Friday, 5 June 2009 – 15.30

      ‘This is the best Chinese food I’ve ever tasted,’ said Alex, expertly picking up a mouthful of chicken chow mein with a pair of wooden chopsticks.

      ‘Best at this price,’ said Martine, her voice still tense from the incident back at the snooker tournament. ‘Let’s not exaggerate.’

      They were eating at the Embassy Kitchen, just across the parking lot from the billiards club. The area itself seemed like a bit of a dump. But Alex was used to slumming it, in his line of work. And he suspected that the same was true of Martine.

      ‘Look, about what happened earlier…’ He was nervous, sensing that Martine was still angry.

      ‘You don’t have to apologize. Just don’t do it again.’

      Alex felt deflated. He hadn’t been going to apologize. But he wanted to clear the air. ‘You shouldn’t have to put up with that kind of crap.’

      ‘And you shouldn’t have to get into fights to prove your masculinity. Okay! You fathered two children. You paid your dues in life. You win battles in court – which is the battleground where thinking men fight and win battles. I don’t need you to beat up some redneck to prove yourself.’

      He was flattered that she said ‘beat up’ not ‘get beaten up by.’

      ‘I wasn’t trying to prove anything. But the way he was going, I figured it was distracting to—’

      ‘Oh gimme a break! You think arguing with him made it less distracting? Come off it, Alex. You wanted to play the hero. You wanted to show me that you’re not the wimp lawyer in a suit but the tough guy who can take care of his lady – like I’m the sort who’s gonna be impressed by that macho bullshit. Like I haven’t seen it, done it and bought the t-shirt.’

      ‘All right, maybe I overreacted. And maybe I’m old-fashioned.’ He was leaning close to her now. ‘But then again, I think that it is a man’s duty to protect his lady.’

      ‘And maybe you’ve also got some unfinished issues.’

      ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

      ‘It means you’re still thinking about another lady you felt you should have been able to protect.’

      She saw the hurt in his eyes.

      ‘I’m sorry,’ she said softly. ‘I was out of line with that.’

      ‘No it’s true. You’re right. I wasn’t there for Melody.’

      ‘You couldn’t have been there for Melody. How were you to know that some loony-tunes with a Saturday night special was going to bushwhack her on the way home? Don’t beat yourself up about it.’

      Alex’s wife Melody had been killed by a gangbanger in the parking structure of the hospital where she worked. Melody was a doctor who had been working in A & E when two gangbangers from opposite sides of town were brought in the same night. What she didn’t know was that the one she was treating had shot the other one. She saved the one on her operating table, but the other doctor lost his. And the dead man’s homeys couldn’t get at the guy who killed their brother, ‘cause he was in jail – in solitary. So they held a council of war and decided that Melody had to pay.

      By that stage, she probably knew she was in danger, but she refused to take it seriously. She even rejected an escort to her car, saying she was too old for a nanny.

      Call it arrogance, call it self-confidence – either way, she paid with her life.

      And Alex still blamed himself in some way.

      ‘I just wish I could…’ He trailed off. But Martine knew what he was going to say. He wished he could turn the clock back. Just like everybody does. But as his son David, a physicist, had once told him: time doesn’t run backwards.

      He tried to take his mind off it. ‘Tell me how you made that trick shot?’

      ‘You should get David to explain it. You see it’s all about Newtonian mechanics. If you hit the object ball at quarter ball with pace, the cue ball moves off at an oblique angle, while—’

      Martine’s cell phone went off. She whipped it out and answered it with polished, professional speed. ‘Martine Yin.’ For the next half minute, she appeared to be listening intently. ‘Okay, I’ll be there in ten.’

      She turned to Alex, looking acutely embarrassed.

      ‘I know,’ he said. ‘Duty calls.’

      She thanked him for his understanding and left briskly. Seconds later, the roar of a car engine outside brought a wry smile to his lips as he realized that the predator in her might lie dormant but was far from extinct. She was still a newswoman, poised to pursue a good story at a moment’s notice, just as he was a lawyer 24/7, even if he didn’t quite resort to ambulance chasing.

      He managed one more mouthful of food before his own cell phone blared out the familiar musical phrase from the Allegro of Dvorak’s New World Symphony.

      ‘Mr Sedaka?’ said an almost desperate-sounding male voice at the other end of the line.

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘I’m the producer of the Elias Claymore show. We’ve got a situation here and I was wondering if there’s any possibility of you coming to LA—’

      ‘I’m in San Gabriel.’

      ‘Oh, thank God for that! Mr Claymore asked me to call you. He’s been arrested.’

      ‘Arrested? What’s the charge?’

      ‘It’s some kind of phony rape charge.’

      Alex knew at that moment why Martine had left in such a hurry.