Page 8 of A Walking Shadow

“Come on in. I have a case for you.”

The junior lawyer launched herself into the room with all the excitement of Mocha being promised a peanut butter dog treat. Sasha suppressed a smile. She could remember, just barely, when she was a baby lawyer with that same eager puppy energy. Although she was inexperienced, Ellie was whip-smart. More than that, though, she had a strong sense of self and unshakable integrity, which was more than Sasha could say for Ellie’s late father. Cinco Prescott had been the bane of Sasha’s existencewhen she worked for him and somehow managed to be a thorn in her side even after she left his firm.

“Billing number?” Ellie rested her legal pad on her knees and sat with her pen poised.

Right down to business, Sasha thought. “Bill it under the firm administrative number.”

“Oh, pro bono?”

“Not pro bono. This is a favor for a friend.”

Bare emotion flickered in Ellie’s eyes. It took a moment for Sasha to place it. Worry.

She leaned forward. “You’re not at P&T anymore, Ellie. You don’t have to worry about your billables. This work counts.”

Assuming the system hadn’t changed in the decade-plus between Sasha’s employment there and Ellie’s, the younger attorney had come from a firm where she had to meet hour quotas for billable work, pro bono work, and administrative work. And if that weren’t onerous enough, if she went over in one category, the extra hours didn’t roll over to make up a shortfall in another one. So the most effective way to break an associate’s spirit had been to load them up with pro bono and/or admin work, making the high billable hours requirement virtually impossible to meet.

Ellie’s face softened with relief as she smiled. “Right. I guess I’m still hardwired to tense up at the thought of admin hours.”

It’ll take her nervous system some time to feel safe, Sasha thought. The lawyers at Prescott & Talbot walked around in a constant state of hypervigilance.

All she said was, “I get it. Believe me.”

“Thanks. So who’s the client?”

“Daniel Steinfeld Krav Maga in Squirrel Hill. He’s been sued in federal district court.”

“Are we representing Mr. Steinfeld or the business?”

“That’s a good question. I believe Daniel has an LLC, but double-check the corporate filings with the commonwealth. I may be wrong about his corporate structure.”

“Doesn’t it specify on the complaint caption?”

“He’s been sued as a free person.”

“Pardon?”

“You heard me correctly. The plaintiff is a sovereign citizen so everything is drafted through that lens. We can’t rely on this complaint for any statements of fact.”

“Oh-kay,” Ellie drew out the two syllables. “So the plaintiff’s representing himself.”

“Nope. There’s an attorney involved. His name is Gray Simmons.”

Ellie jotted the name on her legal pad.

“How much do you know about sovereign citizens?”

“A little. They believe the federal government is illegitimate so that means they don’t have to pay taxes or register their vehicles. That sort of thing. There’s also something about the gold standard.”

Sasha nodded. “You’ve only scratched the surface, but you’re essentially correct. The movement’s evolved over the decades. There are multiple organizations now, all with slightly different ideologies and theories. We’re interested in Citizens to End Oppression, or CEO.”

“Oppression?”

“Right. Based on a, shall we say, unique reading of the Fourteenth Amendment, they believe we’re all enslaved. John Boone, the man who sued our client, is evidently a leader of the local unit of CEO.”

She waited to continue until Ellie’s pen stopped moving.

“Okay, so the part where they reject U.S. currency is relevant here because Boone hired Daniel to run a Krav Maga boot camp for thirty people—members of his organization, I believe.”

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