by Dave Daren
Hannah continued to rub his back, and he leaned further into her touch.
“Twenty thousand wouldn’t even cover the hospital bills,” she admitted, and it sounded like she was just finding more reasons to convince herself to take our side in the suit instead of backing down.
“I’m too pale for the Bahamas,” Adam mumbled with a shaking laugh. He dabbed the edge of the handkerchief at his eyes again as he shifted to sit up a little straighter.
Hannah gave a surprised, genuine laugh, and it was a wonderful sound. For just a split second, I could see the woman she was before the cancer had sunk its claws into her with no chance of letting go.
“You’re right,” she agreed, and I knew we had them.
I cleared my throat and looked between the two of them as they fell into a sad, comfortable silence.
“Are you two willing to join the suit?” I asked the question with bated breath. I felt certain they’d agree, but I couldn’t help the worry creeping up my spine.
Our entire case rested on their backs, and all I could wonder was if there was still enough strength between them to see this through. Odds were, neither would ever see the money, especially if we had to go to trial.
Hannah and Adam looked at each other, and it was clear they didn’t even need words to communicate.
“We are,” Hannah said with a firm nod of her head. “We never officially signed the documents Knox Chemicals sent over. We can throw them out now. Hell, we can shred them or set them on fire.”
Adam huffed out a small laugh, and he waved the handkerchief in the air as if he were trying to clear away a nasty odor.
“Maybe no fire, not with the oxygen tanks in the house, babe,” he joked as he cast a glance over toward the metal tank that was attached to Hannah’s cannula.
She gave a wave of her hand as well, as if to brush off the statement.
“I’m sure it would be fine,” she said. “If we blow the house up, though, it might ignite whatever the hell’s coming out of the tap. Maybe that would finally get someone else’s attention.”
It wasn’t as if the hurt and the pain they were both carrying had disappeared with their agreement to join the suit, but it certainly looked like a weight had been lifted from their shoulders.
I rose to my feet and nearly extended a hand toward Evelyn to help her stand before remembering that she’d probably try and take my whole hand off.
Before I could offer any sort of goodbye, Hannah looked up at me with a furrow between her brow.
“Do you know?” she asked, and my face contorted in confusion.
“Know what?” I asked as I cocked my head to one side.
“What’s in the water, I mean,” she asked and shifted on the couch to adjust the way her legs were crooked.
I scratched the back of my neck with my good hand.
“Uh--”
“It’s just… professional curiosity, I suppose, so you don’t have to answer if it’s like, confidential,” she assured me and held up her hands as if in surrender.
Adam had a fond smile on his face as he watched his wife.
“Hannah’s a chemist,” he said with the sort of pride you couldn’t fake.
She scoffed and gave his shoulder a small shove that didn’t have him moving anywhere. “
“I was a chemist's assistant, over at Tarleton State, in one of their labs while I tried to finish my Masters,” she explained with a wave of her hand.
But despite her brushing off the obvious praise, Adam seemed perfectly content to keep his pride intact.
“She’s being modest,” he insisted. “She helped rework the lab system and practically ran the whole thing.”
I looked over at Evelyn with raised eyebrows. We’d called the usual round of suspects when we’d tried to find an expert, but maybe we could find someone at one of the universities who knew Hannah? Could we find someone who cared enough about their old friend to run a few tests?
I turned my attention back to Hannah.
“Actually,” I started. “We weren’t able to get the complete results of the water testing we tried to conduct at the EPA.”
I was careful with my words. I didn’t want to tell her that we actually had no results of the water testing, even though it was the truth.
Hannah cocked her head to the side before looking at Adam.
He didn’t even need to meet her eyes before he sighed.
“She wants to test the water,” he said with a shake of his head, as if that could hide the fondness in his tone.
“By all means, if you want to share the findings you come up with, they could be helpful in the suit,” I replied as I tried not to grin. “But, don’t push yourself too hard.”
I amended my previous statement with a raise of my hands. The last thing I wanted was to convince a terminally ill woman to exacerbate her cancer.
Hannah grinned, but despite her newfound excitement, it was apparent just how exhausted she was.
“No, no, I’d have one of my former coworkers run the tests, but I’d like to know what did this to me,” she said with the sort of grit even cancer hadn’t been able to smooth away.
Adam leaned over to kiss the side of her shaved head with a soft smile. He began to push himself up to his feet, but Evelyn stopped him with a wave of her hand.
“No need for that, we can see ourselves out,” she assured him with a shockingly soft smile. “I’ll keep the two of you in my prayers, and thank you for your help.”
And with that Evelyn turned on her low heels and disappeared down the bare hallway. I could hear the gentle tap of her shoes and then the creak of the front door.
I blinked and looked back at the couple. Apparently, we were done, but I wanted to be sure that they understood we would be there for them.
“You’ve got my office number,” I said. “Don’t hesitate to call if anything else comes up, alright? And if you do run those tests, I’d love to know. Thank you both for seeing us.”
In contrast with Evelyn’s abrupt exit, I crossed the room to shake Adam’s hand, and then Hannah’s.
