No Legal Grounds (15 page)

“Sammy!” Nicky’s voice was ebullient over the phone. “Thanks for the email, good buddy. I’d
love
to get together.”
“Lanark Park. You know where it is?”
“Sure! Looked it up. Can’t wait to see you face-to-face.”
Gamesmanship. “Tomorrow,” Sam said. “Two o’clock.”
“We have
lots
to talk about.” A hard tone now.
“Oh, yeah,” Sam said. “You are so right about that.”
Sam was shaking when he closed his phone. What was he doing? Linda was right. This was no time to play detective.
Or was it? It beat sitting and waiting.
Which is what he had to do now. The night lay ahead, and he was sure he wouldn’t sleep again. Maybe he’d pop a Benadryl. That seemed to help sometimes.
Drugs.
Trust
. The word popped into his mind with neon brightness.
Sure, trust. But he wasn’t feeling God-trust in his body and bones. Didn’t he have a book somewhere on that topic?
Sam loved books, collected too many. His bookshelves were overstuffed. When he became a Christian he dove into the study of Christian ity, like he had clamped his jaws on the law. He bought books he knew he wanted to read someday, and they piled up.
He scanned the shelf and found the volume he was looking for. A simple tome entitled
Trust in the Lord
, a collection of various authors.
He took it and sat, opening to the table of contents. His saw a section written by Charles Spurgeon. He’d heard that name. Don Lyle mentioned him sometimes. He was apparently a famous English preacher from the 1800s.
Sam turned to the page.

In seasons of severe trial, the Christian has nothing on earth that he can turn to, and is therefore compelled to cast himself on his God alone. When his vessel is on its beam-ends, and no human deliverance can avail, he must simply and entirely trust himself to the providence and care of God. Happy storm that wrecks a man on such a rock as this!

Happy storm? A bit odd, wasn’t it? How could anybody be happy in a storm? Maybe that was just a quaint way of putting it back then. But then there was that bit about wrecks.

Be strong and very courageous, and the Lord thy God shall certainly, as surely as he built the heavens and the earth, glorify himself in thy weakness, and magnify his might in the midst of thy distress.

Glory in weakness. Might in the midst of distress. It sounded like something only God could do.
Sam closed the book and his eyes. He wasn’t sensing any glory in any of this. When he finally went up to bed, it was weakness he felt most of all. After whispering a prayer for Heather, he fell into a fitful sleep.

Nicky Oberlin wore his fake wide smile, as open as the area where they were meeting. Lanark Park was on the corner of Topanga and Roscoe. It took up an entire block, with ball fields and a pool, and a large grassy area with plenty of trees.

It was a little run-down. The city, strapped for funds, didn’t keep it up as well as it used to. Sam remembered bringing the kids here when they were little. There was considerably more trash strewn about, and patches of dry ground, than in those happier times.

Heather had loved the swing set here. It was a big one, and you could go high. It was also in a wide-open space, which is why Sam chose it for this meeting. On a Wednesday afternoon, it wasn’t as heavily trafficked as it would be on a weekend.

