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- Herausgeber: Wildside Press
- Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
- Sprache: Englisch
Temptation nips at the heels of disbarred Los Angeles lawyer, Jack Adams, when his ex-convict father suddenly shows up at UCLA hospital claiming he’s had a stroke.
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Seitenzahl: 32
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024
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Table of Contents
COPYRIGHT INFORMATION
SAME OLD SONG, by Billie Livingston
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
COPYRIGHT INFORMATION
Copyright © 2024 by Billie Livingston.
Original publication by Black Cat Weekly
BlackCatWeekly.com
SAME OLD SONG,by Billie Livingston
Jack had been practicing law for about three years when he came home one afternoon and flopped on the couch. Beside him, Maisy pecked at her laptop, hunting for light at the end of the teaching tunnel. In her two years as a substitute in the Los Angeles public school system, she’d been punched, groped, shoved, and locked in a closet. The day the kid threw a chair was the day she decided she’d rather wait tables. Pay couldn’t be any worse.
“You’re home early.” Eyes on her computer screen, she skimmed an article titled: What Else Can I Do With a Teaching Degree?
“I, uh…” Silence. He picked at a hangnail. “I got disbarred.”
“What?!” Maisy slapped her laptop shut. “What did you do?”
“Nothing, baby.” When they were first together, they made fun of couples who called each other baby. Now they do it too—reserved for deep cuts and white lies. Sometimes it just feels better when someone you love calls you baby.
She scoffs. “Come on, Jack. They don’t just suddenly disbar you.”
“Suspended technically. But they’re talking two years. Failure to make reasonable inquiries of clients in the face of overwhelming, objectively suspicious circumstances.”
“What does that mean?”
Jack considered for a moment. “Apparently, helping clients buy property with suitcases of cash is frowned upon. In particular if said client is found guilty of running an illegal gambling operation. And I may have changed a couple pertinent client details on a contract.”
“So, money-laundering and fraud.” She closed her eyes and took a breath.
“That’s putting it a little harshly.”
Harsh but not entirely false. Jack liked to take an edge where he could. He passed the bar exam without spending a day in law school. Perfectly legal in California. But she should have known something was off when he made so much money his first year. Maisy convinced him to park the cash somewhere safe. Put it into a waterfront condo. Santa Monica high rise: two bedrooms, two baths. They’d have the mortgage paid off in no time. Maybe she was just as bad.
“We’ll be fine,” Jack said and gave her neck a rub. “I’ll write the real estate exam. Easy peasy.” Probably would be. Jack Adams knew how to hustle. It’s how he was raised.
* * * *
It is about thirteen months later when Maisy stands in the bank arguing with the teller. “What happened to the deposit I made?” These days she works at El Jardin in the Casa del Cielo. The restaurant is in a five-star hotel so most shifts are decent for tips. But now the mortgage payment’s due, the dishwasher is broken again, the joint account is gasping and here’s this pinch-faced weasel giving her the run-around.
“You were overdrawn,” the teller says. Louder this time. “If you transfer funds by end-of-day, you’ll avoid an arrears penalty. All this information is on the app.”
She wants to tell him to shove the app up his arrears. Instead she takes her readers out to look at the receipt. Maisy’s prescription glasses got crushed when she sat on them last week.
Shit. Jack used their joint account to pay the vet. She feels her face getting hot. “Can’t you just transfer funds from the other account?” The teller asks what name is on the other account. “My husband’s. Jack—I mean John—John Adams Jr.”
One station over, a man turns his head suddenly. Tan skin, silver-hair, he wears a pale blue overcoat. Probably cashmere. Unusual to see a coat like that in Southern California, but this is one cold January. The man looks back as his teller lays rows of bills in front of him: “Fifty, one hundred, one-fifty…”
“I can’t do that, ma’am.” Maisy’s teller pulls her attention back.
