CASSIDY'S COURTSHIP

by Sharon Mignerey

  He followed her gaze outside to the gray expanse of Cherry Creek Reservoir. The bleak windswept water suited his mood perfectly. He wished he was out there in his boat despite the weather. Even a storm would be preferable to the meeting in a few minutes with Harvey Bates and Brenna James.

  "Do you think she's guilty?" Myra asked a moment later.

  Cole didn't have to ask if she meant Brenna James. "Guilty or not guilty doesn't apply in a civil case."

  "Don't get all technical on me," Myra returned, "or I'll start straightening your tie and treating you like the son you're young enough to be."

  "Yes, ma'am."

  Over her shoulder, she threw him a mocking dark glance at his tone. He grinned, then stood and put his hands in his pockets.

  "The settlement makes her sound like a terrible person," Myra continued.

  "It does," he agreed.

  "Is she?"

  "In the eyes of the law, it doesn't matter."

  "You're still not telling me what you really think," Myra chided.

  He didn't dare confess to his secretary that Brenna James haunted his dreams, that if he had a way to change the outcome of the case, he would do it.

  "I think she's in a lot of trouble," he said, finally.

  In the street below, a bus pulled to a stop, and a single rider emerged, absently catching his attention. Brenna James.

  She gazed at the building a long moment as if assuring herself she was at the right place, then turned up the collar on her coat and thrust her hands into her pockets. Her hair was pulled into a bun; he wondered if she ever wore it loose.

  She brought her hands out of her pockets, and carefully pulled a hot-pink knit hat over her hair, a flare of color for the gloomy day. Again, her hands disappeared into her pockets as she meandered down the tree-lined sidewalk away from the office building and toward the lake. If the chill bothered her, from this distance Cole couldn't tell. The bright color of her hat was a beacon that held his attention.

  "That's her, isn't it?" Myra asked. "When she was here earlier for the depositions, I remember thinking she was pretty. A little on the quiet side, but then, in her situation, who wouldn't be."

  Cole nodded.

  "Most of the time, I think we're doing the right things. I read the agreements, and they make sense." Myra shook her head. "This time, I know what Harvey Bates—what we're doing for him—is wrong." She glanced at Cole. "It might be legal—"

  "It's legal," Cole assured her.

  "That doesn't make it right." Myra looked again at her watch, then crossed the room. "Back to work before my grumpy boss fires me."

  Cole grinned at her. "So now I'm grumpy."

  "Grumpy as a toddler cutting teeth," was Myra's parting shot as she left the office.

  Alone, Cole thought about Miller's accusation that he was in this only for the money. The idea nagged at him. His gaze strayed back to the woman on the street.

  Victory, and it wasn't sweet at all.

  An interminable twenty minutes later, Myra knocked, then pushed open the door. "Everybody's here, Cole."

  "Thanks." He rose from his chair, stretched a kink out of his back, and put on his jacket.

  "Expecting trouble?" Myra asked, picking up the folder.

  "No."

  "You've got that worried look again."

  "Hell, what could I be worried about? We won the case. Bates gets his pound of flesh, and—"

  "If you tell me 'life is good,' I'll smack you," Myra said.

  "Wouldn't dream of it." Cole took the folder from her and strode down the hall.

  He walked through the conference-room door and in an instant assessed the small changes that had taken place in Brenna during the last week. Her skin was translucent. The blue, almost bruised-looking shadows under her eyes told him too much about her state of mind. She looked as though she hadn't had a good night's sleep in weeks. He didn't like knowing that his actions had contributed.

  She looked up, her features tightly schooled into an expression of calm he almost believed. Almost.

  Instead of the gray suit he had been expecting her to wear, she was dressed with almost military precision in navy slacks, a matching jacket and a white tailored shirt.

  What had she been doing the last few days, he wondered. Who had she confided in? Her composure was light-years away from the turmoil he felt, and he envied her self-possession. Calm detachment had never been one of his strengths, and his temper got him into trouble more regularly than he cared to admit.

