Текст книги "Vindicate"

Автор книги: Beth Yarnall

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Текущая страница: 6 (всего у книги 17 страниц)

Chapter 11 Cora

Something pretty. I don’t own anything pretty. I own useful and comfortable, and that’s about it.

Leo makes me leave the office earlier than I want to. He’s going to pick me up in an hour and a half. I don’t know how it got this far or why I haven’t stopped it before now. I shouldn’t be going on this date. I shouldn’t want to be pretty for Leo and I shouldn’t like him as much as I seem to. That last thought has me wondering again—how in the hell did this happen?

The other day I caught myself staring at him instead of at the computer screen. What’s the matter with me? He’s somehow wormed his way in through the cracks in my defenses. And the thing is I never saw it coming. There was nothing overt or forthright about his approach. He stole in like a thief and dismantled all of my defenses against him. I don’t protest at all when he takes my hand or hands me something I was just about to look for. I answer when he calls. I let him kiss me.

I pull up to my friend Jamie’s house and park. She still lives with her mother in the house she grew up in. Someone else lives in the house I grew up in. Some new family, pressing new memories into the walls and pushing my family’s out. Dad moving out during Beau’s trial was the beginning of the end. A few months later I came home from school to find a For Sale sign in our front yard. I never told Beau they sold the house. I didn’t have the heart to.

Jamie answers the door, chewing a wad of gum as big as her tongue. I don’t know what it is with her and gum. It’s some kind of oral fixation I don’t want to know the roots of. People say we look alike, but personality-wise we’re opposite in every way. Somehow we work. I don’t question it. I just roll with it.

“I’ve got just the thing.” She yanks me into the house and tows me down the hall to her room. It’s a mess—clothes everywhere. She pulls a couple dresses out of her closet and holds one up to me. “I like you in black, but not this one.” She tosses it on the bed and holds up another one. “This could work.” She hangs it on the door of the closet. “So tell me about him.” She does some more rifling through the racks.

“His name is Leo.”

Her head pops out. “Leo Nash?”

How did she…? “You know him?”

She snorts. “My brother played baseball with him. Girl, you bagged yourself a big fish if you’re going out with Leo Nash.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean he got drafted by the Pirates right out of high school, but he took the full ride scholarship to UCLA instead. Now I hear he’s in law school, top of his class. He’s already gotten a couple of job offers and he doesn’t graduate for another year. Plus he’s hot. Seriously hot. How did you meet him? Oh, right, his dad’s agency. Wow. Okay. This”—she shoves the dress she set aside back into the closet—“isn’t going to work. We need something special, sexy. Oh! I know just the thing.”

She digs around some more and comes up with a garment bag. “I’ve been saving this for a special occasion, but I think it will be perfect for you. Oh, man, are you going to knock him on his ass when he sees you in this.”

She pulls the garment bag away and I can’t believe how beautiful the dress is. I’ve never worn anything like it. I’ve never seen anything like it. I finger the fabric. The ivory Ultrasuede is buttery soft and surprisingly light.

She shoves it at me. “Try it on.”

I pull my T-shirt off and shuck my jeans. She helps me pull the dress over my head and zips up the back.

“Look at yourself.” She pushes me toward the stand-up mirror in the corner.

I turn from one side to the other, examining my appearance. The way it nips in at the waist makes it look incredibly tiny. There’s just enough cleavage that I’m not going to have to worry about bending over.

“I was going to wear that when I lost ten pounds.” She pinches her waist. “That was five pounds ago. It’s perfect on you.”

“I can’t.” I finger the price tag hanging under my arm. “This is new.”

“Shut up. Yes, you can. Oh! I’ve got the perfect shoes.” She dives into the bottom of her closet. After a few moments she comes up with a shoebox and lifts the lid. “These.”

Cobalt-blue leather slides sit nestled in white tissue paper. “No. I couldn’t.”

“Yes. Yes.” She takes them out of the box and shoves one into each of my hands. “Put them on right now. Do it.”

