The Eye of the Tigress

by Paul Coggins

“I didn’t come here looking for business,” Cash said. “I came looking for you.”

  “Whatever favor you want from me, forget it.” Leroy polished off the beer. “The statute of limitations has long since run on anything you did for me back in the day.”

  “Get this through your thick skull. I’m not looking for a favor.” Not close to being true. “I’m trying to do you a solid.” Closer to true but not 100 percent there.

  “I know I’ll regret asking this,” Leroy said, “but what favor are you dying to do for me?”

  “I hear that your broke ass agency is at war with the big, bad FBI over who runs point on the La Tigra investigation.”

  Leroy perked up. “So?”

  “So the enemy of my enemy is my friend.”

  Leroy laughed. “You, a friend of ours. No fucking way.”

  “With Rob Rhoden out of the picture, I’m La Tigra’s go-to guy north of the border.”

  “Your mother must be so proud. Still doesn’t explain why you’d give a rat’s ass over which agency comes out on top.”

  “The Bureau is fucking over my girlfriend. The brass took issue with our relationship and plan to bury her in Bismarck. Nothing would please me more than screwing those self-righteous pricks.”

  “Revenge is a dish best served cold,” Leroy said, “much like beer.” He banged his mug on the table. The bartender returned with a full pitcher.

  It wasn’t full long.

  “I’m still not buying what you’re selling,” Leroy said.

  “I prefer dealing with people I trust. Say the word, and I go through you and you alone in my negotiations for La Tigra.”

  Leroy did a double take. “What’s in it for me? You know what the old-timers say. Little cases mean little problems. Big cases, big problems. You show up out of nowhere, offering me the mother of all monster cases, and expect me to jump on this live grenade?”

  Cash had anticipated pushback. The agent’s initial reaction would be suspicion, followed by heightened suspicion.

  Cash sweetened the pot. “It’d be a helluva capstone to a career with lots of ups and downs.” He didn’t point out that recently there’d been far more downs than ups. “Plus, taking the lead in catching La Tigra would spring you from this shitty detail.”

  The agent scratched his salt-and-pepper stubble. Far more salt than pepper. Didn’t take a mind reader to know the hook had been planted. “What’s in it for you?”

  “I need a get-out-of-jail-free card for a trans prisoner you arrested earlier tonight.” Cash wrote her name, date of birth, and social security number on a napkin and slid it toward Leroy. He figured the agent was a few beers past remembering those details.

  “What’s the tranny to you? Is she your client, or are you hers?” Leroy waved off an answer. “On second thought, I don’t want to know.” He grabbed the napkin. “I suppose you expect me to arrange for a limo to pick her up at the jail.” Said with sarcasm to spare.

  “That won’t be necessary,” Cash said, “but deep-six her case.”

  Leroy grunted. “I’ll see what I can do, soon as I finish my beer.”

  Cash left the bar, confident that Leroy would step up. Cash had a favorite quote from Churchill. How he could always count on the United States to do the right thing, but only after it had exhausted the alternatives.

  The saying applied in spades to Leroy, who would get around to doing the right thing. The only question was whether it would be in time to save Campos.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  A knock on the office door interrupted Cash’s text to Maggie. The odds of the message being finished and sent were roughly the same as those of her remaining in Dallas.

  Less than zero.

  He checked the time. 1:17. Toby Fine must’ve jumped the gun on his two o’clock appointment. Cash deleted the draft and yelled for the client to come in.

  The door opened to reveal not a current client, but a past and future one. For someone who had left the county jail only hours earlier as Chris Campos, the reincarnation as Tina came off as stunning.

  Crossing the office to take a chair, Tina exaggerated her sway. In her case, the hips might lie.

  “Where’s Eva?” she said.

  “She’s gone.”

  “What do you mean gone?” Her voice was high-pitched but husky enough to keep the customers guessing.

  “I ran her off.”

  “That was a dumb shit move.” She placed her Kate Spade purse on the desk and smoothed her dress.

  “Seems to be the consensus.”

