After dropping Lindy off at the parking lot next to her office where she had left her car, Nina drove directly on to her next appointment. For the first time in months she turned on the car heater and shut out the dusty dry scents of autumn by rolling up the windows. Along the parkway between the highway and the lake a steady stream of joggers and skaters cruised along. High cirrus clouds blocked some of the sun and the lake had turned choppy in a rising breeze.

Sandy was waiting for her after lunch along with several clients. She followed Nina into her office and said, “I finally got a call back from Winston Reynolds’s assistant. She says he can only meet with you at eight tonight.”

“He’s here in town?”

“He’s in L.A.”

“Well, that won’t work. The Tahoe airport’s closed to commercial planes, even if there were direct flights. Reno’s airport is sixty miles of hard driving from here. He can talk to me tomorrow.”

“He’s in trial. His assistant said he’s making a big effort to free up dinner tonight, but you have to get down there.”

“I could charter a flight,” Nina said. Her normally frugal nature balked at the thought, but this was no time to pinch pennies. “Call the airport and see if I can get a charter.” She went into her office, feeling grand, and pulled out her office checking account records, which didn’t look grand. How far would twenty-five thousand dollars go? How would she snatch Winston Reynolds away from Riesner without paying a whole lot of money up front?

She needed him. She would think of something.

Sandy buzzed and said, “Six hundred round trip. Six p.m. You’ll be there by seven. The pilot will wait at LAX until you’re ready to return.”

Nina raced to the school to wrest Bob from a street hockey game he was playing with friends on the asphalt field. He didn’t want to leave and sulked through the ride home, growling at her when she said he’d be sleeping at Matt and Andrea’s that night. “There’s no place quiet to do my homework there,” he said. “Troy’s got way less than me and then him and Bree play around. And I don’t even have a desk there. I’m old enough to stay home alone.”

“Not overnight, you’re not,” said Nina automatically. “And I’m sorry to do this to you on a weeknight. But I’ll make it up to you on the weekend.”

“How?” Bob asked as she pulled up to their house.

“How about a bike ride around the Baldwin Mansion and Pope House?”

“What day? I’ve got a science project.”

“Sunday afternoon. Without fail. Try to finish your project on Saturday.”

“Mom, don’t make promises you can’t keep. What are the chances?”

“Cynic,” she said. “But you’re right. It’s not a promise. I’ll just do my best. Don’t I always?”

Bob relented then, and together they climbed the steps to the front porch of their house. Throwing her most expensive, new powder-blue suit and matching heels into a suit bag, she helped him stuff his backpack with books, called Andrea, and got Matt instead.

“Matt, I’m embarrassed to ask you this, but I’m in a pickle,” she said, without preamble.

“Hi,” said Matt. “And how are you?”

“In a rush. Sorry.”

“What’s up?”

“I need a favor,” asked Nina, “just like I always seem to need a favor.”

“You sound so guilty.”

She felt so guilty. She had never fully expressed her deep gratitude for all that Andrea and Matt had done for her and Bob when they arrived in Tahoe, friendless and practically destitute. They had given the best thing anyone could, a home for the single mom and the confused little boy.

“I wouldn’t ask except it’s the best place for Bob. I need to go out of town on business tonight.”

“You know, when you say you wouldn’t ask, you make me feel bad. If we don’t want to do something, we’ll let you know, I promise. And you need to promise that you’ll continue to ask, anytime, for anything, okay?”

Lindy treasured her friends, but Nina treasured her family. “You’re the best. Can I drop him at four?”

“Tell him it’s taco night. That ought to excite him.”

A female pilot, pleasant and polite, had charge of the sporty little two-seater Cessna. Lolling in the leather seat, staring out the window at the lights of Tahoe Valley spread out below twinkling like a bejeweled Indian tapestry, Nina decided she would never fly coach class again. She could get used to living this way…

She felt relaxed when she disembarked at LAX. After a short conversation with the car rental agent, who told her there would be a slight delay, she grabbed a large, caffeinated cola at a bar masquerading as a restaurant. Taking a stool next to the black windows overlooking the airstrips, she watched lonesome-looking business travelers nuzzle their drinks like lovers, and observed as a dozen planes took off and landed without crashing, marveling at the survival of all the fragile little packages of flesh crammed inside.

She stopped at the restroom to change, removing her official travel clothing of soft stretch leggings and a sweater and exchanging them for the snug-fitting suit, stockings, and shoes she had brought. At the mirror, she liberally applied makeup, including red lipstick. When in the Southland, she would do as the Southlanders do. Anyway, once in a while she enjoyed turning into a glamorous stranger.

Standing in line at the rental car agency, she studied a map of the maze of freeways and streets she needed to memorize if she was going to arrive only fashionably late. The car, a radiant-blue Neon with turquoise trim, was low to the ground and zippy as a sports car. She joined the million other cars flowing through these arteries into the night, another bright corpuscle in L.A.’s lifeblood.

She turned the radio on to a song with a lot of bass and let the music travel through her, all the way down to the toes in her high-heeled shoes. All her life she had climbed a ladder routinely and without thought, slipping more often than she wanted. For the first time, she had glimpsed the top. And there, in that upper region, shiny and bright, was the payoff, a glorious mountain of gold, the Markov money.

A share of that kind of money would set her up for life. She could buy her house outright, or a bigger, better house, and finally create the kind of stable home life Bob needed. She could work less, be more available to him, maybe even be more available to a relationship that would put a man in her life and in Bob’s on a more permanent basis. She could buy Bob all the things she couldn’t afford now, the fancy athletic shoes he wanted, the computer software that was out of her price range, all the tickets he wanted to visit his father in Europe. She might even turn into the parent she wanted to be, patient, generous, and undistracted.

Pulling up in front of the hotel that housed the Yamashiro Restaurant, she handed her keys to the parking valet.

The maître d’ was expecting her. He led her past the regular restaurant, where silverware and glasses clinked and people talked in muted tones, where sounds and colors were as discreet and perfectly balanced as in a Japanese temple, into a private room of bamboo and scrolls.

A black man about six feet four, at least a foot taller than she was, stood up and held out a big hand with a diamond band on his ring finger.

“I appreciate your making time for me,” she said.

“You’re so very welcome.” She got a brief whiff of spice and starch before he stepped away. “It takes my mind off the case in progress. We’ve been in trial for two weeks. I’d forgotten there was an outside world and beautiful women with propositions for me,” he went on, “even if they happen to be the legal kind.”

With a deep, compelling voice and a solid, athletic body, Winston Reynolds inspired total confidence. He wore metal-rimmed glasses and a navy-blue suit with a crimson tie, standard trial attire. About forty-five years old, he had hair that receded a little to expose a broad brown forehead. Notes scribbled on his napkin revealed that he had kept himself occupied while waiting for her, no doubt recording things to remember after a long day in court, but he didn’t seem as wiped out as she would have expected. In fact, his eyes had caught and held hers as she came through the door. She saw his interest and brushed it aside. He had too many impersonal reasons for turning on the charm with her tonight.