Judge Not Read online

  "Me, too," Ashley nodded. "So what do you want me to do?"

  "I want you to go interview the people who run the parenting class he went to, and talk to the social workers who've seen him with the little girl." Jerry shook his head in disgust. "I hate guys like this who will use their child to get back at the mother. This guy is a piece of shit."

  Ashley and Mary looked at each other. Jerry was pretty good about not getting attached to clients and he never cussed, but he really hated it when people screwed with kids' lives. "I'm on it," Ashley responded, moving to the file cabinet to dig out the old case files. "Have we got a hearing yet?"

  "Yes, in two weeks, Judge Carlisle's court."

  Ashley stopped in her tracks. "I thought the cases went back before the original judge?"

  "The father asked to have a different judge. He felt Judge Matterson was too prejudiced to hear his case again." Jerry moved to the hall. "I'll be in my office. Let me know when you get the information together."

  Mary hadn't said a word during the whole exchange, but she saw Ashley's face go completely white. "Ash, what's wrong?"

  Ashley looked down the hall towards the partner's offices, and then took Mary's arm and pulled her toward the bathroom at the other end of the office. When they were inside with the door shut, Ashley leaned close to Mary and whispered, "Judge Carlisle was the dominatrix."

  Mary leaned away from Ashley with a stunned look. She pointed at Ashley, "Yours?"

  Ashley nodded.

  "The one you just ended things with?"

  Ashley nodded again.

  "Oh shit, that isn't going to be good. Do you want me to try to get Jerry to let me work the case?"

  "No, he'll want to know why I don't want to do it and what am I going to say?" Ashley groaned and started ringing her hands. "Surely, she won't do anything in the court room?"

  "She's going to give you a hard time, but if your evidence is solid, she won't be able to do much other than hear the case," Mary reasoned.

  "True," Ashley agreed. But Ashley had not seen Jean Carlisle since the night she had handcuffed her to a bed and kissed her goodbye. The Judge had warned her that she would get back at her for being the one to end their relationship. Ashley had been waiting for something to happen, and this probably would be it. She'd do something to make Ashley look like a fool in court. She sighed. Whatever Jean decided to do, Ashley knew there was nothing she could do to stop her.

  "I'm going back up front," Mary said. "You pull yourself together. It's going to be okay."

  Ashley nodded as Mary left the bathroom, but dropped her head on the door. The truth was that Ashley didn't know how she would react to seeing Jean again. The woman was so beautiful, just seeing her made Ashley’s knees weak. It was going to be hard to face her, knowing everything that they had done, everything Ashley had allowed Jean to do to her. She was afraid she would start stuttering, or something equally embarrassing, in front of her.

  She opened the door and went back to the file cabinet. All she could do, was try to do her best, and pray she didn't have to face Judge Jean Carlisle too many times before she was able to get over this fear and attraction.

  * * *

  Jean stared at the name on the docket. Ashley Jessup would be with Jerry Winslow in her court to represent the mother of Amy Garrett, a little girl who had already seen too much of life's harshness. She had seen so many of these cases over the years. The father or mother was clearly not interested in taking care of the child, but did not want to allow anyone else to care for the child properly either. Selfish, stupid people! Cases like this pissed Jean off. Seeing Ashley had helped Jean deal with cases like this. In the past two weeks, Jean had been to the bar and had sex with four different women, all of whom had enjoyed being punished, but it hadn't been the same. Damn that woman for getting under skin.

  She should have never allowed their relationship to go on for as long as it did, Jean knew that was the problem. She never kept a plaything for longer than a few months, but she had liked Ashley. Ashley did exactly what she wanted. She seemed to be able to read her in a way that no one else ever had. And she was beautiful. Those big blue eyes had made Jean want to drown in their depths. Damn that woman!

  Trying not to hunt Ashley down and demand she resume her role as her plaything was one of the hardest things Jean had ever done. She knew she could find out where she lived. In fact, she was pretty sure she already knew. Shaking her thoughts off, Jean threw the case file aside and picked up a different one. She would deal with the Garrett one tomorrow after she'd been to the bar tonight and satisfied her anger and hunger with some willing young thing. Maybe, she'd do two women tonight. Maybe, that was what she needed, something different from her usual pattern.

  Chapter Four

  When the court date finally arrived, Ashley got up at five in the morning and spent two hours picking through every business suit she had, trying to find the most conservative. She wanted to look more professional than she ever had in court. She wasn't sure if she was more interested in trying to impress Jean or trying to turn her off, but she definitely didn't want to wear anything that might be considered even remotely sexy. That might set Jean off.

  Finally, she emerged from her room fifteen minutes before Mary and she were due to leave for work. Mary gave her a questioning look. "What the hell was taking you so long? I was afraid you were going to bail altogether."

