She hadn’t seen Professor Castillo since he’d been one of her professors at Florida State’s law school. Funny, she’d just been thinking about him last night and that ridiculous infatuation she’d had, like a teenage girl with her first crush.
She peeked around the giant peace lily for a better look at Miguel. Still gorgeous. He was the classic tall, dark, and handsome, with an oval face framed by jet-black hair, and lots of it. His tortoise-shell glasses framed nearly black eyes and rested on a straight nose. But it was his mouth that really made his face so captivating—full lips with a natural hint of color and a thicker lower lip that gave him a hint of a pout. On a less masculine man, his lips would have been feminine. But on him, they were sensual.
The man had simply radiated sexual allure back in Abby’s law school days. But if Miguel had ever even remotely noticed Abby back then, he’d managed to hide the evidence. Of course, during that era of her life, Abby had been dumpy.
Dumpy, hell, she’d been fat. Okay, not fat…but definitely plump.
Miguel, whether he knew it or not, had spurred her into a total make-over—or rather her crush on him had. A diet. A gym membership. Regular trips to a top beauty salon where the stylist had convinced her that redheads, not blondes, had more fun. Her natural chestnut hair took on some red and gold highlights that glimmered. Unfortunately, her metamorphosis had taken place after she graduated and Miguel never saw the new her.
“Why don’t I explain a bit of my problem with the seminar?” Miguel’s deep voice broke in on Abby’s reverie of her improvements since law school. “And gather your ideas for ways to cure them.” He paused, smiling at Mr. Draper. “And when we have all of that worked out, maybe this weekend you and your beautiful wife can join me at my place on the lake.”
Uh, oh, it was time to stand up. Abby rattled some papers to alert them of her presence. She put on a smile she hoped looked natural.
“Ah, Miss Coleridge,” Mr. Draper said. “We didn’t see you there.”
She stepped toward the men, doing her best to reflect gracious good manners and not look like she was fall-down fatigued. “Good morning.” She nodded toward Mr. Draper, then turned to Professor Castillo, and held out her hand. “Abby Coleridge, Professor Castillo. So pleased to see you again.”
The professor took her hand, holding her gaze with his dark eyes. Slowly he smiled, curving his full lips to show straight, white teeth. Abby didn’t see a flicker of recognition on his face, but maybe that was just as well.
“Miss Coleridge, how delightful.” He gave her hand a little squeeze before he let it go.
“Please, do call me Abby. I was your student in Legal Ethics and American Jurisprudence. Wonderful classes, both of them.” Actually, the classes had been dull as soggy cornflakes and Miguel had been an uninspired teacher—though his looks had held her attention even when his boring lectures hadn’t.
Mr. Draper cleared his throat. Abby and the professor both turned to him.
“Miguel and I were just about to discuss a joint-teaching venture at the law school. And this conference room is quite comfortable.” Mr. Draper’s tone of voice suggested that Abby should offer to vacate the conference room.
Abby thought quickly. She knew Mr. Draper was an adjunct professor at the law school, teaching seminars on oil and gas issues, but she couldn’t imagine what he and Miguel could co-teach, or why. But the important thing at the moment was her upcoming deposition. She could gather up her notes and move. It was, after all, Mr. Draper’s office building and law firm. Surely one of the other conference rooms was free, especially this early in the morning.
Before Abby said anything, Miguel spoke. “Phillip, she’s already spread out some documents and obviously needs this room. Let’s you and I retire to your office and let Abby continue her work here.”
Mr. Draper narrowed his eyes at Abby for a split second. “Fine. My office is not quite so comfortable, but I’m sure we’ll make do.”
What did he mean, his office wasn’t comfortable? She had lived in apartments that were smaller than his corner suite. But regardless of what she thought, Abby nodded. “I do have a deposition scheduled and my client should be here any moment.” She refrained from mentioning she’d reserved the room a month in advance.
