Gold pointed at a second box outside the door. “We brought some of those, too.”
* * *
“How you feeling?” Gold asked.
Silver forced a weak smile. “Fine, Dave.”
“Fine as in ‘I’m okay,’ or ‘I feel like hell, but I’m dealing with it’?”
“Fine as I can be after being tased, kidnapped, tied up, and almost burned to a crisp. Then a crazy Area 2 detective channeled his inner Dick Butkus and dropped me with a flying tackle.”
“We call that good police work. Besides, I’m the one with the separated shoulder.”
“All in the line of duty.”
They were by themselves in Silver’s room. She’d changed into maroon U. of C. sweats. Lucia had driven Harry home. Vanessa and Battle had taken Jenny to the cafeteria.
Gold lowered his voice. “Tell me how you’re really feeling.”
“I have a little headache. That’s it.”
Relief.
Silver flashed a knowing smile. “It was sweet of your dad to give me his bat.”
“We thought you could use a little protection. You’re coming to the Sox game with us, right?”
“Of course, but I’m not switching teams. My great-grandfather lost a ton of money on the 1919 World Series. He swore that no member of his family would ever be a Sox fan.”
“Then I’ll work on Jenny. It isn’t too late for her.” Gold turned serious. “She seems okay considering everything that happened last night.”
Silver fought to maintain her composure before she leaned into Gold and burst into tears. “I almost lost her.”
“I almost lost both of you.” Gold held her tightly as she sobbed. He gently stroked her hair and wiped the tears from her face. “Everything’s okay.”
She struggled to catch her breath. “Everything is not okay, Dave. My baby was terrified. Vanessa was tased. DeShawn is dead. So is Paulie. And Christina Ramirez. And the caretaker at the church. And the people at the museum. And on Rush Street. And at Metra station. And at O’Hare. And for what? Because a crazy guy came home angry and wanted to stop some people from building a mosque in his neighborhood.”
Gold had no good answer. “We stopped Janikowski. You’ll get the death penalty for Al-Shahid. That’s something.”
“It won’t bring anybody back. Think of all the funerals this week. Think of Katie Liszewski and her kids.”
Gold took her hand. They held each other in silence for a moment. Finally, he pointed at a vase containing a bouquet of summer tulips. “Who sent them?”
“Danny’s name is on the card, but it must have come from his secretary.”
Gold was sorry he’d asked. “At least somebody was thinking about you.” He pointed at the second floral arrangement. “And those?”
“Fong.” Silver gave him a thoughtful look. “He isn’t a bad guy.”
“I know. We had a long talk last night. I’ve decided he’s a good guy who’s having a tough time, too.”
“No hard feelings about Paulie?”
“A few.”
“You’re evolving, Dave.”
“I’m trying.” Gold pointed a the largest and most elaborate bouquet. “Who sent those?”
“Earl the Pearl.”
“Seriously?”
“Yep. He isn’t evil. He’s just on the other side.”
“The wrong side.”
“The system needs people like him.”
“I suppose.”
Silver arched an eyebrow. “Maybe it is better that you decided to become a cop.”
“Maybe he ought to have his client plead guilty to first-degree murder.”
“Not gonna happen, Dave. Besides, it’s a conversation for another day. For now, I was able to persuade him to delay Al-Shahid’s preliminary hearing for a couple of weeks. It’ll give us a chance to take a few days off. You got time to take a ride to Wisconsin this weekend?”
I’d love to. “I’m sorry Lori. I have to take my dad to Christina’s funeral on Friday. Then I have to go to DeShawn’s funeral on Saturday. Can I have a rain check for a week or two?”
“Of course.”
Good. “You and Jenny want to come over tonight? Vanessa can come, too. A.C. and Estelle will be there. I promised my dad shrimp from Cal Fish.”
“We’d love to.” Silver gave Gold a thoughtful look. “How do you do it?”
“Do what?”
“Avoid becoming cynical. Lord knows you’re entitled. Your wife and daughter died. Your partner was killed. You almost got yourself killed chasing a terrorist. Chicago PD has been jerking you around for years. You take care of your dad without complaining. Why don’t you move to Wilmette and get a cushy job writing parking tickets?”
“Being cynical is the easy way out.”
“What do you mean?”
