by Nora Roberts
“Yeah, it occurred to me. But I’m part of your life, and you can’t shut me out.”
“I may not have a life,” she shouted. “If they bind me over for trial tomorrow—”
“You’ll deal with it. We’ll deal with it. You’re going to trust me, goddamn you. I’m not a ten-year-old boy you have to protect. And I’m sure as hell not some spineless prick who’ll let you carry the whole load while I run off to my own tidy life.”
Her eyes went to smoke. “This has nothing to do with Lincoln.”
“The hell it doesn’t. And don’t ever compare us in that sharp little brain of yours again.”
Her face wasn’t pale now, nor was her breath even. The flash of temper meant more to him than a dozen words of love. “Let go of me.”
He lifted a brow, knowing the gesture was derisive. “Sure.” He released her, stuffed his hands into his pockets.
“This has nothing to do with Lincoln,” she said again. “And it has nothing to do with you. It’s me. Get that through your surplus of testosterone. I’m the one whose life is on the line in that courtroom tomorrow. You can beat your chest and howl all you want, that’s not going to change. I haven’t got that many choices left, Paul, and if I want to walk out of that door, that’s just what I’ll do.”
“Try it,” he invited her.
Incensed, she whirled around. He caught her before she’d reached the stairs. “I told you to let me go.”
“I haven’t finished beating my chest or howling.” Because he was dead sure she’d take a swing at him, he cuffed her hands behind her back. “Hold it. Dammit, Jules.” Faced with a tumble down the stairs, he shoved her back against the wall. “Look at me. Just look. You’re right about choices.” With his free hand he forced her head up. “Do you want to walk away from me?”
She stared into his eyes and saw that he would let her. Maybe. And if she turned away now from this, from him, she would always regret it. Survivors lived with their mistakes. Hadn’t Eve told her that? But there were some you couldn’t afford to make.
“No.” She pressed her mouth to his, felt the heat and the strength. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry.” His kiss grew more avid, more needy. “Just don’t walk away from me.”
“I’m so scared, Paul. I’m so scared.”
“We’re going to make it right. Believe it.”
For a moment she could.
Drake was feeling like a million dollars. Or at least a quarter million. Within twenty-four hours he’d have the cash in his hand and the world at his feet. He was dead sure Julia would go to trial, and, with any luck, be convicted. Once that happened—and with money in the bank—he figured it wouldn’t be to hard to get his piece of Eve’s estate. He resented Paul getting half, but he could live with it. With a good lawyer Drake was sure he could cop Julia’s share.
The law wouldn’t let her touch it. And anyway, where she was going, she wasn’t going to need it.
All and all, things had worked out fine.
Pleased with himself, he turned the stereo on blast and settled down with a racing form. By the weekend he was going to have a nice little stake to take to Santa Anita. He’d play it conservative, but with a few thousand on the nose of the little filly he had a tip on, he could finesse that first payment into the big time.
Of course, his backer didn’t know it as only a first payment. Drake hummed along with Gloria Estefan and figured he could milk his source for plenty over the next year or two. By then, his inheritance should come in. After that, he was taking off. Riviera, Caribbean, the Keys. Anywhere where the beaches, and the women, were hot.
He picked up a glass of champagne. The Dom Pérignon was an early celebration. He had a date to meet a sexy little number at Tramp, but the action wouldn’t start for an hour or two.
Christ, he felt like dancing. While he tried out a little conga, wine sloshed over his fingers. Gleefully, he licked it off.
He thought about ignoring the doorbell when it rang, then chuckled to himself. It was probably the lucky lady of the evening. Who could blame her for wanting to start things off early? Instead of meeting at the club, they would get things going here and now.
When the bell rang again, he brushed his hand over his hair, and on a whim unbuttoned his shirt. He had the champagne glass in his hand when he answered the door. Though it wasn’t tonight’s lucky winner, he toasted his guest.