“Well, then, it’s settled. We’ll leave you to it.” Miguel smiled again, with that same slow curve of his lips as he stared into her eyes. “So very lovely to see you again, Abby,” he added. “I do remember you from my first year of teaching, with your captivating red hair right there in the front of the class room.”
Abby’s smile suddenly felt glued on. She hadn’t been a redhead in his classes, and she’d never have sat near the front unless someone made her do so upon the threat of expulsion. “I really appreciated your lectures on how the first Supreme Court justices shaped American history,” she said. That was as untrue as his comment, so they were even. What she’d really enjoyed was his book, A Thesis on Early American Jurisprudence: A Study of the First U. S. Supreme Court. Most people who read such books considered it brilliant, and she still had a signed copy.
“Shall we then?” Miguel led Mr. Draper out of the conference room.
Once the two men were truly gone, Abby sat down hard on her chair. Miguel had flirted with her and yet, despite her law-school crush on the man, his attentions meant nothing to her now. She wondered if her eighty-hour work weeks had killed any hope of passion.
But as she turned back to her legal documents, she thought of Victor.
No, she wasn’t entirely dead to those kinds of feelings.
She just had them for the wrong man.
Chapter Eight
Abby wanted to put her head down on her desk and nap on her pile of mail and unanswered phone messages. But the steady hum of caffeine and anxiety in her veins wouldn’t let her, nor would the demands of the rest of the morning. At least her deposition was done and she could soon start on Delphine’s trial brief, which she’d failed to finish last night due to the mugging.
As if summoned by Abby’s very thought of her, Delphine knocked and entered the office in one smooth, quick move. “Heads up.” Delphine put a steaming cup of coffee on Abby’s desk.
Abby lifted her eyes from the stack of unanswered phone messages and looked at Delphine. The woman was fifty, but looked thirty, and worked nonstop. As the firm’s first African-American partner, perhaps Delphine felt she had something to prove. But surely she’d done so by now, Abby thought. After all, Delphine had won the largest single judgment of any jury trial in the history of Draper’s law firm.
“Sip it slowly,” Delphine said. “My own personal beans, honey-processed Brazilian.”
Abby looked at the steaming cup. Though she had never heard of honey-processed, she knew it would be excellent. But dare she drink more coffee?
She also knew if Delphine was bringing her coffee, the woman wanted something. But rejecting the offering wouldn’t make Delphine go away, so Abby reached for the cup. She sipped. “Delicious.”
As Abby drank, she became conscious that Delphine was studying her a bit too closely. She ran her hand over her red hair, smoothing it down, and tugged at her blouse. Maybe she had dressed in a bit of a hurry—but she’d only just gotten to sleep when the alarm had gone off that morning.
“You might need to go home at lunch and change. Something very sharp and professional.” Delphine narrowed her eyes as she continued to stare at Abby. “I know, wear that blue seersucker suit, the one with the belted, peplum jacket. Very becoming. Shows off that tiny waist of yours and yet very professional.”
Yes, one of Abby’s favorite suits, but one she reserved for special occasions or court appearances.
“We’re having important visitors today, potential clients of the utmost prestige and I want everyone to look their best. And to behave.” Delphine smiled at Abby. “But you always behave.”
Abby smiled back, but guardedly. The other shoe hadn’t dropped yet and she didn’t sip anymore coffee.
“But Layla, damn it.” Delphine sighed, long and slow. “We need to keep her out of the office all afternoon.”
Abby frowned. Delphine hadn’t even asked about Layla’s health after she’d been attacked. She admired Delphine, but sometimes the woman’s focus could be too ambitious and single-minded.
“I’ll have Phillip call her and tell her to take the afternoon off.” Delphine nodded, as if pleased with herself. “He’ll just have to do without her today, whatever it is she does for him.” Delphine’s voice held a trace of snideness.
Abby had also wondered exactly what Layla did for Mr. Draper since he appeared to be more rainmaker and glad-hander than lawyer. But what did she know about them, really? Abby rarely had contact with Mr. Draper as she worked exclusively with Delphine, and she preferred to keep it that way.
