Alpha Omega 03 - Fair Game

practicing. He didn’t seem too upset about it.
    Charles’s nose told him that the rest of the firm were mostly fae—and that there were a lot of taped-up boxes in the hallway. Maybe they were planning on closing the firm altogether, reinventing themselves and going on. One of those gift/curse things about a long life. He’d “retired” and started anew a few times himself.
    They played pinochle, a slightly different version than either he or Anna knew, but that was, generally speaking, true of pinochle anywhere. It kept them busy while they waited and kept the tension at a low sizzle.
    There was no love lost between Lizzie’s parents, though they were frighteningly polite to each other. Her stepfather ignored the tension admirably and seemed to have decided it was his job to keep Lizzie entertained.
    When the call came that the jury had handed in a verdict, after only four hours of deliberation, they threw in their hands with a sigh of relief.
    THE JUDGE WAS a gray-haired woman with rounded features and eyes that were more comfortable with a smile than a frown. She had avoided looking atCharles, Anna, or Isaac during the trial—and she had quietly stationed a guard between her and the witness stand when any of the werewolves or fae, including Lizzie, had been questioned. Her voice was slow and patient as she listed the names for which murder charges had been lodged against Les Heuter. It took a long time. When she finished, she said, “How do you find the defendant?”
    The foreman of the jury swallowed a little nervously, glanced at Charles, cleared his throat, and said, “We find the defendant innocent of all charges.”
    The courtroom was silent for a long breath.
    Then Alistair Beauclaire stood, his face expressionless, but rage in every other part of his body. He looked at the members of the jury, then at the judge. Without a change of expression, he turned and stalked out of the courtroom. Only when he was gone did the room explode into noise.
    Les exchanged exuberant hugs with his lawyers and his father. Beside Charles, Anna let out a low growl at the sight.
    “We need to get Lizzie out of here,” Charles told her. “This is going to be a zoo.”
    He stood up as he said it and used his body to clear a pathway for Beauclaire’s daughter and her mother and stepfather while Anna shepherded them out. Several reporters came up and shouted questions, but they backed off when Charles bared his teeth at them—or maybe it was his eyes, because he knew that Brother Wolf had turned them to gold.
    “I expected he’d get off lightly,” Lizzie’s mother said, her teeth chattering as if the brisk autumn air was below freezing—rage, Charles judged. “I thought he’d be convicted on a lesser charge. I never dreamed they’d just let him go.”
    Her husband had an arm around Lizzie, who looked dazed.
    “He’s free,” she said in a bewildered voice. “They knew. They knew what hedid. Not just to me but to all those people—and they just let him go.”
    Charles kept half of his attention on Heuter, who was speaking to a crowd of reporters on the courthouse steps, maybe fifty feet away. His body language and face conveyed a man who was sincerely remorseful for the deeds his uncle had made him do. It made Brother Wolf snarl. Heuter’s father, the senator from Texas, stood behind him with a hand on his shoulder. If either of them had seen Lizzie’s mother’s face, they’d have been hiring bodyguards. If she’d had a gun in her hand, she’d have used it.
    Charles understood the sentiment.
    “They played up the strangeness of the fae and the werewolves and used it to scare the jury into acquittal,” said Lizzie’s stepfather, sounding as shocked as Lizzie. Then he looked Charles in the eye, though he’d been warned by Beauclaire not to do so. “Travis and Benedict won’t hurt anyone else—and people will be watching Les if I have to hire them myself. He’ll make a mistake and we’ll send him back to jail.”
    “You might consider investigating the jurors, too,” suggested Anna in a cold voice that didn’t hide her fury. “The good senator has more than enough money to bribe a few people if necessary.”
    Lizzie’s stepfather turned to Lizzie and his voice softened. “Let’s get you home, sweetheart. You’ll probably have to give an interview to get rid of the reporters, but my attorney or your dad can set that up.”
    “Trust Alistair not to be here when we need him,” muttered