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“Baby, so am I.”
She bites her lip at my endearment.
“Sorry,” I say. “I suppose we should keep things professional here.”
“Yeah.” She nods.
“So.” I take a seat in the leather chair behind the oak desk. “I have no idea what’s going on today. I hope my mom doesn’t have to be in court this morning, because if she does, I need to go in her place, and I don’t know what any of the cases are about.”
“The secretary will know.”
“Right. She’ll probably be in soon. In the meantime…what did Mom say you’d be doing?”
“Filing, errands. Whatever needs to be done while the rest of you are busy, I guess.” She bites her lip.
“Something wrong?”
“No. It’s just… Like I’ve said before, I think your mom might have hired me because she feels sorry for me. For our whole family.”
“My mom wouldn’t do that. I mean, she’d want to, but she wouldn’t.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. Trust me. I know my mom better than anyone. Sometimes I think I know her better than my dad does, even. You have to remember that my mom grew up very modestly, like Dale and I did before the Steels adopted us. She knows how it would feel to have someone do something out of pity, and she wouldn’t do that to anyone else. If my mom hired you, it’s because we need you.”
She smiles. Sort of. I’m not sure she believes me, but I know the truth. My mom would totally want to do everything, but she wouldn’t out of respect.
“So,” I continue, “that means there’s something for you to do around here. I guess we’ll figure out what.”
The secretary, Alyssa, bustles in then. “Hey, Don,” she says. “Is Jade coming in?”
Shit. She hasn’t heard. “Not today. Probably not all week. My father was… He was shot yesterday.”
Her hands fly to her mouth.
“He’s okay,” I say. “He’s going to make it, but Mom’s at the hospital in Grand Junction with him.”
“Thank God. But Jade’s due in court in a half hour.”
I sigh. “I guess that’s on me, then. I’ll go down and explain the situation, get the cases continued until I have a chance to get up to speed. By the way, this is Callie Pike. She’s going to be our new…”
Callie smiles. “Jack-of-all-trades?”
I return her smile. Life sucks at the moment, but Callie Pike gives me a reason to smile. “That’s as good a description as any. Callie has a degree in criminal justice and is going to law school next year.”
“But I’ll do anything to help,” Callie pipes in. “Filing, whatever. Alyssa and I went to school together, by the way.”
“Good. Then you already know each other.”
Alyssa nods. “It’s great to have you here, Callie. I can find you some stuff. You want to come with me?”
Callie rises. “Sure. Are we done here?” she asks me.
“Yeah, go ahead.”
She follows Alyssa out of the office.
“You want your door closed, Don?” Alyssa asks.
Yeah, I want my door closed. I’m about to commit a little fraud. But, “No, that’s okay. Get me today’s court schedule, please. I don’t want to look completely ignorant when I go in front of the judge in half an hour.”
“Right away. I’ll set you up in the system so you can access everything.”
“When you say everything, you mean all the databases, right?”
She nods. “We have access to all state and local information just in case we need it.”
“Thank you.”
Perfect.
Just perfect.
Chapter Forty
Callie
Alyssa sets me up in the cubicle next to hers. The investigator, Troy, has the other cubicle. The two offices, of course, belong to Donny and Jade. It’s a small building. Snow Creek is a small town. The other side of the second floor houses the administration for the town. Parks and recreation—a department of one—and the mayor and city administrator—department of two.
Oddly, the city attorney’s office has more employees than the other two offices put together. The police department is next door and consists of a sheriff and two officers. Yeah, they’re called officers instead of deputies. Go figure.
Are there that many legal issues in such a small town?
Apparently.
I’m about to learn all about them, which is cool. Anything to dip my hand in the pot of my career choice.
“You can start with some filing.” Alyssa hands me a stack of documents. “Everything is by case number. It’s all online, but Jade likes to keep hard copies of everything too.”
“Got it.” I get to work.
A half hour later, Donny whisks by. “Everything going okay?”
“Yeah. Fine.”
“Good. I’m going down to court. Back in an hour or so.”
I nod and can’t help watching his posterior as he heads toward the staircase.
Nice. Very nice.
Alyssa peeks her head into my cubicle. “Do you mind going for coffee?” she asks.
I stand. “Not at all. Don’t you have a machine here?”
“We do, but it’s in Jade’s office. She’s the only one who makes coffee. She’s weird about her coffee, so none of us use it. Plus, her office is locked.”