  "If only I could," Ashley sighed, straightening the gray pinstriped suit coat.

  Mary raised an eyebrow as she looked Ashley over. "Going for quiet mouse look?"

  "Yes," Ashley confirmed, and then added, "I should wear my glasses. That would really throw her off." She rushed into the bedroom to grab them.

  "What's with her?" Jackie asked as she shrugged on her UPS jacket.

  "Remember the dominatrix she was seeing?"

  "Sure," Jackie replied.

  "She’s the judge Ashley has to present before today," Mary explained, giving Jackie a quick kiss on the lips.

  "No shit?" Jackie answered. "I knew she had some political job that she was careful to make sure no one knew about, but I wouldn't think being a judge and dominatrix would be that big of a deal."

  "She's a family judge," Mary responded, "And an elected official."

  "No wonder she was always so secretive," Jackie acknowledged with a nod. "She definitely doesn't want the fact that she was playing that kind of a role getting out."

  "I'm sure she doesn't want anyone knowing she has sex with women, let alone being a dominatrix." Mary picked up her purse and walked with Jackie to the door. "Come on, Ashley," she called.

  "I gotta run though. Love you," Jackie kissed Mary and hurried out the door.

  Ashley came up beside Mary. "Don't you two ever get sick of that shit?"

  "You're just jealous."

  Yes, I am, Ashley thought to herself.

  * * *

  Ashley sat next to Laura Garrett on the left side of the court room. Jerry was on the other side of Laura. Ashley looked past the two of them to John Garrett and his new attorney, Wayne Hubble. Wayne was very detail oriented, and Ashley had prepared for him and Judge Jean Carlisle to rip her apart today. She'd spent all night last night going over her notes, and had Mary drill her this morning at the office while they waited to come over to the courthouse for the case.

  Jean stepped out from the judges' quarters and the bailiff announced. "All rise. The Honorable Judge Jean Carlisle presiding."

  Ashley stood and straightened her suit for the hundredth time this morning. She looked at the judicial emblem on front of the desk, but did not raise her eyes to look at Jean. She wished now that would have worn her glasses so she could feel like she had a shield to protect her from Jean's intense eyes.

  "You may be seated," the bailiff said, after Jean had taken her seat.

  Ashley spent the entire hearing staring at the papers on the table in front of her. Only once had she spared a glance at Jean, whose dark eyes immediately locked on her. She c
ould feel the anger radiating toward her. She immediately dropped her eyes back down to the papers.

  Both attorneys made their arguments, and Jerry was doing his rebuttal. Ashley couldn't wait to get this hearing over with so she could go vomit. Her stomach was in knots. Jerry was talking about the information Ashley had gathered from the social workers and parenting class teachers, all of whom had said they felt that Mr. Garrett was doing all the things he was doing just to appease the court, not because he had truly changed.

  Jerry was detailing the testimony of a woman from one of the parenting classes; she said that Mr. Garrett would slouch in his chair throughout the class and make rude comments about things other parents were saying.

  Ashley had just barely been paying attention. She kept praying that the judge would refuse Mr. Garrett unsupervised visitation, the hearing would be over, and she would be out of Jean's presence.

  Suddenly, Jean said, "Is that correct, Ms. Jessup," addressing Ashley directly.

  Ashley's head shot up. She looked at Jean with wide frightened eyes, then over to Jerry who was giving her a questioning look. She closed her eyes for a moment to recall what had been said, and then finally said, "Yes, yes, that's correct”.

  Jean glared at her, her dark brown eyes piercing Ashley. "Are you sure? Did you hear what Mr. Winslow just said?"

  Ashley forced herself to meet Jean's eyes. God, the woman has no right to be so beautiful, Ashley thought, taking in the dark brown hair that framed her oval face. Those intense eyes, that perfect mouth that she had finally gotten to kiss. She swallowed. "He said that I had spoken with Amanda Smith at the county parenting classes. She told me Mr. Garrett had been rude in class and slouched in his chair like he was sitting on his own couch." Ashley took a deep breath and continued. "She also said that his answers to questions about parenting appeared to have been memorized from the books they were assigned to read. He didn't seem to have really learned anything from the books or the classes, and was just going through the motions to appease the court."

  "Thank you, Ms. Jessup," Jean said, a slight smile playing at the corner of her mouth.

  Ashley knew that Jean loved the fact that Ashley was completely flustered from being in her presence. She went back to looking at the papers on the table and conversed quietly with Laura Garrett as Mr. Hubble made his rebuttal arguments that Mr. Garrett was making an effort to prove that he was trying to be a better parent. In the end, the judge ruled that Mr. Garrett would continue with therapy, AA meetings, and supervised visitation for at least another four months before she would review the case again.

