Under the Table(32)
“Unless you’re going to spend the night staging a protest outside, there’s no point in that.”
“Do you know any lawyers? Do you want me to call Blake?”
“I want you to call them all, but I get the feeling it’s not going to do any good right now. I can’t believe the nerve of this guy. Right now, my only regret is not kicking him harder.”
“Ruth, now is not the time to go all balls to the wall. This is one of those situations where apologizing would go a long way. You can plot his demise after you get out and lawyer up.”
“This is a nightmare,” Ruth said, taking one last look at herself in the mirror as the reality hit her full force. She gave herself a quick finger comb.
“They’re waiting,” Zoey said quietly.
“There is something you can do,” Ruth said, her voice shaky. “Call work for me in the morning? Tell them I’m sick, can’t stop throwing up. That’s not far from the truth.”
The cops led Ruth down the small hall to the stairs and away. The apartment, despite the television still being on, now seemed eerily quiet. Zoey started to pace from room to room. She picked up and put down her phone half a dozen times, resisting the urge to call Tristan. She picked up her phone one last time, this time to place a call. To Derek.
“Hey, baby,” he greeted her. “I was just thinking about you.”
“They just hauled Ruth off to jail,” she blurted. “I don’t know what the hell I should be doing!”
Normally, his chuckling was aggravating. This time, it lent an air of feeling that everything was going to be all right. “Oh shit, Ruthless must’ve really messed up if she wasn’t able to talk herself out of it.”
Zoey told Derek the story of her night with Ruth and the handsy judge. She left out any mention of Tristan.
“I don’t think this guy would want to take it all the way. A good defense attorney would make him look like a pervert, and that’s rotten publicity whether it’s true or not. Sounds like he’s trying to prove a point.”
“Like what? That he has great power at his disposal and he uses it to crush women who aren’t interested in him?”
“That. Or maybe he doesn’t appreciate a kick in the jewels. She’ll probably get a fine, maybe some community service.”
“Don’t forget a criminal record!” Zoey said hotly. This was serious. Ruth was behind bars. “Dixons are a lot of things, but we aren’t jailbirds!”
“You aren’t a Dixon anymore.” Derek, as usual, took the most inopportune moment to get back to his agenda. “You’re a Sullivan. You should be grateful you aren’t sitting in that cell with her.”
“Derek, please don’t make me regret reaching out to you.”
“I’m sorry. I can’t help it. But when you call me late on a Sunday night to tell me your sister just went to jail for losing her cool after a night of partying, I have to worry. You’ve been cleaning up after your sister’s misadventures since we all were kids. You can’t fix her and she doesn’t want to be saved. I’m afraid you’re going to get caught up in one of her messes.”
So much of what he said was the truth. But Derek wasn’t known for his timing. Zoey’s response was silence followed by a long, drawn-out sigh. Before hanging up, Derek left her with one more attempt at comforting.
“Look, Ruth is going to be fine. She’s going to spend a night in jail, something that in the long run might do her some good. There’s nothing you can do for her between now and the morning, so get some sleep tonight and then just go pick her up.”
*
After the second night in a row spent tossing and turning, Zoey had barely fallen asleep when she was awakened right after sunrise by another pounding on the front door. Luckily, this time when she looked through the peephole, she saw Ruth’s eye up close, blinking back at her from the other side.
Zoey opened the door with a sigh of relief. Her sister didn’t look too worse for wear, other than the dark circles under her eyes.
“That was harrowing,” Ruth said while breezing in and flopping down on the futon.
“How did you get out so soon? They said last night you wouldn’t be arraigned until this morning.”
“It’s all about who you know.” After all she’d been through, Ruth still was able to appear haughty.
“I’m too tired to play guessing games or congratulate you on your network of friends. Just answer the question.”
“I would’ve picked up coffee,” Ruth continued, “but as you know, I left here without my wallet.”
“We can make coffee. Are you still in trouble or what?”
“I probably could’ve gotten the guys at the bagel place to front me a couple of cups, but it’d be over my dead body that I’d let them see me dressed like this.”
“RUTH!!” Zoey’s already frayed nerves had reached their breaking point.
“Okay!” Ruth laughed. “I knew a couple of detectives at the station. They were just as surprised as I was, since not once did they ever tell me they were cops. Or maybe they did and I just forgot.”
“Ruth,” Zoey repeated, this time as a growl.
“Relax! While they were booking me, these guys intervened. I never saw the inside of a jail cell. They called and woke up a judge they knew, who didn’t take kindly to having an already overextended justice system being burdened by the hurt feelings of an out-of-town traffic court judge. They couldn’t get me out of the court date, but they were able to spring me on my own recognizance. And I scored a date for the fireworks on the Fourth of July, on a boat in the harbor, no less.”