The Interior by Lisa See Read Free Book Online

drinks and dinner. Keith was a good guy, pretty open. The next time Hulan called, David was sure he’d be ready with whatever information she might want on Knight.
             
    At seven, the Water Grill was jammed with the pre-theater dinner crowd, as well as people who’d come down out of their office towers for business dinners or romantic evenings with their spouses. The Water Grill specialized in seafood, and here and there men and women wore big plastic bibs to protect their clothes from the splatter of bouillabaisse or flying pieces of cracked crab. At other tables customers attacked towering
fruits de mer
platters piled high with shrimp, oysters, mussels, and seaurchins.
    David followed the hostess as she wended her way through the main room to one of the banquettes along the far wall. Keith was already seated and nursing a scotch on the rocks. A waitress came up and asked if David wanted a drink. “Shall we get a bottle of wine?” David asked Keith. When Keith nodded, David ordered a bottle of Chateau St. Jean. Moments later, wine had been poured for David, and Keith was working on another tumbler of brown liquor. During this time David sized up his old colleague.
    Ten years ago, Keith had come to Phillips, MacKenzie fresh out of law school. He hadn’t known much about law except how to take a test and argue with a teacher. And, with the exception of moot court, he’d never tried a case in front of a jury. But at the law firm, as it was in private law firms across the country, he hadn’t been expected to try a case for many, many years. He’d been assigned to several of David’s matters, had written briefs, done document reviews, and summarized witness testimony. When David left Phillips, MacKenzie, Keith was a senior associate. A couple of years ago he’d made partner and decided to focus more on mergers and acquisitions. But as a junior partner he was nothing more than a glorified associate—working hard but getting little of the credit or the fun.
    Sitting across from Keith now, David saw that the past decade had been hard on the younger man. He’d once been a bit of an athlete, but he’d put on weight and begun to lose his hair. And the drinking? That was something David didn’t remember.
    Over dinner—Hawaiian mahi mahi on nori rice with blackened sesame seeds for David, grouper with an ancho chili sauce for Keith—the conversation concerned mutual friends, legal committees they were involved with, and news from the headlines. They bantered about David’s captivity at the hands of the FBI security team—the fast-food meals, the lingo, the sense of importance the men and women agents brought to a job that David thought totally unnecessary. Once the dishes were cleared, Keith ordered brandy while David settled for coffee.
    Finally David asked, “They still have you slaving away over there?”
    “Yeah, you know how it is,” Keith said.
    “Have you tried any cases yet?”
    “Shit no. I’m corporate all the way now.”
    “It’s not too late to go back to litigation. If you want experience, come to the U.S. Attorney’s Office. By the end of the first year, you’ll have been in court so many times—”
    “But my bank account would be empty.”
    David shrugged. “There are things other than money.”
    “Really, what?” The bitterness in Keith’s tone made David look up.
    “Doing right, working on the side of justice, putting away bad guys.” David said the words, but he didn’t know if he believed them anymore. So much had happened in his own life and to his sense of who he was and what he did.
    As if reading these thoughts, Keith asked, “How can you still spout that stuff after all you’ve been through?” When David didn’t respond, Keith continued, “After everything that happened to you in China…”
    No one was supposed to know exactly
what
had happened to David in China. Was Keith speculating or did he actually know something? David decided to dismiss the comment