Her Surprise Hero

by Abby Gaines

  She glanced down at those notes now. Ethan had made the compelling point that the window-punching boy would struggle to control his temper as long as his home environment included his two older brothers, both with a track record of violence. She’d sentenced the youth to Ethan’s work program on the recommendation of the parole officer. But she still wanted to know more about the payment Ethan received for the program.

  The bailiff invited Ethan to the front of the courtroom. As before, he took the witness stand to make his submission. Cynthia allowed herself a proper look at him. He wore a pale gray shirt with a darker gray tie—entirely suitable for court, but it didn’t mask his strong physique.

  “Your Honor.” He gripped the stand with a tension she hadn’t seen earlier. “Sam is an intelligent young man who’s had some major upheaval in his life. He needs the support of family around him, and a focus for his considerable energy. Working at the Double T ranch will address those issues.”

  The mood in the courtroom was unmistakably in his favor. Cynthia started to feel beleaguered. Instead of simply declaring her sentence as she was entitled to, maybe she should take people through her decision process.

  She leaned toward her microphone. “Mr. Granger, could you clarify for the court the exact nature of your relationship to Sam Barrett.”

  He blinked. “He’s my son. You know that.”

  Yes, but it has to be on the record. “So if Sam served his community service on your ranch, he would be working at home. With his father.”

  In the dock, Sam twitched.

  “If this is about the money, Your Honor,” Ethan said slowly, “I wouldn’t expect to be compensated.”

  That he even had to say that was an indication of how weird the situation was—she had grounds to refuse his request right there. But the locals were nodding approval; it seemed they couldn’t see the problem.

  “Mr. Granger, how did you feel when you heard Sam had been arrested for vandalism?”

  Ethan flexed his fingers on the witness stand rail. “What do you mean, how did I feel?”

  “Were you angry?”

  Ethan shot a look at Sam’s lawyer.

  “Uh, Your Honor…” the lawyer said. Unsure how far he wanted to antagonize the new judge.

  She quelled him with her stare. “Mr. Granger?”

  “I was disappointed,” Ethan said in a low voice.

  She waited, but that was all he was offering. “Not angry?”

  “No.”

  “The reason I ask is because it’s difficult to be objective about one’s own family.” She was trying, subtly, to remind him that yesterday he’d said Sam despised him, that he couldn’t get through to the kid.

  “I don’t anticipate any difficulty,” he said. “My work program has proven effective for other young people…”

  “You betcha,” someone called.

  “…and it’ll do the same for Sam.”

  “It will also put him in close proximity to other troubled youths, who could be a harmful influence,” Cynthia pointed out.

  His eyes narrowed at her reference to his own suggestion that Sam had been unduly influenced. “Does Sam get to work at the Double T, or not?” His voice was tight, flinty.

  A rumble of chatter, too indistinct for one offender to be singled out, started near the front row, then worked its way back. The sheriff shifted on his feet.

  “Thank you for your submission, Mr. Granger, you may leave the stand.”

  Ethan didn’t return to his seat. Instead he sat at the lawyer’s table. The bailiff didn’t pick up on the breach of protocol, so Cynthia let it go. She scrutinized Sam. A definite resemblance to Ethan—the same dark hair, same stubborn chin. But Sam’s eyes weren’t as dark. His build was slighter than his dad’s, longer in the torso and shorter in the legs. A good-looking young man, who doubtless set hearts aflutter in school.

  A young man set for trouble, judging by the three arrests since he arrived in town. His expression had grown increasingly sullen as he listened to his father.

  She pinched the bridge of her nose. This shouldn’t be so hard. Maybe she wasn’t cut out to be a judge after all. Pull yourself together. She rested her forearms on the bench, one hand over the other. I can do this.

  “Sam,” she said, “do you think working on your father’s ranch is an appropriate sentence?”

  A flurry of reactions around the room told her people had expected her to do whatever Ethan recommended.

  “No,” the teenager said. “He’s mad at me, and I don’t want to work with him.”

  “Sam,” Ethan began, “I’m not mad.”