“Anybody can deal with the good stuff. You get measured by how you deal with crap. Some people get mad. Others try to ignore it. My brother hides in Lake Forest. Me, I attack it head-on.”
“Like your dad.”
“I guess.”
“He and your mom didn’t bail to the suburbs when the neighborhood changed.”
“He’s a stubborn old cuss. So was my mom.”
“And so is their son. I like him that way.” Silver held up a hand. “How do you deal with your father?”
“He didn’t have a stroke just to make my life harder. It isn’t easy living with him, but it’s a lot easier than being him. Fortunately, my brother can afford to pay for lots of help, and Lucia is great. My dad could have packed it in after my mom died or after his stroke, but he didn’t. He doesn’t complain too much. He gets up every day and tries to do something productive—even if it’s just walking over to Bessemer Park or sending pictures to his grandkids on Facebook. I give him credit for trying.”
“Like you.”
“I guess.”
Silver gave him a knowing smile. “I guess that’s why I love you, Dave.”
A feeling of warmth rushed through Gold’s body.
“What?” Silver said.
Gold reached over and stroked her cheek. “I waited a long time to hear you say that.”
“I never make anything easy. I hope it was worth the wait.”
“It was.”
Silver’s lips formed a cautious smile. “And?”
Gold leaned over and kissed her. “I guess that’s why I love you, too, Lori.”
THE END
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Writing stories is a collaborative process. This is my first non-series book with new characters, a new setting, and a new narrative voice. I got an enormous amount of help on this story, and I want to take the opportunity to thank the kind people who have been so generous with their time.
Thanks to my beautiful wife, Linda, who still reads all of my drafts, keeps me going when I’m stuck, and remains supportive when I’m on deadline. You are an extraordinarily generous soul. Thanks also for putting together the terrific video trailer, handling my website, and dealing with electronic books and other modern technology. Thanks to our twin sons, Alan and Stephen, who are very understanding when I have to spend time working on my books.
Thanks to Margret and Nevins McBride, Donna Degutis and Faye Atchison at the Margret McBride Literary Agency. Thanks to Elaine and Bill Petrocelli at Book Passage.
Thanks to my teachers, Katherine V. Forrest and Michael Nava, and to the Every Other Thursday Night Writers’ Group: Bonnie DeClark, Meg Stiefvater, Anne Maczulak, Liz Hartka, Janet Wallace and Priscilla Royal.
A huge thanks to two of my fellow natives of Chicago’s Southeast Side. Thanks to Rod Sellers of the Southeast Side Historical Society, who is a retired teacher at Bowen and Washington High Schools. Thanks for the grand tour of the Southeast Side and the helpful information about its history. You are an extraordinary teacher and great friend, and I now know more about our old neighborhood than I did when I was living there. Thanks also to retired Detective Mike Rowan of the Chicago Police Departmen
t, who took me on a tour of the Southeast Side’s police haunts, and explained the inner workings of South Chicago Station and Area Two. For those of you who are interested in the extraordinary history of South Chicago and the Southeast Side, please check out the Southeast Side Historical Society’s excellent website at: http://www.neiu.edu/~reseller/sehsintro.htm.
A big thanks to Caryn Amster and the contributors to the Overflow blog for residents of Chicago’s South Shore neighborhood. Special thanks to Mark Kotlick and Carlos Rosas at Calumet Fisheries at the 95th Street drawbridge. You still make the best smoked shrimp anywhere!
A big thanks to the incomparable Melanie Kuliniak for the tour of Chicago’s Polish Town.
Thanks to my friends and colleagues at Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton (and your spouses and significant others), for being so supportive through the birth of eight books. Space limitations don’t allow me to list everybody, but I’d like to mention those of you with whom I’ve worked the longest: Randy and Mary Short, Cheryl Holmes, Chris and Debbie Neils, Bob Thompson, Joan Story and Robert Kidd, Donna Andrews, Phil and Wendy Atkins-Pattenson, Julie and Jim Ebert, Geri Freeman and David Nickerson, Ed and Valerie Lozowicki, Bill and Barbara Manierre, Betsy McDaniel, Tom Nevins, Ron and Rita Ryland, Bob Stumpf, Dave Lanferman, Mike Wilmar, Miriam Montesinos, Mathilde Kapuano, Guy Halgren, Aline Pearl, Jack Connolly, Ed Graziani, Julie Penney, Steve Winick, Larry Braun and Bob Zuber. A big thanks to Jane Gorsi for your incomparable editing skills.
