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“It’s a serious world. Serious issues, serious problems. Mine is, at least,” Ashe told her.
“Maybe a little too serious.”
“Divorce is a serious topic,” he argued. “It’s really hard for people.”
“I know. I want to help them. Truly, I do,” she claimed. “If you believe nothing else about me, please believe that. I take helping people very seriously.”
“So, tell me what it is you do at these classes of yours,” Ashe said, deciding she deserved a chance to be heard. Plus, he’d promised Wyatt to find out if she was up to something with Wyatt’s wacky relatives.
“Eleanor said you’re in family law. Or that you were, and now you hear cases in family court,” she began.
“Yes.”
“Divorces?”
He nodded. “Plus custody issues both between parents and social services, some probate stuff, guardianship issues for people who are older or incapacitated in some way, that sort of thing.”
“Have you seen how some people, while they might have been divorced for a while or just separated for a long time, are still emotionally so entangled in their marriages?”
“Yes.”
“To the point of it being highly detrimental to their lives? Clouding their judgment? Keeping them locked into place, unable to move on emotionally or just let go?”
“Yes,” he agreed.
He could tell stories that he thought would keep anyone, even the most hopeless, foolish, absolutely blind romantics and optimists, from ever getting married. In fact, he thought if he could videotape some divorce and custody proceedings in his courtroom, he could splice real-life scenes together into a documentary that had the power to end marriage, once and for all, in America, possibly even globally.
“I want to fix that,” Lilah said, as she eased back in her seat to make room for the plates of food their waitress was placing in front of them. “Divorced people who can’t let go and move on.”
“That’s all?” He dug into his lunch, deciding she was either supremely confident or hopelessly naive. He thought about telling her his idea for simply ending marriage altogether, which would end the need for helping anyone get over divorce, emotionally or otherwise.
“It’s important work,” she insisted.
“Yes, it is. I’m just not sure if it’s at all possible.”
“Well, I intend to try.”
She was naive, Ashe feared, perhaps idealistic and completely unrealistic. He felt sorry for her and experienced some small need to try to save her from herself.
“I don’t think that’s a job for one person, all by herself.”
“Then help me.”
“I don’t think it’s a job for two people, either. Way too big for that.”
She sighed, sounding disappointed. “Gandhi said, ‘Be the change you want to see in the world.’”
Ashe blinked at her. She’d quoted Gandhi to him? “I wonder if he was ever married.”
“He was. To the same woman for sixty years,” she claimed.
“Sixty years? Truly?”
“He was young when they married,” Lilah said.
“Must have been.”
“Okay, he was like … thirteen, and she was, too, or maybe a year older. It was an arranged marriage—”
Ashe laughed out loud, truly enjoying that little fact.
“Which has nothing to do with anything—”
“You’re the one who brought Gandhi into this,” he reminded her.
“Because I admire the sentiment. Imagine what a better world this would be if we all found a problem, a cause we felt passionate about, and went to work fixing it?”
Good grief.
Had Ashe ever been this naive? He didn’t think so.
Lilah sighed, clearly disappointed with him. “Please, just think about helping me. I promise I won’t tease you anymore about naked women.”
Which should have been a plus, he supposed.
“I don’t think it’s ever a bad thing to try to help people who truly need it,” she pleaded. “Watch those people coming through your courtroom and think about whether you believe they need some help letting go, moving on. That’s all I’m asking.”
He frowned. “You’ll be holding these … classes at the Barrington estate?”
Lilah nodded. “It’s perfect.”
“I thought she’d turned it into a wedding venue?”
“That’s what makes it perfect,” Lilah claimed. “All that excitement, the anticipation, the happiness. It’s like it’s in the air there, plus all the physical preparations to turn it into someone’s fantasy of the perfect wedding. We get caught up in the fantasy, the dream, and then reality sets in, and … Well, you know all this. You must see it every day. The fantasy doesn’t last.”
“No, it doesn’t.”
“I want to use all that energy, all those feelings, the memories. Too often, we try to run away from those feelings or to bury them so deeply we never feel them, and that doesn’t work, either. The women coming to my classes won’t be able to. Wedding preparations or the dismantling of the wedding fantasies will be all around them there.”
“You want to deliberately stir them up?” He saw it now.
Lilah nodded. “Not to be unkind. Just to make it impossible to hide from those emotions. We have to deal with our feelings before we can move on from them.”
“So, that’s why you’re at Eleanor’s?” He couldn’t argue the sense in that.
“It seemed perfect, once I thought about it. And she’s been so kind. She’s a good friend of my mother’s and a distant cousin of some sort.”
“And you’re living there?”
“For now. I didn’t intend to, but I don’t know much about the town or where I’d really like to live. She offered, and there’s so much room there. I’m not a freeloader, if that’s what you’re thinking—”
“I didn’t say anything like that,” he protested.
“But you were thinking it. I’m going to see how things go for me here. If I like it and decide to stay, I’ll find my own place. For now, I’m staying in a little room off the kitchen, the maid’s room. It’s quiet and out of the way and all I really need.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be insulting.”
