Devil's Advocate: A Dark Mafia Romance (Devil's Playground Book 1) by Vivi Paige (different ereaders .TXT) 📗

I stood up and looked down at Indro, who winked at me. I shook my head and sighed.

“The defense calls Indro Lastra to the stand.”

Indro stood up, buttoned his jacket and walked over to the witness stand, a bailiff approaching.

“Raise your right hand,” the bailiff said and Indro did.

“Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so you help you God?”

“God, Buddha, Vishnu, whatever you got,” Indro said, sparking some laughter from the gallery and the jury.

“A simple ‘I do’ will suffice, Mr. Lastra,” the judge said tiredly.

“Apologies, Your Honor. I do,” Indro said and sat down. I walked over to the witness stand and took a breath.

“Mr. Lastra, thanks for joining us here today.”

“Not like I had much choice, Counselor,” he said, invoking more laughter.

“Indeed,” I said. “Now, Mr. Lastra, the District Attorney has stated that, regarding the death of Diego Malone, he was killed by you in a cold-blooded act of murder. What do you say to that charge?”

Indro shook his head emphatically.

“What I did was in self-defense. Diego Malone came at me with a friggin’ chunk of concrete, and I did what I had to do to walk out of that alley alive.”

“So you’re stating that you didn’t murder Diego Malone, but only acted to protect yourself. Is that correct, Mr. Lastra?”

“Smart and a good listener. Are you seeing anybody?”

More chuckles from the crowd and I gave Indro a look to stop flirting with me. Now was not the time.

Judge Moreno frowned, adjusting her glasses as she peered down at Indro. “Please answer either yes or no, Mr. Lastra.”

Indro shrugged. “Yes, that’s correct.”

“Mr. Lastra, could you tell the court what happened on the night in question?”

“Yes, I surely can,” he said. “Diego and I used to hang out in the old neighborhood. I ran into him at Sal’s diner, and we started catching up. Then he got all hot on account of he’s a Sox fan, whereas I bleed Cubbie blue, if you catch my drift.”

The gallery chuckled. Moreno rolled her eyes and reached for her gavel, but the laughter subsided quickly.

“What happened after Mr. Malone got, as you put it, hot?”

Indro shook his head. “The guy threw a bowl of friggin’ soup in my face and took off running. Now, I fully admit I wanted to beat his ass after that, but that’s all I was gonna do. Hand to hand, man to man. You might get busted in the lip but you both walk away, you feel me? Why he decided to try and murder me with a chunk of concrete, I have no idea. Maybe he was having problems at home. Word on the street was his old lady had done kicked him out.”

“Forensics back up your testimony. Mr. Malone’s fingerprints were found on the piece of concrete in question. What did you do after he came at you with that chunk of rock?”

“I did what I had to do. He got me down on the ground, was about to bash my brains in, and I whipped out my knife and went for the most vulnerable spot I could see.”

“And that’s when you cut his throat? To prevent your own death?”

“That’s it exactly, beautiful.”

More laughter. Judge Moreno kind of threw her hands up and poured herself a cup of water from the pitcher on her bench.

“Believe me, I didn’t want to do it, but it was him or me. And that was that.”

I nodded and smiled.

“Thank you, Mr. Lastra, for sharing that traumatic story with us. Your witness,” I said to Miller as I turned back to him.

The DA stood up, buttoning his jacket.

“Your Honor, the prosecution requests a recess until tomorrow. As we haven’t made any such requests in the past, we hope the court would permit this one now.”

I was shocked and looked to Indro, who gave me a questioning look.

I shook my head. I had no idea what Miller was up to.

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Sophie

Well, that didn’t go as badly as it could have. I made my way to the parking garage. It seemed that our self-defense approach was gaining some traction with the jury. Particularly the women, who couldn’t help noticing how charming Indro was. And, while ordinarily flirting with your lawyer while on the stand would be frowned upon, it may have humanized him a bit. Maybe Indro knows what he’s doing here…

I listened to the click of my heels on the cement as I tried to remember where I parked. Level 4, wasn’t it? The garage seemed eerily empty for this time of day. The thing nagging at me now was Eddie asking for that recess. What was he planning? Ordinarily I wouldn’t be worried about Eddie Miller, but he was pulling out all the stops for this case.

I looked up again, scanning the rows for anything that looked familiar. Where was my car? And why was no one else in this parking garage? I looked ahead and nearly jumped out of my skin as I saw a figure in the shadows. A big guy. Dressed in black. It was a bit hard to make him out in the dim lighting of the garage. Wait, was he looking at me?

Oh God, please not another juror tracking me down for a date. My heart started to race. Jurors flirting with me was a problem from my old life. My reality these days included much more dangerous encounters with strange men.

You’re fine. I took a deep breath. I scanned the cars in front of me and finally caught sight of my car further down the row. My stomach dropped as I saw it was directly across from the dark figure who was still staring at me.

Just make it to the car. You’ll be all right.

Why was I suddenly wishing Indro had walked me out? No. I was used to taking care of myself. I didn’t need him babysitting me. The four-inch heel I was wearing could serve as a powerful weapon if