Thanks to my supportive friends at my law school alma mater, Boalt Law School: Kathleen Vanden Heuvel and Leslie and Bob Berring. Thanks also to my supportive friends at my undergraduate alma mater, the University of Illinois: Cheryl and President Robert Easter, Chancellor Phyllis Wise and Dick Meisinger, Dean Larry DeBrock, and Tim and Kandi Durst.
Thanks always to the kind souls who provide comments on the early drafts of my stories: Jerry and Dena Wald, Gary and Marla Goldstein, Ron and Betsy Rooth, Rich and Debby Skobel, Debbie Tanenbaum, Dick and Rosamond Campbell, Joan Lubamersky, Tom Bearrows and Holly Hirst, Roz and Rabbi Bernard Spielman, Julie Hart, Burt Rosenberg, Ted George, Jeff Roth, Phil Dito, Sister Karen Marie Franks, Brother Stan Sobczyk, Elaine and Bill Petrocelli, Stacy Alesi, Jim Schock, George Fong, Chuck and Nora Koslosky, Libby Hellmann, Bob Dugoni, John Lescroart, Thomas Perry, John Sandford, Jeff Parker, David Corbett, Allison Leotta and Jackie Cooper. A huge thanks to Charlene and the late Al Saper, two native South Siders who vetted this story and who have always been there for us.
Thanks always to Charlotte, Ben, Michelle, Margie and Andy Siegel, Joe, Jan and Julia Garber, Terry Garber, Roger and Sharon Fineberg, Beverly Rathje, Jan Harris Sandler and Matz Sandler, Scott, Michelle, Stephanie, Kim and Sophie Harris, Cathy, Richard and Matthew Falco, and Julie Harris and Matthew, Aiden and Ari Stewart.
Finally, a big thanks once again to all of my readers, and especially to those of you who have taken the time to write. Your support means more to me than you’ll ever imagine, and I am very grateful.
A Note to the Reader
Dear Reader,
Thanks very much for reading this story. I hope you liked it. If you did, I hope you will check out my other books. In addition, I would appreciate it if you would let others know. In particular, I would be very grateful if you would tell your friends and help us spread the word by e-mail, Amazon, Facebook, Goodreads, Twitter, Linkedin, etc. In addition, if you are inclined (and I hope you are), I hope you will consider posting an honest review on Amazon.
If you have a chance and would like to chat, please feel free to e-mail me at [email protected]. We lawyers don't get a lot of fan mail, so it's always nice to hear from my readers. Please bear with me if I don't respond immediately. I answer all of my e-mail myself, so sometimes it takes a little extra time.
Regards,
Sheldon
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About the Author
Sheldon Siegel is the New York Times best-selling author of seven critically acclaimed legal thrillers featuring San Francisco criminal defense attorneys Mike Daley and Rosie Fernandez, two of the most beloved characters in contemporary crime fiction. He is also the author of the thriller novel The Terrorist Next Door featuring Chicago homicide detectives David Gold and A.C. Battle. His books have been translated into a dozen languages and sold millions of copies worldwide. A native of Chicago, Sheldon earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Illinois in Champaign in 1980, and his law degree from the Boalt Hall School of Law at the University of California-Berkeley in 1983. He specializes in corporate and securities law with the San Francisco office of the international law firm of Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP.
Sheldon began writing his first book, Special Circumstances, on a laptop computer during his daily commute on the ferry from Marin County to San Francisco. A frequent speaker and sought-after teacher, Sheldon is a San Francisco Library Literary Laureate, a member of the national Board of Directors and the President of the Northern California chapter of the Mystery Writers of America, and an active member of the International Thriller Writers and Sisters in Crime. His work has been displayed at the Doe Library at the University of California at Berkeley, and he has been recognized as a Distinguished Alumnus of the University of Illinois and a Northern California Super Lawyer.
Sheldon lives in the San Francisco area with his wife, Linda, and their twin sons, Alan and Stephen. He is a lifelong fan of the Chicago Bears, White Sox, Bulls and Blackhawks. He is currently working on his ninth novel.
