After dealing with a psychotic kid, Paul knew he didn't have it in him to go through another round of reporters asking him stupid ass questions. As they snuck out the back, he heard the voices of the people gathered in front of the police station, with the sheer magnitude of the chatters, he could tell that it was a crowd. He called the cab, which arrived a few minutes later and he drove to his office from there. Tyler had asked for a life imprisonment instead of a death sentence, which will be almost impossible to get. The judge himself will be under a lot of pressure from the president, vice president and every right wing politician in the country, coupled with the fact that the evidence they have is enough to prove he was a shooter. To make matters worse, the state of Utah still had the death sentence, there was no way he could wriggle him out of the chair. His phone began to ring, the call was from Kim Draxler, his former girlfriend and associate.
"Hello, Kim, how are you?" Paul asked
"I'm doing fine Paul," her voice hit him like crack, it brought back so many good memories of them, memories of them from before he was just a worker in his older brother's law firm to when they were together, dating, a wave of sadness hit him.
"Paul," Kim continued, "what the hell did you get yourself into this time?'
"What are you talking about?"
"You're everywhere, news, newspapers, social media. Whenever I open my phone today, what I see at every turn is your face. Why in the world will you take that case, are you not tired of being the center of trouble every goddamn time?"
Paul sighed, he hasn't even faced the judges and the persecutors yet, and he already lost more than half of the fighting energy in him.
"He hired me before the whole assassination saga, so I'm his legal representative."
"Paul, you just got out of suspension, is this sort of attention what you want for yourself? Why do you keep doing this to yourself, taking the little good thing you have and trashing it! Paul, drop that case, hand it over to another lawyer, this is my advice to you."
"I can't do that Kim, it will be an insult to the practice, to myself." He could hear Kim laughing at the other end of the line.
"For someone that spent more than half his career insulting the practice, this shouldn't be an issue for you. Besides do you think you are qualified to handle a case like this? When was the last time you actually sat in a courtroom?" she cut the call.
It's been more than ten years since Paul defended anyone in court. He scratched his head hoping an answer will come, yet he had no reply because he knew Kim was right.
"For the first time in your life, put others first and drop that case," Kim dropped the last line and ended the call.
It was a bad idea, he knew that. Yet he couldn't bring himself to drop it because he might fail because Tyler hired him himself. Of all the lawyers in the United States, he hired him. There must be a reason for that, because there was no way chance brought Tyler into his office that day. But even if he took the case, he knew he might not be able to get Tyler that Life imprisonment. Perhaps, the best course of action for him and Tyler was to drop the case, and let another capable lawyer handle it.
He turned on the TV, picked up a novel and threw himself into one of the couches in the living room. As he flipped through the novel on his couch, while his mind wandered to thoughts of the case. What to do with the case, and if it came down to it, how he was going to break it to Tyler that he won't be representing him. Then the nine O'clock Foxxx news came on, he paid no attention to it until he heard the news presenter mentioned Paul Goodman, he instantly dropped the novel and turned up the TV volume.
"The disgraced Lawyer Paul Goodman, after coming back from suspension has decided to pick up the case of Kyle Robson. You might wonder what type of person willingly chooses to defend a murderer, well this is the kind of man Paul Goodman is. He was first suspended from practicing law after he broke and entered into his brother's home, then he assaulted his 65 years old brother in the process. Few weeks later, his brother lost his life few weeks later after this event happened. Then after serving his suspension, he decided to help the infamous drug dealer Heisenberg to launder hundreds of millions of dollars until he was arrested. To save his career he had to forfeit all his assets, and serve a 10 years suspension from Practicing law. Now he is back, and what is the first thing he decides to do? You guessed it right; he chose to defend a man that murdered another man in cold blood in front of his family. One might wonder, when you spend your lifetime defending criminals, does it reach a point where you end up becoming a criminal yourself?"
Paul sighed once again, he knew this tactic, the government trying to weaken his resolve through public ridicule. Then after he dropped the case, they will hand it over to a puppet public defender that will do their bidding. A ploy like this would've hurt him if he had any public image he wanted to protect in the first place. They could say he was a criminal for helping a dangerous drug dealer, but all he did was his job as his lawyer.
The news presenter had moved to trending news when he turned back to the TV, apparently the Monday Night show host Jimmy Kimmel was fired. This was due to a joke he made on the murder, the News presenter played the footage. It was neither very funny nor outrageous the only thing he saw was the Right abusing the first amendment.
"If they could destroy a comedian for telling a joke, what then will they do to less known people for saying things they don't like?" he turned off the TV to think he spent the whole night brainstorming on how he will take the needle far away from Tyler there had to be a winning strategy, if only he could find that, then he would definitely take the case.
The first thing that hit him the moment he opened his eyes the next day was a good but risky idea. He had to see the chances of winning if he went forward with this idea of his, so he rushed through his morning routine and took off to his office. There was barely anyone on the road when he got there, getting to his office, he was surprised by a big brown envelope lying in front of his office entrance. He picked it up, and on the envelope was written, 'This is for Paul Goodman's eyes only.'