“I just wanted to tell you that I’m turning in my resignation.” She half rose to lay an envelope on August’s desk, then sank into the chair again. “I’m sorry. I know you have a lot of cases pending, but today is my last day.”
“Is everything okay? I mean—” August rubbed her temple and started over. “You leaving will be a big loss to this firm, Susan. Can I do anything to change your mind?”
Susan’s brow furrowed as she avoided August’s gaze.
“Did someone offer you more money or a more flexible schedule? Give me a chance to match or better whatever they’ve offered.” August opened her desk drawer and dug out her bottle of one hundred aspirins to shake three into her hand. She grabbed the bottle of water sitting on her desk and washed them down before turning her attention back to Susan.
Susan stared down at her lap. “Nothing like that. You’ve been great, August.”
“I can’t believe another firm wouldn’t allow you to give—” She stopped. “The twins are okay, aren’t they? I don’t want to pry into your personal life, but we’ve worked together since they were babies.”
Susan smiled briefly. “The girls are fine.” She shook her head. “Different as night and day. One’s all frills and the other a tomboy.” Susan glanced up at August, then back toward the closed door. August sat forward in her chair. Something was wrong. The pounding in her head ratcheted up a notch and she massaged her forehead.
“Are you okay?” Susan sat forward, her expression worried.
August pinched the bridge of her nose, as if that could shut off the pain. “I woke up with a headache that I can’t seem to shake.” She gestured to the drawer where she kept her pills. “That was my third dose of aspirin. They don’t seem to be helping.”
“Did you eat breakfast?”
“No. My stomach is sort of queasy, too.”
“Let’s go to that new coffee shop down the street. You need some bread in your stomach, some chocolate, and extra caffeine.”
“I don’t think I can drink any more coffee right now.”
“They have bagels, croissants, and the best hot chocolate I’ve tasted. They also sell those chocolate-covered espresso beans you like.” Susan nodded toward the door and mouthed, We’ll talk there.
“Okay. It can’t make me feel any worse.”
*
Mid-morning translated into few customers at The Infusion, but the staff was busy reloading after the breakfast rush and preparing the few sandwiches they offered for lunch. So, their order was filled quickly, and they sat at a small table in the back corner for privacy and to get August away from the bright sun coming through the windows at the front.
August watched most of the whipped cream melt into her hot chocolate before she took a sip. She could almost feel her sinuses open and the pain lessen as she held the cup close and breathed in the steamy aroma. She stared down at the huge cinnamon roll Susan had insisted she buy, and her stomach growled its approval. She put her cup down, pulled off a small section, and popped it into her mouth. Another sip of cocoa. August felt Susan watching her, so she looked up and smiled. “Thanks. This is making me feel better.”
Susan’s smile was tentative. Then she glanced nervously about the shop.
“I hope you know you can talk to me,” August said gently. “Whatever we discuss in here will be handled with the utmost discretion.”
Susan took a sip of her sparkling water, then looked up at August. “I don’t have another job, but I can’t work there anymore.”
August sat back in surprise at Susan’s blurted words, then took a slow sip from her mug to give her racing mind a chance to digest the implication.
“I know Christine can be a bitch sometimes, but you always seem to handle her. Is one of the other employees bothering you? I can straighten that out pretty quick.”
Susan edged forward, her voice low. “Shady things are going on. I’ve tried to ignore it because I work mainly for you, and your name hasn’t been on any of their paperwork. I told myself that you didn’t know anything about what Christine’s doing, and I’ve held my tongue because that Delgado guy scares the hell out of me.”
August was stunned. Then she was instantly angry. Raphael Delgado, a freshly minted junior attorney Christine had taken under her wing as a law student, was the son of their biggest client, Luis Reyes. Was he using their office for something illegal? “What kind of shady things?” She put her mug down. “I need you to be specific, Susan.”
“I’m talking about making witnesses disappear or go silent, and purposely letting a man go to prison to keep the real culprit on the streets.”
