The Proviso (81 page)

Justice had three days at the range, which was equal
to the time it took to get a new wardrobe. In that time, she got
really good at drawing from both holsters, shooting with two
standard grips, shooting with one hand, and with her hand turned
over in what Giselle called “gangsta grip.”

“Don’t use that if you can help it. It’s unstable
and inaccurate as hell, but it’s very intimidating because of its
gang association. Now, let’s do it all over again, only with your
left hand this time.”

“But—”

“You have no idea how important it is to be able to
be as good with your non-dominant hand as your dominant one—and
both at the same time. Trust me.”

It was in the car on the way back to Giselle’s home
that Justice put her foot in her mouth.

“Have you ever used a gun?”

Giselle pursed her lips. “Be more specific.”

“Have you ever used one on someone?”

There was a long silence. Then Giselle drew in a
deep breath and looked away from her, out the window. Suddenly,
Justice understood. “Oh, I’m sorry. Never mind.”

But by the time they parked in the driveway late
that evening, Giselle had begun lecturing again as they walked into
the house, like nothing had happened.

“You never draw a gun on someone unless you’re
prepared to shoot them, but—as Bryce so kindly pointed out—I break
a lot of my own rules. I do attempt to aim for something
nonessential to life.”

“If you consider the head nonessential,” Mr. Kenard
called from somewhere in the house and Giselle laughed
delightedly.

Justice spent the rest of her time there feeling as
if she were being prepared for something. There was something going
on that ran much, much deeper than her having shown up at the
courthouse for an interview one day and witnessing a shooting.
Justice knew she was in over her head and had no idea how she’d
gotten there.

The deafeningly silent answer Giselle had given her
probably shouldn’t have shocked her so much. Giselle was Knox’s
“right hand.”

Justice had already seen what Knox’s left hand could
do.

* * * * *

72:
LIVING IN A FISHEYE LENS

“She cleans up nice,” Mr. Kenard commented, popping
a handful of nuts into his mouth as Giselle put the finishing
touches on Justice to go to the symphony the last night she would
be with the Kenards.

“Yeah, she does,” Giselle commented absently,
fiddling with Justice’s hair and some very nice costume earrings.
“Pretty sure Knox doesn’t want me buying you pearls and emeralds
straight out of the gate,” she’d said earlier that day when they’d
passed by Tivol.

Justice didn’t say anything. After almost a week of
trying on and buying tons of clothes and shoes, learning how to
wear them and walk in them, how to hold her head and sit and cross
her legs, how to apply makeup and fix her hair, Giselle had
declared her a quick learner and said they’d go out.

“You don’t really have a need for a formal evening
gown,” Giselle had told her, “but every woman needs at least one—if
only to make herself feel better. That, a semiformal dress, and a
couple of cocktail dresses ought to be sufficient.

“I’m not sure Knox would consider pants appropriate
for the courtroom, so we’re only going to get a couple pairs.
I
think that pants in the courtroom diminish a woman’s power
but then, Knox doesn’t like my leathers, so what do I know? If I
had legs like yours, I wouldn’t hide them in pants. Okay, let’s
go.”

At the Lyric Theater, there was a good mix of people
milling about in the lobby and gathering at their seats in various
dress, from jeans and tee shirts to formal. She noted that the
people in jeans sat way up in the back and the people in formal
wear sat down in the front, center.

Mr. Kenard had offered Justice his left arm and held
hands with Giselle on his right. Justice garnered many looks that
night, which made her anxious not because she was getting them, but
because they were entirely different from the looks she’d always
garnered. Men looked at her appreciatively and women looked at her
resentfully. Giselle got the same attention, but seemed oblivious
to it—as always.

Then Mr. Kenard spoke to her, low. “Don’t let on
that you see people looking at us. I’m a very ugly man with two
very beautiful women, so people are going to stare. If you were
here alone, they’d stare anyway. It’s just part of being a
beautiful woman. You need to understand that you are one and get
used to the attention. Stand up straight and walk like you own the
world—because at this moment, you do.”

