The Child Comes First (3 page)

Jayda reached out and patted Tiffany's hand, putting an end to the list.

“I get the picture,” Simon said. Tiffany seemed to be an exceptionally intelligent child. And it made sense to him that she was happiest when she was talking about academic things she knew about. There'd been times when he hadn't wanted to stay focused on the real world, either. But she had to know what was coming, no matter how frightening it might seem. “Okay, I'm going to give it to you straight.”

He paused and looked hard at the girl. She held his gaze, waiting, probably resigned to a fate no eleven-year-old should have to imagine. “The prosecutor is going for second-degree murder. A guilty verdict could mean thirty years in prison.” Tiffany took this in without a quiver. Simon didn't dare let his gaze drift toward Jayda. They both knew that a prison for adults—where she'd go if convicted as an adult—would make the juvenile detention center seem like Disneyland. He just went forward with the information. “If we go all the way to trial, I'll make sure the judge gives the jury the option of manslaughter, too. If you were found guilty of that, it would mean two to ten years. Worst-case scenario would be about five years served.” Tiffany stared at him, wide-eyed and pale. Surely she'd heard this before, but maybe he'd been too blunt.

This time, he couldn't keep himself from glancing at Jayda. She wore almost the exact same stunned expression as Tiffany, even though this couldn't have been the first time she'd thought about the girl serving time in prison. He gave them a few moments to process the information.

“What do you mean,
if
we go to trial? Do I have a choice?” Tiffany asked.

He remembered Jayda had been adamant that the girl should not cop a plea. But he wanted to hear what Tiffany would say. “The prosecutor will probably offer you a plea bargain, to save the government the expense of a lengthy trial. It would likely be a good deal, too, because no one wants this case reported in the newspapers any more than it has been already. The victim was very young and you're pretty young yourself. He'll decide it's better not to drag this case through a trial, if he can avoid it.”

She thought about this. Then she asked, “Would I have to agree that I killed Derek?”

Simon exchanged a glance with Jayda. “Yes. You'd have to admit guilt.”

She squinted her eyes at him and he glimpsed the stubborn, hardened side of her that was otherwise hidden by her sweet outward appearance. “But I didn't do anything wrong,” she insisted. “I don't know why he died.”

“Well, there's no evidence that anyone else could have hurt Derek, so the prosecutor may be able to convince the jury you did it on purpose, even if you say you didn't.”

She scowled at him. “I'm not just
saying
it. I really didn't do anything to Derek that should have killed him. He fell over by himself. It's not fair that my two choices are to go to prison or to pretend that I killed a little boy.” She began to nibble on the fingernail of her left pinkie. The action made her appear smaller, younger, more vulnerable.

Jayda sat forward then. “There are more choices than that, Tif. That's why we brought Mr. Montgomery in on this case. He's famous for getting acquittals on hard cases.”

“That's good,” Tiffany said, looking at Simon with additional respect. She put her hands together on the table once more. “Can you get an acquittal for me, too?”

Simon felt the weight of responsibility fall on his shoulders. He found himself hoping he wouldn't let her down. But the case would be a complicated one. “If you go for the bargain, you'd plead to a lesser offense than murder. Maybe involuntary manslaughter, which would be like saying you did it by accident.”

Tiffany shook her head negatively. Jayda mirrored the gesture.

Simon stifled a sigh and turned a page in the file. “You have some other experiences of bad behavior in your record, Tiffany,” he said gently. “You're going to have to explain what appears to be a history of violence.”

“I can do that. All those times, I was just protecting myself. I'm not a bad person—I don't want to be mean. But if someone is messing with me, I have to be tough. If you don't protect yourself, you'll just keep getting hurt.”

“And each time you were violent, someone was hurting you?” he asked.

Tiffany evaded his direct gaze, but Jayda came to her defense. “The record may be exaggerated, too,” she interjected. “I know what's in her file and I already know what Tiffany says happened. She was very young when two of the incidents were reported. She can hardly be held accountable for what she did in a childish moment. She didn't even get to say what happened at the time. It's wrong to hold those isolated incidents against her.”

He could use that argument, if the incidents came out in court. “What about when you threw an ashtray at your foster mother last year?” he asked.

