The Smart Money introduces San Francisco litigator, Laura Di Palma, described by the New York Times as "one of the smartest, most open-minded sleuths in the lawyering trade." It is available in Amazon's Kindle Store, the iTunes store, and Barnes & Noble's Nook Store. A year of death threats and harsh publicity might drive any woman back to her home town. And Laura Di Palma certainly got hit for defending the killer of two U.S. Senators. But Laura didn't leave her dream job in the city just to hide away. 14 years ago, her marriage ended when she walked in on her high school sweetheart with another woman. She rebounded with that woman's husband: convinced herself she was in love and convinced him to run away with her. But he left her waiting, bags packed, at a motel. Now she's learned he died that night. And she's certain her ex-husband murdered him. She has the money and fame these days to spotlight the old crime. But in a town run by her uncle the mayor, Laura's ex isn't the only one who'll strike back hard to keep a secret. Find out why Booklist says, "Tight plotting, good characterizations, and page-turning suspense make Matera one of the best contemporary mystery novelists. Matera is too good to miss."             The Smart Money   By Lia Matera       Copyright 1988 Lia Matera   Electronic Edition 2011 eISBN 978-1-937697-02-0     This ebook may not be re-sold, reproduced, copied or distributed for commercial or non-commercial use.   First Bantam Books Edition 1988 First Ballantine Books Edition 1991     Author's Note   This book differs in some ways from the print version, published by Bantam in 1988 and reprinted by Ballantine in 1991. In this edition, I have removed or reworked some historical references and added some fresh observations.         The Smart Money       Chapter One     My cousin Hal had just moved into a condemned bungalow near the jetty. Everyone else deserted the development when the foundations cracked and dunes began reclaiming the thoroughfares. Hal's kerosene lamps provided the only glimmer of light on the wind-flogged cul-de-sac. He had none of the amenities there—no heat, no water, no company but scrambling sand fleas and other hungry pests. Apparently it suited Hal to keep his staples in glass jars, rodents and roaches scratching to get in. I stood at the threshold of his hovel. In the lantern light, I could see boarded-up windows, a sand-choked porch, and exterior walls veined with wet cracks. Behind the house, on the opposite shore of the bay, the old nuclear power plant glowed like a neon dinosaur. My hometown. "Hotshot lawyer." My cousin regarded me with undisguised disgust. "Opening an office in this backwater. How come? Stick it to your ex-husband?" "That about sums it up." The wind whipped sand around my ankles, and I could feel my shoulder muscles knot with the cold. "I'm freezing, Hal." He motioned for me to enter, then preceded me down a drafty hallway. His sweater was too short and his corduroy pants were threadbare at the seat. Henry Di Palma, Jr., had once favored trendy jeans and pressed shirts. Dozens of them still hung in the cedar-paneled closets of his father the mayor's house. In Hal's living room, two lanterns flickered near a slashed recliner, and a fire battled the river of cold air whistling down the fireplace flue. He'd been sitting there doing nothing, I guess. There were no books or papers beside the chair, just a jam jar with the dregs of red wine. I found a wood stool and brushed it off, wrinkling my nose at the dirt that clung to my palm. "Cleaning lady must have missed a spot," Hal said. I sat down and took a good look at him: glowering brows, deep lines from cheekbone to dimpled chin, eyes set in a perpetual wince, salt-and-pepper hair that had suffered an impatient and inexpert haircut, self-inflicted. "Whatever it takes to keep the family away?" "At least I don't go out of my way to kick them in the behind." "Don't waste your sympathy on my ex-husband. He deserves it." My high-school sweetheart, Gary Gleason, had the town's public defender contract. I was going to take it away from him, and I was going to enjoy doing it. "I'm just opening an office. The city doesn't have to accept my bid." "Except that you're famous." "There is that." A year earlier, I'd defended Wallace Bean, the man who shot and killed two Republican senators as they stepped off a chartered jet. I'd managed to assemble that one-in-a-million jury with enough regard for expert testimony to acquit Bean by reason of insanity. The nation—especially conservatives who'd rallied behind the senators' "bombs for victory" approach to war—had been outraged. But my career had been made. Time, Newsweek, and other national magazines carried lengthy articles about the trial and, inevitably, about me. "But I'm not exactly popular, Hal." My hometown was backwoods