Page 84 of Clean Out of Luck

I pull into the small parking lot, which luckily has two open spaces. I park the car, accidentally taking up both spots, but I don’t think I could do better even if I tried another fifty times. It’s been a long time since I’ve driven anything. I turn off the car, engage the parking brake, climb out, and lock it with the key fob. I stare at Gloria’s blueberry of a car, so happy we made it. Gloria doesn’t know what a horrible driver she entrusted with her car, but I’ll make sure to pay her back with some cookies for letting me use it.

I hurry up the front steps of the courthouse and take the stairs up to the floor where all the courtrooms are located, as well as my office.

I see Claire standing in the hallway with Judge Mosher and Higgins, the lawyer who’s accusing her of causing the mistrial. I read the highlights of the case. The only way his candidate is going to walk is if he walks on a technicality. There’s too much evidence of his guilt. The only hope of getting him off is finding an error in the court system. I’ve heard rumors about Higgins—that he’s willing to stoop to petty things like this.

“I requested those papers, and you did not give them to me.”

I walk up behind Claire and stand between her and Judge Mosher. I watch as the lawyer’s eyes go wide. Oh, yeah, he knows. There’s a reason he brought this issue up on a day when I wasn’t working.

Judge Mosher looks at me and shakes his head. “I’m sorry, this probably doesn’t concern you, Scarlett. You’re supposed to have the day off.”

“Oh, but it does, Judge,” I say. I look back at the liar and frown. I don’t do confrontations unless necessary. But this time? I might enjoy it. I don’t like it when people lie about other people, even when the person being lied about is Claire.

“Lawyer Higgins came into the office and requested those papers on Wednesday of last week. Claire was already at lunch, which I thought was strange since he hadn’t come in to get them in the morning or the afternoon when she was in. I saw him around the courthouse multiple times that day. Instead, he came to get the paperwork when she was at lunch, and he tried to grab it from her desk. I had to make him his own copy. I have confirmation that he took the paper copy and that I also emailed him the PDF.”

Judge Mosher looks between the three of us in confusion. “Wait, so he already has a copy?”

“Oh, yeah. Why don’t you check the security cameras? It was only last week. They should still have the footage, right?” I ask with a smile.

The lawyer pipes up, “You gave me the wrong paperwork. It was not the report from the right courtroom. I am requesting a mistrial because of this woman’s error.” He points at Claire. “She didn’t send them.”

I look at Claire who looks like she’s been through the wringer, but there’s a glint in her eye that makes me think she might be out for blood soon. “You sent him the file?”

“Yes, of course I did. Remember? You were staring at your empty coffee mug. I don’t know why, but that’s how I remember when I sent it to the email address he provided.”

“Well, that’s very interesting because when he came in, he told me that you hadn’t sent it yet and wrote down a different address on a piece of paper for me. Why don’t we just compare those two and see if he accidentally gave you the wrong email address on your form?”

Claire looks at me wide-eyed, a little surprise on her face.The judge and the lawyer follow us into the office, where we both pull up our computers and display the messages in which we sent the correct documents. We flip our screens around to show the judge that they are indeed two different email addresses. It does not look good for the lawyer because it means that either it was his mistake, or he was intentionally deceiving us. He wanted to have an excuse to call a mistrial, and he didn’t care that he might cost someone their job for it.

The judge does not look happy. “Well, then, did you give one of them the correct one and the other the wrong one? Either way, you have the court documents, and you do not need to be wasting our time.”

The judge turns around and apologizes to Claire. “I’m sorry this was even an issue. In the future, if you could both send copies to me, it would make it clear who the real problem is—because it’s obviously not you.”

He walks out of the office, berating the lawyer, and Higgins hurries after him, trying to explain himself.

“Was this over the fire insurance fraud?” I ask.

She nods slowly. Then she looks at me. “I don’t really know what to say other than thank you. I did not expect you to be the person who would save my job, but I really am grateful you did.”

I break into a big smile. “I didn’t know you were capable of saying nice things.”

She smirks. “Are your legs burning from biking that fast? How did you get here so quickly from The Serendipity?”

“I actually drove instead—my neighbor let me borrow her car. I knew it would be a lot faster.”

She looks at me in surprise. “Was that legal?”

“Driving the car?”

She shakes her head. “I guess I just always assumed you had a DUI and lost your license.”

“Valid assumption,” I say. “I just don’t like to drive.”

Claire blessedly leaves it alone and doesn’t nag to find out why. “Whatever your reasons, thank you for doing that today. I might even owe you one.”

“Might?” I call back to her as I walk out of the office. “You mean you definitely do.”

I walk down the stairs to the bottom floor, where I exit the courthouse.

---