Waylaid

by Sarina Bowen

  And then there’s Daphne. She’d also have to sit up there and admit to her relationship.

  “I don’t know,” I whisper. “Do I have to make this decision without speaking to anyone else?”

  “Yes,” he says. “And you’ve got an hour, tops.”

  That hour goes fast.

  I’m given a rubber bagel and some brown water that’s supposed to be coffee. I brush my teeth with my finger and change into a fresh shirt that my lawyer brought me. I wonder if he buys them in bulk, for every time he needs to make a loser look presentable.

  There’s no help for my broken face, though. My face is throbbing with pain, and my nose is so swollen that it’s distracting in my field of vision.

  I’m handcuffed again for the trip out of my cell. The cops lead me down a series of hallways and into a dingy room where my lawyer is waiting. An ancient sign reading COURTROOM ENTRANCE is affixed to another door.

  “You clean up nice,” my lawyer says with a chuckle.

  “Oh, we’re doing comedy now?” I growl.

  “Laugh or cry, kid. Sometimes those are the only choices. Listen—we step inside that courtroom, you let me do all the talking. You get one spoken line in this drama. After I enter your plea, the judge will ask if that is correct, and you'll say: Yes your honor. That's it.”

  “Okay.”

  “So don’t keep me waiting. What's it going to be?”

  “I haven't decided.”

  “Oh, Richard. They told me you were a genius.”

  I snort. “Who did?”

  “Your girl and her sister.”

  “They’re not here, are they?” I don’t know how I’m supposed to make this choice, knowing that other people will be affected.

  He actually rolls his eyes. “Don't look to the girlfriend for advice. It's your ass on the line. No handcuffs on her.”

  “But she's affected by this. If there's a trial…”

  “Let's go!” says a uniformed bailiff. He swings the door open.

  "Chin up," my lawyer says, stepping into the courtroom ahead of me. And then I hear him add, "Holy smokes, that’s a big crowd.”

  I follow him into a large room. We’re up front, by the judge’s dais. There are already several handcuffed defendants seated on benches near the front, most with a lawyer seated beside them.

  But my lawyer's gaze is on a cluster of guys with sharp suits, silk ties and shining haircuts on the other side of the room.

  They're all staring at me. Every one of them.

  Suddenly my skin feels hot and tight. And I'm way too conscious of my unwashed hair and my damaged face. I look like something dragged in from the gutter. And those men are here to make me feel small and afraid.

  It's working.

  "Look over there,” my lawyer whispers. "They want your attention."

  I turn and spot May Shipley. But only May, not Daphne. And then I notice the man standing next to her.

  My father. His expression is… I can barely stand it. The man looks devastated.

  So this is what total humiliation feels like. I thought I was done leveling up in all the ways I’d disappointed him. But this is much worse than suing his alma mater. He's here to watch me become a goddamn criminal.

  Fuck. My throat goes dry and my eyes are hot.

  “Follow me,” the lawyer says. He grabs my arm and steers me up the aisle toward an empty bench at the back of the loser section.

  I sit down and face the judge. I take a deep yoga breath, and I feel grateful that Daphne isn't here. I'm desperate to know what she'd want me to do. But I don't actually want her to witness this.

  On the one hand, she wouldn't want Halsey to win. I know this.

  On the other hand, I don't want to cause her any more pain than I already have. I don't want to make her testify on account of my screwups. She’d hate that.

  It’s all sinking in now. Daphne and I won’t survive this. I’ve already lost her. It started the moment I failed to mention that Halsey’s face looked familiar. And it ended when I attacked him in front of her.

  Swear to God, losing Daphne will hurt more than having a misdemeanor on my record. But how many times can I fail her? First I stood her up. Then I held back information, even though I know she has trust issues. I can’t make her testify at a trial involving two men who failed her.

  I’ll take the plea deal and spare her the rest. It’s the least I can do.

  Someone clears her throat behind me. “Rickie.” It’s May Shipley’s voice.

