Barring Complications Page 4

  “Yeah, add me to your mailing list and I can join the ranks of those too busy to confront how busy I am.”

  “You do manage to sneak in a little fun now and then, right?” Sonya asked, and Victoria could hear that while she was trying to be playful, an edge of concern laced her voice.

  “Sure. I’m writing a book right now.” She wondered why that project suddenly didn’t sound like fun.

  “Ooh, is it a steamy romance novel?”

  Victoria knew she was blushing, but she couldn’t figure out if it was because of Sonya’s suggestion, or because she knew her answer would be boring. “Sorry to disappoint, but it’s on the value of using international laws in our domestic legal system. Not quite a page-turner.”

  “I’d read it. But I read anything.”

  “Including steamy romance novels?”

  Sonya bit her lip. “I’ll never tell.”

  After the briefest of pauses, the two women laughed at the same time.

  Victoria felt a twinge of disappointment as she realized their ride had nearly ended. “The one on the left is me,” she said, and indicated a two-level rusticated stone house set back from the road. The sloping front yard featured a meandering set of stairs that led to a red door and landscaping designed to look naturally wild. Branches from a weeping willow dipped below the surface of a small oblong pond with lily pads. Red shutters bordered each window, and soft lighting emanated from the panes on the second story.

  “Nice place.”

  “Thanks. It’s usually my sanctuary. I’m not sure about these next few months, though.”

  “Because you voted to hear the gay marriage case?”

  “Ah, ah, ah, don’t think I’m going to give that one away.”

  Sonya put the car into park. “Can’t blame me for trying.”

  Victoria shook her head, smiling. “Let’s just say that there will probably be a repeat performance of tonight’s tango with the media.”

  “Well, you have my card. Call whenever you need me to rescue you.”

  “It’s unlikely that a gorgeous blonde doctor picking me up on a regular basis wouldn’t incite more media frenzy, Dr. Lukin.” Victoria surprised herself with her boldness.

  “Well, that’s the nicest thing I’ve heard all day.”

  As the two women smiled at each other, Victoria drowned for a moment in kind brown eyes.

  Her reverie was broken when Sonya spoke. “Hey, my wife and I are hosting a little barbecue a week from Saturday. You should join. It’s casual—just an excuse to pull out the grill before it gets too cold. We’d love to have you.”

  Victoria cleared her throat. “Thanks for the invitation. I’ll think about it.”

  Sonya nodded at the business card Victoria had been fiddling with. “Call if you want directions. Next Saturday, two pm.”

  As Victoria exited the car, she heard Sonya repeat her earlier directive: “Give ‘em hell, Madam Justice.”

  Before shutting the door, Victoria leaned down and peered into the car. “It’s Tori. Thanks again for the chariot ride.”

  “Anytime!” came Sonya’s cheerful reply.

  * * *

  Alone in her den, with her legs tucked under her on a brown leather accent chair, Victoria nursed a glass of chardonnay and shook her head, more at fate than at herself. Of course the first woman she’d been attracted to in she couldn’t remember how long would be married. Sonya seemed brilliant, generous, caring, clever. And beautiful. Let’s not forget beautiful. As her imagination summoned an image of Sonya laughing in the driver’s seat, with the Arlington Bridge in the background, she smiled wistfully.

  It had been so long since she had even allowed her mind to wander in this direction. She cast her thoughts back to law school, when for the briefest of moments she had entertained the notion of love, romance, and passion—when for the briefest of moments she had believed she could find a way to have it all.

  The throbbing in her hand brought her attention back to her surroundings. Love, she had learned, was nothing but a distraction.

  She finished her wine, which on her empty stomach hit harder than usual, and padded off to bed.

  Chapter Four

  The next morning Victoria strolled around the produce section of her grocery store, searching for risotto ingredients and doing a poor job of ignoring the photographer who dogged her steps. More than once she thought about shooting him a dirty look, but she knew that would make for a horrid photo.