I slip them on and stare at my reflection. I’ve never worn anything so fancy and nice.

She bundles my hair at the top of my head with her hand. “You have to wear your hair up. Damn. You have no idea how pretty you are, Cora. He’s going to just die when he sees you.”

“It’s the dress. And the shoes. Are you sure, Jamie? What if I spill spaghetti sauce on it or something?”

“Don’t order spaghetti.”

“I can’t.”

“Wear it and the shoes, and we’re even. But you have to tell me everything that happens on your date. Ooooo,” she squeals. “I’m so excited for you.”

She doesn’t say it, but she knows this is my first date. Ever. I wasn’t nervous before she told me all that stuff about Leo. He was just Leo then, but now he’s like this unattainable, way-out-of-my-reach guy. I can’t do this. I’m going to call and cancel. No, I’ll text him, then turn my phone off so I can’t see his response and he can’t talk me into changing my mind.

“Don’t you dare cancel on him, Cora.”

I swear it’s like she can read my mind. “This is such a bad idea.”

“He obviously doesn’t think so, and neither do I. Go. Have fun. And then call me and tell me if he’s a good kisser or not.”

Heat creeps up my neck to my face.

“Oh, my God. You’ve already kissed him. Well?” She nudges my arm with her elbow. “How was it?”

I can’t speak. I don’t have words for how very much it was to kiss Leo Nash.

“That good. Damn. Good for you. It’s about time you got out.”

Jamie and I have been friends since the third grade. She’s the only one I have left from my life before. All of my other friends dropped me one by one until I looked around one day just after Beau’s conviction and realized they were all gone. And the odd thing was I didn’t miss them. I wasn’t the same person they’d befriended. I was someone new and unrecognizable. I didn’t understand the things they talked about. My life had taken a million-mile trip to places they never could’ve imagined.

“I don’t know,” I tell her. Because I don’t. I don’t know what the hell I’m doing dressing up. I don’t know how to act on a date and I don’t know what to do with all of the new information I have on Leo.

“Go. You deserve this. And I want you to know right now that if you don’t go out on this date I will never speak to you again.” She’s not serious.

“Why did you have to tell me all that stuff about him?”

“That’s what’s freaking you out?”

“Kind of.” Yes.

“He asked you out because he likes you. That says more about him than anything I could say.” She takes me by the shoulders and turns me toward her. “Go out. Have a good time. Get your lipstick smudged by a hot guy. You deserve this more than anyone else I know. Beau would be so pissed if he knew that you’ve turned your life into a shrine to him.”

“I have not.”

She glares at me.

“It’s not a shrine,” I insist.

“Go on this date and prove it.”

“I don’t like you.”

“I’ve had a crush on Leo Nash since the eighth grade, so right now I’m not liking you very much either.” She smiles. “Wear this dress and those shoes and knock him on his ass.”

“Fine.”

I take the shoes, the dress, and the earrings she pressed into my hand before sending me home. I spend more time putting my makeup on and doing my hair than I ever have in my life. Normally I’m pretty minimalistic, but tonight I add a smoky eye shadow that makes the blue of my eyes pop and a shimmery lipstick that makes my lips look fuller than they are. Even with the extra time I took, I’m ready fifteen minutes early.

As I stare at my reflection, hardly recognizing myself, I wonder what Leo is going to think. And then I wonder why I care so much. And then I think about Beau and it takes everything in me not to rip everything off, scrub my face, and pretend I’m not home when Leo rings the doorbell. This feels all wrong. I can’t believe I let Leo bulldoze me into agreeing to this date. Twisting my hands, I pace back and forth in my small apartment. Oliver sits a few feet away, his tail curled around his feet, watching me with his accusing green eyes.

I can’t do this. I pull my cellphone out of my purse to text Leo when the doorbell rings. Oliver continues to stare at me. The bell rings again.

I’m sorry, I silently tell Oliver. His gaze bores into me and I’m trapped by the condemnation in his eyes.

Leo knocks and I jump. “Cora?”

“I can’t leave him out there,” I tell the cat.

