Bending down, he said, “Move over, punk.” His low voice rumbled like distant thunder.

I focused on what Bud had said. You defend yourself, no matter what. Haley would be happy with nothing less. I said, “Keep moving.”

He chuckled. He bent a little more to look down on me. He said, “Move over and get naked.”

He was a white guy, late thirties, probably, with a full black beard grown nearly to his chest, a shaved head, and a swastika tattoo on his neck. I popped him in the crotch with the knuckles of my left hand. He grunted with pain and bent a little lower as I spun around on my back, braced my shoulders against the wall, and kicked his knees with my heels. There was a loud popping sound. He screamed and dropped to the floor.

I got out of the bunk, got a grip on his beard with one hand, and took the collar of his overalls in the other hand. The inmates on the bunks on each side watched silently as I dragged him down the aisle between them. It was hard work. He was heavy. His screams became whimpering moans.

“Oh, my knees. You broke my knees.”

I reached the open area near the door where the overflow guys were lying on the mattresses on the floor. The inmate closest to the door was a little fellow, maybe five feet four and one hundred and twenty pounds.

I told him, “Go find this guy’s bunk and get in it.”

The little fellow got up and went looking. I dragged the would-be rapist to the little guy’s mattress and dropped him there. The rapist was still moaning loudly. I banged on the door ten or eleven times with the side of my fist, and then I went back to my bunk.

A few minutes later, two guards came in. One of them knelt beside the moaning man while the other one stood facing the bunks. He shouted, “Who did this?”

I lay on my back, studying the underside of Flaco’s bunk above me. I was still thinking about what Bud Tanner said and what Haley would have said if only she were there. Step one is, you go on. You don’t take the easy out. Semper Fi, no matter what.

Again the guard shouted, “Who did this?”

Nobody answered.

A minute later, two other guards arrived. The four of them each gripped a corner of the sheet under the moaning man. They picked him up and carried him away. The door slammed behind them. Everyone was quiet. After a few minutes, someone in a nearby bunk began to snore.

32

In the morning the guards led us out and down a hall into a large recreation area, where we lined up for chow. Powdered eggs, powdered milk, some sort of orange-colored liquid, cold bacon, and a slice of white bread. It wasn’t any worse than a meal ready to eat in the Marines. I found a seat at a round steel table and dug in.

About nine o’clock, four guards came into the recreation area and announced they would be calling names for court. Mine was the third name on their list. When I walked over to the deputies, they put cuffs on my wrists and chains around my ankles, which were connected by another chain to the cuffs. After they had called a dozen prisoners up to be restrained, we all shuffled off in single file.

It turned out the Orange County Superior Court had a courtroom right there in the jail. They kept us waiting in a holding cell until our names were called. When it was my turn, a deputy removed the cuffs and shackles and led me into the courtroom. It wasn’t a very big space. The ceiling was low. The public seating area was limited but completely full. I figured most of the observers were reporters. Obviously, a home invasion at a congressman’s residence was big news. I figured the reporters had already checked my criminal record and learned I was one of the butchers of Laui Kalay. Toss in a movie star like Doña Elena mortally wounding one of her attackers, and you had a global story.

I thanked God for the presence of mind that had led me to answer “self-employed private investigator” when they booked me into jail the day before. I told myself there was no reason the reporters would care about my employment history, no reason they would look into it hard enough to learn I was once Haley Lane’s chauffeur and bodyguard. I told myself the police file on Haley’s murder wasn’t public, so the reporters wouldn’t know I was the other victim on the night she died. I told myself those things and prayed they were true.

Teru was waiting for me beside a table in front of the raised platform where the judge was sitting. He looked good in a well-tailored black suit with a red paisley tie and a pair of tasseled Italian-looking loafers.

“Nice shoes,” I said.

“Can’t say the same about yours.”

Looking down at the slippers, I shrugged. “Comfort before fashion.”

We sat at the table. He put a piece of paper and a ballpoint pen in front of me. “Sign this power of attorney so I can tell Howard Williams to cover your bail,” he said.

“Howard Williams?”

“The lawyer in New York.”

“I know who you mean. But can’t I use my own savings and a bondsman?”

“With a bail bondsman, you’d have to cover ten percent. Do you have a hundred thousand?”

“You think it will be set that high? A million dollars, really?”

“At least.”

I sighed, picked up the pen, and signed where he pointed on the paper.

The bailiff called the court to order, and the judge asked the lawyers to go to work. A middle-aged woman sitting at another table rose and explained that the people believed I had participated in a home invasion. She listed their evidence against me. The judge asked me how I wished to plead. Teru and I stood up, and I told her I was not guilty. We sat down again. The middle-aged woman said the judge should refuse to grant me bail, because I was a highly trained ex-soldier with a criminal record, capable of great violence, and an obvious flight risk who had spent years traveling all over the world. Teru stood up and said the judge should grant bail because I was a highly decorated marine with strong connections to the community.

The judge cast her eye over the crowd of reporters and said, “Bail is set at one million five hundred thousand dollars. Bailiff, call the next one.”

The middle-aged woman at the other table looked smug. She probably assumed I wouldn’t be able to make that much bail.

Teru said, “Should I tell Williams to use a bail bondsman and pay the full amount directly?”

I thought about it for a minute. “If Williams pays it in cash, would the reporters find out?”

“No. The source of bail payments isn’t made public.”

“If I appear when I’m supposed to, the county returns the money?”

“That’s right, unless there are fees. They’ll take those off the top.”

I decided it didn’t make sense to pay one hundred and fifty thousand to a bondsman when I didn’t have to. Haley would want me to be smart with the money. “Tell Williams to go ahead and cover the whole million and a half.”

About two hours later, a deputy took me to the intake and release center, where my clothing and the contents of my pockets were returned. They didn’t return my firearm or my knife. Teru met me outside in the lobby. So did half a dozen reporters, including two camera teams. Everybody started asking questions at the same time. I had learned how to handle it from watching Haley. I smiled as widely as I could and looked straight at the cameras so my photos in the media would look wholesome and friendly, but I didn’t say a word. It was a great relief that nobody mentioned Haley.