“We have a sign-out system for them.” Tina took a slender file from the credenza at the far end of the room and quickly paged through it. “No one's checked it out.”

That meant nothing. Litigators, meticulous about observing court procedures, regularly overlook office protocol, particularly as they get close to trial.

“How long did you work for Mr. Pearsall?”

“It would have been one and a half years next month.” Her fingers fluttered first at the file, then at a few stray hairs at her neck. She didn't seem to know what to do with her hands.

“Did he keep a trial notebook for his cases? You know, his thoughts about the case, the way he planned to try it.” Sooner or later someone would return the binder containing the transcript of Warren's deposition, but if there was anything important in it that needed attention at trial, Pearsall would have mentioned it in his notes.

Tina shook her head. “He never said anything about a trial notebook.”

A lawyer with Pearsall's experience would not prepare for a trial of this size without outlining his strategy, setting down the main points for his direct and cross-examinations, noting whether a deposition witness seemed overly forgetful or remembered events that had not occurred. By this point in his preparation, Pearsall also would have sketched out his theory of the case, the story interweaving fact and law that would, or so every lawyer hoped, give the jury no choice but to decide for his client.

“After Mr. Pearsall died, who moved his things out of the office?”

“I did. Any documents related to the case, I sent down to the workroom.” One floor down, the workroom had been part of Tina's office tour that morning. The size of three conference rooms, it was where the paralegals working on the case had their cubicles. The storehouse of last resort, the workroom was also where the team kept the correspondence files and documents that were not in the conference room.