Page 31 of Take the Bait

“Amen,” she added. She took another appreciative sip of her wine. “Before that, I had a frustrating meeting with a client.”

“Can you talk about it?”

“Sorry, no. Confidentiality and all.”

“Got it.”

“But, I do want to talk with you about a fascinating chat I had with Leon Whitney yesterday.”

“About?”

She watched him closely. “I suspect you know what.”

His gaze flickered up toward the ceiling. Evasion. Oh, yeah. He’d definitely sicced the old fart on her to get her to take the D.A.’s plea deal.

All he said, though, was, “And?”

“And my client isn’t budging. I saw him yesterday and again this morning, and he remains committed to going to trial.”

“Was he your frustrating client?” Cam asked perceptively.

She nodded, declining to mention out the bit about Alex threatening to fire her if she did too good a job defending him.

Cam leaned back and took a drink of his own wine before commenting, “Based on our conversation so far this evening, I have to say this should be an interesting trial. I’ll look forward to what gambit you pull out of thin air in your futile efforts to save a one-hundred percent guilty man.”

She grinned in genuine amusement. “If that was a fishing expedition to get me to show you my cards before the trial begins, you’re gonna go home with an empty bucket and no fish for supper.”

“You do realize it’s nothing personal, right, Dani? You and I are both just playing our parts so the legal system can do its job.”

“Yes, Cam. I am vaguely familiar with the purpose of defense attorneys and prosecutors.”

“Just saying. There’s no need for us to be enemies because we’re sitting on opposite sides of the aisle.”

“I got that memo in ninth grade debate,” she replied dryly.

“You did debate, huh? So did I.”

Debate wouldn’t have gotten him noticed by the cute girls in school, and he struck her as the type who’d been popular and dated a lot in high school. She studied him over her wine. “I’ll bet you played football, too. Let me guess. Star quarterback?”

He shrugged. “I’m tall and have a good arm. I didn’t ask to be quarterback. Coach just put me at that position. I’d have been just as happy being a tight end or maybe a linebacker on the defensive side of the ball.”

She had no idea what tight ends and linebackers were. “And I suppose you led your team to the state championship?”

He grinned ruefully. “We did make it to the state championship game. But we got crushed by a school with a gigantic defensive line they imported from somewhere in the South Pacific. Every one of their linemen was at least eight feet tall and weighed five hundred pounds. Took me a week to walk upright again after that game.”

She shook her head. Why boys insisted on putting on pads and trying to pummel one another over an oblong hunk of leather escaped her understanding.

“How about you? Did you play any sports in school?”

She nodded as the first course was set down before them. “I did. Four years of girls’ basketball. Vicious sport. No pads and long fingernails.”

They traded funny anecdotes of their high school years, moved on to war stories of their worst professors in law school, and migrated into favorite books and films. The main course finished without a resolution to their debate over the best film of all time.

Finally, he announced, “Obviously, a head-to-head viewing of each of our favorite movies is called for, followed by a final vote.”

“Name the time and place,” she challenged, “and I’ll bring the popcorn.”

“You interested in dessert?”

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