Free The Hearing by John Lescroart

Abe to bear. She couldn’t have lived her interesting and committed life, done all she’d done, touched so many people, only to have it all wiped away in a completely random moment as though she were no more important than a bug.
    Although, of course, that’s exactly what did happen.
    But with his own daughter?
    He couldn’t fit it anywhere, couldn’t live with it. At least until he knew more—about Elaine, about her killer, the intersection where some meaning could be attached to it.
    It was important. It was stupid and made no sense. He had to do it.
    Again, he met the woman’s eyes. “If, for example, Elaine worked at all with the Free Clinic or Legal Aid, if she had any professional contact with junkies . . .”
    “Then she might have met with the man?”
    Glitsky made a face. “The point is, if Elaine volunteered with any of these people . . .”
    Treya was shaking her head. “She did volunteer, do some pro bono work, but not on the streets. She considered those people lost for the most part. If they were going to get back, it was going to have to be on their own. They weren’t her issue.”
    “So what was?”
    “Students. People who were trying to do something with their lives. So she taught moot court at Hastings, for example. She didn’t have much patience for professional victims—she always wanted to yell at people to not let themselves get in that habit.” Treya’s eyes briefly flickered bright with a rogue memory. “One of her great expressions was that there were only two kinds of people—victims and warriors.”
    “I like that,” Abe said. “But maybe Cole Burgess hung out with some students.”
    “Law students? I don’t think so.” Another shake of the head. “I don’t remember ever hearing the name.”
    “All right.”
    Treya bit at her lower lip again and Glitsky found himself watching her. The swollen, nearly pouting mouth.
    “When was the last time you saw her?”
    The question startled her. “Why do you want to know that? You can’t think I was . . .” She was staring, doe-eyed, in disbelief.
    “I don’t think anything.” Glitsky hadn’t meant to spook her. He softened his voice. “I’m trying to start somewhere, get a timeline of her last hours. It’s really routine.”
    “Isn’t that what the police always say when they suspect somebody? That it’s routine?”
    Glitsky’s mouth turned up a fraction of an inch, another humanizing touch. “Actually, they do, you’re right. But I’m not doing that now.”
    She sighed heavily. “Sunday afternoon. Here.” At Glitsky’s expression, she felt the need to explain and pressed on. “I’m often in on weekends, and she was doing some special master work.”
    Glitsky nodded in understanding. This wasn’t unusual. A special master was an attorney appointed by the court to help serve a search warrant on material that might be privileged—doctor’s records, lawyer’s files, psychiatrist’s tapes—and deliver whatever was not privileged in the requested records to the court. If the person who had the records was uncooperative, the master would do the actual searching and separate out what could lawfully be seized from the private records of other clients and patients, whose right to privacy was therefore protected from the police.
    “And Elaine came back here when she was done with that?”
    “Yes.”
    “What time was that?”
    Treya’s face showed her concentration. “I’m not sure, exactly. It was just turning dark, so maybe five-thirty. I was finishing up.”
    “And what did she come back here for?”
    “Just to leave me some files. Then she was going out for a meeting and then home.”
    Glitsky was leaning forward now. This was an unexpected bonus. Treya had talked to Elaine on the last day of her life, within hours in fact of her death. “Did she say who she was meeting, or where?”
    “No. I’ve tried to remember for myself. But she never said. I’m sure. She just said she had a meeting