Mr. Hall Takes A Bride

“What the hell are you doing here, Jenny?” he wondered out loud.

And what was he doing here? he wondered silently. For that matter, where the hell was he going to park his car? More to the point, was it going to be there when it came time for him to leave? Cars like his were targets in seedy neighborhoods like this. A good team could strip it in no time flat.

Maybe he should have rented an inexpensive car for the next three weeks. Too late now, he thought with a sigh.

A sign indicating that there was parking behind the row of stores had him circling the block, looking for an opening. He missed it the first time around. When he discovered it on his second pass, he found his driving skills challenged. The alleyway that led to the lot was narrow, even for his sports car. He held his breath the entire time.

When he finally reached the lot, Jordan saw that there were several cars already there. Or maybe they’d just been abandoned, he amended, seeing the condition of the vehicle closest to him. It had at least twenty years on it and the years had not been kind.

Getting out, holding a container of cappuccino in one hand, Jordan engaged the security alarm in his car with his other, wondering if the gesture was a futile one. He had a feeling that anyone here probably knew how to disarm such an alarm in a matter of seconds, silencing it before it had a chance to go off.

Here goes nothing, Jordan thought, walking back out onto the street.

He passed a man rolling back the rusted iron security gates that protected the pawn shop from any break-ins. Short, squat, with arms that looked as if bench-pressing an elephant would have presented no hardship to him, the man wore his hair cropped so close to his head it appeared to be almost shaved.

Pausing as he secured the gates, the pawn-shop owner looked at Jordan and then nodded at the display window. “See anything you like?”

Jordan didn’t bother looking, although he did return the man’s smile. No sense in antagonizing someone whose biceps rivaled the circumference of truck tires. “Not at the moment.”

The pawn-shop owner continued staring at him. “Nice threads,” he commented. “I could get you a good price for them.”

Probably not anywhere in the neighborhood of what he’d actually paid for the Armani suit, Jordan thought. “Thanks. I’ll keep that in mind.”

“You work there?” the man asked as Jordan put his hand on the doorknob.

“Temporarily.”

The man nodded knowingly. “That’s what they all say.”

Jordan didn’t bother to answer.

The door to Advocate Aid, Inc., was unlocked when he tried it. The second he entered, he knew that he had overdressed. The closet of his penthouse apartment was teeming with expensive suits, suits he regarded as part of his trade because his father had impressed on him at an early age that people judged by appearances and the Halls had always been judged well. Wearing a suit was second nature to him—when he wasn’t wearing the latest actress or model or drop-dead gorgeous debutante.

But designer suits were definitely out of place in here, he thought, closing the door behind him.

Walking in, he looked around slowly. His first impression didn’t improve. The area seemed almost claustrophobically small. His old bedroom in the family estate was bigger than this place that Jenny said had five people working in it when they were running at full capacity.

He didn’t understand how anyone could get anything accomplished here. It looked like an illustration for chaos. Every inch of the place was filled with books and papers, scattered and bound. Three of the desks had computers, all of which appeared to be on their way to a museum. The desks beneath them looked battle-worn.

Over in the corner there were ancient bookcases that appeared to be leaning forward, bowing beneath the weight of legal books and, he could only assume from this distance, dust.

It was enough to send someone of his orderly nature out into the street, gasping for air.

Jordan glanced at his watch. Jenny had told him to get here by nine. It was eight-thirty. He was early because that was his nature. He hated to be kept waiting and felt that keeping anyone else waiting was rude. But early or not, he hadn’t expected to be the first one here. He looked around again, but there was no one else in the office. Not unless they were hiding beneath the stacks of paper on the floor.

But the door was unlocked, he recalled.

Maybe they had decided to close down after all and someone had just forgotten to lock the doors. Not that there looked as if there was anything to steal here, he thought, looking around again.

