Defenseless

by Celeste Marsella

  The two young men walked off—Cory and Rod—talking and laughing in the muted tones of an inside joke.

  “Sherman’s a smooth operator,” McCoy said once they were out of earshot.

  “Smooth? I should have punched him in the face.”

  “He may have punched you right back. He’s a spoiled Hollywood horror with a bad temper. He wields a lot of power with the students and the administration. His family has the connections and the money to make trouble.”

  “I was a prosecutor. I can handle him,” I said, getting back on the bike.

  “Hmm. Maybe you could handle me a little too, while you’re at it.”

  McCoy stayed to my rear, but I could feel his smile on me. He was the type who scattered lines to women like seeds onto a patch of ground, waiting to see what he could harvest.

  I kept pedaling in silence. Any response from me would sound like some silly line too, but I was beginning to feel that I couldn’t help myself. Everything about this McCoy character seemed geared to suck me into a trashy but deliriously yummy B-grade romantic comedy. That he probably used this charming brand of assault on every woman he met didn’t matter. It was a pretty damn delectable assault. Maybe my weakness was due to a desperate need for a sentimental journey down Lovers’ Lane after dating, dumping, and then being double-crossed by Jeff Kendall.

  Or—perish the thought—I was actually falling for a dumb ex-cop. “I think I can handle both you and Sherman,” I said.

  McCoy came around the front of the bike. The look on his face brought my pedaling to a halt. “You watch out for Sherman,” he repeated. “At the AG’s you were only dealing with scum. Guys like him, you have to handle like molten lead—he can burn you.”

  A few seconds passed and I realized he was frowning, squinting at me.

  “Getting a migraine?” I said.

  His grimace took a half turn upward before rising into a sunny smile. I got a tingle looking at his gleaming white teeth through the frame of his opened lips. He tugged at both ends of the towel looped around my neck, drawing my face within inches of his.

  What was he doing? In the middle of the school gym surrounded by students. My first day of work and I was going to be fired for fraternizing with a coworker I hardly knew. I felt a twang of panic but I kept looking him in the eyes, not moving a muscle.

  He nodded his approval—I hadn’t bridled—and then, as if taunting me, he abruptly let go of the towel, flourishing it in the air like Zorro.

  “You’re a real jerk,” I said.

  He nodded again, then backed away from me. “Got some work to do. See you soon, gorgeous.”

  I watched him saunter toward the exit, wiping his hairy armpits with his towel. Yuck. What exactly was I finding attractive in this guy?

  Pondering that, I pedaled until five-thirty, walked the treadmill until six, and was out of the shower by six-ten. While I was drying myself I heard someone come into the women’s bathroom and close the door to one of the toilet stalls. Passing the stall on my way out, I peeked down and saw a pair of pink crocodile shoes facing the wall. I waited at the sink, running the faucet, and after a few more moments heard the familiar sound of several long steady inhalations.

  Yes, I had done a little cocaine in my not-too-distant youth.

  I left the bathroom to avoid having to confront her, but then immediately felt guilty for leaving. I was, after all, now a sort of legal counselor to these students. I found my locker and dressed quickly, but minutes later when I got back to the shower room the crocodile-shoe girl was gone. I grabbed my backpack from the locker, slamming it shut, and ran out the main entrance of the gym, where I bumped smack into—

  “Hey, Byron! Did you see a girl with pink crocodile shoes just leave here?”

  “Real or embossed?” she droned sarcastically.

  Ignoring her, I peered down the four-way intersection at Wheeler and Butler where, once again, I saw nothing. I dropped my shoulders, feeling all my weight settle down on my heels.

  “What’s your problem, Melone?” she said, backing a foot or so away.

  “Problem?” Realizing then that Byron and I were just not meant to be soul sisters, I looked back at the gym and changed the subject. “I just had a great workout. Beautiful gym.”

  “Dean Carlyle’s baby,” she said, looking over my shoulder at it. “We worked incredibly hard on that project.”

  “I know. I heard the zoning was a real bitch.”

