Guilty as Sin

by Tami Hoag

  “And I'm not one of them.”

  “Would you want to be? You've got priorities of your own. I doubt I'm one of them.”

  “Not so,” he said. “I believe I made my interest in you clear from the first.”

  “Your interest in me as a player,” Ellen clarified.

  “You still don't trust me,” he charged.

  “You know the position I'm in,” she said, stepping around the heart of the issue. “You were an attorney, you should know better than to take it personally.”

  “That's a little hard to do, all things considered,” he said with a sarcastic laugh. “I thought we were past the cover-your-ass stage. You know, I've already seen yours from some very intimate angles.”

  “Thank you for pointing that out,” Ellen said sharply, her temper fraying down to the nub. “Would you care to see it again so you can describe it accurately in chapter nineteen?”

  “Jesus Christ, you are so—” He broke off, clamping his teeth down on his temper, reining back the wrong words before they could make a bad situation worse. “Dammit, Ellen, don't you know I wouldn't do anything to hurt you?”

  “No, I don't know!” she shot back. “I know you're the one who keeps warning me away and then pulling me back until I feel like a paddle ball. I know your stated purpose in coming to Deer Lake, and I've made it very clear that I hate it. I know you went to law school with Tony Costello, but you claim you don't know him. You pretend to be my friend, then get pissed off when I don't let you in on what you know damn well has to be confidential. You walk into my life out of the shadows like a stalker, then tell me you want to keep me safe. What the hell am I supposed to think about you?”

  The question lay between them like a gauntlet. Ellen waited for him to take it up. Neither of them moved. He stood with his hands jammed at the waist of his jeans, eyes narrowed, mouth set in an uncompromising line.

  “I've known you a week,” she murmured. “A week. One of the worst damn weeks of my life. What am I supposed to think? That you're a hero? That I should trust you? Do you know what happened the last time I trusted a man who said he was my friend, who said he understood?

  “He took that trust and used it, used me to buy himself some power. A rapist walked free.”

  “Fitzpatrick?” Jay whispered.

  “His victim was counting on my team. Art Fitzpatrick had destroyed her life, and he walked away from that like it was nothing, because I was stupid enough to trust the wrong man. Tuesday I get to stand across a courtroom from that man, knowing he'll stop at nothing to get what he wants.”

  “Costello.”

  He closed his eyes and muttered the name like a curse. The puzzle pieces he had been playing with for a week fell into place. He had known about the Fitzpatrick debacle, of course, but there had been no direct connection to Costello. Costello hadn't represented Fitzpatrick. But he sure as hell would have courted Fitzpatrick and his counsel for future reference. And he had gone through Ellen to do it. That son of a bitch.

  “He'll do whatever he has to do to win a case or anything else he happens to want.”

  “And did he want you? Is that what this is really all about, Ellen? Costello fucked you over figuratively and literally?”

  The words exchanged in anger Friday night came back to him now. Costello had betrayed Ellen, and Costello was here, Wright's attorney of choice—a choice made after Ellen had been given the case, a choice made after Jay himself had come into the picture. Christ almighty, no wonder she was paranoid.

  And what do you do, Brooks? Jerk her around like a goddamn rag doll.

  He had played on her emotions, purposely kept her off balance in the attempt to get what he wanted—the story, the inside track . . . the woman; this woman who stood before him with her defenses worn thin, her pride held up like a shield.

  “How's that for an extra twist to your plot, Mr. Brooks?” she said bitterly. “Maybe you'd rather write that story. Maybe you'd rather exploit those people, though I don't imagine sexually abusive corporate magnates sell as well as stolen children. You'd rather tap into that deeper vein of emotion, hit us where we'll all bleed. Well, congratulations, Jay, you managed to hit a double bull's-eye with me. You should be so proud.”

  “Ellen—” he began, reaching out toward her.

  She stepped back from him, holding her hands up in front of her, warning him away. “I think you should leave. The night is young. You can go home and write this little fight scene down while it's fresh in your mind. You can call Costello up and compare notes about my sexual performance. There's just nothing like firsthand experience when it comes to research, is there?”

