A Good Mother by Lara Bazelon (different ereaders txt) 📗

Abby keeps up the death stare, and Will shrinks back slightly, relieved not to be the target. Paul coughs again. “And, needless to say, there’s no one-size-fits-all with these things.”

“Yes, sir,” Will says cheerfully, though no one is actually soliciting his opinion.

Paul tilts his head at Will, says to Abby, “I’ve been trying to get him to call me Paul, but the first-name thing isn’t easy when you’ve spent your whole life on military bases, like Will has. His dad was a naval officer and he’s lived all over the US and in Japan, Holland, Korea. When he was in JAG, Will was based at Altus Air Force Base and then Maxwell, where he became an instructor.”

“How many trials have you had?” It’s the first time Abby has asked him a question directly and Will decides to try out another smile. No dice.

“Thirteen, ma’am.”

“That’s quite a lot,” Paul points out. “More than you.”

“In military court.” Abby looks disdainful. “It’s different.”

“We’re all here to learn from each other,” Paul says, and a look passes between Paul and Abby that Will can’t parse. “Initially, I thought I would second-chair the trial, but—and actually I was about to tell you this, Abby, when Will walked in—I’ve been promoted. No official announcement until next week, but I’m going to the tenth floor to be the deputy in chief.”

Will knew this already, as did most everyone else in the office through the ever-churning rumor mill, but he tries to look as surprised as Abby. “George is out?” she says.

“His wife has been sick for a while. And he’s eligible for early retirement.”

“Who’s taking your place?”

“Roger.”

“So I’m in his group now?”

“No.” Paul pauses. “You stay with me.” This, too, Will had known. Roger Morrison wouldn’t take Abby and neither would any of the other five supervising attorneys. The DIC was not supposed to supervise because of the administrative workload, but in the end, Paul had had no choice.

Paul and Abby are looking at each other, another unspoken communication passing between them, and then Paul sits back in his chair and closes his eyes. Will and Abby wait, Will looking at the gold-framed picture of Paul, his wife, and their twins on the desk. Paul and Angie—who met when they started the same year at the public defender’s office—are a head-turning couple: she’s blonde and voluble, born and raised in Alabama; he’s deliberative and mild-mannered, born and raised in Haiti. Even Angie, outrageous as she was, still had enough sense to stay home after she’d given birth. She was back now, but only after taking a full year off.

Paul opens his eyes. “Given that this is a somewhat unorthodox arrangement, I’m going to switch things up a bit and have you two try this case as a team. Equal responsibility across the board.” Paul makes a leveling motion with his hand, like he’s sliding onion slices into a frying pan before they can make him cry.

“Paul—”

“That’s the decision, Abby.”

Will swallows. Abby Rosenberg is a brilliant lawyer. People were still talking about her closing argument in the Rayshon Marbury case, the way the words poured out of her like she was giving up her heart, righteously indignant, but deeply moving at the same time.

But there was a seamier side of things, or so he’d been told. Of course, people talked smack, he knew that, particularly to the new guy. In some ways, the federal public defender’s office was no different than the military bases where he’d grown up; everyone perennially in everyone else’s business. The office hookup culture—some of which resulted in marriages like Paul and Angie’s and some of which ended less happily—was rampant. Even so, a woman like Abby—young, pretty, gifted—made for a juicy target. The envy was understandable. A week after Marbury was freed, the LA Times ran a profile of her called Joan of Arc Storms the Public Defender’s Office. He’s seen the framed picture in her office—the only one actually on the wall and not stacked in a corner—a courtroom sketch of Abby with the client, foreheads touching, his fist on top of hers. Celebrating exoneration.

Abby Rosenberg was the closest thing their status-less, grimy job had to a celebrity. Until, spectacularly, she was not. Marbury had gotten himself murdered, proving true the grim public defender axiom that every victory is a Pyrrhic one. There was also the lingering, still-unresolved question of exactly how Abby had come by the evidence she used to free him.

Then there was her drinking—she tried to hide it but everyone knew it was a problem—and making, well, other poor choices, often because of it. A few months after the trial she had gotten knocked up by Rayshon Marbury’s marshal. Slut wasn’t the right word for Abby Rosenberg, Will knew that wasn’t the right word to describe anyone anymore, but just the circumstances of her situation, not to mention that she was basically abandoning her own baby after six weeks. Who would do that? Forty-six days. Counting down like it was some kind of jail sentence.

That case made her, one of his colleagues had told Will, but it fucked her, too.

Yes, people talked smack out of spite, but in Will’s experience, that didn’t make the smack they talked any less true. He could only imagine what Meredith would say when he told her tonight at dinner. At least she’d have no reason to be jealous herself. The woman standing in front of him bore no resemblance to the image he’d carried in his head of a light-filled avenging angel who spoke in a lilting poet’s voice.

Will startles, realizing too late that it’s his turn to say something. “Well,” he offers, “that’s great, sir. And I—” he forces himself to look at Abby “—really look forward to working with you, ma’am—Mrs.—” He takes a deep breath. “Abigail.”

Paul claps his hands together. “Terrific. Let’s schedule a time to sit down next week, after Abby’s had a chance to go over the discovery.”

“Yes, sir.