The words echoed in Emilie’s mind. Surely she hadn’t heard him correctly. “You want me to do what?”
“I want to fight for Kinley.” He took a sip of coffee, and Emilie noted his hands trembling.
“I don’t know that you can do that.”
“I want to try.” He set the cup down and then slipped his hands out of view. “I don’t know how well you knew Kaylene.”
“I thought very well.”
“Then you must wonder what really happened.”
“All week. The woman I knew wouldn’t have done everything they say no matter what some crazy phone video shows.”
“And they didn’t know her.” He put air quotes around they. “I didn’t either, not like I should have. Maybe you knew her better.” He sighed, a sound so deep and broken she wanted to weep for him. “I need someone who will help me fight for Kinley, help me do what Kaylene asked.”
The words sounded like something Don Quixote would state with the same level of conviction. Was this a fight she could join? Was this a way to fix her failure?
Why was she even asking the question? It was her job to fight for those who were likely to lose. She relished the battles, so why did the thought cause her to duck beneath an intense wave of weariness and I-don’t-want-to?
It was almost as though Reid read her thoughts as he continued. “I need someone who knew her outside the media firestorm. Someone who knew her heart. Is that you?” There was a challenge in his eyes that made something rise inside her.
“You don’t know what you’re asking.”
“Then tell me.”
She took a deep breath and quickly evaluated him. Could he handle the truth or would it scare him? While he looked shaky around the edges, if he was anything like the brother Kaylene had described, there was a core there that could see this through to completion.
“Not here.” She glanced around the busy coffee shop. “If you’re serious about doing this, we need to make sure our conversations are protected by attorney-client privilege. That means having them in private.” Where should they go? Nowhere anyone would connect them to Kaylene. “We’ll start at my house.” She’d figure out where they could meet next after she knew he was committed.
He eyed her skeptically. “Why not your office?”
There was no way she could risk Rhoda seeing her with him until she had decided what she would do.
“If we’re going to do this, you have to trust me. Even when it doesn’t make sense.”
He studied her for a minute as if testing her, then slowly nodded. “All right.”
“Good. Here’s the address. I’ll meet you there in fifteen minutes.”
Reid watched as Emilie got to her feet and reached into her attaché case. She pulled out her keys, but a piece of paper came out with them. He hadn’t thought her porcelain skin could get whiter, but the color leached from her cheeks. He reached out to steady her. “Okay?”
She looked from him to the paper, then quickly dropped it back into her bag. “Fine. I’ll see you at my house in fifteen minutes.”
Her reaction bothered him as he followed a map app’s instructions to her home. Traffic should have demanded his attention as he wound through Old Town, but he wanted to know why she’d been so rattled.
Parking was nonexistent in front of the red brick town house, so he pulled around the corner and walked back. The town house fit the style of the area: old, carefully restored, and surrounded by influential neighbors. Mere blocks from Old Town, it sat in a small section of the overgrown Virginia suburbs that still felt historic—like George Washington might exit an establishment on King Street at any moment. Being an attorney paid better than he thought if she could afford this.
He opened the gate and paused when he spotted Emilie sitting at a round wrought iron table set on a pad of red brick that matched the townhome. She nodded toward the vacant chair. “That didn’t take long.”
Reid closed the gate behind him and took a seat. “Nope. It’s easy to find.”
“Would you like a drink?” There was something hesitant, almost uncertain about her demeanor. Something very different from the controlled woman he’d seen in the courtroom. Yet she’d regained some of the color she’d lost in the coffee shop.
“I’m good. Are you all right?”
Her spine stiffened ever so slightly, and she watched him with a guarded expression. She slipped the sunglasses that had been perched on her hair back down onto her nose, effectively hiding in plain sight. “Tell me about Kaylene.”
“From where I sit, you knew her better.”
“How did she and Robert meet?”
Reid frowned, discomfort slithering up his back. “She was always a little oblique. Like they met, but she wasn’t necessarily proud of how.” This wasn’t the first time he’d wondered why.
“She told me she was Miss Iowa and met him at a Miss USA event.”
“Sounds about right. I never understood the pageant world or its appeal.” That remark earned him a slight smile, and he wanted to figure out how to get it to return. “She enjoyed it, but I was the kid brother dragged to a couple excruciating evenings before my mom agreed I could stay home.”