Sheldon welcomes your comments and feedback. Please email him at [email protected]. For more information on Sheldon, book signings, the “making of” his books, and more, please visit his website at www.sheldonsiegel.com.
Books by Sheldon Siegel
Mike Daley and Rosie Fernandez Mysteries:
Special Circumstances
Incriminating Evidence
Criminal Intent
Final Verdict
The Confession
Judgment Day
Perfect Alibi
David Gold/ A.C. Battle Mysteries:
The Terrorist Next Door
Connect with Sheldon Siegel
Email: [email protected]
Website: www.sheldonsiegel.com
Amazon: Author Page
Facebook: Facebook Fan Page
Twitter: @SheldonSiegel
Goodreads: Author Profile
Excerpt from
SPECIAL CIRCUMSTANCES
A Mike Daley & Rosie Fernandez Mystery (#1)
Chapter 1
A LICENSE TO PRINT MONEY
“Founded in 1929 and headquartered in San Francisco, Simpson and Gates is the largest full-service law firm based west of the Mississippi. With over nineteen hundred attorneys in eighteen offices on four continents, Simpson and Gates is recognized as an international leader in the legal profession.”
— Simpson and Gates Attorney Recruiting Brochure.
“For seven hundred and fifty dollars an hour, I’d bite the heads off live chickens.”
— J. Robert Holmes, Jr., Chairman, Simpson and Gates Corporate Department. Welcoming remarks to new attorneys.
For the last twenty years, being a partner in a big corporate law firm has been like having a license to print money. At my firm, Simpson and Gates, we’ve had a license to print a lot of money.
At six-fifteen in the evening of Tuesday, December 30, the printing press is running at full speed forty-eight floors above California Street in downtown San Francisco in what our executive committee modestly likes to call our world headquarters. Our 420 attorneys are housed in opulent offices on eight floors at the top of the Bank of America Building, a fifty-two-story bronze edifice that takes up almost an entire city block and is the tallest and ugliest testimonial to unimaginative architecture in the city skyline.
Our two-story rosewood-paneled reception area is about the size of a basketball court. A reception desk that is lon
ger than a Muni bus sits at the south end of the forty-eighth floor, and I can see the Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz Island and Sausalito through the glass-enclosed conference room on the north wall. The gray carpet, overstuffed leather chairs and antique coffee tables create the ambiance of a classic men’s club, which is entirely appropriate since most of our attorneys and clients are white, male and Republican.
Even in the evening of the customarily quiet week between Christmas and New Year’s, our reception area is buzzing with a higher level of activity than most businesses see in the middle of the day. Then again, most businesses aren’t the largest and most profitable law firm on the West Coast.
Tomorrow is my last day with the firm and I am trying to shove my way through three hundred attorneys, clients, politicians and other hangers-on who have gathered for one of our insufferable cocktail parties. I hate this stuff. I guess it’s appropriate that I have to walk the gauntlet one last time.
In the spirit of the holiday season, everybody is dressed in festive dark gray business suits, starched monogrammed white shirts and red power ties. A string quartet plays classical music in front of the blinking lights of our twenty-foot Christmas tree. The suits have gathered to drink chardonnay, eat hors d’oeuvres and pay tribute to my soon-to-be ex-partner, Prentice Marshall Gates III, the son of our late founding partner, Prentice Marshall Gates II. Prentice III, one of many lawyers in our firm with Roman numerals behind his name, is known as Skipper. He is also sailing out of the firm tomorrow. The circumstances of our respective departures are, shall I say, somewhat different.
After my five years as an underproductive partner in our white-collar criminal defense department, our executive committee asked me to leave. I was, in short, fired. Although the request was polite, I was told that if I didn’t leave voluntarily, they would invoke Article Seven of our partnership agreement, which states, and I quote, that “a Partner of the Firm may be terminated by the Firm upon the affirmative vote of two-thirds (2/3) of the Partners of the Firm, at a duly called and held meeting of the Partners of the Firm.” In the last three years, fourteen of my partners have been Article Sevened. I have graciously agreed to resign. On Monday, I’ll open the law offices of Michael J. Daley, criminal defense attorney, in a subleased office in a walk-up building in the not-so-trendy part of San Francisco’s South of Market area. Welcome to the modern practice of law.
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