  "Miss James, Mr. Miller," Cole said, extending his hand to Brenna.

  He remembered her handshake from prior meetings—warm and firm, her fingers long and her hand slim inside his own broad palm. He wanted to raise her wrist to his face and inhale the scent of her skin.

  As always, the gaze from her clear gray eyes was direct. This close, freckles and the fine grain of her skin drew his attention, as did a single larger freckle at the corner of her eye. Whatever her thoughts, they were well hidden. At that moment he would have given all of Harvey Bates's retainer to know what she was thinking.

  She pulled back, and reluctantly Cole let go of her hand, hoping his expression betrayed no more of his thoughts than hers did.

  Cole shook John Miller's hand and turned to Harvey Bates. As usual, Cole's client was impeccably dressed, his charcoal suit, custom-made shirt, and conservative tie the epitome of the power suit. Bates's attention was on Brenna, his dislike of her evident.

  "Have you had a chance to review the agreement, Miss James?" Cole asked when everyone was seated around the table.

  "Yes."

  "Do you have any questions?"

  "No," she said with a slight shake to her head, looking briefly at John Miller, who was sitting beside her. "I just want this to be done with."

  This was the most emotion Cole had heard in her voice since her anguished whisper in the courtroom. His gaze slid across the room to his client, then came back to Brenna. "You understand the language in this order goes beyond what the court required in its judgment?"

  "Is this true?" she asked, turning to her attorney. When he didn't look at her, she repeated, "Is it?"

  He stared a moment at his hands folded on the table, then sighed and met her gaze. "Technically, it could be."

  Cole extended his hand across the table. "Mr. Miller, did you explain to your client this agreement amounts to a confession of a felony?" His eyes never left Brenna's face though his question was not directed to her.

  Her attention, however, was focused solely on her attorney.

  Bates slammed his palm on the walnut table. "She says she's ready to sign. So let's get on with it."

  "Did you?" Studying Brenna, Cole waited for Miller's answer and ignored his client. The seconds ticked by, her mouth tightened, the first stirring of anger cracking through her calm expression.

  Bates fired a gold Cross pen down the length of the table. "She said she's ready to sign."

  Brenna's fingers closed around the pen, then she slid it away from her.

  "In a minute," Cole said quietly. "She has the right to understand the possible consequences of this."

  "What consequences?" she asked, her voice little more than a whisper.

  Her query was lost under Bates's imperative tone. "There's only one that matters, boy! She doesn't have the money. No money, no release. If she's got a problem, let her lawyer handle it."

  Cole's gaze blistered over Harvey Bates, his patience with the man gone, before he turned to John Miller. "So handle it. She asked. Tell her."

  Miller pushed his chair away from the table, gave Brenna a frowning glance, and turned to Cole. "It's the agreement you said you had to have, Cassidy. My client—"

  "I want to know what consequences Mr. Cassidy is talking about, John," Brenna interrupted, all traces of her earlier huskiness gone.

  "Are you changing your mind?" Miller asked her. The question might have been solicitous. Instead it was belligerent. "When we met yesterday, you just wanted—"
<
br />   "What is he talking about? Specifically?"

  Miller scratched his nose. "He's referring to a clause that protects Bates in the event you have trouble paying off the settlement."

  Brenna cut her lawyer off with a small wave of her hand and focused her attention on Cole. "Protects Mr. Bates how?"

  "Paragraph six is a confession that you intended to commit fraud when that check was written," Cole said, giving her the stark truth that her attorney refused to spell out for her.

  A tiny muscle twitched at the corner of her mouth. "You mean as in going-to-jail fraud?"

  Cole nodded. He felt like a bully picking on the smallest kid on the block for even having drafted the language in the agreement.

  "It's not just the money, is it, Harvey?" she asked, her voice devoid of emotion, almost as though she already knew the answer. "I'm the example, right? To make sure everyone knows you don't mess with Harvey Bates."

  "Damn right," Bates drawled, his lips curved into a cruel smile. He pushed the pen back toward her. "Sign."

