In Her Defense

by Julianna Keyes

  A shrug.

  I sigh. “Why are you still dressed? Did you just get home?”

  “We were supposed to get dinner, remember? At eight. I texted you.”

  “Oh, dammit, Eli. I forgot. We’re so b—”

  “Busy. I know.” He turns and walks back to the living room.

  I run a frustrated hand through my hair and blow out a guilty breath. He had texted me. I’d seen it. And I’d been so absorbed in my research that I’d glanced at the phone, promised myself I’d respond as soon as I finished the page I was reading and promptly forgotten.

  I slip out of my dress and pull on one of Eli’s old T-shirts, then make my way to the living room. “Eli.” He’s staring stone-faced at the television, beer bottle dangling from his fingertips. “Eli, come on.” I sit close beside him, legs curled beneath me, near enough I can practically feel him vibrating with irritation. “I said I was sorry.”

  “Be quiet, Caitlin. The game’s tied. I’m trying to watch.”

  I check the screen. The game is indeed tied at four in the bottom of the ninth. The Orioles are in town and the Sox lead the season series 8—4. These are not the kind of facts I care about, but I listen when Eli enthusiastically rambles on about White Sox stats, even though he accuses me otherwise.

  With one out, we have a runner on second, and Saunders, a big-hitting lefty, comes up to the plate. The Orioles put the shift on, and I shake my head. “He’s gone off-field half a dozen times this week. Double in the left field corner.”

  Eli grunts. “Grounder to first. Carlisle moves to third.”

  First pitch is a swing and a miss. The next two pitches are balls, and Saunders lines the fourth down the third base line. The fielder is fast but the runner is faster, diving headfirst into home a split second before the catcher applies the tag. The umpire calls him safe and the stadium explodes in cheers as we win. I tense with excitement, but Eli’s just sitting there. “You’re not happy?” I ask.

  “You want me to say you were right? You were right.”

  I pull back. “I want you to be happy your team won.”

  “You count how many times he hits off-field?”

  “I pay attention.”

  He nods, still focused on the screen, though it’s just a commercial for a pizza place. “Hey.” I kiss his cheek. “I’m sorry. Let me make it up to you. Whatever you want.”

  He pulls away and stands. “Let’s just go to bed. You need your rest for tomorrow. And since you have to stay here...”

  I stand, too. “Would you stop, please? I apologized a dozen times.”

  He takes his bottle to the kitchen, rinses it and places it in the recycle bin. I watch him move, so controlled and efficient, a perfectly responsible adult in frat boy clothing. One whose feelings I hurt.

  I follow him down the hall. “It won’t happen again. I want to be here. I promise. I didn’t even take my phone out of my bag when I came in.”

  He glances over at me as he undoes his pants and pushes them down to reveal polka-dot boxers. “It’s not in your panties?”

  “Uh-uh.”

  “Not set to vibrate?”

  I lower my voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “It’s not even turned on.”

  He snorts. “Liar.”

  “I’ll prove it to you. And if it’s turned off, you forgive me.”

  “And if it’s not?”

  “You can hate me forever.”

  He runs a hand across his mouth. He tries to make it look like he’s considering the offer, but I know he’s trying to hide a smile. “Okay. Deal.”

  I fetch my purse, join him at the side of the bed and pull out my phone. I place it in his hand, he presses a button, and...nothing happens. It’s turned off.

  Now I’m the one trying to hide a smile, and I can’t help but mumble, “Two for two,” as I take the phone back and return the bag to the dresser.

  “I’m sorry?” Eli asks archly as he pauses in pulling back the covers. “What was that?”

  “What was what?”

  “It sounded like you gloated.”

  “Like I gloated?” I look around as though there might be someone else in the room to warrant this baseless accusation.

  “Get in bed before I change my mind.”

  I crawl under the blankets. “You can’t take back forgiveness.”

  “No? Why not?” He switches off the light and I curl up next to him, secretly relieved when he wraps an arm around my shoulders the way he normally does.

