Pulling off his helmet, Jordan looks over his shoulder and smiles at me. “So? Did she grow on you?”
I make him wait for my answer. Taking a firm grip on the hand he holds out, I step off the bike and wait for my legs to stop trembling. Kind of a surprising side effect considering I’ve essentially been sitting still for the entire drive. When I fumble with the latch on my helmet, he reaches over and unclips it. Once I shake my hair down and free, I respond. “Better than expected. This beastly machine is a girl?”
“Don’t you think?” He puts the kickstand down and stows our helmets in a container on one side of the seat.
I take a few steps up onto the sidewalk and examine the bike. It’s all shiny chrome and black paint. He obviously takes care of it and it looks like Jordan to me now. He definitely falls under the masculine category. “I don’t know.” I shrug.
He gives me a pointed stare. “You’ll hurt her feelings.”
I laugh and rub my hand across the leather seat. “My apologies, very feminine bike. I didn’t mean any offense.”
“She forgives you.” Jordan steps up next to me. “So, now what?”
I crane my neck up at the building and see nothing but mirrored windows looking back. That’s one thing I don’t like about skyscrapers. It feels like so many people can be looking down on you. You don’t know who they are, and you can’t even stare back.
“Now, we’re going to talk to an old friend.”
*
The elevator doors slide open and the tiny ding signaling our arrival feels absurdly loud in the quiet office. The reception area is empty. Curving letters glitter at me from behind the desk: Law Offices of Smedley, Masters & Goldman. The silver-and-black words feel strange and wrong now, like something is missing. Daddy is what’s missing. It used to be Smedley, Masters, Beckett & Goldman.
It’s early evening, but the lamp on the receptionist’s desk is off for the night, and the reception area is empty.
Jordan grabs my elbow and jerks his thumb over his shoulder toward a lighted sign for the restrooms. “I’ll be right back.”
“Now?”
He gives me an exasperated look. “I didn’t plan it.”
I nod. “I’m going to look around to see if anyone else I know is still here tonight. Find me when you’re done.”
“Deal.” He disappears quickly through the door.
I glance out the window in the reception area, marveling at how beautiful this city is from up here. What would our lives have been like if Daddy had never even been accused of this awful crime? How different would it be to visit him here in an expensive office in a beautiful downtown skyscraper—instead of in dark and dismal Polunsky? Daddy would have to deal with boardrooms and legal meetings instead of weekly visits and near-constant isolation.
That’s a life we should’ve known, and every time I come here it feels like I’m peeking in on a parallel universe where everything in my life went right instead of horribly wrong.
I stick my head past the reception wall and take a look around.
Rows and rows of cubicles line the middle of the huge room. The outside walls are full of offices and shining boardrooms. The firm has obviously grown since I was last here. Mama told me it’s more than double the size it was before Daddy went to prison. The firm had still been in this same spot, but back then they only had one quarter of the floor instead of the whole thing. Back then the cubicles didn’t outnumber the offices twenty to one.
“Wow,” I whisper to myself. There is movement in a room to my right, and Stacia pokes her head out.
“Riley?” She gives me a startled look before walking over for an awkward hug and then pulling me toward the room she’d been in before. It’s a giant break room and she’s making herself a coffee.
“What are you doing here, hon?” Her expression overflows with pity and I turn my gaze away, pretending I don’t hate that look.
“I came to meet with Mr. Masters. We don’t have long to do something before they’re—they will—” I stop suddenly, realizing I’ve opened the door on my emotions too wide. I can’t escape the thought that we are down to only seventeen days left—seventeen. I’ve always felt safe with the knowledge that Stacia truly believes Daddy is innocent and that she can be trusted to understand the pain I’m in. Still, the lump in my throat keeps me from speaking, and I silently curse myself and all my confused emotions.
Stacia pulls me in for another hug when she sees me break; this one is so tight it surprises me. “We’re going to figure this out, Riley. We won’t let them do that.”
I hug her back and force myself to get a grip. “Do you really think you guys can do anything to help him?”
Stacia hesitates, her eyes damp. She truly seems to be hurting and it’s nice to not feel alone in my pain. Then she squeezes my arm. “I think he’s going to be—”