  She moved to another cooler of vegetables and bumped him. “Move. You’re in my way,” she said as she passed.

  He stood there unfazed.

  “Could you at least pretend to be shopping?” She kept her back to him as she put a bundle of asparagus into her basket. He mutely took another photo. She stepped backwards and managed to clobber his foot. Hard. He grunted and she enjoyed a few seconds of silence before his shutter clicked again.

  As the cashier rang her up, she continued her awkward pas de deux with the photographer, managing to keep her back to him more than not. He followed her to her car, and even when she drove away he lingered on the sidewalk, snapping more photos. She was unnerved that he now had her license plate number, but then it occurred to her that if he had tracked her to the store, he probably had it anyway. Her only consolation was that he didn’t get into a car and follow her.

  She parked on a cobblestone side street in Georgetown and walked up to a flower shop named Bloomsday. She had been coming to this same shop since her mother took her here as a child and told her that any establishment selling flowers or coffee must have a pun in its name to receive her business. Although a number of shops in the greater DC area met her mother’s criterion for patronage, Victoria had only ever seen her purchase flowers from Bloomsday. Perhaps that was because the florist was named Rosie.

  A tiny bell above the door tinkled as she entered.

  Rosie pushed aside the heavy plastic flaps separating the cooler from the counter and walked over, wiping her hands on her apron.

  “Well, look what the cat dragged in.” She placed her hands, covered in tiny scars from thorns, on the sides of Victoria’s face.

  “Gee, thanks,” Victoria laughed. “Good to see you, Rosie. You look good.” She didn’t say that she thought Rosie looked older.

  “I look a damn sight better than you do.” Rosie patted her cheek, then turned away to move a bucket of peonies. “Those bags under your eyes are so big you’d have to check them before you got on a flight. Session just resumed, I take it.”

  Victoria leaned over to smell a particularly fragrant bucket of flowers. “Where do you even get lilacs this time of year?”

  “The black market.” Rosie shuffled around the shop, selecting various flowers from the buckets lining the floor.

  “Okay. Be coy, then.”

  “You’re the one who avoided my question.”

  Victoria rested her hip against the counter. “Yes, session has resumed.”

  “By the looks of it, it’s going to be a walk in the park this year.”

  “Easy as apple pie.”

  Rosie selected a vase from the shelf behind the counter and began arranging the flowers she had gathered. “I’ve been listening to the news. You’ll weather this, just like you always do. Don’t let them get to you.”

  While Rosie turned around to grab some ribbon, Victoria slid fifty dollars underneath the cash register. The last time she had been to Bloomsday, Rosie refused to accept her money and Victoria wasn’t about to lose another argument with her.

  “Thanks, Rosie.” She thought for a moment. “What flowers would you take to a barbecue hosted by a woman you just met and attended by people you don’t know?”

  Rosie whipped around and a slow grin spread over her face. “Have you finally met someone?”

  Victoria felt the heat rise in her cheeks. “No. I mean, yes. Well, I didn’t know her before.” Wow, I hope I’m this articulate next time I’m asking questions from the bench. “She’s married. I only met her a
few days ago when she, um, helped me out of a jam. I’d like to say thank you.”

  “Sweet peas. They’re open and friendly. What day is this party?”

  “Saturday. Can I come by in the morning?”

  Rosie finished fussing with the flowers and slid the completed arrangement across the counter to Victoria. “Yes. You can sit right here and tell me all about this mystery woman while I arrange your sweet peas.”

  Victoria smiled. “How much?” she asked, nodding at the flowers.

  Rosie’s eyes narrowed. “Haven’t we danced this dance before? You’ve been coming here since you were small enough to step on. If I want to give you flowers, I will give you flowers.” She thrust the vase into Victoria’s hands. “Off you go.”

  Victoria leaned around the flowers to kiss her cheek. “Thank you. I’ll see you Saturday.”