They offered their own goodbyes, and then I was hurrying after Evelyn. I caught up to her as her heels clicked against the aged sidewalk while she made her way toward my car.
“I didn’t know you were religious,” I said to break the silence I could feel looming over us.
Evelyn looked over her shoulder at me like I was an idiot.
“I’m not,” she said with a flatness in her tone that had me wanting to roll my eyes.
“Then why--” I began, but she cut me off before I could continue.
“Because it’s a nice thing to say, Archer,” she said with a huff as she threw open the passenger side door. The door slammed shut to punctuate her sentence.
I gave myself a moment to savor being able to stretch my legs before I sighed and sidled up to the driver’s side door and crammed myself into the seat. My car had begun to feel more and more like a clown car with each passing day.
I didn’t say anything else, if only because I was unable to get a firm read on whatever strange mood Evelyn was in and would rather survive to see the end of our fifteen minute drive back to the office than not.
But, as I pulled out of Piney Crest and back onto the road, Evelyn broke the silence herself.
“Frank died of cancer,” she said without any sort of preamble.
The words hung there in the air, simple and shocking. Frank died of cancer.
It took me a moment to realize that she was talking about her husband. She didn’t wear a wedding band, at least, not on her fingers, and so it was almost easy to forget that she was a widow. I recalled the ring on the chain she wore around her neck.
Her comment inside the Rietvalds’ residence made more sense now, as did the understanding she’d had when she said that there was only one way to survive their circumstances.
I floundered for something to say, but it didn’t seem like she expected me to have a response, because she was already continui
ng on.
“Stomach cancer that they caught just a little too late,” she said in a short, clipped sentence.
I couldn’t help but wonder if this was the first time she’d spoken about her husband’s illness, because she seemed awfully uncomfortable doing it. But then again, I doubted I’d be comfortable discussing my father’s death with a co-worker in such a clinical way after having witnessed what must have felt like a memory.
“I’m so sorry,” I managed to get out before she cut me off again.
“Don’t give me that sort of shit, Archer, I’m not here boo-hooing for an apology or sympathy,” she scolded me and shook her head.
She shifted her purse in her lap and looked out the windshield with a thousand yard stare.
“It’s just the truth,” she said when I couldn’t think of what else to say. “Frank got sick, and so we both retired early, and it was when he retired that we found out he had cancer. We had just assumed he was losing his appetite, but, that wasn’t the case.”
I didn’t interrupt again and just gave a nod of my head to urge her to continue while I drove us back to the office.
“He made it just over a year after the diagnosis before he died,” she said. “They’d not caught it soon enough, and he couldn’t give up smoking. He was closer to seventy than he liked to admit, and the addiction was stronger than him.”
She shifted in the seat of the car and adjusted her grip on her purse. For a moment, her bottom lip quivered, but she lifted her chin and she was her old self again.
I offered another nod of sympathy without offering my condolences. I don’t know if I understood Evelyn any better, but it did feel like I was seeing a part of a bigger picture that I’d been missing.
I’d heard awful things about watching cancer take one of your loved ones, and I’d just seen it up close and personal with Hannah and Adam. I couldn’t imagine how it had made Evelyn feel.
“If I could find what gave him cancer and tear it down, I would,” she said. “Would beat any vacation to the Bahamas whatsoever.”
And just like that, she was done sharing. She clamped her lips tightly shut and turned to look at the window.
We rode the rest of the way back to the office in silence. Evelyn had said her piece, and I didn’t know what to say in response. I was already looking forward to the end of this case, though I knew we were still in the beginning stages.
There was something about being surrounded by sickness and sadness that wore on you, and the longer Knox faced no repercussions for the damage he’d caused, the worse the inevitable ulcer I’d given myself would get.
I stepped out of the car and waited for Evelyn on the sidewalk with my hands in my pockets.
She gave me a scrutinizing look and scrunched her nose.
“Are you going back to work?” she asked with a huff.
The sun hadn’t quite set, but it was rapidly working its way to the horizon, and I could still feel the tired ache in my bones that my brief nap hadn’t quite shaken away.
“With the Rietvalds taking our side, I need to get the rest of our evidence compiled so we can bring it before the judge,” I said as if it was obvious. I gave an easy shrug of my shoulders as I started back toward the front door of Landon Legal.
Evelyn scoffed and rolled her eyes as she trotted along next to me.
“You’re going to run yourself into the ground, Archer,” she muttered.
I didn’t point out that she was walking toward the office with me, however. I thought mentioning that aloud might have gotten me smacked with her purse, so I was more than happy to keep quiet.
I nudged the door open with my shoulder and held it open for her, but apparently the amused little smirk in the corners of my mouth was too apparent, because she stepped on my foot without the grace of pretending it was an accident. For such a small woman, she could certainly put a lot of weight onto those damn heels.
I inhaled a deep breath to keep myself from swearing and exhaled through my nose. This was the Evelyn I was used to, and I was glad to see her back, if only because I had no idea how to handle an Evelyn that was willing to share her feelings so freely.
Her heels clicked against the wooden floors of Landon Legal, and she made her way to her desk with a disgruntled sigh as if she wasn’t actively choosing to come inside.
