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make the firm’s bottom line look better than it was.”
    Tom looked down. “I . . .”
    â€œYes.”
    Tom reddened. “I told her I wouldn’t help her.”
    His eyes pleaded with Amanda for understanding. “I was afraid. I really needed my job, and I needed peace and quiet. I didn’t want to get involved. I’d just been arrested; if you hadn’t cleared everything up I could have been fired. So I said I wouldn’t help and we had an argument. I felt awful, after she’d stood by me, but I . . . I just couldn’t take the risk of losing my job.”
    Tom looked down, ashamed. “Maybe if I’d been there for her like she was for me . . .”
    â€œDo not beat yourself up,” Amanda said firmly. “Whoever killed Christine had a well-thought-out plan. I doubt there was anything you could have done to save her. What you have to concentrate on now is saving yourself, because the police won’t look for Christine’s killer as long as they’re convinced that you murdered her.”
    â€œOkay, but I don’t know anything.”
    â€œYou said that Christine thought someone high up in the firm was doing something with the books. Did she tell you who she suspected?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œShe was upset when she left Dale Masterson’s office. Did she suspect him?”
    â€œI cut her off before she gave me a name; I told her I didn’twant to know. Mr. Masterson is one of the most powerful partners, so it could have been him.
    â€œTom, I’m going to ask you a question, and I need a completely truthful answer. And remember, anything you tell me is confidential; your answer stays between us.”
    Beatty looked directly at Amanda. “What do you want to know?”
    â€œA prosecutor doesn’t have to prove what motivated a criminal to commit a crime, but the first thought that will pop into the mind of a juror when a woman is found murdered in a man’s bedroom is that a lovers’ quarrel was the motive. What was your relationship with Christine?”
    â€œChristine was my boss,” Tom stated emphatically. “She was also my friend, but there was never anything romantic between us.”
    â€œWill the police be able to find witnesses who can make a case to a jury that you were romantically involved?”
    â€œHow would they do that?”
    â€œIf I was prosecuting you, I’d show the jury that Christine bailed you out when you were arrested. Why did you call her?”
    Tom looked down at the tabletop. “I don’t have friends here. I get up in the morning and go to work. Then I come home. Every once in a while I go to a movie or the Lookout to watch a game. The only people I know well are the people I work with and Christine is . . . was the partner I worked with the most.
    â€œWhen I was arrested for the fight, they told me I could call a lawyer. I didn’t want anyone at the firm to know I’d been arrested for fighting in a bar—I was scared I’d lose my job. But Christine . . . I thought she wouldn’t judge me, that she’d listen to myside, and she’s a lawyer. I knew she didn’t practice criminal law, but I hoped she’d know a lawyer who could help me.”
    â€œSo that’s all there was to it. You never went out socially, say to dinner or a movie, with Christine?”
    â€œNever.” Beatty paused. “We did have breakfast after she bailed me out. But all we did was talk about what happened, and that’s the only time we ever ate together. We never dated.”
    â€œDid you ever argue?”
    â€œJust when I said I didn’t want to get involved in her investigation of the firm’s finances.”
    â€œCould anyone have heard you argue? This is important, because she was killed soon after.”
    â€œBrittney could have heard us.”
    â€œThat’s Christine’s secretary?”
    Beatty nodded. “And there are