“She’s lonely, I think, even with her friends and the weddings. Apparently her godson and his wife and son were living in the guesthouse for a while, but they bought a house and just finished the renovations on it and moved. So now it’s just Eleanor.”
“Well, I’m sure she’s happy not to be alone all the time,” Ashe conceded, then looked down at his watch. He had motions to read before court resumed. “So, that’s all you need from me? To perform some sort of divorce ceremony?”
“Well, if it’s not too much trouble, there are often people in the group who have questions about the divorce process. They aren’t looking for legal advice, but an explanation of how the process works.”
“Okay. I could do that,” he agreed.
“And—last thing, I promise—inevitably, I’ll run into a few women whose husbands or ex-husbands are abusive—”
“Yeah, you don’t want any part of a situation like that.”
“Well, no one does, but it happens, and some of these women will come to me for help.”
“Lilah, I see this all the time, and the thing is, a very few of these situations will end very badly, and even I can’t predict which ones will. But when it happens, it’s really bad, really dangerous.”
“I know. I’ve worked with battered women before. And I know, some cops are better at handling these kinds of situations than others. Some take them much more seriously. I just want a name, that’s all. One cop who’ll take the situation seriously, and as a judge, I bet you know who the good ones are.”
“Yes, I do.”
“But you don’t want to tell me who they are?”
“No, I think you need a keeper. I don’t want to do anything to help you put yourself in the middle of domestic violence situations.”
“A keeper? Really?” She looked both amused and mad. “A big, strong man who knows so much better than I do? One I should let make decisions for me?”
“That’s not what I said,” he told her, although … yeah, he thought it was probably true.
Not because she was a woman, but because she seemed to think she was invincible, ready to charge into even dangerous situations and fix them. Someone should be telling her not to do that, that she was bound to be hurt eventually.
Of course, she obviously didn’t want him or anyone else to do that, and she seemed to enjoy provoking him in all sorts of ways.
And it wasn’t entirely unpleasant, having her try to provoke him.
“Look,” she said finally, “the divorce ceremony doesn’t come until the very end of my series of classes, which means the first one won’t be for two and a half months or so. You don’t have to make up your mind yet. Just think about it.”
“All right. I’ll think about it,” he said.
Chapter Three
Ashe was wrapping things up for the day in his chambers when Wyatt knocked on his open door. Ashe motioned for him to come on inside.
“Did you really have lunch with a naked woman at Malone’s today?” Wyatt asked, looking completely baffled.
Ashe winced. “No, I did not have lunch with a naked woman at Malone’s. I had lunch with Lilah, who was fully clothed.”
“Oh.” Wyatt sounded disappointed, then shrugged at the look Ashe shot his way. “Sorry, it was one of the best rumors I’ve heard in months.”
“Well, it probably has to do with the photograph she took to advertise her divorce classes at Eleanor’s estate. I’m sure the posters are all over town by now, if I know Lilah. She wouldn’t have wasted any time.”
“Oh. Okay.” Wyatt frowned but let it go. “So, about Lilah? Do you think I should be worried?”
“I think if those three little old ladies were related to me in any way, I would always be worried,” Ashe said.
“True. Pity me, please, and help me. Should I be worried about Lilah?”
“Probably. I mean, I don’t think she’s a swindler or anything like that. But she likes to shake things up, at the very least. Enjoys it, even.”
“Which Eleanor and company will love, if I know them. Are you going to do this class with Lilah?” Wyatt asked. “Please tell me you are, because if you do, you’ll know what she’s up to.”
Which was a great excuse to help Lilah. He could do it for Wyatt. If only Ashe could convince himself that’s why he’d be doing it. He thought about how she’d looked today, how vibrant and … interesting.
The woman was nothing if not interesting.
How long had it been since he’d met someone he found truly interesting? Who challenged him the way she did?
“The woman quoted Gandhi to me. ‘Be the change you want to see in the world.’ What a beautiful world it would be if we all made an effort to try to fix just one problem. She actually said that to me,” Ashe added.
Wyatt reminded him, “You try to fix things.”
“I do damage control. We all do. You know that.”
“Bad day, Judge?”
Ashe nodded.
“Well, do you think Lilah could help people going through divorce?” Wyatt tried finally.
“I don’t know. God knows, somebody needs to. There are way too many screwed-up people in the world.”
“Look, I’m not asking for a lifelong commitment here. Just do one of Lilah’s little classes.”
“One class. And you’ll owe me big-time.”
Lilah put her posters up all over town, immensely pleased with how well they’d turned out. And—if she was completely honest with herself—how uncomfortable they’d made Judge Ashford.
She got back to the Barrington estate at sunset and found Eleanor, Kathleen and Gladdy just finishing dinner and moving on to coffee and dessert, which they invited her to share. She agreed, having found the trio of women to be delightful, interesting company, although a bit secretive. She always felt as if they were up to something they wouldn’t talk about.
“Were you pleased with your little advertisements, dear?” Eleanor asked, as they all dug into delicious fruit tarts with fresh cream.
“I was, but I’d love to hear what you all think,” Lilah said, pulling out the last poster, which she’d kept for herself, and holding it up for them all to see.
