Mickey Haller 4 - The Fifth Witness

would be hard even for you to make a case for involuntary. It’s not like she just happened to be in that garage. Do you think she’ll take it?”
    “I don’t know. She’s said since the start no deals. She wants a trial. I can try to sell it. It’s just that…”
    “Just that what?”
    “I’m curious, you know? Why such a nice offer? Why are you coming down to this? What’s gone wrong inside your case that makes you feel you need to cut and run?”
    “This is not cutting and running. She’ll still go to prison and there will still be justice. There’s nothing wrong with our case but trials are expensive and long. Across the board the DA’s office is trying for dispositions over trials. But dispositions that make sense. This is one of those times. You don’t want it, I’m ready to go.”
    I held my hands up in surrender. I could see her focus on the plaster cast on my left hand.
    “It’s not whether I want it. It’s my client’s choice and I have to give her all the information I can, that’s all. I’ve been in this position before. Usually a deal this good is too good to be true. You take it and you end up finding out later that the main witness was going to flake out or the prosecution just picked up a nice piece of exculpatory evidence you would’ve gotten in discovery if you’d hung on just a little bit longer.”
    “Yeah, well, not this time. It is what it is. You have twenty-four hours and then it comes off the table.”
    “What about going with the low range?”
    “What?”
    It was almost a shriek.
    “Come on, you didn’t come in here and give me your last, best offer. No one works that way. You have one more give and we both know it. Voluntary manslaughter, low-range sentencing recommendation. She’ll do five to seven tops.”
    “You’re killing me. The press will eat me alive.”
    “Maybe, but I know your boss didn’t send you over here with one offer, Andrea.”
    She leaned back and looked at Aronson and then around the rest of the room, her eyes trailing over the shelves of books that came with the office.
    I waited. I glanced at Aronson and winked. I knew what was coming.
    “I’m sorry about your hand,” Freeman said. “That must’ve hurt.”
    “Actually, it didn’t. I was already down for the count when they did it. I never felt a thing.”
    I held up my hand again and wiggled my fingers, their tips moving along the top edge of the cast.
    “I can already move them pretty good.”
    “Okay, low range. I still need to hear back in twenty-four hours. And this is all off the record. Other than to your client, this is not to be revealed outside of this room if it doesn’t go.”
    “We already agreed to that.”
    “Okay, then I guess that’s it. I’ll be heading back.”
    She stood up and Aronson and I followed. We dropped into the sort of small talk that often follows a meeting of great importance.
    “So who’s going to be the next DA?” I asked.
    “Your guess is as good as mine,” Freeman said. “There’s no front-runner yet, that’s for sure.”
    The office was currently operating with an interim district attorney following the appointment of its former holder to a top job in the U.S. Attorney General’s Office in Washington, D.C. A special election would be held in the fall to fill the slot and so far the field of candidates was uninspiring.
    Finished with the pleasantries, we shook hands and Freeman left the office. Sitting back down, I looked at Aronson.
    “So what do you think?”
    “I think you’re right. The offer was too good and then she made it even better. Something’s gone wrong in her case.”
    “Yeah, but what? We can’t exploit it if we don’t know what it is.”
    I leaned forward to the phone and pushed the intercom. I told Cisco to come in. I swiveled in silence while we waited. Cisco entered, put my cell phone down on the desk and then took the seat where Freeman had sat.
    “I have the trace underway. I’d give it three days. They don’t move that quickly.”
    “Thanks.”
    “So what’s up with the prosecutor?”
    “She’s running scared and we don’t know why. I know you’ve vetted everything she’s given us and checked out the witnesses. I want to do it again. Something’s changed. Something they thought they had, they no longer have. We have to find out what it is.”
    “Margo Schafer, probably.”
    “How so?”
    Cisco shrugged.
    “Just speaking from experience. Eyewitnesses are unreliable. Schafer is a big