“Those are pretty serious accusations.” They weren’t the kind of things Susan could have read in a case file.
“Did you know that when they put in the new central air, the duct to my office connects right to Christine’s? When the compressor fan clicks off and she’s working in her sitting area rather than at her desk, I can hear every word she and Raphael are saying.”
August stared at her. “Why didn’t you come to me before?”
Susan waved her hand dismissively. “It was nothing I could prove.” She folded her hands in her lap and studied them. “And she’s your lover. I couldn’t expect you to believe me without proof.” She looked up again and met August’s gaze. “But I think I’ve found written proof that she’s been setting up sham businesses and nonprofits to funnel money into offshore bank accounts.”
“To dodge taxes?”
“I think it’s to launder drug money. You know most of the criminal cases she handles for Reyes are drug cases that involve his employees or relatives.” Susan dropped her gaze, and her next words were hesitant. “I’ve heard you guys argue about it.”
August stood and paced toward the condiment table and back to Susan. Reyes was at the core of most of her domestic turmoil. The minor assault or drug possession cases he’d asked them to handle had been a blessing when their practice was new and they were broke, but August had grown uneasy when the incidents grew in number and cases were suddenly major felonies. It seemed clear to her they were representing a major crime lord, and this wasn’t the reputation she wanted for their firm.
Christine disagreed. She thrived on the money and power earned as Reyes’s legal eagle.
They’d argued over the nature of the cases—assaults evolved into murder cases and possession into trafficking—so Christine shifted all Reyes’s work to her caseload.
Then they’d argued about Raphael. His position wasn’t budgeted when Christine hired him without consulting her. A few months later, August had wanted to fire him after several women staffers complained that he’d made inappropriate comments to them. But Christine stepped in, promising he’d be assigned only to her cases and she’d keep a tight rein on him.
Lately, they’d argued mostly over Christine’s increasing late-night meetings with Reyes.
August sighed. The last thing she needed was another fight with Christine, but she couldn’t let this go. She rubbed her temple again. Hot chocolate and a cinnamon roll weren’t going to make this headache go away.
“I have so much respect for you, August. You and Christine gave me a chance and helped me through a really bad time when Matt was killed.” Susan’s eyes filled with tears. “But Christine has changed. And, when I found out what they’re doing now…I have to get out. I have to get my babies away from this.”
August stared at her. “What more are they doing?”
Susan wiped at her eyes, then lifted her chin and met August’s gaze. “They’re putting your name on some of the nonprofit documents so it looks like you’re involved. If they implicate you, then I’ll be sucked in by association. They want leverage, I suppose, when things finally blow up between you and Christine.” Susan abruptly stood and edged toward the door. “I mean, you know, over the Reyes stuff.”
August had learned long ago to read the body language of a witness under questioning. Susan’s sudden need to escape screamed that she had more to tel
l, something she hadn’t intended to reveal. She stood, too, and rounded the small table to block Susan’s path to the door. “What else, Susan? I want to know.”
Susan’s shoulders slumped and she stared at the floor. “I don’t want to hurt you, August.”
“Keeping me in the dark isn’t helping me. I need to know if I’m going to defend myself.”
Susan chewed on her lower lip, then looked up to meet August’s gaze. “You’re right.” She put a steadying hand on her chair as though she needed support. “I came back late one Friday night after being out to a movie with friends because I’d left my cell phone at work. The light was on in Christine’s office down the hall, but I figured she was just working late. My phone must have dropped out of my coat pocket, because it was on the floor next to the air vent, and when I bent to pick it up…oh, God.” Susan’s face reddened. “I wish I could erase it from my memory.” She covered her face with her hands.
“Just tell me.”
Susan lowered her hands but didn’t raise her eyes. “Christine wasn’t alone. I could hear Luis Reyes, too. They were…there was no mistaking what they were doing on the sofa in her office.”
