Chapter Twenty-Eight
Final Ruling
“Ladies and gentlemen, please rise.” The bailiff announced Judge Vandalay’s return.
Dane couldn’t have predicted the way everything in LaBarge’s whole demeanor would crumble to dust when Ames Crosby got up and testified. But he could barely focus on that, or the return of the judge, now that he’d overheard Crosby’s request to Brooke. What promise had he extracted from her? How far did it go?
This worry tainted everything. He refused to give it any ground, though. Despite Crosby’s help, he’d researched, presented, and won this case, through and through. And he’d show her— this very second— that he was still in the game and intended to stay there.
“Good call on the Crosby testimony,” he whispered to Brooke, taking the chance to nuzzle her ear. “You’re endlessly insightful.”
“You are the one who saw the family connection and made the testimony relevant.” Brooke could compliment him all day. He thawed a little. She didn’t sound the least insincere, nor did her eyes wander to anywhere behind them in the gallery.
He refused to let what might be nothing turn into something in his mind.
“After consideration,” Judge Vandalay began, “based on the expert authentication of the handwriting in the addendum to Harvey Jarman’s will as being his own, I rule in favor of the defendant, Miss Brooke Chadwick.”
Exactly as Dane predicted— the judge based her decision, it seemed, solely on the handwriting. All the other stuff was just fluff.
Including Crosby’s account.
Yeah, it served to throw LaBarge into meltdown, but it wasn’t the crux of the ruling. Not at all.
That? That was all Dane.
And the godsend, Mr. Koen.
Beside Dane, Brooke suppressed a squeal of delight. She turned to him and beamed her biggest pageant smile, the one she wore the day she’d won Miss Chesapeake. If it had been remotely professional, he would have gone in for his long-awaited kiss right then.
But Judge Vandalay was still talking.
“Bailiff, please get the artifact in question from the courthouse vault and present it to her. She shouldn’t be deprived of her inheritance for another day.”
With a bang of the gavel, triumphant energy surged through him. Dane went in for his kiss—
“Miss Chadwick. Ahem.” A tall guy and a wave of Polo cologne inserted themselves between Dane and Brooke. “It looks like I jumped the gun in asking for the money I invested in Left Field to be returned. I didn’t realize you’d have such a dramatic victory planned here in court.” He extended his hand to take Brooke’s in a business handshake. “It looks like our deal is back on. Let’s get Left Field open. I want the world to see this ball as soon as possible.”
Dane watched as Brooke’s eyes kind of misted over. “Thanks, Mr. Earnshaw.” But her chin jutted, and she said, “I’m sure sorry we had that disagreement, and that you lost faith in both me and Aunt Ruth. We’ll repay what you’ve loaned us, and I believe another investor will be lined up by end of business day tomorrow.”
“But Miss Chadwick. I insist—”
“No, I insist, Mr. Earnshaw. People who believe in me and don’t waver are the people I put my trust in. Thank you for the time we’ve had together. You’ll be hearing from my lawyer.”
Dane’s eyes nearly popped out of his head. Brooke! She’d stood up to one of the richest bullies in the whole Commonwealth of Virginia.
“Brooke, that was pretty sweet.” He slid his arm around her waist. Now— it was time. He’d earned it. The ethics panel had cleared him, and her case was done. Dane looked down into her brown eyes that looked up at him with a perfect mixture of love and desire. His mouth longed for a taste of hers, but he wanted to make this moment, so long-awaited, so well-earned, really count.
“Brooke Chadwick,” he whispered, so only she could hear—
The bailiff reappeared, clearing his throat. “Miss Chadwick?”
Dane pulled himself back, the moment destroyed.
The bailiff handed Brooke the black lacquer box with the Called Shot Ball inside.
She lifted the lid, and Dane saw her eyes well up. With a single hand, she hoisted the box aloft, open to show off its prized contents for all the courtroom to see.
A cheer rose up, followed by applause and more shouting. Three cheers for Brooke, three cheers for Dane. Three cheers for baseball. Someone started singing “Take Me Out to the Ballgame,” and the whole courtroom erupted in song.
Justice could be joyous sometimes. Dane’s heart pounded with satisfaction at victory— and at having the girl of his dreams at his side looking happier than he’d seen her since before the accident. This, this was the Brooke Chadwick he’d always hoped to resurrect from the ashes of her pain.
