The First Time (38 page)

“You’re late,” the senior Maclean stated, declining the invitation.

“Sorry. I had a last-minute phone call. It couldn’t be helped.” Jake faked a smile. Why was he apologizing? He didn’t owe this man any explanations. He was here, wasn’t he? Wasn’t that enough? “Did I miss anything?”

“Party doesn’t really start until you show up, Jake,” Angela Fontana said. She was an impeccably groomed woman with dark hair that was pulled into a French roll at the back of her head, and a wide mouth that seemed to stretch from one side of her narrow face to the other, even in repose. Jake estimated her as in her late forties, as was Keith Peacock, the other attorney present. Despite his surname, Keith Peacock was as bland in appearance as he was humorless in temperament, although he always seemed to be smiling. Both attorneys came from large firms and had stellar reputations. Normally Jake would have considered it interesting, even fun, to be working with them, but today he found himself more than mildly irritated by their presence. How could three of the best legal minds in the city be the mouthpieces for such callow and despicable young men?

Jake shifted his attention from the attorneys to their clients. Mike Hansen was a good-looking boy, as tall and thin as his lawyer, although his face, unlike Keith Peacock’s, seemed frozen in a perpetual scowl. His dark brown hair was neatly trimmed, and he wore a shirt and tie underneath his red-and-white leather jacket. The jacket clashed with the chairs, Jake thought, eyes wandering to Neil Pilcher, who was
shorter and heavier set, although he too would probably have been considered handsome under more pleasant circumstances. He sat nervously biting his nails, every so often glancing toward Eddy Maclean, who stared lazily off into space, an unlit cigarette dangling between bored fingers.

“Put that damn thing away,” Thomas Maclean told his son, and Jake watched as the boy casually crushed the cigarette inside the palm of his hand, the tobacco filtering through his fingers and falling to the oak tabletop like dried flecks of manure.

“This is Neil Pilcher,” Angela Fontana said, introducing Jake to her client. “And this is his father, Larry Pilcher.”

Jake nodded at the pale man, whose eyes seemed to sag with the weight of the heavy bags pulling at them. Were the bags there before his son raped and sodomized a fifteen-year-old girl? Jake wondered, trying not to think of Kim, of how he would feel if she were ever the victim of scum like these, of how scornful she would be at his taking this case.

“My job isn’t to do justice,” he’d told her the day she’d come to watch him in court. “My job is to play the game according to the rules.” Except there were times lately when Jake was no longer sure what the rules were.

“Jake—” Keith Peacock was saying.

“Sorry, what?”

“I was introducing you to Mike’s father, Lyle Hansen.”

“Sorry,” Jake said, nodding toward the balding bulldog of a man leaning forward in his seat, muscular
arms crossed one over the other. “I guess we should get started.” All eyes turned to him. Show us how brilliant you are, their eyes shouted collectively. Show us how to get three guilty, unrepentant rapists off the hook. Give us a strategy and show us the way. It doesn’t matter that the girl they raped is the same age as your daughter, or that your daughter will hate you for defending them. She’ll hate you anyway after you disappoint her mother. After you break your promise and Mattie’s heart. Hell, what difference will it make? Jake thought with a small chuckle. She hates you now.

“Something you find amusing, counselor?” Tom Maclean demanded.

Jake cleared his throat. “Sorry. I was just thinking about something.”

“Care to share your thoughts?”

“Not really, no.” Jake turned to Angela Fontana. “Angela, how do you see this case progressing?”

“I think it’s pretty straightforward—the word of a girl with a questionable past against the word of three upstanding young men whose roots go as far back as the
Mayflower
. I thought you could give the opening and closing statements to the jury, I could handle the testimony of the police detectives and the doctors, Keith could cross-examine the forensic expert, and we could all take turns with the girl.”

“Sort of like the boys did,” Jake said.

“What did you say?” Thomas Maclean demanded.

“Just a little jailhouse humor.” Jake watched Angela’s eyes widen with astonishment and the smile disappear abruptly from Keith Peacock’s face.

“I’m afraid I see nothing humorous in either the remark or the situation.”