I let the door fall shut behind me and raised my eyebrows in her direction.
“You don’t have to stay,” I pointed out to her, despite knowing that she’d never listen to me as I leaned up against my desk.
Evelyn sank into her chair and looked at me as if I were an idiot and not a very mildly successful lawyer who did things like pay taxes and get shot at.
“Don’t be stupid, Archer,” she said with a roll of her eyes as she hefted her frightening purse up onto the corner of her desk with a thunk. “If we want this case to be approved by any judge worth his robes, you’re going to need my help. Call Brody, too, considering he’s the class action lawyer on the payroll.”
I wasn’t sure when I’d become her errand boy, but she did have a valid point about calling Brody. Hopefully he wouldn’t mind coming in, because we had a case to build.
Chapter 15
I shifted on my feet in the anxious dance I’d not been able to stop as I stood waiting in the hall of the courthouse. I was outside of Judge Calhoun’s chambers as we waited for word, and the tension permeated the air.
After our visit with the Rietvalds and Hannah’s offer to have a colleague test the water for us, everything had started falling into place.
It might have been in ways we hadn’t predicted, but the pieces were there, and the puzzle had a clear image that didn’t paint anything positive for Knox and his cronies at the petrochemical plant.
With the information provided to us by the labs at Tarleton, the photos I’d managed to capture at the dump site, the small handful of doctors we’d been able to snag for our side, and the residents of Piney Crest themselves that had agreed to join us, we had a thick file of evidence ready to lob against Knox.
I just prayed at least a single piece of it stuck.
I smoothed my hands over my tie and shifted on my feet again. I couldn’t help the way my nerves sparked in my body. I’d worked difficult cases before, and I treated all of them like they were of equal importance, but even I couldn’t lie and say that this case was like every other.
So many peoples homes, their livelihoods, their lives were riding on a single verdict from a judge. Would we be able to move forward with the suit, or would we just be thrown out? Too many questions buzzed in my head, and I didn’t have a single answer.
At least we had Calhoun. I hadn’t been sure which judge would be overseeing the class certification until a day or so before we were set to arrive at the courthouse.
Calhoun might have been gruff and generally unpleasant, but he was still more favorable of a judge than the likes of Minkins or Hoffman, both of whom seemed to have a certain distaste for me I’d never been able to explain.
To my left, Evelyn sat on one of the narrow benches lining the halls with her legs crossed at the ankles and her hands folded patiently in her lap.
I wasn’t sure how she managed to come across as so preternaturally serene in a moment I felt so sweaty and disheveled, despite the fact I wasn’t actually sweaty, and I didn’t have a hair out of place.
My nerves might have made me feel like I was about to combust, but I knew from experience that I didn't show it. Maybe Evelyn was the same way, or maybe she was that calm about the certification.
At the very least, Brody looked almost as nervous as I felt.
He’d been out of the game for long enough that it made sense for him to be on edge. He’d had his bar suspension lifted long before this case, but that didn’t mean he’d been practicing, at least not on this level, where so many things and people hung in the balance.
I’d always been a bit of an adrenaline junkie, and in between the way my heart clenched in my chest, I couldn’t deny the
sort of thrill I felt burning its way through me, just like it had during the chase through the desert.
I drummed my fingers against my leg in time with the one-two rhythm tap of my heartbeat as I tried to play through every situation, every scenario, every possible way the class certification could play out.
The worst-case scenario was obviously if Calhoun dismissed us without any real thought.
No, actually, that wasn’t true. I realized that the worst case scenario was if Calhoun was in the pocket of Knox Chemicals and that was the reason why he dismissed us immediately. I’d rather have him think I was an idiot and a ladder climber than have him be in bed with the enemy.
“Calm down, Archer,” Evelyn snapped out and broke her silent reverie.
I stiffened and stilled my fingers against my leg as I gave a small half-turn toward her with a thin smile painted across my face.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I lied.
She rolled her eyes though she managed not to huff in exasperation.
“Oh, I’m sure,” she muttered before turning her ire toward Brody. “You, too, Lucas. You’re about to sweat through your damn suit.”
Brody gave an affronted scoff, but that didn’t stop him from taking off his hat and using the wide brim to fan himself.
He loosened the bolo tie around the thick barrel of his neck by hooking a finger under the leather ties and tugging once. His salt-and-pepper brown hair looked almost damp from perspiration.
“Maybe keep the hat off,” I suggested with a small laugh working its way up my throat. “It’s nearly a thousand degrees in here.”
It was hot in the courthouse, thanks to the two thin rows of windows that lined the hallway up near the ceiling, but really, it was just an easier excuse than addressing his obvious nerves.
That felt too much like a ‘pot meet kettle’ situation, and I wasn’t ready to be forced to acknowledge my own anxieties.
My briefcase sat next to Evelyn on the bench, and I couldn’t help but flick my eyes over to it every so often, as if it would disappear from sight if I didn’t keep a firm eye on it, as if all our hard-earned information would waltz out the courthouse doors and into the sweltering street like some sort of disobedient dog off its leash.