  “Maybe try and sleep a minute or two between now and then, huh?”

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  She exited the shop with the oversized arrangement obstructing her view. As soon as the door closed behind her, she heard the click of an SLR camera.

  “Justice Willoughby, who are the flowers for? The world wants to know: are you dating someone?”

  Victoria was about to respond when a raspy voice behind her handled it. “Are you dating someone? When was the last time you bought flowers for anyone? Probably never—who would even want to date a skinny white boy like you? Leave. Now.”

  Through a sea of blooms Victoria could see the paparazzo’s eyes widen and his jaw drop. This one was shorter than the guy in the grocery store and he looked like an albino ferret. He began to back away until he bumped into a parked car.

  “Scram, low-life,” Rosie called, waving her scissors, and to Victoria’s surprise he listened. He threw himself into a black hatchback and drove away.

  Victoria turned to face Rosie and was about to begin effusively thanking her when the older woman cut in.

  “Victoria, why aren’t the Supreme Court Police taking care of this nonsense? When you were being confirmed, they followed you around like a lost puppy. I remember.”

  Victoria opened her mouth to respond, then closed it. It hadn’t really occurred to her. But of course, during moments of particular media attention and scrutiny, the SC Police would escort justices when they were out in the city. Rosie had been particularly taken with a tall officer named Rex who had been on Victoria’s detail during her confirmation hearings.

  “So. You haven’t told them.” Rosie crossed her arms.

  Victoria thought she would look more on top of things if she didn’t have a face full of peonies. “I will call them today, yes.”

  Rosie pulled open the rear passenger door and helped her situate the arrangement on the floor behind the seat. “When I see you on Saturday, there better be a strapping policeman tailing you. Bring me another tall one.”

  They waved at one another as Victoria pulled away. It wasn’t until she was parking her car in the garage beneath the Mt. Vernon Triangle that she noticed the fifty dollars stuck in the pocket of her pants.

  * * *

  After parking her car in a garage and cracking the windows so the flowers could breathe, Victoria grabbed her gym bag and headed toward the Harbour Club. She was looking forward to some time away from the world while she swam. Located above Mt. Vernon Triangle, the Harbour Club was DC’s most exclusive gym and only admitted new members if current ones recommended them. Most members held public office or were senior staff to Senators or Representatives. Alistair had recommended Victoria shortly after she joined the Court.

  Alistair Douglas had once had an amazing jump shot. His weekly basketball game in the Highest Court in the Land, on the top floor of the Supreme Court, was infamous. Clerks for other justices lobbied hard for an invitation to play against him, and harder still to be on his team. He was devastated when the arthritis in his hip became too painful for him to continue shooting hoops. He joined the Harbour Club after his doctors insisted that swimming was the best therapy for his joints.

  In addition to the basketball court, the top floor of the Supreme Court also housed an impressive array of weight machines, elliptical trainers, and treadmills, along with two racquetball courts. Unfortunately for Victoria, the Court’s fitness facilities did not feature a pool, and swimming was her exercise of choice. Alistair said he had the perfect solution, but she was unprepared for the grandeur of her new gym.

  When she had first entered the locker room of the Harbour Club a year ago, she’d struggled not to gape at the private changing rooms with engraved nameplates bearing names such as “Secretary Kathleen Sebelius,” “Ambassador Susan Rice,” and halfway down the last row, “Justice Victoria Willoughby.” She had used her new keycard to enter her room, and it had taken a moment for her eyes to adjust to the dim lighting. A terrycloth robe hung on a hook behind the door. To her right, a slate countertop supported a sink basin and one of those funky faucets she had only ever found in upscale restaurants. Displayed on the countertop were a hair dryer and diffuser, Q-Tips, face lotion, hair spray, toothpaste, mouthwash, and assorted other toiletries. To her left was a floor length mirror, framed in stone. Ahead of her, fluffy towels were stacked on a shelf outside of another door that opened into a shower featuring three nozzles. Shelves built into the stonework of the shower supported bottles of shampoo, conditioner, and body wash.

