Scales: Of Justice (Broken But ... Mending Book 3) Read online

  Scales

  (of Justice)

  by

  Dale Mayer

  Book in this series:

  Skin

  Scars

  Scales (of Justice)

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Back Cover

  Complimentary Download

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Author’s Note

  Complimentary Download

  Previews

  Second Chances Sample

  Touched by Death Sample

  About the Author

  Also by Dale Mayer

  Copyright Page

  Back Cover

  She thinks she escaped Justice

  He is still waiting for Justice to happen.

  She’s afraid her day of reckoning is near.

  He’s afraid his day of reckoning will never arrive.

  Will love balance the scales of Justice?

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  Your Free Book Awaits!

  KILL OR BE KILLED

  Part of an elite SEAL team, Mason takes on the dangerous jobs no one else wants to do – or can do. When he’s on a mission, he’s focused and dedicated. When he’s not, he plays as hard as he fights.

  Until he meets a woman he can’t have but can’t forget. Software developer, Tesla lost her brother in combat and has no intention of getting close to someone else in the military. Determined to save other US soldiers from a similar fate, she’s created a program that could save lives. But other countries know about the program, and they won’t stop until they get it – and get her.

  Time is running out … For her … For him … For them …

  DOWNLOAD a complimentary copy of MASON? Just tell me where to send it!

  Chapter 1

  Paris Wilson sat with her back to the wall and waited as the room slowly filled up for the first morning seminar. They’d all briefly met the night before but the real workshop started today. Set in downtown Vancouver, at a posh but business-style hotel, she couldn’t help but feel this Inner Healing workshop could be the answer to so many problems. It had better be, especially after pleading with her professor that she was ready for this. It was a special workshop for university students under Professor Jenna Komak. And Jenna alone made the decision as to who would be allowed to attend.

  Now Paris was here and couldn’t wait to get started. She had picked a perfect spot to watch the other attendees but only be seen by a few of them as they looked around. Those she could ignore.

  She’d ignore everyone if she could. They were a distraction. There was a reason she was here and she was anxious to get started. Several reasons actually. When her brother, Sean, had attended the same workshop earlier this summer, he’d fallen in love with a special woman he’d met there. Robin was stunning inside and out.

  Paris was seriously happy for Sean. She’d always known he’d find someone someday – even if he hadn’t believed it. Not only because he was her brother, but because he was a great man and a terrific human being.

  He deserved to be happy. And that made all the difference in the world.

  Brushing back her black hair, Paris knew that any of these other attendees could potentially impact her life in a similar way. In wonder, she studied the few people taking seats at the very front. She’d never been able to do that. Being front and center. It put too much attention on her. Considering how eager she was to get moving on this, she should probably consider the risks. Even though her hopes were high for the workshop, she knew she was asking a lot. She was eager. Too eager. She didn’t have rose-colored glasses with which to view the world, but she had her brother’s experience as a standard.

  Dropping her gaze to her hands, her fingers picked away at the skin from the base of the nails. Ugly. Damaged. Falling to pieces. Gee funny, her outside matched her inside.

  At that, she almost gave an audible snort but held it back at the last moment. It wouldn’t do to attract attention in this setting. She settled back and watched as several men took their seats. The only men she knew well had been her father and her brother. Both of them were so much alike and so opposite in all the ways that counted. Other males she met seemed to be a mix of the two. Maybe that was good. Maybe not.

  She’d been interested in a few men she’d met through work, but knew they wouldn’t want her. What was to want? She was an okay size as in shorter than Sean but just a hair taller than his partner Robin. Even though she ate like a horse, she was slim, bordering on gaunt. Her brother said she was too nervy to keep any weight on. Whatever.

  She had to admit to being a little on the driven Type A side, but she had a reason. After missing out on so much in life, she couldn’t help but want to do more. Be more.

  Then there was the mixed-up part of her that knew she could never be enough. Never be good enough. She hadn’t ever been that good. And that perception impacted her actions every day.

  It was stupid. She was an adult now. Surely her childhood shouldn’t be doing this to her anymore.

  Except, whispered that gentle voice inside, you weren’t a child when it finally stopped. You were a teenager. So very vulnerable to the actions, opinions of those around you. Very impressionable at an age where you’d already been beaten into the ground. Knew there was no one out there that would save you. Already understood that the original fairy tales had the right of it, they were grim, heart-wrenching stories. Nothing like the pretty pink stories she heard other kids talk about with teddy bears and rainbows and unicorns even.

  Paris knew the bogeyman was real. And she knew that there was one inside of every single person – including herself.

  “Is anyone sitting here?”