  “Mr. Granger, you will speak when the court addresses you,” Cynthia said in her best judge voice. Someone gasped. Too bad. “Sam, it seems to me you need to occupy your time better during the day, so that you’re too tired to skulk around at midnight with a spray can.”

  Relief crossed Ethan’s face, in inverse proportion to the consternation on Sam’s. Not so fast.

  “I believe it is in Sam’s interest to be separated from other youths who might share the same tendency to damage public property,” she said, addressing the court. “I also believe it will be difficult for Mr. Granger to manage his son in the work program.”

  Ethan looked as if he wanted to raise a strenuous objection. When the lawyer put a hand on his arm, he clenched his jaw.

  “My preference is for sentencing that reflects the nature of the crime and if possible makes restitution,” she continued, her confidence growing. She might be new to judging, but over the years she’d thought a lot about how to make sentences more meaningful and effective, while preventing offenders from becoming more hardened in their ways. Especially young offenders. “We need to take into account the need for justice, for both victim and offender. We do not need to take into account the needs of the offender’s father.”

  Ethan glowered.

  “Samuel Barrett, you have been found guilty of vandalism. I sentence you to one hundred hours of community work, to include the removal of your graffiti from the library building and then working with the librarian on whatever tasks she assigns to you.”

  The librarian, sitting at the far end of the front row, dropped her knitting. “I don’t want that lout near my books.” She subsided under Cynthia’s stare.

  “Your Honor, this is a bad idea.” Ethan, who else?

  “Mr. Granger, if you can’t respect the decision of this court, I will find you in contempt, an offence that carries a short but effective jail sentence.”

  She hadn’t exactly intended to threaten the most respected man in town, but that was the way it came out. A belligerent rumble rolled around the courtroom. The sheriff’s hand went to his gun. Just what she needed, insurrection on her first day. Sam’s snicker didn’t help; she glared at him.

  “I know what’s best for my son.” Ethan’s deep voice drew her attention. Hostility emanated from him in waves. Just when she thought he might start yelling, he wheeled around and left the courtroom.

  Cynthia realized Jim, the clerk, was talking in a low voice. “That’s it for the morning, Your Honor.”

  “We’ll stand in recess until 1 p.m.,” she announced, her voice too high. She stood, and the bailiff belatedly caught up with an “All rise.”

  She forced herself to take measured steps through the judge’s exit, to ignore the resentment aimed at her. As soon as the door closed behind her, she practically ran up the back staircase to her chambers. She sank into her chair.

  “It’s easy for you to wave your sword and hold your scales,” Cynthia grumbled to Justice, standing faithfully on the mantelpiece. “That blindfold means you can’t see that everyone hates you.” Her gaze drifted farther, to the closet. She swiveled her chair to face the window.

  She didn’t want to think how her father would have rated her performance today. She thought about calling Megan to confide just how difficult it had been. But she wasn’t sure she could hold herself together and sound as if she was de-stressing the way sh
e should be.

  How long before she could leave Stonewall Hollow and go back home? And what were the odds that she’d be completely crazy by the time she got out of here?

  CYNTHIA’S CELL PHONE rang as she unlocked the front door of her cottage the following evening. She pressed to answer. “Hi, Dad.”

  “Cynthia.” Her father always boomed into cell phones; she held the phone a couple of inches from her ear. “I meant to call last night, but it was the golf club banquet. How was your first day in court—your first two days?”

  She kicked her shoes off as she closed the door. The house was a few minutes’ walk from the court—she’d chosen it from the Realtor’s list with a vague vision of her newly relaxed self strolling to work each day in smog-free air—and her feet were sore. The carpet, faded and soft, welcomed her bare toes. “It was okay.”

  Silence. Her father expected firmer sentiments. How could she have forgotten that just a few days out of Atlanta? “I heard twenty-eight cases yesterday, thirty-four today,” she said. Today had gone better—lots of muttering, but the sheriff didn’t finger his gun once. “Nothing more complicated than a DUI, I’ll speed up with practice.”

