Page 20 of Pursuit of Happiness

“It’s time for us to have a woman president. Connie was on trackto bring that trophy home, but now it’s up to you.”

She’d never liked Cecily and she liked her less now. “Really? Mygender is my number one asset? I always thought it was my brain.” She felt Jenpress lightly against her arm, and she tempered the tone of her next words butnot the content. “No one, I repeat no one, wants to see a woman in the WhiteHouse more than me. I’ve worked my entire adult life as an advocate forequality of all kinds, but I’ll be damned if you are going to push me intorunning by using the gender card. Not going to happen. If I choose to run,it’ll be because I’m a qualified candidate, just like everyone else in therace. Understood?”

Cecily nodded slowly, but her lips twitched slightly, and Meredithcould tell she was itching to say more. She didn’t give her the chance. “I’mnot convinced that this is the right time. It’s no secret that I plan to runsomeday, but until now I didn’t think that would happen until after ConnieArmstrong entered her second term. Accelerating my plan by six years is not anideal approach.”

“And that’s why it’s important for you to know that your partywill rally around you,” Jeremy said.

“What about the other candidates in the primary?”

“Stroud and Denst are only running to promote their key issues,energy and choice. Neither one of them expect to win, and they’ll rally behindthe front-runner as soon as we get through Super Tuesday if not before. Lankinwants to win, but it’s not his time and he knows it. They’ll start droppinglike flies after New Hampshire.”

Meredith let that one go. The DNC couldn’t be seen as forcinganyone from the race, but they would have their ways of showing who theirfavorites were and making sure the right funding and press bolstered theirchoice. Politics wasn’t always pretty, but was definitely effective. “Okay, butthere’s one thing we haven’t discussed, and you can bet it’s going to be thefirst thing that Bosley or the PACS that support him will feature in ads.”

The room became silent, and Meredith knew they all knew what shewas talking about even if none of them wanted to broach the subject on theirown. She looked at Jen who raised her shoulders as if to say she wasn’t surehow to approach it either. “Really? Is no one willing to talk about the factthat not only would I be the first woman president, but I’d also be an outlesbian holding the highest office in the land? Someone needs to start talkingabout it because you can bet the other side will.”

More silence. After a few uncomfortable moments, Cecily spokefirst. “It’s an issue, certainly, but I’m not sure we need to be the onesbringing it up. Like you pointed out, the focus should be on yourqualifications, not personal matters that have nothing to do with your abilityto do the job.”

“Are you really that naive?” Meredith said. “Whoever brings it upfirst gets to craft the language used to frame the ‘issue.’” She shuddered. “Wereally need to find another word for my sexuality.” She glanced around theroom. “And you all need to stop flinching at words like sexuality. I refuse tolet my sexual orientation become the central issue in this case, and the way wedo that is to normalize it right out of the gate. I want to see some ideasabout strategy right away.” She looked over at Jen who was grinning broadly.“What?”

“You sound like someone who’s decided to run for president.”

Meredith grinned back. “Maybe I am.”

The rest of the morning was spent making plans. There were teamsto assemble and messages to craft, but as everyone in the room starteddiscussing the details, Meredith felt like she was in two places atonce—completely engaged in this new adventure and hovering above the tablewatching her future play out, enthralled with the idea and terrified at thesame time. Either way, she wanted to reach out and tell someone her good news,and Stevie’s name was the first one that came to mind.

* * *

Stevie looked up at the sound of her office door opening, readyto snap at whoever was disturbing her concentration, but when she saw it was Hannahshe motioned her in. “Please shut the door behind you. The closer I get to thedeadline on this motion, the more I get distracted with interruptions.”

“Sorry, but I’ve got one more. Alice is out sick and needssomeone to cover a detention hearing at one.”

“Can’t you get anyone else? Seriously, Hannah, I need to finishthis.”

“I promise I asked at least three other people first, buteveryone’s got a setting in some other court this afternoon. Alice said youowed her one.”

Stevie sighed. She did owe Alice a favor for handling a motionshearing for her last month, one that was supposed to be simple, but had turnedinto an all-day affair. “Give me the ten-second rundown.”

“It’s a drug case. The usual, conspiracy. He’s not the firstperson listed in the indictment, but he’s not the last either.”

“Gotcha.” The first person listed in a typical indictment wasviewed as the head of the conspiracy, and the culpability trickled down fromthere. “Did he take the interview with pretrial services?”

“He did, but I think that his answers might be questionable atbest. On top of that, Alice is worried he’ll fail a drug test.”

“Judge won’t hold it over for a day?”

“It’s Reinhardt.”

Stevie nodded. Judge Reinhardt ran a tight ship, and if youdidn’t follow his deadlines, you would be cast off the side to drown. “You tellAlice this makes us even. Reinhardt’s going to detain this guy, so it shouldn’ttake too long.” She reached out a hand for the file and started studying thesparse contents while Hannah ducked out of her office. After a few minutes, shedetermined there wasn’t much she could do except make an impassioned argument.Not exactly what she’d geared up to do today, but putting on a game face wasthe nature of the job.

Reinhardt’s courtroom was milling with attorneys when she walkedin. She scanned the defendants in the jury box and matched one of the faces tothe booking photo in her file, but when she started to walk over, she wasdistracted at the sound of someone calling her name from the other side of thecourtroom. She turned to see Emily Watkins, the prosecutor from the Barkleycase.

“Hey, Em, I’m just here for Alice on the Ortiz case. She and abunch of others are out with the flu. You have a rec about detention?”

Emily looked confused for a minute and then shook her head. “Notmine. That’s Simon’s case. Actually, I went to your office looking for you andHannah said you were down here. Do you have a minute? I need to talk to you.”She glanced around the room. “In private.”

At that moment, the bailiff entered the room and commandedeveryone to rise as he announced the judge who dashed to the bench, slid intohis seat, and gazed out expectantly over the crowd. Reinhardt was a seasonedjudge who didn’t waste time. He called the first case and tapped his finger onthe bench impatiently, making Stevie wish yet again that she’d told Hannah nosince she hadn’t had a second to talk to the client. When the attorney for thefirst case walked to counsel table, Stevie walked with them and took a seat inthe first row of the gallery next to a pretrial services officer sherecognized.

“I’m here for Alice Luther. Do you have the report on ManuelOrtiz?” she whispered, barely getting the question in before the judge startedhis usual recitation from the bench. The officer handed her a sheaf of papers,and Stevie skimmed the information quickly. Any positive thoughts she’d hadabout getting bond for Ortiz faded as she read the report. No local familyties, lots of priors, and he’d conclusively failed the drug test administered afterhis arrest. Those things combined with the fact the crime he was charged withcarried an overwhelming presumption against granting bail to the defendant,meant this entire exercise was an uphill battle.

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