conservative—loggers, fishermen, cannery and dairy workers. Its citizens doubtless disapproved of what the President had called "an abortion of justice." On the other hand, I was a celebrity in a place where people still talked about the time Robert Goulet stayed overnight at the Hillsdale Inn. I smiled at my cousin. "All in all, I'd say the smart money's on me." Hal stroked his jaw—surprisingly clean-shaven—with a long, callused hand. "I like my money the way I like my women: easy." I glanced around the room. Dust balls scampered across the floor, wood crates did duty as tabletops, broken pieces of furniture glowed in the fire. "I don't see much evidence of either around here." "No regrets about Bean? Just one more crazy on the street?" "A medical review board decided my client was sane. I didn't make that decision." "But you represented him—" "At the sanity hearing? Of course I did. That's my job." The state attorney general had argued against me. How can a man be crazy in May and sane in April? An acerbic psychiatrist had replied, How can the governor gut the mental health budget and still expect us to provide years of in-patient care? "It wasn't me who put Bean back on the street." "So you'll take the credit, but not the blame?" "Something like that." A damp draft chilled my legs. I tugged the hem of my skirt over my knees. "Why the hermit routine?" He smiled, his expression—except for his eyes—suddenly rather sweet. "Didn't the family tell you?" "You use the war as an excuse to be a self-destructive, ungrateful bum." "Indulge in an 'I told you so,' if you want." Hal lowered his eyelids, transforming his smile into a smirk. I'd tried to talk Hal out of going into the service, might have succeeded if his parents hadn't muddied things by agreeing with me. I wasn't surprised to hear he came back moody and waspish. He'd joined for reasons that made little sense, then fought a war that made even less.  I'd only seen him twice since then. I'd run into him Golden Gate Park five or six years after he got out. He'd looked haggard and filthy, said he'd never gone back home. A few years after that, I found him outside my apartment wielding a greasy wrench. He stayed a few days, just long enough to repair his coughing old van. He'd seemed more relaxed, even amusing in a dry, offhand way. But he wouldn't tell me where he'd been living or what he'd been doing. I didn't mention Hal's visits to our family, as I couldn't say he looked a bit prosperous, or even happy. From what I gathered, Hal hadn't contacted them in the years since. He'd simply appeared at this abandoned development one day last week. "You know how long the war's been over, Hal?" Long enough for me to get divorced, run off to the big city, finish college and law school, clerk for a state supreme court justice, put in a year with the U.S. attorney, criminal division, and join the cream of San Francisco law firms, White Sayres & Speck. "What's this really about? Why the TV-movie torment?" "Please. Spare me your lectures." "And you'll spare me yours?" Hal laced his fingers behind his head and looked me over. I let him look. I didn't consider myself vain, but it paid to take advantage. Jury consultants and make-up artists had taught me to keep courtrooms focused on my wide-set eyes and full lips and not my Roman nose. I'd switched to belted suits to accentuate a small waist. My shoes were exquisite to distract from being larger than I'd like. And though I hated doing what it took (and it took a lot), I'd tamed a once wild mass of curls. If I came across as a successful lawyer, it was not by accident. "I liked you better when you looked like Mowgli," was my cousin's verdict. "You're behind the times, Hal. This is how we dress in the jungle nowadays.'' "So why come back here? You always hated the rain." "You just told me. To stick it to my ex-husband." He shook his head. "So you get the goddam public defender's contract, and Gleason scrambles a little. He'll get by. He always has." "Don't bet on it." I was surprised to hear the venom. I'd had a lot of practice keeping anger out of my voice. ("With all due respect, Your Honor…") I changed the subject. "Are you coming to my office-warming party?" "My parents going to be there?" "What do you think?" Not a word from them in the years they'd considered me "loose" for running off to San Francisco, but they'd been in the aisles with their cameras when I graduated from law school. "I think I have a previous engagement." The firelight accentuated the harsh creases in Hal's cheeks. "And I think you've worn out the war as an excuse." "Any suggestions for a better one?" I indicated his surroundings. "Shame that your daddy rammed this boondoggle down the planning commission's throat." "You should be grateful to the mayor. He had to put your ex-husband in the hospital to build this little bit of hell." "Every cloud has its silver lining, Hal." Hal rested his forearms on his knees. "What did Gleason do to you, anyway?" "It's something he's going to do for me." There was still a whisper of wrath in my voice, but only a whisper. "Once he sees nothing else will get me out of town." Fire shadows capered over the bare walls and cob-webbed ceiling. Hal's voice was unusually quiet. "Gleason coming to your office-warming?" "I'd say so. He wouldn't want to appear ungracious." "So you did invite him." "Why, Hal. There's no one I'd rather see there."     