Anything You Can Do(67)
"We agreed to take her case."
"Before we were aware of the facts." She folded the paper again.
"The facts being that she's been involved in a personal injury suit before, she’s having a relationship with the defendant, and she's horrible."
Bailey slammed her fist down on the desk. "What is the deal here? She's not one of our major clients. How did we get her in the first place? Is she somebody's sister? Is she sleeping with somebody important? We don't need her business, but we do need our good standing in the legal community."
Stafford nodded and turned his attention back to the file. "I'll go over it." He stuck the cigar in his mouth.
In disgust, Bailey turned to leave, but Morris' voice stopped her. "Your notes."
"What for?" she demanded. "You can't read them."
He held out his hand and smiled. She passed him the multi-folded paper and rushed out before she said something she'd probably regret. Probably, but not definitely.
*~*~*
"The man is a total, one hundred percent perfect jerk!" Bailey shouted as she pulled on her running shorts and dug her shoes out of the closet.
"Will you come in here so I don't have to yell?" Paula called from the living room.
"Only if I can continue to yell." Bailey stomped across the room and flopped onto the floor in front of the sofa where Paula sat drinking a glass of Zinfandel wine.
"Can you sort of start at the beginning and tell me in chronological order exactly what happened?"
Bailey jerked her shoelace tight then cursed when it broke. "Austin's been trying to get our firm to merge with his."
"I know all that," Paula interrupted. "Get on with the story between you and Austin."
"You know about the merger?" Bailey asked, pausing in her attempt to rejoin the pieces of her shoelace.
"You didn't think Stafford Morris typed up the notes on the merger that all of you had to read, did you?"
"Well, why didn't you say anything?"
Samantha leapt off the sofa and pranced over to crawl in Bailey's lap.
"Good grief, Bailey. You should know a legal secretary's job is confidential."
Bailey stroked Samantha's soft fur and cuddled her to her neck, feeling some loosening of the constriction in her chest. "Not confidential from somebody who already knows."
"You never brought up the subject. Have a glass of wine. You can't run with a broken shoelace." She shoved a full glass across the coffee table.
"I can run barefoot if I have to," Bailey declared, and Samantha squirmed at the angry tone. "Sorry, darling." She scratched a fuzzy ear then slid the dog back to her lap while she resumed work on the shoelace. As dispassionately as possible, Bailey described Austin's violent entrance into her office.
"I just can't believe he would get so mad at you over a stupid merger," Paula interrupted.
"Believe it. He did. He was vicious." Both shoes tied, Bailey set Samantha on the floor, put her feet together, and began to bounce her knees, stretching her thigh muscles.
"Did you try to explain your reasons?"
"Yes, I did. I told him I'd done what I considered the right thing, and then he accused me of representing Candy Miller even though she's a fraud, which is just what your boss is trying to make me do."
"So then did you tell him what you'd been doing about it?'"
"Why should I? If that's what he thinks of me, I don't want anything to do with him." She stood and began stretching.
"He'll get over it," Paula encouraged.
"How nice for him. I won't."
She headed for the door. Behind her she heard Paula say in a voice obviously meant to be overheard, "Samantha, I think your mommy's in love."
Bailey charged down the stairs and forced her legs to carry her across the parking lot, toward the street. Any minute now, she told herself, her muscles would become properly oxygenated, the adrenaline would start to flow, and she'd begin to enjoy this. The sun blazed heat down on her, and the concrete slammed it up into her face. Running in an oven took a lot of effort.
The run ranked right up there with her first venture out after a bout with pneumonia three years ago. Her legs felt like rubber bands, and each foot seemed to weigh twenty pounds. This business of fighting for real and dealing with scrunched-up insides apparently took a lot of energy. Not a pleasant thought.