What a pompous, self-righteous son of a bitch, Jake thought. Thomas Maclean didn’t give a shit about that poor girl. He didn’t even give a shit about his son, except insofar as how the boy’s behavior impacted on his precious reputation. No, the only person Thomas Maclean really cared about was himself. Sound like anyone you know, Jake?

“I wondered if we could set aside a few dates,” Keith Peacock said.

Ruth Kertzer called
, Jake heard Mattie say.
She wanted to clear a few dates with me
.

Dates for what?

“I have next Monday and Wednesday afternoon free,” Angela Fontana said, checking her appointment calendar.

“I’m not available Monday,” Lyle Hansen said.

Do you want to tell me what’s going on, Jake?
Mattie asked.

It’s a little complicated. Can we talk about it when I get home?

Except what was there to talk about? He’d made his decision. He couldn’t go to Paris. Not now. Not when Frank Richardson had made it perfectly clear that by going on this trip he’d be putting his partnership on the line, not to mention his entire career. He couldn’t do it. Mattie had no right to ask it of him.

Except she hadn’t asked him. He’d volunteered, practically begged to come along. She’d agreed against her better judgment, and he’d had to work hard to win her trust. He knew how much Mattie was looking forward
to the trip, how the mere mention of it kept her spirits up and her hopes high. He also knew how much she’d come to rely on him these last few months, and he understood that any postponement, however brief, would be too long. He knew if they didn’t go in April, they wouldn’t go at all, that even if Mattie agreed to a postponement, she’d never trust him to keep his word again, that he would never trust himself. Something had come up this time; something would come up again. Something always did for men who put their own interests ahead of everyone else’s. For men like Thomas Maclean. For men like Jason Hart.

Bad boy, Jason. Bad boy, Jason. Bad boy, Jason.

Badboyjason, badboyjason, badboyjason
.

Except things were different now. He was no longer the man his mother had programmed him to be. His priorities had changed. By pretending to be a good husband and father, he’d actually become one, and Jake was surprised to discover he liked the man he’d been pretending to be. He felt comfortable in his skin, secure in his decency. In the end, Jake realized, the face we show the outside world is often truer than the one we see in the mirror every day.

We are who we pretend to be.

And damn it, he’d been looking forward to accompanying Mattie to Paris. Sometime over the last few months, in the middle of all the planning and guide books, false pretense had given way to genuine enthusiasm. So was he really preparing to abandon his plans, abandon all he’d become, for the dubious pleasure of being made partner in some stuffy downtown law firm? Was he really planning on skipping Paris so he
could attend some mind-numbing legal convention in Chicago? Was he willing to lose the respect of his wife and daughter so that he could win an undeserved acquittal in court? Was he willing to risk losing everything, including himself?

“Jake—?” Angela Fontana was regarding him expectantly. Obviously, she’d asked for his opinion. Clearly, she was waiting for a response.

“I’m sorry,” Jake said again. How many times had he said that since walking in the room?

“Are we boring you?” Eddy Maclean asked.

Jake looked from Eddy Maclean to his father, to the other boys, to their fathers, to their respective lawyers, then back to Eddy Maclean. “As a matter of fact, you are,” Jake said, rising from his chair and heading for the door.

“What?” he heard Keith Peacock gasp above the shocked laughter of Angela Fontana.

“What the devil is going on here?” Thomas Maclean demanded, racing around the desk to confront Jake at the door. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“I’m going to Paris,” Jake said, opening the door and stepping out into the corridor. “And you, sir,” he said with a smile, “can take that miserable kid of yours and go to hell.”

“Mattie?” Jake called from the front hall. “Mattie? Mattie, where are you? Mattie!”

Mattie heard the voice as if it were part of a dream. She tried to block it out, to will the voice away. She’d been sleeping so peacefully. She didn’t want to be disturbed
by dreams, by reminders, by ghosts and false images. Go away, she muttered to herself, a slight murmur the only sound escaping her lips.

“Mattie,” she heard again, as the bedroom door opened. “Mattie?”

Mattie pictured herself standing over her bathroom sink, sprinkling twenty deadly tablets into the palm of her hand, like so much salt. She peeked through half-closed eyes, saw Jake’s handsome face looming above her. “Jake? What are you doing home so early?”

“I’m through for the day.” He laughed. “Actually, there’s a good chance I’m through for good.” He laughed again, a short manic burst of sound.

