Page 56 of Legal Desire
CHAPTER TWELVE
TREVFELTASif she’d punched him in the throat. He couldn’t breathe for a moment. His heart stopped beating. Had she just confessed?
“What?” he asked. “You are the mole?”
She shook her head, so violently that her hair tangled around her face. She reached up with a trembling hand to push it away. “No. The mole was never after Street Legal,” she said. “The mole was after me!”
Trev felt as if he’d been hit again for a moment. What if she was right? But then he considered what she’d said, and as a lawyer his first instinct was to argue with her.
“It wasn’t you who could have lost his license when those forged documents got to Muriel,” he said. “That was Ronan.”
“The mole couldn’t have known for certain that Muriel would bring those documents to the bar association, though,” she pointed out. “Maybe he thought she would only go to the press with them.”
Trev drew in a shaky breath. She was right. “But helping out the district attorney...”
“Blew my media defense of the accused out of the water,” Allison pointed out. “Hillary didn’t just make Stone look like a fool. She made me look like one, too.”
“And me...?” he asked. “Why go after me?”
“For the same reason as the others,” she said. “I was promoting your case in the press. If you lose, I lose, too.”
He shook his head. “I think you’re taking this too personally.”
She gestured toward that television screen. “How can I not? I thought she was my friend,” Allison said, and her voice cracked with emotion. “That story wasn’t really about any of you. It was about me. And it made me look horrible.”
He couldn’t argue with her about that. It had made her look horrible while it had cleared up Street Legal’s reputation. All their bad press had been made to look like her fault.
One of his partners wouldn’t have gone to the press, would they? Since the practice had been Simon’s idea—one he’d come up with when they were living on the streets—he would do anything to protect it. And he was very well acquainted with all the local reporters.
“My business is ruined,” she said. “Who would ever trust me again after that report?”
Trev flinched.
“Karma is a bitch,” she murmured, and her pale eyes were bright, glistening with what Trev suspected were tears. She blinked them away, though, before meeting his gaze. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Tell your partners I’m not going to sue.”
Trev wouldn’t blame her if she did. And if one of them had given the reporter that story, he would represent her himself. Pro bono...
But at least she had her grandfather’s trust. If the business failed, she wouldn’t be homeless like he’d been after Wally had died. She would be fine.
But she didn’t look fine. She looked sick and pale and shaky.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
She nodded. “Yeah.” But her voice cracked again and one of the tears she hadn’t blinked away overflowed a beautiful eye and trailed down her cheek.
He reached out to wipe it away, sliding his thumb across the silky skin of her cheek. “We’ll figure this out,” he said. “We’ll find the mole.”
She smiled at him but the smile didn’t reach her eyes. “How many months have you and your partners been trying to figure it out?”
“Too many.”
“I wish you would have told me,” she said.
“I’m sorry.” They should have. He realized that now.
“But I understand,” she said. “I get that none of you would trust me.”
He wanted to assure her that he trusted her now. But that little voice in his head, the one that had helped him survive the streets, whispered some doubts.
