“It’s a lovely restaurant,” said Nina, adjusting her skirt and setting down the ever-present attaché beside her.

“It is, isn’t it? This is a real treat. Please thank your generous client for me.” He had already ordered wine. He poured her a glass, studying her openly, approvingly. “Let me say right now how much I appreciate you flying down here just to take me out to dinner tonight.” He took a sip of his wine. “My mama would get a kick out this situation, a woman like you wooing me. Dad, too, God rest his woman-loving soul.”

A waiter silently arrived before she could respond, and they ordered. The restaurant featured fresh fish of every kind. Nina wanted shrimp but it could get messy, so she ordered beef, figuring she should concentrate on Reynolds, not on whether she was dripping sauce all over her best suit. Reynolds went for the duck.

He leaned back in his chair, swirling his wine in the glass, and looking into its red depths gave a half smile. “Tell me about the Markov case,” he said.

“I’ll tell you what I can without violating the attorney-client privilege. Lindy Markov lived with Mike Markov as his wife. She worked alongside him for over twenty years, building a business from scratch. Those two crucial facts are undisputed.”

“I understand everything is in his name. Your secretary mentioned a few things to my assistant. I hope you don’t mind.”

“He put everything in his name and she agreed to that, because they had a deal to share everything equally.”

“So she says.”

“Yes. And so she will testify in court.”

“Has she got anything in writing?”

“You must understand we can talk more about her position when you commit to taking the job.”

“I see. You want me to get involved without letting me have a chance to evaluate the case?”

“Not at all. Here are the basic pleadings and a summary of the issues and the basic facts about the Markov relationship.” She pulled up her case as she spoke, opened it, and passed over a manila folder. Reynolds spent a few minutes looking it over, sipping thoughtfully from his glass from time to time. He was a fast reader.

“You got any rabbits in the hat?” he said when he had finished. “Because you’re gonna need lots of magic to win this.”

“Well, there is one case that has enough in common with our situation to be potentially useful,” Nina said.

“Maglica versus Maglica,” said Winston. “That’s been news for years around here. We’re all waiting to hear how she does on appeal. But I believe the lady in that case was older. She devoted her adult working life to building that business. The relative youth of your client might adversely affect your outcome.”

Nina smiled, happy he had passed his first test. “Yes, but Mr. Maglica had already established something of a track record as a businessman. The Maglites venture was his second undertaking. I think Lindy’s primary role in developing this, the Markovs’ only successful business, will be easier for us to demonstrate.”

“I like the sound of that,” said Winston.

“And while we haven’t found much in the way of legal precedents to encourage us yet, we’re confident Lindy Markov is entitled to a substantial share of Markov Enterprises. We’ve sent out our first set of Interrogatories and we’ve already scheduled Mr. Markov’s deposition for December.”

“Moving right along.”

“The Superior Court is very efficient in El Dorado county, Mr. Reynolds. We’ll be in trial in six or seven months in spite of the magnitude of this case. Mr. Markov’s chafing under the receivership the court ordered, and Mrs. Markov is in financial difficulty.”

“You don’t think you can settle it?”

“Mr. Markov has hired Jeffrey Riesner. I believe you know him?”

“I do.”

“Then you know what we’re up against. He’s hard-line and uncompromising.”

“And that’s just the beginning with him.” He was teasing.

“He hates to settle. And my client wants something she’s not going to get.”

“Which is?”

“Mr. Markov. She wants a reconciliation with him, but I don’t believe that’s a possibility. The lawsuit will drive them further apart.”

“So it’s a battle. Palimony cases are very difficult to win,” Reynolds said, “but you knew that, didn’t you, Ms. Reilly?”

“Yeah,” Nina said, feeling disappointed. She knew, but she hoped she hadn’t blown her evening and a thousand bucks just to hear a final nail being driven into the coffin of her case. “I know it, but I’m going to fight it with or without you, Mr. Reynolds.”

He laughed. “Well, at least you don’t come down here talking trash. I appreciate that.”

“You don’t think the case is winnable?”

“I didn’t say that. Every case is winnable but only if it gets to the jury. That’s the hard part. Get it to the jury and you always have a chance. Actually, a couple of our colleagues, and I won’t name names, have been in touch with friends of Mrs. Markov to offer their services to her.”

“Really? If her case is so hopeless, why?”

He stared at her as if scrutinizing an idiot for some small hint of intelligence, then shook his head. “Money. All that money up for grabs! Enough money to make a sane man mad with greed. Enough money to get big firms all over the state wondering how to steal your case. You understand?”

She nodded. For the first time since considering the case, she felt the sheer power that so much money exercised. Well, she had felt some of it, too, on the drive over, the tickling of her own desire for money, for what it could buy, for the freedom it represented.

“It’s a big case,” he said. “Too big for you, but you know that. That’s why you’re here.”

“Well, now,” Nina began, but Reynolds wasn’t finished.

“So you know what I overheard today at the racquetball club? I heard what Mrs. Markov did when the other guys came knocking,” he said. “She told them to go piss up a rope. She said she already has excellent representation.” He laughed heartily. “She may be right. You’ve made a good beginning in court, and you’ve got a loyal client. I couldn’t have done better myself.”

Nina lowered her eyes, so he wouldn’t see the mingled relief and pleasure she felt. That other lawyers would want this case should not surprise her, but it did. She had actually thought she was doing Lindy a favor. Now she was starting to see the Markov case in a whole new light.

“Have you ever handled a really big piece of litigation, Nina?”

“I’ve handled jury trials in homicide cases,” Nina said. “I doubt that it gets much worse than that.”

“Have you ever had a jury trial in a civil case?”

“No,” she said.

“I’m not trying to undermine your confidence. I just want to see if you appreciate what I can do for you. I do jury trials in civil cases. Cases a lot like the one you have. That’s all I do. You know how they used to call Mel Belli the King of Torts? Well, here they call me the Prince of Palimony.”

“I wouldn’t be here all dressed up in a restaurant in L.A. when I ought to be home putting my kid to bed if I didn’t appreciate what you can do for me,” Nina answered.

“Well, then. What do you have in mind?” He ran his thumb absently around the rim of the wineglass, his brown eyes gazing steadily at her. “You want me to handle the trial?”

“No. I want to handle the trial. I want to associate you in as a cocounsel, but I want to have the final say as far as strategy. I realize you don’t usually play second chair, Mr. Reynolds, but even second chair could make you a rich man if we win this case. I’m operating on a reduced hourly fee basis with an additional contingency fee of ten percent of the final recovery. I’ll give you half the ten percent, plus pay your hourly billings each month at the rate of a hundred dollars an hour.”

Reynolds had knit his brows and sunk his chin into his shirt. He usually charged three hundred an hour, she knew, but he didn’t usually have such a massively abundant pot of gold waiting for him at the end of the rainbow. Nina let him think about what she had said for a moment, then added, “If we ask for only half of the value of their business, our claim is for over a hundred million.”