Read The Advocate - 02 - The Advocate's Betrayal for Free Online Page B

possibly get?”
    Sabre didn’t want to tell her it could possibly be a lifetime of this humiliation. “Betty, listen to me. If you want me to represent you, I will. And Bob said he’d help. We’ll get this thing all sorted out. But you need to know that although I’ve done a lot of criminal work, most of my experience has been in juvenile court, and while the rules of evidence are the same, the system is quite different.”
    “How’s that?”
    “Well, for one thing, there are no jury trials in juvey, and you’ll definitely need a jury trial. And there are other things, too. I don’t know the judges, and they don’t know me. Sometimes that can be an advantage, but sometimes not. I want you to decide what you want, but know that either way, I’m going to be here for you.”
    “Thanks.” Betty looked up at Sabre like a whipped puppy. “I’d feel much better if you were my attorney, but you know I don’t have any money to pay you. All I have is the trailer and it’s not worth much, but I’ll give you everything I have.”
    “I know that. Don’t worry about it. I don’t want your money, but I need to tell you up front that I’ve never handled a murder case. So if you’d be more comfortable with a public defender, it’s your choice.”
    “No, I want you. I trust you. And you know I didn’t kill John. They may not believe me. You do believe me.” She paused and looked at Sabre. “Don’t you?”
    “Of course I do. I know you didn’t do it. I’ve known you what, five years now? No, almost six. I know you couldn’t kill anyone and especially not John. I know how much you loved him.”
    “God, I miss him so much. He’d know what to do right now. I don’t know what to think or what to say. He always handled the big stuff.” Betty put her hands over her face and cried.
    “I’m so sorry. I know this is hard.” Sabre’s heartfelt words sounded empty even to her. “Listen, Betty, hopefully I’ll have the police report tomorrow or the next day. Arraignment should be set for Tuesday. Once I have the report we can see what kind of case they have. Do you have any idea why they’re charging you, other than that you were with him?”
    “No,” she sobbed, “but I didn’t do it.”
    “I know. We’ll get to the bottom of this.” Sabre waited a moment while Betty composed herself. “Did John have any enemies?”
    “No, everyone loved him.”
    Sabre, in an effort to reassure Betty, said, “I’m going to talk to a private investigator I know and get him started on the case.”   
    “What will a PI do?”
    “Try to find out who really killed John. He’ll dig into his past and see….”
    Betty sat up straighter. “Why would he do that? I told you John didn’t have any enemies,” Betty said with a hint of anger or fear in her voice. Sabre wasn’t sure which.
    “We just want to find out who did this,” Sabre said softly as she touched Betty on the shoulder. “Is there anything else I should know, anything you may have forgotten to tell me?”
    Betty looked up at Sabre and then she lowered her eyes. “No, I’m sorry. I wish I could help.”
     

5
     
     
    Sabre walked through the front door of Polinsky Children’s Center, a facility consisting of ninety-two thousand square feet of buildings that stretched over ten acres. It had an Olympic-sized pool, sports fields, and a library. It was a far cry from the old facility that had housed abused and neglected children for so many years in San Diego. Still, although the new accommodations were clean and comfortable, the children who had been removed from their homes, more often than not, would have preferred to stay in the squalor and pain just to be with their families. Sabre looked around at the freshly painted walls and the white tiled floor and wondered, as she always did, what this case would bring.
    Sabre handed her bar card and driver’s license to the young receptionist with a purple streak in her hair. “I need to see Kat and Kurt