High Crimes

“And yet you got a rapist off,” he said gently. He knew how uneasy she was about having taken on the Lambert case. The famous heir to the Lambert fortune, thirty-year-old Gary Lambert, whose picture you couldn’t help seeing in People magazine, usually in the arms of some supermodel, had been charged by the New York Police Department with the rape of a fifteen-year-old girl.

When Lambert’s fancy trial lawyers asked Claire to handle the appeal, she didn’t hesitate. She knew why she’d been hired: it wasn’t simply because of her growing reputation as an appellate lawyer but rather because she was a professor at Harvard Law School. Her prominence in the legal profession might go a long way toward offsetting Gary Lambert’s fairly squirrelly reputation. Yet she was fascinated by the legal issues involved, the police search of Lambert’s penthouse apartment and his trash, which she knew wouldn’t stand up. She never doubted she’d get his conviction overturned.

Suddenly, as a result of the case, Claire was on the cusp of minor celebrity. She was now a regular on Court TV and on Geraldo Rivera’s legal talk-show. The New York Times had begun to quote her in articles on other trials and legal controversies. She certainly wasn’t recognized walking down the street, but she was on the national media’s radar screen.

“Look,” Tom said, “you always say that the more despicable the person, the more he needs counsel. Right?”

“Yeah,” she said without conviction. “In theory.”

“Well, I think you did a great job, and I’m really proud of you.”

“Maybe you can give my interviews to the Globe,” she said.

“I’m all done now,” Annie said, holding up a crust of bun. “Now I want dessert.” She slipped out of her chair and crawled into Tom’s lap.

He smiled, lifted his stepdaughter up in the air, and gave her a loud smacking kiss on the cheek. “I love you, pumpkin. My Annie-Banannie. It’s coming soon, baby.”

“I forgot to tell you,” Claire said, “that Boston magazine wants to name us one of its Fifty Power Couples, or something like that.”

“Mommy, can I get ice cream with it?” asked Annie.

“Let me guess,” Tom said. “They just called because you got Gary Lambert off.”

“Yes, sweetie, you can,” said Claire. “Actually, they called a few days ago.”

“Gee, I don’t know about that, honey,” Tom said. “We’re not that kind of people.”

She shrugged, smiled with embarrassment. “Says who? Anyway, it’d be good for your business, wouldn’t it? Probably attract a lot of investors to Chapman & Company.”

“I think it’s a little tacky, honey, that’s all. ‘Power Couples’...” He shook his head. “You didn’t say yes already, did you?”

“I didn’t say anything yet.”

“I just wish you wouldn’t.”

“Daddy,” said Annie, one small arm curled around his neck, “when is the man bringing the cake?”

“Soon, babe.”

“Do they have to bake it?”

“Sure seems like it,” Tom said. “It’s certainly taking long enough.”

“Did I tell you the cops think they might have recovered one of the stolen paintings?” Claire said. They’d had a break-in a few days earlier, in which two of their paintings had been stolen — a Corot sketch of a nude woman that was a recent birthday gift to her from Tom, and a William Bailey still life in oil that Tom loved and she hated.

“Seriously? And I was all set to file the insurance claims. Which one’d they find?”

“Don’t know. Of course, it wouldn’t tear me apart if the Bailey’s lost forever.”

“I know,” Tom said. “Too cold and precise and controlled, right? Well, I loved it. Anyway, honey, it’s only stuff, you know? Objects, things. And no one got hurt; that’s the important thing.”

The waiter arrived with a tray. On it were the chocolate cake, a coffee cup, and two flutes of champagne. “Compliments of the house,” the waiter said. “With our congratulations.”

As they left the restaurant, Annie darted ahead into the mall’s food court, shouting, “I wanna go play in the space ship!” The giant plastic space ship was located in Annie’s favorite kiddie store nearby, in front of which stood giant resin statues of cartoon characters.

The food court was lined with upscale fast-food places and furnished with small round tables, wooden benches, and ficus trees in brass planters. The floor was tiled in highly polished marble. The big open space was three levels high and ringed with balconies that rose all the way up to a glass skylight illuminated by floodlights. At the far end of the atrium was an artificial waterfall that cascaded down a jagged granite wall.

“Slow down, Annie-Banannie,” Tom called out, and Annie circled back, grabbed her father’s hand, and tugged at it, at the same moment that two men in suits approached them.

One of them said, “Mr. Kubik, come with us, please. Let’s make this simple.”

Tom turned to the one on the left, puzzled. “Excuse me?”

“Ronald Kubik, federal agents. We have a warrant for your arrest.”

Tom smiled, furrowed his brow. “You’ve got the wrong guy, buddy,” he said, taking Claire’s hand and striding quickly past them.