Family Secrets: Books 5-8

by Virginia Kantra

  Im going for an examining trial, she told Eric, but Judge Albright is a hard-liner. With a high-profile case like this, hes not likely to cut the defense any slack.

  Eric narrowed his eyes. What does that mean?

  It meant they had a hard road ahead of them. Other than the search and arrest warrants, well have little information about the case against you.

  How can that be legal? I thought they had to disclose the evidence to the defense?

  Not before the grand jury meets. Grand juries handcuffed the defense and gave a rubber stamp to the prosecution. Since this is a federal case, the prosecutor needs a grand jury indictment. I wont be allowed into the proceedings, and typically only minimal evidence is presented, so as not to tip the prosecutions hand. Salinger will only present enough evidence to secure a true bill.

  Which grand juries almost always delivered, wrapped up tidily with a ribbon and a bow, like year-round Christmas gifts for the prosecution.

  An examining trial creates an exception, Leigh explained. An examining trial would allow me to put Venturi on the stand and ask him detailed questions about his investigation and the information that led to your arrest. Its a form of discovery.

  Lets do it, then.

  Ill file the request, but the chances are slim. Examining trials are rare. And, as I said, with the spotlight on this case, Albright is going to play it straight. Hes not going to risk presidential scorn.

  Erics expression darkened. Thats bullshit. How the hell do we fight this, if we dont know what they have against me?

  Leigh frowned. The judicial system was designed to protect the innocent, but Eric was right. Many processes and procedures were tipped in favor of the prosecution. And in this case, with a jittery nation looking on and the president hungry for a conviction, the odds were stacked even higher against them. She would fight with everything she had, but deep, deep inside, a cold feeling spread through her, the realization that everything she had might not be enough to keep her sons father from spending the rest of his life in prison.

  Leigh? Eric put a finger under her chin and tilted her face toward his. His eyes were hot and glowing and they damn near ripped her heart from her chest. Whats wrong?

  Five

  S he could barely breathe, that was what was wrong. She was a savvy, creative attorney, but when Eric looked at her like that, when he touched her, her brain shut down and sensation took over. Longing washed through her in thick, suffocating waves.

  Once, shed loved this man wholly and completely. Shed never forgotten his voice, his laugh, the warmth that glowed in his eyes. As she stood there so close to him, with his hand to her face and his gaze concentrated fully on her, the desire to feel his arms around her, to feel their bodies pressed together and hear his heart beating, almost knocked her flat.

  Forcing a breath, Leigh stepped back from the torture and reminded herself she had to focus. She had to be strong. She could not let Eric Jones or the past distract her, touch her.

  After the grand jury she said, using her professional voice to hide the hated breathlessness. But that was all she could manage. What was wrong with her? She wasnt a silly school girl anymore, damn it. She was a grown woman, and this man was part of her past. She tried again. Well request typical pretrial informationtheir list of witnesses and experts, transcripts of police statements and interviews, lists of everything seized and what was found on your computer, that kind of thing.

  Eric closed his eyes, opened them a moment later.

  Cold certainty glimmered bright. You think Ill be indicted.

  Something deep inside responded to the wariness in his voice. The urge to put a hand to his or, worse, put her arms around him and hold him, just hold him, warred with common sense. He looked so alone standing there, accused of a crime she knew he didnt commit. His life was being turned upside down, and even ifwhenshe proved him innocent, there would always be those who looked at him with suspicion in their eyes. That was the kicker with the justice system. Innocent until proven guilty sounded well and good, but even when the accused was found innocent, many still saw him as guilty.

  The shadow of doubt lingered for a long time.

  Eric didnt deserve this. The heartache and disappointment littering their past lost all importance, all relevance, in the face of what lay ahead.

  Better than a seventy-five percent chance, she acknowledged.

  He swore softly. So what do we do?

  The question pulled her from the haze of nostalgia and returned her to the comfort zone of lawyer-client relationship. She crossed the plush rose-colored carpeting to a small round conference table in the opposite corner of her office. There, she had notes spread out and a tablet waiting.

  You tell me everything you know, she said, picking up her pen. Come sit down.

  Eric remained standing stoically at the window. I cant.

  The sudden gust of warmth was ridiculous. Of course, Eric Jones couldnt just sit down and let someone else take over. Hed always been the one in charge, the one to take command of a situation when no one else knew how. This reversal of fortune had to be eating him alive.

  Okay, she said, realizing the futility of arguing. Just answer a few questions, then.

  Whatever you need to know. He crossed to her, his big body moving with the masculine grace she remembered from so long ago. Hed been lankier then, more boy than man. But during their years apart hed filled out in all the right places. His shoulders looked broader, his thighs more powerful, and while she didnt think hed actually grown taller, he dominated a room more fully than he had before.

