Reasonable Doubt by Carsen Taite Page A

be pulled back in, and she made a mental note to meet with Meg next week to let her know she was just going to have to be more firm with their former clients.
    On her second circle around through the parking structure at Love Field, Ellery spotted her dad walking toward a shiny red Porsche Cabriolet. She angled her truck into a space directly behind the expensive sports car and rolled down the window. “Dad, over here!”
    He looked up at the sound of her voice, his furrowed brow showing his confusion. She called out again and he finally redirected and made his way over to the passenger door. She put the truck in park and hopped out to meet him. “It’s good to see you,” she said.
    He stuck out his hand. “Good to see you too.” He glanced back at the Porsche, a touch of wistful in his eyes. “I guess you’ve got new wheels.”
    She placed his one suitcase into the rear seat and motioned for him to climb into the truck. She waited until she was behind the wheel, pulling away from the curb before responding. “I sold the Porsche. It wasn’t real practical for my new line of work. Plus, the money came in handy. Don’t you like my new ride?”
    He glanced around the interior. She could tell he was fishing for something nice to say. She didn’t care what he thought. She was proud of this truck. It might not be as luxurious as her fully loaded sports car, and it certainly wasn’t as fast, but it was practical. It wasn’t like she could load some curbside find onto the hood of her Porsche.
    He finally offered his appraisal. “It’s very roomy.”
    She laughed and he joined in. Even after all the years they’d lived and worked together, she continued to be astonished at how different she was from either of her parents. Neither one of them had even pretended to understand how she could walk away from a lucrative practice to start a business making furniture. She imagined they’d had many conversations about the waste of her law degree and years of networking they’d put into the firm. At first, she’d cared enough to try to make them understand, but she’d quickly realized despite the DNA they shared, she would never define success the same way they did. While that was okay, she held some small hope that when her father saw her studio and tonight’s show, he’d finally get her.
    “Are you hungry?” she asked. It was just after nine and they were near one of her favorite breakfast spots.
    “Breakfast would be great.”
    She took a right turn onto Mockingbird and drove toward Market Diner while they talked about easy, inane subjects like the weather. They were almost at the restaurant when her phone rang again. Damn. She’d meant to turn it off after she picked up her dad. She looked at the screen. Meg again. She’d already left three messages. Ellery’s thumb hovered over the ignore button. She could hit ignore and then shut the phone off. Meg would leave more messages and she could deal with them later. Or, she could pick up now and make it clear she was not to be disturbed for any legal work. Probably not a bad conversation for her father to witness. She answered the call. “Hi, Meg. Miss me?”
    “Where are you?”
    Ellery pushed past the anxious tone in Meg’s voice, refusing to be bullied back into the practice. “I’m in the car with my dad. He’s in town for a visit. Not a good time for you to light up my phone with a million messages about cases you want me to work. In fact, it’s never going to be a good time for—”
    Meg cut her off. “Didn’t you listen to any of my messages? All hell’s breaking loose. You need to get down here right now and straighten this out. I just had a huge potential client walk out and I’ll probably lose a bunch more by the time they’re done.”
    “Slow down. You’re not making any sense. Who’s they? What’s going on?” Ellery pulled into the parking lot for the restaurant and parked the truck.
    “Homeland Security agents are here with a search