  The deep dark voice shook her to the core. Surprised at the swarthy young man standing beside her, she stared uncomprehendingly at him. She glanced at the direction he pointed and realized she’d been sitting in one chair and taking up a second chair with her legs, subconsciously giving people no choice but to stay away. Jenna, their professor, would have a heyday with her body language.

  Paris dropped her legs and muttered, “No, it’s free.”

  Nodding, he sat down, turning his back to her.

  She studied him covertly. As broad as Sean was lean, he was solid looking. Farmer stock. Big hands and forearms but not the muscle-bound body builder type. Nice actually.

  And there was a faint smell, not cologne, subtler than that. Aftershave or even shaving soap. With his dark coloring, she imagined he had to shave a couple of times a day. He turned and gave her a bland look.

  She flushed. Damn it, he’d caught her studying him.

  Back in school, she had learned that if she went into
class afraid, the teacher would pick on her to do a question on the board. She always got picked. However, if she walked in and couldn’t have cared less about it, she never got picked. How come she couldn’t apply that same trick to the world at large? Paris wondered.

  The instructor walked in at that moment. The air magically twisted, becoming lighter, airy. The underlying nervousness quickly dissipated.

  Paris was here for the same thing everyone else was here for. To heal.

  They all needed to move past issues that stopped them from leading the fulfilling lives they all wanted. They all wanted to move forward.

  Simple. Not.

  Jenna had achieved phenomenal results with her earlier seminars, but at what point did her special touch run a little thin? Paris knew if the magic was going to run out, it would run out with her. She hadn’t learned the trick of making her life happen easily. Nor of making it through life unscathed like so many people she knew. Neither did she expect much more than what she had.

  But she wished…dreamed…fantasized of so much more.

  Especially babies.

  And there were just some things that no matter how much wishing one did, it wasn’t going to happen.

  Still, the alternative would have been worse. She was here, and she was strong and healthy and alive. She was good with that. There were alternative dreams she could dream.

  She smiled.

  And damn if her neighbor didn’t turn and looked at her suspiciously.

  It was her turn to give him a bland stare.

  He cocked one eyebrow, a glint of amusement in his gaze before he shifted back in his chair and turned his attention to the front of the room.

  Only she caught sight of a muscle in his jaw twitching in a steady pulsating manner.

  Squeezing her eyes shut, she tried to focus on Jenna’s words. That’s why she was here. Her eyes popped open. Yet at the same time her neighbor, in the chair next to her, was starting to drive her nuts. She wanted to slap a hand over that muscle and make it stop.

  Just part of her stress management techniques she had to work on. Fix what she could fix and ignore what she couldn’t. So how was she doing on that second half? Lousy.

  Jenna held up a stack of folders. “Good morning, everyone.”

  A murmured response rippled through the room.

  “I’m glad to see you’ve all settled in, we’ll work first on getting you divvied up into pairs and then hand out the assignments. Until I call your name, remember I mentioned homework last night? Well this…” She held up a stack of papers to the groans of those around her, “Won’t be homework if you get it all done now.”

  And with that, she dropped the stack at the front desk and said, “Take one and pass them around.”

  Paris watched as the stack moved from one person to the other. She’d be last. Maybe that was okay too.

  Jenna called two people’s names and moved the couple to the back of the room where three chairs sat in a cozy arrangement in the corner. Paris kept half an eye on their reactions but as there were lots of smiles and nods, she figured the first couple wasn’t unhappy with their assignment. A few moments later, the couple returned and Jenna called out two more names and asked the attendees to join her at the back.

  Somewhere in there, the assignment sheet arrived on the table in front of Paris. She picked it up and sighed. This one was a sheet on dreams. Your dreams. Dreams you gave up on. Dreams you couldn’t give up on. And the last one got to Paris – list the innermost secret dream you were too afraid to let yourself dream.

  She stared at that question and wished she had an answer.

  “For those of you working on the homework sheet,” Jenna said. “Please add one question to the bottom of the sheet.”

  There were long, heavy sighs from those around her.

  Paris looked at Jenna, waiting, wondering where she was going with this.

  “Write down the biggest regret in your life and how the event impacted your dreams.”

  Shit.

  Paris’s hard-won calm disintegrated. That question required no thought.

  She already had the answer. She lived with it daily.

  She wished she’d never killed her father.

  *

  What was Paris’s problem? Cool name. If he’d read the top of worksheet correctly.

  But the woman…her expression was that of a deer frozen in the spotlight. He stared at her, seeing the glassy eyes and the stark-white pallor.

  Like what the hell?

  Trying to sneak a glance at her paper again, he realized she was filling out the question that Jenna had just added. All he could see was something ending with her father.

