Chương 2
Richard’s attorney closed his eyes for a fraction of a second.
“Yes.”
Chloe unclasped the necklace.
The gold chain trembled once between her fingers.
Emily watched her remove it.
The gesture should have satisfied something.
It did not.
Chloe placed the necklace carefully on the defense table as though it might burn her.
Emily heard herself speak before Arthur could stop her.
“You didn’t erase me,” she said. “You documented yourself.”
Richard looked at her.
For the first time in nearly two years, she saw something in his face that had never been there during their marriage.
Fear without control.
Judge Hale slowly removed her glasses.
Richard’s gaze shifted toward the double doors at the back of the courtroom.
The bailiff noticed.
So did the judge.
“Bailiff,” Judge Hale said.
The uniformed officer beside the bench straightened.
“Secure the doors.”
Richard’s head snapped back toward her.
“Your Honor—”
“Sit down, Mr. Vance.”
The bailiff crossed the room and pulled the heavy doors closed.
The latch struck with a hard metallic click.
Richard stood in front of his overturned chair, staring at the doors behind him.
That click stayed with Emily long after everything else became noise.
Court recessed twenty-three minutes later.
It did not end with handcuffs.
That disappointed several spectators who had apparently absorbed too much television.
Judge Hale did not announce Richard guilty of anything. She did not order him dragged away. She did not pound a gavel and deliver a speech about justice.
She did something less satisfying and more dangerous.
She ordered him to remain in the courthouse while the court reviewed whether his testimony and the newly authenticated records required immediate action concerning the temporary control of Vance Meridian and referral of evidence to the appropriate authorities.
She also ordered both sides to preserve every document, device, communication, corporate record, medical authorization, financial instrument, and electronic record relevant to the disputed transfer.
Then she looked at Richard’s lawyers.
“I suggest,” she said, “that no one interpret recess as permission to improve the evidentiary landscape.”
Arthur later told Emily that this was judicial language for Do not delete a damn thing.
At the time, Emily barely heard it.
She was trying to button her blouse.
Her fingers would not cooperate.
The first button slipped twice.
Arthur positioned himself between her and the gallery without making a production of it.
“You can leave it,” he murmured.
“I don’t want to.”
“All right.”
She missed the button again.
Arthur turned his back toward her, giving her a wall of navy wool and broad shoulders.
On the other side of the courtroom, Richard was arguing with his lead attorney in a whisper far too loud to be private.
“You told me the hospital records weren’t coming in.”
“I told you we were challenging them.”
“You said—”
“I said there was a basis to object.”
“You said she didn’t have anything.”
His attorney’s voice hardened. “I did not say that.”
Emily got the button through.
Her hands stopped shaking almost immediately after.
That annoyed her.
She wanted her body to behave with some consistency. Instead, it had chosen the least useful moment to tremble and then calmly abandoned the problem.
Chloe remained at the defense table.
The necklace lay in front of her.
She did not pick it up.
When Emily finally looked over, Chloe met her eyes.
Neither woman spoke.
Chloe had a face that cameras liked: wide dark eyes, high cheekbones, glossy brown hair shaped into waves that appeared effortless and certainly were not. Emily had disliked her before meeting her, which she considered unfair and had done anyway.
Arthur had warned her not to make the case about the affair.
“The affair matters to you,” he had said. “It matters to motive in limited ways. It does not prove the share transfer was fraudulent.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“I can hate her and still understand evidence.”
Arthur had stared at her.
“What?”
“That sounded almost like something I would say.”
“You’re a bad influence.”
He had smiled.
That had been two months ago.
Now Chloe looked less glamorous than tired.
She pointed at the necklace.
“I didn’t know,” she said.
Emily’s first response rose quickly and meanly.
You knew enough.
She swallowed it.
Chloe continued.
“He said it was his mother’s.”
Richard turned.
“Chloe.”
She flinched.
The movement was almost invisible.
Emily saw it anyway.
Richard saw that she saw.
Something moved between the three of them then, something too complicated to be called recognition. Emily had spent years believing nobody else could understand how Richard created fear without appearing angry. He had never needed to throw things every time. He could produce obedience with a lowered voice, a prolonged silence, the right glance across a dinner table.
Chloe looked down.
“I thought his mother gave it to him.”
“Chloe,” Richard said again.
This time his attorney caught his sleeve.
“Stop talking.”
Richard pulled his arm free.
Arthur touched Emily lightly at the elbow.
“Conference room.”
“I want my necklace.”
“I know.”
“She took it off.”
“I see it.”
“I want it.”
Arthur studied her face.
He was not her father, though he sometimes looked at her with the patience of a man who had raised three difficult daughters and survived their adolescence.
“We’ll have the bailiff secure it.”
“It’s mine.”
“And if you walk over there and take it from their table during a preservation order, I will develop an eye twitch that may never resolve.”
Despite herself, Emily laughed.
It was one short, inappropriate sound.
Chloe looked up.
Richard stared at Emily as if laughter, under the circumstances, constituted treason.
That made it worse.
Emily covered her mouth.
Arthur’s expression remained grave for approximately two seconds.
Then he said, “Conference room.”
She followed him.
May you like
The room the court had assigned them was narrow, over-air-conditioned, and furnished with a table designed to make everyone feel vaguely municipal. Emily sat in the corner and stared at a stain on the carpet shaped like Florida.
Arthur closed the door.
