Chapter Eight

Olivia opened her door, swiveled her gym-toned legs, and set her high heels onto the drive. Leaning out, her attention was fixed on Beowolf. "Oh!" she called. "You're more beautiful than I could ever have imagined!" Her arms opened wide, and with a happy rumble, Beowolf took off, galumphing his way to Olivia, dragging his lead, tongue dangling, slobber helicoptering his head like a damp halo.

Pressing up from his crouch, Nutsbe now understood the problem with strangers in public. Though, in Nutsbe's experience, once the Iniquus K9 had their vest on, they knew they were on the job and maintained a good work ethic. Obviously, that wasn't the situation today.

Beowolf came to a muscle-twitching stop and buried his head in Olivia's lap to receive his hug.

Her blond curls draped over Beowolf's back. Her eyes closed tightly as she absorbed the moment. "You're so, so beautiful," she whispered into his scruff.

Yes, she was,Nutsbe thought. And not at all what he was expecting. In person, Olivia Gladstone didn't look like the battle maiden he'd seen in the grainy black and white photos in the D.C. newspapers. She looked sunny, approachable, like a friend. Friendly, Nutsbe corrected himself. Those thoughts flashed through one part of his brain; the other part was processing the outcome of hugging the droolminator.

"Hello, precious! What a nice welcome." She patted the K9's sides. "You are amazing. Look at you." Her voice bubbled with delight. "There is so much of you." She bent over to kiss Beowolf as Nutsbe took long strides toward her, the drool rag draped over his palm.

When she turned her head to see Nutsbe, she startled, then blinked. But that might have little to do with Nutsbe himself and more to do with Beowolf's draping his copious jowls across her lap as he sat, looking up at her with his big doe eyes.

She could probably feel the slobber absorbing into her suit skirt.

"Ma'am," Nutsbe started, and Olivia sat up. "I'm Nutsbe, your handler. Uhm, the dog handler for your case. I apologize. Beowolf's a drooler." He held out the rag he knew she'd need.

"Oh," she said, accepting it with a smile, switched it from one hand to the other then held out her freed right hand for a shake. "Olivia Gladstone."

Her fingers were cool, her skin soft. Her clasp was fine-boned and small, and he felt like he had bear paws in comparison. Nutsbe had no idea what he said or if he said anything. He was held in place by her smile and the sensation of warmth radiating from her hand to his.

He didn't want to let go.

Might not have let go.

Might have just stood there looking like a fool. But thankfully, Beowolf broke the spell by pressing his head against Nutsbe's thigh, giving him a nudge as if to say, "Yeah, that's enough. I'm the only one with a license to drool." As soon as Nutsbe moved, Beowolf shifted his head back into the petting zone.

Reluctantly, Nutsbe released her hand and turned to give Bob space to join the conversation.

"Hey, there, Liv. How was court today?" Bob asked, coming to stand next to Nutsbe.

"I thought that tonight, I might practice some kind of song and dance routine for the morning to keep my jury focused. That way, I can use lunch as a change of scenery and come back with this guy for the afternoon." Olivia stroked a thumb over Beowolf's wrinkled forehead.

Bob looked at Nutsbe, "She's kidding, you're going to try very hard not to let the jury know there's a dog in the courtroom."

"Got it."

Turning back to Olivia, Bob said, "You know, a lot of lawyers I've talked to say that crime shows on TV are making the actual work of prosecuting that much harder," Bob said.

"Exactly. I was just saying this to our paralegal this morning. The jury expects entertainment. And I'm just not the kind of prosecutor that makes a rabbit appear with the tap of a wand."

When Olivia looked down, Beowolf lifted both his brows, waiting for a directive but not moving until absolutely necessary. Nutsbe could understand that. It looked like a nice place to be. As soon as the thought popped up, Nutsbe pushed it aside. He was here as an Iniquus representative and not some guy looking to buy a girl a drink at the bar.

"Beowolf," she said with a smile. "Can you back it up, sweetheart? I need to get out now."

Nutsbe stepped to the side and tapped his thigh. "Beowolf, flank." For a moment, he was afraid that Beowolf would ignore him for Olivia's exuberant attention. But Beowolf swung his head around, then trotted over to stand on Nutsbe's left. "Good boy."

