nuzzling kids with muscular dystrophy. The next day, they’re packing explosives. I don’t think so.”
A waiter came to their table with offers of key lime pie and
“If Hardcastle’s as corrupt as you say, what’s a retired naval officer like Sanders doing mixed up with them?” Victoria asked.
“I figure he was a legitimate hire, the perfect guy to run the dolphin-training program. Then Hardcastle tells Sanders he has twelve months to produce, and he says it can’t be done. They say make it happen. Again, he says it’s impossible. Finally, they put someone else in charge, two guys from their security division, or whatever they call their department of dirty pool.”
“The men in the Lincoln,” Victoria said.
“They tell Sanders they’ve got a shortcut. Steal trained dolphins. But they need cover. It’s got to look like the Animal Liberation Movement is behind it.”
“So Sanders dupes Nash? That’s your theory?”
“A perfect plan. Sanders and his buddies can hit several attractions around the country and blame the animal nuts. This was the first raid, and it blew up in their faces.”
Victoria sipped her tea.
Steve waited.
In the saltwater pool, a long-necked white ibis with a curved beak joined the herons in their search for dinner.
Victoria sipped some more, then said, “I think you may be right.”
“Yes! I knew it. I knew you’d respond to logic and reason. You always do.”
“Your client was clueless, wasn’t he?”
“Yep. Nash figured they were setting the dolphins free. He’d have shit a brick if he knew they were turning the animals into warriors.”
“Not that it would matter if Nash knew.” Victoria put down the teacup and patted her lips dry. “It’s irrelevant that his accomplices were committing a different crime. Regardless of their motive or his, Nash committed a
SOLOMON’S LAWS
9. Be confident, but not cocky. Smile, but don’t snicker. And no matter how desperate your case, never let the jurors see your fear.
Thirty
Steve sat at the defense table, slumped and frowning, in blatant disregard of his rules of courtroom behavior. He’d taught Victoria that a trial lawyer should always project confidence.
Victoria delivered her opening statement with competence and ease. Clearly she’d learned her lessons.
Steve had a blank yellow pad on the table in front of him, his client Gerald Nash beside him. Victoria was doing just what Steve expected. No frills, no riffs, no fancy footwork. Just solid, likeable lawyering. She started by reading the indictment. Prosecutors often do that. The formal language tends to convey to the jury that Zeus himself had leveled the charges.
“The Grand Jurors of the State of Florida, duly called, impaneled and sworn to inquire and true presentment make…”
Steve briefly considered an old trick.
Then he would tear the indictment in half. But Victoria would be ready for the stunt. She’d seen him do it before.
“I’m going to give you a preview of the evidence,” Victoria told the jury. “But before I do, there’s one image I want you to see.”
She picked up a poster board and positioned it in front of the jury. A head shot of Sanders in his dress whites. Handsome. Rugged. Still alive.
He’d always told her to humanize her clients. Now, while the State of Florida was technically her client, she wanted the jurors to connect with the late Chuck Sanders.
“This is Lieutenant Commander Charles Sanders,” Victoria said. “He grew up in a small town in South Carolina and worked summers as a lifeguard. He earned a swimming scholarship to Vanderbilt and enrolled in the Reserve Officers Training Corps because he wanted to serve his country. In the U.S. Navy, he survived the most rigorous training known to the military, and he became a Navy SEAL. A decorated war hero in Desert Storm, he…”
Steve tuned her out and watched the jurors. All twelve were transfixed. Victoria was a natural. Poise and presence. You didn’t have to hear her words. Just look at her in her double-breasted jacket and matching skirt that fell just below the knees. Brown pinstripes, wide lapels. Gucci or Prada or Fendi. One of the Italian designers; he couldn’t tell them apart. Victoria looked great whatever she wore. Smart and stylish and sexy.
At that moment, Steve was aware of two conflicting feelings. Despair at the knowledge that he would lose the case, and a reservoir of warmth, an ocean of love, for the woman who was going to defeat him.
“Now Charles Sanders is dead,” Victoria continued. “Killed as a direct result of a crime committed by the defendant, Gerald Nash.”
She pointed toward the defense table, her pin-striped arm steady, her lacquered nails glistening.
The jury turned toward Nash, who winced and squirmed in his chair. In his ill-fitting suit with its lumpily knotted tie, he couldn’t look more guilty if he’d been foaming at the mouth and howling at the moon.
Victoria smoothly moved on to a discussion of the elements of the crime, describing exactly how Nash’s actions fit every one.
Steve drifted off again. Victoria had been right the day before when she said he had no defense. Sure, he may have solved a mystery. He knew what Sanders was doing and who he worked for, but so what? Steve had spent so much time tracking down loose ends, he hadn’t done the scut work of defending his client. Now he needed to do something he’d never done before in a criminal trial. When the judge turned to him, Steve would politely decline to give his opening statement. He would wait until after the state rested its case, then belatedly concoct something to say.
This strategy-or lack of strategy-violated yet another one of his rules, based on the psychological concept of “primacy.” People are more receptive to information at the
But here he was, reserving opening statement until after he heard the state’s evidence, because he had no winning strategy.
He scanned the gallery. Marvin the Mavin and Teresa Torano sat in the front row, holding hands. They nodded with approval as Victoria crisply explained the difference between peaceful protests protected by the First Amendment and trespasses and larceny, which are crimes.
“She’s good,” Nash whispered, sounding alarmed.
Of course she is, Steve thought, I taught her everything. No, that wasn’t true. A person isn’t a dolphin. You don’t blow a whistle and hold up a mackerel to teach a person how to try a case. They either have the innate talent or they don’t.