  “Zoning? No. The approvals flew right through the board. I’m talking about the capital expenditure. It took us five years to get the funding and we were still a million short. Ken stepped in and saved the day with some incredible last-minute donations. He’s a whiz at generating capital.”

  “I probably misunderstood about the zoning.”

  “No, I don’t think you did.” She took a step closer. “That’s probably the outsider gossip. Don’t bullshit me, Melone. You get your priorities straight and we’ll both get along. Okay?”

  Because she was dead-on—my priorities weren’t exactly crystal clear—I was as speechless as a child who had just wet her pants. But I pulled up my britches and went for another shot. “Have we met in a past life? You just met me yet your hatred for me seems to have a long history.”

  With that, she moved right up in my face. “I think you’re a fraud. You’re an insecure, prissy little broad with your fuck-me stilettos. And why are you here in the first place? Ken must have had a good reason for saving you from the unemployment line, but for the life of me I can’t figure it out.”

  “Seems my employment history is an open book around here, huh?”

  She actually chuckled, deep and throaty. “Your employment history, and the fact that you’re a lousy lay. There might be one thing you and I agree on. Jeff Kendall’s a shit. He screws you front and back before you know which side is up.”

  I smashed my rising temper underfoot like a glowing cigarette while Byron turned toward the gym laughing like an oil baron at a fossil-fuel-burning furnace in an ice storm.

  What Jeff ’s history was with Byron Eckert I couldn’t begin to imagine, but it was comforting to know she hated him as much as I did. If I never got a solo chance to pay Jeff back for putting me in this position, maybe someday Byron and I could use him as the rope in a heated game of tug-of-war. I’d even let her win.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Candy from a Baby

  DAY TWO, 8:35 A.M. Five minutes late, I rushed across the street toward Langley. Wind rustled the trees and the clouds in the sky hung low and dark. A squirrel darted across my path. The door to the building had been propped open with an old-fashioned, thick wooden shim, and a few autumn leaves had scurried into the front marble corridor. The building was overheated and the interior air was darkly perfumed and stale. Secretaries, sipping coffee and huddling, wisecracked a litany of mild grievances as I walked by their offices toward my own.

  Rita seemed to be Langley’s only non-cantankerous secretary that morning. She was standing by the door of my office with a crisp smile and a hot cup of coffee. “Guten Morgen, mein Fräulein,” she said. “Your ten o’clock appointment is early. I have her in my office. Should I ask her to return later?”

  “No, I’m here. Send her in.” I took the coffee. “You’re as good as a dream, Rita.”

  Seconds after I’d settled into my desk I glanced up at a stick figure standing solemnly in my doorway.

  “Hi, I’m Lisa Cummings. I have an appointment at ten. May I come in now?”

  One of her hands seemed to be grasping the wall. A short pink raincoat with a Burberry print lining hung loosely from her shoulders. She was a gaunt, pale slip of a girl.

  “Come on in.”

  Lisa shuffled to my desk and stopped, awaiting further orders.

  “Close the door and have a seat,” I said.

  Back to the door she went, pushing it closed with both palms like it was made of heavy iron. She dragged her feet oddly as she slogged back to me, but I kept my eyes on her
face. She sat and plucked a ball of used tissues out of her pocket, holding the wad in her hands like a beloved baby blanket.

  I put on my prosecutor’s face and leaned forward in my chair.

  She wrapped an errant lock of hair behind her ear and paused, looking at me blankly. She knew why she was there. She would either deny everything, or admit the theft and offer an excuse. That was the drill at the AG’s and I didn’t figure on human nature proving too different here. But I wanted her to talk first. She sniffed and dabbed her nose a few times with the ball of tissues and then kept massaging it with her thumbs. I saw no tears but I slid my own box of tissues toward her anyway. She shook her head and her thin blonde hair moved in clumps, as if she hadn’t showered in days. The lock pinned behind her ear fell free, veiling one of her eyes.

  “Are you having financial problems?” I finally asked.

  She shook her head and began rocking back and forth like a hysterical child. With both hands she held the tissue to her nose. Her skin was a transparent gray.

