Page 147 of The Lincoln Lawyer

I met Lorna at the gate and took from her a videotape with a single piece of paper wrapped around it with a rubber band. As she had been told to do earlier, she whispered in my ear.

“This is where I act like I am whispering something very important into your ear,” she said. “How is it going?”

I nodded as I took the rubber band off the tape and looked at the piece of paper.

“Perfect timing,” I whispered back. “I’m good to go.”

“Can I stay and watch?”

“No, I want you out of here. I don’t want anybody talking to you after this goes down.”

I nodded and she nodded and then she left. I went back to the lectern.

“No recross, Your Honor.”

I sat down and waited. Roulet grabbed my arm.

“What are you doing?”

I pushed him away.

“Stop touching me. We have new information we can’t bring up on cross.”

I focused on the judge.

“Any other witnesses, Mr. Minton?” she asked.

“No, Your Honor. No further rebuttal.”

The judge nodded.

“The witness is excused.”

Meehan started crossing the courtroom to Corliss. The judge looked at me and I started to stand.

“Mr. Haller, surrebuttal?”

“Yes, Your Honor, the defense would like to call D.J. Corliss back to the stand as surrebuttal.”

Meehan stopped in his tracks and all eyes were on me. I held up the tape and the paper Lorna had brought me.

“I have new information on Mr. Corliss, Your Honor. I could not have brought it up on cross.”

“Very well. Proceed.”

“Can I have a moment, Judge?”

“A short one.”

I huddled with Roulet again.

“Look, I don’t know what is going on but it doesn’t matter,” I whispered.

“What do you mean it doesn’t matter? Are you—”

“Listen to me. It doesn’t matter because I can still destroy him. Doesn’t matter if he says you killed twenty women. If he’s a liar, he’s a liar. If I destroy him, none of it counts. You understand?”

Roulet nodded and seemed to calm as he considered this.