LITMIR.BIZ

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Allen’s office. “Does she know you’re talking to the serfs?”

      “She will if we keep standing here.”

      Sewell’s office was identical to Hewitt’s, Lilliputian, merely functional. I saw no signs that she’d done anything to personalize it, except to display a framed five-by-seven photo of a tiny child on a desk piled high with file folders, paper, and notepads. She pointed me to the chair, then sat behind her desk and folded her hands on the desktop.

      I sat down across from her, eyeing the piles of paper. “Hewitt didn’t have much of anything on his desk.”

      “They’re trying to frustrate him until he up and quits, and me, they’re trying to overwork. Same goal, though. That’s my punishment for suing the Great Vonda Allen . . . and winning.” She straightened the piles absently, like she really didn’t care whether they were straight or not, but needed something to do with her hands. “That doesn’t mean I’m after her. I know that’s what you’re thinking.” She glanced out at the hall. “They think she’s got a secret admirer—notes, flowers—like we’re in some dippy rom-com. It’s darker than that.”

      I slid my chair a little closer to the desk. “How do you know?”

      “No one is that jumpy or paranoid over love notes. She’s scared and trying to hide it. Either way, admirer or not, she’s not getting a lot of sympathy around here. She’s burned too many bridges.”

      “Why’d you sue her?”

      “Still thinking it could be me?”

      She watched me for a reaction. I didn’t think I offered one. But she was right. Why couldn’t it be her? I waited for her to answer my question. Instead, she drew a business card from beneath the corner of her desk blotter and slid it toward me. I picked it up.

      “My lawyer’s card. I’m not supposed to discuss it, but since I’m the one everyone suspects, I figured I’d head things off. If Philip had any smarts, he’d do the same, but he won’t listen to anyone with breasts.” She pointed at the card. “My lawyer’s good. I can call him now, if I need to.”

      I stared at her, then at the card in my hand, wondering what Sewell was into that she needed a lawyer on speed dial.

      “Did I miss something?” I said, a bit bewildered. Usually, I had to pull information out of people, like I was a dentist yanking out a rotten molar, but here was Sewell offering it up, taking the lead, shaking up the game. I needed a moment to readjust.

      “I am the number one suspect, right? No one could hate her more than I do.”

      I read the card. I didn’t know the lawyer, but I knew the firm by reputation. It was one of the best in the city, with a roster of notable, well-heeled clients, and their sharks didn’t work for chump change. If I ever needed a lawyer, I’d want one from this firm, though I’d have to sell my soul to pay for the billable hours. Had Allen handed me the card, I’d have thought, Well, sure, of course. Linda Sewell? Allen’s employee, toiling away in a glass zoo cage? It didn’t fit.

      “I’m sorry. Can we back up? What are we talking about?”

      “Vonda Allen’s on someone’s hit list. Secret’s been out for weeks, and everyone’s making themselves scarce, working from home, at the printing facility, on the off chance he comes for her and misses. She can afford to hire people like you to watch her back. Me and the others? We’re all we’ve got.”

      I held the card up, wedged between index and forefinger. “You still haven’t said why you sued her.”

      “Vonda Allen’s a user, a drafter. If she can get away with buying you cheap, she will. All of us make well below what we could get anywhere else for the same job we’re doing here, and for that she expects us to be at her beck and call twenty-four /seven, with no exclusions for holidays, family time, or even your own mother’s funeral.”

      I eyed the card. “Pittance?”

      “I reported her for unfair work practices. She fired me. I went to them, and they jumped at the chance to go up against her . . . high-profile celebrity, high-profile case, their firm’s name in all the papers . . . right up their alley. She settled. I was back, full pay, with a little extra. Now in order to fire me, she’ll have to prove I’m derelict in my duties.” Her eyes scanned over the mountain of work at her elbows. “She’s stacking the deck in her favor. You want to ask why I’m still here?”

      I sat back in the chair, nodded, deciding to just go with it. If Sewell was going to give me stuff without my having to fight for it, I’d take it. “Okay.”

      “Because it kills her to see me walk in here every day, knowing that she couldn’t beat me, that she can’t break my spirit. That’s some small satisfaction. Also, because I need the job and the health insurance that comes with it. Another reason it isn’t me.”

      I looked at the child’s picture. “Your son?”

      She smiled. “Jarrod. He’s eight. He’s why the insurance is so important, and why the settlement, while it was a victory, got used up fast. He’s special needs. I’m a single parent. I have only the one paycheck, and therapy, his school, they’re expensive.”

      “I get it. Any idea why Hewitt doesn’t quit?”

      She chuckled. “He thinks he’s smarter than all of us and that if he just sticks it out long enough, the universe will right itself and he’ll come out on top. He isn’t so smart. He’s a gambler. He likes the casinos, blackjack, mostly, but he isn’t lucky. He’s probably headed there now.”

      “Does Allen know?”

      “There aren’t many secrets around here. Information is currency. The more you have, the safer you are. We know something’s happening. We’ve seen the flowers. We just don’t know the details.”

      I paused, fingering the card. “So if it’s not you, who do you think it is?”

      “Someone she’s crossed. Someone she’s taken something from. It’s how she does business.”

      I watched Sewell trying to figure her out; she appeared to be doing the same to me. She glanced down at her son’s picture, a wistful look in her eyes. “You asked about my son. Vonda hasn’t once asked about him. She wouldn’t know the first thing about any of us if you walked down there and asked her. We’re staff, resources, about as important as that copier across the hall or the telephones on our desks. Did you find her charming?”

      “Not particularly.”

      “Then you got the real Vonda, the one we see. There’s also the fake Vonda, the charming, personable, down-with-the-people Vonda who lights up the room at all the galas and glitzy parties. She’s a great pretender, an even greater manipulator. If you let her, she’ll manipulate the hell out of you.” Sewell stood, smoothed out her skirt. “If she knows who’s doing this, then your job just got a lot harder, because she’ll never tell you. Instead, she’ll do what she always does, throw money at the problem, try to bully it. Let’s hope that works.”

      I stood, too, and tried handing the card back, but she waved me off. I slipped the card into my pocket instead, not that I could do anything with it. No one at that firm was even remotely in my price range.

      I said, “I don’t think money’s the answer.”

      “Then that’s too bad, because that’s all she’s got.”

      * * *

      “So?” Ben asked when I got back.

      I plopped down into the chair beside him. “We’re not working for Mother Teresa.”

      “You had to go down the hall for that?”

      “I suspected it before. Now I have confirmation.”

      “Hewitt?”

      “Tough talker, but maybe this time he got pushed too far?” I told him

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