Courting Trouble

“Yes, but what do you call the person who owns the business?”

“Like me? The owner, I guess.”

“Not ‘the boss’?”

“I never say that. It’s weird. Why?”

Of course. “Just a question. Now that you’ve gotten over the shock of me still drawing breath, how else can I help you? Is there anything you want to talk about? Has the media been driving you nuts?”

“This is kind of strange, don’t you think?” Gil looked with renewed doubt from Anne to Judy and back again. “You’re just going to pretend that this isn’t happening? That some woman didn’t get murdered? That this murderer, whoever he is, isn’t out there?”

Anne felt stung. “Gil, I’m not pretending anything. I am simply handling both. Doing both. Multi-tasking.”

“It’s my company, Anne. My reputation.” Gil’s expression darkened. “The mutual funds are watching, the VC guys. I’m risking everything here. I have to win, I’ve guaranteed it to my Board. I can’t go forward with less than a hundred percent from you.”

“I understand that, and you have it.”

“You’re ready to try this case, even with this murder thing hanging over your head? It’s a huge distraction, and now you’re telling me you have to hide from the police—”

“It’ll be resolved by the time of trial, Gil.”

“If not?”

“That’s not possible.” Anne knew she was losing him, watching him edge backward on the seat of his chair.

“I don’t know,” he said after a pause. “I just don’t know. It’s good that you’re alive—great, obviously—but it’s strange. I can’t let this get personal. It’s business.”

“Then think about your business, Gil,” Judy interrupted, and Gil’s head swiveled to her at the sharpness of her tone.

“What do you mean?” he asked

“The whole world knows that Anne Murphy of the all-woman firm of Rosato & Associates represents you. They also know that Anne was brutally murdered last night. How will it look if you fire the girls when they’re down? How’s that gonna look to everyone, to the press, and to your potential stockholders? Or to the women who end up on your jury?”

Gil paused. “I can handle the press and the shareholders, and my lawyer can ask the jurors about that when we’re picking them. He’ll just make sure the ones who think like that stay off the jury.”

“No, you can’t,” Judy said. “It’s not a criminal case, where the jury gets vigorously screened for impartiality. Voir dire in a civil case is routine, especially in Judge Hoffmeier’s courtroom. You came to us because we’re women and it may be the reason you’re stuck with us.”

Gil’s eyes glittered. “That’s blackmail.”

“That’s litigation.”

“Wait a minute,” Anne broke in before it came to fisticuffs. “Listen, Gil. This is all news to you, my being alive, my trying the case, and it’s a surprise. So why don’t you sleep on it and we’ll talk again tomorrow?”

“I don’t know.”

“Give me a day. You’ve known me a long time. I’ve done good work for Chipster, won almost every motion. We have them where we want them. If you want to fire me Sunday, you can. I’ll turn over the files on the spot.”

“Prudence is the better course,” Judy added, as if she’d been a Republican all her life. In red clogs.

Gil looked from one lawyer to the other, his expression impassive. “I don’t know.”

“Don’t decide now.”

“There’s one thing, Anne.” Gil rose to go, smoothing out his khakis. “I tell Jamie everything. She’s been with me every step of the way, from the beginning, even through the humiliation of this case. I’d like to discuss this with her, if I’m waiting a day. I trust her to keep anything confidential.”

“No,” Anne answered firmly. “Fire me now if you will, but don’t tell another living soul.”

Gil gave the table a resigned knock. “Okay then, I’ll call you tomorrow at nine.”

“Try after my memorial service.”

“Memorial service?” Gil asked, and even Judy looked over in surprise.

It was Plan B. Anne was throwing herself a memorial service, and she knew Kevin would find a way to be there. Then they could catch him, once and for all. “Yes, tomorrow at noon the office is holding a memorial service for me, at the Chestnut Club. It would be great if you could come.”

Gil snorted. “You want me to come to a memorial service and pretend you’re dead?”

“I’m sorry, it can’t be helped. You can’t stay away. The media will be there.”

“Jesus, Anne.” He walked around the conference table to the door, where he stopped. “Look, I’m not unsympathetic. I know you care about the case. But my priority is my company.”

“Leave that to me,” Anne said and pretended not to mind when Gil opened the door and closed it abruptly behind him.

As soon as the women were alone, Judy’s eyes flared with outrage. “I hate that asshole!”

“Why?”

“Aren’t you offended by what he said? That he hired you because you’re a woman?”

Here we go. “Judy, I’m not naive. Companies hire black lawyers to represent them in race discrimination cases. Rapists hire women to represent them in rape cases. Everybody hires older men when they want authority.”

“I know that.” Judy raised her voice. “The question is, doesn’t it offend you? It does me, even though I know it happens.”

Go for it. Anne braced herself. “But that’s not what’s really bothering you, is it? Because that’s not exactly what Gil said. He said he hired me because I’m a pretty woman. Frankly, he wouldn’t have hired me if I were an ugly woman, right?”

“Right.” Judy reddened slightly.

“And we both knew that, you and me.” Anne leaned over, leveling with her. “But you know what? It doesn’t bother me, because I find it ironic. In my mind, I know how bogus my beauty—my alleged beauty—is.”

“Bogus? What are you talking about? You’re perfect! Your face, your body, even in your new haircut. Men fall at your feet. You look like a supermodel.”

“I was born with a cleft lip, a unilateral cleft lip.”

Judy looked like she wasn’t sure exactly what that meant, and Anne sensed it would do her good to explain it, to say it out loud. She never had before, outside of a doctor’s office. It was her dirty little secret. That, and the fact that she’d been rejected twice for an American Express card.

“My lip, right here”—Anne pointed to the left of center—”was split halfway up to my nose, at birth. It’s the most common birth defect, and my case was relatively mild because the palate wasn’t cleft, just the lip. The vermilion, the surrounding tissue, to be exact.”

“Jeez.”

“Exactly. My mother, well let’s just say, didn’t have the best of reactions. She was a pretty woman and she wanted a pretty baby. One she could make into a movie star.” Anne refused to sound like a victim, so she shortened the story. “I didn’t get the surgeries I needed—lip, palate, even gum—until I was past ten. It took seven operations to get me to look like this, and by the end I felt like a science project. So when something comes to me now because of the way I look, I just laugh inside.”

“It must have been awful.” Judy swallowed hard, and Anne shrugged.

“I can’t take it back, my prettiness or my ugliness, and I wouldn’t. I just know that the world changed when I got pretty, and you’re right, lots of unfair advantages came to me. Men, clients. The manager at Hertz saves me a Mustang. The boy at the video store sets aside the new releases. Security guards at the courthouse run interference for me. I know how well I’m treated now, because I saw the difference. I’m a walking ‘before’ and ‘after’ picture. And I used to feel the unfairness, the resentment, and the jealousy. Like you do.”

Judy’s light eyebrows slanted unhappily.

“So I don’t begrudge you your feelings, and you don’t have to hide them from me. I feel more like you than