Page 39 of The Wrong Side of the Law

“Defendant was employed as a lighting technician in the touring road crew for… oh.” Emily’s face drains of the angry red, but her eyes burn even brighter as she sinks into one of the visitor chairs facing my desk.

She’s never sat down in my office before, unless I ordered her to. Is she getting more comfortable? Or was this just shocking enough that she didn’t think about it before doing it?

“Yes. He was a roadie. For Robert Ferry.”

Emily stabs the page with her finger. Eyes wide, her mouth works soundlessly for a moment before she finally finds her voice again.

“This-” She stops, clears her throat. “This is almost exactly like my brother’s situation.”

“I know,” I say, putting every possible bit of grim and serious into my tone. “And a jury found, beyond a reasonable doubt, that he was guilty of trafficking in heroin.”

“I’m not going to let that happen to Francis Jun…Frank.”Emily’s jaw is set, determination plain on her face, but dissolves into a giggle. “I can’t believe I’m laughing at this, but it’s sort of funny in a dark way. He’s afraid of what’ll happen to him in prison with a name like Francis.”

Her smile fades quickly.

“There’s a lot more of this stuff, Emily. These two boxes? Complete records of a case from last year in California, courtesy of David Banks. Great job getting me his cell number, by the way. Thank you very much for that. And there’s a CD-ROM with more cases from around the country.”

“What do you need from me? What can I do to help?”

“You can go through all this stuff. Collate. Correlate. Find anything in here, any pattern or set of patterns, that we can use to pry at your brother’s charges. Anything that we can use to go after the real villain of the piece.”

“You believe that my brother is innocent?” Emily fixes me with her gaze. Her eyes plead with me for agreement.

“I don’t know,” I sigh, but I don’t look away from her. “But I’m willing to consider that he is. I want a conviction, sure, but only if I’m convicting the right person. If this case leads to your brother’s conviction, then he will go to prison. And he will go there for averylong time. I will not break the rules in his favor, and I will not allowyouto, either. Am I clear enough on that point?”

“Yes.” Emily nods with so much enthusiasm that I’m afraid she’s going to spend the next week in a neck brace.

“We are going on a secret fishing expedition against Ferry. And he is a very big fish. But, it has to saysecret. For now. As far as anyone is concerned, I’m still moving forward with your brother’s prosecution. In reality, though? I’ll be doing everything I can to buy us time to put together a case against Robert Ferry. If it’s possible. But-” I wag a finger at her in warning “-Iammoving forward with your brother’s prosecution. There’s no way that I can’t.”

“I get it.” Emily nods, but far less energetically, this time. She takes a deep breath and stands up. “I’ll, um. I guess I’ll take these back to my desk, then. I’ll get started with reading as soon as I finish up the brief for Kochanski.”

“Whoa, now. No, no you will do no such thing, Emily!”

She stops cold and glares at me.

“Hey, easy,” I say. “I’m not yanking the rug out from under you. Those files arenotleaving my office. You’re going to be working on them right here.” I point to the assistant’s desk by the door to the outer office. “That’s your new workstation. From now on you’re going to be working from here, at least part-time.”

“Part time?” she asks, the glare flashing over to hope in a heartbeat.

Hm. I haven’t completely thought this through. There’s going to be some weeping and gnashing of teeth. The ASA’s working for me have become rather dependent on her in just a few short weeks. And that’s not even counting what Whitehall’s going to do when he finds out I’m pretty well going against him and monopolizing Emily’s work hours for my own needs.

“Yeah,” I say. “I’ll make sure everyone else knows you’re no longer quite as available.”

Emily smiles at me, as grateful as if I’ve given her the greatest present in the world, rather than an incredibly tedious task. I smile back at her, suddenly feeling goofy and dumb.

There must be a problem with the air conditioner, too, because it feels like it got about ten degrees hotter in here. As soon as Emily turns to her new task, I loosen my tie and undo my top button.

To hell with John Whitehall and his interference. Either I’m head of Narcotics Unit or I’m not. If the State Attorney wants to micromanage every personnel decision involving a relatively low-level hourly employee, I can find all sorts of creative ways to make sure that’sallhe has time to do.

Emily doesn’t take up much space, and she works quietly but for occasionally talking to herself and the scratching sound of pen against paper. Her presence, though, is larger than life, and I find myself spacing out in my own work. I have no idea what the words on the page that I just read say, but I am very aware of the sleek waves of red that Emily pushes back away from her face. Every movement catches my eye: each time she nibbles on the pen cap; every time she flips the page on her notepad. Every time she leans over to reach for a new piece of the file.

I’m enthralled, and I have to admit that there’s no problem with the air conditioning. That warm rush is coming from Emily Wilson.

I really do hope that she finds something in those files. On the one hand, it gets her something that she wants—her brother’s name, cleared—and on the other, it brings me the exact sort of high-visibility case that I need to really become the threat that Jack Whitehall thinks I already am.

If anyone can do it, I’d say it’s her. She’s brilliant. She has an analytical mind and a way with words. She knows what she wants and has the drive and ambition to reach out and go for it.

And she’s beautiful.

What the hell am I doing moving her into my office?

I’m furthering my own ambitions, by enabling her to work on her goals. That’s all I’m doing. It’s the smart play, given the situation.

I think.

But am I thinking clearly?

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