“Um, yes, of course.”
“Very good,” Griffin said, leaning back in his chair. “But it’s just not going to be that easy, I’m afraid.”
Lorraine asked, “Grif?”
With a shrug, Griffin said, “A signing bonus, of course. If I don’t do that, what kind of performance can I expect? We’re talking about the care of my children, my family.” Lorraine knew Jeremy meant more than just the kids, he meant taking care of Jeremy, whom they both considered family. “Hundred grand enough?”
Anton muttered, “One hundred t’ousan’t?”
“No, you’re right,” Griffin said, “this is New York. Let’s make it five, the hundred-K will be a holiday bonus. Will that about do it?”
Jeremy and Anton stammered, eyes wide, heads nodding. “Yes,” Jeremy said, “and more, a lot more. Griffin, it’s too much — ”
“Nonsense,” Griffin said. “Find the adoption agency you want to work with, explain to them that we’re willing to go the extra mile to make things happen. They’ll know what you mean.”
Jeremy was near to tears, but Griffin just smiled and extended his hand. Jeremy took it eagerly, shaking it with one hand while cupping it with the other. “I will, Grif, I will, and thank you so much!” He was overwhelmed with a flood of emotions.
“Happy to do it,” Griffin smiled, turning to shake Anton’s hand. “I’ll pop by the offices, have a contract and some checks written up, take care of the details.”
“T’ank you, Mistah Griffins, arie!” Anton beamed.
Griffin’s landline phone on the desk rang. “Griffin Phoenix.” Lorraine watched Griffin take the call while Jeremy and Anton smiled and slid out the door to allow the Phoenix couple to get on with other business.
“Really,” Griffin said, his tone catching Lorraine’s attention. She leaned closer, hearing no more of the other side of the conversation but unable to resist the temptation to try. “Okay,” Griffin said, “I see. Well, all right, thanks for the call … Yeah, keep me posted.” Griffin put the phone back on the cradle.
“Bad news?”
“Good guess.” Griffin grimaced.
Chapter 4
Lorraine had never seen a deposition given before, and she knew she'd have to give her own soon enough. She wasn't eager to see the man they'd be deposing, but she had to hear what he was going to say, how bad his lies were going to be.
Tony Gardner had been shaving his head, the very thin layer of stubble giving him a stark, almost skeletal look, his right arm just a bit out of alignment. He wore a short-sleeve button-down shirt to make sure the arm was visible, palm facing up as it lay idle by his side. Behind him and scattered around the cold blandly decorated room, several oil paintings sat on easels, mostly pastoral work; meadows, mountains, sunset skies, a few fairly well-rendered portraits in pallet knife including Albert Einstein and Ernest Hemingway.
Griffin’s attorney, Hal Rodney was graying and pale but with the etched face of a man who worked hard, maybe too hard. “Mister Gardner, you say you did nothing at all to provoke this attack by Mr. Griffin in that Denver train station?”
“That’s right! I was just walkin’, all the sudden that maniac’s got my hand, arm all bent back. Wham, I’m on my back, y’know? And he just keeps pushing it, pushing it, twisting harder and harder. I tell him to stop, beg him to stop, that he's breaking my arm. He says, ‘No, I’m popping your tendons,’ and then the guy cranks my arm, and I can hear the bones crack, man. He smiles and says, ‘Now I broke your arm.’ That’s fucked up, man! This guy can’t be loose on the streets, he’s a public menace.”
“All right, Mr. Gardner,” Hal said, glancing down at his folder. Lorraine and Griffin watched from the other side of the table, not far from where Tony’s own lawyer was making notes, a recording machine on the table tracking every word of the deposition.
Hal went on, “And you’re saying there was no provocation at all, none whatsoever.”
“That’s right. He said something about me attacking his girlfriend or something, I guess she’s his wife. But I didn’t do that. And when they tried to pin it on me, the police blew it and I walked. Because that’s justice!” he declared.