  Time to buck the suspect up.

  “Okay, Lisa. Do you want to tell me what’s going on?”

  She shrugged her shoulders and hazarded a glance at me. “I don’t know why I do it.” She clenched the tissues in her hand.

  I paused, then began again. “How are things going in school? Your grades?”

  She shrugged her bony shoulders again. “All right, I guess.”

  “Are you missing classes?”

  She focused keenly on my eyes. “You talked with my professors?”

  “No.”

  “I’ve got the notes from the classes I missed.”

  “Good. All right, then. Would you like to talk to Dr. Becker?”

  “I already do—once a week. But I don’t need a psychologist. I just need to . . . um . . . just get back to classes. I missed a couple of tests, I think.”

  “Lisa, I can’t say you have psychological issues, but you are coming across to me this morning as very scattered, very unfocused—”

  “I’m immature,” she said straight-faced. “That’s what my therapist in New York said.”

  “Oh. Okay. Well then, help me out here. What should we do about this stealing?”

  Down bobbed that floppy head of hers. Her shoulders heaved silently as she exhaled. She said nothing for a few seconds, but neither did she move a muscle to get up and leave.

  “I told Mr. McCoy I would pay for the food.”

  Hmm. Simple confession with no excuse. Why was I surprised? “Are you sure you told Mr. McCoy about reimbursing the cafeteria? It wasn’t mentioned in his report.”

  “Ask him why he left it out. He probably left a lot of stuff out.”

  “What else did he omit, Lisa?”

  She shrugged and shook her head, as if it weren’t worth the effort to defend herself.

  “Well, reimbursement is not quite the issue at this juncture. Where I came from at the AG’s office, people are prosecuted by the state for stealing. It’s a criminal violation.”

  Her eyes went feral and wide. I expected her to start screaming bloody murder, but instead she gulped miserably for air and doubled over in airplane-disaster posture, clutching her knees.

  Without straightening up she began addressing me in a low baritone, her eyes pinned to the floor. “The school wouldn’t prosecute someone like me. Would they?”

  My guess was no. But I wasn’t telling Lisa that a group which included Dean Carlyle, Mike McCoy, and probably countless others were wedded to the unalloyed truth: Have bucks will travel.

  “Whether or not the school brings criminal charges is irrelevant. You can’t keep stealing. Can we at least agree on that?”

  She sat up as if I’d astonished her with simple logic. “Okay.” At which point she reached into the back pocket of her jeans and unfolded a thin packet of cash, peeled off a single bill, and placed it on my desk. Neither of us moved. “Is a hundred enough?” she asked softly.

  Maybe she wasn’t so naive after all. I shook my head slowly and slid the money back her way. As I was looking at her, my stomach flip-flopped as if I were going to cry. “No, Lisa . . .” My voice cracked, so I stopped talking.

  Lisa picked up the bill and bunched it together with the shredded Kleenex in her fist. She was absolutely oblivious to my clemency. “Sometimes I forget to bring money with me. I’m not used to needing cash.”

  “Is that how it’s been taken care of in the past? Shoplift stuff and your father pays the tab later?”

  Disregarding me, she rose listlessly from the chair and emptied her pocket of mangled tissues in a wastebasket by my desk. I wondered if that hundred-dollar bill had become part of the trash. “My father’s dead.” She turned back to me. “How did you know about that? Bergdorf’s had to sign a confidentiality agreement. It was supposed to be a secret except for my family and the lawyers.”

  “Bergdorf ’s? You stole from Bergdorf Goodman?”

  She settled herself down in the same chair while reaching for my box of Kleenex. She sniffled richly and sneezed. The wings of her nose were a translucent crimson-pink and her eyes were rimed with redness. “I’m sorry, Miss Melone. Maybe I’m not making myself clear. This has nothing to do with money.”

  “All right, Lisa. Maybe Dr. Becker can help you sort through this. But I want you to write a letter of apology and reimburse the cafeteria manager. Also, go do some community service. Just thirty hours—anywhere you want. Bring some proof back to me when it’s complete. Then this whole thing will be over, and no one will ever know it happened.”