“Well now. I didn’t expect to see you until tomorrow. But that’s fine. Just so happens I’m open for business. Come on in. We’ll do this over a glass of champagne.”
Grinning to himself, he led the way back to the bottle. It looked like he wasn’t celebrating early after all. “What do you say we drink to dear Julia?” He poured a second glass right to the rim. “Dear cousin Julia. Without her, we could both be standing in some deep shit.”
“Maybe you’d better check your own shoes.”
Drake turned, thinking that a great joke. He was still laughing when he saw the gun. He never felt the bullet that plowed between his eyes.
Spectators and press crammed together on the courtroom steps. Julia’s first test of the day would be to walk through them. Lincoln had instructed her on how to do that. To walk briskly, but not to appear hurried. Not to bow her head—it looked guilty. Not to keep her head back too far—it looked arrogant. She was to say nothing, not even the ubiquitous “no comment,” no matter what questions where hurled at her.
The morning was warm and sunny. She’d prayed for rain. Rain might have kept some of the curious and accusing inside. Instead, she climbed out of the limo into a cloudless southern California day. With Lincoln on one side and Paul on the other, she moved into the wall of people who wanted her story, her secrets, or her blood. Only the fear that she might stumble and be swept away by them helped her ignore the painful clenching in her stomach, the uncontrollable trembling of her legs.
Inside there was more air, more space. She shuddered off the nausea. It would be over soon. Over and behind her. They would believe her, they had to believe her. Then she would be free to start her life again. Free to take that one slim chance on making a new life.
It had been years since she’d been in a courtroom. From time to time during summer vacation, she’d been allowed to watch her mother or father work a jury. They hadn’t seemed like her parents then, but larger than life. Actors on a stage, gesturing, manipulating, strutting. Perhaps that was where she’d gotten that first spark to take to the stage herself.
But no, she thought. That had come through the blood. That had come through Eve.
At a signal from Lincoln, Paul leaned closer, took both of Julia’s hands in his. “It’s time to go in. I’ll be sitting right behind you.”
She nodded, her fingers creeping up to touch the brooch she’d pinned to her lapel. The scales of justice.
The courtroom was jammed. Among the faces of strangers she saw the familiar. CeeCee sent Julia a quick, encouraging smile. Beside her niece, Travers sat rigid, her face set and fierce. Nina stared down at her linked fingers, unwilling or unable to meet Julia’s eyes. Delrickio, flanked by his steely-eyed guards, studied her impassively. Gloria’s eyes gleamed with tears as she twisted a handkerchief in her hands and huddled under her husband’s protective arm.
Maggie, her lipstick chewed off until it left only a thin line of red around her mouth, looked up, then away. Kenneth leaned over her to murmur to Victor.
It was that look, that tortured, grieving look that had Julia faltering. She wanted to stop, to scream out her innocence, her rage, and her terror. She could only move forward and take her seat.
“Remember,” Lincoln was saying, “this is only a preliminary hearing. It’s to determine if there’s enough evidence for a trial.”
“Yes, I know,” she said quietly. “It’s only the beginning.”
“Julia.”
She tensed at Victor’s voice and made herself turn. He’d aged. In a matter of weeks the years had caught up with
him, pulling down the skin under his eyes, digging lines deep around his mouth. Julia put a hand on the rail that separated them. It was the closest she believed either of them could come to reaching out.
“I don’t know what to say to you.” He pulled air into his lungs and let it trickle out. If I had known, if she had told me … about you, things would have been different.”
“Things weren’t meant to be different, Victor. I would have been sorry, very sorry, if she had used me to change them.”
“I’d like to—” Go back, he thought. Thirty years, thirty days. Both were equally impossible. “I couldn’t stand behind you before.” He looked down, lifted his hand, laid it on hers. “I’d like you to know I’ll stand behind you now. And the boy, Brandon.”
“He’s—he’s missed having a grandfather. When this is over, we’ll talk. All of us.”
He managed a nod before his hand slid away from hers. “All rise!”
