“You wonder why no one liked you in law school,” Jessa mumbled.

“That kind of childish taunting stopped working on me in junior high. We both know I had friends. We sat around and talked about how you magically passed criminal law after failing the midterm. Two tests in the class and you failed one, yet you ended up with an A.” Every conversation seemed to bring them to a new, hateful low. Gabby despised who she was with Jessa and how the fury welled inside her and fought to break out. “Quite impressive.”

“I studied.”

One time. Gabby made a silent promise that she’d say this one time then let it go. She was closing in on forty and too old for this nonsense. “You stole the test, and when things got hot, you blamed someone else. What was his name? Grant? I can’t remember because you got him expelled, the poor bastard.”

“He cheated, not me.” Jessa’s words stayed calm, but she started to shift in the small chair.

All of it. Gabby decided to tell it all. To let Jessa know what shaped the negative view of her. “Then there were your private lessons with our contracts professor. Those certainly seemed to help your grade.”

“What are you insinuating?”

Oh my God. “That you slept with him for a good grade. Wasn’t that clear?”

“Sex shaming?” Jessa slipped into a chastising tone. “Really, Gabby? From you?”

“I don’t care who you slept with or why.” And that was the truth. Gabby didn’t have a problem with sex and clearly had made some questionable choices on that score in her life. She didn’t judge others for that. “It was your condescending ‘I get this class better than anyone else’ bullshit. Strutting around like you were a genius when, in reality, you got an early peek at the test at the professor’s house. That’s a pattern with you. All that lying and cheating. It makes me wonder why you really left your first law firm. Did your partners catch you doing something very bad?”

“You’re such a . . .” Jessa’s voice cut off when she looked past Gabby. Whatever she saw made the color drain from her face.

The tone and mood morphed from taking shots at each other to what looked like panic. Gabby turned around, trying to see what had caused the shift. “What is it?”

“Is that Rob Greene? That reporter?”

“Probably. When you texted, I was already supposed to meet with him to talk about some information he gave me.” Seemed reasonable to combine the two meetings, but then Gabby hadn’t expected this odd, undefinable reaction from Jessa.

“Why here?” Jessa glared at Gabby. “Is the goal to ruin my reputation?”

“You’re kidding, right?”

Jessa stood up, knocking her thigh against the table and making it wobble. “I’m not staying.”