CHAPTER 2

“That was some statement your client made, Corvelli,” Boyd called out as Jake and I plodded toward the towering double doors. “You prep Sinaloa yourself?”

“It speaks,” I said to Jake as I turned to face the houseplant.

Boyd was dressed as always in an uninspired navy suit that hung scrupulously on his perfectly average frame, a crisp white oxford and muted red tie peeking out over two ever-closed, vertical brass buttons.

“Ah, more botanical humor,” it said, marching toward us. “Played really well before Justice Ingraham last week.”

I was fast running out of patience. “Did you initiate this conversation for a reason or are you simply working on your social skills, Boyd? Because my partner and I both have appointments this morning.”

As I pushed through the heavy wooden doors, Boyd said, “Just wanted to know if we can expect you here at the courthouse tomorrow morning.”

“Not likely,” I muttered, ushering Jake into the lavish hall. In state courts, law is practiced on small, weathered Little League fields; federal courthouses, on the other hand, are Major League ballparks all the way.

Boyd caught the door before it closed. “You’re not joining us for the arraignments tomorrow?”

Jake sprang to life. “What arraignments?” Jake would fancy nothing more than another nickel-and-dime CJA appointment.

“You haven’t heard?” Boyd said. “There was a DEA raid on a meth superlab up North Shore this morning. I’m sure you’ll see it on the news tonight at whatever dive bar you’re frequenting these days.”

I snatched Jake’s elbow and led him toward the marble staircase so that we wouldn’t get caught in an elevator with Boyd.

“You hear about this?” Jake said, breathing heavily as we hustled down the stairs.

“You all right?” I asked as we hit the second landing.

“Fine,” he said, though he paused for a breath. “So how about it, son? You hear anything about this raid?”

I shook my head. “No surprise. It’s an election year. Someone wants to look tough in the so-called war on drugs.”

When we reached the first-floor lobby, I handed the same bored court officer my ticket, and he took his time retrieving my phone. As he slapped it on the table between us, he asked if I was fucking deaf.

I told him I wasn’t.

“Well, then, Counselor, you’d better clean the shit out of your ears, because I told you twice to make sure the fucking thing was turned off, and evidently you didn’t hear.”

I stared at the cell, which alluded to eight missed calls, eight voice messages, at least one of them marked urgent.

Before I could respond to the federal court’s answer to the coat-check girl at Club Tsunami, my cell phone started going off again. A simple ring; no “Funky Cold Medina.”

I opened the phone and put it to my ear. “Speak.”

“Take it outside, Counselor,” the court officer warned.

Jake and I started walking toward the exit as a frightened voice spoke in my ear.

“T’ank God you finally answered, Mistah C.”

“Turi,” I said. Turi Ahina was a lawyer’s best friend: a career criminal. A hell of a nice guy who always carried a gun, and who had once used that gun to save my life. “What’s the trouble?”

“I got myself pinched again, Mistah C.”

“That’s no trouble,” I told him as Jake and I stepped outside. I placed my Panama Jack back atop my head to shield my eyes from the midday Hawaiian sun. “I’ll come straight over to County and arrange bail.”

“I ain’t at County, Mistah C,” Turi said glumly.

“Then where the hell are you?”

“I’m at the Federal Detention Center. Wasn’t the HPD that arrested me this time.”

I stopped cold on the cement steps, in the same spot I stood this morning, though this time my shadow simply surrounded me like a pool of blood.

“Who was it?” I asked Turi, though I was pretty sure I already knew.

Turi confirmed my suspicions by uttering the three ugliest letters in the English alphabet, bar none: “DEA.”