Chapter Two     I tried to stifle the buried-alive feeling I always got, seeing the gilt rococo mirrors and satin floral settees in the mansion my father shares with Hal's parents. He's been a widower for thirty years, but he and I and a housekeeper always lived in the house my mother chose for us. It wasn't until I got married that Papa sold the brick bungalow and moved in with his second (or third?) cousin, my "Uncle" Henry. I found Papa in his study, smoking a tiny cigar. His feet, in gleaming black shoes, were crossed on top of his account books. His black hair was sleekly combed and his jowly face was calm, perhaps bored, as he stared out the window. "I've been to see Hal," I told him. He dropped his feet to the floor. "'Hal.' My cousin's name isn't good enough for his son?" "Henry, then." I didn't feel like fighting the battle of the name for Hal again. At age sixteen he'd begun to insist his contemporaries call him Hal. (Years later, I read Henry IV, Part I, and finally got the joke.) He'd also refused to touch his birthday present—a brand-new Fiat Spider I'd have killed for. Papa shook his head and muttered, "He lives in a slum when he could live in a palace." A slight exaggeration. The "Mayor's Residence" (easy to think of it as my Uncle Henry's own house, since he'd been mayor for twenty-seven years) was an eight-bedroom mock Swiss chalet, ludicrously out of keeping with the town's bungalows and Victorians. It had been pretentiously overdecorated at the taxpayers' expense. "I don't think Aunt Diana appreciates his, um, rough charm." The understatement of the year. Hal's mother had nothing but disdain for those less shallow, wealthy, and insincere than herself. The town Babbitts appreciated her unbridled ambition and ostentatious displays of wealth. But those attributes weren't particularly desirable in a mother, not if you happened to be an antisocial pauper like Hal. "Anyway, Hal—Henry—is too old to live at home." Papa stubbed out his cigar, brushing ashes off his vest. "He's too old to live like a gypsy, you mean." "I rented a house today." I was glad to change the subject. "Arranged for furniture, all that. Movers should have me in by dinnertime tomorrow." Papa's nostrils flared but he said nothing; a victory for me that he considered it useless. We both knew my Aunt Diana would speculate that I lived alone to entertain men, a proposition that would be unbearable to my papa if I lived to be a hundred. He was still struggling to accept my divorce. He'd told me at the time—told me until I stormed out of town—that boys will be boys, and a wife should understand the ways of the world. "On Clarke," I continued. I could see he was surprised. That three-block strip of Victorians had been restored to perfection, with rich colors and bas relief, oak flooring and stained glass. It was as pricey as the town got, and it was where my ex-husband kept house with his girlfriend, Kirsten Strindberg. In fact, my new house, a drafty four-bedroom, was directly across the street from my Gary's. My Aunt Diana stepped into the study. She was a tall woman with high, arched brows, a long, thin nose, and a tiny chin she tucked down into a plump neck. She greeted me with cold cordiality. That morning she'd suggested I let her and my uncle host my office-warming party. ("It doesn't look good for a young girl to put herself forward.") My snub had, of necessity, been forceful, and Aunt Diana had decided to punish me by remembering "other plans." "Shall I have them set a place for you at dinner?" my aunt inquired. "I have to be somewhere at seven," I lied. "Sorry." "Dieting?" She sniffed, regarding my trim figure. "They say that after thirty a woman has to choose between her face and her figure." Equally daunting options, in my aunt's case. I spent most of the evening driving around town. For fourteen years, I'd associated Hillsdale with feeling trapped, understimulated, suffocated by my family, and—worst of all—shamed by my husband. Now the place barely seemed familiar. It was just another small Pacific Northwest town smothered in gray drizzle. Newer streets had big square houses on big square lots interspersed with muddy hills and gullies. In the older parts of town, high curbs—to keep torrential rain from flooding sidewalks—made it impossible