Olivia stood.

"Uhm." Nutsbe wiggled a finger at her skirt. There was a poorly positioned wet splotch. "Again, my apologies, ma'am."

He couldn't really read the mix of emotions on her face. "Not ma'am, just Olivia, thanks." She swiped the rag down her skirt, but the liquid had already been absorbed. It didn't seem to bother her much. Olivia had focused on the house. "Come on, I can see Candace watching us from behind the curtains. Let's go in and see how she does."

"Olivia, I'm staying out here to make some calls," Bob said. "Nutsbe's got you."

Olivia shifted her gaze to Nutsbe. "Right, Nutsbe, you said?" She stepped onto the sidewalk. "But Thaddeus Crushed on your court papers."

"That's right. People call me Tad or Nutsbe. Your choice." Nutsbe felt ice wash over him. His name was going to be in the court's public documentation. If anyone knew how to look, he'd be exposed. Nutsbe would have to tell Sy Covington what was going on.

He thought certain leaders in the FBI might be interested in making the McMahan debacle go away by alleviating the friction point, him. If his testimony were interrupted, the whole "counterintelligence chief as Russian asset" might never find the light of public awareness. And the FBI might never be exposed to scrutiny or embarrassment. And though Nutsbe held the FBI in high esteem, it was a broad organization with a variety of personalities and personal goals. Yeah, Russia and Albania weren't the only ones with skin in this game.

With Thaddeus Crushed transcribed into the court records, that could very well be the way to draw a bead on him.

Olivia led the way to the front door.

While she rang the bell, Nutsbe waited on the sidewalk with Beowolf in a down-stay. He wanted the witness to have a bit of distance to see Beowolf's size and come to some conclusion about how she felt.

"Nutsbe, this is Candace," Olivia said. "And that beast there, Candace, is Beowolf. He's your personal knight in shining armor. His job is to gallantly sit with you and support you the entire time you're in the courtroom."

"Big," she said, hugging herself.

Candace presented as an oxymoron. Her face was soft and pale with a splatter of fat freckles that, for some reason, made Nutsbe think of Huckleberry Finn. Spikes jutted through six different holes in each of her ears. With her orange-auburn hair clipped into barrettes, her natural curls draped over the chunky, grey wool sweater hanging loose from her slight frame. Around her neck was a thick dog collar-styled choker. The spikes on that made Nutsbe nervous that if she nodded her head, she'd impale herself.

His gaze traveled to her shoes. Nutsbe found that a person's shoes said a lot about the role they were playing at that moment. Here, black work boots peeked out from her wide-legged jeans. From the shape, he knew they would have steel toes that would set off the metal detector if she wore them tomorrow. He'd never faced that before. It could be that the officers would consider them a weapon—the footwear version of brass knuckles—in a fight. They were deadly if you knew what you were doing.

Candace nodded and retreated into the house. She sat on an overstuffed chair in the corner. It was the position someone with a great deal of situational awareness would choose.

With Beowolf at his side, Nutsbe walked over to Candace. "Why don't you spend some time with Beowolf and become friends?"

She looked up at Nutsbe. "Can I get down on the floor with him?"

"Yeah, sure. This is your time." Nutsbe smiled woodenly. "I want you to be comfortable."

When Candace got down, Beowolf lay beside her, sniffing at her clothes and hair, making her laugh.

That was a sound he hadn't expected. Maybe he could relax a little.

Nutsbe put a knee on the ground so he wasn't looming over her. He didn't want Candace to feel vulnerable. "Tomorrow in court, Beowolf will be right at your feet. You can pet him. Slide your feet out of your shoes and put your feet on him. He's there for you."

"Okay," she said, then laid down next to Beowolf and wrapped herself around him. When she tipped her head in, she started whispering.

Since Beowolf looked relaxed with no whale eyes or signs of stress, Nutsbe climbed back to his feet.

Olivia had found a place on the couch, and Nutsbe went to sit near her. The room was silent except for the tick, tick, tick of the hall clock and the swhss-swhss of Candace's secret conversation with Beowolf.

Nutsbe thought this was going pretty well and that he'd probably stressed out for no reason. But that thought formed on the cusp of a sob.

It started with a choking noise, a kind of hiccough, and then Candace was like a volcano letting off hot lava emotions.