“Does Giselle—?”

“Oh, believe me, she knows
exactly
what’s
going on. And she doesn’t care.”

Justice wore a short-sleeved cheongsam made from an
iridescent green silk that looked black when it lay a certain way.
“It’s woven with two colors,” Giselle told her. “The warp is green;
the weft is black. The silk itself has a sheen, so when it’s all
put together, it shimmers.”

It had black piping and frogs and stopped just below
her knees and looked like it was a lot tighter than it really was.
It fit well, emphasizing her long legs and what Giselle called her
“hourglass figure.” Her copper hair emphasized the green sheen of
her dress while the green sheen of her dress exaggerated her hair
color and her freckles to outlandish proportions. Her hair was not
specially dressed.

“Your freckles dance and your curls bounce when you
walk. It’s
very
dramatic.” Justice wasn’t a dramatic person,
so she was uncomfortable with this and she
still
wasn’t
happy about the freckles. Her legs were wrapped in almost-nude
nylons and her feet were shod in black heels.

“ . . . in until lights down.”

“ . . . be so stupid. You see Fen anywhere?”

“No.”

“Are we done cleaning up his messes?”

“Do we have to talk about this right now?”

Justice only caught bits and pieces of Mr. and Mrs.
Kenard’s low conversation, but it meant nothing to her.

Mr. Kenard and Giselle took their seats, leaving
Justice on the end, with one empty seat between her and the aisle.
Once the lights dimmed and the emcee had begun to speak, she felt
the seat next to her shift and depress. She looked up and
gasped.

“Justice,” Knox murmured as he inspected her from
head to toe, but it was dark so she wasn’t sure how he could tell
anything about anything. “I guess you’ll do.”

Anger exploded in her chest and she sucked in an
angry breath. She’d
do
?

He smirked at her, then settled back in his seat to
listen to the orchestra while she fumed. She couldn’t even enjoy it
because of him—and she’d only had time during law school to go to
one symphony concert.

Gradually, though, she relaxed when Knox did
nothing. He shifted every so often, but other than that, he didn’t
talk to her, didn’t touch her except when they brushed at the arms
a few times. Yet at the moment she’d decided to let her guard down
and enjoy the rest of the program, his arm stretched across her
shoulders and he began to play with her curls.

She gasped and shot him a look, and he looked
straight back with a calculating but endearing smile, daring her to
say anything.

Justice gulped and decided there were worse things
than having one’s hair played with by a devastatingly handsome
blond man in a black suit—and he never wore dark suits at work—at
the symphony.

Though she refused to look at him if she could help
it, she did feel every twist of his fingers, every touch of his
thumb brushing her ear.

Gradually, she got used to the feeling of the warmth
of his body next to hers, his hand in her hair, the occasional
touch of his shoulder to hers, the feel of his thigh next to hers
when he moved his long legs to a more comfortable position. She
didn’t even get angry with herself for resting her elbow on the arm
they shared and leaning (just a little) toward him. This—this was
what she had fantasized about oh, so way back, when she was still a
law student.

Suddenly she felt fingers on her chin. Surprised,
she looked at him and found herself caught in a kiss that took her
breath away.

Knox’s tongue swept into her mouth and she thought
she was falling off a cliff. Her belly turned and churned. That
empty spot between her legs was suddenly wet and she tingled all
over.

Who was this man beside her tonight? Was he the same
man who’d calmly put the gun on the desk to let her know she wasn’t
leaving? Was this the same man who’d not-so-forcibly nuzzled her in
his office that day? Was this the same man who, except from that
moment in time to now, had ignored her completely?

The kiss went on and on, and Justice thought she
might cry with the sheer beauty of it.

Then he wasn’t there anymore.

The lights came up to reveal an empty seat. She was
left flushed, her mouth wet, her heart thundering in her chest, and
bereft.

Lost.

Alone.

She missed him. Inexplicably. She touched the
cushion that was still warm and felt a tear slide down her
cheek.