  “Son,” my father whispers.

  I don’t want to turn around.

  My lawyer pokes me.

  Fuck. I swivel my busted face over my shoulder and lock eyes with May. “Fight it,” she hisses. “Don’t let him win.”

  I give a slow blink, because this is definitely surprising. May of all people should know what a trial will entail.

  “And I’ll help,” my father says. When I crank my neck around to find him, his face is red. “It’s not too late for that, right? I’ll help you.”

  Hell, now my eyes are stinging.

  “Docket number 2305547!”

  “Game time,” my lawyer says. “Stand up. Now what’s it going to be?”

  Forty-Three

  Daphne

  May: They called his case.

  When I see my sister’s text, my heart leaps into my throat. I should be in that courtroom. But I’m sitting outside the dean’s office, because when I called her first thing this morning to beg for a few minutes of her time, she’d said “If you can get here by ten thirty I’ll fit you in.”

  It’s ten thirty right now. I’m glued to my phone. May and I were up half the night discussing Rickie’s legal situation in the hotel room I’d planned to share with Rickie. My sister briefed me on his choices, and my stomach is in knots over it.

  I need him to plead not guilty. I need him to fight it. Reardon Halsey cannot win.

  This is all my fault, too. I shouldn’t have dragged Rickie into my mess. I’ve spent the last year with my head up my ass, fixated on my own fall from grace. I should have known better than to imagine I could secretly fix this clusterfuck I’ve created.

  That’s stupid, not brave. And now Rickie will pay the price.

  The office door opens, and Dean Rebecca Reynolds waves me in.

  I sneak another look at my phone. There’s no further update from May. So I shove the phone into my bag because I cannot let it distract me right now. I walk into the dean’s office and close the door behind me.

  “It’s good to see you,” she says immediately. “I’m still in the dark about why you quit your job last year. And now I hear that you’ve left the university? Could that even be true?”

  “Yes,” I say, and my voice shakes a little. Because I’m here to tell the truth. “I made some mistakes last year. I need to tell you some things, and you won’t be happy with me.”

  “All right,” she says, her expression grave. “Why don’t you start at the beginning.”

  So that’s what I do. “First, I had a sexual relationship with Reardon Halsey, even though I knew it was wrong, since I was his supervisor.”

  Her eyes widen, and I tremble. But I just keep on going. I explain how he ended things without drama. And that I’d felt guilty writing his evaluation, but I’d done it carefully.

  Then I explain how I’d accidentally caught him throwing away surveys.

  She gasps, but she doesn’t say anything.

  So I ramble on about my suspicion of his motive. “But of course I couldn’t prove it. My next mistake was confronting him, instead of sharing my suspicions with you. He threatened me so fast my head spun.”

  She sits back in her chair at that. But she doesn’t interrupt me.

  “And then I was stuck. If I shared my suspicions, he was going to accuse me of horrible things. I’d be thrown out of Harkness, or at least I’d be under investigation. So I panicked. I quit working here. I couldn’t write another recommendation for him, obviously. And I didn’t hav
e any proof. It took me until this past summer to think of a way to prove what he’d done.”

  I pull out my tablet and set it on the desk. “I think you’ll find a mismatch between the postal expenses and the survey entries. Last night, I snuck into the team office and snapped this photo of the login information.”

  “Lord, Daphne.”

  “I know. That was the absolute peak of my stupidity. I wanted to prove it myself, and then write you an anonymous letter about it. But then Reardon saw me, and he threatened me again, and my boyfriend attacked him.”

  “Good Lord.”

  “Yeah,” I say with a sigh. “This is the hardest, most embarrassing conversation I’ve ever had. But that’s all. That’s the whole story. And whatever happens to me, I deserve it.”

  She sits back in her chair and stares at me for a long time. I’m nervous about what she’s thinking. And I’m nervous about Rickie’s case. And my future. But I just sit there and take it. Because I brought this upon myself.