to get passenger side car doors open. Metal hitching posts with brass rings still rose from a few corners. Flophouses near the redeveloped marina had been repainted and marked with historical plaques. Except for the stink of fish and pulp mill, the foggy neighborhoods around the bay were rather grand, with their dripping hedges and giant rose bushes. I'd grown up in an old Queen Anne here. I remembered the five-foot skunk cabbages in the gully behind it. I hadn't thought of them in years. I parked my car in front of the place I'd just rented. I turned up the heater and stared across the street. My ex-husband owned a two-story Victorian with a domed roof. It looked well cared for, painted tan with rust-and-navy trim. A green Peugeot was cozily tucked into the gingerbread carport. Red and purple rhododendrons were in flower, the lawn was neat, the porch was hung with potted fuchsias. I wondered where Lennart Strindberg was buried, whether his grave was as manicured as my ex-husband's lawn. But Kirsten probably preferred to tend to the living. For Lennart's sake, I hoped my plan was clever. It was the best I could do under the circumstances. But it was only a half measure. It wasn't a bomb, it wasn't a knife in the ribs. I remembered Kirsten's nasty habit of getting Lennart to fetch and carry for her, of making her round little doll's face look plaintive as she said, "Len, more coffee for everyone?" or "Len, could you get the groceries?" Lennart Strindberg, six feet four, translucent white skin over pronounced cheekbones and a delicate nose, hair the color and consistency of corn silk, long-fingered hands, faraway gray eyes, an unhappy set to his too-wide mouth… I'd thought him the handsomest man in the world. And the kindest. I'd hated seeing him used as a servant by Kirsten. I'd hated that he never rebelled, never even hesitated. Kirsten used to chide me in Gary's presence. "You spoil Gary." Her tone was as coy and affected as the look she'd flash him. Then she'd narrow her eyes and add, "I'd beat him into shape fast enough." And Gary would respond with an Oh, would you? grin. Lennart Strindberg told me, the very last time I saw him, that Kirsten hated to be obeyed, that it made her feel unwomanly. "Then why do you do it?" Lennart had shrugged. "Good manners are most necessary when they are least appreciated." Lennart Strindberg. All these years I'd thought of him as a living, breathing human being. All these years I'd wondered if we'd ever meet again, if he'd ever changed his mind about me—"wised up," as it were. And all these years, Lennart had been dead. Dead so long that Kirsten and Gary probably thought of him only rarely, thought of him with little guilt and less remorse. But I would change that.     Chapter Three     The office warming was going well. I'd bought a great deal of expensive champagne, and I was doing my best to charm magistrates and judges—the ones who informally advised the county, helping it select the public defender. I let my Uncle Henry lead me around the room, introducing me to them. Uncle Henry was short and barrel-chested, like my father, with the same dark, firm skin and sleek black hair. But my Uncle Henry wore an expression of false candor, of goodwill, that my father could never, nor would ever need to, feign. Uncle Henry was in fine fettle that afternoon, slapping backs and telling jokes that would have made my Aunt Diana tight-lipped with disapproval. I was standing with our congressman, a bloated bald man with a squashed strawberry of a nose. I was defending—for the thousandth time—"TV syndrome," a phrase coined by newspeople during Wallace Bean's trial. Bean had been hooked on the type of television fare that glamorized violence and intrigue, that showed one brave man breaking the rules, beating the system, changing history. When he met the senators' airplane with his forty-five, Bean saw himself as a savior of liberalism, an avenger of dead soldiers, a man purging the national psyche of an unjust war. Bean's jury hadn't based its insanity verdict on his television viewing, though. I'd argued it was just one symptom: Bean had taken television's violence-for-a-good-cause as a tacit go-ahead. Why should he think his fantasies were antisocial or wrong when similar acts were applauded night after night on show after show? Unfortunately, the press—and even many lawyers, who should have known better—thought Bean was acquitted because he watched too much television. TV syndrome had become a catchphrase for the subversion of justice by sneaky defense lawyers. In the year since the trial, I'd been on a dozen talk shows and given a hundred print interviews to clear up the misconception. But people seemed determined to believe in the perversity of the legal system. I was tired of trying to set the record straight. To the congressman, I said merely, "Bean's