  “Community service? Where’s that?”

  “There are local soup kitchens. And the Salvation Army is always looking for volunteers to help out in the store. Anything you want.”

  “Yeah, sure,” she sang in the key of sarcasm. She turned her wrist to read the thin gold watch. “I’ve got to go.”

  “Class, I hope?” She shook her head. “I’m meeting someone.” She looked up at me. “Cory Sherman.” She had said his name as if on a dare. I kept silent—didn’t jump at the bait.

  “At least Cory doesn’t try to help me. I don’t want anyone’s help. You should all leave me alone. Just leave me alone.”

  “When you stop stealing, perhaps we will. But until then, I, for one, will not leave you alone. I’d rather help you stop than punish you, but that’s up to you.”

  Of course I realized I was one of those do-gooders she chafed at, but why beat a dead horse. Lisa was the kind of fragile looney-tune whose behavior begged for the help that she consistently refused. I waited for her to say more so that I could feel I’d accomplished more than reciting the Ten Commandments to a deaf person. But Lisa was done, and she slowly pulled herself up to go.

  My first case at Holton. Child’s play compared to the D.A.’s office. A voluntary confession without breaking a sweat. But as I watched her dragging herself to my door I realized Holton’s special salve of leniency had already rubbed off on me. I was a quick study. If Vince had heard me telling a confessed unrepentant larcenist to write a letter of apology for repeated acts of theft, he would have thrown me in a jail cell next to the thieving bum and instructed Shannon to swallow the key.

  The heels of Lisa’s shoes caught in the carpeting as she dragged her feet to the door. Not until her hand touched the knob did I finally give in, looking down at the pale pink crocodile pumps.

  I bolted up from my chair. “Lisa, wait!”

  When she turned to look at me, her expression was dazed as if the mere act of turning made her dizzy.

  “I heard you at the gym yesterday. In the bathroom.”

  “I wasn’t at the gym yesterday.”

  “I saw those shoes. They’re hard to miss.”

  “I don’t know what you saw, but you’re wrong.” She waited a few beats. “Can I go now?”

  My phone light began blinking. “I can easily verify whether you signed in at the gym yesterday.”

  She snorted and swung the door open, then disappeared down the hall.


  Rita must have seen Lisa amble by her door. My intercom buzzed. “Miss Melone? Your boss is on the line. Your old boss.”

  I waited a few seconds, screwed my courage to the sticking post, as Lady Macbeth would advise, and picked up.

  “You got anything to say to me?” Vince snapped.

  “Can I come home now?”

  “Hey, this is your dime. You got something or not?”

  “My dime? I didn’t make this call.”

  “Lynch told me you were on the line for me. You girls playing games?”

  I waited for the sound of distant gunfire as Vince took practice shots at me from across town, but I couldn’t even hear him breathing.

  “No games. I just want to come back.”

  “Dig up some dirt over there and hand it to me on a silver platter and then maybe I’ll let you back here to shine my fucking shoes.”

  “After I shine your shoes, can I have my job back?”

  “You can work your way up, you know, through the ranks, so to speak.”

  “You know, Vince, now that I’m on the outside I can see that your asshole status is really well deserved.”

  “Nice talk. That blue-blood Holton patina is really rubbing off on you, huh?”

  “Screw you, Vince.”

  I waited for the red-hot comeback. But he just hung up. I hit the new-line button and dialed back. Vince’s secretary picked up. “He won’t take your call, Miss Melone. Sorry.”

  “Get Shannon on the line.”

  An eternity of seconds later, Shannon picked up. “Hey, Mari.”

  “Vince just called me. Says you told him I was on the line for him.”

  “Ah, I just thought if I got you two back to the negotiation table you might work this little lovers’ spat out.”

  “Call me crazy, Shannon, but I think he may be putting a contract out on my sorry life.”

  “Anger is a good thing. Means there’s still some love there. What do you got for me? Anything?”

  “Kids strung out on cocaine. Nothing murderous as yet. How about you?”