Picking up the teapot, Kate filled the two thimble-size cups before them. “Tell me more about Jonah.”
Jackson took a breath. Where did he begin? And how did he say this without coming across as bitter? He wasn’t bitter, just tired—and losing hope that Jonah would ever come to his senses. “He’ll try to charm you into giving him what he wants. If that fails—”
“It will,” Kate assured him.
In his experience, women had trouble saying no to Jonah, but he wasn’t about to make any assumptions about this new lawyer until he had an opportunity to watch her interact with his brother. “Then he’ll try to intimidate you, except that he’s not very good at that. Mostly he uses guilt.”
“Guilt?”
Jackson nodded. “He wields it like a top-flight surgeon wields a scalpel. He’ll make you feel guilty for turning him down. Jonah’s very good at manipulating people. He’s accumulated a lifetime of experience, working on my parents.”
Listening, Kate detected an undercurrent of more than one emotion. His relationship with his brother, she decided, was complicated. “Are you two close?”
Not anymore, Jackson thought. Something else to hold against Jonah. He missed what they’d once had. Missed being proud of his brother instead of drained by him.
He took a sip of tea, letting the warm liquid wind through him before answering. “We were when I was a kid. These days, I’m the bad guy.” He laughed shortly. “Jonah’s closer to total strangers he hooks up with at clubs than he is to me. There’s always someone with him who’s his new best friend.”
Kate studied Jackson as he spoke, forcing herself to focus on what he said, not the way he looked as he said it. Looks, the crackle of chemistry, none of that mattered anymore, she thought fiercely. It had taken her a long time, but she’d finally learned her lesson. Good-looking men were only hunters and gatherers of women. You couldn’t build a stable life with a gatherer.
“You love him a great deal, don’t you?” she asked as he paused.
Jackson shrugged, taking another sip. “That has nothing to do with it.”
“It’s nothing to be embarrassed about,” she said matter-of-factly. “If you didn’t love your brother, you’d let him get his hands on his share of the inheritance, walk away and go on with your life.”
“Maybe I just don’t want to be connected to a scandal and if Jonah has free rein to do what he wants with his money, there’ll be serious repercussions. I guarantee it. And I’d rather avoid that if I could.”
“Understandable,” she agreed. “But even a few of our presidents have had to deal with the annoying specter of clueless, classless brothers whose actions kept landing them on page one. They all survived.” Kate raised her eyes to his. She considered herself a fairly good judge of character when it came to her clients. She just failed miserably when judging men on a personal level. “You strike me as a man who knows that the people who count will judge him on his own merits.”
“Maybe you’ve forgotten the purpose of this lunch, but it was for me to get to know you, not the other way around.”
Amusement curved her mouth. “Things don’t always go according to plan.”
“No,” he agreed, thinking of the life he’d once planned with Rachel. “They certainly don’t.”
Their server returned, a silent, genial inquiry in her eyes. Kate nodded and ordered first. “I’ll have the lobster Cantonese, egg-drop soup and a spring roll.”
Inclining her head, the server turned toward Jackson.
He hadn’t made his selection yet. Hearing what Kate ordered, he decided to go with that. “That sounds good,” he said to the server, surrendering his menu. “Make that two.”
The young woman smiled, nodded and retreated with their menus.
Kate folded her hands before her. “All right, what would you like to know?” she asked the moment their server had left.
What you’d look like, waking up beside me in the morning.
He had no idea where that had come from. He did know that he would have felt more comfortable if his lawyer had been less attractive. Or a man. It was hard to keep his mind on business when the sight of her kept ushering in completely unrelated stray thoughts.
“What would you like to tell me?” he asked politely.
She poured more tea into her cup, then raised it to her lips, buying herself some time.
This was an odd way to conduct a first interview, she thought. Wainwright had placed control, at least temporarily, back in her hands. Was that to make her feel comfortable? Or to get her to relax before he sprang his real questions on her?
And then there was that tiny, nagging thought. Her mother had sent him. There was still a possibility, growing smaller now she had to admit, that this was all a setup.
“That if you’re looking for a good lawyer, I won’t disappoint you.” Then, in case he thought she was bragging, Kate gave him a little background information. “My brother and I are third-generation lawyers. My father helped found this firm. His father was a criminal lawyer. Grandpa had his own one-man practice,” she elaborated. “Most of the time he defended people who, without him, would have had nowhere to turn for proper representation. I’m not afraid of hard work,” she continued. “My brother will tell you that arguing’s in my blood. If you decided to go with my firm—with me—I’ll do my very best to accomplish whatever you ask me to.”
The last line hung in the air between them and she prayed he couldn’t interpret that the wrong way, because suddenly, they sounded like a sensual promise to her ear. What was wrong with her? She was usually sharper than that.
Taking a breath, she delivered her closing argument. “And if you’re afraid that your brother will sweet-talk me into bending the rules for him, don’t be. You pay the bills, you get to make the calls,” she assured him. “I’m just the instrument that makes whatever you require done come true.”