No cheer rose from the prosecution side of the courtroom. Instead, Sarge LaBarge growled in a demonic fit that had begun the second Judge Vandalay handed down her ruling. “This is the most ridiculous pile of garbage and slander I ever—” He stormed toward the back of the courtroom.
“Just a minute, Mr. LaBarge,” issued a voice from a man in uniform. “I’m from the Maddox Police Department. You’re wanted for questioning in the bombing of Brooke Chadwick’s apartment last week.”
Dane turned back to see Brooke hug the box to her chest. “Let’s take a moment of silence and thank Harvey Jarman for his generosity,” she said.
Up through the crowd pressed Mr. Koen. When he approached, he blinked several times, reaching for the box. Brooke didn’t hesitate a moment, but generously handed it to him.
“I can’t thank you enough,” Dane said, squeezing a grateful hand onto the man’s shoulder. “It was incredibly great of you to make the trip down, all based on a desperate voice mail from an obscure lawyer down the coast. Please, let me give you my business card, and you can invoice us for your expenses and fees.”
“Fees? No fees.” The little man adjusted his yarmulke but kept his eyes riveted on the ball, bringing his hand down to reverently touch the red and blue stitches. “I might not look old enough, but I was a little child when this event happened. I heard it on the radio, play by play; heard the crack of the bat of my hero, Babe Ruth.”
Speaking of Ruths, Aunt Ruth walked up and linked an arm through Brooke’s, listening to Mr. Koen.
“It was a game I would never forget, even though I was just a small boy. When I heard about this ball’s existence on the news, I sent a wish to heaven that someday I’d have the chance to see it. Heaven heard my prayer, I knew, when you called me.” He looked up from the ball finally and said, “I wouldn’t have missed this chance for all the world.”
Dane, not one for goosebumps or sentimentality, shivered under the emotion of Koen’s irresistible story.
“You loved the Bambino, too, eh?” Aunt Ruth said, taking Mr. Koen by the hand, and closing up the box to hand back to Brooke while they walked off to reminisce about the good old days of baseball.
At last, Dane had Brooke to himself again. His whole body was strung tight as a bowstring, ready to let fly the arrow of his kiss.
“Brooke?” He pulled her to him once again, intent on claiming his prize.
But next came Twyla Tyler. “Mr. Jarman wanted you to have it. You deserve it.”
Brooke pulled away from Dane to give Mrs. Tyler a huge hug, thanking her over and over— and just about killing Dane.
Man, everyone was delaying his victory kiss. He stood back while Brooke let everyone else who came up to her ooh and ah over the ball for a while. But every moment she delayed, the more he intended to extract from her lips as payment on this, one of the best days of his life.
Imagine. This morning he was nothing better than a Rockwell up on sexual harassment charges. Now he’d been exonerated, and he’d just saved the most important artifact in baseball history from certain destruction.
Maybe he was shaking his reputation after all. Or embracing it. Without Uncle Vincent, his Rockwell connection, this day might not have been possible.
“Okay, everyone. Brooke’s had a long day.” Dane wedged his way into the crowd and stood at her side. They needed to clear out— for a lot of reasons, not the least of which was a well-earned make-out with the most jaw-droppingly gorgeous girl in all of Chesapeake. “Why don’t we all clear the courtroom for the judge’s next case?”
He went to rest his hand on her shoulder, but before he could make contact, the hand of none other than Ames Crosby shot in and touched her first.
“You promised me a good talk, Brooke.”
All the hair on the back of Dane’s neck stood on end. Uh, whose victory was this, anyway? Who’d been there for her, law degree intact, to win her case?
Obviously, Ames assumed he was the conquering hero, the way he looked so possessive over her. Hadn’t he heard the judge’s ruling— based on authentication of the handwriting? It had little or nothing to do with exposing Sarge LaBarge’s bad character. Hello.
But none of these words made their way out of his throat. They died on the way out, when he saw Brooke give Ames a doe-eyed look. Dane knew the look— he’d been in the receiving end of it himself a time or two— and his abdominal muscles clenched.
“Right,” she said.
Brooke turned to Dane.
“I need twenty minutes.”
Dane wasn’t getting his kiss. No. Instead, Brooke was going to Ames.
“Miss Chadwick?” Some hick in a bolo tie tapped Brooke on the shoulder, snaring her attention. Dane, stomach too knotted to make polite conversation anymore right now, slid out the back of the courtroom.
If she wanted him, she’d have to come find him this time.
And if she didn’t?