August felt the blood drain from her, and she slumped back into her chair. She was the one who needed support now. Sure, it’d been months since she and Christine had made love. Actually, longer than that because it’d been more than a year since their couplings felt like more than a simple physical release. But she’d never made the leap to suspect that Christine was actually cheating with another lover, especially a man. Christine had never mentioned being bi-oriented or having male lovers in her past. Her brain pounded painfully in her ears, her stomach twisted, and bile burned the back of her throat. A cool glass bottle—Susan’s sparkling water—was pressed into her hand.
“Drink,” Susan said. “Just a little.”
August sipped at the liquid, if only to soothe the acid in her throat and wash the vile taste from her mouth. Then she closed her eyes and held the glass to her temple for a moment. “I’m okay.” She opened her eyes and wearily met Susan’s worried gaze. “Christine came home around three a.m. last night, and we had another fight. I didn’t sleep at all.” She rubbed her forehead again. “That’s why I have a headache.”
Susan sat again and waited as August held the cold bottle to her temple and gathered her thoughts. The news wasn’t really such a surprise. In the back of August’s mind and deep in her soul, she knew she and Christine were done, but she had refused to acknowledge it or do anything to change it. It was time to get her head out of the sand. Her heart walled off and her lawyer brain kicked in. “Put that resignation letter back in your purse, then go write us down on the schedule as out of the office for the rest of the afternoon to take depositions on a farm-machinery accident.”
“You don’t do those kinds of cases.”
“Christine has been pestering me to branch out and accept cases that generate more money. Ambulance-chasing brings in lots of money.”
Susan frowned. “I really am resigning.”
August looked up at her. “I know. But we both need to make sure our exits from this practice don’t look like we’re leaving because we’re guilty of something.” She grasped Susan’s hand. “Trust me, okay? I want to make sure you and the twins are protected. If Reyes decides to go after somebody when this explodes, I want it to be me.” She stood. “Let’s go back so you can sign us out. I want to grab some things from my office. Then I’m going to follow you to your home to make sure you’re safe. Stay there until I call you. I need to think and set up a meeting with my attorney.”
Chapter Two
TJ eyed the temperature gauge on her old Honda Civic.
Not TJ. Teal. She’d left the whip-smart Ivy-league graduate TJ Giovanni behind in the Washington, DC, apartment Lauren had rented for her. She was once again Teal Crawley, the farm girl she’d buried when she’d taken her mother’s maiden name and escaped her ultra-conservative father’s Pennsylvania dairy farm. TJ needed to disappear for a while, so she’d serve a second sentence as that farm girl until she’d paid for her failure in the fast lane.
She watched the gauge’s needle climb as steadily as the record-breaking temperatures currently cooking the Southern states. Was that a wisp of white steam curling from under the hood or just the heat shimmering up from the two-lane blacktop highway that had seemed to go on forever? Damn. She’d refilled the coolant in Missouri. That was several hundred miles ago, but she’d hoped to make it to her cousin’s small ranch in New Mexico without stopping for an expensive repair. The way her luck was running, the problem would be a leaky ten-dollar hose that required removing the entire engine to replace.
Congressional aides didn’t make much money when you deducted the cost of living in DC. She’d never had to worry about money because Lauren paid for everything—hotels, dinners, even a credit card that she insisted TJ use to buy expensive clothes for the events they’d attended. And, while other aides had multiple roommates to defray the excessive rent charged for basic apartments in downtown DC, Teal had lived in an apartment that Lauren’s campaign leased where the building’s owner made his private elevator available for a certain powerful senator’s late-night visits to her most trusted aide.
So, Lauren had sent more than half of her earnings to her sisters. When their time came, she wanted them to have a chance to escape the farm, too. Then, after paying her living expenses like groceries and utilities, she invested the rest of her meager salary. Her nest egg wasn’t huge, but most of it was locked up in short-term, high-yield investments that had two more months to mature. So, her current cash flow was down to a meager few thousand dollars.
