Practice Makes Perfect(23)
After eight years, it had finally come down to this.
Him versus her.
The buzz of the telephone intercom, his secretary’s call, momentarily startled him.
“Yes, Kathy,” he answered in a clipped, brisk tone. He needed a few moments alone to think.
“Sorry to bother you, J.D.,” came Kathy’s voice through the speakerphone. “Chuck Werner asked that you call him as soon as possible to discuss next week’s deposition schedule.”
J.D. pinched between his eyes. He felt a headache coming on and was not at all in the mood to deal with his opposing counsel. “Thanks, Kathy. I’ll get back to him.”
“And one other thing,” Kathy added quickly, seeming to sense his eagerness to get off the phone. “Your father called and asked me to give you a message. He said you would understand.” She spoke slowly, confused by the message. “He said to tell you that he heard the firm was making an announcement today and wanted to know whether your mother just got her new mink coat.”
J.D. closed his eyes. His headache had suddenly gotten much worse.
PAYTON LEANED AGAINST her office door with her eyes shut. She slowly breathed in and out, trying to steady herself.
She wasn’t in her office five seconds before her phone began to ring. She tried to ignore it.
Then her second line rang.
Payton opened her eyes and headed to her desk. Glancing over at her computer, she saw that she had twenty-five new email messages.
There was a knock at her door. Without hesitation, Irma popped her head into the office.
“Oh, good, I thought you were here—you have Mr. McKane holding on line one, and Eric Riley waiting for you on line two. He wants to talk about the Middleton trial.”
Payton couldn’t breathe. She felt as though the walls were closing in around her. A third call came in, and the ringing of her phone seemed deafening.
She needed to get out.
Now.
She slid past Irma. “Tell everyone I’ll call them back. I . . . have to take care of something. An urgent matter.”
With that, she took off in a hurry toward the elevators.
THE FIFTY-FIFTH FLOOR housed the firm’s law library. With grand cathedral ceilings and sunlit stained-glass windows, the library’s grandeur befitted a different era, a time when—egads—lawyers consulted books for information. In the post-Internet days of online research, however, it was rare to find a living soul amongst the library’s elegant two-story mahogany bookshelves—save for Ripley & Davis’s lone librarian, Agnes, who had been with the firm since its inception.
Nearly six years ago, getting lost while looking for the accounting floor, Payton had stumbled upon the law library (it wasn’t even included in the new associate tour anymore) and had been charmed by its quiet calm. It was an oasis of serenity amid the chaos and bustle of the firm’s other floors.
Truthfully, it was also pretty much the only place in the entire building to which an associate could escape without being called, emailed, beeped, sent for, paged, or otherwise hounded by ne’er-do-well partners trying to pawn off emergency TROs at 4:00 on a Friday afternoon. Not that Payton—the highly industrious associate she was—had ever personally utilized the library for such nefarious purposes. She could just surmise that the library would be great for hiding out, if one so happened to be inclined.
Payton burst into the library, relieved to see that it was empty as always. She hurried past the librarian’s desk en route to her favorite “thinking” spot: the Archives shelves in the far back corner of the library.
“Hello, Agnes,” she said politely as she breezed by.
Agnes turned at the sound of Payton’s voice. Eighty years old if a day, the librarian’s vision wasn’t the greatest. She smiled and waved in the wrong direction, addressing the air.
“Hello, Ms. Kendall!” Agnes called out. “Come to practice another opening statement?” It was the excuse Payton had given her years ago, to explain what she did while hanging out by herself amongst the library stacks.
“I won’t be long today,” Payton said over her shoulder. She just needed a minute or two to collect herself. Ben’s news had come as a shock. All of her anger was bubbling up to the surface and if she didn’t get a moment to herself to calm down, she might explode.
Payton headed to the Archives section, and when she was safely tucked out of sight, she came to a stop. She leaned against the bookshelves and took a deep breath. And another.
Keep it together, she told herself. It wasn’t the end of the world. Yet. She still had a chance of making partner. She still—
Oh, hell. Before she could stop it, tears of frustration welled up in her eyes. She looked up at the ceiling. No, no, no, she would not do this. Not here, not now.
It was at that moment that Payton heard Agnes call out in greeting to someone else. She peered through the bookshelves and saw—shit!—J.D. standing at the entrance of the library. Payton watched as he headed over to Agnes’s desk, saying something she couldn’t hear.
Payton glanced around, hoping to spot another exit out of the stacks. She really couldn’t deal with J.D. right then. Unfortunately, there was no other way out. Peering through the books, she saw Agnes point to the Archives section where she was hiding. J.D. nodded, then began walking straight toward her.
Payton quickly brushed away the tears from her eyes, praying that her mascara wasn’t smudged. She needed a cover—fast. She saw a nearby step stool and climbed up. She grabbed the first book she saw off the shelf and cracked it open just as J.D. rounded the corner.