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But the firm collapsed during Clay’s last year of law school, and his father left town. That was another story. Clay became a public defender because there were no other last-second jobs to grab.
It took him three years to jockey and co
He tossed the Tequila Watson file on his very clean and very neat desk and took off his jacket. It would have been easy, in the midst of such dismal surroundings, to let the place go, to let the files and papers pile up, to clutter his office and blame it on being overworked and understaffed. But his father had believed that an organized desk was a sign of an organized mind. If you couldn’t find something in thirty seconds, you were losing money, his father always said. Return phone calls immediately was another rule Clay had been taught to obey.
So he was fastidious about his desk and office, much to the amusement of his harried colleagues. His Georgetown Law School diploma hung in a handsome frame in the center of a wall. For the first two years at OPD he had refused to display the diploma for fear that the other lawyers would wonder why someone from Georgetown was working for minimum wages. For the experience, he told himself, I’m here for the experience. A trial every month—tough trials against tough prosecutors in front of tough juries. For the down-in-the-gutter, bareknuckle training that no big firm could provide. The money would come later, when he was a battle-hardened litigator at a very young age.
He stared at the thin Watson file in the center of his desk and wondered how he might unload it on someone else. He was tired of the tough cases and the superb training and all the other crap that he put up with as an underpaid PD.
There were six pink phone message slips on his desk; five related to business, one from Rebecca, his longtime girlfriend. He called her first.
“I’m very busy,” she informed him after the required initial pleasantries.
“You called me,” Clay said.
“Yes, I can only talk a minute or so.” Rebecca worked as an assistant to a low-ranking Congressman who was the chairman of some useless subcommittee. But because he was the chairman he had an additional office he was required to staff with people like Rebecca who was in a frenzy all day preparing for the next round of hearings that no one would attend. Her father had pulled strings to get her the job.
“I’m kinda swamped too,” Clay said. “Just picked up another murder case.” He managed to add a measure of pride to this, as if he were honored to be the attorney for Tequila Watson.
It was a game they played: Who was the busiest? Who was the most important? Who worked the hardest? Who had the most pressure?
“Tomorrow is my mother’s birthday,” she said, pausing slightly as if Clay was supposed to know this. He did not. He cared not. He didn’t like her mother. “They’ve invited us to di
A bad day just got worse. The only response he could possibly give was, “Sure.” And a quick one at that.
“Around seven. Coat and tie.”
“Of course.” I’d rather have di
“I gotta run,” she said. “See you then. Love you.”
“Love you.”
It was a typical conversation between the two, just a few quick lines before rushing off to save the world. He looked at her photo on his desk. Their romance came with enough complications to sink ten marriages. His father had once sued her father, and who won and who lost would never be clear. Her family claimed origins in old Alexandria society; he’d been an Army brat. They were right-wing Republicans, he was not. Her father was known as Be
For almost four years, the romance had survived a monthly brawl, the majority of them engineered by her mother. It clung to life by love and lust and a determination to succeed regardless of the odds against it. But Clay sensed a fatigue on Rebecca’s part, a creeping weariness brought on by age and constant family pressure. She was twenty-eight. She did not want a career. She wanted a husband and a family and long days spent at the country club spoiling the children, playing te
Paulette Tullos appeared from thin air and startled him. “Got nailed, didn’t you?” she said with a smirk. “A new murder case.”
“You were there?” Clay asked.
“Saw it all. Saw it coming, saw it happen, couldn’t save you, pal.”
“Thanks. I owe you one.”
He would have offered her a seat, but there were no others in his office. There was no room for chairs and besides they were not needed because all of his clients were in jail. Sitting and chatting were not part of the daily routine at OPD.
“What are my chances of getting rid of it?” he said.
“Slim to impossible. Who you go
“I was thinking of you.”
“Sorry. I got two murder cases already. Glenda won’t move it for you.”
Paulette was his closest friend inside the OPD. A product of a rough section of the city, she had scratched her way through college and law school at night and had seemed destined for the middle classes until she met an older Greek gentleman with a fondness for young black women. He married her and set her up comfortably in North West Washington, then eventually returned to Europe, where he preferred to live. Paulette suspected he had a wife or two over there, but she wasn’t particularly concerned about it. She was well-off and seldom alone. After ten years, the arrangement was working fine.
“I heard the prosecutors talking,” she said. “Another street killing, but questionable motive.”
“Not exactly the first one in the history of D.C.”
“But no apparent motive.”
“There’s always a motive—cash, drugs, sex, a new pair of Nikes.”
“But the kid was pretty tame, no history of violence?”
“First impressions are seldom true, Paulette, you know that.”
“Jermaine got one very similar two days ago. No apparent motive.”
“I hadn’t heard.”
“You might try him. He’s new and ambitious and, who knows, you might dump it on him.”
“I’ll do it right now.”
Jermaine wasn’t in but Glenda’s door, for some reason, was slightly open. Clay rapped it with his knuckles while walking through it. “Got a minute?” he said, knowing that Glenda hated sparing a minute with anyone on her staff. She did a passable job ru
“Sure,” she said abruptly, with no conviction whatsoever. It was clear she did not appreciate the intrusion, which was exactly the reception Clay had expected.
“I happened to be in the Criminal Division this morning at the wrong time, got nailed with a murder case, one I’d rather pass on. I just finished the Traxel case, which, as you know, lasted for almost three years. I need a break from murder. How about one of the younger guys?”