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It was a slip from a tired, sleep-deprived brain. As Sloane struggled

to

recall

his

actual

name,

Arwyn

appeared surprisingly amused rather than o ended.

“Do you mean Chad?” she asked, pulling o her jacket as she slid onto Sloane’s desk.

“Obviously. Who else has a hole in their chin?” Sloane replied, unwilling to even look embarrassed. “I know. Not my most creative work, but I wasn’t feeling all that inspired when I met him.”

Arwyn’s laughter was a tight fist squeezing Sloane’s heart. “And here I thought I was the only one subjected to your penchant for nicknames. I’m not sure if I should be relieved or jealous.”

“What do you think about Juror Six? I think he’s a holdout,” Sloane decided abruptly, trying not to watch Arwyn cross one pantyhose-covered leg over the other.

“He was pretty openly sympathetic to the theory of defense,” she agreed after a sigh. “If he wants to, he could buy into the argument that he didn’t purchase anything illegal, and even though it looks sketchy, we didn’t produce a tracker from the victim’s car or evidence of the spyware on her computer.”

“

Yeah well, he did have months between when the charges were filed and when we discovered all this stu .

Plenty of time to get rid of it,” Sloane grumbled, wishing they’d been able to get more.

“We do have that shot of him standing outside the store, making a call on the burner phone at the exact same time his ex-wife got the fake call from the pharmacy. I mean, that’s not just suspicious. There’s no innocent explanation for any of it. That has to be guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.”

Sloane wanted to match Arwyn’s optimism, but all she could do was think about Juror Six. Every time she looked at him during her closing arguments, he cringed like her words were nails on a chalkboard. She’d regretted running out of strikes before getting to him, but he was so far down the list she was sure they’d never even get to him and he’d be dismissed as unnecessary along with the others at the end of the pack. It might prove a costly mistake.

While recounting the events at trial as if they hadn’t both been there and already talked about it ad nauseam, Arwyn rubbed the back of her neck.

“Are you falling apart already? You know, even as a summer associate I worked sixty-hour weeks. I guess not everyone is built for it,” she teased, picking at her manicured nails.

“Hilarious,” Arwyn replied with an eye roll, but it lacked any actual disdain.

As she watched her massage the same spot, she realized she couldn’t remember the last time they’d really hated each other.

“You’d make a terrible massage therapist,” Sloane decided, doing her best to sound bored.

“I didn’t know they o ered those classes in law school.”

Arwyn dropped her hand into her lap. “I must have missed it

while taking various criminal law, evidence, and procedure classes so that I’d know how to do my actual job.”

Sloane laughed. “Why so defensive?” She cocked her head to the side. “You should really figure out what’s going on there. Or wait, maybe it’s the chip on your shoulder hurting your neck!”

Arwyn glared. “Unless that chip was sticking out of my couch where I inadvertently slept last night, I don’t think so.”

Easing to her feet, Sloane pointed to her now empty chair.

“Sit.”