Elise stared at him with wide eyes, stunned at what he was telling her.
“He threatened to take me to court and I wasn’t sure if he would follow through with it or not until he filed paperwork for it. We knew he was going to take the case as public as he could to garner sympathy for himself, and try to get as much money from me as he could through a lawsuit. That would be the only way he could save the business he had created that meant so much to him. We knew going to court with him would mean that he would be slandering me all over kingdom come, telling the public that I was a racist, and that would be a truly devastating blow to me, to my company, to my life, to my public image. That was when Carlson decided the only way we could save my public image and convince the public that I wasn’t racist, was to take on a wife who was black, and to have a child with her. That’s when you came in.”
David took a deep breath and sighed. “It was a good plan in the beginning. Hire you on, marry you, have the baby, show the public and the courts that I am not a racist, and then when he had lost the case and gone his way, we could divorce and we would have a child to share. You’d be paid a good sum, and I would avoid the nightmare he was trying to put me through. But then I fell in love with you and everything changed.”
Elise felt her heart skip a beat. She watched him talking, and as he explained it all to her, everything became clearer to her, bit by bit.
He slumped down in his seat a little and gazed off into space as he spoke. “At first I didn’t want to tell you because we weren’t sure how it would go with his attempts to get it into court. And, we wanted to keep the lid on it as much as possible to prevent any backlash from it: tighter lid, smaller mess. That’s what Carlson said. He was right, to a point.
“Things progressed with you and Carlson kept filing all kinds of motions and things that delayed the date further and further, hoping that all the delays and court costs would be more than Jackson could afford and he’d drop the case against me and give it up. That dog went through his company and took up a collection from his employees for legal counsel and he found a black attorney that is bent on dragging me through the ringer and is representing him for next to nothing.
“He wants money from me, one way or another, and he isn’t going to let it go until he wins. Well, I didn’t say anything because we weren’t sure if we were actually ever going to get to court plus, because I had fallen in love with you, I must’ve known how deeply wrong everything was. I didn’t want to admit it to myself, but more importantly, I didn’t want to admit it to you. That is, until the judge put it on the docket and now there’s a court date and the first thing Jackson’s attorney did was give a press conference about it, which is how you wound up getting hounded by the reporters. They had his side, so they wanted mine. It became a sensational story to print, and our situation went from not needing to let anyone know about it to everyone knowing about it and me losing you in the process.”
He looked up at her and saw her watching him with a sorrowful expression and tears in her eyes.
“I can’t lose you, Elise. I love you. You’re my wife in every single sense of the word, and that is our daughter lying in that machine in there, and we are a family. No matter how we found our way to each other, we are together and we can’t lose each other. You two are the most precious gifts I have ever had in my life. Please say that you understand what happened and that you will come home to me. Be my wife, Elise, always.” He looked at her with pleading loving eyes and her heart melted in her chest.
She reached for him and they held each other and wept into each other’s necks, bleeding out all of their sorrows until they were stilled and quiet. He let her go and looked at her and she closed her eyes and covered her face.
“I’m so ashamed,” she whispered.
He looked at her, stunned. “Whatever for?” he asked in confusion.
She raised her face from her hands and looked at him fully. “I was so upset that I went into labor. If I had just listened to you at the house and given you a chance to explain, I’d still be pregnant and Jaden wouldn’t be in that machine!” She began to sob and he stopped her.
“No! No, that’s not it at all. It wasn’t because you were upset. The doctor said it was just the way your pregnancy went. I asked him about that because I thought it was my fault for upsetting you. He told me that it just happened. It had nothing to do with what was going on between you and me. Please don’t think that because it’s just not true.”
Elise took a gasping breath and looked at him in wide-eyed relief. “It wasn’t my fault?” she asked breathlessly.
He shook his head and pulled her close to him. “No, honey, it wasn’t your fault at all.”
They comforted each other for a while and he looked at her as they rose to go back to Jaden. “Will you please come home with me when you leave here?” He felt like his heart was in his throat as he asked, but he had to know.
She nodded. “I will be glad to,” she said softly, reaching for him and hugging him warmly.
“Thank you, Elise, thank you so much. I love you. I’m never going to keep anything from you again, I promise.” He buried his face in her neck and breathed her in, holding her to him as if she was his only connection to life.
“I love you, too. Always,” she whispered to him. They held one another for a long moment and then walked back, hand-in-hand, to their daughter.
***
The days went by and Elise returned to the house and to David’s bed, sleeping beside him each night, glad that they were together. They went to see their daughter every day and spent almost all of their waking hours with her.
Being in the hospital with Jaden had kept them away from the press, and Carlson had deftly handled everything that had come at them, part of it, without them even knowing it. Elise was able to get to her shops to check on them and was relieved to find that they were running like well-oiled machines in her long absence. All of her staff had refused the press entrance to her businesses, and all of them had made or bought cards filled with well wishes for Jaden.
