Page 20 of Resurrection Walk

“So, what do you think?”

“It raises a lot of possibilities, that’s what I think. We need to go out to Chino.”

“We?”

“Yeah. Tomorrow. I want to talk to her. I’ll clear the schedule. Today, you get your bony ass over to UCLA.”

“Okay. What about Silver?”

“I’ll deal with him. We’ll need his files.”

Bosch nodded. They were finished. For now. Both men stood up. Haller leaned in close to Bosch.

“You know, this could get…” Haller said.

His voice trailed off.

“I know,” Bosch said.

“We need to be careful,” Haller said. “No footprints till we’re ready.”

Haller bent down to grab his briefcase. Bosch looked up at the top of City Hall.

The vultures were still circling.

PART TWO

THE NEEDLE

8

THE COMMUNE CONSISTEDof a long row of side-by-side attorney offices on the right and an open space with work pods on the left for support staff. Only I didn’t see any support staff.

Each of the individual offices had a small frame mounted to the right of the door where an attorney could slot in or slide out his or her business card. It was a commune for legal transients, lawyers who came and went on the whims of cases and clients.

I looked at the cards as I walked down the row. All of them featured the standard scales-of-justice symbol with little variation. Some had a tiny photo of a smiling or seriously staring attorney. No embossing. The quality of all the cards suggested that the lawyers were attempting to keep costs down while also trying to project some semblance of success and dignity in the shared office space.

Six offices down, I saw the first card embossed in silver. It belonged to Frank Silver, of course, and the embossed card was either left over from better times or an effort to stand out from the others in the legal row. The office door was open but I reached in and knocked on it anyway. A man at a faux-wood-veneer desk looked up from a laptop screen.

“Frank Silver?”

“That’s me.”

I saw a flash of recognition in his eyes. He was fifteen years my junior with a thin build and dark curly hair. I guessed that the walk from here to the courthouse kept him in fighting form.

“You. You’re the Lincoln Lawyer.”

I entered the room and extended my hand. We shook.

“Mickey Haller. Were we on a case previously?”

“Frank Silver. No, I recognize you from the billboards. ‘Reasonable doubt for a reasonable fee’ — surprised the bar lets you get away with that one. Have a seat.”

I looked down at the one chair available for a visitor in the cramped office and saw a foot-high stack of files on it.

“Oh, sorry, wait a second,” Silver said. “Let me get that stuff out of the way.”

He came around the desk. I stepped back in the small space so he could get to the chair. He lifted the stack, took it back with him around the desk, and put it down next to his computer.

---