I should have spent Friday morning making a brine of vegetable broth, ginger, salt, brown sugar, pepper, and allspice at Dani’s house. I should’ve been helping Emily roll out baguette loaves.
Instead, I had been called into the office just after nine a.m.
It was a cold day, the promise of winter in it. We didn’t get much of a fall in these parts anymore; typically it stayed warm through October, then it seemed as though all the trees shed their leaves all at once, in the first week of November, and now it was all just a boring prelude to winter.
When I got there I saw Jason’s car in the lot, as well as what I thought was the Lexus driven by Mrs. Jackson’s attorney.
My heart sank into my stomach, where it bubbled menacingly with the bourbon I’d had for Thanksgiving dinner.
Nobody else was in the office, and I thought I heard raised voices in Jason’s office. So I made my way there and shoved right in without waiting for an invite.
“Jack,” Jason said. He was dressed casually, a polo shirt over jeans, which I almost never saw him in. But then, it was the Friday after Thanksgiving. Nobody worked then; not even him.
I nodded. “Ms. Hanes.” The attorney was wearing a loose gray sweater over dark blue jeans that looked expensive, and heeled boots. It was casual-as-dressy.
“Just what do you think you were doing, assaulting my client’s husband. Do you realize how this complicates her case? I’m here to get back every damn dime she paid you.”
“Assaulting your client’s husband?”
“Yes, and he said there’d be witnesses. Said you even tried to steal his car.”
I walked over to the conference table and set down my helmet and gloves.
“Ms. Hanes. If I had truly wanted to steal Donald Jackson’s car, would he have been able to stop me?”
“He says he threatened to call the police.”
I sighed. “Ms. Hanes, where does he say this occurred?”
“At a gas station a few blocks away from the firm.”
“How does he know where the firm is?”
“It’s public knowledge.”
“Right.” Behind her I saw Jason starting to grin. “And did he use my name or describe me?”
“He referred to you as Jack.”
“So your suggestion here is that I was stupid enough to brace Mr. Jackson and give him my name.”
“He says a bystander called you that.”
“Huh. Ms. Hanes, did it occur to you to ask Mrs. Jackson how her soon to be ex-husband knew who had handled the investigation into his infidelity? Not the firm, I mean, but the individual.”
“No, I just got a phone call from his attorney and…”
“Immediately sped over here on Black Damn Friday, America’s favorite holiday, to try and get money back?”
“It’s my job to defend the interests of my client.”
“Your client told her husband who I was. She told him I rode a bike, and what kind, and what I looked like, and where to find me.”
“How do you know that?” She was put off. I don’t think she’d expected me to be anything but surprised.
“Because a few days ago he tried to run me off the road. Then he followed me to the firm and attacked me.”
“Well,” I could see gears clicking behind her lawyer’s eyes. I liked her a little less, though I understood where it came from. Best interests of her client indeed. “That would change things. How did you respond?”
“I defended myself.” I saw her eyes start to widen, and I raised a hand. “Gently,” I said. “I didn’t hurt him. I did take away his keys for a little while, because he was clearly at the end of a three-martini lunch, and I didn’t want to put him back on the road. I told him to walk to the gas station and back for coffee and to cool off. Eventually I gave him his keys back. And your client sent him after me because she wanted him at least humiliated, probably roughed up.”
“Are you willing to appear in court in order to…”
“No,” I said flatly. “Not unless Mr. Jackson tries to press charges.”
“But this could mean…”
“I don’t care,” I said, cutting her off, rudely, which I immediately felt badly about. But I had the initiative and I soldiered on. “Look, my work for Mrs. Jackson is finished. I don’t want to go back on the clock for it, and frankly, I’m out of town for a long time starting Monday. I don’t blame you for looking out for Mrs. Jackson, and that’s all you thought you were doing. But we’ve wasted enough time on this.”
Ms. Hanes reached into the small purse she carried. It had an expensive looking designer’s marque on it, but I could never tell one of those apart from another. She handed me a card.
“You may hear from me,” was all she said before walking out. We both watched her leave, waited to hear the door close.
Looking at the card, seeing her name in black and white, it finally occurred to me to ask.
