest gangs in the county.
Michelle was saying something, but I couldn’t hear her over the din of the helicopters. I shook my head and pointed to the ceiling.
Michelle shouted. “How’d he do on the stand?”
“Not bad.” For a rapist-bully-asshole. His eighteen-year-old victim, Aidan Mandy, a homeless kid Ringer had found hanging around a fast-food joint looking for a handout-money, food, or drugs-had a prior bust for solicitation. So Ringer’s claim that it’d been a consensual business deal might’ve been a winning gambit. Except Aidan wound up in the emergency room with injuries so bad it’d take years before he fully recovered-if he ever did.