“I wasn't throwing it at
her.
I was throwing it at her boyfriend, who was chasing me around so he could beat me with his belt.” Tiffany wore a mutinous expression now, and righteous anger lit a fire in her eyes. “I ate the last Twinkie, which Miss Consuela had packed for my school lunch, and he wanted to smack me around for it. Maybe I shouldn't have thrown the ashtray, but I had to defend myself somehow.”

“Is there any way to prove that's what happened or to show your actions were in self-defense?” he asked. “Maybe Consuela would vouch for you?”

Tiffany couldn't hold his gaze. “No. She's the one who put the story into my record. She wanted an excuse to exchange me for a different foster kid. But there's no way to prove her version of the story, either.”

She had him there.

“It's outrageous that she's being treated this way,” Jayda nearly shouted. Her fist came down on the table, and she added, “Tiffany has been a victim more times than I can count, and now the court is victimizing her one more time by trying her as an adult. Does she look like an adult to you?” She smacked the surface a second time, making Tiffany cringe and blink—a common reaction in kids who were used to being hit.

Operating on instinct, Simon reached across the table and placed his hand over Jayda's balled fist. He looked into her furious eyes and did his best to soothe her without words. Outbursts of anger would do Tiffany no good, and might even do her harm if the girl picked up on the helplessness felt by the adults who were charged with protecting her.

At once Jayda's tension eased and she slipped her hand out from beneath his larger one. Simon was sorry the moment hadn't lasted longer. Her hand had fit perfectly into his, and he'd liked the warmth and energy she exuded. Perhaps it had been his imagination, but he thought that there had been a connection between them when their hands had touched. As soon as that thought struck him he was glad the moment was over, because he didn't want there to be a connection between them.

“Maybe something happened to Derek
before
Tiffany began watching him that day,” Jayda suggested. “That's the only possible explanation.”

She'd taken the thought right out of his head. If Tiffany hadn't killed Derek Baldridge, then he'd been in the process of dying before she'd been given her babysitting chore—something she shouldn't have been asked to do by her foster mother in the first place. He looked at Jayda and gave her the slightest nod. He didn't want to say anything in front of Tiffany, but any number of things could have been done to Derek that would have caused him to die later. He could have been shaken, beaten…thrown.

“The public defender never ordered another examination of Derek or the coroner's report to look for proof,” she said.

“Well, we'll get a new reading of the report—or a new autopsy, if necessary.” He used the word “autopsy” with reluctance in Tiffany's presence, but he knew she'd hear worse before this was all over.

“An autopsy tells the medical examiner, who's sometimes called a coroner, what caused the person to die. The examiner looks at blood and internal organs and does reports like toxicology,” she said, as if reciting from the Discovery Channel.

“She's a fan of
CSI,
too,” Jayda explained.

Simon had to hold back a chuckle. The kid was as smart as Jayda had promised. And as focused on legal procedure as he'd been on sports when he'd been her age. Sports had helped him to connect with his foster father. His interest in law had come much later.

“I read, too,” Tiffany said. “I've been getting books on criminal forensics. The library here is better than in other places I've been. I need to know as much as I can about stuff that relates to my case. Because knowledge is power,” Tiffany said in her lilting voice. Spoken by anyone else, that last line would have sounded sassy. But coming from this child, it sounded like the truth.

This time, Simon couldn't keep himself from smiling. She was bright, articulate, and she hid a remarkable strength beneath the sweetest facade. A perfect client. He knew he shouldn't make any decisions about her yet, and he cautioned himself not to get caught up in the persona the girl presented. But he admitted to himself that he was already making plans for how he would get Tiffany out of the detention facility quickly and into a safe foster home. He leaned back in his chair, easing away from this girl who had the power to draw him in. His policy of never becoming involved in his clients' personal lives suddenly appeared to be at risk. And with Jayda, as well. Once again, he had the frightening sensation that these females were somehow sliding into his life.

He caught and held Tiffany's gaze, trying to see into her soul. “I want to be sure you understand that everything you say to me is protected and no one else can find out about it,” he said. “I'm your attorney, so no one can make me tell them what you say to me. The same goes for Jayda, when she's with me.”

She nodded to show that she understood him. “Attorney-client privilege,” she said.