“Ms. Hanes,” I said, and she paused at the door of Jason’s office. “How’s Liza?”
She lifted an eyebrow as a question. She had pinpoint control of her features; I don’t know if that was a lawyer thing, but I bet it helped.
“Did she never mention me? I found her friend Gabriel after he dropped out of school.”
The eyebrow lift that was a question melted into widened eyes of comprehension. “Of course she did. She never gave me your last name, but…I probably should’ve made the connection on my own.”
I shrugged. “Not like it occurred to me either.”
“My daughter did seem to think well of you, which is unusual for her and…any adult.”
I chuckled. “We all go through that phase, but…she seemed like a good kid. The kind who worried about her friends. If you doubt the account I’ve just given you, maybe ask her if she thinks I’m a liar.”
“I will,” she said, and I was convinced she was going to go do just that as she shut the door and walked out.
“I’ve never known anyone who could impress someone while pissing them off quite like you, Jack,” Jason said, with a little laugh.
“We all have our gifts.” I turned to Jason. “How good can she be if she fell for that bullshit from the Jackson asshole?”
He shrugged. “Took her off guard, I guess. And this is a divorce attorney’s busy season anyway.”
“November?”
“The holidays. Nothing to make you realize you hate your family like being forced to spend time with ‘em.”
“Hell,” I said, feeling a little sick, “I don’t need to spend any time with my family to know that.”
The lighter tone vanished. Jason cleared his throat and said, “Well, the DWF still wants you Monday. Let’s get you kitted out. I’m going of town this weekend.”
He reached into his pocket for keys.
I knew better than to argue the point. If this was a bodyguarding job, I knew I needed to carry something, even if I didn’t much like it.
First, he set down a Taser, yellow and blue in a plastic belt holster. Then a box of 9mm ammo. A small black plastic case, locked. A couple key-ring sized pepper spray dispersal units.
He turned to me. “You want a shoulder rig or a belt?”
“Uh, shoulder I guess. Be able to wear it under a jacket then.”
A leather strap with two loops for shoulders hit his desk. Then, finally, a vest.
“Really? A vest?”
“If people are serious about attacking you’ll be glad you have it.”
“I’ve already got Kevlar in my jacket.”
“It won’t look suspicious at all if you follow him around wearing a motorcycle jacket zipped to the chin all the damn time.”
“Fine, fine.”
He used a smaller key to open the black plastic case. Inside it was a Beretta Storm 9mm.
“We could probably do the subcompact if you really wanna go concealed…”
“Doesn’t matter,” I said. “Let’s just get this over with.”
“You’re gonna wear it now.”
“I’m here on the bike, and I don’t have saddlebags to get any of this home. Plus I don’t have a safer place to leave it between now and Monday.”
“Well, don’t sleep with it on.”
“Don’t plan to.” I took my jacket off and Jason looped the rig over my arms. There were pockets for two magazines under my right arm and the holster under my left. He held out the case and I reluctantly took the gun. There was one spare magazine. I ejected the one in the pistol, checked the slide to be sure it was unloaded, then slid it into the holster.
Goddamn but I hated wearing a weapon. I’d hated it in the Marine Police and I hated it now. Reluctantly, I slid the jacket back over it, then said, “There a spare gym bag or something around for the rest of this?”
“Go look for something,” Jason said.
I hunted through the various cubicles; eventually I found a large reusable shopping bag. I was going to feel damn strange carrying it on my bike back to the Belle but there we were.
When I came into his office with it, my boss looked like he was reconsidering. “You’re going to put a Taser and a block of ammo and a vest into a shopping bag and, what? Stick it in your chain locker?”
“No. I’m going to leave the vest and the pepper spray in a locker on my boat. I think I know a more secure place for the rest of it.”
“Fine. Don’t you dare lose my firearm.”
“I can’t lose it if you don’t make me take it with me.”
“Not arguing about this. Now go do some shopping or whatever it is you do on days off.”
I knew I was up against one of his limits, so off I went. After storing the vest and the pepper spray on the Belle I texted Dani.
You still got a locker in the garden shed?
Yeah. Why?
I’m on my way but I’ve got a package.
Fine.