Gerald Case, parked on Roscoe, could very easily see the two of them.
“Let’s cut the pretend stuff, all right?” Sam said. “You went too far when you broke into my house with that flower stunt.” Sam had his micro tape recorder in his side pocket, had pressed the record button just before Nicky walked up to him.
Everything was in order, it seemed. So why was he shaking?
Because he knew Nicky Oberlin was capable of anything. But it was time to turn up the heat. The law, after all, was on Sam’s side. He’d made sure of that.
“Stunt?” Nicky said. “I’m afraid I don’t follow.”
“You follow.”
“But breaking into your house? That’s a crime, isn’t it?”
“You should know all about crimes, Nicky. Crimes involving baseball bats.”
When Nicky didn’t respond right away, Sam took comfort in a point scored. Maybe Nicky wouldn’t be such a hard one to scare off after all.
“Sammy, you’re talking funny for an old friend.”
“Funny or not, you entered my house. Why?” He wanted to get it on tape, an admission. Something he could take to Cam Bellamy.
“You’ve got to get off that, Sam. I would never do anything like that to you.”
“You’re lying. You have a criminal record. I know all about it. I know all about your mother too.”
Nicky’s cheeks twitched. “You better tread lightly, Sammy. You could hurt a guy’s feelings.”
“I wonder if Mom knows what you’ve been up to down here. Maybe I ought to — ”
“You best not mention my mother again.”
“Oh, Mommy wouldn’t like that news?”
Nicky snorted. “You’re not too good at threats, Sammy.”
“No, I guess you’re the master, huh? That’s what you want to be. You didn’t make it in life, so you want to tear down those who have. Well, it’s over for you, Nicky. You can’t win. I know all about you and Mom and I will seriously — ”
“I told you to shut up about her. You better, you hear?”
“Or what, Nicky?”
He smiled. “I will take you apart, bit by bit. You and your family.”
At that moment Sam wished more than anything that he had a gun. He would have used it. The truth startled him. It was wrong, it was murder. Oh, maybe he could justify some sort of self-defense or heat-of-passion argument, but he knew his heart was pumping cold blood and he could do it right now.
“It’s over for you, Nicky. This is my last warning. The DA knows everything about you now. You’re persona non grata in LA. I know too many people. Better run home where it’s safe. And don’t show your face to me or anyone I know again.”
A kid screamed on the swing set, and Sam almost jumped out of his shoes. He hoped the fright wasn’t flashing on his face like a cheap restaurant sign. Nicky just stared at him.
Finally, shrugging, Nicky said, “Have it your way, Sammy. It’s a real disappointment that you treat old friends this way. A real bad disappointment. Because I was willing to be friends, to let bygones be bygones. I guess human beings will always let you down. I thought you were better than that. I really did. But now I see you’re just like everybody else, just like you were back at the dorm. Looking out for number one. Some Christian you turned out to be.”
Nicky Oberlin shook his head derisively, then turned his back and walked toward the parking lot.
Sam watched him go and for a split second almost felt sorry for him. The guy had no life, and somewhere he’d gone diving into a pool filled with darkness.
Maybe that would be the last of Nicky in his life. But he wasn’t counting on it. At least now he had a tape recording, and Gerald Case was taking things from here.
Pile up the ammo for a rainy day.

Sam went to the office to box up all the files in the Harper case. He thought it more efficient to work on this at home. Doreen helped him.

Trask.”
“Fun? You’ll have a blast.”
“Are you okay?” She sounded like a little sister, and he was

happy she did.
“I’ll be fine, Doreen. I’ve been practicing law without a break for
twenty years. Maybe I deserve some time off.”
She started organizing the files in the box, setting them in order.
“You know, I was thinking of going to law school.”
He looked at her. She raised her eyes, young eyes, fresh and
clean. She was a good kid, Doreen. A tremendous help around the
office. Working here while she finished up at Cal State at night,
supporting a mother who was not doing well.
“Do you think that’s a good idea, Mr. Trask? Law school? I mean,
there are so many lawyers out there.”
“Not all lawyers are created equal. We’ll always need good
ones.”
“Is it worth it?”
Sam paused, leaning on the file cabinet. “How do you mean?
Time and money?”
Doreen shook her head. “No, I mean is it something worth doing
with your life?”
That was the big question for this generation, he thought. They
were all about wanting to do something meaningful. Even Heather.
She didn’t want to go the college way. Maybe he should resign himself to that.
But here was one who could have been his daughter. He felt very
fatherly all of a sudden.
“I wanted the same thing when I went into law,” he said. “There’s
always been a lot of cynicism about lawyers. Remember what
Shakespeare said in one of his plays? ‘First thing we do, let’s kill all
the lawyers.’ ”
“That would be a lot of killing.” She giggled.
“And all the lawyer jokes. Like, what do you call a thousand
lawyers at the bottom of the ocean?”
Doreen laughed. “A good start.”
“See that? Everybody knows ’em.” He paused a moment. “But
when I really started to think about what I was doing with my life, I found an old book in the UCLA library. It was a book of reflections on life and the law, and they had a quote by John Locke. He said, ‘The end of the law is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and
enlarge freedom.’ I wanted to be part of that kind of thing.” “And have you been? ”
He thought about all the big cases he and Lew had done over the
years, the major corporate clients. The memories didn’t move him.
But then he thought of Sarah Harper, and her mother and father. “Yeah,” he said. “In some small way, maybe I have. And you can
too, Doreen. Hang on to some idealism. It’s the only thing that
holds our fabric together. You remember when Hurricane Katrina
hit New Orleans?”
“Of course.”
“When it became apparent there was no law around, the
looting started, the shootings. In the absence of law, that’s what
people do.”
“Sheesh.”
He remembered then how he felt yesterday, when he’d faced
Nicky Oberlin in the park. How he had the urge to kill him right
there. He wasn’t so far from lawlessness himself. He decided not to
share that inspirational moment with Doreen.
Sam got a page from reception. A man had a package for him.
Should he come on back? He needed a signature. Sam said to send
him down. He stepped out of the office into the corridor to wait. The man was dressed in a nice blue suit and wore a pleasant
smile. “Mr. Trask?”
“Yes.”
“This is addressed to you.” He held out a paper folded in thirds.
The moment Sam took it the man said, “You’ve been served.” Then
he turned on his heel and walked away.
Lew came out of his office, watched the man exit. “What was
that all about?”
Sam opened the paper and almost burst a blood vessel. “He’s
suing me.”
“Who?”
“You have to ask?”