  “It’s hard to know where to begin,” she finally says.

  “I’ll bet.”

  Then she barks out a laugh, and covers her mouth with her hand. “It’s always the quiet ones.”

  “I’m getting that a lot.”

  “I trusted you.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say quickly.

  “No, I mean I trusted you, and I didn’t trust Mr. Halsey. But I didn’t act on that feeling, because his father is a very powerful man.”

  “I’m sure you’re not the first person to make that mistake,” I point out. “I let him charm me into dating him, even though I knew I shouldn’t. I liked the attention.”

  “You’re not the first person to make that mistake, either,” she says drily.

  “Noted.”

  “You understand that I have to investigate everything you’ve told me.”

  “Of course.”

  “And that will take some time.”

  “I hope it takes a very long time,” I point out. “Because I really need a college degree. And I’m only a few credits short. If I get arrested for trespassing here and then thrown out of Burlington U, that’s it for me.”

  She puts her head in her hands. “Daphne, nobody is going to arrest you. And you’ll finish your degree.”

  I sag with relief.

  “You should have just told me that you were involved with him. You’re both undergraduates. It didn’t have to be a big deal. I would have rearranged things. Maybe you would have been taken off the project.”

  “In hindsight, that sounds perfectly acceptable. But I let my ambitions get in the way.”

  She shakes her head. “If it makes you feel any better, I’d already noted the strange turnout pattern in Hartford. It’s gotten worse in the last couple of months.”

  I let out a little moan of anguish. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” A scientist is lost without her data. “I’ve ruined everything.”

  “Did you throw any surveys away, Daphne?”

  “What?” I yelp. “No way.”

  “Right. You didn’t create this problem. And the fact that it’s continued after you left is part of the reason I believe your whole crazy story. But I still have to verify it.”

  “Of course you do. And if there’s anything I can do to help—aside from staying far away from your brand-new office building—I will do it.”

  “How’s Burlington U?”

  “Good. Fine. I like it there. I have a job working for Dr. Drummond. If I’m lucky, I’ll be applying to graduate school in a couple of months.”

  The dean taps her pen on the desktop. “Can anyone else verify that Mr. Halsey threatened you?”

  “Well, no.” My face reddens. “Only my boyfriend. But seeing as he punched Reardon yesterday after another string of those threats, nobody will believe him.”

  She flinches. “Mr. Halsey said he’d accuse you of sexual harassment.”

  Burning with shame, I nod.

  “If that’s the case, he’s the harasser, Daphne. You’re the one with a case against him.”

  “If I hadn’t panicked, you’d be right,” I admit in a small voice. “And he’ll never confess. His type never does. The best I can hope for is that you verify the damage he did to your study. He can’t try to blame me if it continued after I left. That’s the only way I’ll be out from under him—by slinking off to earn a degree somewhere else.”

  Her sigh is heavy. “All right, Daphne. Thank you for telling me the truth. I have a lot of work ahead of me.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I know you are,” she says gently. “Hang in there. You’ll hear from us eventually. I’ll probably need you to sign a statement about all the things you just told me.”

  “Okay,” I say, my throat closing up. I did it. I told the truth. And it didn’t kill me. “Thank you.”

  With that finally done, I duck out of her office and speed walk back to the old Volvo. I’m nervous about running into Reardon, but luckily I don’t see him anywhere.

  It isn’t until I’m locked safely into the car that I pull out my phone. There are two new texts from May. First she writes: Plea is not guilty! Lawyers convened at the bench.

  Then, five minutes later: CASE DISMISSED! OMG!

  There’s also a photo of Rickie in a bear hug with an older man. It must be his dad. We’d called him last night, just like Rickie had asked me to do.

  Now I call my sister, and she answers on the first ring. “You okay?” she asks.

  Once again I’m humbled. May dropped everything to rush to Connecticut and be by my side. She found the litigator for Rickie. She met me in the parking lot of the police station and made me tell her the whole story. And then, after I told her about breaking into Reardon’s office, she made me unavailable to talk to the police.

