Part 2 (1/2)

'Might I remind you both that my life was going well until you two became involved in it again. ”The rising star of the Scottish Bar” that was me. And then you ...' I pointed at Kailash, 'decided to settle your differences with my senior partner by involving him in a s.e.x scandal and splashed it all over the papers. So what happens then? My firm gets plunged into debt because of the defamation charge going against us and unless my firm pays off its overdraft then I'll be bankrupt and unable to practise on my own? Thanks to you, Mummy dearest, I'm looking at a future of being someone else's cash cow, so don't start telling me what to do when the best thing is probably that you keep well out of things.'

Kailash didn't look fazed in the slightest. I suppose a lot worse had been said to her.

'Brodie,' she went on, as if I hadn't spoken, 'you play the cards you're dealt. If you could win carrying on the way you are making enemies left, right and centre I'd say go ahead. But you simply can't win.'

'You don't trust me?' I asked her. 'You don't trust me to do things properly?'

'Too bad,' she cut back. 'Your life is at stake now and that's far more important.'

'You're using a lot of gambling terminology, Kailash,' I commented, trying to move the conversation on. 'Are the rumours correct?'

'Yes, they are. For once. I've taken over the Danube Street casino.'

She mentioned it as if she'd bought a new handbag. And that was the rub. I knew that all I would have to do would be to ask either of them for money to buy my way out of the firm. Lothian and St Clair would see the back of me and I would be, technically, free. I knew that Kailash and my grandad would give me as much as I needed without a second thought, but my d.a.m.ned pride insisted that I had to do it my own way. If I did rely on the money of others, who would I choose anyway? Which fortune was more acceptable to me? The one made recently by one woman's ingenuity and willingness to do anything to survive, or the other based on old, aristocratic money handed down through the ages? I told myself it wasn't a choice I was ready to make.

'Enough of these diversionary tactics. Kailash can't you see what she's doing?' Lord MacGregor was shouting.

He was a great lawyer in his time, my grandad, but the judge in him took over now. There was only one person in charge in his drawing room and it was clear that it wasn't going to be me.

'Brodie the only route open to you is to take a position as a sheriff. Put in a few years in the lower courts and then get a seat in the College of Justice. Join the family firm and become a judge. It would make me very proud to see you wear the red robes.'

'Easy as that, is it?' I asked. 'Just say what you want and it all comes together? Even for your annoying b.a.s.t.a.r.d granddaughter?'

He looked slightly fl.u.s.tered. Unusually.

'Well, the only reason I can even suggest this is that the powers-that-be are looking for more women to become judges. Political correctness or some other such b.l.o.o.d.y nonsense. It can work in your favour, my dear.'

'Follow in my father's footsteps?'

'If it will save you from being ruined, then yes, do whatever you have to continue.' Kailash joined in the shouting match.

'Some people would bite their arm off for the chance we are offering you.' Grandad's voice was raised.

We. I didn't want to know about Kailash's involvement. Thinking about what favours she was pulling in on my behalf made my blood run cold. No one likes to think about their mother having s.e.x, much less for money or other favours. It was enough to keep me in therapy for years.

My grandad's next words made that thought disappear.

'Bridget Nicholson is wining and dining as we speak. That girl is desperate to be elevated to the bench.'

'Girl? She was born middle-aged, and she's certainly looked it ever since I've known her. She's probably excited by the huge pension.'

'Whatever her reasons are, Brodie, could you really imagine yourself sc.r.a.ping and bowing before Lady Nicholson?'

And there he had it my hot b.u.t.ton.

I didn't want it, but I was b.l.o.o.d.y sure I didn't want Bridget Nicholson to have it either.

Chapter Three.

'Have you been sleeping there all night?'

It's surprising how sharp and hard a ball of rolled-up paper is when it hits you in the face. I had been sleeping, head down on my gla.s.s-topped desk, and I could feel the drool running freely from the side of my mouth.

'Was I snoring?'

'Like a pig in clover and the resemblance doesn't stop there. Did you go home last night or have you been working in the office all night?' Lavender looked sniffily around my office, which was littered with files.

'When I finished at St Leonard's with the custodies, it was hardly worth going home. I was busy at the weekend and I hadn't had time to prepare the trial files properly.' The mere mention of the word 'weekend' made my mouth go dry Lavender Ironside wasn't just the best secretary in the firm, she also knew me inside out and I was terrified she'd make me spill the beans about Jack.

'If you employed an a.s.sistant they could do some of the preparation,' she pointed out.

'You know we can't afford it,' I replied.

Lavender snorted. 'I know the money that comes in for criminal fees you're paying more than your fair share into the partners' p.i.s.sing pot. Why don't you ask the others to cut down on their expenses and get the overdraft down?'

'If I had the energy, I'd laugh, Lav.' The very thought of the rest of them walking to work or taking clients to McDonald's was risible. 'I need some caffeine would you?'

I knew that I must still be looking pathetic when Lavender switched the coffee machine on without a murmur. I wouldn't get away without a few comments, though.

'For all your money, Brodie, I wouldn't have your life.'

'Is that some sick joke, Lav? You of all people know I'm skint.'

She considered her options. 'Well, even for your body I wouldn't have your life well, I might consider it.' Lavender self-consciously smoothed her hands over her rounded rump before continuing. Like a hound dog she turned on a sixpence for all her flaws, I loved her to bits, and knew that it was reciprocated. She presented me with a steaming cup of strong black coffee before delivering the killer punch.

'You've been s.h.a.gging this weekend haven't you?' Her bright blue eyes were hungry for details.

'Come on, Brodie, share don't spare my blushes.'

'Your interest in other people's s.e.x lives is, frankly, obscene.' I tried to sound superior, but we'd had too many of these conversations in the past to take the moral high ground.

'Oooh, you're not denying it then?'

'I didn't admit anything I was merely commenting on your unhealthy obsession with second-hand s.e.x.'

'Do I know him?'

She pressed her face into mine, and for some bizarre reason sniffed as if she believed she would get his scent.

'What the h.e.l.l do you think you are doing, Lavender?'

'Trying to get inside your aura.'

'My what?' Lavender came up with the oddest things sometimes. I'd known her ever since I was a student doing part-time work at the firm and she was a secretary there over the years we had become friends much more than workmates, and I trusted her more than I trusted myself at times but she was still strange on occasion.

'You know that I've been going to the College of Parapsychology to increase my psychic ability,' she said, as if she'd just signed up for woodworking. 'Well, this weekend I went to an introductory course on psychometry.'