concept of reality was formed by what he saw on network television, sir. It was his family's baseline, their church and their Bible. It was his schoolhouse." I'd heard the congressman's rejoinder so many times—we all watch TV, but we don't all kill senators—that I put my brain on hold and began discreetly scanning the room, looking for an excuse to slip away. And I saw Gary Gleason standing near the door. He wore a shiny sharkskin suit that looked straight out of a parcel with a Tokyo postmark. The bastard had kept slim, though, aged well. He wasn't as tall as I remembered, he was long in the torso but short-legged. His hair had thinned from an unmanageable tangle of brown frizz to a wispier style that showed more forehead than in his youth. His face stirred unwelcome memories. How many times had a I stared at that thoughtful frown, the hazel eyes and chiseled nose, the ironic smile? I exorcised a ghost of the old feeling, then noticed squint lines beside his eyes, creases in his forehead, a hard bracket around his mouth. His stance was different, too. It was wary, tense—natural under the circumstances but a comedown from the cocky arrogance of youth. My ex-husband, unaware of my scrutiny, looked around my well-appointed offices, shaking his head slightly. I excused myself and walked toward him. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my papa watching, saw him grow still and tense, his hand poised in midair with his cigarette lighter aflame, like a torch. Gary became aware of me, looked me up and down, and forgot to smile. "It's been too long," I lied. "Thanks for coming. Your practice is going well?" "Sure. Yes. I guess there's…" He waved toward the other rooms of my office suite. "Plenty of work in this town for a few more lawyers." "Oh, it's just me. I'll be in that office." I pointed to a big room with a view of the courthouse. "I'll install my detective in the one at the end. Computers, paralegals, next to me. The small room's for the office manager. And the receptionist will be in here, of course." He glanced out the nearest window to hide his surprise. I remembered that mannerism. The window framed the main street of downtown, which was also part of Highway 101. A fifty-foot logging truck rattled by, a pyramid of redwood trunks strapped to its trailer. For a moment, it obscured my view of Woolworth's. "Your own detective, huh?" I nodded. "I like to have one in-house. I like the convenience. How about you?" He shook his head. "You forget how small this berg is. In fact, you might have trouble finding paralegals." "I'll be using one of White Sayres & Speck's for a while, while they move to new offices. A woman who went to law school but didn't take the bar. My detective has a couple of years, too—Tulane Law. He was a cop, thought it would help him get promoted. But it turned out his sergeant didn't trust lawyers." I smiled. "I think the paralegal's coming to be near him. She thinks he looks like Gary Cooper." A slight rigidity of the chin told me Gary was hating every second of this. "That's great." "How's Kirsten?" My turn to hate. "Fine." "Any kids?" Kids were a complication for which my plan made no allowance. I was relieved to hear Gary say, "No. Not yet." Time for the opening salvo: "I found out recently that Kirsten is White Sayres & Speck's landlord." A flush started up Gary's neck. He didn't say anything. "She's the reason the firm's moving. You probably know that. The lease expired, and she hiked the rent by a factor of—" "The only businesses in San Francisco still getting bargains are the ones with the fifteen- and twenty-year-old leases." Gary frowned. "That's not why you left White Sayres?" "No. But rents here are certainly reasonable, aren't they? When I heard how little they wanted for this place, I couldn't believe it." I waited a few beats, till Gary began looking comfortable again. "Now that Kirsten's getting better value on those San Francisco offices, maybe you can buy more talent for yours." Gary squinted at me, preparing a reply. "Paralegals, I mean." I added casually, "By the way, did you know we're neighbors?" "Neighbors?" He couldn't quite keep the horror off his face. "My father says you live on Clarke. I just rented a house there. One fifty-seven." "What are you—?" For a minute I thought he'd lower the facade. But he caught himself, burying his fists in his pockets. "We're across the street." "Tell me, do you ever see Lennart?" I noticed how quickly his flush died into pallor. "It's been I guess fourteen, fifteen years since I last saw him. I thought I'd give him a call if he's still in—" "He died. I thought you knew that." I let him see a little of the anger I felt. "Who'd have told me?" He looked away. "I supposed maybe your father? I'm sorry." "Are you?" We made eye contact again. "Of course." "Then come over later and tell me what happened." I waved to show I had other things to do at the moment. He frowned, hesitating. "All right." "Seven okay?" He nodded. I turned to greet another guest before Gary could see my smile. But my papa, his lighter burnt out and lowered, did see it. What he made of it, I don't know.     