Due Justice

Chapter 8

Tampa, Florida

Thursday 9:10 a.m.

January 7, 1999

On Thursday morning, we slept late and had the after party chat over breakfast and coffee that we didn’t have the night before. We shared laughter and outrage and he gloated a while before we kissed and left for work.

I didn’t tell him about Carly just yet. George thinks I have a blind spot where Carly’s concerned. He calls it my Mighty Mouse Routine. I’m always saving the day for her, he says, and he views it as an unnecessary extravagance.  He thinks Carly is old enough to take care of herself.

That’s not the only thing he’s wrong about.

The good news about Dr. Morgan would resolve Carly’s issues and then I’d give George the whole story without having to argue about how I’d handled her this time.

That was the plan.

For about thirty minutes after I reached my desk, it seemed the plan would work.

One of the greatest things about my job is no obnoxious phone calls. George, Kate, and select family can reach me on a private line. Otherwise, my secretary takes messages and my judicial clerks talk to the callers. It’s one of the many advantages of being a federal judge. A state court judge is elected; they have to talk to everybody.

The point is, Carly could have returned my calls on my private line, my cell, or my home phone, but she hadn’t. I’d heard nothing from her since yesterday. Not an unusual occurrence. But just now, damned inconsiderate. And worrisome.

My secretary brought in the message slips for calls I received through regular channels. I flipped through them quickly:  CJ at 7:45 a.m. Ha! As if. In addition to making my own hours, my lifetime appointment means it’s not necessary to kowtow to a little guy who thinks he’s the boss. Gleefully, I crumpled it and tossed it into the trash can. She scores!

Four more slips. A reminder of my hair appointment, Kate, President of the Women’s Bar Association, and, at the bottom of the pile, Carly.

She’d called yesterday. Before she appeared at Minaret.

For some reason, I felt a bit better knowing she’d tried to reach me first. Seemed not so desperate, maybe.

Asked my secretary to schedule an appointment with the chair of the Women’s Bar Association, confirm my hair appointment, and make a date for late lunch with Kate.

Studied yesterday’s pink slip reflecting Carly’s call. No further clues revealed themselves. Wondered aloud, “What’s going on with you, little sis?”

Remembered the last time we’d met before yesterday afternoon. We’d argued then, too. The issues were not dissimilar.

While I was still in private practice, I volunteered my time to teach a law school course. Despite her two brothers and me all being lawyers, Carly decided to go to law school. Or maybe it was because we were lawyers. Anyway, Carly threw caution to the wind and took my class four years ago.

Even if she hadn’t been my “little sister,” I’d have thought she was one of those rare students who understood the subject and demonstrated desire to excel.

She became a colleague that year and I found myself working with her to make sure she understood the basics of cross examination, jury selection and evidence.

After she graduated, my personal relationship with Carly, always strained, finally achieved an uneasy truce:  Carly began to look on me as an available, if not overly desirable, mentor. For a time. Too briefly.