  “I can just refuse?” I’d asked.

  “You can, and you will,” she’d said firmly.

  Then she’d bought me a fast food sandwich and made me eat it.

  She’d sat up late last night fielding calls from Rickie’s dad and Rickie’s new lawyer and explaining it all to me.

  I guess she doesn’t hate me after all.

  “Daphne, are you okay?” she repeats. “What did the dean say?”

  “She was floored. But she listened. Now she has to go and dig her way through that mess.”

  “Not your fault,” my sister says firmly. “Where are you?”

  “In the parking lot. Can I come to you and Rickie?”

  “Honey, his dad took him home. He needs to get a doctor to look at his broken nose.”

  “Oh.” My heart drops. “I have his car.”

  “I know, girly. You’re going to have to drive it home. Are you okay to drive? Do you need some food, first?”

  I open my mouth to refuse her help. And then I think better of it. “Let’s get some food,” I agree. “And coffee. My treat. And then I’ll let you get back to your life.”

  “Sounds nice,” she says.

  “I love you,” I choke out. “Thank you for this.”

  “I love you, too,” May says. “Now pick a place. I’m starved. Drama makes me hungry.”

  So I pick a pizza joint that I used to love.

  But not as much as I love May and Rickie.

  Forty-Four

  Rickie

  "I just want you to know that I'm sorry,” my father says, both his hands on the wheel.

  "You said, Dad. It's okay." Actually, he's said so about a million times in the last forty-eight hours.

  It's Saturday, and my dad is driving me back to Moo U. I'd gone home with him after my dramatic court appearance—after I'd rolled the dice on a not-guilty plea.

  The fact that it had worked, and worked immediately, is still hard to get my head around. My lawyer had been right when he'd guessed that the Halsey family didn’t want a trial. That Reardon had too much to lose.

  But I still feel raw—like it was a horribly close call. It's as if I almost got into a serious car accident, and can't stop
hearing the squeal of the brakes in my head, and can't stop seeing the terror in the other driver's eyes.

  I’m not over it.

  And now my father can't stop apologizing to me. And my mother can’t stop fussing. When I'd told them what really happened to me—and Paul—they’d been horrified. "I'm glad you sued them! They should pay for letting an animal run wild in a venerable institution." That's his new tune. Like I’m some kind of hero.

  I don't feel like one, though. I feel like a loser. He'd wanted to drive me straight to the nearest hospital to have my nose looked at. "And you should sue the cop, too!”

  But I'd turned down both those suggestions. I'd asked Dad to take me home instead, to my parents’ house, where I hadn't been since Christmas. I'd just wanted a shower and a bed.

  My mother had cried over me. The broken nose didn’t help. I’d felt terrible for making her worry. But after my shower and a great meal and a full night's sleep, I let her take me to a doctor.

  He'd pronounced my nose broken, and said to ice it. Quelle surprise.

  But I'd stayed two nights with my parents, who were overjoyed. It seems they love me more now that there's a new villain in my story. I hadn’t fallen off a wall and wrecked myself. It was someone else’s fault. They adore this change in the narrative.

  But I'm still the same old wreck who's sneaking back into town when Daphne won't be home. I don't know how to process all the harm I brought her. I haven’t spoken to her because she has my car, and therefore my phone charger. My phone died forty-eight hours ago.

  And because I'm a damn coward.

  But now I open the glove box of my dad’s car, and I find an old charger of mine in there. So finally I plug that sucker in. After ten minutes of driving, my phone reboots. I watch the apple glow on the lock screen as my phone wakes up and remembers itself.

  I'm honestly afraid to look at my messages. It's hard to say how widely the inglorious news of my arrest may have spread.

  And sure enough, my texts are brimming over with messages—most of them from people named Shipley. I see a text from Daphne, of course. My stomach actually rolls with the sight of her name. But there are messages from Dylan, too, and May. And even Ruth, and Grandpa.