Read Online Clifford Irving's Legal Novels - 02 - FINAL ARGUMENT - a Legal Thriller by Clifford Irving - Free Book Online

about fighting back. I’ll snap your arm like a twig. Then I’ll break your neck. I’m a karate black belt. Cinturon negro, comprendes?”
    There wasn’t a word of truth in any of that.
    Pale but thrilled, Connie Zide said, “My hero.” It didn’t sound at all sarcastic.
    I’m almost positive that the serious expression on my face didn’t alter, but some other sea change took place in me, some upheaval of the senses in keeping with my braggadocio. Latin people have a name for it, which translates into English as the “thunderbolt.” You cannot evade its effects.
    After the cops arrived and wrote down Mrs. Solomon Zide’s name, address, and telephone number, and bundled Ortega off to the Duval County Jail, Connie slumped against the side of her car and said, “My God, what a thing to happen! I need a drink. Can you indulge me just a bit more than you already have?”
    We went to the first bar we could find on Atlantic Boulevard: a quietly lit place called Ruffino’s Kitchen, which served thin-crust pizza. She ordered a double Johnnie Walker Black on the rocks with a twist.
    We talked, but there was a roaring in my ears, and half the time I wasn’t able to listen with the required concentration. I had known a few beautiful women before. Toba, when she was in her twenties, would have been considered beautiful, or close to it. A young assistant public defender who had been Miss Florida and had an M.A. in penology hit on me for an entire winter, and I patted her cheek and said, “You’re lovely, Angie, and I’ll bet it would be great fun, but I don’t need the complication.”
    Connie Zide’s blue-green eyes, set in the perfect oval of her face, were large and clear, her lips ruddy and full, her teeth even and white. Her body was richly sculpted, with a slender neck, round breasts, and long legs. All of this was topped by an affluence of silky light-brown hair that fell halfway down her back unless she piled it on top of her head, which is what she normally did in public. (Most southern women then, I’d observed, had hair that looked fried and dyed.) If you got past the dazzle you noticed that she was deep into her forties but looked ten years younger. That was because her bones were prominent and also because she’d had periodic work done on the skin and musculature by a world-class cosmetic surgeon in Atlanta. The sea-colored eyes were veiled from time to time by melancholy light, and her smile had that same underlying worry. Her raucous laugh came as a welcome surprise; sometimes it seemed to surprise even Connie Zide.
    “Well, Mr. Jaffe, what happens next?”
    A question wild with meaning. I held her gaze as steadily as I dared. It wasn’t possible, I decided, that she was reacting to me the way I was reacting to her. Such things didn’t happen—not to me.
    “You have to go down to the courthouse first thing tomorrow morning,” I said. “File a complaint. Make a statement. Otherwise they can’t hold this guy.”
    “He’ll get sprung?”
    “You watch cop shows?”
    She laughed wickedly. “Good heavens, Mr. Prosecutor, everyone knows sprung .”
    “Here’s how it works, Mrs. Zide. In most states, this kid would have to be indicted by a grand jury. In Florida, to speed things up, we do it differently. One of the people in my office will be there at the jail to hear what the cops have to say. They’ll file a probable cause affidavit, and the assistant state attorney will file what’s called an information. Unless the kid wants to hire his own lawyer, someone from the public defender will be there to represent him. The point is, nothing will happen from then on if you don’t go down to the courthouse and make a sworn statement. I’ll have to do it too. I was a witness.”
    She sighed. I had heard that kind of sigh before.
    “I know,” I said. “But if we let him get away with it, he’ll be at another mall in a few days. Hit on some other woman. The cops found a switchblade knife in his