“That's right. So, I want you to be sure to tell me the truth at all times. And tell me all of the truth, not just parts of it. Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

He looked into her eyes. “Did you have anything to do with Derek's death?” He'd already asked her, but she hadn't answered him directly, even if she'd persuaded Jayda of her innocence.

She hesitated for a fraction of a second, and Simon's heart sank even as his doubting mind was vindicated. She'd lied. Her hesitation made that clear.

But then her eyes lifted to meet his, honesty shining from them. “I don't think so. I might have pushed him and his truck away from me. He was a pretty big kid for his age, and we'd wrestle sometimes. Kids hit and push one another sometimes, right? But we'd been getting along okay for a while—at least a week. But I dropped him when Ms. Hester yelled at me.” Her troubled gaze collided with his. “I shouldn't have been able to kill him that way. Should I?”

The last two words were said in a small, worried voice and Simon found himself believing in her again. She appeared to be doing her best to honestly answer his questions. As a result, her doubts about her own behavior came shining through. More than anything else, this helped Simon to feel the first hint of real certainty about Tiffany.

“No, Tif. You didn't do anything that could have killed Derek,” Jayda said with conviction. She focused her gaze on Simon, as if challenging him to refute her statement in front of the child. He wouldn't do that.

He just hoped Tiffany was as genuine as she seemed. Because he could tell Jayda wanted her out of the facility, out of harm's way, out of trouble with the law—acquitted. And Simon knew he'd have to use every last trick he knew to give Jayda what she wanted.

J
AYDA COULD HARDLY BEAR
to say goodbye to Tiffany. She knew her attachment to the girl had to do with her own history, but she couldn't help her feelings. Though she was a lot tougher, Tiffany seemed so much like the kid Jayda had been, helpless and alone. An almost overwhelming need to protect her from further harm seemed to settle in Jayda's heart.

As she hugged Tiffany, Jayda had a hard time letting go. Tears threatened and her throat went tight. But Jayda regained her composure by force of will and promised she'd see her again soon. Finally, she made herself let go. Tiffany stood back with a stoic expression on her young face.

“C'mon,” said the uniformed matron gently. “Let's head back to your room.” As Jayda stood watching, she saw the guard put a large hand lightly on Tiffany's shoulder, as if comforting her. A rare kind gesture in a place like this.

“We have to get her out of here,” Jayda blurted as she turned and followed the lawyer toward the parking lot. “God only knows what's happening to her inside. I can't get any reassurance she'll keep her assigned cell to herself, and a roommate could take advantage of her. You can see she's small for her age—anything could happen to her.”

Simon stopped to look at Jayda as she vented. When she realized she'd sounded off with a good deal of vehemence, Jayda calmed herself down. “I'm sorry,” she said. “It's just that she's so small and helpless.”

“First, I don't think she's helpless at all. She's smart, and she seems capable of forcing the system to work for her. I can see that just from spending this brief time with her. She's extremely savvy and sharp, even though she's young. It won't help any of us to worry over the fact she has to stay here for now.”

“You know how it is. The other kids will look for ways to prey upon someone like her. It's the natural order of things, for the bigger, stronger kids to hurt the weaker ones.”

“I do know how it is. But she's not weak, either,” he said.

Jayda looked at Simon and wondered what power he thought Tiffany would have against the brutality she might encounter. “Please, Mr. Montgomery. Get her out on bail.”

He considered this for a moment. Then he said, “We're going to be working together for a long time. You can't keep calling me by my last name—please call me Simon.”

Jayda nodded, even though she wasn't sure how she felt about using his given name. It seemed far too intimate, somehow.

“May I call you Jayda?”

She shrugged as if she didn't care. “Sure,” she said. But she worried that allowing him to be so familiar would lead to something—feelings, perhaps—that she wasn't prepared to handle. Already she was noticing his good qualities more than she wanted to. But it wouldn't be practical or normal to keep calling each other by their last names.

Besides, Simon seemed to be a nice man. He'd been kind to Tiffany, and that said a lot about him. And Jayda had appreciated his gentle support when he'd put his hand over hers during the interview, after she'd gotten herself worked up. Against all expectations, his warm fingers had comforted her, soothed her, calmed her. If she were honest with herself, she'd admit she'd been unaccountably tempted to turn her hand over to hold his for a moment, palm to palm. Or maybe she'd just wished that she had a man with whom she could share such intimacies. At present, her social life was nonexistent.