  “Stop it.”

  “Don't give me orders in my own home, Brooks. I'll call that officer in here and have him throw your ass in jail.”

  She would, of that Jay had little doubt. Ellen didn't make a bluff she wouldn't back up.

  “Ellen, I'm sorry,” he offered. “I'm a son of a bitch. I admit it.”

  “And you think that somehow gives you license to go on being a son of a bitch,” Ellen said, shaking her head in disbelief. “As long as you warn people ahead of time, then they can't very well complain, can they? As long as you tell them up front you came to use them—”

  “I didn't come here to use you.”

  “Didn't you? Do you even know the difference anymore? You tell me last night didn't have anything to do with the case, but you turn around and use it against me in—in thinly veiled threats.”

  “That's not true. You're twisting this out of proportion.”

  “Am I? Let's see,” she said with cutting sarcasm. “Last night we slept together. Today I go to witness the hypnosis of my victim. And here you are tonight, looking for a little pillow talk and getting ugly when I tell you no. What does that add up to?”

  “So much bullshit,” he snarled, annoyed with her assessment of his character and angry because in his heart he knew she wasn't far wrong. He did want to know what had happened with Josh. He would have tried to get her to talk about it. But he didn't think of going to bed with her as part of the process, a sacrifice in the name of duty.

  “God, you're no better than that reporter who was screwing Steiger,” she said with disgust.

  “I do not prostitute myself for information.” Jay took a step toward her and then another, backing her up until a wing chair stopped her. “I've said it before: what happens between us is between us. Maybe we met because of this case, but I sure as hell wasn't thinking about the case last night. I was thinking about how hot you were, how soft, how tight you were around me.”

  With every word his voice dropped and softened. He leaned closer and closer until they were nearly belly to belly, thigh to thigh.

  “What we had last night wasn't about the case,” he murmured. “You know damn well it wasn't.”

  She almost wished it had been. But there was no call for righteous indignation. She was a grown woman who had made a choice. He hadn't seduced her; he had needed her. And she had wanted him. And a part of her wanted him even now.

  “You're a woman, Ellen. You're not this case. You can't just let it swallow you whole. Isn't that what you wanted away from?”

  Yes. But where did she draw the line . . . and where did he? Where did the case end and their personal lives begin? Could the two even be separated or were they as hopelessly intertwined as everything else in this web?

  “The choice doesn't seem to be mine to make this time,” she said sadly. “I walked away from it once, but the evil came to me this time, to this place. Costello came here. You. The media. Hannah's turned to me. And Josh. And the people I work with. And the people I work for.” She forced half a smile, half a laugh. “I'm surrounded.”

  “I'm not the enemy, Ellen.”

  No. He was one of those mythical creatures—sometimes good, sometimes bad, always shadowed and mysterious, his role unclear until the end of the story.

  “You know what I'm dealing with,” she said. “It's up to me to get justice for
these people. This is the toughest case I've faced in my career. And I'm rusty. And it scares the hell out of me that this son of a bitch might just outsmart me and walk. And you—you just show up on my doorstep because you want to have sex.”

  “I came over here because I was concerned about you, Ellen,” Jay said stubbornly. “And I'm not leaving.”

  The steel in his tone made her eyes widen. “Excuse me?”

  “Jesus, Ellen, someone blew up your damn car. You've been threatened. You've been singled out for attention from this lunatic and his pals and you've got Barney Fucking Fife parked in front of your house. If I can get in here without his knowing, your nemesis sure as hell can. I'm not leaving. I don't want to see you get hurt.”

  He didn't want to see her get hurt, but he would hurt her himself. He would be a villain in one sense or another. He would write about this case, turn it into a diversion to be read and tossed aside and left on airplanes. He would reduce her to a character, and Hannah and Josh, and Mitch and Megan. He would take what he wanted from this and leave. He had given her a part of himself, but he would still leave.