  You said they took your computer? she asked.

  Eric nodded. My laptop, as well as all my floppy disks and CDs.

  How do you connect to the Internet?

  DSL line.

  Leigh looked up from her notes. Damn.

  Eric didnt need an explanation. Open line?

  Makes it a breeze for anyone who wants to hack into your computer.

  And plant evidence, he supplied.

  Bingo, Leigh said, wishing she could get her hands on the computer, but knowing it was probably tucked away at FBI headquarters in Quantico, Virginia, by now. The feds obviously found some kind of link between your computer and the World Bank, maybe erased code or other program files.

  There were manuals of some sort, Eric said. I saw them in evidence bags as they were arresting me.

  Leigh jotted notes, already planning her defense. First thing in the morning shed make phone calls and set her strategy into motion. What kind of manuals?

  Looked like computer programming manuals.

  Were they yours?

  Found in my bedroom, but Id never seen them before.

  Leigh sucked in a sharp breath, let it out a moment later. Thorough bastards, arent they?

  Eric leaned against the wall and let his head loll back. Christ, Leigh, I keep thinking youre going to wake me up and Im going to realize this is all some weird Twilight Zone dream.

  Leigh looked away from him, trying not to think about the fact that if she were t
o wake him, that would mean theyd been sleeping together. I wish, she said, then cringed deep inside.

  She did not wish they were sleeping together.

  The good news, she said, standing, is that so far everything seems circumstantial, which is easier to defend. The standard for conviction is beyond a shadow of a doubt, and its difficult to reach that level of certainty with nothing concrete. Computers can be tampered with, those manuals were clearly planted, and even that photo of you and Nikoli Dusek doesnt mean a damn thing. Just because you shook the mans hand at a cocktail party doesnt mean youre in bed with him.

  A hard sound broke from Erics throat. I should hope not.

  Despite the gravity of the situation, she smiled. I meant that figuratively, of course.

  A slow smile curved his mouth. We dont want to give the prosecution another angle to play, after all.

  She didnt know how it happened, how Eric managed it, but her smile bubbled into a small laugh. It had always been like that between them, tense moments broken by stupid nonsense. No, we dont. She rubbed the back of her neck. We dont have a lick of motivation, either.

  Eric pushed away from the wall and crossed to her. Other than greed, you mean.

  Well, yes, theres always that. But youre a successful businessman, you own your own home, and you Her words stopped abruptly when he moved into her personal space and stepped behind her.

  Let me, he said, and before she could step away, before she could so much as breathe, his hands joined hers at the back of her neck.

  She went completely still, but he didnt. His hands were big, stronger than she remembered. And when he rubbed them along her neck and down to her shoulders, she thought she might just dissolve into a puddle of pleasure right then and there. Warmth sang through her in an achingly familiar rhythm.

  The little moan slipped free before she could stop it.

  Youre tense, Eric murmured, as his clever hands jumbled her thoughts. You need to be careful or youll give yourself a headache.

  The memory hung there between them, of the countless times Eric had gently scolded her for pushing herself to the brink of exhaustion or for internalizing problems. He always said she took life too seriously, that she needed to relax. And hed always done his best to help her do so.

  Even when that meant having her lie on the carpet so he could straddle her hips and work magic with his hands.

  The intimacy had always been an excruciating combination of pleasure and torture, much like the sensations now humming from pulse point to pulse point. Her blood thrummed with memory and longing. Shed always known his heart belonged to another. Shed known he saw her only as a friend.

  But that hadnt stopped the yearning, the impossible desire to be the one Eric Jones shared his heart and soul and future with. Shed felt like a fraud for calling herself a pal when she wanted so much more, but shed preferred friendship to not having him in her life at all.

  But he was back now, and his talented fingers could still play her body like a song.

  It took effort, but Leigh found the strength to step away. Im fine, she said, turning to face him. Mistake. The intensity in his eyes was as dangerous as his hands. Youre the one Im worried about.

  Dont be. Ive handled worse.

  That got her. She stared at him, wondering once again what his life had been like after hed returned to Cloverdale. Hed had a father to bury, a mother to console, a fiance to nurse back to health and a business to salvage. No easy task for a twenty-five-year-old whod been intent on conquering the world of high finance, starting with a plum job hed already lined up at a high-powered brokerage firm in Chicago.

  Hows your mom holding up? Reporters arent hounding her yet, are they?

  Eric went very still. No.

  Relief washed through her. Shed only met Susan Jones a time or two, but Leigh remembered her as a kind woman with lively eyes and a warm smile. Her love for her son had been obvious and deep. Leigh hated thinking of Mrs. Jones fending off an army of blood-thirsty reporters.

