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chuckled.
    “Well, boy,” said another deep voice from the
doorway of the common area. Eric looked up to see Judge Wilson.
“You’ve finally come into your own. Congratulations.”
    “Thanks.”
    “I remember when you were standing in front of me in
shackles.” Eric’s mouth tightened a bit. “How long ago was that,
anyway?”
    Suck it up, princess. Hold your head high. Face ’em
all down and dare ’em to find fault. You aren’t going to get
anywhere in politics if you let that drag your ass.
    He couldn’t count the number of times Knox had said
that to him.
    “I don’t know. Twelve, thirteen years.”
    “That long! Well, I’m telling you now. If you pull
anything like what Knox pulled, I’ll have you disbarred. I’m tired
of all that bullshit and you know every one of his tricks.”
    “Aw, Wilson, that’s not fair. I don’t know every
trick.”
    He pointed his age-gnarled finger at Eric. “Don’t
push me or you’re going to find out what it’s like to have your
political career go up in smoke before you really catch fire.” He
looked at Justice’s desk, which was as clean as it had been when
she left for maternity leave four months before. Adam and Lesley
hadn’t come in yet, but it was early. “I’m really gonna miss that
crafty bastard,” Wilson muttered, a catch in his voice, as he
left.
    Eric turned and opened the door to the office that
Knox had occupied for fourteen years after he’d deposed his predecessor at gunpoint. Now it belonged to Eric. It seemed so . .
. lifeless . . . without Knox’s overpowering personality, but it
was his now. He would turn it upside down and pull it inside out,
starting today at ten o’clock.
    He had a nasty past that had caught up to him and a
brilliant future within his grasp.
    He meant to meet them both head-on.
     
     
    * * * * *
     
     
    6: Too Big to Cry
     
     
    The only television Vanessa “Granny” Whittaker had
ever bought for her inn hung in the kitchen for the staff. She had
no time for pleasure viewing and she got her news from the
internet, but her chief financial officer had had a TV installed in
his suite the day before. He’d already read everything in the
Whittaker House library, and his own library had gone up in flames
last month.
    His doctors had restricted him from most of the
inn’s chores, his love-struck nurses all made sure he complied, his
unsympathetic physical therapist controlled nearly every move he
made, and he’d sent his wife home because she ran roughshod over
his medical team. Since he couldn’t carry anything as heavy as a
baby, the wife had taken their daughter with her; since he wasn’t
allowed to drive, he couldn’t go anywhere because no one at
Whittaker House had the time or inclination to take him.
    In the five days since he’d moved into Whittaker
House, he’d caught up on all the accounting, sent all the quarterly
reports to their corporate partner, compiled the financial data
they needed to embark on Whittaker House’s next expansion, sent the
paperwork to the county for zoning permissions, and filed and paid
their taxes. Daily bookkeeping only took an hour if he was caught
up, so he had to wait until tomorrow to do anything further.
    One possibility for his entertainment, the Mormon
missionaries who lived in one of Whittaker House’s cottages, were
always busy. At the moment, they were doing their laundry and
wouldn’t have time to talk to him until after lunch, if even then.
The rest of their week was booked solid, which left them no time to
indulge him in the deep theological discourse he enjoyed.
    Ol’ Curtis Lowe wanted no truck with him; in
Curtis’s opinion, any man who refused to fish and hunt was
completely immoral.
    Two of Whittaker House’s permanent residents had
their own routines, which did not include him, and the third one,
his chess partner, was in a meeting.
    The production crew for Vanessa’s cooking show, Vittles: Gourmet Weeds and Roadkill , wouldn’t arrive
until