Читать книгу Confessions Bundle - Jo Leigh - Страница 25

THE DEFENSE SPENT a week bringing in witnesses who testified to the character of the defendant. Employees, clients, even friends from Egypt. Juliet built a solid picture for the jury, a picture of a man incapable of defrauding anyone. A man who’d spent his time in the Cayman Islands living like the young married and financially modest man he was, not a man in possession of more than a million dollars. A man who was on the Islands only occasionally in between volunteering for weeks at a time in third world countries. Eaton James had sent money to help feed homeless children. Blake Ramsden taught them to feed themselves.

And still, the jury looked doubtful.

“It’s that damn bank account,” she told Duane late on the third Thursday in August. The trial had been going on for almost four weeks. If she didn’t win them over soon, Blake Ramsden was going to prison.

“What I know,” Duane said, lounging back in the chair across from her desk, “is that I’ve never seen you so emotionally involved in a case.”

She didn’t like his tone. “And your point is?”

“Nothing, Juliet.” He sat forward. “You’re like a daughter to me, you know that.”

She did, and acknowledged his statement with a nod. “But?”

“I just wonder if maybe your emotional involvement with this man is clouding your judgment.”

“You think he’s guilty.”

“I have no idea.” The older man ran a hand over his balding head. “What I do know is that you have a talent for finding the truth and for some reason, that talent isn’t helping you out on this one.”

Her friend and partner had never asked her why Blake, her client, had been at her house that day. He’d never asked why the little girl had run away. But she knew he was hurt that she wasn’t telling him.

If she had any idea what to say, she would.

But she didn’t.

ON THE SEVENTH DAY of testimony, when the defense was due to rest, Mary Jane insisted on attending court.

“He’s my dad, Mom,” she’d said over breakfast that morning. “He needs me there.”

Juliet might have replied if she hadn’t been choked up with tears that she couldn’t let fall. It was the first time the child had acknowledged that she had a dad. Until then, Blake had been a father in the biological sense. And, maybe more recently, a friend. Blake seemed to be capturing his daughter’s heart as surely as he’d captured Juliet’s. When Juliet said nothing, Marcie jumped in, offering to bring the little girl to the afternoon session.

Had there been any chance the jury would deliberate and deliver their verdict that day, Juliet would never have allowed Mary Jane to be there. As it was, she couldn’t justify keeping her away.

Blake had already lost eight years of sharing life with Mary Jane. And she was right. He did need her there.

All morning in court he was restless, and growing more tense as the minutes ticked past. Like her, he could probably see the writing on the wall.

And there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it except sit there and wait to be hanged.

She offered to take him to lunch, or to have sandwiches brought in to her office. He opted to drive out to the beach instead. She hated to picture him there, all alone, but couldn’t very well stop him from going.

She went to her office alone, instead. And spent the hour and a half poring over numbers and reports and statements that she’d already committed to memory frontward and backward.

BLAKE TOOK HIS SEAT for the afternoon session of court with more peace in his heart than he would have expected. He’d rather die than spend time in prison, but somehow, over the past weeks, he’d come to understand that there was one thing that mattered more than time, or prison, or even life or death. It had finally hit him an hour before, at the beach.

It was the obligation to be true to oneself.

He’d been true to himself when he’d stayed away three years longer than he’d planned—and when he’d come home, despite the difficulty his wife had had adjusting to life in one place.

The obligation to be true to oneself was why Juliet had had to have her baby on her own terms, by herself.

After weeks, months, years of searching, it had taken one walk on the beach with his back completely against the wall to show him what he’d known all along.

Real honesty meant following the dictates of one’s own heart.

He was already seated in court by the time Juliet arrived. She’d been planning to wait outside to walk Marcie and Mary Jane in. He didn’t turn around to see if she had.

But he did try to catch her eye as she slid into her seat beside him. She didn’t give him a chance. Something had happened.

Tight-lipped, she shifted in her seat as they waited for the call to rise. She shot up the second Judge Lockhard asked if she had any further witnesses. He knew that she had not. She’d already presented every piece of evidence she’d disclosed.

“May I approach the bench, Your Honor?”