  Figures. Every messed-up girl seemed to have daddy issues. While he turned back to his paper, he kept an eye on her. When she started to rub out the words written on her paper – words written in pen – he knew she wasn’t all there.

  The questions in front of him were beyond his understanding, but he had to ponder the concept. He wasn’t about dreams. He was all about goals. Dreams were nebulous. Airy and light. Weightless. Euphemism for useless. He was a planner. A-one-foot-in-front-of-the-other-and-walk toward a specific end point kind of person. Not for the joy of the walk but because he was going to get somewhere specific. He was all about specifics. That he was here in this damn class said he was doing one of the steps that he needed to do to get on with his life.

  Another check box was being marked off. Good. Therapy wasn’t his thing, especially not his own. At least not now. No, he couldn’t really say for sure why he was here except because of Jenna herself. He’d heard about Jenna’s classes and had even attended several of her evening lectures. But he didn’t need her class and he’d told her so. That’s when she’d smiled that really witchy smile, her eyes glowing with laughter, and she’d challenged him to attend. To show that he’d taken care of his stuff. That there wasn’t anything else she could show him.

  “Hell,” he’d said with a snicker, “of course I could do it, but I don’t need to. I wouldn’t pay good money for something like this.”

  With a laugh, she replied, “If you think you’re immune, then write up a paper on it. If it’s any good, I’ll help you get it published. If you find out you’re not immune, we’ll revisit the subject of the report at the end.”

  Now that appealed to his sense of purpose. His portfolio was missing published articles – particularly in peer-reviewed journals. Even if having a shrink’s name on his paper didn’t help in getting a paper published, it was on his bucket list. And damn it, that bucket list was important.

  So he’d accepted the challenge. And here he was.

  So no, he hadn’t been tricked into attending, but…it almost felt like it. Or maybe it was that he felt played…and had taken the bait. And that now he was where she wanted him to be.

  But why?

  To observe? To write his insights? There was lots of fodder here. Some of these people needed serious help.

  He shook his head and scratched the word dreams out and replaced it with the word goals. When he was done, he realized the odd sound beside him was the sound of paper ripping. He snuck a glance over at Paris to see her trying to rip out the answer she’d tried to rub out first. Apparently, she was seriously determined to not let anyone see that answer. As he studied her, he realized that she’d actually ripped off the strip of paper and had rolled it up into a tiny ball.

  Fascinated, he watched her struggle to find a place to hide the tiny item. He couldn’t take his eyes off it. What the hell had she written that she wanted erased so badly?

  His gaze swung back to the paper. She’d left the other answers intact. Just a long strip missing out of the bottom half. As if sensing his bewilderment, she lifted her gaze to his face. Her cheeks flared with bright colors as their eyes met, and she slammed her hand over the same hand that held the tiny ball of paper. The ball flew from her fingers, bounced on the table, and rolled toward him.

  It was inevitable. The curious behavior
he witnessed had him itching to know what she was trying to hide; what was written on the crumpled ball on the floor in front of him. Just as he reached for the paper ball, she snatched it up, their fingers brushing briefly as he watched the trail of her fingers to her mouth.

  She popped the tiny globe into her mouth…and damn if she didn’t swallow it.

  Chapter 2

  Paris shuddered with embarrassment. Oh God. Oh Lord. Please say she hadn’t just done that.

  She’d been so panicked when she’d seen him first glance at her paper. The answer she had written. An answer she’d never intended to share. There’d never been any consideration that someone else would read it. Of course Jenna. But then she already knew.

  The thought of anyone else knowing…she struggled to control her breathing. Closing her eyes, she took one deep breath, then a second one. It was impossible to have a panic attack here, she didn’t dare. She hadn’t had one in a long time…

  A shadow fell across her face. A heavy hand landed on her shoulder. “Are you okay?” asked a deep rolling male voice.

  Opening her eyes in a flash, she knew before she saw that it was him.

  Her gaze widened and she swallowed. Finally, she managed to nod and whisper, “Yes, thank you.”

  Hard eyes stared down at her, studying her. As though he was looking into the very heart of her. Quickly, her eyes slammed closed before he could see too much.

  See the guilty stain on her soul. Sense the vast emptiness inside.

  “Hey, take it easy.”

  The fingers on her shoulders squeezed gently. The warmth of his touch pulsed through her and she took another breath.

  “Okay,” she said, nodding as she opened her eyes and gave him a lopsided grin. “Believe it or not, I’m trying to.”

  “Try harder.” That tone said do it. No excuses. And something about it worked. She straightened up, gave him a small nod of thanks, and glanced down at her paper. The paper was destroyed, ripped to shreds. “Wow, I really didn’t like that question.”