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THE FIRST 48

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By Tim Green

Warner Books

Copyright © 2004 Tim Green
All right reserved.
ISBN: 0-446-53144-8

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Chapter One

Tom Redmon didn't need to hear more, but he knew the couple needed to talk. Beneath the desk, he clenched and unclenched his hand, squeezing the tennis ball, trying to be patient. Finally they finished. The mother was sniffing and dabbing her eyes with a napkin from McDonald's. He looked past them and out through the old glass to a bright locust tree, wavy and distorted.

In his office, the paneling of one wall sagged under the weight of diplomas. A 1996 calendar of a German castle high on a mountaintop hung by a pushpin. In a wood frame was a cheap print of van Gogh's View of Montmartre with Windmills. Tom loosened his tie and unbuttoned his collar. Size nineteen. If he could have, he'd have taken off his coat.

The couple was young. Their little girl sat between them, her eyes hollow, her head bald and white. When she smiled, her teeth shone gray, with great gaps between them. The father worked at the power plant, stoking coal. The mother stayed at home. There were four other kids too. None of them were sick. Yet.

Tom slapped his hand on the desk and said, "We'll sue them." "Who?" the father asked.

"Everyone," Tom said, standing. "GE. The State of New York. The City of Ithaca. The Power Authority. The EPA and the DEC."

"Everyone?" "I mean it," Tom said. "I've done it before. I just sued the New York State Dormitory Authority and won.

"These big corporations. These colossal government entities. They need to be taken down, and that's what I do, Mr. Helmer.

Don't you worry, Mrs. Helmer. They'll pay." "I just want her to be okay," she said through the napkin. "We all do," Tom said.

He patted the little girl on the shoulder. She smiled up at him.

"I'll have the papers ready for you to sign by the beginning of next week," Tom said. "Say Tuesday. How's ten?" He opened the door and Sarah, his secretary, looked up from her romance novel. She was sixty. Yellow hair. Cat glasses and chewing gum.

"Tuesday at ten for the Helmers, Sarah," he said. "We'll start on the papers first thing tomorrow morning."

He showed them out and turned to Sarah. She sat staring blankly at him.

"The property management company called again," she said.

"That's the problem," he said, smiling. "When one man owned this building, a favor here and there wasn't forgotten. Now it's a nameless, faceless LLP that you can't appease and you can't kill."

"We are two months late." "Let them evict me," he said. He winked and grinned and took off his blazer and lost the tie. "Take the rest of the day, Sarah. Get some sun."

"You've got Mr. Potter scheduled for three-thirty." "Cancel it."

"Tom, they will evict you." "Cancel it. This Helmer case could be the big one." "We've had a lot of big ones, Tom," she said. "They never pay. The small stuff is what pays."

"We got the janitor." "That's one. They settled because their witness died, remember? Mr. Potter will pay a retainer up front. I told him that on the phone and he agreed."

"Sarah," he said. "I know you care, and I appreciate that. But I'm sick and tired of DUIs and shoplifters and aggravated assaults. I'm tired of drug dealers, pickpockets, drunks, crack-heads, motorcycle gangs, and dregs. These are the people I used to put in jail."

"You're a defense lawyer, Tom. You need money to file that suit. You need an index number. You need an investigator," she said. She was standing now, with her hands on her thick hips. "You already owe Mike Tubbs six thousand dollars." "He sent a bill?"

"Of course not," she said, pressing her lips tight. Tom flattened the tennis ball and rubbed his chin.

"Then reschedule Potter for Thursday and go get some sun," he said. "It's beautiful out there. And do me a favor, will you? Dial up Mike Tubbs and tell him I'll meet him at Friendly's at three-thirty, sharp."

"Of course," Sarah said.

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from THE FIRST 48 by Tim Green Copyright © 2004 by Tim Green. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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