  “If you have a brain cell left in that thick skull of yours,” Tina said, “you’ll beg her to come back.”

  “Too late for that. She landed a better job.”

  “Yeah, well, low bar.”

  Cash changed the subject. “Hate to interrupt your fun at my expense, but while we’re on the subject of expenses, any chance you’re here to settle your legal bill?”

  “I don’t have the cash on me now.” She paused. “But I should have it for you by…let’s say midnight.”

  “To borrow a line from Clarence Darrow, I cannot accept as payment of my fee the proceeds of a crime.” He paused for effect. “Committed so recently.”

  Her laugh tipped the scales to the feminine side. “Then perhaps we can agree on an alternative payment plan.”

  “If you came here all dolled up to seduce me, sorry but I don’t date chicks with dicks.”

  “Certainly not those of us with bigger dicks anyway.”

  “If you’ve got something to say beyond simply busting my balls, make it quick. A client will be here any minute. A paying client.”

  Tina looked crestfallen. “I came to thank you for saving my life last night. Your DEA buddy pulled me out of the holding cell, before I got thrown into gen pop.”

  “All in a night’s work.”

  She started to speak but held back. Rose and walked slowly to the door, looking like she’d lost her last friend.

  It hit Cash that she might be down to a single soul in her corner. Him. He extended a lifeline. “Hey, wait a minute. Maybe you can help me with this case.”

  She hurried back, heels clicking on the hardwood floor, and perched on the edge of the chair. “I’m all yours.”

  “Do you advertise in the Backdoor?”

  “Of course.”

  “Why?”

  Tina smiled, as if the answer was obvious. Straight out of Hooking 101. “For starters, all the girls are on the site, and most with more than one ad. I have six up and running, each geared to a specialty. Vanilla, couples, dominance, submission, bondage, and switch.”

  She went on. “From time to time, I tweak the wording in my ads to keep them fresh. Everybody wants the new girl in town, which is challenging when you’ve been on the site forever. Like me.”

  “How long exactly?”

  Tina ticked off the years finger by finger, until she ran out of digits. “Almost twelve years.”

  Cash did the math in his head. “How old are you?”

  “That’s not a question to—”

  He cut her off. “I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t need to know.”

  “Twenty-five.”

  Which made her fifty in street years.

  “Are you telling me that you placed your first ad in the Backdoor when you were thirteen?”

  “That’s not exactly how it went down. My first ad was placed for me on another website by the man I was living with at the time.”

  Cash shook his head. How the hell had she survived in the life for more than a decade? He hoped her gateway pimp hadn’t been so lucky.

  “The scumbag who broke you into the business,” Cash said, “is he still in the picture?”

  “Yes and no.” She blushed. “Rocky has a stable, but I’m no longer in it. He likes them young, so he turned me out when I hit eighteen. I know he’s still active, because I can spot his ads.”

  “How do you know which ads are his?”

  “By his code words. Babysitter. Bare
ly legal. Lolita. First time. Words that mean something in the trade.”

  Cash didn’t need a primer on their meaning. “How did you meet him in the first place?”

  “He bought me.” She wouldn’t say from whom.

  ***

  Toby Fine filled the chair left warm by Tina. More like flowed over the seat, his ass hanging low like saddlebags.

  The royal blue jogging suit didn’t flatter his roly-poly body, and the matching headband was purely decorative, since he never moved fast or far enough to work up a sweat. He looked pale, soft, and lumpy. Reminded Cash of the Pillsbury Doughboy.

  Cash had a rule of thumb for newbie clients. If they came to the first meeting in a suit, the attorney-client relationship would be smooth sailing. If they wore business casual, choppy waters ahead. And if they sported sweats, batten down the hatches.

  “For what it’s worth,” Fine said, “you were my first choice of counsel. She made me go to Rhoden.”

  It wasn’t worth spit to Cash. “No problem.”

  Long as you don’t have a third option in the wings, making me as expendable as Rhoden was.