  At least she didn’t have to worry about running into Nancy Pelosi when they were both naked in a communal shower.

  Normally Victoria was not a big fan of locker rooms. But on that first day, as she unpacked her gym bag and placed her makeup next to the newspaper the Club provided, she’d grinned. This, she could get used to.

  Still, the Club staff continued to surprise her. As she stripped off her clothes and tugged on her swimsuit, she noticed they had left two chocolates on a tiny plate next to her floss. She often emerged from the pool ravenous and craving sugar, and she wondered if the staff knew this about her, or if they had provided every member with chocolate today. She would believe either scenario.

  Donning the plush white robe and snatching a towel, she headed to the pool.

  She swam slowly for the first five laps, warming up her muscles and feeling the tension leave her back. She concentrated on reaching as far in front of her as she could to begin each stroke, keeping her fingers relaxed and pulling the water back in an S shape. After all these years, she still had to remind herself to bend her elbow so that her stroke would stay close to the length of her body rather than windmilling far away from her. She breathed every third stroke and focused on keeping the splash from her flutter kicks as small as possible. After five laps, she increased her pace and pushed herself so that she remained winded, but stopped short of gasping.

  Settling into the faster pace, she allowed her thoughts to drift back to work. Tomorrow she and Wallace, the clerk she had assigned to the gay marriage case, would begin their research. They would start by reading the district and appellate decisions. Then they would read everything they could get their hands on that might indicate a viable line of reasoning to sway Jamison toward marriage equality.

  She would also get her team of clerks started on researching the habeas case the court had granted cert to, as well as an antitrust case against Google. The docket would be announced on Friday, and she wanted to use the intervening day to dole out preliminary assignments to her staff and wrap up the third chapter of her book on international law.

  This portion of the book tackled the discrepancies between the UN Charter and US foreign policy, and she meant to put forth some hypothetical situations that would examine whether international law might be enforceable. She wouldn’t have time to focus on the book until the court’s session had concluded, and if she didn’t get her thoughts down on paper now, they would float away like autumn leaves, scattered and impossible to recapture.

  The rest of her laps passed in a blur of planning, mental lists, and strategizing.

  Freshly s
howered and dressed, she nibbled on her chocolate as she walked back through the gym toward the exit. Her mind was on the International Criminal Court when a security guard stopped her.

  “Pardon me, Madam Justice. A word, please?” He gestured to an office behind the front desk.

  Concerned, she nodded and followed him. They sat down in chairs on opposite sides of a desk and he offered her tea, which she gratefully accepted.

  While she sipped the steaming chamomile, the guard spun around a monitor on his desk that showed a grainy picture of the parking garage where she had left her car. He pointed to a dark blue van parked three cars down from her Volvo, and she could just make out the silhouette of a person in the driver’s seat.

  “This van followed you into the garage, and the driver has remained in the car. We’ve written down the license plate number.” He slid a slip of paper across the desk, and she pocketed it. “If you’d like to give us your keys, a member of our staff will drive your car out of the garage and to one of the private, underground delivery entrances for the Club. You should be able to exit from a different gate, and lose your stalker that way.”

  She jerked at the word stalker. She couldn’t tell if he was joking, and felt a wave of unease wash through her and settle in her stomach. She took another sip of chamomile before responding.

  “Yes, thank you. I appreciate your attentiveness.” She pulled her keys out of her purse and placed them in his hand, noticing that her fingers shook a little. Probably too much physical exertion with too little food, she thought.

  “You’re welcome to stay here and watch us on the monitor if you’d like. We’ll come and get you when your car is settled in the delivery garage.”

  She kept an eye on the security footage after he left, but felt too jittery to sit still. She stood and paced around the tiny office.