Vinnie and I worked long days and nights. The other associates scurried away from me in fear, practically running for cover whenever they saw me coming down the hall. Word was that I'd somehow gotten worse. Whispers in the break room and frightened glances never bothered me. After all, I was the bad bitch. I had no time or inclination to try to be anything different. I'd destroyed any chance my associates had of getting out from under my iron fist when I first dialed Washington's number. So, as far as I was concerned, they could continue to scurry and plot about how to avoid my ire. Be a-fucking-fraid.
As the case wore on, we had a smattering of hearings over small things, like exhibit lists and witness orders. I didn't file anything that would hold up progress.
I got sick before every hearing. My lunch was never safe when I knew that afternoon held a run-in with Lincoln. I wasn't scared, and I certainly didn't fear him; it was something else. Shame, maybe? Shame that when he saw me now, he really saw me-all the ugliness and pettiness that had been hidden by my manipulation now out on display.
Every time I caught a glimpse of him, it was like someone had punched me in the solar plexus. The wind went out of me, and I couldn't focus for a moment. Then I would fight the feeling away and pretend like everything was fine.
The tables had turned. Lincoln never met my eye. It was as if I no longer existed to him, as if I were beneath his notice, not good enough. Some of that may have been projecting, but the fact remained that he couldn't stand to look at me. I couldn't blame him for it. I deserved his censure or worse.
When the hearings were over, he would walk out, never looking back. I would let him go. I had to. There was nothing I could say, nothing I would say. I made my choice. Wrongly or rightly, my path was laid out ahead of me, leading ever onward, though definitely not upward.
After long nights at the office, I would get takeout and go home, tired, beaten, and solitary. I would drink lonely, not alone. I never set foot in the Docket Call. I missed Jonesy and Wood, but I didn't have the balls to set foot on their turf. I wondered if Lincoln talked about me to them now, wondered if they shared tales about how the bad bitch burned them every chance she got. How she couldn't be trusted, no matter what she did or said. How every word out of her mouth was a lie.
The trial date moved ever closer, 120 days gone in a flash. The week before jury selection was to begin, we argued our evidentiary motions. Wash was back in town, though his job was to sit at the counsel table and look pretty more than anything else.
"Ms. Pallida, what motions do you have for the Government?"
I strode up to the podium in the center of the well. Lincoln took his now-customary place against the jury box, arms crossed over his chest. I meant to glance and look away, but something on his face caught my eye-a neat row of small bandages running along his nose. I stared harder, noticing the shadow along his jaw and the dark discoloration under his left eye. He'd been fighting. I had driven him back to the darkest time in his life and left him there. I swallowed my self-loathing. There was no turning back now. Not anymore.
Still, he didn't look at me.
"Yes, Judge, I would first like to move to disqualify the accounting expert proffered by the Government. Mr. Rains does not have a PhD and has never served as an expert witness in any case. His methods are suspect at best. Because he has no qualifications to actually testify as an expert, case law is clear that he should not be qualified as such."
"Mr. Granade, well, Lincoln." Judge Crane glanced to Wash and back to me. "Response?"
"Mr. Rains does not have a formal PhD, no. However, he's worked as an accountant for the past decade. He has an undergraduate degree in accounting, and his reports were done in accordance with GAAP principles. The fact that he's never testified as an expert witness before is, I think, a good thing. He's not a professional witness who will spin his story according to however counsel, like Ms. Pallida, tells him to spin it. His reports are solid."
"First, Judge Crane, I take issue with Mr. Granade's implication-"
"It wasn't implied." Lincoln finally looked at me. What I saw in his eyes was rage, the anger he'd told me about while he held me in his arms. He kept it controlled, for now. Even his words, though they stung, were delivered in a monotone. He was right about his past, how he'd changed. He controlled the rage. It didn't control him.
"Judge, I can't allow him to stand here and impugn my character like this. We have proffered experts with advanced degrees and myriad experience in testifying about the facts of cases. They have the experience and ability to properly perform forensic accounting in accordance with the generally accepted accounting-"