Then he said, “I ran against him not simply for my ego, though I thought at the time that I’d make a better D.A. Still do. But I’ll never forget how he handled that disaster with Sharon. When he found out I was dating her, he made our lives life hell. He argued with me about everything, sabotaged my cases then came running in to save them at the last minute. He misplaced important documents to embarrass me in court. I could handle it, I figured it would blow over soon enough, or Sandra would put a stop to it. But how he treated Sharon—it was inexcusable. He intentionally made her look bad. Demanded she stay late to redo reports that didn’t need to be redone, simply because he found a small error—errors he made in the first place. He was vindictive. Petty. If he screwed up, he blamed Sharon. She didn’t know which way was up by the end of the year, she was popping pills to stay awake because she worked so many hours she couldn’t see straight. I finally went to Sandra, who agreed to reassign her to another team of prosecutors. But it was too late. Sharon crashed her car going home late one night. She had drugs in her system, went into rehab, decided she didn’t want to be a lawyer.”
Hart was staring into his empty wine glass, his mind far away. Alex didn’t know what to say to him. She wanted to believe that there was another reason, that it wasn’t Matt’s fault, but she didn’t know. She hadn’t known Matt back then. And he had a deep loathing of Travis Hart—it made sense now. They fell for the same girl and Hart won. Could Matt be that spiteful and ruin a young woman’s career because she chose another man?
What did she really know about him, anyway? She’d walked into this situation to right a wrong, she didn’t have to get involved with any of the people. That had been her mistake, mixing business with her personal life.
“I’m sorry,” Hart said. “I shouldn’t have told you all that. I thought I was over it, but going over some of those cases today reminded me of what I lost because of Matt Elliott.”
“No apologies necessary. I understand how vindictive people can be, especially people you work with.”
“I don’t want to end tonight on a downer. Have an after dinner drink with me. Just one. You’ve had three cups of coffee, certainly a little alcohol won’t affect you.”
She wanted to, but shook her head. “My rule. I’m carrying, no alcohol.”
“Where’s your gun?”
She raised an eyebrow. “Which one?”
He laughed, and that effectively washed away most of the depressing tone of his conversation. “I like you, Alex Morgan. You’ll fit in well with my staff.”
“If I take the job.”
“You’ll take it.”
“Confident, aren’t you?”
“I usually get what I want, and I want you in charge of my security. I’ll give you until the end of tomorrow to say yes.”
“And if I say no?”
He smiled. “You won’t.”
Chapter Eleven
Matt Elliott had ordered from archives the files related to the case that Alex had flagged, but they wouldn’t be delivered until tomorrow. The State of California vs. Charles Vincent Paulson. The case was from the three years he’d served in the State Senate. Zoey had already run a report from the computer which gave him the basics including charges, motions, disposition, and witnesses. He’d brought what he had home and made himself a late dinner, trying to put Alex’s dinner with Travis Hart out of his mind. He was irritated—he knew it was irrational—but he didn’t like the idea of Alex alone with Travis.
Travis Hart was a prick. He was unethical, corrupt, shrewd, and slick. Finding evidence of his corruption had proven next to impossible. But he was attractive, charming and attentive. People, especially women, liked him. He had that rare talent to be both arrogant and self-deprecating at the same time.
Sixteen years ago, Matt was a new prosecutor in Sacramento. So was Travis. Travis was younger, hired right out of college. Matt had spent three years in the Navy before college, and it had changed him—for the better, he thought. Matt was disciplined and a firm believer in the system. Travis was still a college frat boy who felt he was entitled to everything.
They’d hated each other on sight. Matt didn’t know if Travis saw him as competition or what, but he’d had an attitude as if he wanted to take Matt down a peg; Matt definitely viewed Travis as a jackass who used the law as a tool and viewed justice as flexible. Matt believed in right and wrong and that justice must be blind to be fair—Travis wanted to be a player. He liked the deals, the manipulation, the power he had to change lives. To cut deals—or not cut deals—based on his own criteria, a set of rules Matt had never understood.
Travis undermined Matt whenever he could, but Travis excelled at creating allies. The tension in the office during those early years was palpable. Sandy Cullen, the D.A. before Matt, had Matt’s back but she wouldn’t get rid of Travis. He was a smart lawyer. He won big cases. He made friends. So Matt kept his head down and did his job, because being drawn into Travis’s games would ultimately destroy or demoralize him. Five years into their service, Sandy moved Matt to the special unit for prosecuting sex crimes. After that, he and Travis rarely crossed paths.