A buzzing filled her ears when the courtroom rose to its feet. She watched the judge stride in, take his place behind the bench. Why, he looks like Pat O’Brien, she thought foolishly. All ruddy and round and Irish. Surely Pat O’Brien would know the truth when he heard it.
The D.A. was a wiry, energetic-looking man with sideburns of gray on his close-cropped hair. Obviously he didn’t take the warning about sun exposure seriously, for his tan was deep and smooth, making his pale blue eyes gleam in contrast.
He had the voice of an evangelist. Without hearing the words, Julia listened to it rise and fall.
Reports were placed in evidence. Autopsy, forensic. The pictures, of course. As Julia watched the prosecutor present them, the image of Eve sprawled on the rug froze in her mind. The murder weapon. The suit Julia had worn that was streaked with a rusty-looking stain that was dried blood.
She watched the experts take the stand, then step down. Their words didn’t matter. Lincoln obviously thought differently because he would rise and object from time to time, and he chose his own carefully in cross-examination.
But the words didn’t matter, Julia thought. The pictures said it all. Eve was dead.
When the D.A. called Travers, she shuffled up to the stand as she had shuffled her way up and down the hallways of Eve’s home. As if she were reluctant to expend the energy it took to lift one foot, then the other.
She’d scraped her hair back and was wearing a plain, working-class dress of unrelieved black. She clutched her purse with both hands and stared straight ahead.
Even when the prosecutor led her gently through the early questions, she didn’t relax. Her voice only became more harsh as she explained her relationship with Eve.
“And as a trusted friend and employee,” the prosecutor continued. “Did you have occasion to travel with Miss Benedict to Switzerland in …” He reviewed his notes before he stated the date.
“Yes.”
“What was the purpose of this trip, Ms. Travers?”
“Eve was pregnant.”
The statement caused a ripple of murmurs through the spectators until the gavel was struck.
“And did she have a child, Ms. Travers?”
“Your honor.” Lincoln rose to his feet. “The defense is ready to stipulate that Miss Benedict had a child, which she gave up for adoption. And that the child is Julia Summers. The state need not waste the court’s time proving what has already been established.”
“Mr. Williamson?”
“Very well, your honor. Ms. Travers, is Julia Summers Eve Benedict’s natural daughter?”
“She is.” Travers flicked one brief, hate-filled glance in Julia’s direction. “Eve agonized over that adoption, did what she thought was best for the child. She even kept tabs on her over the years. It upset her something fierce when the girl got herself pregnant. Said she couldn’t bear to think about her going through all that she’d been through herself.”
Lincoln leaned toward Julia. “I’m going to let her go on. It establishes a bond.”
“And she was proud,” Travers continued. “Proud when the girl started writing books. She used to talk to me, cause there was nobody else who knew.”
“You were the only one aware that Julia Summers was Eve Benedict’s biological daughter?”
“No one knew but me.”
“Can you tell us how Miss Summers came to live on Miss Benedict’s estate.”
“It was that book. That cursed book. I didn’t know then how she got the idea in her head, but nothing I said talked her out of it. Said she was scooping up two birds. She had a story to tell, and she wanted time to get to know her daughter. And her grandson.”
“And did she tell Miss Summers the truth of their relationship?”
“Not then, not for weeks after she’d come. She was afraid how the girl would react.”
“Objection.” Lincoln rose smoothly to his feet. “Your honor, Miss Travers couldn’t know what was in Miss Benedict’s mind.”
“I knew her,” Travers tossed back. “I knew her better than anybody.”
“I’ll rephrase, your honor. Miss Travers, were you a witness to Miss Summers’s reaction when Miss Benedict told her of their relationship.”
“They were on the terrace, having dinner. Eve had been nervous as a cat. I was in the parlor. I heard her shouting.”
“Her?”
“Her,” Travers spat out, pointing at Julia. “She was screaming at Eve. When I ran out, she’d shoved the table over. All the china and crystal were smashed. There was murder in her eyes.”