A sheen of sweat glistened Nutsbe's skin. His lungs constricted, and he wanted one of two things to happen—a dragon to slay or an exit route. He pulled at his collar, feeling his face grow red, and he turned to Olivia to see if she was watching the panic rise in his system.

"This is good," Olivia pronounced. Her focus was on Candace. "She needed to let some of her pent-up emotions go." Olivia slowly turned concerned eyes on him.

Desperate for a distraction, he blurted out. "I've read about you in the paper. Seen your photo. You look different in person, less like someone who could get dangerous people thrown in prison for life." She was just so familiar. The where of it, though …

"More approachable without my game face?" She smiled.

"Were you ever in the military?"

"No." She shook her head, but the smile didn't fall off and Nutsbe found himself smiling back despite his churning stomach and nerves lit on fire.

He didn't know her from the war. Nutsbe tried to focus on the puzzle of this sensation. How did he know her? The answer was like a word sitting on the tip of his tongue that his brain simply wouldn't retrieve. "Have you ever been to North Carolina?"

"No. I haven't. Is that where you're from?"

"Until I graduated from high school, and then I went to the Air Force Academy in Colorado. Have you been out that way, Colorado?"

"I haven't. I'm told it's beautiful." She tipped her head, and her eyes crinkled at the corners. Her smile seemed to ask, what's this about?

"I'm trying to place how I might know you beyond your newspaper photo, that is. So far, in my timeline, we haven't been in the same state. I was stationed in Maryland and quickly deployed, so that's not it. Do you happen to know anyone at the VA?"

"I think we're neighbors." Her smile widened. "I'm almost a hundred percent certain that you live in my neighborhood or not too far. Isn't that you who jogs by my house most mornings? I'm on Millrace."

"Oh?" Millrace was the road that ran behind his.

"I have the charcoal gray house, white trim, and an obnoxiously bright raspberry-pink door."

"I know the one. There's a sweet little cockapoo that likes to look out the window." He felt the fizz of excitement bubble across his skin. "That one?"

"I prefer my best friend's term, cockapoodle-do." Her smile turned into a bashful laugh. "Her name is Henrietta."

Nutsbe turned his attention to the picture window and looked out front toward her car. He had never seen Olivia at that house; he'd remember. And the car didn't seem familiar either, though she could keep it in her garage. That the car didn't ring a bell wasn't that unusual; Nutsbe didn't normally memorize cars in driveways along his run. The bright raspberry door, though, stood out against the reliably neutral colors in his mid-century neighborhood.

"That's a brightly colored door," he said.

"When I left my soon-to-be ex-husband. I moved into my rental property and never got around to repainting that door. It's not my style, but it's also a low priority. It was the real estate lady's idea for curb appeal, making the house stand out as memorable."

"She was right," Nutsbe agreed. "I knew exactly the door you were talking about. Big fence at the back of your backyard?"

"Very big. Poor Henrietta has a serious case of fence envy."

"Why's that?" Nutsbe was relaxing into the warmth of Olivia's smile, and after the sound of female sobs jangling his nerves, this felt like a refreshing dip in the pool on a blistering day.

"My marital house has a fenced-in yard. She used to like to hang out in the back, make friends with the butterflies, and sleep in the sun rays."

"Ah, well, that's my fence," Nutsbe said. "So not just neighbors but we abut."

"Seriously?" She tipped her head back and looked at him as if she didn't believe it.

"You have a back patio with blue urns. They're empty, though. I can see them from my bedroom window."

She laughed nervously. "So that's right. Huh." She paused. "They say it's a small world. I shouldn't be shocked at all that you're my behind-me neighbor. At least for the moment, anyway. Divorce court is Tuesday. It all depends on what the judge says. I'm hoping—since my husband left me for another woman, then got mad that I wouldn't take him back—that things will go pleasantly in my direction."

The grandfather clock in the entry chimed.

Olivia leaned toward Candace, who was now quietly curled against Beowolf's stomach with her eyes closed. She looked like she was asleep. "Six o'clock, Candace," Olivia sing-songed.

Candace blinked her eyes open as if she was surprised and momentarily disoriented.