  Thats good, she said. But you should probably give her a heads up. It wont be long before they show up on her doorstep.

  Shes dead, Leigh.

  The quiet words stopped her cold. She looked at Eric standing in the fading light of late afternoon, the stark lines to his face and bleakness to his eyes throwing her back in time ten long years, to the bitterly cold night shed tried to explain to a numb and noncomprehending Eric that his father had been in a terrible car accident, that he hadnt survived. That Erics fiance Becky had been in the car with him. That shed been rushed to a hospital where she was undergoing emergency surgery.

  To this day, the look on Erics face haunted her.

  To this day, the sound of his grief ripped her up.

  Shed taken him in her arms that night, driven by the need to ease his pain, even though shed known that was impossible. She wanted to do the same now, to erase that stark look from his eyes, but she forced herself to stand very still. She didnt trust herself to move. She didnt trust herself to touch.

  It was last year, Eric added in a horribly thick voice. The day after Thanksgiving.

  Sorrow swamped her. Leigh had always loved the open affection between Eric and his parents; shed admired his commitment to spending every holiday at home with them. Especially Thanksgiving. Not even a blizzard had stopped him from traveling home for turkey day, his mothers favorite day of the year, the first holiday she and Erics father had celebrated after bringing a three-year-old Eric home from the orphanage. Hed always bragged about her turkey and dressing, her special cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie.

  Im so sorry, Leigh said, meaning the words deep, but knowing they would never be enough.

  A reflective smile touched his lips. She was ready to go. She never got over losing Dad.

  Had she been ill?

  His eyes dimmed even more. Not technically. Not unless a broken heart counts.

  Somehow Leigh bit back the hard sound breaking in her throat. A broken heart definitely counted. Thats so sad.

  Eric exhaled roughly, but the tension didnt leave his big body. She moved in with me after Becky moved out. Osteoporosis had set in by then, but her mind was still sharp and she was as stubborn as ever. She insisted on cooking breakfast every morning, and when Id sit down, shed read the newspaper to me.

  Leigh smiled, memory washing over her like a fond caress. My grandparents did that.

  Erics expression remained curiously blank. So did my folks. Dad read to Mom every morning. They got a kick out of finding typos and bad grammar.

  Leigh could see it too well. They were good people.

  Eric wandered closer to the table and picked up an unsharpened pencil. The day after Thanksgiving, he said, rolling it between his big hands, I woke up later than usual, close to eight. I was still half asleep when it hit me that I didnt smell coffee or bacon. My heart just about stopped. Because I knew. God, I knew. I was out of the bed and running so fast, running down the hall.

  Leigh wrapped her arms around her waist, not even trying to fight the tears welling in her eyes.

  She was still in bed, Eric said in an oddly mechanical voice. The lamp was on and Dads picture had been pulled to the edge of the nightstand. And Momlooked pe
aceful. Id swear she was smiling.

  Thats beautiful, Leigh whispered, imagining Erics parents reunited after nearly a decade apart.

  Eric snapped the pencil in two. She never got to be a grandmother, he bit out. She was so excited when Becky and I were married, waiting, waiting for a grandchild to spoil. But it was just like her and Dad all over againno children. He dropped the two halves of the pencil to the carpet. After the divorceit was like something inside Mom just withered away, too.

  And for that, Eric blamed himself, she knew. It wasnt your fault, Leigh said softly.

  The deep blue of his eyes glittered. I tried, damn it. I tried to make that marriage work. I dont know how it took us six years to discover we didnt love each other, not like He broke the words off violently. Not the way we were supposed to.

  Leigh sucked in a jagged breath. Shed known this conversation was coming; she just hadnt thought it would be today. Theres not a right and wrong when it comes to love, Eric. It just is.

  Theres a right and wrong when it comes to marriage, he shot back. It was as if we were actors playing out a stale script that should have been retired a long time ago. He paused, looked up and met Leighs gaze. Things had started falling apart before the accident, but after He eyed another pencil on her desk, before roughly turning away. She couldnt walk for almost two years. There was no way I could turn my back on her. I was all she had.

  And Eric Jones lived and breathed responsibility. You two had been together forever, she recalled.

  She always wanted more, Eric said. Id hear her in bed at night, crying, but there was never a damn thing I could do. His expression twisted. By the time we realized it was over, all either of us felt was relief. For years wed been going through the motions, pretending for the world and my mother, convinced that once we had children the emptiness would go away. He paused, frowned. That never happened.

  Leigh could hardly breathe. Guilt sliced through her with painful precision. It had happened. Eric had fathered a child. A son whose lopsided smile reminded Leigh so much of Eric that her heart hurt just thinking about it.