The Last Invitation (25)

Jessa wasn’t sure what to say to that, but she didn’t have to say anything. Retta continued to talk. Despair and fury wrapped around her, pushing through the claustrophobic pressure choking the room. She seemed frozen in memories that held her hostage.

“People talk tough about fairness and due process until the day they’re the ones begging for help; then they realize the formal justice process is bullshit,” Retta said.

That, from a judge. Jessa sat there, afraid to speak, because she had no idea what the right thing to say could be.

Retta let out a harsh chuckle. “You don’t have to say what you’re thinking. I only want to be clear that the robe doesn’t insulate a person from human feelings, including hate.”

Jessa rushed to clean up whatever thought her expression telegraphed. “No, I—”

“I thought becoming a judge would change things. I’d be able to see justice through to the end. The parade of abusers and human garbage standing in front of me would finally understand that enough was enough.” Retta sighed. “But that’s not how it works. There are technical errors, surprise jury verdicts, and cases that never see the inside of a courtroom.”

“The system is imperfect,” Jessa said, repeating back a phrase Retta often said as a professor.

Retta’s focus sharpened. “If I offered you a way to cut through the Bartholomew case, to get to the very heart of it without the power and posturing, would you do it?”

Was she saying . . . No, it couldn’t be. Jessa stalled as she mentally scrambled to find the right answer. She did not want to fail this test. “I don’t know what that means.”

“I think you do,” Retta said in a firm voice. “Let’s say there was a different system, one outside of the courts. A system that answered to the victims. Would you agree to do anything to preserve that sort of alternative system?”

Jessa started her legal career by taking the easy road. She never let her mind go there, to how willing and eager she’d been for a shortcut that made her light shine brighter, but it raced there now. The bright line that should be there in her mind, the one that balked at trampling all over the parameters of what should be possible, got lost in a cloud of confusion.

“Yes or no.” Retta snapped her fingers. “Go with your gut.”

“We have a system that works.”

Retta made a face. “Does it?”

Jessa didn’t understand this test . . . or if it was one. “Are you saying this alternative exists?”

“If it did, would you use it?”

“I’m not—”

“Even if it meant breaking the rules?”

Jessa waded through all the twisting and confusion and rapid-fire questions and still wasn’t sure what the conversation was about, but the answer should be no. Everything she’d learned in law school, including from this woman, pointed to no. “I should be able to handle Darren and his attorney within the current system, regardless of their lies.”

Retta frowned. “That wasn’t the question.”

“No, I’m fine.” If Retta needed a specific response for the rest of the club, some sort of ethics check or something, that should do it. “I can do this the right way. Without special help.”

Retta’s expression didn’t change. “I guess we’ll see.”





Chapter Twenty-Four

Gabby




Gabby sat at the breakfast bar in her kitchen and read through the paperwork again. She’d grabbed the envelope out of Baines’s house yesterday and had not been able to think of anything since.

Bids. That was the deep dark secret worth hiding. Bids on a job. A big job, sure. The kind that changes lives and expands companies, but boring, basic, job-related bids. Nothing special. Talk about an anticlimactic conclusion.

She didn’t understand the top secret behavior here. Baines was not an innocent actor. He’d done appalling things to secure the life he wanted, and knowing that scared her enough to leave. But this?

The alarm chirped when the front door opened. Before Gabby could get off the stool, she heard the beeps from the code sequence being entered. Liam. Must be. Maybe he could help her understand the bid issue.

“Mom.”

Gabby jerked at the unexpected sound of her daughter’s voice. “Kennedy?”

She spun around in time to see Kennedy blow in, long hair escaping her ponytail and a bag slung over her shoulder. She stopped right before entering the kitchen. Tension pulled around her mouth, and her mood bounced around in that scary slip of space between screaming and crying.

“What are you doing here?” Gabby’s mind refused to focus. “How did you get home?”

“That doesn’t matter.” Kennedy’s voice sounded strained.

“It does to me.” She attended school in New York, more than five hours away. She couldn’t drive. “Answer me. Are you okay?”

“Bus and train.”

“What?” The enormity of the situation stole Gabby’s breath. She grabbed onto the chair she just abandoned to keep from being knocked down by the mental images flashing in her brain. Kennedy traveling alone. Somebody grabbing her. Being vulnerable. Lost and desperate. It took all of Gabby’s control not to yell, but a rabid scream rumbled in her throat, ready to release. “You are supposed to be in school, young lady. You can’t just leave and—”