Blind Conviction (Nate Shepherd Legal Thriller Series Book 3)
Page 33
I talked to Ronnie Hawkins and Abby Ackerman that afternoon and told them the whole story. Abby never did remember any more details about what happened to her that night, but the whole thing spooked her enough, justifiably, that she broke off her engagement with Hamish that same day.
Mr. and Mrs. Mack were at a loss for what to do for a while since their son Hamish was not a criminal, but he wasn’t exactly innocent either. It turned out he’d been the one who had orchestrated the crop sabotage. After he had learned about how profitable the well could be from Timmons, Hamish had wanted to make sure their crop yields were high enough that his parents wouldn’t be tempted to accept Hillside’s offer of a lease for themselves. So he had fertilized the fields and worked night and day to keep them afloat. Mr. and Mrs. Mack were distraught—they couldn’t take their land back from Hamish but they also couldn't trust their youngest son anymore when it came to the farm. Eventually, they got their own lawyer and deeded the drilling rights for an oil well on their part of the farm to Peninsula Petroleum, Hillside Oil's biggest competitor.
I’m told Will Wellington put the Macks in touch with the Peninsula folks for no commission. He is, by all accounts, exactly that nice.
It turned out that the drilling pad only took up ten acres, leaving the Macks plenty of land for farming. Mr. and Mrs. Mack, though, wanted no part of the profits. They deeded it all over to Abby. Abby tried to refuse, of course, but Mr. and Mrs. Mack couldn't bear the thought that their son had been such a colossal shithead and sent the payments to a trust in her name.
I heard Abby eventually started donating funds from the trust to support sustainable farming. Later, I guess she teamed up with Big Luke to set up a scholarship for farmers’ kids at some university but, I have to admit that, by then, I wasn’t paying much attention to the details. I did hear through Ronnie, though, that Abby’s hip healed and that she was able to walk normally again, but that the fracture alongside her eye never healed quite right.
It's interesting with clients. Sometimes you keep in touch and other times the case that is the most intense period of their lives is the only time you have any contact with them. I didn’t see Archie again for years and I didn’t see Hamish again at all, which I suppose shouldn’t have surprised me since I really don’t spend much time out in the fields of northern Ash County.
As for Cade and Olivia and me, the swelling went down around Olivia’s eye and she was allowed to go home from the hospital that Monday without any problems. Cade and I didn't really talk any more about our fight, except that he would sometimes say how easy it was to get out of a rear naked choke and I would occasionally comment on how it’s pretty simple to bring down someone much bigger than you…and Olivia would mention that there were times when she wished that her ears had been injured instead of her eye.
Which leaves me to tell you about breakfast.
I slid into the booth, ignoring Olivia as the waitress came right over.
“One sunny side up hash skillet, please,” I said. “With orange juice and coffee.”
The waitress smiled and said she’d be right back.
“Check the time,” I said.
It was hard to tell if Olivia was amused or irritated as she pulled out her phone, then said, “4:29.”
“Ha.”
She gave me a little smirk. “You look like shit.”
“Feel like it, thank you. You really do this every day?”
“I really do.”
“You have issues.”
“Doesn’t take a law degree to figure that one out.”
A carafe of coffee came. I politely declined the cream, then took a gloriously hot sip. “So you’re cleared to lead your classes already?”
“I’m not in the hospital.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“It’s the answer though.”
“Goodness.”
She smiled. “I usually don’t have company until my second cup of coffee.”
“Well then,” I said, and refilled her cup from my carafe. Steam wafted up and left thin trails across her lenses that vanished as soon as they appeared.
A moment later, my personal cast iron skillet appeared with two sunny side up eggs on a bed of hash made from cubed potatoes, peppers, and onions. I hit it with hot sauce, picked up my fork, and said, “Do you want to tell me about it?”
“No.” Olivia’s bowl of oatmeal and blueberries appeared to need concentration. “How long have you known?”
I shrugged. “A while now.”
She nodded. “What gave it away?”
