Some of the haze started to clear. Jessa no longer wanted to crawl out of her skin. Retta had her full attention now. “The alternative system you talked about the other day?”

“Yes, then I was talking about a hypothetical, but the system is very real.”

“And it’s run by the Sophie Foundation . . . or the group of women behind the Foundation.” Not a question, because Jessa knew she was on the right track.

“Our current traditional justice system doesn’t work, so we created one of our own, complete with strict rules. It deals with people who abuse the community. We review and we decide, using the same unemotional certainty as a surgeon removing a malignancy.”

The harsh words, delivered with such smooth efficiency, stopped Jessa. “Decide what?”

“Punishment.”

That couldn’t be . . . could it? “Like a judge?”

“I am a judge.”

“What if you, as a group, make a mistake?” Because it would happen. People misread cues, acted on emotion, didn’t wait for all the evidence. Jessa had been a lawyer long enough to experience all of it.

“We move on.”

This sounded like the anti–law school, like the opposite of everything she’d spent years trying to perfect. “It’s that simple? Mess up and forget about it?”

“If I help you, you will need to rethink concepts like the law, justice, and revenge to see them in a new way, as pieces of a system defined only by us.” Retta’s ringing voice didn’t leave room for compromise. “We shift the conversation and take the power back for the victims.”

The unspoken part lured Jessa: she would be in charge. She could have a group of women to guide her, support her. She’d no longer be out there, flailing and alone. Failing and scrambling not to get kicked out of the legal club.

Jessa didn’t weigh the pros and cons, didn’t think about downsides or the costs. She did what she’d been doing her whole life—ignored the consequences, convinced she could outmaneuver them later. “I’ll do whatever it takes to become a member.”

Retta leaned back in her chair again and smiled. “Yes, Jessa. I think you will.”

Chapter Thirty-Seven
Gabby

Exhausted. Gabby searched her mind for another word, but that one fit. By the time Liam pulled into the private garage of his duplex in the swanky Kalorama area of DC, filled with ambassadorial residences and private security details, Gabby didn’t want to think about knives or attackers, blood, or Detective Schone. Gabby would barter and beg for a bed and a few hours of quiet, but she had to walk a gauntlet of teenage angst first.