Simon opened the car door for her again, a bit of chivalry she'd thought long dead. As she slid into the passenger seat, her cynical side wondered if the gesture was made solely to keep her from touching the custom paint job of his precious car. Yet, when he got in beside her, he was still focused on Tiffany.

“I have some things I need to work on overnight, if we want to try to free her. It won't be easy, but maybe I can get a new bail hearing. First, however, we'll have to find a foster parent she can live with. Are there any possibilities you haven't tried on your end?” He started the engine and they headed off toward his office building.

“We looked all over Baltimore, both in the city and across the county. We even asked the child services of the surrounding counties. No luck. But I can try again.”

He nodded. “Do that, and let me see what I can do on my end. If you'll meet me for breakfast tomorrow at seven, we can go over our strategy.”

“Breakfast?” she inquired. “I usually like to get to know a guy before I do breakfast with him.” Even as this came out of her mouth, she realized she was making a mildly suggestive joke. Was she flirting with Simon Montgomery?

He chuckled, apparently taking her comment with the humor she'd intended. Then he said, “It's the only time I have open. I have three other big cases going on and we just got another one today. But Tiffany needs immediate attention. Breakfast is an open hour for me. Take it or leave it,” he said bluntly.

“I'll take it.” And she'd have to be more careful with the comments that popped out of her mouth from now on. Her supervisor, Marla, would certainly frown on a lack of professionalism. “And thank you. For taking Tiffany's case. For finding time in your busy day to focus on her.”

He smiled as he downshifted, turning onto the street that would lead them back to his building. “All in a day's work, ma'am. We attorneys may not seem much like knights in shining armor, but every now and then we get the opportunity to save a damsel in distress.”

She smiled again, fascinated to realize how easy it was to be with him, how comfortable it felt to banter with this intelligent and powerful male. “Well, Tiffany
will
be a grateful damsel, if you can get her out of that place and into a decent home.”

“And what about you?” he asked with a playful grin. “Will you be a grateful damsel, too?”

She had to force herself not to stiffen up. He hadn't meant anything by his question, she told herself. He was just flirting back—responding to something she'd started. She had no business getting huffy. Surely he didn't mean to imply that she owed him anything for helping Tiffany. Simon was not like her uncle, who
would
have intended such a comment to mean she'd owe him fondling privileges—and other sexual favors he'd never managed to actually collect from her.

The playful light in his eyes faded away. “Sorry. I was just trying to be funny,” he said. Perceptive guy, noticing that she'd suddenly gone quiet.

She needed to get the conversation back onto a lighter footing. Composing herself, she said, “Tiffany's a good kid in a horrible situation. Anything you can do to help her will be appreciated by both of us. And I know you'll do your best for her—I could see you were as taken by her as I am.”

“I just hope we're not both being taken in by a clever young actress. She seems sincere and I like her a lot. She's smart and articulate. But I also know that kids can sometimes be manipulative. When she slapped away your tissue, that may have been her most honest moment.”

“I've been in this line of work a long time. I know how some kids can be, and Tiffany is different. Even more important, she didn't kill Derek.”

“Why are you so sure?” he asked her, as he pulled up next to her car in the garage. “The evidence points to her being the only one who had the opportunity. By Tiffany's own admission, the foster mother hadn't shaken him or done anything else harmful to Derek.”

“I can't prove it, if that's what you mean. I just…know.”

“You mean, like believing in God? Or knowing you're in love?”

She turned to look at him and was struck again by how close they were to each other. If they had been on a date, it would have been so easy to lean toward each other to kiss. But this wasn't a date and he wasn't leaning over the gearshift. He just gazed into her eyes with an intensity that made her worry he would be able to see all her secrets.

“Something like that. Where am I to meet you in the morning?”

“Jimmy's, 801 South Broadway. Seven o'clock.”