  “Because I’m trying,” I tell him. “You tell The Closers you appreciate their best effort.”

  “This is your best effort?”

  I press a kiss to his jaw. “I get better every day.”

  I get to work at six the next morning. I don’t have any pressing matters that need to be handled, but I’d woken up at five and couldn’t fall back asleep. Plus I miss being one of the first people in the office, watching the east-facing rooms glow as the sun rises, enjoying the temporary quiet.

  When I’d first started at Sterling, Morgan & Haines I’d followed the issued edict that no one who wanted to hold on to their job would dare arrive a minute after seven. It didn’t take long to realize that starting at seven wouldn’t get me ahead. I’m not close with my peers, but I do respect most of them, so I quickly trained myself to come in an hour earlier so I could accomplish more. It was as I sat in my then-cubicle on the thirty-first floor, blessedly silent in those early morning hours, that I remembered my dad telling me it was lonely at the top. It’s not lonely, I remember thinking. It’s fabulous. And now, as I turn to look out the window behind me, the pink-and-orange sunlight gilding the city with a warm glow, I can’t help but feel the same frisson of excitement.

  When Arthur walks into my office at 7:06, I resist the urge to point out his tardiness and instead offer a polite, “Good morning.”

  He looks startled, then returns the greeting, squinting at the whiteboard I’d rescued from one of the supply closets and have been scribbling on for the past thirty minutes. “What’s that?” he asks.

  I turn back to the board. It looks like one of the brainstorming clouds they teach kids to use in eighth grade. I’ve got Schwartz in a bubble on the left, his girlfriend Tori in a bubble in the center and Laurel Frances in a bubble on the right. An arrow connecting Schwartz and Tori labels them a couple, but despite the desperate theories I’ve been spinning, I cannot find a way to connect Tori and Laurel. It’s too far-fetched to say Laurel called, randomly got Tori as her customer service agent, they somehow got on the topic of significant others and came up with a plot to chop off Laurel’s finger and bilk Teller of millions of dollars.

  I’d emailed Arthur a summary of my lunch meeting with Berry and copies of the phone records, and now I gesture at the whiteboard, gnawing on my cheek. “I know there’s something to this Herbert Schwartz business, but no matter how long I think about it, I can’t find motive, and without motive, we’ve got nothing.”

  “Kevin Bacon,” Arthur says suddenly.

  “What?”

  “Six degrees of Kevin Bacon.”

  The words ring a bell, but barely. “Remind me what that is?”

  “Everyone in Hollywood can be connected to Kevin Bacon in six steps or less. Maybe we’re not looking for motive right now. Maybe we’re looking for Kevin Bacon. A missing person who connects everybody.”

  I stare at Arthur for a second. “I can’t believe that’s not the worst idea I’ve considered today.” I erase the gibberish scrawled on the board, leaving the names and arrows. “Who do we know that Schwartz associates with?”

  “Ah...”

  “Teller,” I say reluctantly, adding a connecting line and jotting down the name. “And all the people he came into contact with during his tenure.”

  “He has
no family,” Arthur adds unhelpfully. “Both parents are dead, only child, no known relatives.”

  “Okay, Tori.”

  We’re both silent for a long time.

  “Let’s come back to that one,” I suggest. “Laurel Frances.”

  More silence.

  “Petra...” Arthur says eventually.

  I add Petra, Laurel’s Whispering Angels support group friend, to the board, though I think we both know she won’t be helpful. I scratch my eyebrow as something niggles at me. “What about... What about those pictures?” I ask. “The weird protest photos?” Laurel’s a protest junkie, willing to join any sort of movement in support of any cause. She’s chained herself to fences, poured pig’s blood on fur coats and dressed up as a courier to deliver a dead fish to a company who dumped toxins in a lake. She has no known history of protesting Teller, but chopping off a finger could be an illogical next step. Our original research turned up countless images of her protesting everything from working conditions for apple pickers to the county’s decision to replace the glass in City Hall to—

  It comes to me. “The stuffed animals! They were protesting the lack of gender diversity in the toys produced at the Downing factory and there was one guy—”

  “The flying tiger,” Arthur supplies.