No response. His glare tracks me as I go to the door and open it.

Leo’s hand is raised as though he was going to knock again. His jaw goes slack and now I have two sets of eyes staring at me from opposite sides. I don’t know what to do. I’m caught between what I should do and what I want to do.

“Wow,” Leo finally says. His gaze is everywhere, taking me in, from my freshly painted toenails to the soft bun at the top of my head. He offers me a small bouquet of white roses. “These are for you.”

“Thank you.” I love the smell of roses. I wonder how he knew that.

He’s the most dressed up I’ve ever seen him, in a button-down shirt and nice slacks. His hair is combed back from his cleanly shaven face and I can’t believe how handsome he is.

We stand there in awkward silence, taking in each other’s appearance. I have no reference for what I’m supposed to do here. What is the protocol? Should I let him in? I should let him in.

Opening the door wider, I wave him inside. “Come in.”

Leo’s gaze stays glued to me until he passes. He stops abruptly just inside the door. “You have a cat.”

I close the door. “That’s Oliver. He’s not really my cat. He just lives here.”

“Cora.” His voice is soft with shock. “Is that Cassandra’s cat?”

“I found him outside her apartment a few days…after. No one wanted him, I guess.”

Leo leans against the door, looking at me like he just can’t believe me. I don’t know where to look or what to do. Somewhere behind me I know Oliver is staring at me the same way Leo is.

Leo reaches for one of my hands, untwisting it from the bouquet that I’m practically crushing. “You took him in.”

“It’s more like he lets me feed him.”

He puts a hand to my cheek and leans in to kiss me. He smells good. So good. I close my eyes and kiss him back.

“I don’t know how you do it,” he says, as he ends the kiss. “But you constantly surprise me.”

I can’t tell from his tone if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.

“That dress.” He steps back and studies me again, with that same kind of glazed look in his eyes. “Wow.”

“I should put these in some water.” I untangle myself from him, needing some distance. I wonder if I’ll ever get used to compliments.

Oliver flicks his tail and walks away. He’s not happy with me. I’m going to pay for this later, probably with a regurgitated furball on my pillow.

Leo takes a short stroll around my apartment. Such as it is. I was lucky to find this converted garage. It’s small, but it suits my purposes. I take care of the main house when the owners go out of town. In exchange, I pay next to nothing in rent. He stops to examine a photo of Beau and me that was taken just before Cassandra was killed. It’s my favorite pic of the two of us. I can see who we used to be before and I can almost remember how it felt.

I don’t have a vase, so I put the flowers in a blue jar I got at a garage sale and set them on my little dining table. They look pretty. I finger a petal. These are the first flowers I’ve ever gotten from a guy. How sad that is.

“Are you ready?”

No, I’m not ready. I still think this is a really bad idea on every level. But there’s so much expectation in Leo’s face I feel like I can’t let him down. Smoothing the front of my dress, I decide that I’ll see how tonight goes. It’s just one night. I can give him one night.

“Sure.”

He walks me to his car and holds open the door for me. His hands are a little shaky and I wonder if he’s anywhere near as nervous as me. That’s not possible. He’s probably been on hundreds of dates. I don’t hold that or his prior relationship with Savannah against him. He doesn’t owe me anything. It’s not like we’re a couple, anyway. We’re…I don’t know what we are. Whatever it is, it’s just for tonight. Tomorrow we’ll go back to the way things were.

Even as I tell myself this, I don’t believe it. I can’t imagine going back, and the truth is I don’t want to.

Chapter 12 Leo

Ho-ly. Shit.

I’m trying really hard to act cool, but Cora in that dress is killing me. When she opened the door I thought my head was going to explode. She did something with her hair—piling it on top of her head—making everything about her softer somehow. And her eyes, that intense, drop-me-to-my-knees blue, pinned me where I stood. I thought she was pretty before, but I was wrong. She is absolutely without a doubt the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen.

And she’s going out with me.

