Now Kirk’s jaw dropped. “You want to bribe the governor to keep Bolton in prison?”
“I thought I was fairly plain. Did you get it, Diantha?”
“I did. I’m speechless.”
“Tell me why it won’t work,” Rusty said with a nasty grin.
They were indeed speechless. Kirk leaned back in his chair and glared at the ceiling as if searching for an answer up there. Diantha pinched the bridge of her nose and felt a headache roaring in from the back of her neck. Then she remembered her cell phone. The recording was now at 22 minutes, 46 seconds, and counting, and it had scooped up a conversation that could land all three of them in prison with Bolton.
It was imperative that she now play defense. “I’m not so sure about it,” she said.
Rusty said, “It’s beautiful. The more I think about it, the more perfect it becomes. Five more years with Bolton locked away and we’ll have most of the tobacco money.”
Diantha asked, “What if Jackal says no?”
“Then we tell him we’re going to the FBI. He’ll back down. I can handle that clown.”
Kirk chuckled at first, then began laughing. “It’ll work. Jackal will grab it because it’s more money but also, and more important, there’s no crime. Think about it! Selling a pardon is obviously a crime. But taking a bribe to do…what? Not sell a pardon? It’s never been heard of.”
Rusty was revved up and kept going. “You can’t find a statute in any state that makes it illegal to not sell a pardon. It’s beautiful.”
Diantha glanced down: 24 minutes, 19 seconds, and counting and getting deeper. To save her neck, she said firmly, “I’m not in, boys. I don’t like it and I disagree. There’s got to be something illegal about it.”
“Come on, Diantha,” Kirk said. “We’re all in this together, aren’t we?”
“Hell no. We’re all splitting the tobacco money because we’re entitled to a portion of it. This is something different. You guys are on your own here.”
She grabbed the cell phone, dumped it into her handbag, rose dramatically, stood without a word, and left the room. She practically sprinted to the elevator and expected one of them to call her name. She ducked into the stairwell and was halfway between the fifth and sixth floors when she stopped to catch her breath. She pulled out her cell phone and turned off the recorder: 26 minutes, 27 seconds.
Now what was she supposed to do with it?
（34）
Mimi walks to a large window and gazes at the traffic below. It has been a long session, almost ninety minutes, and she is in no hurry because her patient has not been this fragile in many years. Mimi crosses her arms, speaks casually to the glass. “You don’t trust them now, do you?”
The answer is slow and deliberate. “No.”
“Have you ever trusted them?”
“I think so. We’ve worked together for eighteen years, got off to a rough start and all, but over time we came to respect each other. Now, though, their worlds are unraveling and they’re under pressure. Their problems are self-imposed but then most are, aren’t they?”
“Have they ever engaged in criminal conduct before?”
“Not to my knowledge. They may have danced around some campaign finance laws, something they learned from their father, but I have no direct knowledge of it. As I said, they believe they are committing no crime if they pursue this plan.”
“And you’re a lawyer. What’s your opinion?”
“It’s bribery, plain and simple, and I can’t believe they feel otherwise. They’re very bright and they know it’s illegal.”
Mimi turns and leans against the glass, arms still crossed. She looks at Diantha, who’s lying on the couch, heels off, eyes closed. Mimi says, “It seems to me that you’re in a dangerous predicament. Are you afraid?”
“Yes, very. There are too many crooks involved and something will go wrong. When that happens, no one knows who’ll get caught in the crossfire.”
“You’ve got to protect yourself. And trust no one.”
“There’s no one to trust.”
（35）
Of the many lawyers currently working in the office of the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri, Diantha knew only one. She had served on a committee honoring “Women in the Law” with Adrian Reece, a career prosecutor known for her tenacity in going after sex traffickers. They kept in touch and enjoyed long lunches in which they happily bitched about the clumsy antics of their male counterparts.