Blackout Read Free Page B

Buckingham’s insistence. He had allegedly forced her into a sexual relationship on the promise he’d keep her drunken car wreck a secret from her mother. Apparently Janelle had put the other driver into a three-day coma after her inaugural experience with alcohol. Buckingham successfully kept her wreck just between them, though whether the secret came with a price tag was up for debate.
    The affair had lasted nine months and ended when Natalie Buckingham, the wife and mother, walked in on Theodore pounding his younger stepdaughter from behind. Since then, numerous women—from the housemaids employed at his mansion to the interns who spent their summers with the titan media mogul—had come forward with similar allegations. Most, if not all, claimed Buckingham had seduced or blackmailed them into a sexual relationship, leaving them used, abused, and occasionally pregnant.
    Buckingham was the worst sort of client, and though this was Lennon’s first large case, cooperating with the slime was nearly enough to persuade a less ambitious man to change careers. His work with Doran and Gage—he had been hired on almost six years ago, immediately after finishing his internship and passing the bar—had all but murdered his conscience. And while his ambitions hadn’t faltered, he’d started thinking this particular law firm wasn’t the one with which he wanted to jumpstart his career. Most of his colleagues made up the fodder for lawyer jokes, and, call him an idealist, but Lennon, with idols like Atticus Finch, had chosen law for the same reasons Mr. Smith had made his trip to Washington.
    “I’ve met Buckingham,” Lennon said. “He’s a bastard, that’s right, but it doesn’t make it okay for you to break into his lawyer’s house and take his case file. More to the point, anything he’s told me that you learn from something stolen will be inadmissible in court.”
    “Doesn’t matter,” Kenzie replied. “Once the jury’s heard it—”
    “You watch too much Law and Order . The odds of this case going to a jury are not in your favor.”
    “Kayla says it will.”
    “Kayla hopes it will.”
    Kenzie held her head high. “And why shouldn’t she? Her little sister was raped! Her mother was…was…who knows what, and how many other women were victimized by this piece of shit? You know Buckingham won’t settle. He thinks he’s bulletproof. And at this point, I don’t know if a settlement offer would be accepted, because everyone keeps getting pissed off.”
    A rush of anger, fueled and coaxed by fatigue and desire, pushed through his weary system. Lennon swallowed hard and did his best to maintain a level tone.
    “Kenzie,” he said softly, evenly, “if you give them that file, I’ll be lucky if all I lose is my job. I could be sued for malpractice or even disbarred. Do you understand that?”
    She frowned. “No. How? You can’t possibly be blamed for someone breaking into your home.”
    “Our situation is a bit more complicated than a run-of-the-mill burglary, isn’t it? You’re a former employee, and our relationship isn’t exactly…well, standard.”
    Kenzie huffed and flipped the file closed, again pulling it to her chest. “I can’t believe you want this guy to get off the hook.”
    “I never said that.”
    “Well then—”
    “There’s a difference between rooting for someone and doing your job,” Lennon said hotly. “Buckingham is a Grade A son of a bitch—a bitter, sex-starved pervert who is used to buying his way around every turn. But regardless, he’s still a United States citizen whose rights include being presumed innocent until proven otherwise.”
    “I can’t believe you’re in bed with this guy.”
    “I can’t believe you turned out to be an activist.”
    She frowned, worrying a lip between her teeth. The gesture softened her, made her seem more approachable, more feminine, more like the Kenzie in his fantasies. The girl he imagined riding his cock so hard he went