It wasn’t until she was out in the public a little more that Elise discovered what kind of damage Marvin Jackson and his attorney were trying to do to David. They accused him of attacking Marvin first, rather than the truth, which was that Marvin had actually attacked David. They published stories about it being racially motivated and they showed David as a hater of darker skinned people and small businesses.
They were doing everything they could to bury him alive, and the more that Elise saw, the angrier she got. It weighed on her mind and in her heart, and finally, she came up with an idea that she felt would be just the thing to help her husband and save him from the onslaught of Marvin Jackson and his attorney. She invited Carlson over for dinner and sat with him and David, discussing her idea.
“I’ve given this a lot of thought and I want to do everything I can to help David.” She smiled at him and covered his hand with hers tenderly.
Carlson looked at her with raised eyebrows and asked, “I take it you have something in mind?”
Elise nodded. “I do. I want to testify on the stand in court that David helped me with my small businesses, that we fell in love and were married and now have a child together. That would disprove everything Marvin Jackson and his lawyer are saying.”
A wide grin spread over Carlson’s face. “Elise, that’s a brilliant idea. I’m going to take you up on that. I’ll want to prepare you as a witness, so you’ll need some coaching time with me, when you can. I know you’re both busy at the hospital, but we’ll need to prepare you. This is going to be an ugly battle and you can’t go in unprepared. How’s Jaden doing, anyway? Any news on her progress?” he asked looking at them both.
Elise could not contain her happiness. “She can come home in two more weeks. She’s much better; she is getting stronger and bigger every day.”
Carlson nodded and tilted his head with a smile. “That’s what kids do.”
David looked at Elise and shook hi
s head with a little grin on his face. “It means so much to me that you’re willing to testify for me. Thank you so much. You’re doing more for me than you could imagine, I really appreciate it.” He felt enormous gratitude at her thoughtfulness and loyalty to him. He could not believe how lucky he had been in finding such a good woman to be his wife, even though it had been as a business deal in the beginning. He didn’t know if it was fate, coincidence or just pure luck, but as he looked at her sitting there beside him, he couldn’t imagine his life without her.
Elise just shrugged her shoulders. “Well, we have to keep both of our businesses afloat. We’ve got a baby to bring home and take care of now!”
They laughed and enjoyed their meal together, discussing details of both Jaden’s homecoming and the court date that was getting closer every day.
***
Over the days that followed, Elise spent hours with Carlson and David as they prepared for court. Carlson ran through scenarios with her, practicing being on the stand and testifying. He threw every curve ball at her that he could imagine. After she learned how to answer, she felt as though she would be successful when she was called to speak on David’s behalf.
Every day, David and Elise evaded the press who were hounding them and they spent their free hours at the hospital with their daughter, bonding with her as best they could and waiting to take her home. Her health improved in small amounts every day. And, while she was improving, her parents finished up work on the nursery that adjoined their room.
Elise prepared her shops for her absence, making sure to hire and train new staff, and get extra chocolates made ahead of time. David settled as much as he could at his office. They both felt as ready as they ever would be when the day finally came to bring Jaden home from the hospital. They spent the first day with her at their home alone, and on the second day that she was there, they invited Sarah and other close friends and family over to meet their baby girl. It had been a long road and they had gone through so much to bring her into the world and their home. But it had finally happened, and for David and Elise, it felt like their dreams were coming true; their happiness knew no limits.
One week after Jaden was brought home, the red circled court date on their calendar came. Because they knew it would be beneficial, not only to Jaden to be with her parents, but also to draw sympathy from the court, Jaden accompanied David and Elise to the courtroom for the first day of the trial.
The courtroom was old and grand with wooden floors and railings, uncomfortable benches and tall narrow windows that looked out onto the city. The judge sat up on his pedestal and looked down at all of the people gathered before him while ceiling fans suspended by cables whirred softly overhead, doing nothing to freshen the air in the quiet room.
On the plaintiff's side sat Marvin Jackson, suited up and looking every bit a professional and respectable businessman. Beside him was his attorney, Dennis Beck, who had been calling all of the press conferences and slandering David as much as he could. Beck looked slick in his black suit and tie, with his hair carved backward from his face. He had dark cold eyes that looked like a black hole, just waiting to suck in everything he saw and keep it inside of himself forever.
Carlson sat at the defense table looking calm and unperturbed. He was in a navy blue tweed suit, wearing a lighter blue tie. It seemed to Elise that he looked approachable and welcoming, and she thought that the contrast between his look and that of Beck’s dark and almost sinister look was vastly different. Carlson did not write or flip through pages of notes, he did not look around nervously or lean over to David and whisper every few moments. He just sat there, still and quiet, looking ahead at nothing in particular, as if he might be waiting as a passenger on a train for his stop to come up.
