Illegal

TWO

One hour before he stood, naked and terrified, in the chambers of the Honorable Walter Rollins, Jimmy Payne stood, clothed and angry, glaring at a wooden pin some sixty feet away.

The five-pin.

Payne hated the five-pin nearly as much as he hated Cullen Quinn, his ex-wife's fiance. And there the damn thing stood-the pin, not Quinn-smack in the middle of the lane, taunting him. For most bowlers, the five was the easiest spare, but for Payne, the ten-pin-that loner at the right edge of the lane-was the gimmee. The trick, he knew, was not being afraid of dropping into the gutter.

Payne's second ball whooshed past the five and thwomp ed harmlessly into the pit, leaving the pin standing.

Damn. Even Barack Obama could have made that spare.

So could Payne's son. He thought about taking Adam bowling this weekend. His eleventh birthday was coming up, and the boy already threw a decent little hook.

Payne checked the counter behind the ball rack. The stranger still stood there, watching him. He had shown up around the third frame, sipping coffee from a Styrofoam cup. Blue shirt, striped tie thickly knotted, cheap tan suit that needed pressing. Hair that might have been blond once, now turned the yellowish brown of a nicotine stain. A gum chewer, with jaw muscles dancing; a face of angles and planes; a cold stare. A cop? Homicide, maybe.

Not a problem. Payne hadn't killed anyone. He hadn't even represented a murderer in a couple years. Bar brawlers, check bouncers, hookers from the Sepulveda Corridor. He could really use a good murder trial right now. Or a personal injury case with fractures to weight-bearing bones. Even a nasty divorce would do. Lacking any decent cases, bowling alone on a weekday morning provided a break from bill collectors and anger management classes.

Payne hoisted his Hammer Road Hawg from the ball return and settled into his stance. Sensing movement, he glanced over his shoulder. Wrinkled Suit was headed his way. Payne considered challenging the guy to three games at ten bucks a pin.

"Morning, J. Atticus Payne."

Keeping the ball at hip level, Payne turned to face the man. "Jimmy. Jimmy Payne."

"Your Bar card says 'J. Atticus.' "

"My parents were hoping I'd grow up to be Gregory Peck."

"Nah. They named you 'James Andrew.' You changed it. Not legally, of course. Just made it up and put it on your driver's license, which also says you're six feet tall, when you're really five-eleven. You make up a lot of shit."

Grinning now, Gotcha. Like he was Sherlock Fucking Holmes.

"Some people think Atticus fits," Payne said, thinking of his ex-wife, Sharon.

"What slimeball you gonna walk today, Atticus?"

That was before she started calling him "the respondent." When Sharon divorced him, her bill of particulars included his reputation for sleazy behavior.

"Respondent has engaged in a pattern of professional activity that is a source of embarrassment to Petitioner, a police officer."

If he'd been different, Payne wondered, if he'd made more money and been more respectable, if he'd lunched at the California Club instead of Hooters, would Sharon still be his wife?

Nah, that wasn't the issue.

"You weren't here for me when I needed you, Jimmy."

"Why do you lie so much?" Wrinkled Suit asked.

Payne shrugged. "I'm a lawyer."

"You rolled a baby split in the third frame. The three-ten. Very makeable. But you hit the 'Reset,' erased the score, and bowled again."

"That a crime?"

"What kind of guy cheats when he's bowling alone?"

"Maybe a guy who wants a second chance."

"To do what? Tell a client to flee the jurisdiction?"

"Who the hell are you?" The man reached into his jacket pocket and flipped open a vinyl wallet with an L.A.P.D. badge and photo I.D.

Payne read aloud. " 'Detective Eugene Rigney. Public Integrity Unit.' Kinda wussy, isn't it? I mean, compared to Robbery Homi cide. Or SWAT."

He turned toward the pins and took his four-step approach. A high back swing, a wrist-snapping release, a fluid follow-through. The ball skidded on the oil, dug in, and hooked hard left into the pocket. A big mix, the clatter of rolling logs. The skinny neck of the six-pin kissed the ten, pushing it over like a wobbly drunk.

Strike! Take that, Mr. Public Integrity.

Rigney didn't look impressed. "You gotta do something for me, Payne."

"What?"

"Bribe a judge." The cop looked at his watch. "And you've got one hour to do it."