A noise coming from the rear of the room caught his attention. It sounded like a door slamming. Maybe there was more to the office than he’d noticed. He was about to make his way to the back when he found himself almost colliding with a petite—she couldn’t have been more than five foot one—young woman with auburn hair and incredibly lively green eyes.

Her arms were full of files which she immediately transferred into his.

The woman didn’t bother with an introduction.

“Call Mr. Abernathy about tomorrow’s hearing. You have a ten o’clock appointment with Joan Reynolds. Mr. Wyatt wants to know why no one has returned his calls. He’s on line two and he’s not getting off until he talks to a lawyer.” About to take off again, she skidded to a halt in order to add, “Oh, and the temp called in sick again and Harry is stuck in traffic and says he’ll get here when he gets here.”

Only quick reflexes had Jordan saving himself from an unscheduled close-to-scalding cappuccino bath. He managed to switch hands just before this Energizer Bunny on steroids with the rapid-fire mouth dumped the files on him.

Still shell-shocked, he stared at her now. “Harry?” he repeated. His voice sounded hoarse to his ears.

The woman was frowning. And her eyes were passing over him as if she was judging him—and finding him wanting. “Harry Reed. The other lawyer who works here.”

Finished, she turned on her heel, giving every indication that she was about to disappear into the abyss from whence she had emerged.

“Hold it!” Jordan called after her.

Ordinarily, when he took that tone with the law clerks who were interning at Morrison and Treherne, they froze. If they looked up at him at all, it was with meek expressions on their faces. Whoever this whirling dervish was, she only paused in her flight, glancing at him over her shoulder. There was a look of barely suppressed annoyance on her face.

“Yes?”

“Just who the hell are you?” he demanded sternly. He wasn’t accustomed to being ordered around, fluffed off or ignored and she had done all three in the space of less than a minute.

“I’m Sarajane.” She said the name as if that was supposed to mean something to him. When he made no response, she added her last name impatiently. “Sarajane Gerrity.”

The frown on what seemed like an otherwise pretty face deepened. Exasperated, Sarajane turned completely around and crossed back to him. “You are Jenny Logan’s brother, aren’t you? Jordan Hall?”

That was a new one on him. He couldn’t remember himself ever having been referred to that way. If anything, Jenny was regarded as “Jordan Hall’s sister.” He was the one who had garnered fame and attention in the family, not Jenny. To have it stripped away so cavalierly was a completely new experience for him. Apparently, in this small corner of the universe, his sister had come into her own.

Way to go, Jen.

“Yes, I am,” he answered.

Sarajane nodded, as if she approved and he had given the right answer to her question. But the slight frown remained. “She said you’d be coming in today to try to help out.”

He noticed that she’d said try. As if she didn’t expect him to accomplish anything. Obviously the woman didn’t get out much. Or maybe she just didn’t read the local section of the newspaper. The cases he handled appeared in print with a fair amount of regularity. There was talk of making him a partner at the firm the next time around.

“She didn’t tell me about you,” Jordan countered. Jenny had called him again late last night, to tell him about the office manager or office secretary. He hadn’t paid that much attention really. She might have even said the woman’s name, he wasn’t sure. Besides, office managers weren’t people he ordinarily interacted with unless they forgot to order something he needed.

A buzzer sounded behind him. Jordan turned around just as the front door opened. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the woman with the disapproving expression suddenly transform, as if a magic wand had been waved over her. The frown vanished, replaced by a warm, welcoming smile. She looked positively sympathetic.

And positively beautiful, he realized.

Devoid of her frown, Sarajane Gerrity’s features softened. She looked almost radiant. Despite his best efforts not to, he found that his attention was immediately engaged.

Sarajane sailed by him as if he was nothing more than one of the desks or chairs in the place. Her attention seemed to be completely focused on the couple who had just walked in. He looked at the couple now. They appeared to be in their later fifties, possibly early sixties and life had not been kind to either of them.

He caught himself wondering what had brought them here and what had put that close-to-panic look on the woman’s face.