“What’s the name of that law clerk in the library who always sticks his head in where it’s not wanted?” Delphine frowned and tilted her head in the general direction of the firm’s library.
“Ah, you must mean Emmett.” Abby knew Emmett was intelligent, ambitious, and served as an associate editor of the law review. But he hadn’t learned that a law clerk’s role was to be seen and not heard.
“Yes, him.” Delphine grinned. “Smart boy, but we can’t let him loose among our visitors or he’ll be spewing forth his resume.”
“And his family lineage,” Abby said.
“All the way back to Jamestown,” Delphine and Abby said in concert.
The two women laughed. Abby felt a bit mean about it, but Emmett had trapped them all with his family tree more than once and it had become a standing joke.
“You know, he’s actually quite competent when he calms downs. He just wants to be an associate here too badly after he graduates in June.” Delphine shook her head. “Sorry to say we’re only hiring one associate after graduation and Layla’s got a lock on it.”
“Really? Layla?” Abby watched Delphine and hoped for more information.
“Don’t look at me. I wouldn’t hire her to take out the garbage, but Phillip’s already promised her a position.” Delphine raised a finger to her lips. “But you didn’t hear that from me.”
Delphine headed for the door, turning back to add, “I’ll send Emmett to the courthouse to look something up after lunch and get him out of the way. Oh, and email me a copy of that trial brief in progress.” With that, Delphine left Abby’s office, closing the door behind her.
Abby took a long gulp of the coffee. Once more, she couldn’t help but think Delphine should have asked how Layla was doing. After all, the young woman had been mugged. But Delphine seemed too caught up with the potential new clients to worry about that.
Ambition before compassion, Abby thought. Was that the law firm rule?
Or just Delphine’s?
Chapter Nine
Victor pulled up his sturdy combat boots and hopped into his pickup. Classes were over for the day, thank goodness. He hated law school. All that sitting still inside a room with no windows was against his basic nature. Of late, this was troubling him. What if he hated being a lawyer as much as he despised his classes? He’d started law school full of drive and energy. He wanted to redeem himself and was motivated by a different sense of purpose than he’d had in the Navy. Look how badly the Navy had turned out. So maybe it was all right this time to shoot for the money and prestige?
Stop moping. Focus on Layla, he told himself. None of that endless introspection about law school mattered at the moment. His best friend Layla might be mad at him because he’d cautioned her against a relationship with a married man, but she was still his best friend. And she was in trouble.
He was coming to the bitter conclusion that the mugging was just too much of a coincidence on the heels of the fire in her apartment. Those acts had to be connected with the phone call he’d overheard. Whatever those items were that Layla said she’d hide might have put her in harm’s way. She said she wouldn’t hide “them” at her apartment, which left a lot of other options. But Phillip’s house was a definite possibility given what Victor’d heard, or at least what he thought he’d heard. He needed to find or figure out what the secret was before she got in worse trouble, and he figured he might as well start at Phillip’s house.
Hopefully, what he was about to do would ultimately help Layla.
If it didn’t get him arrested.
Victor wore an old work jumpsuit that had belonged to his dad. He drove his older model pickup, but the piece de resistance was his Dad’s old plumber’s license and giant tool box. He was going to present himself at Phillip Draper’s house, claim that he had been called to check on a leaky toilet in the upstairs back bathroom, and hope that he’d get a chance to snoop. From the many online newspaper articles on Phillip’s socialite wife, Jennifer Draper, Victor had learned she went to some kind of Junior League meeting on Wednesday afternoon. This being Wednesday, he figured he had a clear shot at dealing just with the housekeeper.
He’d found a photo spread of the Draper house in an Architectural Digest article that gave him a good idea of the floor plan. The back bath on the second floor might give him the best chance at an undisturbed study of Mr. Draper’s den. Humming an old George Jones song his father had favored, Victor carefully tucked his hair up under a baseball cap, snapped down his Dad’s old aviator sunglasses on his face, and hoped this counted as some kind of disguise.
