“I?m not blaming you,” I said quickly. „Was it dropped before or after the trip with Lukatis?”
“I really don?t remember.”
“Guess.”
“You son of a bitch.”
“Well?”
“Probably after.”
“Beautiful. And Titan asked you to drop the case, right?”
She had to think about that one for a while.
“Not exactly,” she said. “He just didn?t come up with the goods for an indictment.”
“Fair enough,” I said. “Okay, we?re even, kiddo. By the way, I suggest you push for a no bond on
Donleavy. If I?m right, he probably has half a million dollars waiting for him in Panama. If he gets on
the street, he?1 turn rabbit.”
“Over my dead body,” she snapped.
“Don?t say that,” I groaned. “We?ve got enough of them already. Who knows, kiddo, you just might
ride the Raines case into the governor?s mansion.”
I winked at her as she scurried by and headed for the booking desk:
71
NANCE SHOWS HIS STRIPE
The Breezes reeked of money. The conservative, two-story townhouses were Williamsburg gray with
scarlet trim, and the walkways wound through ferns and flowering bushes that looked almost too good
to be real. Some intelligent contractor had left a lot of old oaks and pines on the development and
there wasn?t a car in sight; the garages were obviously built facing away from the street. The lawn
looked like it had been hand-trimmed with cuticle scissors.
There was a combined exit and entrance in the high iron-spike fence that enclosed the compound. It
was divided by an island with a guardhouse and around-the-clock guards. The one on duty, a tall
black weightlifter type, was starched into his tan uniform, and his black boots glistened like a
showroom Ferrari.
He looked at me through no-shit eyes and shifted his chewing gum from one cheek to the other. He
didn?t say anything.
“My name?s Kilmer, to see Mrs. Raines,” I said.
He checked over his clipboard, leafing through several sheets of paper, and shook his head.
“Not on the list,” he said.
