Thursday morning images from the basketball game and coffee date warred for attention with the latest stack of legal motions Emilie needed to review. She’d worked her way through half of the stack when a distraction came in a call from Jordan Westfall. She sent it to voicemail, a remarkably easy way to avoid someone. There was no reason for him to call her.
At eleven Taylor entered Emilie’s office overloaded with a mug of coffee for each of them and a stack of folders under her arm. She sidled up to Emilie’s desk, and Emilie grabbed a mug as Taylor edged the folders onto the desk. “I’ve got a stack of filings you can take with you when we’re done.”
“Great.” Taylor sank onto a chair and then reached for the files. “Do you care how we go through these?”
“Not at all.”
“Okay.” Taylor took a sip from her mug, then set it on the edge of Emilie’s desk. “Let’s start with Benson.”
The first five old client files contained no surprises. Taylor had noticed the same things Emilie had that might make a client want to take action against Emilie. A comment here, a disgruntled phone call there, but nothing that seemed to rise to the standard necessary to cause someone to move to harassment. Especially when some of the cases had ended more than two years earlier.
While Emilie had full custody hearings or divorce trials for some clients, the majority were a contested protective order. Relatively quick and to the point. Evidence presented, a decision rendered, police enforcement to follow. There wasn’t much about the process that Emilie controlled in a way that a client could blame her.
“Do you want to continue?” There was an upswing in Taylor’s voice, and the pencil ceased moving around her fingers as if she hoped Emilie would stop the waste of time.
“There has to be something.” The last files might have something she could track to her shadow.
“All right.” Taylor sighed. “Then let’s look at Raleigh Hardin. Her boyfriend was the one who showed up at her job, the daycare, everywhere. We got her the protective order, but it didn’t accomplish much. The man didn’t care that he had an order to stay clear. He reminded Raleigh she was his every chance he could.”
“I remember. Why do you think Raleigh would blame me?”
“I don’t.” Taylor frowned, and the pen took up motion again. “I think more likely it’s him. The police finally got it across that the PO was serious by putting him in jail the fifth time he violated. And . . .” She paused. “He was released on parole at the end of March.”
“Where’s Raleigh?”
“Left the state. Moved home to Georgia, so if he can’t go to her because of the conditions of parole, maybe he’d shift focus to you.”
Emilie nodded, then jotted a note. “Reasonable assumption. Any indication of violence?”
“Other than hounding Raleigh? An assault and battery in college. Got a slap on the wrist. That’s it.”
“Okay. The timing fits. It would take him a while to figure out Raleigh was out of reach.”
“Exactly. Then he’d turn to someone he could touch.”
Emilie steepled her fingers. “Remind me of his name.”
“Marcus Wilcott.”
“Right.” His image and behavior flooded her mind. He never bothered to charm the judge. His demeanor was hard enough to make someone step across the street if he approached. Some people couldn’t be convinced they were wrong. Stubbornness was a trait they valued.
“I’ll see if I can find his parole officer, learn more about where he is and what he’s up to.” Emilie jotted a note. A quick call would take care of him.
Taylor nodded, then shuffled that file to the bottom. “The best bet for a client is Maddy Shift. She called several times after her case was resolved.”
Emilie scanned her notes and frowned. “Why didn’t I know?”
“There was no point. I thought she just needed to vent.” She leaned forward and met Emilie’s gaze.
“What bothered her?”
“She was convinced the dream she had would never come true.”
“What dream was that?”
“That’s why I didn’t mention it, it sounded so crazy.” She grimaced and shifted against the seat. “I was sure she would come to her senses. She didn’t do anything while we worked with her that indicated she would suddenly dream about you and think you were behind her current woes.”
“Which were?”
“She lost her job and ended up in transitional housing while she struggled to find work. It wasn’t good, but there wasn’t anything you could do about it.”
“Unless she was wrongfully discharged.”
