names on up in front of him. 'You also said that in twenty years or so of practice, you hadn't ever seen anybody take it out on the lawyers.'
'True. But I'm seeing it now.'
Blanca quickly took in his disheveled appearance again. 'So you got a name now?'
'Wade Panos.'
Blanca reacted almost as if he'd been struck. 'The Patrol Special? Actually, the king of the Patrol Specials?' He put his pencil down.
'His people. Especially a thug-I think he's Wade's nephew-named Nick Sephia.'
Blanca didn't need to consult any notes. 'I've heard of him.'
'I'm not surprised. When he worked for his uncle, his specialty was planting dope on working girls, but he's been known to hit people, too. Now he's muscle for the Diamond Center. A real sweetheart.' Finding a receptive official audience a nice change of pace, Hardy leaned back in his chair. 'Jackman tells me you got a partner to help with the Freeman investigation.'
'Yeah,' Blanca said, 'but what investigation? We don't got witness one to interview and Freeman still isn't telling us anything.' He looked up with some real sadness. 'Anyway, even with CSI going over the place a second time, we got nothing, and I mean nothing. So unless somebody walks in off the street and confesses, the investigation as you call it is closed.'
'I was thinking maybe what just happened to me might reopen it. If there were two of you, maybe you could shake a tree or two. At least see if Sephia's got an alibi.'
Blanca shook his head skeptically. 'That's an awful cold trail, and if he had partners, they'd cover each other anyway.'
'Okay, but I'm not a cold trail. Somebody shot at me in the last two hours. Sephia's someplace to start. Maybe you can find out what he was doing.'
'No maybe about it. But you didn't see him?'
Hardy shook his head. 'I saw the car. Gray sedan, late model. Then the gun, which I'm afraid took all of my attention.'
Blanca chuckled. 'Yeah, they tend to do that.'
'I guess I just wanted to put what's happened to me on your radar as part of Freeman. Which, of course, I can't prove. But if you could find anything, either up at Coit Tower or talking to Sephia…'
'Hey, I'm hearing you. I'm on it.'
It wasn't the kind of story he was dying to tell his wife. In a fair, just, and kind world, she wouldn't have been home in the middle of this Friday afternoon, and he could run upstairs, shower, change into a new suit or even some hangout clothes-'Oh, with David out of the office, there wasn't much to do, so I thought I'd spend some extra time with you and the darlings.' He could bury his ruined clothes under something in the garbage can, explain away his scrapes with a humorous anecdote about one of his client's vicious cats.
Except that Frannie was sitting on some cushions in the bay window in the living room, studying, and saw him when he got up on the porch. She made it to the door and opened it before he did. 'What happened?'
'It's not as bad as it looks,' he said.
Twenty minutes later, he was soaking in a hot bath upstairs. Aside from the scratches on his hands and his face, the upper right quarter of his back was badly scraped and already swollen. Frannie sat on the edge of the tub, twisting a towel anxiously as they talked. 'I must be missing something, then,' she said. 'So who shot Silverman?'
'That I don't know. Not specifically. Maybe Sephia.'
'Which gets you to Panos?'
'Right, maybe, if he even knew about it.' He let out a breath. 'But there were three of them. And another problem. I've got the same people killing Silverman and Creed, right?'
'Okay.'
'So why did Creed have to get killed?'
'So he wouldn't get to tell the homicide cops he wasn't sure about identifying John and his friends.'
'Right. And who does that benefit?'
'The real killers, whoever they might be.'
'Exactly. So then they decide-actually, they probably decided at the same time as Creed-if they do away with Terry and Wills, it's going to look like John. It's got to. The cops still were working with the three names and there's nobody else left. So they plant the Silverman/Creed gun and some of the Silverman loot in both places and bingo.'
'But they really don't want John arrested.'
'No. They want him dead. Then all the questions stop because there's nobody around to ask them. It's just low-lifes purging each other from the gene pool. It's a tightly wrapped, self-contained case, and everybody involved is dead.'
'Not exactly. There's still you.'
He looked up at her, shaking his head. 'They had us both there for a minute…'
'But how could they have known about that? That you'd be together?'
'I don't know for sure, but I'd bet they figured John would eventually come to my office, or I'd go to him, so they just decided they'd tail me for a while. And everything worked like a dream. Except I saw them in time.'
'So if it isn't about David's case after all, why did they attack him?'
'Or us, for that matter, with the windshield. Maybe it's both.'
'That seems like such a reach, Dismas. I'm sorry, but it really does.'
Hardy nodded ruefully. 'Those were Jackman's exact words, I believe.'
'And planting evidence in two apartments? Does that really happen? Are you sure John wasn't at Silverman's?'
He hesitated, then shook his head. 'No.'
'Or that this Nick Sephia was?'
No answer.
Frannie tsked, twisted the towel some more, stood up and walked over to the door. 'I mean, I can't imagine John killing anybody either, but…'
'He sure didn't kill his bartender and his boyfriend, Frannie. Not that way. I don't believe that.'
'Okay. I can't see that either.' She turned back to face him. 'Maybe you could talk to the man who's got Abe's old job.'
'No. That's not going to happen.'
'Why not?'
'Because he's got a suspect and I'm the guy's lawyer. My only function is to deliver John so they can arrest him. As I mentioned to you the other night, as a defense attorney, I have no interest in justice, only in getting my client off.'
'But Abe used to talk to you about cases.'
'And it's one of the things I always loved about him. But it got him in trouble more than once and he's already told me he won't talk about this one.'
'He might, though, when he finds out they shot at you. That might make it different.'
He shifted in the tub and an involuntary groan escaped. Finally, he got through the pain. 'It's worth a try, I guess,' he said. 'I've got to do something.'
She was over by him again. She sat on the edge of the tub, put a hand gently on his shoulder. 'You're not going to want to hear this, but maybe you should consider dropping this lawsuit. See what happens to David, then take it from there.'
He gave it a minute of real consideration. 'It might get to that anyway. I can't afford to keep it going by myself, although I might be able to talk one of the big firms into taking it on. It would be a big payday.'
'If you win.'
'There is always that. But what I'd really like is to try to bluff them into making another settlement offer at least, pay for expenses and the time I've already worked. Although I can't believe this thing this morning was about that. With Freeman out of the way, the thing's going to pretty much dry up on its own anyway. So I'm thinking it
