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Thing is, I can’t keep them out of my head anymore. Maybe I never could.
What Icando is make it fair. Make it right. Make itjust, if you will.
The consortium didn’t work alone. They had help from a judge who looked at their bullshit excuse for a lawsuit and took everything from us with a stroke of a pen. Bettencourt was probably so adamant about keeping these records sealed so he could keep using the judge for his nefarious plots.
And…
There he is.
There’s his name. There’s his signature.
I laugh out loud at the sight of his name. Beaufort Hayes. Some motherfucker named Beaufort ruined our lives. If it hadn’t been for him, I’d be able to sleep at night. If it hadn’t been for him, I wouldn’t have to fuck off to my cabin quite so much. If it hadn’t been for him…
Lots of things would have been different.
My blood feels cold enough to chill the fire in my brain. The name is enough to sharpen my focus. The urge to move, to get this show on the fucking road, comes next.
I pace the bedroom while I Google him.
Judge Beaufort Hayes is a white dude in his sixties.
Judge Beaufort Hayes graduated from Columbia Law.
Judge Beaufort Hayes sits the bench at the Criminal Term of the New York State Supreme Court.
Judge Beaufort Hayes has one granddaughter. I picture a six-year-old with his blue eyes.
Another thirty seconds, and I have his home address. He lives in Cobble Hill. I’d have expected Satan to live in Tribeca.
I have no other plans. Might as well take a look.
The city’s already heating up in advance of summer, and the year still smells new. It’ll be July too soon. The anniversary comes around faster every year. This year, it hurts at a constant level. I’d like to fly the fuck away from it.
I settle for the subway.
Forty minutes later, I’m strolling down Judge Beaufort Hayes’s street, looking for his house. It’s past sunset, but his neighborhood has plenty of streetlights. Plenty of greenery, too. I wish it was ashes. A man like thatdeservesashes. Not an elegant rowhouse on an upscale street.
Something flashes in the corner of my eye. A headlight bouncing off something. Light footsteps rush in.
I’m in the process of turning my head toward the sound when someone runs into me, crashing directly into my chest. I catch her by the shoulders so she doesn’t go flying into the masonry bordering someone’s fancy Cobble Hill patch of grass.
“Oh! Oh, my God, shit, sorry. Sorry!”
The woman lets me nudge her away from me. She’s short, with a ponytail that’s still in motion. I want it in my fist. The urge comes out of nowhere. Or my body is just catching up with what my eyes have already seen, which is that she’s gorgeous. We’re in the penumbra of the nearest streetlight, so I only have impressions, not clear images, but even the shadows make my pulse race. Glints of light in her eyes. Moon-white sneakers.
She bounces a little on the balls of her feet. “Are you—you’re not a mugger, are you? Because I’m, like, almost done running.” The woman jabs her thumb over her shoulder. “Maybe get the next one?”
“I’m not going tomugyou. Did you just suggest a more convenient victim?”
“That might be a conspiracy.” She says it mostly to herself, but it’s a shock to my spine. I’mherebecause of a conspiracy. “No, okay. Okay. If you have to mug somebody, go ahead. I just have my phone.” A sigh. “It’s got alotof notes on it, so—”
“Again. Not in the business of mugging people.”
“That’s good. It would be a huge bummer if you were.”
“Because you’d lose your phone?”
“Because it would be so embarrassing to get mugged by a guy who looks like you when there are much better ways to spend our time.”
