Her eyes moved once across the page. Then again.
The room shifted.
And when she finally looked up at me, it was no longer with procedural neutrality.
It was recognition.
“Miss Hamilton,” she said slowly, “you argued before me last year in the Fitzgerald case.”
The table went still.
My sister stopped moving.My mother’s mouth parted.
And the judge, still looking directly at me, said the one sentence no one in my family had prepared for.
“I call it the best defense I’ve seen in thirty years. Why is your family filing a complaint claiming you are not a lawyer?”
Nobody answered.
The ventilation system hummed above us.
Somewhere behind me, a pen clicked once.
Then again.
Brenda’s fingers tightened around the strand of pearls at her throat.
My mother turned toward me with an expression I recognized immediately.
Not pride.
Not confusion.
Accusation.
As if I had somehow deceived her by succeeding without permission.