  Good, Ashley thought, hopefully, by then I'll be over this fear of her.

  Ashley walked with Laura to the bathroom. Jerry stood outside waiting for them. There was a protection order against John Garrett, but that didn't always stop men like him from grabbing their spouses or girlfriends inside the courthouse and beating the crap out of them.

  They were leaving the bathroom when Ashley realized she had a piece of paper towel stuck to the bottom of her shoe. "Go on out, Laura," Ashley told her, leaning against the wall to get the paper off her shoe.

  The door closed when Laura went out, and then opened again. Ashley stood up to find herself face to face with Jean Carlisle. Jean put her hand on the closed door to keep it closed and looked toward the empty stalls. Her eyes dropped to Ashley's lips. Ashley subconsciously ran the tip of her tongue across them. Jean leaned into Ashley quickly, but hard enough to ram her leg into Ashley's groin making Ashley almost double over in pain. "No one ends things but me," Jean hissed before stalking off to one of the stalls.

  Ashley took a deep breath and bit her lip. She forced herself to stand upright and walk as calmly as she could out of the bathroom. Jerry, Laura and she walked to the elevator together. Jerry must have noticed her wince. He asked, "Are you okay?"

  "Pulled a muscle in my leg when I went to pull a piece of paper off my shoe," she grunted quietly.

  He nodded at her explanation, and then started talking to Laura about what she needed to do before the next court date.

  Ashley took a deep breath and made a mental note to never be in the bathroom at the courthouse alone.

  Chapter Five

  Jean scoured the crowd, looking for a young blonde. She wanted to hurt someone. She wanted them to hurt her. Seeing Ashley had caused such an ache in her heart that she had almost gotten up and walked out of the court room. She tried to prepare herself, tried to tell herself that she wouldn't be affected by Ashley's presence, but she had been so wrong. She hated these feelings. This want and hurt that she still felt from Ashley ending things. And the kiss. Damn that woman for kissing her. It was one of the best kisses of her life, something she had always feared. It was why she never allowed Ashley to kiss her. She was aware from the beginning that she could become addicted to those luscious, full lips if she ever tasted them. She needed to quench the want.

  Finally, she found what she needed, a young blonde, who looked out of place; this was probably her first time at a sex bar. Jean approached the woman. She danced around her staring into her eyes. Moving in and taking the woman in her arms, Jean asked, "You new in town?"

  "Yes," the woman answered, "I heard this was a very happening place."

  "Oh yes," Jean cooed in the woman's ear. "Lots of things happen here."

  The woman looked around over Jean's shoulder at the couples touching and kissing as they danced. "I can't believe people are getting it on right here on the dance floor."

  "You think that's something," Jean said, taking the woman's hand and practically dragging her toward the back of the bar. "Let me show you what happens in the back."

  The woman barely had time to register the women having sex in the corners and on the benches before Jean pressed her against the wall. Jean put her lips next to the woman's ear. "Are you here to have fun or just watch?"

  "Have fun," the woman murmured in a husky voice.

  Jean immediately opened the woman's pants and slid her hand into the woman's panties. "Oh yes," she hissed. "You are so wet." She took the woman's hand and put it in her own pants. "You've made me wet too. Do you know what to do about it?"

  "Yes," the woman said and began stroking Jean with lightning quickness.

  Jean matched the woman stroke for stroke until they both came. Jean squeezed the woman's breasts roughly. She wanted to get her alone and really fuck her. "You want to go some place more private?" Jean suggested.

  The woman nodded. They both fastened their pants, and then Jean pulled her toward the front of the bar and out the door. "Are you driving?" she asked when they got outside.

  "No, I rode with a friend," the woman replied.

  "Do you need to let them know you’re leaving?"

  "I'll text them later.”

  Jean knew that she was being careless. She didn't usually take women to a hotel until after they'd hooked up at the bar together a couple of times, but she needed to get some of this pent up anger and desire out of her system. Ever since she had seen Ashley in the court room and the touched her body in the bathroom, she felt like she was losing her mind. She picked this woman because she reminded her of Ashley, because this is what she wanted to do to Ashley.

  Leading the woman to her car, she spared a glance over her shoulder back at the bar. Maybe she should just fuck her out here in the parking lot, but she turned back to the woman who looked up at her with heated blue eyes, so similar to Ashley's that she lost control.

  She closed the door, ran to the other side of the car, got in, started the car and drove like a mad woman to her favorite hotel. She checked in under the assumed name that she had used before. The clerk knew her. They had a monetary arrangement about the room she used. She took the woman into the elevator and practically ravished her in it. She could barely contain her need to take this woman.