  Sam Barrett’s case had been full of complications, none of them legal.

  “I struck an unusual interpretation of the law on criminal trespass,” she said, looking for something that might interest her dad. “The attorney tried to argue his client was authorized to enter a car lot after hours because the firm’s radio advertisement said, ‘Come on down today.’”

  Her dad laughed. “Sounds like he got his degree out of a cereal packet.”

  “What’s striking is that the D.A. didn’t argue unlawful purpose—I had to do it for him.” The D.A. hadn’t appreciated her prompting, but the law was the law.

  With each word, her tension dripped away and the weight in Cynthia’s chest lightened. She stopped pacing the small living room—no open-plan renovation for this cottage—and settled onto the faded gold corduroy couch. Feet curled beneath her, she ran through a few more cases.

  “You’re doing a great job, as I knew you would,” her father said. “What about the…other thing?”

  It wasn’t like him to be so abstract. Her meltdown had left him nonplussed in a way she’d never seen him.

  “I’m fine, Dad.” No need to tell him about the closet in her chambers. “I’ll be ready to come back to Atlanta in no time.”

  “Hmm.”

  Resentment constricted her chest. All those years of being the perfect daughter, then one slip and she was out of town.

  Because Dad wants the best for me.

  The same thing she wanted for herself.

  “What’s new with Megan and Sabrina?” she asked.

  “Cynthia, you’ve only been gone three days. What could be new?” Jonah chuckled. “How are you getting along with the locals?”

  The question was well out of his usual sphere of interest. She frowned as she traced a knot in the pine coffee table with her finger. “Okay, I guess.”

  This time, he didn’t notice her lackluster response. “I heard some good news today. Gus Fisher is about to announce his retirement.”

  Cynthia uncurled her legs. Augustus Fisher was a judge in the Atlanta’s Fulton County superior court.

  “You could replace him,” Jonah said.

  He wasn’t reluctant to have her home, after all. He was just preoccupied. She scrambled to her feet. “I can’t imagine I’m a serious prospect.” Worry, not modesty, prompted her.

  “Thanks to your leaving town, the whispers have already died down.”

  She tightened her grip on the phone.

  “The powers-that-be are keen to appoint a judge who’s sensitive to the concerns of smaller communities,” her dad continued. “Some lobby groups have been complaining that the judiciary is full of city lawyers who are out of touch with a big chunk of the population.”

  “The small-town attitude takes some getting used to,” she agreed with feeling. “People approach me openly to talk about sentencing.”

  “Your experience there will look good on your résumé.”

  “I won’t be here long enough for it to make much difference.” She hoped.

  A gusty sigh escaped him, and she imagined him settling deeper into the chair in his study. “You can talk up the experience when you need to.”

  “Dad…” Reluctantly, Cynthia prepared to confess. “Things aren’t going so well in court. I mean, I know my decisions are legally sound. But I don’t think there’s one person in town who agrees with me. No one except me has any objectivity.”

  “It’s often that way when everyone knows everyone,” Jonah said. “Trust me, Cynthia. If you want to leapfrog the line into the superior court, you need to get in sync with the locals. Demonstrate that you understand their lives and their issues. In fact—” his voice changed and she imagined him hunching forward to make his point “—you should be doing that anyway. It’ll help you win cooperation in the courtroom.”

  She found it hard to converse on any topic other than work, and she had the lack of a social life to prove it. Her recent disgrace just made it harder. How could she hope to get in sync with anyone, let alone find the kind of long-term relationship both her sisters had, when she was wound tight as a spring?

  But as always, her father had a point. Maybe she could use her stint in Stonewall Hollow to practice her rusty social skills. If she messed up, no one in Atlanta would know.

  “Dad, you’re right about getting in with the locals.” She glanced at her watch. “I’m going to start right now. There’s a potluck supper tonight—I’ll go along.”

  “That’s my girl, never lets anything get in the way of her career.”

  “Wish me luck,” she said.

  “You don’t need luck, you’ll do a great job.” He paused. “Cynthia, although it’s important to integrate with the town, make sure you don’t let anyone have undue influence.”

