The air inside the courtroom was cool and smelled of old paper and wood polish.

We walked toward the petitioner’s table on the left.

The judge had not yet entered, but the court reporter was already setting up her machine.

We sat down at the table.

I set Rosie on the chair between Nathan and me.

“Stay close to me, okay?” I whispered to her.

She nodded, her eyes wide as she looked around the large, high-ceilinged room.

On the opposite side of the aisle, Grant, Evelyn, and their three lawyers took their seats.

Their lead attorney, a man with sharp features and grey hair, immediately began spreading documents across their table.

He glanced over at us, a look of professional satisfaction on his face.

Nathan opened his laptop, his fingers moving across the keyboard.

“My lead counsel, Mr. Vance, is parking,” Nathan whispered to me.

“He will be here in two minutes.”

“We need him now,” I said, my hands trembling under the table.

Just then, the door at the back of the courtroom opened.

A young woman in a dark suit walked in quickly.