Chapter Four     The reception broke up at five o'clock, leaving me tired of saying the kinds of things a person has to say. I grabbed a couple of bottles of champagne, jumped in my car, and sped out to Hal's. Conversation with him never went in a predictable direction. He didn't invite me into his collapsing bower. Instead, he took the champagne bottles and started walking, apparently expecting me to follow. I picked my way over buckled sidewalks strewn with warped window frames and sandy strips of carpet. On either side of us, two-story houses rose from a litter of broken glass, dune weeds, and beer cans. Doors were nailed shut, windows were boarded up, and tattered condemnation notices flapped in the salty wind. Here and there, doors had been pried open, revealing carpetless floors, bits of abandoned furniture, and appliance-looted kitchens. Walls were graffitied with obscene parodies of the developers' motto, "Luxury You Can Afford." Then, fighting a freezing blast of wind, we crossed the sand flats that separated the sinking development from the bay. Hal led me onto a jetty of giant, jagged boulders extending like a crooked finger out to sea. "Didn't think I could do it in heels, did you?" I turned up my jacket collar. It was always painfully, miserably cold on the jetty, and this evening was no exception. Waves battered the saw-tooth granite, and the wind whistled with sprays of spindrift. "Bonus points for sitting on the rocks. Not worried about your fancy clothes?" "I've got others," I said. He popped both champagne corks and handed me one of the bottles, sucking froth from his. "Expensive taste in liquor." I shrugged. "And clothes and cars." He sat beside me. "Things. I guess they're important to you?" "Things, no. Not really. Appearances, yes, somewhat. They're my stock-in-trade. Clothes and car, office, too. It's what you're judged by, in the city. What gets you listened to. So I make sure the package passes muster. I make sure it tells the men around me—mostly men—that I have it. Power, brains. Whatever they associate with money. Talent." "Talent? Crapshoot whether that pays." "Try the champagne. You'll be glad I've got money." Hal drank. A third of the bottle in a swallow. A seasoned drinker, it seemed. He didn't look at me. He stared out at the lead gray water. The jetty ended where the bay met open ocean. The curving inlet showed Hillsdale's corrugated fish canneries and oyster farms, and closer in, the dockside Victorians of its first timber magnates. Directly across from us, behind a strip of muddy sand, a nuclear power plant rose in an intricate pattern of white lights and metal braces. It was one of the first things my Uncle Henry acquired for the town when he became its mayor. It was obsolete and out of commission now, a potential catastrophe for the next several thousand years. "What are you after, Laura?" Hal wedged the bottle in a crevice. "Keep coming out to this dump. Why? Not to get me drunk." "It'd have to be an improvement." "No. Trust me." "Maybe I want to be friends." "You can let that go. Not a thing about me you'd— Well, let's just say I'm not a guy to help somebody climb a ladder." "Could be I'm just bored. Or flirting. We're not first cousins. Not even second." "Good god—how much of this stuff have you guzzled? Not enough to think I measure up." Hal never did flatter easily. "I'd bet my bottom dollar—if I had one—that you go for the European type. Classy. To match the sports car and designer clothes. Good hair. Kills at racquetball, strong jaw. Yale law, cuff links, custom suits." I laughed. "Particular, aren't I? But in point of fact, I'll settle for off-the-rack Armani or Saint Laurent." I looked him over: broad shoulders, long waist, slender hips. Either label would become him. "You know, the last man I was in love with didn't even own a suit. He was unpretentious and quiet, but you could tell by his eyes that— Oh god. Maybe I have had too much to drink." I handed him my bottle. Hal looked down at it, running his finger along the wet lip to make it hum. "So what became of your soul-eyed love? You get some clever revenge on him, too, like you're going to get on your ex?" "He's dead." "Oh. Sorry. Happens to a lot of nice people." I watched him scowl at the dull haze of twilight. I couldn't help remembering the way he'd been once. Not just polished, not just handsome. But vital. Angry, yes, but in a way that seemed to throw off sparks. Now he looked as cold and gloomy as the bay. What had gone wrong? He caught me staring. "Don't do that." "What?" "Look