Jayda nodded and got out of the Mustang. “I'll be there,” she said, bending down so she could see him as she stood beside the vehicle. He grinned at her and she closed the door. As he drove away, she remained there by her car, thinking idly about the intensity of his smile. Then she shook herself back to reality and headed to her own office, where other cases awaited her attention. Juan Lopez needed arrangements made for attention-deficit testing, she had to review the foster-home situation for Carrie Peebles, and fourteen-year-old Malachai Dermley had been arrested again and Jayda would have to meet with his public defender. And there could be any number of additional cases that she didn't know about waiting for her on her desk. Tiffany's case was not her sole concern, no matter how much she'd like it to be.

 

“Y
OU'RE STILL HERE
,” M
ARLA
said from the doorway. She crossed her arms and leaned against the jamb as she looked at Jayda, her beautiful African features inscrutable.

“So are you,” Jayda said. “And you have a four-year-old you're supposed to go home to. You have to give up these late nights at work.”

Marla scowled slightly. “Bad habits are hard to break. So my advice to you is not to start any. Go home yourself.”

“Can't. I've finally got Tiffany some real legal help and now I need to do my part.”

Marla straightened up, staring at Jayda intently. “Tiffany. Again. If you get any more involved in her case, I may have to reassign her to someone else.”

Jayda stared back. “Please don't,” she said, firmly meeting Marla's gaze. Marla had warned her not to become too attached to any of the kids assigned to her, but Tiffany had worked her way into Jayda's heart. Jayda couldn't say any of that to Marla, so instead she protested, “You'd potentially hurt her court case the instant the prosecutor found out she'd been reassigned. Even such a small thing could cause her to spend years in prison, whether she's guilty or not.”

Marla shifted from one foot to the other. “I'm not ‘causing' anything, Jayda. I'm simply looking out for my staff, making sure they stay objective and balanced. You're the one jeopardizing Tiffany's case by getting too close to her.”

“I'm not,” Jayda insisted. “I admit it might seem that way. But I promise you I still have the proper level of detachment. And you'll be relieved to know her new attorney, Simon Montgomery, is exceptionally skeptical about her and keeps warning me she could be manipulating us. He's not ready yet to believe she could be genuine. So I have him to help me stay neutral.”

“Okay,” Marla said. “I'll accept that for now. You lucked out getting such a high-profile lawyer for her—and one who seems to have some common sense. But if I see you slipping, I'm going to pull you. What are you trying to get done for her at this hour of night, anyway?”

“Simon Montgomery thinks he can get her another bail hearing, if I can find a foster home for her to go to.”

“Didn't you tap every possibility the first time?”

Jayda nodded wearily. “I just want to make sure I didn't miss anyone. Or maybe something has shifted in the interim. Someone might have gone back to their parents, leaving a new opening in a foster home somewhere.”

“Good luck getting anyone to agree to take her. She's a handful.”

“Mostly, she's a good kid. When she acts out, she's venting frustrations with a system that hasn't served her very well. So, that's why I'm still here.” Jayda offered a small smile. “But you don't have to be. Go home and hug your boy. And give your baby-sitter a break.”

Marla scowled again. Jayda accepted that she wasn't the easiest boss to have, but usually she was fair. And she worked hard for her clients. Five years ago she'd nearly lost her job after she'd fallen for a schoolteacher who'd been accused of molesting one of his students. Even though he'd been acquitted, their secret relationship eventually had soured—and then become not-so-secret when Marla decided to keep the resulting baby. Jayda wasn't even sure the guy knew Marla had given birth to his son, months after he'd moved to Chicago. Marla's cautions to Jayda were, at least to some extent, an effort to help another staff member avoid the same kind of difficult emotional upheaval.

Marla turned to go, then stopped and took a step backward, looking down at her feet as if contemplating something significant. “One thing more,” she said. “Don't let your feelings for ‘Simon' get away from you, Jayda. He's Tiffany's attorney and you need to maintain a professional distance between the two of you.”

“I don't have any feelings for—”

“Cut the crap,” she interjected. “From what I've heard, Montgomery's smart, he's handsome, and now he's taken on Tiffany's case with zeal. You probably have a crush on him already.”

“No!” Jayda shouted. “That's not…”

“Don't forget. I've been there and done that. I know all the signs. But you can fight it. Do us all a favor and resist, because after me, I don't think this office could stand another scandal.” She walked out before Jayda could put together a coherent protest.