The Venus Fix Read Online Free PDF Page A

half hour later she arrived home. Upstairs, she didn’t remember to take off her coat or her dripping boots. She didn’t turn on any lights or make herself a cup of the English breakfast tea she liked so much.
    In her husband’s dark study, she sat down at his desk in front of the computer. Alan never shut it off. The screen saver twinkled with stars in the cosmos. Tentatively, as if she didn’t know whether she was reaching into a treasure chest or a snake’s nest, she put her hands on the keys.
    She hit the
H
key but it could have been any key. The screen saver disappeared, replaced by the desktop. The brighter glow made the diamonds in her wedding band glint hypnotically, and she stared at the silver-white bright shine for a second, distracted.
    Each time she had done this, she’d felt the same overwhelmingexhaustion at first. A feeling so heavy her shoulders sagged under its weight. That this was morally wrong should have mattered to her. At least as a concept. Only four months earlier, she would have found her actions abhorrent. Was it possible that she had become this person, living this life, doing these things, in only sixteen weeks?
    Her fingers typed out his password.
    It was an accident that she knew it. She’d barely been paying attention that night. They’d been here, talking, and he’d wanted to show her an e-mail from one of his students, so he’d typed out the seven letters. She’d hardly been aware that she was watching his fingers move on the keyboard, but when the time came that she decided to go searching for the truth, the password was there in her mind, teasing her with its irony.
    J-u-s-t-i-c-e.
    All around her, leather-bound legal volumes with gilt lettering on their spines stood at attention on their shelves, mocking her actions. Alan had seen to that. He had chosen as his little hobby—the single most insulting pastime he could have, considering who she was and what she did and how she felt about it.
    Yes, she defended porn kings and smut dealers because there was no greater test for the First Amendment. Each and every time she won a case, she got satisfaction that she was tightening the screws on the protective glass over the Constitution.
    The last big civil case—between her client, a pornography king, and well-known feminist Stella Dobson—had garnered more media attention than she’d ever had before. Even though public opinion was with Dobson, the law was clearly on Kira’s side. She’d won.
    But at what cost?
she asked as she lay in bed at night, staring at the ceiling, not able to sleep, seeing the faces of the women she betrayed—feminists and trailblazers and reformers.Women like her own mother, who struggled so her daughter could go to law school. Women who’d made a difference, like Judy Wilson, Emma Michaels. Like Dobson herself. All women she knew and admired, versus these men who were in it for the dollar. Not for principles. She talked to, met with, worked with, defended and saved the hides of businessmen who brokered in some of the most disgusting images she’d ever seen. And it was justified because she was proving and protecting inalienable rights. Except…
    She couldn’t think about that now. She had work to do before Alan came home. He couldn’t find her invading his privacy.
Even though he’s done worse to you,
the strident voice in her head whispered. The voice talked to her all the time now and said there were no more excuses and there was no more time for weakness. There was too much to do.
    The computer made a slight humming noise, like a bee circling overhead. The keys clicked in a rhythm that was slightly off kilter. It was easy enough to check where Alan had been the night before. Since he didn’t suspect she had access to his computer, he didn’t empty his cache, and the last twenty Web sites he had visited were right there for her perusal.
    Three different women.
    He’d spent the night with three women.
    When she was lying in their bed by