  For some reason, she pictured Ethan Granger in court yesterday, his eyes hard, his mouth clamped shut as if his silence would stop her noticing his resentment. “Don’t worry, Dad. I won’t.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  GETTING READY FOR THE potluck was much harder than getting ready for a state banquet. Cynthia discarded every single item of the limited casual clothing she’d brought with her before settling on a sundress of Sabrina’s. Sabrina had worn it once, back when she was Miss Georgia, to face the media when she was booted out of the Miss U.S.A. pageant. Afterward, she’d told Cynthia she wouldn’t be able to wear it again without thinking of one of the worst days of her life.

  It fit a little more snugly on Cynthia than it had on Sabrina, but it was fine. She rubbed the filmy yellow fabric between her fingers as she paused outside the museum and community hall complex. This was the perfect dress to say Cynthia Merritt, girl around town, rather than Judge Cynthia Merritt, but she was overly conscious of her bare shoulders beneath the spaghetti straps. It’s practical, she told herself. It had to be eighty degrees still, and the humidity made it feel hotter.

  She wiped her palms on the floaty skirt and pondered the mystery that she could walk into a high-profile murder trial with absolute confidence, but fret about the possibility of failure at a potluck. Then she pushed the door open.

  The pastor was saying grace. When the door banged behind her, at least twenty people looked up. Cynthia closed her eyes for the remainder of the prayer, which was considerably longer than any grace she’d ever heard.

  Behind her, someone else slipped in, far more quietly than she had, and waited next to her.

  At last the preacher said, “Amen.”

  Cynthia opened her eyes. And discovered Ethan standing beside her. What were the odds the hundred or so people in the room were frowning at him?

  “Hey, Ethan.” Ernie Rice, the man she’d sentenced on the DUI charge, ignored her. She resisted the urge to ask him if his wife had driven tonight.

  “Good evening, Mr. Granger,” she said pol
itely.

  Ethan’s grunt might have been a hello.

  She registered Sam’s presence, right behind his father. Great. The night was clearly going to be one of courthouse déjà vu, a game she sometimes played with Megan when they attended a swanky function—name which guest has appeared in court and why. “Hello, Sam.”

  He nodded.

  “Speak up,” Ethan told him.

  This time, she got a mumble. Still, his father hadn’t set a great example.

  Melanie made her way over. “I’m so glad you made it, Cynthia.” She pressed a glass of tea into Cynthia’s hand. “There are at least eight different kinds of barbecue, and the desserts…” She circled her finger and thumb and kissed them theatrically. “To die for.”

  Ethan walked away—he was immediately surrounded by people, almost clamoring to talk to him. No wonder the man had big ideas about how much influence he should wield in the court.

  Melanie introduced Cynthia to her sister, Margaret.

  “Mellie and I are the spinster sisters of Stonewall Hollow,” Margaret announced, double gold hoops bobbing in her earlobes as she pumped Cynthia’s free hand. “No man brave enough to take us on. Not for long, anyway. Let me introduce you to some folks, Judge.”

  Respect for Cynthia’s position—or maybe it was just affection for the sisters—scored her a dozen handshakes. Beyond that, stiff words and forced smiles, before people moved swiftly on. Whatever happened to small-town hospitality? “It’s so nice to meet you, I’m delighted to be here,” she said in a dozen different ways. Didn’t matter how she said it—she still got the cold treatment. Half these people hadn’t even been in the courtroom, but every one of them had heard how she went against the mighty Ethan Granger.

  When she’d exhausted her stock of synonyms for delighted, and she no longer had the strength to smile, she joined the line at the buffet.

  “This all looks so good,” she said to no one in particular. So much for using tonight to brush up her social skills. She piled a spoonful of cheesy grits onto her plate and added some collard greens. Hearty Southern fare. When she’d heaped the plate with more food than she could ever eat, she could no longer procrastinate. She scanned the clusters of plastic seats around the room for someone who wouldn’t move away when she sat next to them.