  “Point taken,” she said. “And I appreciate the thought. I'll have that dead bolt installed first thing tomorrow.”

  “And tonight?”

  “I'll take my chances.”

  “No,” he argued. “A chance is the last thing you're willing to take. It's smarter to walk away, play it safe. You got burned once, why risk it again?”

  “I took a big chance last night.”

  “And now you regret it.”

  “No,” Ellen admitted. “I just see the wisdom in not taking it again.”

  Jay studied her face for a long moment—the honesty, the resolve, the regret for this moment if not for the night they had spent in each other's arms. He might have tried harder to change her mind. He might have seduced her, but then every rotten thought she had about him would have been true, and for the first time in a long time someone else's opinion mattered to him. For the first time in forever he caught himself wanting to be something he wasn't. Noble.

  Life had become too damn complicated.

  “Please, Jay,” Ellen murmured. “It's not that I don't want to. I just can't. Not now. I'll have the officer come in and spend the night on the couch. Please go.”

  “You'd rather have some fat ol' cop eating doughnuts on your sofa than have me in your bed? Christ.”

  “No, but it's for the best.” She handed him his coat and started up the steps for the dining room. “I wish things could be different, but the case is the case, and I am who I am, and you are who you are. . . .”

  “And I'm no damn good for you,” he said. “Well, sugar, that isn't exactly headline news.”

  “Maybe after this is all over . . . ,” Ellen began, but she stopped herself. What was the point in saying it? They had shared a night and made no promises.

  “Say good night, Ellen,” she ordered herself.

  “Good night, Ellen,” he echoed, lowering his mouth to hers.

  He kissed her slowly, deeply.

  “If you decide to take that chance, counselor,” he whispered, “you know where to find me.”

  Then he slipped out the door.

  Ellen stood at the storm door until the glass frosted over and the cold chilled the heat of need on her skin. But the heavy sense of yearning, of regret, remained as she took her briefcase to bed.

  CHAPTER 28

  Monday morning brought an article in the Pioneer Press about the harassment of the Sci-Fi Cowboys; phone calls from the mayor, two state senators, and three congressmen; and the threat of a lawsuit. Rudy darkened Ellen's office door before her first cup of coffee could turn cold.

  “They have no grounds for a lawsuit,” Ellen assured him, rubbing a smudge of fingerprint dust from the gooseneck of her lamp. “Priest has his nose out of joint because his pets might turn out to be bad boys after all. Mitch had good cause to haul those kids in and question them.”

  Rudy had somehow managed to tie his necktie over the top of one collar point. Green and yellow, it looked like an oversize garter snake trying to choke him.

  “Ellen, that program has garnered national attention. Do you have any idea of the people who back it?”

  People with money. People with clout on the local and state levels. People Rudy had sucked up to, or would, at some point in his career.

  “I endorsed it myself.” Stopping by her window, he looked out, as if he expected an angry mob to be clamoring at the steps. He pulled a roll of Tums out of his pants pocket, thumbed off two, and popped them into his mouth.

  “It's a fine program,” Ellen said. “It wouldn't be your fault if it turned out to have some rotten apples in the barrel.”

  “We can't have them suing the county attorney's office, for God's sake.”

  “They're making noise, that's all.”

  “Can't you make a statement of some kind? Placate them.”

  Ellen bit down on a rebuke of his cowardice. “Rudy, I have every reason to believe those kids torched that Cadillac. I will not placate them. And what if it turns out Priest is involved with Wright in the kidnappings?”

  “He passed the polygraph. He was in St. Peter when O'Malley was attacked—”

  “We know Wright is the one who attacked Megan. That doesn't absolve Priest of guilt. He could be making this stink now for the sole purpose of getting us to back off so he can have room to maneuver.”

  “Good grief.”

  Ellen watched him stroke his hand back over his steel-wool hair. She could all but hear the oily wheels of his mind spinning as he tried to sort the dilemma into an order from which he could somehow benefit.