Taylor nodded. “But that’s not the kind of law we do. I told her Legal Aid was her best bet, even though they don’t like run-of-the-mill discharges.”
It was true. The employee side of discharges could be tricky. She remembered one of her professors talking about how easy it could be to get someone fired and how hard it was to prove discrimination had occurred. The professor had been clear that didn’t mean you shouldn’t file a claim, but it was hard to make a living on that side of the case.
“Did she call again?”
“A couple times.” Taylor shrugged. “Each time she’d talk for ten minutes. Tell me she’d dreamed you were the answer to her situation. I’d eventually end the call, and she wouldn’t call again for months.”
Emilie considered the information. If she’d been in Taylor’s shoes, she would have handled it the same way. “When was the last time she called?”
“I double-checked before putting her on the list. It was April 1. I almost thought it was a joke.” Taylor ran a finger along the edge of the top folder.
The pause lengthened, so Emilie leaned forward. “And . . . ”
“She didn’t have a reason. Said it was the last time she’d call. She was tired of us not helping and didn’t need us anymore.” Taylor’s finger slid up and down the file so quickly Emilie expected her to get a paper cut.
“Odd, but doesn’t mean she’s fixated.”
“True, but this does.” Taylor slipped the top sheet from the folder and handed it to Emilie.
It was an ordinary sheet of white paper, and the message looked like it had been typed on a typewriter rather than run through a printer.
Dear Ms. Wesley,
I’ve tried to reach you for help. My life has fallen apart and all I needed was a little assistance. I thought it reasonable to seek it from you, my attorney, but clearly I was mistaken. I have learned the hard way not to rely on others. First my husband, now you. It is a lesson learned after great hurt and trouble, but one I have learned well. Do not worry. I will never bother you again, at least not that you know.
There was a handwritten signature at the bottom.
“No one would be crazy enough to sign their name to something like this.” Emilie let the letter fall to the top of her desk and then reread it.
Could this woman have decided Emilie was to blame for everything?
Maddy Shift. Emilie let the name roll around her mind, recalling everything she could of the woman and her story. She’d married young to flee an abusive home life, only to find a husband identical to her father. What followed was typical, except she hadn’t had a child. The divorce should have meant a clean break, especially when her ex found someone else to control.
But it hadn’t.
Maddy had followed another pattern. There were two. Women who could find a support network and the inner strength to back away, and those who immediately found another man like their first.
The man Maddy fell for next had quickly accelerated to physical abuse, the stage where she left her first husband. This time she didn’t have the strength to believe she was worth more. When Emilie offered to help with a protective order, Maddy had been reluctant to agree. It had taken several calls and one meeting, a meeting Emilie wouldn’t let her leave until after they’d walked over to court, the makeup failing to hide the purple and green circles that darkened Maddy’s left eye and her jawline.
It was after the protective order that Emilie had ended the client relationship. There were too many clients and potential clients who needed her help to escape their situations. She couldn’t continue to pour time into someone who didn’t desire change. Emilie had made sure Taylor understood that as they sent the closing letter. No wonder Taylor had shielded her from Maddy’s ongoing calls.
“I’ll do some checking, because unfortunately it makes sense.” Emilie jotted a note at the bottom of her list. “Any indication when she talked to you that either her husband or her boyfriend was back?”
“No. Sounded like she’d moved on.” Taylor’s shoulders slumped and her fingers stopped moving along the files.
“Don’t forget all the women we’ve helped to rebuild their lives.”
“Maddy wasn’t one.”
“No.”
That one word summed up the work they did. What they achieved. And what they couldn’t.
“That’s all I have, except for a lead on Kaylene’s gun.” Taylor handed her another sheet of paper and then grabbed the stack of filings with Emilie’s notes. “I’ll get started on these.”
“Thanks.”
Taylor left, and Emilie scanned the sheet of paper. Then she grabbed her phone and hit speed dial. “What are you doing for lunch?”