Private Screening by Richard North Patterson Read Free Book Online Page A

crafty buffoon, Lord thought: you want that charlatan to make you a federal judge.
    â€œIn fact, they seem to feel that James Kilcannon’s extraordinarily capable.…”
    Life tenure and a pension. All you have to do is help your friends raise money.
    â€œAnd I’m sure you’d enjoy meeting him.” The judge summoned a lascivious smile. “Not to mention his girlfriend, what’s-her-name.”
    â€œStacy Tarrant.” The morning had turned ugly; only the remembered careless flip of Jack Cole’s panama hat kept Lord from walking out. “Frankly, these affairs are a little much for me.”
    â€œMuch?”
    â€œExpensive.” It was the truth, as far as it went: the money he had given Cole for lunch, borrowed from petty cash, left him five dollars pocket money for Christopher. “I’ve also promised my son I’d take him to the baseball game tonight. It’s his first.”
    â€œThere’ll be others.” McIlvaine rested both hands on his stomach. “How old are you, Tony?”
    â€œThirty-three.”
    â€œYour career in private practice is just beginning, and you’re doing it the hard way—a one-man office. Don’t you think you need help?”
    Lord tried to deflect the question. “I like working for myself,” he said easily. “It lets me define who and what I care about.”
    McIlvaine looked nettled. “Still, there are men in the city associated with Kilcannon whom it would do you good to know. I’ll be there to make sure you meet them.” McIlvaine smiled. “After all, a settlement or verdict which includes back pay should make the investment in a grace note easier to swallow. The way this trial’s gone thus far, you’ve got every reason to hope.”
    Lord realized that he could have choreographed it, right down to the unspoken reminder that McIlvaine could screw up his case by not approving a settlement, prejudicing the jury against him, or giving them instructions so adverse that they would never award Jack Cole’s back pay. If he could help it, Lord promised himself, McIlvaine would also never become a federal judge. “What’s the tariff?” he asked coolly.
    â€œTwo hundred fifty,” McIlvaine said in his most deprecating voice. “A small price, as I say, for improving the prospects of settlement.” He smiled with conspiratorial male bonhomie. “Frankly, I wouldn’t mind getting that fairy off my docket.”
    Bias and misuse of office, Lord thought, and McIlvaine could get away with it. “Frankly,” he responded blandly, “ I wouldn’t mind getting ‘that fairy’ off your docket.”
    In his annoyance, McIlvaine’s smile strained so wide that his gums showed. It gave Lord time to do some column addition: $1,700 a month for their two-bedroom house, $173 for the car, $200 for Christopher’s school. Which reminded him of the daughter Jack Cole couldn’t see.
    Lord stood without amenities. “I’ll try to make it,” he said, and headed for the door. He had mentally taken the last $500 out of savings even before the judge called after him, “And bring your wife.”
    4
    J AMIE climbed onto the black limousine.
    They had stopped in the middle of San Francisco’s Chinatown. Stacy stood by the passenger door. Surrounded by aides, reporters, and a cordon of police and Secret Service, she could see but a few faces. In the swelling roar, Chinatown came to her only as the smell of pork or fish or vegetables cooking, Chinese characters in neon, the face of a woman in a second-floor window, holding a baby with fine black hair.
    Between the shoulders of police, a young voice called to her, “See you tonight.” Nine hours to go, she thought, and smiled in no particular direction.
    Jamie stood above the noise, shoulder-held cameras seeking his face.
    â€œThe Second Coming,” a familiar voice