  "Take out that paragraph," Brenna said.

  "I want it in!" Bates shouted. "It's—"

  "No," she interrupted, her voice calm, a stark contrast to his outburst. Turning her attention back to her attorney, she asked, "Why didn't you explain this to me?"

  He shrugged. "I assumed you'd point out anything that bothered you."

  "And I assumed you were looking out for me." She stood up suddenly. "I assumed you were giving me the best advice you had! I assumed—" She stopped speaking, her voice shaking with anger.

  Her distress flowed over Cole like a cold November wind. Other people had lost control in this room, but it had never made his stomach tighten so painfully; he hadn't wanted to protect and comfort them as he did her. But he couldn't shield Brenna from the consequences of her actions. He could do even less to protect her from Harvey Bates's twisted need for revenge or John Miller's incompetence.

  Her eyes shimmered with sudden tears. With a poise that Cole admired, she raised her head and blinked the tears away. "I assumed you were doing the job I hired you to do. I couldn't figure out why you didn't— oh! Never mind! I trusted you!" Her hands balled into fists that she held rigidly at her sides. She closed her eyes and sighed. Her shoulders slumped. With all the fight gone from her voice, she repeated, "I trusted you."

  Cole felt the defeat in her as though it were his own.

  When her eyes opened, they were bleak as a bitter winter day on a Nebraska prairie. "You're fired, John."

  She unclenched her fingers and dropped her gaze to her hands. An instant later, she lifted her head and smiled, but her expression remained brittle—no softening or lightening of her features.

  "I made a mistake, Harvey. I wrote you a check that I didn't have the funds to cover. And then I make another mistake. I thought you were a reasonable man who understood that I had gotten myself into a mess, and with a little time I could get out. But patience isn't your strong suit, is it, Harvey? And, as for sympathy or understanding or a little human decency—those would never have entered into a business decision, would they?" She paused and stared at him, clearly waiting for him to look up. "You can't look me in the eye, even today, can you? You've won! Collect your damn money any way you can."

  "Ask your daddy," Bates said, raising his head. "Then you can pick up the pieces and get on with your life."

  "Go to hell, Harvey," she said.

  She picked up her small clutch, paused at the door, and turned to look at Cole. He met her gaze squarely, more pleased than he should have been that she had taken matters into her own hands. He doubted another attorney could salvage anything out of the case for her, but she couldn't do worse than John Miller.

  Seconds ticked by.

  Cole wondered again what she'd look like smiling. Really smiling. Ah, Brenna, why couldn't I have met you some other way?

  Her attention shifted to Miller, who squirmed under her scrutiny. When her stare shifted to Bates, his color rose within the beat of a second, he dropped his gaze. She looked at him a long moment before her eyes returned to Cole.

  He sensed just how betrayed she felt, knew he had been a part of it, and he hated the association. Without a word, she walked through the door and shut it behind her with a firm click.

  One instant, then two beat by without a sound.

  "Well. You're fired, Cassidy," Bates said, mimicking her tone.

  "Too late," Cole replied. "In case you hadn't noticed, I already quit."

  Back in his office, Cole felt as though a hundred-pound pack had been taken off his back. Representing Harvey Bates was only the most recent in a series of cases that considered only the letter, not the spirit, of the law. The time had come to make a change.

  Cole stared through the window, mentally wording his resignation to Jones, Markham and Simmons. No more representing clients simply because they were assigned.

  He scowled, turning that over in his mind. The overload he had accepted from Peter Jones and David Simmons had been fine. So what was it with Roger's clients? Cole hadn't wanted to represent Bates. Even less had he wanted to represent the latest client Roger had sent him, a man accused of sexual harassment. He had an arrogant, misogynistic attitude—the man had probably done everything he was accused of and more.

  Cole sat down and pulled a yellow pad out of the lap drawer.

  Walking out is cutting off my nose to spite my face. He had been drawn to Jones, Markham and Simmons because of the reputation the firm had in the legal community. Harder to admit, but just as true, was that Cole liked the aura of power.