Lauren had Jeff deposit a significant “pay-off” in Teal’s account, but Teal had withdrawn it all in cash, put it in a plain brown bag, and donated it anonymously to the Human Rights Commission’s fight to extend the federal law protecting the workers’ rights to all workers, no matter what their sexual or gender orientation. She would have felt like a whore if she kept it.
She debated whether to stop and let the engine cool. The needle appeared to vibrate in the red zone. Hot. Hot. Very hot. Crap. She needed to do something. She should’ve brought a few jugs of water with her. If she stopped and shut off the engine, it might not crank again. Then what would she do?
A loud pop followed by a few clunks under the hood made the decision for her. The engine died, and Teal wrestled the car off the roadway without power steering. She let it roll as far as momentum would carry it. As if a few feet would make a difference.
Fu—No. She hated Washington’s most common curse word. Her granny had said cursing was a sign of coarseness. If America only knew the real personalities of the people they sent to Congress. The majority of those who came from money were scavengers living off the backs of the middle class and poor, and the bootstrap crowd was just a bunch of pigs wearing lipstick. They were the guys you had to avoid standing next to in the elevator or you’d have a hand on your ass for the entire ride. But she’d willingly wallowed in the same political sty. She wouldn’t hesitate to use that hand on the ass as political blackmail down the road. Yet she never indulged in their habit of foul language, afraid of slipping up in front of a media camera if she grew accustomed to speaking those words in private conversation.
Perspiration beaded along her forearm, and she pressed the window button. Nothing happened. She checked the ignition. She hadn’t switched it off when the engine died. She turned the ignition off and on again, then tried the window. No power. Crap. Whatever happened must have shorted the electrical system, too.
Okay. TJ Giovanni had been a problem solver. She solved problems for very high-powered people. Need a reservation at a restaurant that’s been booked for months? She’d take care of it. Need more backers to get your bill out of committee? She’d line them up. Need an evening dress and date for the visiting senator’s teen daughter who decided to fly in at the last minute? No problem.
So, Teal Crawley should at l
east be able to handle a little engine trouble.
The car’s interior was quickly becoming an oven, and Teal felt a little queasy. She wished she hadn’t eaten that greasy cheeseburger two hours ago. TJ, but not Teal, would have remembered to restock her small cooler with bottled water. Stop it.
One step at a time. She pulled the hood release—thank God it was manually operated—and got out to raise the hood. She was no mechanic, but she’d learned a few basic things while growing up on that dairy farm.
“Shit.” So much for her resolve to avoid profanity, but crap, that hood was hot. She could almost feel her skin bubble into a blister. Although she’d shipped most of her belongings ahead, her small car was packed almost to the top. She found a T-shirt in the basket of dirty laundry and used it to protect her hand as she grabbed the release latch again. She groped for the rod to prop up the hood and coughed as steam poured out. Only this wasn’t just steam. Smoke. Sparks flew at the telltale sound of wires shorting. Wet hoses sizzled when flame erupted near the fuel line. “Holy crap!”
Teal scrambled back to the trunk, hastily dumping her belongings on the ground to dig out the fire extinguisher stored in the spare-tire well, praying it would work and she could extinguish the flame before the car exploded. She’d shipped her Washington life—suits and heels to her cousin’s ranch, but this car held the real Teal—all of her jeans, T-shirts, running shoes, and boots.
She skidded around the front fender, spraying the engine until the small extinguisher sputtered and spit the last of its chemicals. Her heart thumped a loud counterpoint to the soft tick of the subdued engine as she waited a long moment. When no explosion erupted, she sucked in a huge breath and let it out slowly. Then she lurched to the passenger side of the car and vomited the contents of her stomach onto the dirt. She kicked dirt over the masticated pieces of cheeseburger as she spit bile and saliva on top of the mess, then swiped a shaky hand over her mouth. She really wished she had a bottle of water.
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