As the limousine rolled through the front gates, Casey fingered her Cartier watch and wondered how it was that the shame of such a small moment could last so long.

"Nice place," she said, feigning complacency.

The rock star made them wait in his study for nearly an hour before he wandered in wearing a baggy pair of pants and a scruffy T-shirt. In less than a minute, Casey sensed that what Tony thought was a done deal was far from done. It wasn't even close. In fact, after a couple of probing questions, she was nearly certain that Culpepper had decided to go with a different attorney.

"Can I ask you a simple question?" she said.

The rock star shrugged. "Sure."

"Why are we here?"

"I don't know," Culpepper said, looking to his brother, a younger, scrawnier version of himself who sat in a big chair in the corner with his feet dangling over the arm.

"I told Tony," the brother said defensively, "nothing was guaranteed. I just said that if you wanted to represent Pierce that you'd better come up here and see him in person."

"My brother likes to jerk people around," Culpepper said in disgust and walked out of the room, absolving himself of the entire situation.

"Hey," the brother said somewhat belligerently after staring blankly for a few moments at the door. "I told you, Tony, Pierce has the final say…"

Casey was going to rip into the brother, then she decided to rip into Tony before giving it up completely. It would be a waste of effort. Tony did things like this from time to time, and she didn't want to hear his rationalization about how hard it was to sell their services. It made her feel cheap because deep down she knew it was true. Not that she was a hard act to sell, but beyond Austin, Texas, there was a whole battalion of good trial lawyers trying to represent the big-name stars. She was one of the many, and that was something she would have to live with until the day she became the biggest name in the legal profession. That was her goal, and she believed that one day it would happen. In the meantime, she had to get home. With a look of complete irritation, she made for the door.