  “What’s your plan for getting my indictment tossed?”

  There it was. Cut to the quick. The question that had triggered Rhoden’s execution. Fine never planned to win at trial. His sights were set on a dismissal of the indictment pretrial.

  “And how soon can you get it done?” the client said.

  Cash’s mind reeled. With Fine’s expectations pegged way too high, a simple home run wouldn’t do. The ingrate demanded a grand slam, along with an apology from the opposing team for showing up.

  Cash had to level the playing field. Lower the client’s expectations. Regain the high ground. He should be throwing out the questions. High, hard ones, aimed at Fine’s head.

  “Do you have any idea what the odds are of having an indictment dropped at this stage?” Cash said. “What you’re asking is next to impossible.”

  “I’m not asking,” Fine said. “I’m telling. And what it takes is one phone call.”

  “And who’s on the other end of this magical call?”

  Fine shrugged. “The judge, U.S. Attorney, Attorney General. I don’t give a shit who pulls the plug on my case. Just get it done.”

  “That’s not how I practice law.”

  “Then stop practicing law and start playing politics.”

  “When I entered law school, my plan was to go into politics,” Cash said, “but unfortunately, I passed my ethics exam.”

  The line failed to draw a laugh from Fine, or even a smile. Cash tried a different tack. “If I’m going to spring you, I need to know more about your background and business model.”

  “Fire away,” Fine said. “I’m an open book.”

  “How many underage girls and boys advertise in the Backdoor?”

  “None.”

  “Guess again. Another client of mine has placed scores of ads on your site since her early teens.”

  “Who?”

  Cash shook his head. “That’s privileged. Attorney-client.”

  “But I’m the client.” Fine’s voice rose an octave.

  “So is she. I can’t reveal her confidences to you or vice versa.”

  “What if she has info that can help me?”

  “If she took the stand, her testimony would bury you.” It took several seconds for Cash to process the import of his words. A door had opened for him. Just a crack, but he saw a way out.

  Over the years, conflicts between clients had proven to be professional hazards, ethical traps, and hell on the bottom line. This one, however, might be his salvation.

  He’d hit on a strategy to scratch his name from the lineup and watch from the cheap seats as Fine went down swinging.

  “Fix me a drink,” Fine said, “and make it a double.”

  You’re going to need more than one.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Face to face with Goldberg for the first time since the firm imploded, Cash couldn’t tell whether the breakup had affected the old man at all.

  On the one hand, Goldy looked rested, rambling around his downtown apartment in silk pajamas. His slippers slapped the floor in a steady beat, and his limp had all but disappeared.

  On the other, a warhorse like him lived for courtroom battles, where tyrants in black robes wielded gavels and lawyers fired off objections. Whenever peace broke out on the legal front, he suffered from withdrawal.

  Cash followed Goldy to the kitchen. His eyes swept the room, which would be the only thing to sweep it in weeks. Crumbs littered the floor. Towers of greasy dishes filled the sink. Trash bags barricaded the pantry door, the last line of defense against an army of ants laying siege to the dwindling provisions.

  Cash promised himself not to ask about Eva, or at the very least, not to lead off with her. Show no concern.

  As soon as he sat at the table, he caved. “How’s Eva doing?”

  Goldberg planted his elbows on the table, fingers laced around a coffee cup bearing the inscription: WAIT UNTIL YOU SEE MY BRIEFS.

  “Give her a call and hear for yourself,” Goldy said.

  “She won’t take my calls or return my messages.”

  “Should’ve thought of that before you fired her.” Goldy shuffled to the counter and poured himself a fresh cup of coffee. He didn’t offer one to Cash before returning to the table. “What’s the first thing I taught you?”

  “Get the fee up front,” Cash said.

  “Okay, what’s the second?”

  “Never fly solo.”

  Goldy nodded. “Any lawyer who claims to have won a case all by himself is either a fool or a liar. You need a skilled copilot and a solid crew to bring the passengers home safely. And it takes a damn jackass to bust up the A-team.”