Sam noticed the man in the red Beemer on Marquand Avenue, facing Sam’s house. It was the way he was sitting, as if he had nothing else to do but watch.

The guy looked at Sam as he drove by. Surely there was some rational explanation for this.
Sam parked, got out, walked across the street.
The man in the car didn’t move, didn’t make eye contact with him. Sam heard the low tones of the car stereo as he came up on the driver’s side. The window was up.
“Help you?” Sam said, loud enough to be heard through the glass.
The man looked at him, smiled, and shook his head.
“You look a little lost.”
The door opened. Some urban beat thumped out of the car. The man who emerged was thick across the chest, with short blond hair and blue eyes. A Norwegian linebacker. His forearms had bulges under a long-sleeved, red linen shirt.
“You want to say something?” the man said.
Sam knew this guy could take him apart like so many Legos. But he had to know who he was. One of the things Sam could do was size up a potential juror with a few well-chosen questions. The trick was to get him to talk.
“Just wondering if I could help you out,” Sam said. “You looking for someone?”
“Sure.”
“Who?”
“That’s kind of a personal question, isn’t it?”
“Just trying to help.”
“I’m good. Thanks.”
“Nice car.”
“Have a nice day.”
The guy got back in his car and slammed the door. And sat there.
Sam walked around the back of the car, took a long look at the license plate, then walked across the street to his house.
He decided not to tell Linda about the encounter. She had enough on her mind as it was. And she would soon have more. He sat her down in the living room and showed her the complaint he’d been served. “Oberlin’s suing me.”
She looked over the first page. “I can’t believe this.”
“It’s all too believable now.” He took the complaint from her. “I presume Heather’s not here.”
“She called me. She’s looking for a place with Roz.”
“Delightful. More answered prayer.”
“Sam, maybe we can’t see the answer yet. Heather has to go through this.”
“Why? Why did God set it up this way? I’m used to knowing the rationale behind decisions. This not knowing bites.”
“You sound like one of Heather’s band mates.”
“Please.”
He walked casually by the front window, looking through the lace curtain. The red car with Mr. Linebacker was gone.

“Man, Sam, what is going on? It’s like you’re spinning out — ” “Forget about it, Lew.”
“Did you see the
Daily Journal
?”
“Yeah. I’m a poster boy for a lawyer cracking up.”
“Are you cracking up, Sam?”
“Sometimes I feel like it, I’ll be honest with you. But I’ve got

some people holding me up.”
“Like me?”
“Sure, Lew. But I’m not married to you. Linda is showing her

Lew was silent for a long moment. “You know, of course, that this is putting me in kind of a tight spot.”
“You?”
“Us. The firm.”
“Bad publicity.”

“Hey, what can you do? Newspapers. Blogs. No privacy anymore. Dirty laundry gets hung out to dry and stays there.”
“And we’ve got dirty laundry now.”
“It all stinks, Sam. But maybe . . .”
“Go ahead.”
“When we started out, remember, just a couple of young turks full of starch and vinegar, we agreed that if anything we did were to hurt the partnership we’d — ”
“Agree to go our separate ways.”
“It rips me to say that.”
“I know. But you’re right. And maybe it’s time for me to reevaluate. I’m closing in on fifty. I wonder what I’m supposed to be when I grow up.”
“Be a lawyer, my friend.”
“Yeah, but what kind? Maybe God wants me to do something different with it.”
“There you go. You can get it straight from the Big Guy.”
Sam’s heart did a slow, sad turn. “I’m not going to stand in the way, Lew. Go ahead and do up some dissolution papers and we’ll go from there.”
“I feel terrible about this.”
“Don’t.”
“If you need anything, Sam, anything at all, you come right to me. This isn’t the end of the friendship. And I certainly need to exact some revenge on you on the golf course.”
“You can have at me, Lew, when I feel like I’m allowed to have fun again.”