  “The guy dressed as a flying tiger was in several shots with her. The couple that protests together...”

  “Conspires to chop off their fingers together?”

  “Where’s the picture?” Now that I’m thinking about it, I remember assigning Arthur the simple task of having someone else identify the flying tiger.

  “Hmm...” He’s doing his very best to avoid my eye.

  I pinch the bridge of my nose and remind myself that all I can ask is that Arthur do his best, even if it’s terrible. And yelling at people doesn’t make them work better. At least, that’s what Eli told me. “Do you think you can find out?” I prompt.

  “Yes,” he says immediately. “I’ll find the photo, and find out who the flying tiger is.”

  I swallow the irritated reminder that he was supposed to do that weeks ago and instead say, “Terrific. I’ll look into Tori Castille. Maybe one of them will lead us to Kevin Bacon.” I make myself smile in what I hope looks like a reassuring, teamwork-style kind of way.

  After a second, Arthur smiles back at me. There’s a moment of intense confusion as we realize we’re actually smiling at each other, then he turns and beats a hasty retreat from my office.

  An hour later, I call Eli on his cell. He answers on the second ring. “Yo,” he says.

  “It’s me.”

  “Who?”

  “Me, Cait—” I cut off at the sound of his laugh.

  “Oh, yes,” he says unconvincingly. “Caitlin... Er, the blonde or the redhead?”

  “If you have time to come up with these hilarious jokes, it’s because you don’t have enough work, Eli.”

  “Definitely the blonde,” he deduces.

  I can’t help but smile, turning my chair so my back is to the door and no one can see me. “I need a favor.”

  “Name it.”

  “Um...”

  “Is it that kind of favor?”

  “No.” But it is the kind of favor I might not want to ask for over the phone. “Can I meet you downstairs? In the server room?”

  “Now?”

  “Yes.”

  “See you in a few.”

  Five minutes later I find Eli leaning against the wall outside the server room. He swipes his ID card as I come down the hall, and pushes open the door for me to enter first. I’d taken a moment to put on a fitted jacket over my sleeveless dress in deference to the chilly temperatures, but my bare legs quickly tell me the jacket won’t cut it.

  I rub my arms as I turn to face Eli. “I need—”

  “Quiet for a second.”

  “What? Why?”

  I try to look around but he catches my chin between his thumb and index finger and kisses me softly. “Because I said so,” he says when he pulls away.

  My mind is suddenly blank and I struggle to remember why I came here. “Facebook,” I blurt out.

  Eli lifts a brow. “Facebook.”

  “I need—” I look around warily.

  “We’re alone.”

  “I need you to...hack...into somebody’s Facebook page.”

  “I’m sure you know I can’t do that.”

  “I’m sure I recall you telling me how when you were ‘bad’ you did some ‘computer stuff,’ and I feel like finding pictures on Herbert Schwartz’s Facebook page would be no challenge for a super smart guy like you.”

  He smirks to show he’s not buying my well-timed compliment. “No.”

  I head for one of the computers lining the wall and jiggle the mouse to remove the screensaver. “Does this have internet access?”

  “What do you think?”

  Of course it does. I bend over the desk and navigate my way to Tori Castille’s relatively new Facebook profile. She’s a pretty girl with strong Latin features, smooth brown skin, big eyes and pronounced cheekbones. I’d just spent the better part of my morning combing through her pictures, trying to find some way to link her to Laurel, but nothing came up. It was only when I’d spotted the single shot of Tori and Herbert together that I discovered Schwartz was on Facebook, too. Unfortunately his profile is set to private, and I need to see his pictures to expand my Kevin Bacon network.

