For the first time, the marble cracks.
The gallery erupts. A woman gasps. A reporter in the back row starts scribbling furiously.
Judge Torres’s gavel comes down like a thunderclap.
JUDGE TORRES (banging gavel lightly) Sustained. Mr. Crane, stick to the evidence.
The air in Judge Marlene Torres’s courtroom is thick with the smell of old wood, anxiety, and cheap cologne. Sunlight slices through the tall windows, illuminating dust motes that dance above the gallery like nervous fireflies.
Chaos detonates. Crane’s jaw unhinges. Patricia grabs Elle’s arm. Julian lowers his phone, confused. And somewhere in the back, a cell phone begins to ring—the old Nokia ringtone, tinny and surreal.