Page 56 of The Lincoln Lawyer

Levin sat down on the couch on the opposite side from Roulet. I stayed standing and they both looked up at me. I started with Levin.

“I went in to see the DA to kick his ass today and he ended up kicking mine with that. Who was your source, Raul? Because he gave you a marked deck.”

“Wait a minute, wait a minute. That’s not—”

“No, you wait a minute. The report you had on the knife being untraceable was bogus. It was put in there to fuck us up. To trick us and it worked perfectly, because I waltzed in there thinking I couldn’t lose today and just gave him the Morgan’s bar video. Just trotted it out like it was the hammer. Only it wasn’t, goddamn it.”

“It was the runner,” Levin said.

“What?”

“The runner. The guy who runs the reports between the police station and the DA’s office. I tell him which cases I’m interested in and he makes extra copies for me.”

“Well, they’re onto his ass and they worked it perfectly. You better call him and tell him if he needs a good criminal defense attorney I’m not available.”

I realized I was pacing in front of them on the couch but I didn’t stop.

“And you,” I said to Roulet. “I now get the real weapon report and find out not only is the knife a custom-made job but it istraceable right back to you because it has your fucking initials on it! You lied to me again!”

“I didn’t lie,” Roulet yelled back. “I tried to tell you. I said it wasn’t my knife. I said it twice but nobody listened to me.”

“Then you should have clarified what you meant. Just saying it wasn’t your knife was like saying you didn’t do it. You should have said, ‘Hey, Mick, there might be a problem with the knife because I did have a knife but this picture isn’t it.’ What did you think, that it was just going to go away?”

“Please, can you keep it down,” Roulet protested. “There might be customers out there.”

“I don’t care! Fuck your customers. You’re not going to need customers anymore where you’re going. Don’t you see that this knife trumps everything we’ve got? You took a murder weapon to a meeting with a prostitute. The knife was no plant. It was yours. And that means we no longer have the setup. How can we claim she set you up when the prosecutor can prove you had that knife with you when you walked through the door?”

He didn’t answer but I didn’t give him a lot of time to.

“You fucking did this thing and they’ve got you,” I said, pointing at him. “No wonder they didn’t bother with any follow-up investigation at the bar. No follow-up needed when they’ve gotyourknife andyourfingerprints in blood on it.”

“I didn’t do it! It’s a setup. I’m TELLING YOU! It was—”

“Who’s yelling now? Look, I don’t care what you’re telling me. I can’t deal with a client who doesn’t level, who doesn’t see the percentage in telling his own attorney what is going on. So the DA has made an offer to you and I think you better take it.”

Roulet sat up straight and grabbed the pack of cigarettes off the table. He took one out and lit it off the one he already had going.

“I’m not pleading guilty to something I didn’t do,” he said, his voice suddenly calm after a deep drag off the fresh smoke.

“Seven years. You’ll be out in four. You have till court time Monday and then it disappears. Think about it, then tell me you want to take it.”

“I won’t take it. I didn’t do this thing and if you won’t take it to trial, then I will find somebody who will.”

Levin was holding the discovery file. I reached down and rudely grabbed it out of his hands so I could read directly from the weapon report.

“You didn’t do it?” I said to Roulet. “Okay, if you didn’t do it, then would you mind telling me why you went to see this prostitute with a custom-made Black Ninja knife with a five-inch blade, complete with your initials engraved not once, but twice on both sides of the blade?”

Finished reading from the report, I threw it back to Levin. It went through his hands and slapped against his chest.

“Because I always carry it!”

The force of Roulet’s response quieted the room. I paced back and forth once, staring at him.

“You always carry it,” I said, not a question.

“That’s right. I’m a realtor. I drive expensive cars. I wear expensive jewelry. And I often meet strangers alone in empty houses.”

Again he gave me pause. As hyped up as I was, I still knew a glimmer when I saw one. Levin leaned forward and looked at Roulet and then at me. He saw it, too.