at me like I'm a pair of shoes in a shop window. And you wonder why I got marked down." "That is kind of what I was thinking. You know, my friends considered you the best-looking guy in town. They were always—" "And now I'm sadly out of style? All scuffed up?" He smiled, and for just a second seemed to mean it. "Not just last year's model, last decade's." "It's just ratty clothes and a bad haircut, Hal. It's not like you need a Phantom of the Opera mask. You'd clean up fine, if you took the trouble." "Oh, yeah. And then what? Me in my Armani. Out here with the rats and hermit crabs." "A little grooming, and you could shack up with somebody. At least you'd have running water." "But would I be this dashing?" "That's my point. With your looks, your bad boy thing? Women are easier to get than money." "Nope, sorry. I only borrow without interest." "When's the last time you were in a relationship?" "Don't do those. But…" He shrugged. "I'll fuck just about anybody. Except maybe a heartless one. A Snow Queen like you." If he thought he could hurt my tender feelings by insulting me, he didn't know many litigators. "Men like to think that about successful women, Hal. That we wouldn't make it very far with a woman's heart." I glanced at him. "Boy though, whoever got her hooks into you did some epic damage." I stood. "If I'd done a tenth as much to Gary, I'd be happy." I walked away, staggering into a wall of wind. Before I'd gone twenty paces, I heard a champagne bottle shatter on the rocks.     Chapter Five     I took the long way home, winding through the renovated waterfront. What had once been an honest slum of warehouses, thrift shops, and bars now had a brand-new "olde" look. A fountain, a statue, cobblestones, and fresh paint embellished some modest art galleries, taverns, and import stores. But there wasn't a tourist in sight. It would take more than a touch of Disneyland to draw people to a rainy town three hundred miles from the nearest city. It would take more than a few oyster bars to revive an economy that had clear-cut its way out of the timber business and fished its bay to depletion. It amazed me that term after term, bad idea after bad idea, the township of Hillsdale kept reelecting my Uncle Henry to solve its problems. It was starting to get dark when I turned onto Clarke. The clock on my dashboard said six-fifty. I'd barely have time to de-Mowglify my hair before Gary Gleason came over at seven. I was hoping the movers had unpacked my toiletries when I noticed the commotion on my block. Two police cruisers, an ambulance, and a car from a nearby fire station—all with red lights flashing—blocked the street in front of my house. Onlookers huddled in hushed groups, looking somber under streetlights. Men in dark jumpsuits knelt in the middle of the street. Firefighters stood on either side of them. Policemen urged bystanders to go back to their homes. One cop stood behind a tall woman in a Mexican peasant dress. His hands were on her shoulders, and he was forcing her back, away from whatever lay in the road. I parked my car and approached the crowd. I was just about to ask someone what had happened, when I got a closer look at the woman. It was Kirsten Strindberg. She was more beautiful than I remembered, with a heart-shaped face, wide-set blue eyes, and a peachy, unblemished complexion. Her hair was pale gold, blunt cut to her shoulders, with full bangs. Her figure was hidden in the loose folds of her embroidered dress, but I supposed (bitterly) that it was still terrific. At this moment, her lips were pulled back with anxiety, her eyes were puffy and streaming tears, and her hair looked as if she'd been dragging her fingers through it. Something had happened to Gary. Nothing else would account for the tableau. I pushed past the spectators, knocking aside a policeman's arm. I elbowed my way between two firefighters who stood near the kneeling medics. Lying crumpled in the roadway, while a medic gingerly examined his abdomen, was my ex-husband, a few streaks of dirt on his face, his eyelids fluttering. "Gary? What happened?" One of the firefighters snapped, "Christ," and tried to nudge me back behind him. He reeked of English Leather. I am not easily nudged. I repeated, "What happened?" Gary's eyes fluttered open for a moment. "Kirsten?" "Laura." He looked up at me, wincing. He murmured, "It was Franco." The medic barked, "Get her out of here." A cop materialized behind me, grabbing my arm and pulling me away. English Leather said, "He told her something." I glanced at the cop. He was a young man with a wall of stupidity behind his eyes. "Yeah?" The kid tried to look hard-boiled. "What was it?" "I didn't hear," I lied. His grip tightened on my arm. He turned to English Leather and repeated the question. "'It was fun to go'?" The firefighter pulled off his cap and wiped his