She tasted the bitter pills that had crowded against the sides of her mouth, spilling across her tongue, ferreting beneath it, as she’d raised the glass of water to her lips. “Jake, are you all right?” Mattie forced herself into a sitting position.

“Never better,” came the immediate response. He leaned over, kissed her gently on the forehead.

“I don’t understand.”

“Well, let me see. About an hour ago I told a client to stuff it, told Jan Stephens I wouldn’t be able to serve on the Associate Development Committee after all, and informed Ruth Kertzer I wouldn’t be speaking at any seminars or hosting any dinner parties because I was going to Paris with my wife.”

Mattie was momentarily speechless. She saw herself standing in the bathroom with her mouth full of pills. Jake wouldn’t let her down, she’d told the frightened face in the mirror. He wouldn’t disappoint her. And even if he did, she’d realized in that moment, her
shoulders stiffening in quiet resolve, she wasn’t going to lie down and die. At least not yet. Mattie watched her image spit the pills into the sink, following their path as they snaked their way across the porcelain basin and disappeared down the drain. “What will they do about the seminar, the dinner party?” she asked. “Can they get someone else?”

“There’s always someone else, Mattie.”

“No one like you,” Mattie whispered, touching his cheek.

He took her in his arms, leaned back against the headboard, closed his eyes. “Tell me about Paris,” he said.

Mattie snuggled in against her husband’s side. “Well, did you know that most Parisians are great animal lovers?” she asked, as Jake began kissing away the happy tears that were falling freely down her cheeks. “That they allow dogs and cats into their restaurants, sometimes even giving them seats at the table? Can you imagine sitting next to a cat in a fancy restaurant?” She laughed and cried simultaneously, the words colliding with her tears. “But much as they love animals, they aren’t so crazy about tourists, especially ones who can’t speak French. Which isn’t going to stop us from doing all the touristy things,” she stressed. “I want to go to the top of the Eiffel Tower and the Arc de Triomphe. I want to walk the streets of Pigalle, take a boat ride on the Seine, all that stuff, Jake. And the Louvre and the Quai d’Orsay. And the Luxembourg Gardens. And Notre Dame and Napoleon’s Tomb. I want to see it all.” Mattie pulled away, enough so that she could look directly into her husband’s eyes. “And I
was so scared before, when you said you couldn’t go, because I realized that, as much as I wanted to see Paris, I didn’t want to see it without you.” She paused, wondering if she’d said too much, unable to stop herself from saying more. “I couldn’t imagine seeing it without you.”

Tears filled Jake’s eyes. “I wouldn’t let you see it without me,” he said simply.

“I love you,” Mattie heard herself say, snuggling back into his arms.

I love you
, the walls echoed.
I love you, I love you. I love you
.

Iloveyou, Iloveyou, Iloveyou
.

I
t was just after nine o’clock on the morning of April 11 when their taxi pulled up in front of the Hotel Danielle on rue Jacob in the heart of Paris’s Left Bank. “Is this not the most beautiful city you’ve ever seen in your entire life?” Mattie exclaimed. How many times had she asked that since they’d left the airport?

“It’s by far the most beautiful city I’ve ever seen in my entire life,” Jake agreed.

Mattie laughed, not quite believing they were really here. Months of planning and dreaming, and suddenly it was a reality. And it didn’t matter that she was exhausted from the flight and hungry because she’d had difficulty swallowing the overcooked piece of meat that claimed to be steak Diane. “No one can swallow airplane food,” Jake assured her, returning his tray to the stewardess untouched.

“Shall we?” Jake asked now, helping Mattie out of the cramped backseat of the small French car as the taxi driver carried their bags into the stylized Art Deco lobby of the charming old hotel.

“Oh, Jake. It’s beautiful. C’est magnifique,” Mattie said to the exotic-looking woman behind the front desk. The woman, whose name tag identified her as Chloe Dorleac, had dark violet eyes, thick black hair, and impeccable posture. She looked at Mattie the way one regards a child getting ready to misbehave, cautiously, skeptically, as if she were afraid Mattie might start doing somersaults around the room. No danger of that, Mattie thought, leaning on her cane.

“Bonjour, madame, monsieur. Can I help you?”

“How did you know we speak English?” Mattie asked.