Free Fatal Flaw by William Lashner Page B

few months?”
    “No. Nothing. There were some calls at the house, you know, calls I answered and then the caller hung up. Stuff like that. They ended about a month ago, but maybe something was going on. Maybe there was someone else I didn’t know about.”
    I stood and left the table so he wouldn’t hear the snort of disbelief that came unbidden from my throat. It was all too much to take, Guy professing his innocence, casting about for suspects, especially the thing about the phone caller who kept hanging up when he answered, since the phone caller who kept hanging up when he answered was me.
    In the peanut gallery behind the bar, a tall man with a suit and abriefcase was standing in the aisle, talking to Breger and Stone. I took him to be the prosecutor and I stepped over to make the introductions. We were going to be a good team, I was sure, he and I, working together as we were toward a common goal.
    But as I got closer, I realized the prosecutor and two detectives weren’t talking so much as arguing. Stone was keeping her voice low, but her disgust was evident. Breger looked away, his mouth set with a disappointment that seemed expected yet still painful, like a kid on Christmas morning who finds beneath the tree a puzzle and not a pony. When Stone saw me approach, she stopped talking and gestured to the prosecutor. The tall man with the suit and briefcase turned around.
    “You’re Victor Carl?”
    “That’s right,” I said. He was a handsome man, lean and athletic, and I thought he looked familiar but I couldn’t be sure.
    “Yeah, I recognize you from the paper.” He was talking about this morning’s Daily News . Beneath the headline— SHOT THROUGH THE HEART —was my picture, hand out warding off the camera, looking as guilty as a politician in a strip club.
    “They didn’t get my good side,” I said.
    “Well, you were facing the camera,” said Stone.
    Breger, staring now down at the floor, bowed his head sadly at his partner’s impudence even as his shoulders shook with stifled laughter.
    “Now, is that nice?” I said. “Here I am, trying to be pleasant, trying to forge a working relationship with the officers of the law, and you return my overture with insults.”
    “That wasn’t an insult,” said Stone, showing off her healthy teeth. “If I was meaning to insult you, I would have started with your tie.”
    “What’s wrong with my tie?”
    “Please. It’s like you and Breger frequent the same thrift shop.”
    “I was just about to compliment Detective Breger on his neck-wear. It’s rare to find a man brave enough to wear a plaid jacket and a plaid tie to go with it.”
    “If I may interrupt the soirée,” said the handsome man in the aisle. “I’m Troy Jefferson, chief of the trial division in the DA’s office here. I’ll be prosecuting Mr. Forrest.”
    I looked up at him. “I saw you play,” I said. “I saw you light us up for thirty-five when you could barely walk.”
    “You went to Abington?”
    “I did.”
    “Did you play yourself?”
    “No. I was barely coordinated enough the climb the bleachers.”
    “That’s one game I’ll never forget. I had an operation the next week and was never the same.”
    “You were a beautiful player.”
    “Thank you.”
    “Nice to meet you.”
    “Likewise.”
    I smiled at him. He smiled at me. I reached out my hand and he shook it. Troy Jefferson was the basketball star in our conference when I went to high school. He was fast, aggressive on the dribble, with a sweet jumper from the top of the key. He had led his team to a state championship as a junior, and before his knee collapsed on him had been talked about as the surest thing since Wilt. He played college ball, I remembered, but was never the same as before the injury and went undrafted. I had heard he played in Europe for a few years before going to law school and becoming a prosecutor. Word was he was waiting for the right moment to turn political and leap into some public