Read Chapter 34: The Judgment

The courtroom smelled of old wood and dust and the particular sweat of people waiting to be judged. Mara had been holding her breath so long her ribs ached. Beside her, Robbie's hand was a warm anchor around her fingers, his thumb tracing slow circles over her knuckles as if to keep her tethered to the earth.

The judge—a grey man with spectacles balanced on a nose like a cliff edge—looked down at his notes for what felt like an hour. Then he cleared his throat.

"This court finds that the photographs in question, taken by the defendant during a private engagement, were given freely and without contractual obligation. The act of handing over physical film does not constitute a transfer of artistic copyright. The defendant retains full ownership of her work and the right to reproduce, sell, or license it as she sees fit."

Mara heard the words. She heard them land in the room like dropped stones. Whitfield's solicitor shifted in his seat, papers rustling with the sound of a man already losing before the verdict was even finished. But she didn't look at him. She looked at the judge, then at Robbie, whose grip tightened until she felt the blood stop in her fingers.

"Furthermore," the judge continued, "this court takes note of the precedent this sets for freelance artists working within the music industry. The respondent's claim that all work produced in proximity to their talent is work-for-hire is rejected in full."

Mara's breath came out in one long shudder. And then the tears came—hot and sudden and mortifying, pouring down her cheeks before she could stop them. She pressed her free hand to her mouth, but it didn't help. She was crying in front of a courtroom full of strangers, her nose running, her shoulders shaking, and she didn't care.

Robbie pulled her hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles. "You did it," he said, low enough that only she could hear. "You bloody did it."

"I didn't do anything," she managed, her voice cracking. "The judge—"

"You stood up. You walked in here without a lawyer and you faced them." He squeezed her hand again, his eyes bright with something that looked dangerously close to tears himself. "That's everything."

The bailiff was already calling for order, collecting papers, moving on to the next case as if her entire life hadn't just been rewritten in black ink on official stationery. Whitfield was gone from the gallery before she could even turn to look. Dex was nowhere to be seen. Just her and Robbie and the hollow ringing silence of victory.

Outside the courtroom, the corridor was bright with fluorescent light. Robbie steered her to a bench and sat her down, his hand still holding hers. She was still crying—great, ugly sobs that she couldn't get a handle on—when a man in a sharp suit approached. She recognized him as the label's junior counsel, the one who'd been bobbing in Whitfield's wake all morning.

"Miss Ellis?" He stopped a respectful distance away, his briefcase clutched to his chest. "I've been instructed to inform you that the label will not appeal. And that we'd like to reopen negotiations regarding the band's image rights."

Mara blinked at him through her tears. "What?"

"Given the court's finding, Mr. Whitfield feels it would be prudent to extend the same protections to the artists themselves." The solicitor's smile was thin and professional. "The band's contract will be redrawn to give them control over their own likenesses. I'll have the paperwork sent to your solicitor."

"I don't have a solicitor."

"Then to you directly, Miss Ellis." He dipped his head and walked away, his heels clicking on the linoleum like a clock counting down.

Robbie stared after him. "Did he just say—"

"The band gets image rights." Mara laughed wetly, wiping her face with her sleeve. "Whitfield's trying to save face. He knows if you lot walk, he loses everything. So he's giving you what you were going to take anyway."

Robbie was quiet for a long moment. Then he turned to her, and there was something in his face she hadn't seen before. Not fear. Not guardedness. Something open and raw and terrifying.

"You did that," he said. "You made him give us that. Me and the boys—we've been signed to that bastard for four years, and in one morning you got us more than we ever managed."

"I didn't—" she started, but he shook his head.

"You did. You walked in here alone, Mara. You faced them down. And you won." He lifted her hand and pressed it to his chest, over his heart. "You won."

She could feel his heartbeat through his shirt—fast, like he'd been running. Like she'd been running. Like they'd both been running for months and only now, in this ugly corridor with its flickering lights and the distant murmur of the next hearing, had they finally stopped.

"I need to tell you something," she said. The words came out before she could stop them, tumbling out of the fresh space in her chest where the fear used to live. "About Lenny. About the film."

Robbie's expression flickered. "The film—"

"No, not that film. Another one." She swallowed hard. "Lenny gave me a roll of film. He said it had evidence—Whitfield paid him to get Danny off the stage. To push him into a place where he'd fail. And Lenny wanted money for it, and I didn't pay him, and then I had the archive binder, and I thought if I used it as leverage I could protect Danny too. But I never told you. I should've told you."

Robbie's face went very still. "Whitfield tried to destroy Danny?"

"Lenny said he did. Paid to have him sidelined. To break him so the band would need Whitfield more. I've still got the film. I've still got the binder. And I don't know what to do with any of it." She squeezed his hand hard. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you before. I was afraid—"

"Afraid of what?"

"Afraid you'd look at me the way you look at the label. Like I was someone who kept secrets for leverage. Like I was becoming what I hated."

Robbie was silent for a long moment. Then he pulled her to her feet and wrapped both arms around her, crushing her against his chest, her face buried in the rough wool of his coat.

"You kept the secrets to protect people," he said into her hair. "That's not the same thing as Whitfield. That's not even the same universe." He pulled back just enough to look at her, his hands on her shoulders. "And Danny—Danny's going to want to know. We'll tell him together."

Mara nodded, her throat too tight to speak.

"What do we do with the film?"

"I don't know yet." She looked up at him. "But we don't have to decide today. Today we just… won."

Robbie smiled—the full, unguarded smile that she'd first captured on stage, the one she'd kept in focus. In light. In the frame of her mind.

"Today we won," he agreed.

He kissed her forehead, and she closed her eyes, and somewhere in the building behind them a clock chimed the hour, and everything was briefly, impossibly, all right.