Page 14 of Jury Woman, Part 3 of 6

"Are you insane?" She threw her hands up. "You're just handing us over to Dad's girlfriend to raise?"

"It's not like that, Lily. It means your dad will actually be home more, instead of leaving you two to fend for yourselves."

"So instead we get supervised by some twenty-six-year-old who calls herself a 'wellness coach.'" She spat the last two words like they tasted bad. Then, quieter, sharper in a different way: "Does this mean you're never coming home?"

"Of course not." My chest tightened at the fear underneath the anger, finally visible. "This is temporary, all of it. I'll be home the moment the trial ends."

Josh said nothing, just worked at the ragged edge of his thumbnail until a thin line of blood appeared.

Elaine, watching the whole thing unravel, finally raised a hand like a crossing guard. "Okay, you two—give your mom and me a minute, would you?"

They left without a word, without so much as a glance back at the screen, and the silence they left behind felt louder than the shouting had.

Elaine waited until the door clicked somewhere on her end before she leaned toward the camera, arms crossed. "Are you insane? You're letting Warren's baby girlfriend move into your house? Sleep in your sheets? Use your good pans? Your—" she lowered her voice for effect, "—husband?"

"Ex-husband," I said. "And I think it's for the best. The kids need supervision I can't provide from here."

"There are other ways to get supervision that don't involve handing Heidi the keys to your entire former life."

I didn't have an answer that would satisfy her, so I didn't try. Elaine studied me for a beat, her expression softening into something more careful.

"Are you doing okay?" she asked. "With all of it. Really."

"I'm fine."

"Good." Then one eyebrow crept upward. "Making any... friends out there?" She waggled both eyebrows for emphasis, the way she'd done since we were teenagers sharing a bedroom.

Heat climbed my neck before I could stop it, and my eyes flicked, entirely against my will, toward the doorway where Deputy Wells stood in his usual post.

Elaine caught it instantly. She leaned closer to her camera, dropping her voice to a stage whisper. "Is that the handsome marshal? Is he listening right now?"

Wells's gaze shifted toward me, just slightly, just enough that I knew he'd heard every syllable.

"I have to go," I said quickly, now overheating. "Love you. Tell the kids I love them too."

I ended the call before Elaine could get another word in, closing the laptop with more force than necessary.

Walking back down the corridor, my footsteps loud in my own ears, I made myself ask before I lost my nerve. "Did you hear all of that?"

"Hear all of what?" Wells said, eyes forward, expression perfectly composed.

But something in the set of his mouth told me he'd heard every word.

September 21, Monday

I HADN'T planned on the seat next to juror number seven Carol Winslow becoming mine by default, but somewhere over the past month it had, the two of us settling into adjacent chairs in the box each morning as naturally as if assigned seating existed. Today I knitted and she took notes while a compliance officer on the witness stand stammered his way through testimony about corporate filings, glancing at his own attorney before every answer.

Carol didn't say anything about him. She didn't have to. I caught the small, private twitch at the corner of her mouth, the barely perceptible narrowing of her eyes that told me everything her mouth wasn't allowed to. Thirty-one years of third grade, she'd told me once, teaches you to spot a rehearsed answer from across a room. I'd started to understand what she meant just from watching her face during testimony—not a word spoken, but a whole education happening in her expression.

At the noon recess we ended up at the same corner table in the jury room. She leaned over to inspect the sage green blanket taking shape in my lap.

"That's coming along beautifully," she said. "Who's it for?"

"To donate to a children's hospital."

"That's lovely of you. My granddaughter in Charlotte was a preemie and was in the hospital for several weeks after she was born. My daughter brought her home wrapped in a knitted blanket someone had made and donated. It was very special."

I smiled, grateful for the easy conversation, nothing that required careful footwork around the rules Judge Arnold had drilled into all of us.