  “Relax,” she said. “The public will side with Priest. Sig Iverson will side with Priest. You can remain safely neutral. I'm the bad guy. You can't lose, Rudy. Unless, of course, Priest turns out to be a kidnapper and the Sci-Fi Cowboys fried that car.”

  She almost laughed as his face contorted through a full range of expressions from relief to panic. He couldn't seem to decide which one to settle on.

  “You can make the statement,” she said. Stepping up to him, she reached up and tugged his collar free of his tie. “‘No comment regarding ongoing investigations.' You have confidence in my abilities—this said with a grave expression that might leave room for doubt. Same old noncommittal song and dance. Fred Astaire couldn't do it any better than you, Rudy.”

  He scowled at her askance as he tried to catch his reflection in the glass of a framed certificate hanging on the wall. “You know that smart tongue won't do you any good when you run for office,” he said, snugging the knot in his tie.

  “For the millionth time, I have no intention of running for office.”

  He listened as well as he ever did.

  “Where is Jay Butler Brooks?” he asked testily. “I thought he'd be in the offices more. I want to sell him on an idea for a book.”

  “Your life story?”

  “Career of country lawyer,” he said, dead serious. “I've faced some fascinating cases in my day. Like the time the Warneky brothers tipped a cow onto their hired man. It seemed like an accident, but—”

  “You know, Rudy,” Ellen said, tapping a finger against her watch, “I'm sure it's the stuff of a blockbuster, but I've got to be in Grabko's chambers in five minutes. He's ruling on Josh Kirkwood's medical records. I'll update you later.”

  She hurried out of the office, pausing by Phoebe's desk only long enough to instruct her to lock up after Rudy. She took a back staircase to avoid reporters and had to squeeze her way around workmen's scaffolding, swearing under her breath as plaster dust rained down on her, dotting her navy-blue blazer like talcum powder. Brushing away the residue, she slipped past the law library and ducked behind a granite column to scope out the situation in the main hall.

  Family court was in session. The hall in front of what had been Judge Franken's courtroom was clogged with kids and husbands and wives glaring at one another, county social workers and
attorneys, all waiting their turn before the substitute judge the district had sent. Beyond them, milling around Judge Grabko's door and spilling out onto the rotunda balcony, were the esteemed members of the press, waiting to catch first word of Grabko's ruling.

  Waiting to catch me, Ellen thought. They were steamed that the Pioneer Press had scooped them all on the interview with Christopher Priest, and they would take it out on her.

  “I'll run interference if you give me an exclusive.”

  Ellen jerked around. Adam Slater had slipped up behind her and stood close enough to touch. Dressed in grunge flannel and a letterman's jacket, he could have easily blended into the family-court crowd. His hair swung down into his eyes as he made a show of licking the tip of his pencil and poising it above his reporter's notebook.

  “You just don't give up, do you?”

  “It's a common misconception that Generation X'ers have no focus. So are you really going after the Sci-Fi Cowboys? They're supposed to be the big success story. Bad boys turned good, snatched from the jaws of sociopathy and trained to use their powers for the good of mankind. That's what everyone believes—notable exception: you.”

  “It's a wonderful program,” Ellen said by rote. “I hope it turns out the boys had nothing to do with the explosion.”

  “And the kidnappings?”

  “No one ever said they were suspects in the kidnappings.” She shot a nervous glance toward Grabko's door and the crowd in front of it. The natives seemed to be growing restless, and there was no sign of Costello. He had either sneaked in early or was waiting to make his entrance. She was screwed either way. Should have brought a deputy with me.

  “Routine background checks are being run on all of Dr. Wright's close friends and associates,” she said. “Now, I've got to be in judge's chambers, Mr. Slater. I held up my end of the bargain. It's your turn.”

  He scribbled a last line in his notebook, then tucked it into an inside coat pocket and slicked his hair back. “No sweat, Ms. North.”

  He strutted off toward the family-court crowd, drawing a bead on Quentin Adler. “Hey, Curly!” he bellowed, thrusting an accusatory finger in Quentin's face. “You and me gotta have some words, man. You screwed me over!”