Lorraine looked at him, forcing herself to stare right at him and not look away. She’d done it before, in the train station when Griffin did all that damage to his arm, and she was ready to do it again, even eager. Lorraine didn’t want that man to think he had any further hold on them, that he could hurt her in any way.
Even though both of them knew that was no longer true.
Hal asked, “Then, why do you suppose Mr. Phoenix attacked you in the first place?”
Tony shrugged, shaking his head from his slumped position in the deposition room chair. “Look, I think she thinks I’m the guy, I don't doubt that. And yeah, I lived in the Denver area at that time, that’s probably the reason for the mix up. But, there aren’t any credit card records for me at that bar that night.”
“You paid cash,” Lorraine blurted out, withdrawing sheepishly under the glare of every professional in the room.
Hal said, “It’s true, you could could have paid cash. Your bank records show you did deposit a relatively small amount into your accounts.”
“I didn’t earn much,” Tony said. “I was a struggling artist, man! And I had a career ahead of me, too! I was a genius, anybody’ll tell you. But that all went to shit that day in the train station. And all I was doing was walking out to the car, man!”
Tony’s lawyer muttered a few things about the paintings, all of which were being submitted as evidence.
Hal said, “You assert that Griffin Phoenix destroyed your painting career that day.”
“Of course he did! Look at me! My arm is fucked! And I’ve got medical records, x-rays … ”
“But that incident occurred quite some time ago, didn’t it? Three years ago, Mr. Gardner.”
“Yeah, so?” he snarled.
“Well, that’s quite a long to time to realize that you were a painter, and that you couldn’t paint anymore.”
Tony nodded, a bitter sneer on his face. “First of all, I didn’t have good heath care, alright? Secondly, I kept thinking, hoping it would get better, heal up. Then I decided to try to just, y’know, paint through it.”
“Paint through it,” Hal repeated.
“Yeah, because I was that dedicated to my work. But I just can’t do it anymore.”
Hal walked around the conference table, glancing at the paintings. “They’re really quite good, very promising.”
“Yer damn right! And that’s gonna cost Mr. Moneybags here, goin’ around breakin’ people’s arms, shattering their dreams, just because he’s rich and he thinks he can do whatever he wants! That ain’t right, and it ain’t tight.”
“Okay, Mr. Gardner, okay. So you painted these before the incident in Denver, in the train station?”
Tony shook his head and rolled his eyes. “Uh, yeah! When else?”
“Just clarifying, Mr. Gardner. So … You did all these, and presumably more?” Hal questioned.
“Yeah, well, some. These are the best ones though.” Tony said matter of factly.
“I see. Did you ever enter any of these paintings in any shows or competitions?” Hal went on.
“Um, no, I think that’s a misuse of the art.” He said, slightly confused.
“A misuse?” Hal repeated.
“Yeah.”
“Even though it could advance your career and get your art out there in front of more people. That's the general idea of being an artist, isn’t it?” Hal shot a look back at Tony.
Tony gave it some thought, then some more. “I guess?” he then reconsidered, “No, no, art for it’s own sake, that’s what they say.”
“Yet, you want to sue my client for hundreds of millions of dollars, in exchange for a career which you didn’t seem interested in pursuing. Would you like to clarify that?” Hal said assuredly.
Tony’s shaved head lolled on his shoulders. “I still shou
ld have the option for a career in the future if I choose to have one. The fact is that I can’t have one now, and Mr. Phoenix took that choice away from me. That’s why he has to pay!” Tony angrily blurted out.
Twenty minutes later, Lorraine and Griffin and Hal Rodney walked down the steps of the courthouse, a faint spring breeze pushing back a lock of Griffin’s dusty blond hair. Lorraine asked Hal, “Well, now what?”
Hal glanced around, pulling up his belt as they reached the bottom of the steps. “Get some experts, have our own doctors check him out. Can’t lie to you though, Grif, you may think about settling.”
But Griffin was already shaking his head. “No, Hal, not yet. It’s too early to talk about settling.”
“I’m not talking about settling, I’m talking about thinking about settling.”
