Page 128 of Wicked Refusal

I swallow my nerves. “Hi.”

“Ms. Winters.” He greets me formally, but not coldly. “I trust you’re ready for today.”

“I am.”Or at least I hope so.“What’s, um… what’s next?”

“We’ve got our witness list. Opposite side’s got theirs.” He flips through his folder as he says this. “The CPS testimonies are going to be the hardest to overcome. Any smoking gun I should know about?”

Besides the fact that my ex-boyfriend’s family is definitely involved in the brutal murder of my current boyfriend’s one?“Nope,” I blurt. “No, err, no guns. Of any kind.”

He shoots me a suspicious glance, but lets it be. “Then we’d better go inside.”

Sweat breaks out at the back of my neck. Today won’t be like the last time—that was just a preliminary hearing. This is the real deal.

If I lose this, they’ll take Eli.

But if I win…

Then no one will ever be able to take him from me again.

I swallow my nerves and walk into the courtroom.

Itzel Deloera’s up first. Her testimony is… friendly, as much as it can be.

But it’s also tragically objective. Smithers immediately asks her about the night of the fire, the circumstances that led there. She tries to be kind in her delivery, but there isn’t much she can do to soften the blow.

I left my son alone—fact.

He was three years old—fact.

He burned down the place—fact.

When Smithers puts it like that, even the judge can’t suppress a grimace.

Isaak’s cross-examination tries to play up Mrs. Deloera’s emotional side. And while she’s certainly full of praise about me as a person, the judge has already heard her character assassination of me as a mother.

“That wasn’t good,” Isaak murmurs once he’s done with his cross.

“No shit, Sherlock,” Nikita hisses. “I thought you were supposed to be decent at this.”

A vein starts popping on Isaak’s temple. “If you’re concerned with my performance, you’re free to give it a try yourself.”

“I’m not the one who went to Harvard fucking Law.”

“No,” he says, “I didn’t think you were.”

“Please, stop fighting,” I plead in the tiniest voice I can muster.

Nikita begrudgingly drops the issue. “So, what now?”

Now, it’s time for the final nail in my coffin.“Howard Lee’s up next,” I murmur, watching him walk up to the stand. “We are so fu?—”

“Mr. Lee,” Smithers says jovially. “Tell us about Ms. Winters.”

There it is.I’m dead.

My whole life starts flashing before my eyes. How could I ever think I’d win this? How could I delude myself that badly?

I thought Itzel’s testimony was going to be good for us. That it was going to mitigate whatever damage Lee might do. But that was all just wishful thinking, wasn’t it?