“What if this doesn’t work?” Heather asked in a shaky voice.
“It has to,” Simon said. “Because if it doesn’t, I’ll have to help you and Finn get out of the city before Gary can get to him.”
SHE LET HER LAWYER open the door to the courtroom for her. As her eyes darted around the room she saw Gary was already sitting up front with his lawyer. His girlfriend Tiffany was sitting in the back again.
Her stomach tightened painfully at seeing that someone had shown up to support Gary. Right now, instead of waiting in the back for her like he had at the first hearing, Simon was more than likely headed to Gary’s house with the investigator.
That thought didn’t do anything to ease her panic. Simon was putting himself in so much danger for her, and the guilt was mounting with each step she took towards her seat.
Heather sank into her seat beside her lawyer, her body shaking with anxiety while she waited for the proceedings to begin.
Within minutes, the judged stepped into the courtroom and took his seat to begin.
Aaron started cross-examining some of Gary’s witnesses. Ordinarily she would have breathed a sigh of relief that Gary hadn’t managed to get anyone from Dover to testify against her, but she was so focused on Finn that relief was an utterly foreign concept to her.
She hadn’t slept well at all the night before, her mind preoccupied with panic over what would happen to Finn. For the past three days she had kept her fears from her son. It wouldn’t be right to burden a child with her terror of losing him. So, instead, she had pretended everything was fine while she numbed her pain when she was around him. Meanwhile work had been a daze, and while Simon had done everything to support her nothing could erase her sadness and dread.
Finally, Aaron was finished with the last witness and he resumed his seat beside her.
“I think I’ll only have one last chance to stall,” he said to her in a low voice.
“Is there anything I can do to help?” she asked.
Aaron shook his head. “Not at the moment. After Gary’s lawyer has her turn, I’ll have one last chance to lob some softball questions at our witnesses. It’s tougher to stall with our own witnesses, because the more questions I ask the more likely they are to make a mistake.”
She bit her lip. What if Simon had been caught breaking into Gary’s house? What if that was the reason he seemed to be taking so long? She didn’t dare ask her lawyer that question because she didn’t want to throw him off his game, but whatever hope she had clung to was beginning to fade.
Suddenly the sound of the courtroom doors flinging open made her turn around, and she spied Simon and a man she didn’t recognize walking in.
The judge narrowed his eyes in annoyance as the man she assumed was the investigator approached them, handed over a pile of documents to Aaron, and started whispering to him.
She gave Simon a questioning look but he said nothing, his face unreadable.
“Your Honor, we’d like to share some new evidence with the court,” Aaron said as he surged to his feet.
The judge frowned. “What new evidence?”
“May I approach?” Aaron asked.
The judge sighed, but then nodded. “Proceed.”
Aaron walked quickly over to the judge, Gary’s lawyer following quickly after him.
Heather bit her lip. Surely this flurry of activity meant that Simon and the investigator had found something.
“With this new evidence coming to light, we’ll adjourn for a five-minute recess,” the judge said before banging his gavel.
Aaron raced back to her. “The judge said we can meet in his chambers to talk strategy.”
Five minutes hardly seemed like enough time to talk strategy, but Simon reached for her hand and together they followed her lawyer to the judge’s chambers.
“What did you find?” she asked as they stepped into the chambers.
“We don’t have time,” Aaron said. “I’m asking you to trust me on this, Heather.”
“Trust you?” She swallowed hard and glanced at Simon. “What do you think?”
“I can’t tell you what to do, but Aaron has got this,” Simon replied. “The information we got is solid. But...” His face suddenly looked pained.