“Gather your experts, Hal. We’ll start thinking about talking about thinking about all that shit later. I don’t like to settle.”
Hal’s brows raised on his wrinkled forehead. “Could avoid a lot of bad publicity, keep those stock prices up.”
“Or it could welcome a stream of law suits.” Griffin challenged.
Hal cocked an eye at Griffin and countered “Griffin, how many men have you beat up?”
“It’s not that,” Griffin said. “One nuisance lawsuit begets ten more, you know that.”
“Is this really a nuisance lawsuit, Grif? I mean, you did attack the guy, there’s no doubt about it.” Hal chided.
“I used necessary force to keep him from escaping.” Griffin affirmed.
Hal sighed, knowing the uphill battle of the conversation he was having. “If we don’t settle, Griffin, that’ll be for the jury to decide. And they don’t love rich people, Grif, they never have and they never will.”
Lorraine was crossing Empire State Plaza toward the Capitol building, unable to enjoy the warmth of the spring sun on her cheeks. Pigeons fluttered in unruly clusters, scattering as pedestrians walked through, ignoring them.
“Missus Phoenix,” a voice behind her said, stopping her to turn and see Treena Torasco approaching, her stout body bouncing just a bit as she walked. “You’re early, as usual.”
The two began walking toward the Capitol building together, where their files were collected and waited to be picked up.
“I live back in Manhattan, but I like to be prompt.”
“Among other things.” Treena goaded.
Lorraine ignored the comment, unsure of how to take it but knowing it wasn’t a compliment. She said, “I can’t believe they don’t have all these files scanned in digitally. Pulling all these dossiers, it’s so … archaic.”
“As you must know by now, we don’t have a bajillion-dollar budget. We have to work with what we’ve got.” Treena chided as she rolled her eyes.
Lorraine glanced at Treena, looking her up and down. “What’s your problem with me, Treena?”
Treena’s eyebrows leapt up on her wrinkling forehead. “Excuse me?”
“All the snotty comments, the glares I get from you from across the room. I know this little project is probably like pulling teeth for you, am I right?” Treena didn’t answer, simply looking away as they crossed the plaza. “Look, I don’t really care what you feel or why, but I don’t like being disrespected like this, and I’m not going to just stand for it. So if you’ve got a point, I wish you would just go ahead and make it.” Lorraine pointed out.
Treena stopped walking, glancing around before leaning into Lorraine. “All right, fine. Personally, I think it’s terrible that you hold that job, which you got for obvious reasons, when people who are truly qualified and in need of the work have to go without.”
“I see.”
“And the way you try to shake things up all the time. Frankly, it seems like a lot of showboating to me.”
“Showboating,” Lorraine repeated, contempt ripe in her tone.
“That’s right. We all know your history, you’re clearly some kind of megalomaniac. You used the library system to make yourself a celebrity and bag yourself a wealthy husband, which I think is disgraceful. Then you went around pretending you were a champion of the library system, some meek little librarian. I gotta hand it to you, that was an amazing marketing campaign. But we all knew what a front that was, what kind of person you really are.” she snorted.
“Treena, that’s ridiculous! I wrote an open letter and it was published in the local paper. Everything that happened after that just … happened.” Lorraine stated, annoyed that she even had to explain herself.
“Sure. And what about those learning centers?” Treena said in a mocking tone.
“They’re doing a lot of good.” Lorraine insisted.
“For you! But funding’s still a problem, even where those centers are up and running.”
“That’s not our fault,” Lorraine said. “We’re doing what we can,” she said, feeling exhausted already from the conversation.
“For yourselves.”
“For the kids!” Lorraine hissed, louder than she meant to.
“And now you’re going to turn the Education Department into another three-ring circus. It’s shameful, Lorraine, truly shameful.” Treena said with disgust, not backing down.
Lorraine was nearly trembling with rage, but she bit back on it, keeping a level tone but just barely. “I’m sorry you feel that way.”