Eyebrows raised, Lockhard glanced toward Paul Schuster, motioning both attorneys to come forward. There followed a rather lengthy consultation, during which Blake found it hard to keep his hold on the peace he’d brought in with him. One way or the other, he was ready for this to be over.

He could feel Mary Jane back there somewhere behind him. He suffered warring emotions knowing she was there. Her presence gave him a strength he didn’t know it was possible to have—a need to survive, just so she’d be okay. But it hurt him, knowing that his little girl was watching him like this, accused and on trial.

Finally, following something the judge said, both attorneys turned. Schuster, with eyes serious and mouth unsmiling, sat. Juliet nodded to someone behind him.

“The defense calls Private Detective Richard Green to the stand.”

Blake frowned, turned, watched a man he’d never seen before step forward.

To his defense?

The man took the stand. Agreed to tell the truth.

Coming back to the table, Juliet pulled a sheet of what looked to be mug-shot photos out of her satchel.

“Detective Green, can you explain what I’m holding here?”

“Yes, ma’am, that’s a printed copy of parts of a videotape taken at the National Bank in the Cayman Islands.”

The bank where Blake’s supposed account was housed.

“And can you tell me what’s significant about these particular photos?”

“That is the portion of film taken the day and time when Blake Ramsden opened his account.”

Juliet turned to the judge. “I’d like this admitted as evidence, Your Honor.”

Judge Lockhard glanced toward Schuster. “No objection, Your Honor.”

The judge nodded.

That was when Juliet turned, looked straight at Blake and smiled.

“Mr. Green, do you recognize the man in those photos?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Would you tell the jury if that man is in this courtroom today?”

Blake held his breath.

“That would be impossible, ma’am. The man in these photos is dead.”

Blake’s head swam.

Eaton James had opened the account himself, forging Blake’s name. Just as he’d forged Walter Ramsden’s name on the post-office box, and forged various other documents and investment agreements, as well as the names of principal signers of companies that did not exist.

Blake had figured all along that Eaton had opened that account. He’d had no idea of some of the other things the man had done.

And didn’t particularly care at the moment.

He listened, trying to focus on facts being revealed by Green, who’d just flown in from the Cayman Islands. It seemed James had taken the secrecy of the Cayman Islands a little too seriously. First, he’d thought he could hide his ill-gotten gains there in an account that could not be verified by anything other than a bank statement, which he’d manipulated to point the finger at someone else. And second, he’d thought he could shoot off his mouth there, too. Once Green had found James’s watering hole, just the night before, the truth had come pouring out, validated and verified by witnesses over and over again. It had taken him hours—and probably money—to get his hands on the tape.

James hadn’t lost money on Eaton Estates, he’d banked it. He’d purchased the land for less than a tenth of what he’d shown in the investment agreement, for less than a tenth of what he’d charged his investors. True, the original investment had gone sour, but Eaton had that extra money no one knew about. And when Walter Ramsden had started to ask questions, James had offered to prove his integrity by paying the man back every cent he’d invested, to keep Ramsden from nosing around.

That explained those checks James had written to Blake’s father. Payoff, not blackmail. James must’ve had a great laugh at Ramsden for turning around and sending every dime of that money to Honduras to feed those hungry children—who were the first and only children to have benefited from the Eaton Estates deal.

Blake tried to pay attention to the rest, to focus on the answers that had nearly driven him insane with their elusiveness. But they just didn’t seem to matter anymore.

He wished Juliet would finish up with her witness and come sit beside him.

She did, and the moment her gaze met his, when that old connection flared between them, was as sweet as any he’d known.

Until, two minutes later, when he heard the words, “Case dismissed.”

He felt like jumping up, whooping and hollering like a kid, but he couldn’t seem to move. Afraid he might do something really stupid, like cry, he sat there, his arms heavy against the arms of his chair, and blinked a couple of times.

It was all the time it took for Mary Jane to come hurtling forward and fling herself on top of him.

“We did it!” she cried, hugging him.

It was the first time he’d ever felt those tiny arms around him.

Tears slowly dripped down his face.

JULIET STOOD and watched while the courtroom quickly cleared out, reporters following Paul Schuster through the back door. She tried not to watch her daughter in Blake’s arms. Tried not to be jealous. Tried not to need to be there, too.

Marcie, who’d come forward behind Juliet, nudged her. “I guess this is as good a time as any to tell you I’m getting married.”