Twenty minutes later, he eased his truck around the curved driveway of the Draper mansion on Live Oak Plantation Road and turned the engine off.
An older woman in a crisp white uniform and an apron opened the door to his knock. “May I help you?”
“Gordon Rutledge, plumber. Someone called about a toilet that keeps running in the bathroom on the second floor.” Victor glanced at a work order he’d written up himself. “Says it’s the guest bath near the den.”
“May I see that?”
He handed the work order over to the woman, noticing as he did that she frowned.
She scrutinized it closely before she looked up, studying him as carefully as she had the work order.
He had the sudden feeling this was a bad idea.
“Mr. Draper ordered this?” She waved the paper in the air.
“Yes.”
The woman looked at the work order again. Finally she stood back. “Wipe your feet.”
Victor knew a good deal about toilets and plumbing in general from all those summers in high school he’d been forced to work for his father. So he wasn’t flustered at all when the housekeeper in her crisp whites followed him upstairs and stood watch. He could fake her out easily. “Probably just needs a new ballcock.” He glanced up at the woman and smiled.
She sniffed as if he had said something dirty to her.
“Or maybe the flapper,” he added quickly.
“Nobody told me there was any problem. And it’s certainly not running now.” The woman glowered as if this oversight was Victor’s fault, which of course it was in a backhanded kind of way.
From off somewhere in the house, a phone rang. The woman frowned. “I better get that.” She gave him a quick once over and said she’d be right back.
Victor smiled at her retreating footsteps. It hadn’t been that hard to convince his handball partner to call the house and pretend to be doing a follow-up interview for the Tallahassee Magazine on the Drapers’ culinary tastes.
As soon as she was gone, Victor peered out in the hallway, looking around. He didn’t see or hear anyone. As quietly as he could, he tiptoed into the den, where Architectural Digest had said Mr. Draper liked to retire to his “man cave” and work in the evenings. Layla had once let it slip that she and Mr. Draper worked in his den when Mrs. Draper was out. When he’d raised his eyebrows at that, she snapped that it was much quieter at their house than at the law firm.
The den was immaculate. Victor didn’t have a clue where to start looking, or what exactly he might be looking for in the room. The phrase “needle in a haystack” came to
mind and he started to just leave.
But leaving wouldn’t help Layla.
He studied Phillip’s den for another moment before he tiptoed over to a filing cabinet. He pulled open a drawer, pleased that it wasn’t locked. He flipped through the files, but the documents all related to the house. Repressing a sigh, he closed the drawer, and opened the next one, only to find it was full of newspaper and magazine clippings of Philip and his wife.
Victor shut the drawer and rifled through some papers on top of the desk and in the top drawer. Finished with the desk, he glanced around the room, before scouring through the credenza and finding nothing of interest in it or the heavy barrister’s bookcase. Frustrated, he cocked his head, listening for the housekeeper’s voice or her footsteps. Not hearing a thing, he stepped out of the room and listened as he stood at the head of the stairs. He heard a low murmur and caught the word “organic” and “asparagus.” Grinning, he made up his mind to intentionally lose the next handball game to pay the guy back for faking this interview. Then he crept down the hall to a guest bedroom.
A second later, he stepped into an oddly plain room and began to feel under the mattress. Nothing. The chest of drawers and night stand were empty. Out in the driveway, a car drove up, and someone honked. Victor peered out the window and saw the housekeeper hurry outside. Mrs. Draper—Jennifer—was getting out of the car with an armload and the housekeeper struggled to take all the packages.
Damn. So much for Jennifer Draper’s afternoon meeting. Victor cursed himself for taking a big risk for nothing and hurried back to the bathroom, lifted the top off the tank, and tinkered with the chain and flapper until the toilet definitely would be running improperly. As he placed the top back, he spotted something taped under the tank. He felt it with his fingers. Small, wrapped in plastic. With his fingernails, he pried it off and dropped it in the pocket of his overalls.
A Box Full of Trouble Page 41
