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No kidding. Not only is it five o’clock now. It’s a Friday afternoon.
What the jury just heard from Nick Morelli isn’t just the last thing they’ll hear from him today. It’s the last thing they’ll hear from him until Monday morning, about my client making out with Laurel Gates across from the Stephen Talkhouse. A girl young enough to be his daughter. And there’s not a thing I can do about it.
Ahearn winks on his way past Morelli, gets close enough to our table so that Rob Jacobson and I hear him say to us, “Spoiler alert: there’s more.”
Judge Jackson Prentice III breaks in. “We’ll reconvene on Monday morning. For now, court is adjourned.”
The clerk tells us all to rise. Prentice leaves. I can hear the buzz from the spectators behind me, like something just happened in the big game. I put a hand on Rob Jacobson’s shoulder and sit him back down.
Then I sit back down myself and lean close to him so I can whisper in his ear. “You lying son of a bitch.”
Fourteen
“I CAN EXPLAIN,” ROB JACOBSONsays as I nearly drag him into the attorney room. I grabbed him by the arm the last few feet in the hallway. In the moment, it’s not where I’d like to grab him, and then squeeze.
“You told me you didn’t know her,” I say, getting up in his face the minute I’ve slammed the door behind us.
I see the guard watching us closely from the other side of the glass, seeing us nose to nose. Like I am about to drop the gloves. I wave him away. Like:Get out ofmyface.
“Please let me explain,” Jacobson says.
He backs away from me until he has sat down on the other side of the table.
“Can’twait.”
I sit down myself and carefully place my clenched fists in my lap.
“I was drunk that night,” he says.
“That’s your defense? To your very own defense attorney?You’re not a college boy!You weredrunk? Do you honestly think that’s going to get you over on this? You’re on trial for a triple homicide. One of them was that kid you were swapping spit with, you dumb bastard.”
He holds up his hands, as if to cover up.
“I’m embarrassed that I was evenatthe Talkhouse andwasenough of a dumb bastard to walk out with her,” he says. “And just for the record? She was even drunker than I was.”
I keep my hands in my lap and wait for the urge to actually strangle him this time to subside. “Are we referring to the drunkdeadteenage girl here, Rob? That ought to play really well with the jury. I’ll be sure to mention that to them first chance I get.”
“I was never with her again after that one night,” he says.
“Trust me when I tell you: once was enough.”
“I really am sorry for not telling you about it.”
“You’re sorry. Got it. You’re sorry. There’s an old legal expression that covers this, Rob. Sorry doesn’t fix the goddamnlamp.” I stare at him across the narrow table. “Ahearn just said there’s more. Do you know what he might be talking about, or is he just screwing with me?”
He hesitates briefly. But then shakes his head. “That’s all there is,” he says. “She finally went back across the street, and I came to my senses enough to go home.”
I lean across the table. “You better not be lying to me again.”
“I didn’t lie to you in the first place,” he says. “It’s like I said. I just held back something that embarrassed the living shit out of me and hoped would never come up.”
“A distinction without a difference.”
“Listen,” he says, “I understand that you’re pissed that you have to wait all weekend to rip into him. But I know that when you do, you’re going to kill the guy.”
I don’t get the chance.
Jimmy Cunniff calls me around noon the next day and says, “We got ourselves a situation.”