Her smile grew broader, so he pushed the image further. “You should have seen me in a blazer with a bow tie. I looked ridiculous and knew it.” He swallowed against the sudden lump in his throat. “You should have known Kaylene then. She was radiant. The other contestants were beautiful, but she was special. It wasn’t a surprise when she won; the surprise was she didn’t win it all.”
“I could see hints of that.” Sympathy shone from Emilie’s eyes as she leaned toward him. “By the time I met her, though, most of that radiance had disappeared.”
He nodded. “Sometime between the arrivals of Kaydence and Kinley, she changed. By then I was in college and pretty absorbed in landing the best internships that led to the best jobs.” His early career days had demanded all his time, and when he’d resurfaced Kaylene had changed. “I guess I missed something important.”
Emilie settled back against the chair. “She felt she should have been smarter. By the time she realized something was wrong, she was trapped. She had a toddler, an infant, and no job. She also had no access to their finances.”
“Surely Grandma and Grandpa would have helped.” He knew they would have, but wait . . .
“It was during your grandfather’s illness.”
He put the timeline together. “She wouldn’t burden Grandma.”
Emilie nodded. “She couldn’t reach out to them and insisted she wouldn’t burden you.”
“She should have.” His words were harsh, punched into the air.
“Yes.”
The fact that Emilie didn’t argue with him, but instead agreed with one quiet word, shook him. “Why didn’t she come to me?”
“Because you were young and launching your career.”
She didn’t say self-absorbed, but he could feel the impact of the word as though she had shouted it. “I was focused completely on me.”
Starting his career in the high-powered, high-octane world of finance hadn’t left space for time with Kaylene and her family. He’d been in New York City, she’d been here, and it had been easy to let time stretch between calls and visits.
He slumped lower in the harsh iron chair. “She needed me, and I wasn’t there beyond an occasional family event.”
Emilie let the words hang in the air for a moment, then shook her head. “It’s more complicated than that. It always is.” She looked beyond him as if he weren’t even there, sharing space with her. “By the time women come to me, they’re often so lost they’re not even sure who they are anymore. Some of them are so accomplished and composed in their careers, it’s hard to reconcile that person with the one they become around their abusers. Our counselors work with them to help them work through the way they feel trapped, yet still love their partners deeply. Our social workers try to help them see what’s possible. Kaylene knew if she could break free you would help her.”
“Then why not ask me to do something?”
The pain flashing across Reid’s face moved Emilie to reach out and touch his arm, anchoring him to the moment. She could sense his guilt and heaviness. “Because she needed to do this on her own. She had to know she was strong enough.” Emilie bit back the words about how Kaylene had ended up being too weak to stay away. About how Robert’s threats to take the girls had torn Kaylene’s resolve to shreds. She couldn’t withstand the threats and pressure.
“Then why were they at the house? If she wanted to leave, she should have left.”
“I’ve had to accept that I won’t always understand. It’s the only way I can keep helping women like your sister.” She glanced at her hands and took a steadying breath. Did she want to help him? No. Did she feel an obligation? Yes. And that was what she would have to live with if she walked away. “Let’s head inside. I need something to drink, and we need to be intentional if we’re taking this next step.”
As he followed her inside, it felt like the town house shrank. While no one would ever call it large, she’d always thought it cozy and perfect. Now she understood why Andrew laughed over her “dinky” kitchen. There was no way the space would comfortably hold her and Reid. “I have iced tea or water.”
“Tea’s fine.” He leaned against the doorway, and she tried not to notice how he towered over her, or how his muscles were chiseled beneath his dress shirt.
She filled a glass with ice and poured the tea over the top before handing it to him and making another for herself. She picked up a couple mint leaves from her stash, crushed them, and dropped them into the tea. “We can sit over there.”
The black-and-white chair was perfect for her small frame, but the gray love seat looked undersized when he sat. “Were you a football player?” The words blurted out before she could stop them.
He looked at her, startled. Then a slow grin cracked his face, probably the first genuine one she’d seen. “No, my grandma said she fed me well.”
“With a little Miracle-Gro.” She muttered the words, but he still must have caught them, because his smile became even bigger.
“The question is, can you work a miracle and help me save Kinley?”