* * * * *

73:
NOT YOUR DADDY’S SHOTGUN

Justice walked into the courthouse Monday in one of
her new outfits, turning every head as she went. She wondered if it
was because she was pretty now, because they didn’t recognize her,
or because she looked
so
different. She did
not
like
all this attention, and she didn’t care what Mr. Kenard said.

She tried to walk the way Giselle had taught her,
with a slight swivel to her hips—not too much as it would be trashy
and not too little because it wouldn’t be noticed. The high heels
helped with that because she had to walk that way just to balance
on the darned things.

On the other hand, the leather shoulder holster
complete with Glock under her left elbow, and the badge attached to
her holster did take quite a bit of “gorgeous” edge off the outfit,
for which she was grateful.

Looking in the mirror that morning, with no Giselle
there to fuss and pick over details, she had been struck nearly
dumb with this new person who looked back at her from the glass.
That girl—woman—
was
beautiful and that was one thing Justice
had
never
been. Her father had looked at her in a way she
didn’t understand, but left her vaguely uncomfortable.

“I don’t know where you got the money for those
clothes, Justice,” he said gruffly, “but you better not have gotten
it from the farm account.”

He didn’t really seem interested in the money,
though, and she’d left as quickly as she could.

The dress was almost straight, plain, lightly
tailored; it had short sleeves and a square neckline that dipped a
little too low for her comfort. The hem was too short in her
estimation, but Giselle had assured her that, as it stopped only an
inch or two above her knees, it was a proper length for court and,
if pressed, could do double duty for a cocktail party if she didn’t
have time to change.

A harvest gold color, it nearly disappeared, giving
her the illusion of nothing between her face and her feet. Her
red-copper hair overwhelmed the color, but in turn, it made her
freckles pop and her hazel eyes glimmer amber the way Giselle
wanted them to. She still didn’t like deliberately emphasizing her
freckles when she’d spent her entire life trying to fade them and
hide them, but Giselle said it made her unique and memorable. It
would make people focus above her neck, she said, which was a good
thing to dress her body down and her face up.

Her sandals matched her hair. It was just enough
color to contrast, Giselle told her, but not too much.

“The essence of pulling all this off,” Giselle said,
“is knowing what’s just right. It’s subtle and very tricky. You’ll
get better with practice.”

So here Justice had arrived at the courthouse,
hoping she wasn’t too much and wasn’t too little, trying to
remember how to walk in high heels, thinking everyone would laugh
at her, and desperately trying not to think about the scandalous
(albeit lovely and sensuous) lingerie she wore underneath it all.
Giselle had threatened to tell Knox to check her for cotton granny
panties if she didn’t promise to wear her new things and Justice
had no doubt she would follow through with that.

She dreaded Knox’s reaction. Not that he would hate
it—oh, no, but his “you’ll do” at the symphony was a slap in the
face. On the other hand, she trembled every time she thought about
his hand in her hair and his smile at her.

And his kiss.

She just didn’t know how she was going to deal with
this, looking at him, knowing he wanted her, that her three-year
fantasy didn’t have to remain one.

As she climbed the steps with no incident, she
gathered her courage in a steam and walked into the office, hoping
to approximate a slow version of how Giselle had stormed into
it.

Everything came to a halt before she’d taken three
steps in and because it did, so did she. Uncertain and very
nervous, she looked around at her coworkers, who looked at her in
shock.

“Davidson!” came a shout through the door of Knox’s
office and he jerked the door open, looking down at a file, and
stepping through. He glanced up to look for Davidson and he stopped
dead in his tracks when he saw her there, standing right in front
of him in the middle of the room.

His jaw dropped. His eyes widened. His nostrils
flared. Justice felt sick. “What the hell did she do to you?” he
barked after he’d collected himself. “I have a good mind to send
you home to get something decent on. Get in my office. NOW!”

Trembling, unable to squelch her fear and forgetting
everything Giselle had ever said to her, she did as she was told
without a word and he stepped aside to let her.