I don’t know what I was expecting when I asked her out on this date. All I know is that she is so far out of my league and she doesn’t even know it. I steal another glance at her. I’ve been sneaking looks at her all night. I’m not the only one. Every guy we pass gives her the once-over, making me want to punch him in the face. If I’m not holding her hand, I touch her back or her shoulder to signal that she’s mine.

Except she isn’t, really. We’re on this date, attempting to have a good time, but I can tell her mind isn’t entirely on what’s happening at our small table in the corner of the restaurant. I figure she’ll break sometime before the waiter comes to take our order and ask me what happened with Beau. What her brother is going through is as much a part of her as the blue of her eyes. I have to accept that. He’s the other person at the table with us. The invisible uninvited guest. Everything she does is a means to the end of freeing her brother. Even this date we’re on is part of it. I don’t kid myself that she agreed to go out with me because she wanted to. I’m holding information she wants.

She lays her menu down and I know this is it. She’s going to ask me about Beau. We can’t have anything that’s just ours.

She takes a quick sip of water. “I hear you play baseball.”

I stare at her for a moment. What?

“You used to play with my friend Jamie Osborne’s brother Matt.”

“Yeah.”

She fiddles with her water glass. “What position do you play?”

“Pitcher. Or I did. I don’t play anymore.”

“Oh.”

“How do you know Jamie?”

“We’ve been friends a long time. Since elementary school.”

“So you know Matt.”

“He tried to make me eat a bug once.” She has a hint of a smile, so I know this is a good memory. “I got him back by putting snails in his bed.”

“That sounds like him. Good for you for getting him back.”

“Do you ever miss it? Playing baseball?”

“Sometimes. I’m too busy now with law school. It was fun while it lasted.”

“What kind of law do you want to practice?”

At every turn she catches me off guard. This is such a normal, first-date kind of conversation I’m having trouble believing I’m having it with Cora.

“I want to work for the district attorney’s office here in San Diego.”

“You want to put people like Beau in prison?” Her tone takes a dangerous turn.

“I want to put guilty people in prison.”

“How can you be sure they’re one hundred percent guilty? I’m sure the DA who prosecuted my brother thought she was doing the right thing. Especially when she asked the judge for the death penalty.”

I’m in deep shit here, with no way out. I should’ve seen this coming. “I won’t be like that.”

“Why a prosecutor and not a public defender? The system could use a hell of a lot more good public defenders. I know Beau could’ve used one.” Angry, she holds up a finger. “Just one.”

“I can’t undo what was done to your brother, but I can make sure that every case I prosecute is a good one.”

She sits back in her seat and glares at me. She hates me now, I can see it. I’m lumped in with the asshole who sent her brother to prison. I have to find a way to convince her I’m not the enemy. I can do more good on the prosecutor’s side than the defender’s side. I know this. I have to make her know this.

“Cora, you should know me well enough by now to know that I will be better than the DA who sent your brother to prison.”

“You say that now and maybe you mean it, but when you’ve got a hundred and fifty cases that you’re expected to close with a conviction or a plea deal, you cut corners to do it. Did you know that close to seventy-five percent of all wrongful convictions are due to official misconduct, including prosecutors?”

“That’s not going to be me. Someone has to put away the bad guys, Cora, and I want to be one of the people who do that. They can’t be allowed loose in our society to perpetrate again and again.”

“And you’re fine with a few innocent people getting put away in the process?”

“Of course not.”

“It happens.”

“And dolphins get caught in fishing nets. But that didn’t stop you from ordering fish for dinner.”

Her mouth drops open and she glares at me like she can’t believe what a complete and total asshole I am. My whole body goes hot. I can’t believe that just came out of my stupid fucking mouth either. I’ve just equated her brother to so much debris that inadvertently gets swept up in the greater good of the justice system’s net. I thought Cora would be the one to ruin our date. But no, it’s me. I’ve fucked this up so badly I don’t see any way of recovering it.

And they haven’t even brought us our salads yet.

