Jeffery Deaver - Mistress of Justice

She sipped the coffee.

Where and for a first cause of action, Taylor Lockwood did willfully ascertain and make public certain facts about one Wendall Clayton, the decedent, that caused

Taylor sat back in the chair, closed her eyes.

that caused said decedent to blow his fucking brains out .

Mitchell Reece, wrapped in a towel, opened the bathroom door and, smiling with pleasant surprise, walked up to her. Kissed her on the mouth.

"Back early. You okay'"

"I don't know. Wasn't fun. Thumb still hurt?" she asked.

"A bit. I tell you I'm no good at this sort of thing. I'm much better with simpleminded, safe sports." He seemed to be groping for a joke, something cute about sex probably, but he sensed that she was upset. He sat down on the bed opposite her.

"So what's up, Taylor?"

She shook her head.

"What is it?" he persisted.

"Mitchell, you know history?"

He motioned with an open palm for her to continue.

She asked, "You know what the Star Chamber was?"

"Just that it was a medieval English court Why?"

"We learned about it in my European history course in college. It came back to me last night. The Star Chamber was a court without a jury, run by the Crown. When the king thought the regular court might decide against him he'd bring a case in the Star Chamber. You got hauled up before these special judges – the king's privy counselors. They'd pretend to have a trial but you can guess what happened. If the king wanted him guilty he was guilty. Very fast justice, very efficient."

He looked at the coffee, swirled it. He set it down without drinking any more. His face was somber.

She blurted, "Christ, Mitchell, the man is dead."

"And you think it's your fault."

A spasm of anger passed through her. Why can't he understand? "I was so stupid." Taylor looked at him briefly. Wondering how Clayton had felt lifting the gun. Had it been heavy? Had there been pain? How long had he lived after pulling the trigger? What had he seen? A burst of yellow light, a second of confusion, a wild eruption of thoughts, then nothing?

"Taylor," Reece said with measured words, "Clayton was crazy. No sane man would've stolen the note in the first place and no sane man would've killed himself if he'd been caught. You can't anticipate people like that."

She gripped his arm firmly. "But that's the point, Mitchell. You're thinking the problem is that Wendall outflanked us – that our fault was we weren't clever enough. But the fault was that we shouldn't've been playing the game in the first place. That firm's like Wonderland – it's got its own set of rules, which don't even make sense half the time but you never think about that because you're so deep in the place. Topsy-turvy. Everything's topsy-turvy."

"What're you saying?"

That we should've gone to the police. And we should've let the chips fall wherever. So New Amsterdam would've left the firm. Well, so what? And you? You're one of the best lawyers in New York. You would've landed on your feet."

He rose and walked to the window.

Finally he said softly, "I know, I know. You think I haven't been living with exactly what you're talking about?" He turned to face her. "But if I don't lay part of the blame at Clayton's feet, it undermines all my beliefs as a lawyer." He touched his chest. "It undermines all that I am. You know, this is something I'm going to have to live with too I mean, you did what I asked you to do. But ultimately it was my decision."

So here was another aspect of Mitchell Reece – not all-powerful, not in control, not immune to pain.

She walked next to him, lowered her head onto his shoulder. His hand twined through her hair. "I'm sorry, Mitchell. This is very odd for me. It's not the sort of thing Ms. or Savvy prepares the working girl for."

He rubbed her shoulders.

"Can I ask a favor?" she said.

"Sure."

"Can we go back?"

He was surprised. "You want to leave?"

"I've had a wonderful time. But I'm in such a funky mood I don't want to spoil our time together and I think I'd be a drag to be with."

"But I haven't learned to ski yet."

"Are you kidding? You're a graduate of the Taylor Lockwood School of Skiing Injury. You can go out now and break arms and legs all by yourself. With that kind of education there's no telling how far you can go."

"Let me see when I can get the jet."

Thursday afternoon, Taylor Lockwood stood in front of the Metropolitan Museum of Art on Fifth Avenue, looking up at a brown brick apartment building across the street, about as far from the wilderness of New Hampshire as you could get, conceptually speaking.

She checked the address again and verified that she had found the right building. Inside, a solemn doorman regarded her carefully and then called upstairs to announce her.

She was approved and he nodded toward the elevator.

"Sixth floor," he said.

"Which apartment?" she asked.

He looked confused for a moment then said, "It's the whole floor."

"Oh."

She stepped into the leather-padded elevator and was slowly transported to a private entryway. She smoothed her hair, looking into a brass mirror, a huge thing. The foyer was in dark red and filled with Georgian yellow and white dovetail trim. The pictures were old English hunting scenes.

Plaster scrolls and cherubs and angels and columns were everywhere.

An ageless, unsmiling woman in a plain navy shift answered the door, asked her to wait then disappeared down the hallway. Taylor glanced through the doorway. The rooms were larger versions of the foyer. She looked back into the mirror and stared at herself, at a person who was thinner than she'd expected. Thinner and what else? More drawn, gaunter, grimmer? She tried smiling, it didn't take.

A shadow passed across her and Mrs. Wendall Clayton stood in the doorway a middle-aged woman, wearing the stiff, straight-cut, big-patterned clothes that people who learned style in the sixties still sometimes favor. Her straight hair was swept back and sprayed perfectly into place. Her thin face was severe. The foundation makeup had been applied thickly but her skin wasn't good and Taylor could see red patches beneath the pancake.

They shook hands and made introductions.

Taylor followed the woman into the living room Why the hell am I doing this? she wondered suddenly. What possible point could it have?

I'm here to give you my deepest sympathy .

I'm here to say I worked with your husband .

I'm here to say that even though he's dead don't feel too bad because he tried to seduce me .

Mrs. Clayton sat upright in an uncomfortable satin wingback, Taylor in a spongy armchair.

I'm here because I helped kill your husband .

The widow asked, "Tea? Coffee?"

"No, thank you," Taylor said. And then realized that the woman's dress was red and that this was hardly a household in mourning – the room was festooned with antique Christmas decorations and there was a faint but rich scent of pine in the air. Classical Christmas music played on the stereo. Taylor looked at the woman's cocked eyebrow and her expression, which wasn't one of bitterness or sorrow. It was closer to curiosity.

"I worked with your husband, Mrs. Clayton."

"Yes."

"I just came to tell you how sorry I was."

And Taylor understood then, only at that moment, that uttering those words was all she could do. Watching this stolid, lone woman (Taylor couldn't picture her as one half of the Claytons) light a cigarette, she understood that the spirits of Donald Burdick and Vera Burdick and Messrs Hubbard, White and Willis themselves had accompanied her here and were laying cold fingers on her lips. She could not, even here, in Clayton's home, do what she desperately wanted to do explain.