17. Janet
JANET
Peter finds me coming out of courtroom two. "Do you have time to talk?"
"Can we head toward the office?"
"Sure."
He falls into step beside me, slows his pace until I slow mine, and tips his head toward the elevator. I follow him down, through the lobby, and out onto the street without either of us speaking.
We end up on a bench in the small park across from the courthouse. Peter sits watching the pigeons like he has nowhere else to be.
"Elliot Vance filed a Brady violation yesterday morning," he says.
The pigeons scatter from something and regroup.
"I know," I say. "Frank called me."
Peter nods. "Tell me about the video."
"Officers processing the Keller scene without gloves. Mishandling evidence. Chain of custody problems." I keep my voice even. "It was logged as part of the case file."
"And it wasn't turned over to the defense."
Not a question.
"I guess not," I say.
Peter is quiet for a moment. A cab leans on its horn somewhere behind us. The city keeps moving the way it always does, indifferent and loud, while my career quietly starts coming apart on a park bench.
"I talked to Frank this morning," Peter says.
I wait.
"He's telling me he doesn't have specific knowledge of what was or wasn't turned over in discovery in that case."
I go still.
"What exactly is he saying?"
"That the case was yours. That he supervised the office, but the decisions were yours." Peter pauses. "That he doesn't recall the specifics of that prosecution."
He doesn't recall.
I look straight ahead. Frank Liu's voice is in my head, clear as the day he said it. Losing this case is not an option, Janet. Figure it out. And I walked out of his office and I did exactly that and Frank never once asked me how because he didn't want to know.
Now he doesn't recall the specifics.
I can't say any of that. Not here, not yet, not until I understand exactly how exposed I am and how much Frank is willing to say.
"I find that surprising," I say.
Peter glances at me sideways. "Janet."
"He was my direct supervisor. He was copied on every filing. He signed off on the case strategy."
"I hear you." His voice is careful. Measured. This is not Peter, my mentor. This is Peter doing math. "But right now he's drawing a very clear line, and your name is on the wrong side of it."
I keep my eyes on the street. "I understand."
"This doesn't just touch you," he says. "You know that. It touches this office. It touches every case you've built here." A pause. "It touches me."
There it is.
"I need to understand exactly what happened during that prosecution," he says. "Every decision, every filing, everything. Because if Vance gets traction with this?—"
"The office has to protect itself," I say.
He doesn't deny it.
"Could I get disbarred?"
He finishes his coffee. Stands. Straightens his jacket the way he does before he walks into a courtroom.
"Think carefully, Janet," he says. "About what you remember. About what you want to say and when you want to say it."
He walks back across the street without looking back.
I sit on the bench for another minute. The pigeons come back. The city keeps moving.
I stand up and go back inside.
Rosemary is outside my office when I get back upstairs. Leaning against the wall with two cups from the cart downstairs, like she happened to be passing through, which she did not.
She hands me one. "You look terrible."
"I have an old case that's coming back to haunt me."
"What happened?"
I unlock my office and she follows me in. I sit down. She sits across from me, feet tucked under her, watching me with that expression she has that means she already knows something is wrong and is deciding how hard to push.
"Peter found me this morning," I say.
"About?"
"A procedural issue. Someone's lawyer making noise."
"Janet."
"I'm handling it."
She looks at me for a long moment. Rosemary has known me since law school. She knows every version of my face, including this one.
"Okay," she says finally, and her voice is careful in a way that means she doesn't believe me and is choosing not to push. "You know where I am."
"I know."
She squeezes my hand on the way out and closes the door behind her.
I sit there for a second after she's gone.
I open my laptop.
I pull up the personnel directory for Frank's Queens office.
I'm looking for anyone new. Hired in the last six months. Someone with access to old case files who had a reason to go looking through them.
I go through the list slowly.
Administrative assistant, hired in February. Female, thirty-two, transferred from Brooklyn.
Paralegal hired in January. Female, twenty-four, just out of Fordham.
IT support, hired in March. Male, thirty-one. Previous employer was a tech contractor in the Bronx.
Legal clerk, hired four months ago. Male, twenty-six.
I click on his file.
Internship: Vance, Holloway and Associates.
I stop.
I read it again.
Elliot Vance's firm. A clerk from Elliot Vance's firm is sitting inside Frank Liu's office with access to five-year-old case files.
I write the name down. Close the window. Sit back.
Someone put him there. Someone who knew exactly where to look and exactly what they needed to find.
I stare at the name on my notepad for a long time.
I call Frank. Give him the name.
There's a pause on the other end. Not long. Enough to tell me the name already means something to him.
"Yeah," he says. "Already looking into him."
"Are you trying to pin this on Ryan Keller?"
"No."
"I hear your answer is Janet handled it."
"What did you expect me to say?"
"How about I support Janet completely? She has my complete confidence."
"That goes without saying."
"It doesn't. Do not fuck me, Frank."
He hangs up.
I sit there with the phone still in my hand, watching the street through the window, feeling the case shift under my feet. Not breaking open yet. Moving. Like something buried, turning over in the dark.
Mike is already at the table when I get to the restaurant. He stands when he sees me, and whatever my face is doing makes him reach for me before I've said a word.
"Hey." His hands close around my arms. "Talk to me."
"I'm fine."
He pulls out my chair. Sits across from me. Doesn't pick up his menu. Watches me with that steady patience that used to feel like calm, and right now feels like the only solid thing in my day.
The waiter comes. Mike orders without looking. I order the same thing because I'm not going to eat any of it.
"Tell me," Mike says.
"An old case. When I worked in Queens." I press my fingers flat against the table. "It's being reopened."
"What's the case?"
"A bad guy. A drug dealer. I prosecuted him five years ago. Responsible for a lot of deaths. Killed witnesses. I would have lost the case."
He's still. Something moves behind his eyes, and it's gone, and he's just Mike again, watching me.
Mike is quiet. The food arrives. Neither of us touches it.
"Are you in trouble?"
"My old supervisor is telling people it was my case, and he has no specific knowledge of anything." I laugh, but there's nothing funny about it. "Which is interesting. Because he was the one who told me losing wasn't an option."
Mike watches me.
"So, yes," I say. "I'm in trouble."
He reaches across the table and covers my hand with his. His thumb moves once across my knuckles.
"Whatever it is," he whispers, "you'll be fine."
"I don't know, Mike."
The afternoon crawls. I go through the Keller discovery logs, every filing date, every document with my name or Frank's on it. I'm building a timeline. I don't know yet what I'll do with it, but I need to see the shape.
My assistant brings fresh coffee at three. At four-fifteen she appears in my doorway with an expression I can't read.
"There's someone here to see you."
"I have nothing on the calendar this afternoon."
"He doesn't have an appointment." A pause. "He says his name is Elliot Vance."