  I explain as much to Eli, glancing over my shoulder to make sure he’s listening and instead find him ogling my ass. He doesn’t even bother to look guilty when I catch him, just shrugs. “Those days are behind me,” he says, smoothing a hand down the small of my back, fingers trailing over my hip. “Though if you’d like I can hack something else...”

  I’ve never actually used sex as a bargaining chip. It’s demeaning, unethical and unnecessary, since I’m perfectly capable of winning without it. In this case, however, Eli has no incentive to commit a minor crime to help me, and I could use some warming up.

  “Get me into Herbert Schwartz’s Facebook page and you can hack anything you like after,” I counter.

  He looks at me, aghast, though I can tell he’s turned on. “Are you offering to have sex with me in exchange for information?”

  I do my best to appear nonchalant. “You’re familiar with my reputation.”

  “Ah. Yes. But I don’t think those rumors are quite as true as you let people believe.”

  “Maybe not all of them,” I reply, stepping close and folding my fingers around his hardening cock. “But that one could be. Very, very soon.”

  He hisses out a breath, collects his thoughts, then pushes past me to access the computer. In less than six minutes I’m staring at Schwartz’s uninspired page of photos, last updated two months earlier. It’s mostly him and his boat, him lifting weights, him drinking from a coconut. The only interesting thing is that while the pictures on both pages show Tori and Schwartz looking very much in love, there are only a few photos of them together, as if they’d only recently started dating, though we know they’ve been together for at least a year.

  “Why might that be?” I peer down at Eli, who’s still sitting as I look over his shoulder.

  “Honestly?” he says, twisting the chair and yanking me forward so I’m forced to straddle his lap. “I don’t give a flying fuck. Maybe he’s really, really into Tori, and really, really wants her to give him the sex she promised.”

  “Mystery solved. You’re a genius.”

  He pushes my dress up over my hips and reverently trails his fingers along the lace trim of my white silk panties. “Technically, yes,” he murmurs distractedly, dropping his hands to unzip his fly. “But we can talk about that later. Right now you’ve got work to do.”

  * * *
/>
  It’s five o’clock Friday when Derek Berry knocks on my office door and invites himself in. It’s a drizzly day and the sky is dark with threatening rain clouds. “Big plans tonight?” he asks.

  My evening plans involve joining Eli for yet another trip to yet another hardware store, though I’d really rather not. “Why?”

  “I just finished going through the call center records Teller sent over. Tori Castille’s been working there for six months, and they keep a log of all calls. There’s nothing to show that Castille and Frances ever spoke.”

  I blow out a disappointed breath. “Dammit. I haven’t been able to find a connection on my end, either.”

  “I know. That’s where the real investigative work comes in. You up for it?”

  I ignore the implication that he knew I would fail and ask, “Up for what?”

  “I’m going to head out to Schwartz’s old neighborhood, ask around, see if the neighbors remember anything. Maybe Castille visited Schwartz a couple of times, bumped into Laurel Frances. Or maybe Laurel Frances was a frequent guest. Who knows?”

  Berry’s good at his job, that’s why he’s my favorite of the firm’s slew of private investigators. But I’d still like to be on hand to make sure he asks the questions I want answered. Just to be on the safe side. And this sounds so much more appealing than an evening debating the merits of various hammers. It takes twelve seconds to decide. “Okay. Let me make a phone call.”

  “I’m leaving in five.”

  “I’ll be ready.”

  “You have a change of clothes?”

  “What? Why?”

  He shakes his head. “I’ll be up front.”

  I frown down at my red Prada pantsuit and spiky silver heels. Berry’s an idiot. I love this outfit.

  I wince as I call Eli to cancel. I know he won’t appreciate the short notice, but—Ooh, excellent. Voice mail. “Hey,” I say. “It’s me. So sorry to do this, but something came up and I can’t make it tonight. I’m not sure when I’ll be done, but I’ll call you when I get home. Maybe we can still squeeze something in.” I pause. This is where I’m probably supposed to say something sappy like I love you or I miss you but instead I say, “Okay. Bye,” and hang up.