  There were practical things to be considered… Car payments and the two-story house on three acres that made him remember all the best things about the ranch where he had grown up. His house was far enough away from Denver's lights that he could see more constellations than the Pleiades.

  Cole had hoped his house would be filled with children by now. When he bought the land five years ago, the dream of family had been foremost. And he had met Susan Stranahan. Tall, cultured, well educated and highly intelligent, she had a fine mind and a body that he loved loving.

  She had career aspirations of her own that eventually took her to a Fortune 500 company in Chicago. Reluctantly, he had put his house up for sale, had spent time with her in Chicago. They had found a great apartment in the Near North Side. Trendy, upscale and very urban. Susan had loved it.

  Cole had wanted the lifestyle, because living there would prove to his family that he had made it. He had interviewed with a couple of good Chicago law firms and knew he would be offered a position. The final piece fell into place when his house was sold. The house where he had imagined the new trees growing into tall, shady ones. The house where he had imagined raising his children.

  And he hadn't been able to sign the sales agreement. A breach of contract that cost him thousands of dollars. Susan told him he had never stopped being a farm boy. In the end, she had moved to Chicago alone.

  Cole began scribbling notes on the pad, rehearsing how to ease himself away from Roger's workload without causing a breach. He filled one page, then another, his chaotic thoughts becoming more orderly under his forced discipline.

  "Cole, we've got to talk," said Roger Markham from the doorway. Code looked up and motioned the older attorney into his office. "I was just on my way to see you." He would have liked another few minutes to rehearse what he wanted to say, but also welcomed the chance to get his concerns on the table. "Have a seat."

  Roger walked across the office and wrapped his hands over the back of one of the navy blue leather chairs in front of Cole's desk. "Thank you. No."

  "Bates came to see you."

  "Yes. He tells me that Miss James left without signing the agreement. That you advised her not to sign it."

  "She didn't understand that she was confessing to a felony."

  "That isn't your problem. Mr. Bates is our client. My client. And I put him in your trust." Roger picked up a brass sailboat off Cole's desk. "It'
s his feeling you betrayed that trust."

  "I drew up the agreement he wanted." Cole set down his pen.

  "And then you recommended that Ms. James not sign it, didn't you?"

  "In actual fact, no!" Cole responded with heat.

  "Isn't it up to her attorney to—"

  "Her attorney hadn't done one damn thing to protect her!" Code watched fingerprints appear on the shiny sails of the boat. The boat normally reminded him of the exhilarating sense of freedom he felt sailing. Today, he was reminded of sudden storms, of hidden rock formations beneath the surface of the water.

  "That also isn't your problem."

  "What about justice? What about ethics?"

  "The court dispenses justice, Cole. Not you. Not me. As officers of the court, our place is to present information." Roger's arguments were as hard and clear as lacquer over brass. "Justice is not ours to hand out. As for ethics, yours are seriously lacking. I need some assurance this incident will not be repeated."

  "That's something I can't promise," Cole said. "I don't have any regrets about this."

  Roger ran a finger down one of the sails of the brass boat. "That's unfortunate. You failed to give our client your best representation … as required by your oath as an officer of the court. The same things you accuse John Miller of Mr. Bates believes you have compromised any chance he has of collecting the money due him."

  Code folded his arms across his chest, and tried to assume a calm exterior. Somehow there was a way to make Roger understand.

  "She doesn't have any money. She doesn't have any assets that I can find. She doesn't own anything that can be attached. No property. No car. She doesn't have a dime in savings. All she had going for her was her business—which is so deep in the hole, she'll be years clearing it up if she doesn't declare bankruptcy."

  Roger smiled. "Then at last you understand."

  "What?"

  "If this debt is recorded as resulting from fraud—"

  "I know, I know. It's immune to bankruptcy," Cole interrupted. "She has to pay. She gets labeled as a felon, and she could go to jail."

  "Exactly."

  "Never mind that it wasn't."