  “That’s a hard lecture to stomach coming from you,” Cash said. “I lost count of the secretaries, paralegals, bean counters, and baby lawyers your zipper problem drove off.”

  “To quote our fellow Dallasite, president number forty-three, ‘When I was young and foolish, I was young and foolish.’”

  Cash gave him a get real look. “The last time was three years ago, old man. But I didn’t come here to dredge up the past.”

  “Then why are you here?”

  “I’ve hit on a way to put the firm back together,” Cash said.

  “To quote another Dallasite, who also ran for president, ‘I’m all ears.’”

  Cash took a deep breath. “You remember Chris Campos, a.k.a. ‘Tina’?”

  “Sure, the hotheaded tranny you got off.”

  “Depends on what you mean by ‘got off,’ but she was acquitted. By the way, they prefer the term transgender these days. Try to keep up with the times.”

  “Yeah, right.” Goldy’s tone conveyed no intention of doing so. “I remember him, her, them, whatever.”

  “Turns out that Campos has been advertising on the Backdoor since her early teens.”

  “What’s the Backdoor?” Goldy asked.

  Cash shook his head. The old man really hadn’t kept up.

  “It’s a website owned by Toby Fine—at least on paper—where all manner of prostitutes advertise.” Cash’s tone took a sharp turn. “Did you even bother to read the indictment against Fine before he came to our office?”

  “Of course not,” Goldy said. “I wouldn’t do a damn fool thing like that until his check cleared. Remember the prime directive: cash in or client out.”

  “Back to my plan to reunite the band,” Cash said. “Tina has been featured on the site for more than a decade.”

  “So?”

  “That could make her a witness for the government against Fine. Because I’ve represented Tina in the past and will likely do so in the future, I can’t both defend Fine and impeach her on the stand.”

  Goldy looked skeptical. “What’s the endgame here?”

  “I flag the conflict of interest between Tina and Fine, which results in the government bumping me off the latter’s defen
se. Even better, since the feds force the issue, no one can blame me for exiting the case. Not Fine. Nor, more importantly, La Tigra.”

  “That’s the means to an end. What’s your ultimate goal?”

  “To rebuild the firm,” Cash said. “You, Eva, me, and an associate to be named later.”

  Goldy shook his head. “Maybe not the worst plan you’ve ever cooked up, but definitely ranks in the bottom five.”

  “What’s wrong with it?” Asked as if Cash already knew the answer.

  “For starters, of the hundreds, maybe thousands of victims available to testify against Fine, what makes you think the feds will call on Campos to make their case?”

  “A little birdie could whisper in Delgado’s ear that Tina would be a dynamite witness for her.”

  “And what happens if Delgado blows off the tip and decides not to put Campos on the government’s witness list? After all, any prosecutor worth her salt would be wary of a gift from you.”

  “Gina would never pass up the chance to throw me off the case,” Cash said. “She wants no part of me.”

  Goldy took a swig of coffee. “That leads to the final, fatal flaw in your plan. You said there was nothing you could do about the conflict between Fine and Campos, and that may be true. However, there is definitely something La Tigra could do about it.”

  Here it comes. The insurmountable hurdle that had driven Cash to seek Goldy’s counsel.

  “She could have Campos killed,” Goldy said. “Conflict resolved.”

  “Well, when you put it like that….” Cash’s voice trailed off.

  With Cash on the ropes, Goldy pounded away. “I see what’s in this scheme for you, but what’s in it for Campos?”

  Cash couldn’t look Goldy in the eye. “She’d earn major brownie points from the feds, which might come in handy, given her occupation.”

  “Only if she lives long enough to call in the marker,” Goldy said. “Your ploy involves taking a lot of heat off you and a little heat off Eva and me by shifting all the heat to Campos. You would be signing his…her death warrant. Can you live with that?”

  “Can’t live with it,” Cash said, “probably can’t live without it.”

  “To paraphrase the greatest president of the twentieth century,” Goldy said, “if you can’t stand the heat, stay out of the courtroom.”