She snaps her jaw shut with a click I can hear across the table. Her lips flatten and the blue of her eyes is barely visible. I’ve seen myriad emotions on Cora. By far this is the scariest I’ve ever seen her. It’s worse even than her tears, and at the same time she’s so goddamn beautiful, glaring at me across the candlelit table, that I’m struck again by how fucking lucky I am to be in the same room with her, let alone out on this date.

“So,” she says, “basically your justice-system philosophy equates to: You can’t bake a cake without breaking a few eggs?”

“It’s not that simple and you know it. There is no black and white here. Our justice system is the greatest in the world and I have to believe that the vast majority of the people working in it are good and genuinely interested in seeing justice served. Otherwise what’s the point of it all?”

“A part of me knows you’re right, but the other part of me knows firsthand that our justice system is not just. It’s as flawed as the mortals running it. And when you involve people in everything from religion to our court system you invite greed, revenge, laziness, and ambition. People are selfish. They’ll put their own goals and desires before others in a hot minute.”

“Maybe I have more faith in humanity than you do.”

“You definitely do, because I don’t have any at all.”

The waiter appears at the table with our salads and slides them in front of us. “Freshly ground pepper?”

“No, thank you.”

“Yes, please.”

We can’t even agree on fucking pepper.

“Can I get anything else for you?”

We both shake our heads.

“Your dinners will be out shortly.”

The waiter is gone and so is the energy at our table. I’m not going to convince her to see my side and there’s no way I’ll ever see hers. We chew in silence, the clinking and clanking of our silverware unusually loud in the void. There are so many fundamental differences between us it’s a miracle we can stand to be in the same room with each other.

Cora sets her fork down and wipes her mouth. “What did Beau tell you?”

“He broke up with Cassandra because she was seeing someone else.”

“Did he know who?”

“No, but he said her friend Maisy might. I’m going to see if I can talk to her, maybe use the law-student-studying-a-local-case angle. I’m also going to try to take a run at Zelda to see if she might know where Mrs. Wheeler is.”

“What else did he say?”

“He said he gets phone privileges once a week and that if I have any more questions for him I should call instead of driving out there.”

“What did you say to him to get him to cooperate?” she asks.

“What do you mean?”

“You know exactly what I mean. What did you say?”

“He didn’t want to answer my questions at first. I reminded him how stubborn and relentless you’ve been on his behalf and that it didn’t matter what he said. You’ll never give up on him, so he may as well help out.”

“That’s not all you said.”

“No, but that’s between him and me.”

She eyes me like she’s trying to decide if she’s going to kick me in the nuts or punch me in the face.

“I got him to cooperate,” I say. “I thought you’d be ecstatic about that.”

“I am.”

“So that’s your ecstatic face?”

“No, this is my pissed-off-at-my-brother face mixed with my frustrated-with-you face.”

I laugh. She never does or says what I expect her to.

The waiter arrives with our dinners, sets them in front of us, does the usual can-I-get-you-anything-else thing, and leaves.

Cora stares down at her plate.

“Something wrong?”

“Fish doesn’t sound as good as it did when I ordered it.”

“Want to switch for my chicken?”

“Actually…yes.”

I swap our plates.

She looks so relieved. “Thank you.”

“I figured it’s the least I could do since I don’t seem to have a problem with breaking eggs and dolphin casualties.”

She pauses with a bite of chicken inches from her mouth. “I wasn’t exactly being fair with you earlier. I do know that you won’t be like the prosecutors who go after convictions no matter the cost.”

“Thank you. Besides complimenting my ass, that’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.”

She covers her mouth and laughs, deep-throated and sexy. This is the first time I’ve ever made her laugh. And only the second time I’ve ever seen her do it. I have got to get her to do it more often. Whatever it takes. She’s someone who should be laughing all the time. In the photo I saw of her and her brother at her place I could tell she once was someone who laughed freely and openly. I bet she never covered her mouth or somehow managed to look guilty doing it back then.

“You’re so gorgeous,” I fumble out.

She stops laughing, a bewildered expression replacing her joy. She looks down at her plate. “Thank you.”