forehead with his wrist. "Sounded like that." "That's right." I said. "He came to a party at my office today. Must be what he meant." I jerked my arm free. The medics were putting something that looked like a padded splint around Gary's head. "Was this a hit-and-run?" The young cop nodded sourly. "Who are you? Family?" "Neighbor." "Well, go home. It's under control." The medics lifted Gary onto a stretcher. English Leather muttered, "How many points for running over a lawyer?" and his partner snickered. Kirsten, glancing at me with shocked eyes, followed the stretcher into the ambulance. It pulled out, siren screaming, followed by the fire car and one of the two police cruisers. The other continued to block the street, its radio squawking. I stood there for a while, staring at my ex-husband's house. The curtains were drawn and the lights were on. The front door was open, just a crack. I thought about what Gary had said to me. It seemed—it had to be—impossible. I went inside my new place. The movers had put things pretty much where I wanted them, and the result was pleasing, if unlived-in. I'd leased most of the furniture from an antique dealer, and the gleaming old pieces looked good in the small Victorian rooms. I wandered through the house, missing my own less elegant things, wishing myself at home in San Francisco. Six months. In six months I'd be back. White Sayres & Speck wouldn't put up with a longer absence. The Bean case had brought the firm mixed publicity. But it had been an impressive win, enough so that they'd humor me… for a while. My savings wouldn't last much longer than six months, anyway. Not the way I was throwing cash around. In five months, Hillsdale's board of supervisors would award the public defender contract. I would establish myself quickly, win the contract away from Gary Gleason, then strike my bargain with him. Once Gary accepted my terms and conditions, I'd decline the contract and go home. But if Gary didn't recover soon, or didn't recover fully? I'd fantasized about harm coming to him, it was true—but wishing it wasn't the same as wanting it. Regardless, I knew what it would mean for me. There would be no point sticking around here, defending out-of-work loggers who'd had a few too many. Gary always did manage to wriggle off the hook. Maybe that was the idea. Could he be exaggerating whatever had just happened to him? Had he looked up at me and seen a way to lob back my volley? If so, would he repeat the slander to the police? Risk his license by misleading them? Or would he simply hold it over my head? Use it to get me out of his life? One thing I knew for certain: He was lying. Because my papa, Franco Di Palma, would never run from the scene of an accident.       To read the rest of The Smart Money, please go to Amazon's Kindle Store, the iTunes store, or Barnes & Noble's Nook Store.           Books by Lia Matera     Willa Jansson Novels   Where Lawyers Fear To Tread A Radical Departure Hidden Agenda Prior Convictions Last Chants Star Witness Havana Twist   Laura Di Palma Novels   The Smart Money The Good Fight A Hard Bargain Face Value Designer Crimes   Short Story Anthologies   Counsel for the Defense and Other Stories Irreconcilable Differences           Praise for Lia Matera's Laura Di Palma Series   "Di Palma is one of the smartest, most open-minded sleuths in the lawyering trade... [Matera] writes with intelligence and feeling about issues that still hurt and people who still care." New York Times "Compelling... Matera writes with passion about debts to old lovers and old causes." New York Daily News "Sharply written, brilliantly observed." John Leonard, "Fresh Air" "Absorbing... A fine, intelligent story." USA Today "Extraordinary, thought-provoking." Baltimore Sun "Tight plotting, good characterizations, and page-turning suspense... make Matera one of the best contemporary mystery novelists... Highly recommended... Matera is too good to miss." Booklist "Reading a Lia Matera novel is a lot like drinking a superb brandy: velvety, mellow, a bit dizzying and with a bite that stays with you a long time... She leaps to the forefront of the remarkable vanguard of women... who have redefined the modern mystery." Cleveland Plain Dealer "A complex and very likable detective..." Newsday "Di Palma certainly belongs in the same league as Sue Grafton's Kinsey Millhone and Sara Paretsky's V.I. Warshawski when it comes to brains, determination, and guts." Booklist "A welcome respite from the mystery-by-formula crowd." Kirkus Reviews "Matera has her own distinctive voice... Her off-beat plots, quirky style and hard-to-pin-down characters make for a novel both unique and entertaining." San Diego Union "More proof that some of the leanest, most tough-minded prose is coming from women... With emotional zingers throughout and no easy answers." Kirkus Reviews