“An instrument, eh?” he repeated. The analogy amused him, but he made no further comment on it. He had a more important question. “Do you really think that you can keep Jonah’s trust fund safe?”
“Yes,” she said confidently.
“How?”
“It won’t be the easiest thing to overhaul,” she admitted. “But I think there’s a way around it. Your parents initially had the trust fund drawn up because they didn’t consider Jonah mature enough to manage his own money, right?”
“That about sums it up,” he told her.
“If I can show that Jonah’s maturity level hasn’t progressed to the level of an average thirty-five-year-old man, the level your parents felt was right to finally allow him to have control over his share of the money, we might be able to push the time limit back, make it more flexible by specifying that certain conditions have to be met. And if they’re not met, the present arrangement of giving him a certain amount every month will continue. Indefinitely,” she concluded.
“And just how do you intend to accomplish that?” he pressed.
“By compiling reports on your brother’s irresponsible behavior—interviewing his friends, any officers who might have been called in because of complaints by his neighbors or who issued tickets for reckless driving, things like that. It gives us a leg to stand on. I can submit the report to a judge and have the trust sustained,” she told him. She expected Jackson to express relief. Instead, she saw a frown forming on his lips. “Is something wrong?”
He was thinking of the repercussions of filing this sort of a report. “I don’t want him to be publicly humiliated.”
“Doesn’t have to be publicly,” she assured him. “It just has to go to a sympathetic judge.” He needed more, she thought. He really did care for his brother. “I won’t do anything without first running it by you. Fair enough?”
He nodded. “Fair enough.” Their server was back. As she divvied up the different plates, placing a small bowl of soup before each of them, the conversation was temporarily tabled. When she left, Jackson said to Kate, “You’ve got the job.”
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Kate had already assumed that she had, but she thanked him politely for the confirmation, then went on to tell him, “I’m going to need all the papers from the original trust fund filing as soon as possible.”
“I’ll have to look for them.” He thought for a moment, trying to remember where his copy was. His best bet was to secure the copy that had to still be in Mort’s office. The late family lawyer had to be the most organized man he’d ever met. “Soon as I get my hands on them, I’ll have a courier bring them to your office. Better yet, why don’t you come by Republic National’s corporate offices this Friday after five and I’ll hand them over to you personally?” Because she looked slightly puzzled at the time he mentioned, Jackson explained, “That party I’m having your mother cater, it’s set for Friday in our conference room. It’s meant to be a kind of icebreaker to get better acquainted with the people who’ll be working for me. It’ll be nice to have someone there who doesn’t work for me.” He smiled at the thought.
“Technically speaking,” Kate pointed out, “you’re my boss.”
He wasn’t deterred. “Then, for the evening, we won’t speak technically.” His voice softened a little. “I need a friendly face I can trust to be honest,” he said. “It’ll help me relax.”
“Wouldn’t want you tense,” she murmured. Or me, either, she added silently. And she was despite all her best efforts not to be.
Kate lost more time than she’d intended to. It was a few minutes after four when she finally got back to her office. After having lunch with her new client—there was no way she was giving him back to Kullen after laying this much groundwork—she had him drive her back not to the office but to its parking structure.
Once there, she had just enough time to dash to her own car and drive off to the county courthouse. She already had all the papers she needed in order to file for Mrs. Greenfeld’s official name change. She’d packed them earlier in a spare briefcase she had locked in the trunk of her car.
The simple task took close to two hours thanks to the fact that the courtroom was packed. Nothing new there. While she entertained the idea of just going home from there, she had too much waiting for her on her desk. With a sigh, she drove back to the Bedford-based firm. With any luck, she’d be able to go home by six.
But probably not.
Sinking into her ergonomically designed leather chair, Kate barely had time to let out a long sigh before Kullen stuck his head in.
A feeling of déjà vu slid over her.
“So, how did it go?” he asked cheerfully, closing the door behind him. He took a couple of steps in, then stopped to study her and see how receptive she was. He wanted to be ready for a quick escape, should the need for that arise. Because he knew his mother had sent this new client to them and had expressly told him to make sure that Kate was the one who took him on as a client.
Kate glared at him. “I shouldn’t even talk to you.”
He winced. “That bad, huh?”
She shook her head. “No, actually it wasn’t bad at all.”
“So he was good-looking?”
That caught her up short. Kullen had never met with Wainwright so he would have no idea what he looked like. “That has nothing to do with it. Why would you even ask that?”
Not wanting to let on that their mother had mentioned that little fact, he glossed over it and shrugged. “You know me, I’m always saying sexist things.”
“Did Mom put you up to your vanishing act?”
He almost asked how she knew but managed to catch himself in time. “No, I told you, Sheila accidentally scheduled both appointments at the same time. Thanks to your being such a workaholic, I was able to keep my original appointment.”
Kate saw right through that. Her eyes narrowed, pinning her brother in place. “With Allison?”
He would have denied it if he’d thought that it would work. But he knew it was useless. Somehow, Kate always knew when he wasn’t on the level with her. “Why can’t I lie to you?”