“You know we didn’t see each other much for a few years, between law school and life at my old firm?”
“Right.”
“When I first started back at the gym, I thought the new glasses were a fashion statement.”
She nodded.
“Then it was just little things.”
“Like?”
“You don’t play softball anymore. You don’t spar, only roll. You seem to get headaches when you work on the computer a lot. Dropping out of book club. Getting a bigger TV. No one thing but everything.” I pushed my hash around. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
She shrugged and said, “There’s not much to tell.”
“Then it wouldn’t have taken long.”
Silence.
“Is there any vision in the left eye at all?”
“No.”
“What happened?”
Olivia took a bite of oatmeal, then instead of answering me, she said, “You blew out Cade’s knee.”
I shrugged. “What’s a medial collateral ligament among friends.”
“You could have done real damage. It could’ve been his ACL.”
“True. And he might have made it to the stairs.”
“Why did you do it?”
“Do I have to explain what would have happened if he’d made it to the stairs?”
Olivia looked down for the first time.
I put a little more hot sauce on the hash because, well, you have to sometimes. Then I said, “At the time, all I knew was that your right eye was hurt. And that you were going to need your brother.”
“I was fine.”
I nodded. “I didn’t know that. Neither of us did. Hence…” I shook out a last dash of hot sauce and took a bite.
“So you were saving the support system for the blind woman?”
“No.”
Olivia looked up.
“I was saving a support system.” I shook my head. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Olivia pressed her lips together, then said, “Shep, we’ve been fine without discussing this. You hire me to investigate cases. I remind you to get your soft ass to the gym. It works out.”
When I started to speak, Olivia sighed and looked into the kitchen. “I have enough trouble keeping one over-protective brother at bay. I’m not going to deal with two.”
“I wouldn’t do that.”
“Bullshit. You’re doing it now.”
“That’s what friends do.”
“No, Shep, they don’t. They respect each other’s boundaries.”
“Hmm. It wasn’t too long ago that my friend had me in the gym every night working things out.”
“That was different.”
“How?”
“Because it was new for you. You didn’t realize what you were going through, and your friend knew better. Your friend, on the other hand, has long since gotten used to her situation.”
I nodded and took a few more bites. “You handle it better than Cade.”
She smiled. “I used to tell him not to worry about it, that it was more likely that I’d get hit by a car.”
“Guess you’ll have to retire that one.”
“Apparently.”
“Is the gym safe?”
She smiled. “I’m more likely to get hurt working for you.”
I laughed. “Fair. But the question remains.”
“There’s a split of opinion.”
“Are there any doctor
s on your side of it?”
“Does it matter?”
“To me.”
“A few.”
“More on the other?”
She shrugged.
“So you’re not going to tell me what caused it?”
“No.”
“Is whatever caused it resolved?”
She didn’t answer for a while. I thought she wasn’t going to until she said, “I don’t know yet.”
“When will you?”
“I don’t know that either.”
“You’ll come to me if you need help.”
She shrugged. “We’ll see.”
“That wasn’t a question, Liv.”
“Problems come soon enough without running out to meet them, Shep. I’ll handle it when it comes.”
I couldn’t argue with that.
I swirled the last potato in a tiny smear of hot sauce and paused, then decided that would have to do. I ate the potato, enjoying the burn on the way down, took a sip of coffee and said, “So are you torturing a class this morning?”
“Before the sun comes up,” she said, then we finished our coffee, I paid the bill, and we left.
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About the Author
Michael Stagg has been a trial lawyer for more than twenty-five years. He has tried cases to juries and he’s won and he’s lost and he’s argued about it in the court of appeals after. He still practices law so he’s writing the Nate Shepherd series under a pen name.
Michael and his wife live in the Midwest. Their sons are grown so time that used to be spent at football games and band concerts now goes to writing. He enjoys sports of all sorts, reading, and grilling, with the order depending on the day.
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Also by Michael Stagg
Lethal Defense
True Intent
Blind Conviction
False Oath