She’s embarrassed. I’ve embarrassed Cora Hollis. I didn’t think it was possible, like not even remotely. She’s even blushing. This is a side of her I’ve never seen. I like it. A lot.

“So, cosmetology school?” I ask her.

“What?”

“You told that realtor you were in cosmetology school.”

“Oh, yeah.” She shrugs. “I had to tell her something.”

“Is that something you want to do?”

“Maybe someday.”

“Have you looked into it?”

“No. Even if I had the time, I don’t have the money.”

“Do you do your own hair?”

She nods. “And some of my friends’ hair too.”

“You must be very good if they’re willing to let you work on them without going to school.”

One of her shoulders goes up. “I haven’t melted off anybody’s hair yet.”

“Would you cut mine?”

“I could.”

“I’d pay you. I mean, I pay a lady now. I may as well pay you instead.”

She shakes her head. “You don’t have to pay me.”

“Do your friends pay you?”

“Or we trade.”

“So then why won’t you take my money?”

“With you it would be more like a trade. You got Beau to agree to talk about Cassandra. I owe you about twenty haircuts for that.”

Now I’m the one who’s embarrassed. “I didn’t do that to get something in return.”

“If you want me to cut your hair you’re going to have to let me do it for trade.”

“How about for dates?”

“Leo…” she starts.

I’ve taken it too far, but hey, it was worth a shot. “Just kidding.”

She looks at me for a moment like she’s trying to figure out if I really am joking or not. I’m not. Despite how disastrous this date’s been, I want to take her out again.

Somehow we manage to finish dinner and dessert without me pissing her off again and now I’m standing on her front porch with her. The moon is huge and low in the sky, hanging over us like a lantern. Cora by Moonlight. That’s what I’ll call this moment. I lean in for a kiss, but she stops me with a hand on my chest.

“I don’t think this is a good idea,” she says.

Yes, it is. It’s a damn good idea. “Why?”

“Look, I like you—”

“Oh, hell.” No good conversation ever starts that way.

“No, I mean it. I do like—”

I silence her with a kiss, backing her up against her front door. I pour everything I have in me into this kiss. I want her to know all the things I can’t say before she shuts the door on me, on the possibility of us. She kisses me back and I take advantage, using every ounce of skill I have to get her to change her mind. I want her to want me the way I want her.

Her arms wind around my neck and she brings me closer, threading her hands through my hair. It’s all I can do not to push things further than I know she’s ready for. I want to touch her. Everywhere. I want her to touch me. Bringing her tight against me, I use my mouth and tongue to say the things I can’t. The little sound she makes as she moves against me drives me crazy. If she keeps this up I’m going to break the promise I made to myself to go slowly with her. She’s not ready for everything I want to do to her.

I pull back with little nips and kisses along her jaw. She tilts her head, giving me more.

“Go out with me again,” I whisper, then bite her earlobe.

She makes a noise that I can’t quite make out.

I lick around the shell of her ear. “Cora,” I coax. “Go out with me again.”

“Yes,” she moans.

For a moment I’m struck with the image of her beneath me saying that over and over again. I put one hand on the door behind her, then the other, because if I don’t get my hands off her I’m not going to be able to stop.

I give her a hard kiss and push away from her, separating us and unwinding her arms from around my neck.

“Good night, Bluebird.” I open her door and guide her inside.

She blinks at me for a moment, then slowly closes the door. I make myself walk back to my car and climb inside. That girl is going to kill me. I force myself to start the car and pull away from the curb. You’ll see her tomorrow, I tell myself. And I did get the promise of another date out of her. Even after nearly blowing it with my comments about her brother.

The whole way home, what Cora said about prosecutor misconduct rolls around in my brain. I can’t get it out of my head. Somehow I have to prove to her that not all prosecutors are in it to close cases at any cost, including the DA who got the conviction on her brother. If I can somehow get ahold of the DA’s case notes and copies of her files, I can show her that Beau’s conviction was an unintentional mistake. He truly was a dolphin in the fish net.