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I INSIST THAT brIGID spend the night, then try to get her to talk about what just happened between them, promising I’m not looking to judge her.

“It’s my fault,” she says, over and over again.

“A man taking a hand to a woman is never her fault,” I say.

Brigid, eyes shining, shakes her head. “I know you think you know me so well, Jane. But you don’t know me nearly as well as you think you do.”

“Noted for the record,” I say. “But what I do know is that you can’t be with this particular man.”

“The problem is, I can’t not be with him,” she says, and then says she’s tired of talking, tired period, and is going to bed.

She’s already gone when I’m awake at five thirty, wanting to take Rip to the beach for an early walk before I have to leave for court.

No note from my sister. She’s just gone.

Before Rip and I do drive over to Indian Wells, I text Rob, not knowing if he’s awake or not, and tell him I need to see him at court about a half-hour early.

It turns out he is awake, against all odds.

What up?

I text him back.

Trial stuff . Important.

Will explain when I see you.

Three hours later, I am seated across from him in the courthouse conference room, trying to play against type, which means I am forcing myself to remain calm instead of doing what I so desperately want to do, almost need to do, which is bounce him off the closest wall.

“What’s so important?” he asks.

“My sister came to see me last night after she left your house,” I say. “She was pretty upset.”

I stare at him across the table and find myself wondering all over again what my sister still sees in him.

Not the good looks of an aging frat boy.

I’m thinking more about the rats crawling around inside him, the ones you discover are there the more you get to know him.

And my poor sister has known him since they were at Duke together.

“That’s between Brigid and me,” he says.

“Not today it’s not.”

“What did she tell you?”

“You mean after I saw where you hit her in the face?”

“Yeah,” he says. “After that.”

“She actually tried to defend you, by telling me that she wanted it.”

And then he gives me his patented smirk-smile.

“Can’t lie to you, Janie,” he says. “At least not on this one. She did want it.”

I have my hands in my lap, and suddenly realize that if I squeeze them any harder I am going to feel small bones in them starting to break, one by one. Losing it with him, even now, does me no good, and I know it. I can’t change my sister, and I certainly can’t change him.

“I’m asking you for the last time to stay away from her,” I say.

His expression doesn’t change.

“You should have figured out by now that she can’t stay away from me,” he says.

“She’s sick,” I say.

“You said it, not me.”

He’s baiting me and I know it. He wants to get a rise out of me, and I’m not going to give him the satisfaction. At least I can be one woman who doesn’t give him what he wants when he wants it.

“If you ever lay a hand on her ever again, you have my word that I will walk away from you, and walk away from this trial,” I say. “And then you can see how having Thomas McGoey as your first chair works out for both of you.”

“You’ve quit before,” Jacobson says.

I’m thinking about McGoey now, and the conversation we had about The Godfather .

“But it isn’t business this time, Rob,” I say, eyes locked on his. “It’s extremely personal. She’s my sister.”

“There’s nothing wrong with a little rough sex once in a while,” he says, keeping his eyes on me.

“You can tell that to your future cellmate if I walk out this door,” I tell him.

“So that’s your offer?”

“A take-it-or-leave-it offer.”

He leans back in his chair and folds his arms in front of him, looking up at the ceiling now as if deciding.

“So you’re basically making me choose between you and your sister,” he says. And smiles again. “Not exactly the way I had this particular fantasy playing out.”

I stand.

“That’s it, we’re done here,” I say, walking around the table and toward the door.

“You’re bluffing,” he says. “Winning means way too much to you. That’s why you won’t quit.”

“Watch me.”

“What would you do without me in your life?”

I say, “Die in peace.”

My hand is on the doorknob when he says, “Okay. Okay . I’ll stop seeing her.”

“What if she doesn’t want you to break it off?”

“Trust me on this, Janie,” he says. “I know how to cut them loose.”

There’s more I want to say to him. I don’t. So I just open the door and am nearly into the hallway when I hear him say, “Hey?”

I turn back around.

“In case you were wondering?” Rob Jacobson says. “The Carson girls liked it rough, too.”