Weekend Warriors (Sisterhood #1)(7)
Nikki sat down across from Myra and Charles. “I think this would be a real good time for you to tell me exactly what you two are talking about.”
“The system you work under doesn’t always work,” Charles said.
“Sometimes that’s true,” Nikki said carefully. “For the most part, it works.”
Myra looked at Nikki over the rim of her glass. “What if we take the part that doesn’t work and make it work? What if I told you I was willing to use my entire fortune, and you know, Nikki, that it is sizeable, and use it to…make that system work. For us. For all the Maries, the Kathryns and the Alexis Thornes who got lost in the system.”
“Are you talking about going outside the law to…to…avenge these women? Are you talking about taking the law into your own hands and…and…”
Myra’s head bobbed up and down. “Charles can help. He dealt with criminals and terrorists during his stint at MI 6. You’re an attorney, a law professor. With your brains, Charles’s expertise and my money, we could right quite a few wrongs. It would have to be secret, of course.”
“And you just now came up with all this?” Nikki said in awe. “No!”
“Yes,” Myra and Charles said in unison.
Nikki looked at her watch. “Just eight hours ago, give or take a few minutes, you were practically comatose, Myra. You didn’t want to live. You were so deep in your misery and your depression I wanted to cry for you. Now you’re all set to take on the judicial system and dispense your own brand of justice. You’ll get caught, Myra. You’re too old to go to jail. They aren’t kind to old people in jail. NO!”
Myra took a long pull from the highball glass. “If I can’t satisfy my own vengeance, maybe I can do something for others where the system failed.” She spoke in a low, even monotone. “Kathryn Lucas, age thirty-eight. Married to Alan Lucas, the love of her life. Alan had multiple sclerosis as well as Parkinson’s disease and lived in a wheelchair. They owned an eighteen-wheeler, Alan’s dream. In order to keep his dream alive for him, Kathryn drove the rig and Alan rode alongside her. One night when they stopped for food and gas, Kathryn was raped at a truck stop by three bikers. Alan was forced to watch and could not help his wife. Rather than report the rape and destroy what was left of her husband’s manhood, she remained silent. She did nothing. She carried it with her day and night for the next seven years until Alan died. Needless to say, whatever was left of the marriage after the rape, died right then and there. The day after she buried her husband she went to you, gave you all the information she had on the case and you turned her away because the stupid statute of limitations had run out. You told me she had a partial license plate, her husband took pictures, and she said one of the bikers was riding an old Indian motorcycle. You said she told you they belonged to the Weekend Warriors club, probably white-collar professionals out for a fling. Charles said there aren’t many Indians in existence and they’re on every biker’s wish list. It shouldn’t be hard to track it down. You just sit there, Nikki, and think about three men raping you while Jack is forced to watch. You think about that.”
“Myra, I don’t have to think about it. I feel terrible for Kathryn Lucas. Yes, she deserves to have something done but she waited too long. The law is the law. I’m a goddamn lawyer. I can’t break the law I swore to uphold.”
“The circumstances have to be brought into consideration. I need you to help us, Nikki.”
“What is it you want me to do?”
“We could form this little club. You certainly know plenty of women who have slipped through the cracks. Like Alexis, Kathryn, and many others. We’ll invite them to join and then we’ll do whatever has to be done.”
Nikki stood up and threw her hands in the air. “You want us to be vigilantes!”
“Yes, dear. Thank you. I couldn’t think of the right word. Don’t you remember those movies with Charles Bronson?”
“He got caught, Myra.”
“But they let him go in the end.”
“It was a damn movie, Myra. Make-believe. You want us to do the same thing for real. Just out of curiosity, supposing we were able to find the men that raped Kathryn Lucas, what would we do to them?”
Myra smiled. “That would be up to Kathryn now, wouldn’t it?”
“I don’t believe I’m sitting here listening to you two hatch this…this…what the hell is it, Myra?”
“A secret society of women who do what has to be done to make things right,” Myra said solemnly.
“It could work, Nikki, as long as we hold to the secrecy part,” Charles said quietly. “There is that room in the tunnels where you and Barbara used to play. You could hold your meetings there. No one would ever know. I know exactly how to set it all up.”
Nikki struggled for a comeback that would make sense. In the end, she said, “Jack Emery will be prosecuting Marie Lewellen. We’ll be adversaries.”
“I see,” Myra said. She slapped her palms on the old, scarred tabletop. “Then you have to get her out on bail and we’ll find a way to whisk her and her family away to safety. I have the money to do that. It will be like the Witness Protection Program. Charles can handle all that.”
Nikki sat down with a thump. “If I don’t agree to…go along with this, what will you do?”