David did not feel as calm as Carlson looked. He had felt ready to be in the courtroom until they had arrived, but the austerity of it dwindled his confidence into dust. He glanced around him subtly, taking it all in, memorizing every part of the room, thinking about what he was going to say when he was called to the stand, looking back at Elise (who sat behind Carlson and held Jaden in her arms). Sarah sat next to Elise, looking around the courtroom with narrowed eyes. Jaden slept quietly and peacefully with no notice of what was going on around her at all.
Elise gave David an encouraging smile and he appreciated it. Her eyes warmed the cold pit in his stomach and he took a deep breath and steadied himself, reminding himself that they had the truth on their side, and no matter what might be said by the plaintiff, they knew that they could prove the truth. It gave him a flutter of confidence until the bailiff asked all of them to rise and he announced the judge.
The chamber door opened and an older woman, with black and silver hair pulled up tightly into a bun on her head, swept through the doorway into the courtroom, her robe billowing out behind her. David felt his stomach drop to the floor and he reached his hand to the table in front of him to steady himself as he sat back down.
Court was called into session and Beck made his opening argument. He stated that his client had been in business discussions with David and the two of them had originally made verbal agreements that David would absorb Jackson’s company that would allow all of the employees to retain their jobs, current pay rates and benefits.
He then stated that David had begun to insist that if he were to continue with the arrangements they had already agreed upon, that some of the benefits would have to go, and Jackson acquiesced just to see the deal go through. David came back again in another meeting after that and insisted the pay for the workers be lowered or he would back out. Jackson again acquiesced so his employees could keep their jobs. Beck then stated that David had come back again and had insisted because he thought any company owned by a black man wouldn’t be successful no matter what they did, he would be breaking the company apart and dissolving it.
Indeed, Beck explained, David even told Jackson that he should be grateful that he was even willing to do that much for a black man, and when Jackson declined to go forward with the deal, David attacked him, calling him derogatory names meant to belittle and demean negroes, telling Jackson he had to take the deal. Beck stated that Jackson only fought back to defend himself, and Jackson had incurred several injuries, which had cost him a small fortune in medical bills, and his recovery had been a long and slow process, costing him time at his business.
He demanded restitution for not only the medical bills and the time away from work, as well as a litany of other incidental expenses, but all of the money David would have given him had he absorbed Jackson’s company, as he had promised to do in the beginning.
David was internally outraged that such slanderous lies were being spread about what had happened between them. He glared at Beck the entire time the man strutted around the courtroom, raising his voice and pointing his finger at David. Jackson tried to look as pathetic and abused as he possibly could while maintaining a professional demeanor. The judge watched all of it without any expression on her face whatsoever.
Beck took his seat and Carlson stood up, walking a few feet in front of the table he had been sitting at with David. His demeanor was calm, cool and collected. He explained to the judge in a steady and even voice that David and Jackson had been in discussions about a merger in which David’s company would absorb Jackson’s, that much was true.
However, after a careful examination by both David and his business team, it was decided that such a move would not be financially sound and David retracted his offer and proposed a modified offer in which Jackson’s company would be bought out at a much lower amount of money, all of the employees let go and the company dissolved.
He stated that when Jackson heard David’s offer, he went berserk, attacked David in his office and that Jackson’s injuries were no more severe than a blackened eye and a fat lip. He further commented that while David had not addressed the media or public in any way about the events of the meeting and the fallout that occurred thereafter, Jackson had gone to extreme lengths
to slander his client, and though monetary restitution was not being sought by David, he was demanding a public admission of statements of falsehood and an apology.
Again, the judge’s face was perfectly stoic and impenetrable. Jackson made loud scoffing noises at the close of Carlson’s statement but no one paid him any attention over it.
Beck called Jackson to the stand and began to question him about his business. He spoke about how he had built the business up from scratch and that it meant everything to him. He described how his employees were like family to him and he was willing to do anything to keep the business and the employees from going under. He made himself out to be the martyr, practically giving away his precious small business to a greedy corporation who would do nothing but dismantle it, and he himself taking physical punishment from the cold-hearted head of that corporation because of his color and his vulnerability in needing help to save his company from going under. Beck sat down.
Carlson stood up and walked toward him, nearing the stand at a close proximity and looking directly into Jackson’s eyes with a steely gaze.
“Mr. Jackson, you’ve said your business is the most important thing to you and that your employees are like family to you. Would you do anything to keep your most valued investment, that is your business and your employees, from being forfeited?”
Jackson hesitated and looked at his attorney and his attorney nodded to him. Carlson saw Jackson’s move and didn’t turn to look at Beck, but rather, leaned forward slightly and said, “Mr. Jackson, please answer the question.”
“Yes, I guess I would,” he said shortly.
Carlson kept his gaze steady on Jackson. “You’d do anything to protect your business and keep it afloat?” he asked.
The Baby Shower Page 25