“Objection.”
“Sustained.”
“Miss Travers, can you tell us what Miss Summers said during this incident?”
“She said don’t come near me. And I’ll never forgive you. She said …” Travers aimed that black, furious look at Julia. “She said I could kill you for this.”
“And the next day Eve Benedict was murdered.”
“Objection.”
“Sustained.” The judge looked faintly censorious. “Mr. Williamson.”
“Withdrawn, your honor. No further questions.”
Lincoln was clever on cross. Did the witness believe that everyone who said “I could kill you” in anger meant it literally? What kind of a relationship did Eve and Julia establish over the weeks they’d worked together? During the argument, which was born out of natural shock, did Julia try to strike or harm Eve in any physical way?
He was clever, but Travers’s conviction that Julia had killed Eve seeped through.
Nina took the stand, looking chic and efficient in a rose-colored Chanel. She gave her observations on the argument. Lincoln thought that her doubt, her uncertainty, was more damaging than Travers’s testimony.
“That same night, Miss Benedict summoned her attorney to the house.”
“Yes, she insisted he come right away. She wanted to change her will.”
“You knew this.”
“Yes. That is, after Mr. Greenburg arrived, Eve asked me to take the changes down in shorthand, and transcribe them. I’d witnessed her other will, and it was no secret that she’d left the bulk of her estate to Paul Winthrop, with a generous provision for her nephew, Drake Morrison.”
“And in this one?”
“She bequeathed a trust to Brandon, Julia’s son. After the other bequests, she left the rest to Paul and Julia.”
“And when did Mr. Greenburg return to have Miss Benedict sign the new will?”
“The next day, the next morning.”
“Do you know if anyone else was aware of Miss Benedict’s change of heart?”
“I really can’t say for sure.”
“You can’t say, Miss Soloman?”
“Drake came by, but Eve wouldn’t see him. I know he saw Mr. Greenburg leave.”
“Did she see anyone that day?”
“Yes, Miss DuBarry was by. She left just before one o’clock.”
“Did Miss Benedict make plans to see anyone else?”
“I …” She pressed her lips together. “I know that she phoned
the guest house.”
“The guest house where Julia Summers was living?”
“Yes. She told me to keep her afternoon clear. That was right after Miss DuBarry left. Then she went into her bedroom to call the guest house.”
“I didn’t talk to her,” Julia whispered urgently to Lincoln. “I never talked to her after that night on the terrace.”
He only patted her hand.
“After the phone call?”
“She seemed upset. I don’t know whether she reached Julia or not, but she was only in her room for a minute or two. When she came out, she told me she was going down to talk to Julia. She said …” Her troubled eyes darted to Julia, then back to the prosecutor. “She said they were going to have it out.”
“And what time was this?”
“It was just one o’clock, perhaps a minute or two past.”
“How can you be sure?”
“Eve had given me several letters to type. As she was leaving, I went into my office to start them, and I looked at my desk clock.”
Julia stopped listening for a while. If her body couldn’t get up and walk away, at least her mind could. She imagined herself back in Connecticut. She’d plant flowers. She would spend a week planting them if she wanted. She’d get Brandon a dog. That was something she’d been thinking about for quite a while, but she’d put off going to the pound to choose one, afraid she’d want to take them all.
And a porch swing. She wanted a porch swing. She could work all day, then in the evenings, when things were quiet, she could sit and swing and watch night fall.
“The state calls Paul Winthrop to the stand.”
She must have made some sound. Lincoln put a hand on hers under the table and squeezed. Not in comfort, but in warning.
Paul answered the opening questions briefly, weighing his words, his eyes on Julia’s.
“Would you tell the court the nature of your relationship with Miss Summers?”
“I’m in love with Miss Summers.” The faintest of smiles touched his lips. “Completely in love with Miss Summers.”
“And you also had a close personal relationship with Miss Benedict.”