"How are you feeling down there?" Olivia asked. "Will going to court tomorrow with Beowolf at your side gives you a little more confidence? Make you feel safe?"

Candace shifted around until she was sitting up with crossed legs. "Yeah. How does all that work?"

"Would you like me to pick you up?" Nutsbe asked.

"I'd prefer to drive by myself," Candace hugged herself tightly.

"Okay, I'm going to meet you here, then," Nutsbe said. "And follow you to the courthouse. Once we're there, we'll park side by side. We'll go through security together." He pointed at her boots. "Steel toes?"

Her blush was made more vivid, surrounded by carrot-orange hair.

"They may set the metal detector off. I'm not sure of the rules at the federal court." He turned to Olivia.

"I've never had it come up." She faced Candace. "Do you have another pair of shoes you could wear? Something comfortable? But also, the judge is a little old-fashioned. And under such circumstances, every little strategic move can be important."

"You're saying I should dress like a demure lady?" She touched the spiked collar at her neck.

Olivia looked decidedly ill at ease with that characterization. "Do you want to go up and get something you think might be court-appropriate and bring it down? Maybe I can help you choose something, and then I have to get going." She leaned forward. "Listen, Candace, I want you to be you. I want you to be comfortable."

"But you also want us to win." She pushed herself to stand. "Right. Me too." Candace started out of the room, then turned. "Can I take Beowolf up with me?"

"Sure," Nutsbe said. "Beowolf follow." He pointed.

Beowolf shambled to his feet. He gave a whole-body shake, then the two trudged up the stairs.

Olivia leaned his way. "Do you have any questions about tomorrow?"

"I'd like to be near Candace the whole time," Nutsbe said.

"She'll be in a side room until the bailiff calls her. You can be in there with her."

"And once she's called to go in," Nutsbe asked, "I'm allowed to follow her to the witness stand and make sure that Beowolf gets settled?"

"That's correct. We want that to be as quiet a process as possible so the defense attorney can't make it an issue."

"I think we've got that handled." Nutsbe laced his fingers and lowered his elbows to his knees. "But once he's sitting with her. I want to be as close as possible. I can't imagine anything going wrong. But I don't want to be in the back should I need to intervene."

"Yes, absolutely. So the way I've done this before, and the way I had planned to handle it tomorrow—since this is a public trial—is to have one of our paralegals go with me to court and sit in the spot directly in front of the witness. She'll get up when you walk in."

"Good." He glanced around at the sound of footsteps on the stairs.

Candace walked into the room. The change was a shock to the system. She was wearing a cream-colored, short-sleeved dress made of the kind of floaty material that women wore when they took social media pictures in flowering meadows. Her hair was in a loose bun at the back of her nape, with a few whisps framing her face. The juxtaposition of sweetness and the fire of the slash mark scars on her neck and arms was startling. "I thought something like this," she stammered. "This is how I used to dress. And they would probably understand better if they saw who I used to be."

Olivia walked over and took Candace's hands. "You will get to a point in your life when you can be anyone you want. Dress however you like. That's going to take time. And therapy. But I believe in you, Candace. I believe that you'll get those choices. And I completely agree. We need the jury to see who you were when Kyle Offsed shifted your world. Very well done. I'm proud of you. Dressing like this took bravery."

Nutsbe shifted uncomfortably. Even without tears, here was the kryptonite—the sense of powerlessness when he wanted desperately to erase the pain.

"I have to get going." Olivia looked over her shoulder at Nutsbe. "What time tomorrow?"

"I thought eleven would give us plenty of time," he said, his voice gruff with emotion. "There's going to be traffic."

Olivia, still holding Candace's hands, turned back to her. "Eleven, Candace?"

"Yeah, sure." Her lips pulled into a deep frown.

Olivia ran her hands up and down Candace's arms. "Try to keep yourself distracted this evening, okay? Call a friend. Put on a good movie."

"Yeah, Okay." The words caught in her throat and were barely audible.

When Nutsbe and Olivia walked outside, with Beowolf trailing behind, Candace shut the door quietly behind them.

Nutsbe had a bad feeling that that didn't go as well as Olivia might have thought. He was getting the vibe that Candace might just jump in her car and drive through the night.

Of course, if she did that, Offsed might win his case and be back out in society, free.

And then, would she ever be safe?