Juliet had suspected as much, and was scared to death of what Marcie’s future would bring her.

She pulled her twin into her arms and held on. “Be happy, Marce.”

Marcie hugged back, tightly, and then leaned back to look Juliet square in the eye. “I am, Jules. For the first time since Mom died, I feel genuinely happy.”

“Did you tell her?” Mary Jane piped up from her father’s arms. Blake had risen and held the little girl high on his suited hip, as though she were little more than a toddler. The sight took Juliet’s breath away. Her daughter had a dad. And seemed to be perfectly happy about it. Mary Jane might be tough, but Blake was tougher. Her mother could have told her that.

“Yes,” Marcie said, the smile on her face going on and on. She rubbed her stomach and though she wasn’t really showing yet, Juliet felt another twinge of envy. Marcie was going to have it all. Mary Jane was going to have it all. Blake was going to have it all.

And Juliet had robbed herself of everything she’d ever wanted.

“So then.” With one arm hooked around her father’s neck, Mary Jane pulled her mother over to them in the now deserted courtroom. “Now that Daddy knows everything about the bad guys, aren’t you guys going to quit lying and just admit that even if you’re mad you really love each other and want us to be a family?”

Juliet choked. And tried not to cry. Her emotions were on overload.

“If I have to have a father, that’d be okay, but there’s no way I’m going to be a split.”

“It’s not that easy, sweetie,” Juliet said, hating the fear she heard behind Mary Jane’s attempt at confidence.

Blake looked at her, at their daughter, and then back at her. “I think it might be.”

She stopped. Stared. Afraid to believe.

“You did what you had to do,” he said, his gaze intent while his daughter looked from one to the other. “You were being true to yourself, and that’s integrity at its core.”

Her eyes filled with tears then, even though she was still in court. “What are you saying?”

He glanced from the child to Juliet again. “Our daughter said it’s time to admit that we love each other.”

She tried to speak. And couldn’t.

“I always tell the truth,” he finished.

“So does Mom,” Mary Jane asserted.

Marcie laughed out loud.

“So I guess this means it’s official,” Mary Jane said. “We should get married before school starts so that I can finally quit getting so mad every time someone says something about dads.”

MUCH LATER THAT NIGHT, on a blanket on the beach behind Juliet’s cottage, Blake lay with Juliet beside him, his arm cradling her head, while they looked up at the stars.

“I want to know everything about her.”

“I have scrapbooks with pictures and journal entries for every major event,” she told him. “I told myself I’d send them to you when she turned eighteen.”

He couldn’t get upset with that. He understood that those books were Juliet’s way of keeping him with her when her fear was forcing him away. Her fears, her life’s experiences and conditioning—his choices—had forced her to raise their daughter alone. But her heart had insisted that she share the time with him anyway.

“When does school start?” he asked.

“In a couple of weeks.”

The cool breeze coming in from the ocean felt glorious on his heated skin.

“Doesn’t give us long to plan a wedding.”

“Flights go from San Diego to Vegas every hour.”

“Can you get off work tomorrow?”

“At the moment, I just lost my biggest client,” she told him, sounding as if she was grinning. “How about you?”

“I’d already cleared my calendar in case of an extended vacation.”

Juliet didn’t say anything and he wondered if she’d come up with some other challenge to block her trip to happiness. Whatever it was, he wasn’t going to let her do it twice.

“I know we said we’d wait, but I can’t,” she finally said, her voice fraught with pain.

He turned to look at her. “Wait for what?”

“This.”

With a heavy groan, she rolled on top of him. “I just can’t wait anymore.” Very slowly she lowered her head to his, opened her mouth and took them both back nine long years—to a beach and a night and a moment that they had never forgotten.

No one had ever been like Juliet, nothing like the way he felt in her arms. Or she in his.

“Mary Jane,” he muttered when he could form a coherent thought.

“Is a very sound sleeper.”

Blake didn’t stop for another thought until the dawn was coming up over the ocean.

“We’ve done it again,” Juliet said, sitting beside him on the blanket with her recently donned clothes skewed and wrinkled.

He hoped so. God, he hoped so. Including the very same consequences they’d had nine years before.

Only this time, Daddy would know.