Page 4 of Trial Run

But she wasn’t Lydia. She was a broke, single mother slash college student, desperate to make a good life for her son which, above all things, meant keeping him alive.

She reached into her bag and let her fingers trace the edge of the envelope delivered the evening after she’d received theominous phone call. The thin envelope contained a card decorated with letters cut out from magazines, serial killer style.His life depends on you. More to come.

Creepy yes, but mostly terrifying. She’d carried it with her at all times since it had appeared, determined to keep Ben from seeing it, while vacillating about what to do about it. This was the point in the movies when all the viewers thought the person being blackmailed, ransomed, or threatened in any way should go straight to the cops and then issued a collective groan when the “hero” decided to go it on their own. She was no hero, but she wasn’t dumb either, and the voice on the phone hadn’t been messing around. Whoever it was knew things about her. Things that were personal and private, and if they had taken the time and trouble to know those things, they could make good on the threat to harm her son.

“You should take the stairs.”

She whirled around, startled at the voice breaking into her thoughts. It was the woman from the security line. The very attractive, very friendly woman. Brooke stiffened. Maybe a little too friendly. Was this woman following her? Was she an innocent bystander or was she the in-person eyes, working on behalf of the guy on the phone? “What are you doing here?”

“Excuse me?”

Damn. Now this woman was going to think she was crazy. She ran her fingers over the card in her bag. She might very well be crazy, but if she was going to make it through this ordeal she needed to pull herself together. “Sorry, you surprised me.” She looked around. “And I’d definitely take the stairs if I knew where they were.”

The woman motioned over her shoulder. “Come on, I’ll show you the way.” She took a step, paused, and looked back. “I’m Reggie, by the way.”

“I’m Brooke. Nice to meet you, Reggie, tour guide to jurors everywhere.”

“Let’s not get carried away.” Reggie grinned. “I’ll start with you and see how it goes.”

Her friendly manner was infectious, and Brooke decided to trust her. For now. She followed her through the throng of people, down the hall to a nondescript door, but when Reggie held it open for her, she hesitated.

“What’s the matter?”

So many things, most of which had to do with the dangers of following a stranger through an unmarked door in an unfamiliar building, but saying any of those things out loud felt even more dangerous. Her thoughts scrambled to find something innocuous to say and she blurted out the first thing that surfaced. “Are you supposed to wear jeans for jury duty?”

Reggie looked down at her clothes and back again, wearing the grin from before. “Probably not, but I don’t plan to be here for long today.” She motioned to the stairs. “Are you coming?”

Brooke wanted to ask what Reggie meant about not being here long, but caution told her not to engage, no matter how much Reggie’s calm and steady presence tempted her to shed her worry. She glanced back over her shoulder and made a split-second decision. If Reggie was teamed up with whoever it was that wanted her here so desperately, they wouldn’t do anything to keep her from the courtroom where she’d been assigned. And if Reggie was nothing more than a kind person offering to help her out, then following her up a few flights of stairs wouldn’t hurt anyone. “Lead the way.”

A few minutes later, they emerged onto the sixth floor and threaded through another crowd of people to stand outside the courtroom. Reggie exchanged a few words with the uniformed officer standing by the door who then handed them each a clipboard and pen.

“Hold onto these until we call your number,” he said.

Brooke skimmed the questions on the clipboard and her heart started to race. She had to wind up on this jury, but she’d had no guidance about how to answer the questions to ensure that would happen. She looked around as if the answers might miraculously appear in the faces of the other people waiting, but the only person who made eye contact with her was Reggie, and her smile, while strangely comforting, didn’t tell her what she needed to know.

She took a deep breath and started writing. She’d tell the truth and hope for the best.

Chapter Three

The second row wasn’t safe, but it was better than the first.

Reggie walked to the end of the row and remained standing until the rest of the jury panel had filed into the room, mentally counting the consequences of being juror number fifteen. The defense and the prosecution each had six strikes they could use for pretty much no reason, which meant she had to be in the twenties to feel truly safe from being selected, but she was still confident she’d be cut loose soon.

She spotted Brooke in the number two spot. Brooke clearly didn’t want to be here either, but seated where she was, she was likely going to wind up in the box. Too bad for her since sitting in this room for days would only ramp up her already present anxiety. Reggie’s detective brain kicked in. Brooke’s anxiousness felt like more than a case of “I don’t want to be stuck on a jury.” While she was curious about the source, more than that, she was drawn to this woman. It had been forever since she’d had a date. Maybe if they both got cut by lunchtime…

She shoved the thought aside. If she got cut—make that when she got cut, she needed to get the hell out of here and get back to studying. Lunch with a pretty woman, no matter how intriguing, would only be a distraction.

To keep her mind off Brooke, she scanned the front of the room. The prosecutor was Johnny Rigley, but she didn’t recognize his number two. The defense attorney was the infamous Gloria Leland whose clients were usually big local names, but the woman sitting next to her only looked vaguely familiar—middle-aged, white woman with overly styled hair wearing a suit that probably cost more than Reggie had made in a month when she worked at the courthouse.

“All rise,” Leroy, the bailiff, called out. Everyone in the room scrambled to their feet as Judge Foster Hunt emerged from a door behind the bench and took his seat.

“Please be seated,” he said. “Thanks for being here today.” He smiled. “I realize you didn’t have a choice, but we appreciate your service nevertheless.”

He launched into the usual introductory remarks, pointing out the prosecutor and the defendant and his attorneys who all stood up again. “This case involves an accusation of fraud. Mr. Rigley, representing the state of Texas, is tasked with proving that Ms. Mitchell, represented by Ms. Leland, committed fraud against the citizens of Dallas County by making false statements in order to secure tax breaks and government funding for a development project. Does anyone know Shirley Mitchell?”

Ah, now Reggie knew where she’d seen the defendant’s name. Mitchell had been arrested last year for some kind of investment scam. She didn’t remember much about the case—so many developers and public officials seemed mired in bribery accusations, she’d lost track of which scheme Shirley’s arrest had been part of. Several jurors had hands in the air and the judge called on them one by one.

“Mr. Rodriguez. How do you know Ms. Mitchell?”

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