Acts of Desperation(54)

His words cut through whatever remaining armor I had left and tears filled my eyes. I looked over my shoulder. “Just stay away from me for a while, ok? I’ll see you in court next week,” I said through a shaky breath and left.





Chapter Twenty-Four


I met up with Jax and Sarah outside the courtroom. I avoided assessing Jax’s appearance because I knew he would look fantastic, and I’m a sucker for a guy in a nice suit. What good would it have done me? Sarah, however, looked innocent and pure from her simple black pants to her white shirt with eyelet embroidered stitching. Her makeup was simply done and her hair was pulled back up at her temples, making her girlishness shine. She let it dry naturally so she had thick layers of cascading waves. Looking at her I wanted to scream that Anders had put her in this situation again.

“Morning,” I said and smiled. The last time I’d spoken with Jax was in his office that day. For the time being, I was finished with all of it—men, relationships; I was finished. Work and Sarah’s divorce were keeping me plenty busy and, for now, that was enough.

“Morning,” he answered.

“So you ready,” I asked Sarah.

“As I’ll ever be,” she said.

I looked around the waiting area and saw a slimmed down Anders sitting by himself reviewing his notes. He had on classic tan slacks and a white polo button-up—no tie. His hair was held firmly in place as always. You know the saying that anyone who represents themselves in court has a fool for an attorney? Well, I had a feeling that the rule didn’t apply to Anders. I had no doubt that he’d been studying his financial records and working with his accountant to figure out any and every legal loophole he could get away with to limit the amount of money he’d have to pay to Sarah.

Jax took a few moments privately with Sarah to review the things he was going to cover in the courtroom, so I took a seat on a bench in the waiting area. I stared over at Anders almost in awe. It was amazing that one person could cause so much turmoil; he’d so carelessly destroyed three lives. Still, I was having a problem swallowing it all myself. I could only imagine how Sarah felt every day.

Anders had a folder open in his lap, highlighting something then he reached up to wipe some sweat dripping down on his brow. I thought briefly that it might be the sweat of a nervous man, but realistically, given how he’d been conducting himself, he was probably just hung-over.

Well, nervous or hung-over, I hoped it would affect his performance in the courtroom.

I reached in my purse and grabbed my phone to check in on some emails and hadn’t noticed Anders gathering up his things and walking toward me.

“Hey Sember, good to see you,” he said and sat down next to me.

Without a moment’s thought, I said, “Um…no,” and started to put my things away. I had no plans on talking to him, let alone sitting next to him.

He gripped my arm. “I’m sorry about all this Sember. Really. I’m trying to make it better.”

Yeah, it looks like it, I thought, by dragging Sarah to court for the second time.

It was bait, and he was dangling the carrot out in front of me to see if I’d bite. Instead, I silently looked down at his hand on my arm then up to his face. “Well,” he said and removed his hand. “Thanks for being here for Sarah today. I know she needs the extra support. She’s having a really hard time getting over me.”

That was it. I opened my mouth to speak, but then as if on cue, the judge rescued me and called us into the courtroom. Jax and Sarah finished their prep-talk, and we all walked in together and took our positions. Moments later we were sworn in, and the formality of court was underway.

This was the first time I’d actually had to observe Jax in the courtroom, and as I assumed, he looked dashing. I couldn’t not take notice. He had on his charcoal gray suit that I loved and a green tie that matched his eyes. In his opening remarks, I felt he was engaging, charismatic, and commanded attention. After Anders’s somewhat compelling yet contrived opening remarks, Sarah was called up to the stand. Jax questioned Sarah first, and I thought she did well despite being nervous. He went through a detailed list to explain the errors in Sarah’s original paperwork, touching on each issue. Anders cross-examined her and tried to catch her up on a few minute details, but she didn’t falter. She handled herself well against him.

When it was Anders’s turn to go up, he sauntered over to the stand like he was finally taking center stage. The judge and Anders shared a brief exchange about the distinctiveness of Anders’s name, and he took it as an opportunity to charm her, and, as far as I could tell, it worked when she laughed. Jax went through his line of questioning and systematically pecked away at Anders. Jax was direct when Anders was evasive. He was calm when Anders was combative. Anders tried to sell the court on his suffering business, citing a complete list of woes, but Jax worked to discredit his claims and pushed the contradictory elements of his tax statements as evidence.

When it was Anders’s turn, I hated to admit it, but he was also very good. He didn’t outright lie but bent the truth with subtle manipulations of the facts. He walked an extremely fine legal line, but what really stunk was that he was convincing. Midway through his spiel, my hopes for him failing due to nerves or ailments vanished. We were in court for just under two hours when everything finally wrapped up.

Jax, Sarah, and I gathered outside of the courtroom and waited until Anders left before rehashing events.