Courting Disaster Read Online Free PDF Page A

identity and held tight. As long as I had that, I would be all right.
    An hour later Kate and Nicole left. Despite their offer to cover my calendar for the next few days, I’d refused. I needed to be back in action. Besides, I knew neither one would appreciate the in camera evidentiary hearing scheduled in my rape case tomorrow.
    Cradling a mug of tea, I curled up on the sofa—whatever had possessed me to buy this uncomfortable rock?—and opened my case file. What my client Larry Clark wanted me to submit as a demonstrative model at trial was ludicrous, and the prior decisions by the Florida courts were clearly against the admission of such an exhibit. I needed to figure out how to distinguish the facts of our situation from those in the other cases.
    I frowned as I read the copies of case law. As I occasionally highlighted a line here and there, the squeak of the pen competed with the throbbing of my head in the silence of my house. I really should turn on the stereo for white noise, but before I could move, I heard the snap of a branch outside the living room window.
    I lifted my head. The plantation blinds were open and I could see the dark shadow of the solitary palm tree in the front yard. It was dead still.
    I rose and crossed to the window. High in the sky rode the sickle of the quarter moon, casting very little light. However, the Venetian-styled lamps placed at intervals along the street spilled an eerie yellow glow onto the lawn. The developer of this particular townhouse project had landscaped each yard with a profusion of tropical plants, especially along the front and sides of the homes. During the day the effect was attractive and colorful, but at night the plants created swaths of shadows.
    So much better for someone to hide in, my mind whispered.
    Get a grip, I ordered myself. But then the hairs rose on the back of my neck. I had an unsettling feeling, as if someone hidden in the night was watching me.
    Was that a shadow moving at the corner of the house?
    Br-r-ng!
    I about jumped out of my skin. Damn, that phone was loud. I shook off my uneasiness and hurried over to the phone on the end table.
    “Hello?” Good, my voice was steady.
    “Carling.”
    “Jared. Long time no speak.” Just breathe, kiddo. I sat down.
    “I wanted to…” His voice faded a bit as if he was on his cell phone.
    “I couldn’t hear that last part. Your phone cut out.”
    He cleared his throat. “I was about to ask you something when your friends arrived.”
    “Sorry, but I truly don’t remember anything more about Borys’s death.”
    “Not that.” His tone was impatient. “About us.”
    “Us? According to you, we broke up.”
    “Do you remember why?”
    I stared at the opposite wall. We had fought here, I realized. In this room. There had been a heated argument. Hurtful things said. How could two people who once murmured terms of love end up using words like loaded guns?
    The break-up was why I had gone on a decorating binge, I remembered. I’d wanted to erase all memories of Jared’s presence in my life.
    “I recall that it was downright ugly.”
    There was a charged silence before Jared spoke. “Yes, it was. For that I’m sorry.”
    I curled my legs up. “Me too.”
    “I just didn’t know how to deal with the changes in you anymore.”
    “You accused me of accepting any criminal that called my number scratched on the wall by the phone in the jail.” Good, no hurt in my voice.
    Jared didn’t back down. “And that hasn’t changed, Carling. You’re still taking on cases recklessly, without a care for your reputation. You’re becoming the criminal version of an ambulance chaser.”
    Battle on. There’s nothing a lawyer appreciates more than the fine art of an oral argument with its nuances and turns of phrases. However, an occasional verbal slugfest in the trenches cleansed the soul, and I was spoiling for a way to get rid of the anger and fear churning inside me.
    “Gee, Manning, forget your oath as an