“So am I. I actually don’t think you’re a bad person, you’re just … caught up in all this, the cult of personality. But, this isn’t about making a name for yourself, getting in the magazines or whatever it is that you don't already have. This is about hard-working people who sacrifice their lives to keep the system going, to keep the system alive, despite the best efforts of people like you.” Treena chastised.
Lorraine and Treena stared each other down, pedestrians walking past them with disinterest. But each woman’s focus was fixed on the other, and something was going to have to give.
Finally, it did.
Lorraine chimed in, “Now you listen to me; I’m not concerned about your opinions of me or of what I’ve done. I don't have to explain myself to you or anybody, and I won’t be bullied into doing so. I have more money and, as a result, a little more pull, that may be. But, I don’t use it or flaunt it, so if you’re jealous then you’re just going to have to deal with that on your own. But make no mistake about it, I’m not here just because my husband is rich.”
“No, you got it because you’re famous.” Treena retorted jealously.
“Famous to some, infamous to others. But, that’s the last thing I care about, Treena. I’ve been offered book deals, movie deals, millions of dollars — ”
“Which you don’t even need.” Treena barked.
“That’s right. But, that’s not the point either. I don’t have to be here, Treena, driving to Albany twice a week, sifting through staff bios, sharpening the axe. I could be out shopping or vacationing or doing any number of things. But, I’m here because I want to help. If you don’t believe that, it’s none of my business and it certainly isn’t any of my problem.” Lorraine calmly remarked, tired of having the conversation, trying to end it any way possible.
Treena could only stand there and take it, having no response, her anger bringing an increasingly red hue to her cheeks.
“Now, let’s go get those files and split ‘em up … then you get out of my sight.”
Lorraine walked on toward the Capitol, Treena having no choice but to follow.
Chapter 5
Griffin and Lorraine had put the kids to bed and were almost done with the dishes. The kitchen was dimly lit, just a light over the sink and the leaking loom of the dining room chandelier. Lorraine smiled at Griffin as she handed him the last plate, offering him a sexy little role of her shoulder. “See? It’s not so bad, doing the chores now and then. You don’t need a big staff for everything.”
Griffin shrugged, dropping his damp towel onto the faucet and turning to Lorraine, his strong hands finding her hips. “I suppose it’s like eatin
g an oyster.”
“It turns you on?” she asked.
Griffin smiled. “Only worth doing once.” They kissed, a moment of sweet familiarity surrounding them. “This, on the other hand … ” They chuckled and kissed again, long and slow and sweet, before Griffin hoisted Lorraine up with a swift, decisive move that caused her stomach to dip down into her groin. Griffin sat her on the kitchen counter, her legs parted on either side of his incredibly strong torso.
Because of Griffin’s height, his hips aligned perfectly with hers when seated on the kitchen counter, and both of them knew it.
“You’re so beautiful, Lorraine,” Griffin said in his low, sexy growl. “My sexy little librarian. God, I love you so much.” Lorraine smiled and kissed him. “You saved my life,” Griffin said, “you saved both of our lives.” Lorraine knew what he meant, more than just the big rally at the library, when she threw young Ashe back and blocked the bullets meant for Griffin. She had saved their lives, but that wasn’t what he meant.
He didn't have to describe the years of sorrow, of hopelessness, of loneliness, after the death of his first wife Kayla. Because Lorraine knew she’d helped to wipe those years away. And the years since they’d met had been the best of Lorraine’s life, of both their lives.
“We were meant to be together,” Griffin said, “from the very start, from our first breaths, we were destined for each other.”
“Yes, Griffin,” Lorraine purred.
Griffin dropped his pants and stepped out of them, his long, thick cock already rock hard and ready. His hands spread her legs open, pushing her skirt up and pulling her moist panties down, letting them fall to the kitchen floor. Griffin’s hands caressed her thighs, quivering with anticipation as he pulled her a bit closer, Lorraine’s butt sliding easily against the kitchen counter.
“And we’ll always be together, Lorraine, nothing is ever going to break us apart, break up our family.”
“No, nothing, never … ” she agreed with an unshakable certainty.
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