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guardian would ignore that?
    Only one who had a big LOSER sign pasted on his forehead.
    Sam cleared his throat. “Wait a second, Jake. When is the tournament?”
    “Next weekend. I would have called sooner, but I’ve been busy working on an appeal for a new client of mine, Russell Meredith.”
    “I’m aware of the case,” Sam said.
    A couple of years ago, the software exec’s vehicle had struck a child on a bicycle. For more than twenty-four hours, while little Erik Harper had been on life support, the police had scoured the community looking for the driver who’d left the scene of the accident. Finally, Meredith had turned himself in, saying he hadn’t realized his car had even hit the kid.
    “Oh, that’s right,” Jake said. “You handled the civil suit the boy’s parents filed.”
    Sam had managed to get the Harpers nearly five million dollars, which he’d hoped had helped them get on with their lives.
    “The jury must have been putty in your hands,” Jake said. “It’s hard not to sympathize when the victim is a kid and the parents are grieving.”
    “The Harpers lost their only child. Plus they were at the scene and watched the accident happen. The jury would have needed cast-iron hearts not to be moved by that.”
    “Yeah, I know. And I’m afraid the parole board is going to see it the same way. But it was a tragic accident that could have happened to anyone.”
    “ Accidents happen all the time. But this was a case of hit-and-run.”
    “There were mitigating circumstances.”
    “Meredith might have been intoxicated,” Sam countered. “Drunk drivers are prone to flee the scene of accidents. And by the time he turned himself in, it was too late to prove one way or the other. Besides, he had a prior DUI causing bodily injury.”
    “That prior had been on his twenty-first birthday, and the injury was minor. He hasn’t been in any trouble since, and I have witnesses who say Meredith was as sober as a nun and as law-abiding as an Eagle Scout.”
    “You probably should have defended him in the criminal trial.”
    “I wish I had.”
    A wry grin pulled at the corner of Sam’s mouth. He and Jake were both practicing attorneys who could take either side in a case and present strong opposing arguments. In fact, they often did, even cases they discussed between shots on the golf course. “So what are Meredith’s chances for parole?”
    “It’s hard to say. He’s been a model prisoner, and I’ve never seen anyone more remorseful.”
    “Well, he ought to be sorry,” Sam said. Meredith had slammed into Erik, knocking him and his bicycle into the shrubbery that grew along the road, then continued on his way.
    The line grew silent.
    Normally Sam made a point of distancing himself from his cases, yet this one had been particularly tragic and unsettling for everyone involved.
    “Anyway,” Jake said, “About the tournament—”
    Sam cleared his throat. “You know, as much as I’d love to play, I can’t take the time off right now.”
    “Work keeping you too busy, huh?”
    “I’m afraid so.” Sam glanced over his shoulder at the open door to Analisa’s room. He also had an unexpected problem on the home front. “But I’ll make time soon. Maybe next month.”
    After they ended the call, Sam started down the hall toward his own room, but paused momentarily by Analisa’s open doorway. He took one last look at the picture she’d drawn, the angel named Erik. For a moment, a goose-bumpy shiver ran up and down his arms.
    How weird was that?
    He shook his head, quickly disregarding the coincidence. Even if he were foolish enough to believe in fairy tales or some spiritual Twilight Zone , Erik Harper had curly dark hair, not spiky blond.
    And a bright-eyed smile that Sam suspected would haunt the boy’s grieving parents forever.
     
    Claire took the elevator upstairs to the sixth floor, strode to the solid double doors of Vandyke, Delacourt, West, and now Dawson, then entered a spacious lobby