Joan Pickart - Body of Evidence

“Damn it, Jennifer,” Evan interrupted, “cut to the chase. You’re scaring me to death here.”

“Okay, okay.” Jennifer drew a deep breath and let it out slowly. “The baby…our baby…Evan, it’s a boy. I’m…you’re…we’re…going to have a…a son.”

Evan got to his feet, opened his mouth to speak, then snapped it closed again when nothing came out. He plunked back onto the chair and leaned toward Jennifer.

“A son?” he said, awe ringing in his voice. “It’s a boy? A…a son? Are you sure?”

Jennifer laughed, the musical sound seeming to fill the room to overflowing.

“Pictures don’t lie,” she said, still smiling. “The ultrasound was so clear it just took my breath away and, yes, believe me, it was very obvious that our baby has certain equipment, shall we say, that baby girls don’t have.

“My doctor looked at the screen and said, ‘Well, hello, young man.’ I saw him, Evan. I saw his little heart beating and…” She laughed again. “Of course, I wept buckets, but I swear I’ll never forget that moment when I saw…” She flapped one hand in the air. “Don’t get me started.”

Evan sank back in the chair. “A son. Whew. Add that to the stack of ‘I need time to adjust to this’ stuff. Are you disappointed? I mean, don’t women usually want a girl they dress in frilly, pink things, and put bows in their hair and on their socks and…”

“Bows on their socks?”

Evan shrugged. “I saw a little girl in a restaurant once who had bows on her socks. She was in a high-chair and kept lifting her feet so she could see those bows. Her mother finally took off her shoes and socks so the kid would eat some dinner.” He paused. “So, are you? Disappointed that it’s a boy?”

“Not in a million years,” Jennifer said, smiling.

Evan matched her smile and their gazes met across the table. The room seemed to disappear into a mist, leaving a private place where awareness was heightened and desire began to hum, gain force and heat within them. Jennifer was the first to break the sensuous spell.

“The jury applications,” she said, tearing her gaze from Evan’s. “We need to get to work, Evan.”

“What? Oh, right. Work. Yeah.” Evan got to his feet. “I’ll order a pizza first, then we’ll start tackling these things. You don’t have to do this, you know. I mean, if you’re rather go on home I’ll understand.”

“Do you want me to leave?” she said, looking up at him.

“No,” he said quietly. “No, Jenny, I don’t want you to leave.”

“Then I’ll stay.”

“Thank you.” Evan smiled. “Let’s see how much of an argument we can make out of what toppings we want on this pizza I’m going to order.”

“You’re on,” Jennifer said, laughing.

Four hours later Jennifer yawned, then stretched out on the sofa instead of being curled up in the corner of it with her shoes off.

“I like that one,” she said. “The fact that she’s a single woman with no children is excellent. She won’t get caught up in the mental scenario that I did about Cecelia Gardner having lost one son and now here is the other on trial and blah, blah, blah.

“Boy, I sure was wrong on that score. Cecelia isn’t a mother, she’s a walking, talking social machine.” Jennifer yawned again. “Anyway, I vote that you try to get that woman on the jury. I don’t think she’d declare Lyle innocent out of sympathy for Cecelia.”

“Mmm.” Evan nodded, then wrote a note on the top of the paper.

Rain beat against the windows with a frenzy, the thunder continued to roar and lightning followed closely behind each rumble.

“That’s enough of this stuff for one night,” Evan said, rotating his neck. “These people on the applications are all starting to sound the same to me. I think we should… Jennifer?”

Evan got to his feet and moved around the long table to stand next to the sofa where Jennifer had drifted off to sleep. She had shifted to her side, one hand tucked beneath her cheek, the other splayed on her sweatshirt-covered stomach.

So beautiful, he thought, his heart quickening as he drank in the sight of her. In the future he might work late one night…not often, but occasionally…then come home and move quietly through their home so as not to waken her. Then he’d stand next to their bed and gaze at her, just as he was now. He could find a way, he could, to cut back on the long hours he worked. He could. He would.

He’d shed his clothes and slip beneath the blankets and… No, no, wait a minute. He’d forgotten something. On the way to his and Jennifer’s bedroom, he would have stopped first in the nursery down the hall to check on their baby, their son, to watch the little miracle they had created together sleep the sleep of the innocent.

An explosion of thunder jerked Evan from his thoughts. In the next instant the lightning lit up the room with an eerie glow, then the lights went out, cloaking the room and the city beyond the windows in inky darkness.

Evan reached blindly for a chair, connected with one, then turned it around so he could sit next to the sofa. He settled onto it and stretched out his legs, crossing them at the ankles.

He’d stay right here, he thought, in case Jennifer woke up and was momentarily frightened by the darkness. Oh, yes, he’d stay right here next to his sweet Jenny.

Evan slouched lower in the chair so he could rest his head on the top and allowed himself the luxury of being aware of nothing but Jennifer.

She’d been a tremendous help to him as he’d gone over the jury applications, he mused. Her input had been intelligent, and she’d often thought of details about the person that hadn’t occurred to him. He couldn’t think of even one woman he’d dated who was remotely interested in the inner workings of his career. He and Jennifer were good together, a team, like two pieces of a puzzle that fit perfectly.

Just as they would as wife and husband.

Just as they would as mother and father.

Just as they would…forever.

“Ah, man,” Evan said wearily, dragging his hands down his face.

He couldn’t go on like this.

Once this trial was over he was going to sit down with Jennifer, start at the top of the list of issues they needed to address and hit them, one after another, until solutions were found and questions answered.

Yes, once he won this trial for Jennifer so her documentary would have the power and punch he knew she needed and wanted, he…

Evan straightened in the chair, his mind racing and the sudden wild tempo of his heart echoing in his ears.

What? he thought. Repeat that one, Stone. Once he won this trial for Jennifer? Not for the feather in his cap? Not for the very basics of justice being served? Not for the satisfaction of knowing that Lyle would pay the price for killing his brother?

Those things were probably there somewhere in his beleaguered mind, but first and foremost was the deep and heartfelt desire to not disappoint Jennifer, not fall short in her eyes, or cause her problems with her project which her boss might decide to chuck altogether if it had a dud of an ending where the profiled D.A. lost the big case in question.

Damn it, he had to get a conviction. He had to win…for Jennifer.

His eyes having become adjusted to the darkness, Evan looked at Jennifer as she slept, a smile forming on his lips.

For Jennifer, his mind echoed. And there it was. The truth. He was, indeed, deeply in love with Jennifer Anderson.

How strange and complex was this thing called love. It brought to the fore aspects of himself he didn’t even know he possessed, a whole section of his inner being that had been hidden from him. It made him complete, whole, filled with awe, and a wondrous sense of excitement and joy that was intertwined somehow with a soothing warmth of peace, of knowing he’d journeyed far and had finally arrived where he was meant to be.