Kate laughed, shaking her head. “God knows it’s not for lack of trying on your part. But I know you too well. I know all your tells.”
“Tells?” he echoed.
“Your nostrils flare when you lie.” She frowned, thinking of the woman her brother had just wasted time with. “I thought that by now you would have moved on from that bimbo.”
Humor curved his mouth, even as he tried to sound serious. “Have a little respect, you’re speaking of the bimbo I love.”
She sincerely doubted that her brother had ever been in love. The strongest emotion he’d probably ever experienced was infatuation. “At least for today.”
“All any of us have, Katie, is the moment,” he deadpanned.
Kate sighed. Maybe she didn’t get out these days, but her brother got out too much, spreading himself incredibly thin. His time could be so much better spent.
“Honestly, Kullen, I don’t know what you see in that woman. I’ve removed lint from the dryer that’s more intelligent than she is.”
“I’m not really interested in giving her an IQ test.”
He was better than that, Kate silently insisted. She knew if she’d said it out loud, her brother would deny it. “You are impossible, Kullen.”
“But happy,” he countered with a broad smile. “Very, very happy. You really should try it once in a while, Kate.”
She could feel her guard going up. “What? Going out with Allison?”
“No,” he said seriously, “being happy. Not every guy out there is a rotten SOB.”
No, only the ones I’m attracted to. Kate closed her eyes for a second, gathering strength. “Don’t you start sounding like Mom.”
“Hey, her heart’s in the right place.” He started to open the door again.
“Remember that when she suddenly starts working on you.”
He paused to look at her over his shoulder. The grin on his face was utterly boyish. Kate could readily see why, at any given time, there were so many women pursuing her brother. He had a face that could stop a heart and fill it full of longing.
“She’d have to catch me first. Besides, you’re her pet project for now and given your ‘willingness’ to cooperate, I’d say Mom is going to be busy for a very long time.”
Kate pointed to the door. “Get out of here.”
He was on his way out, but he needled her a little more. “Stop scowling, Katie. You know you can’t stay mad at me.”
“This time around, I intend to give it a real good try,” she informed him. But as her brother walked out, she raised her voice and called after him, “Don’t forget, you owe me.”
He half turned in the doorway. “Say what?”
“I said you owe me.”
“My undying love,” he replied. “After that, we’ll talk.”
“You owe me for taking on your client,” she said pointedly.
Curiosity got the better of him. “So this was actually on the level? He really does need a lawyer?”
“Oddly enough, yes, he was on the level.”
Kullen laughed shortly to himself. “She found a legitimate one to send. Mom’s good.”
Easy for him to say. “I’ll remind you of that when it’s your turn.”
The wide grin was back. “Never happen.”
“Don’t underestimate that little woman,” Kate warned him, thinking back to the days not all that long ago when her mother was actively lobbying for her to get married. “When she makes up her mind about something, she clamps down harder than a junkyard dog.”
“She’ll have to corner me first,” Kullen crowed just before he closed the door behind him.
Oh, she will, Kullen, Kate silently promised with more than a little confidence. She will.
Chapter Four
Kate had every intention of calling her mother and letting her know that she didn’t appreciate being manipulated like this. But the phone on her desk rang just as she reached for it. She was wanted in a general meeting. For the time being, anything pr
ivate had to be pushed to the side. Kate promised herself to make the call to her mother when she got home.
But by the time she got home, all Kate had the strength to do was crawl into bed.
The following day was just as packed, with no letup in sight. And then, somehow, it was Friday and she had her newest client’s function to attend.
Looking back, Kate wasn’t even sure why she’d agreed to go. It really wasn’t to get those papers she needed to start the extension on the trust because they could have come just as easily—and more efficiently—by courier as she’d first suggested.
Maybe, that annoying little voice in her head speculated, she’d said yes to Jackson’s invitation because she was ever so slightly attracted to the man. Be that as it may—and he was attractive—she planned to fight that attraction with her very last ounce of strength.
It had taken her a long time to get herself together. She was drained and very tired of the so-called dating game. Tired of putting herself out there emotionally only to have her hopes dashed over and over again by men who didn’t turn out to be worth the effort. She’d actually thought that she’d finally hit the mother lode with Matthew. The man was handsome, intelligent, sharp and ambitious. He seemed perfect in every way. Not only that, but there was chemistry. Oh God, there was chemistry, that magic “something” that made her tingle whenever she was near him.
She didn’t trust chemistry, not anymore. It had blinded her to things she might have noticed sooner—like the fact that Matthew turned out to have a ten-feet-tall libido.
No, no more chemistry for her. No more men, period. At least, not socially.
To that end, when she’d gotten up this morning, Kate had had every intention to dress the part of a subdued, scholarly professional. That usually made her look years older than she actually was. And that, in turn, would show Mr. Wainwright that theirs was nothing more than strictly a professional relationship.
But somewhere between the shower, the closet and the eyebrow pencil, the rebellious side of her kicked in. The side that liked testing her and pushing her to her limits, no matter what the case. So, rather than pin her hair back or up, the way she did when she was due in court, Kate wore it loose, letting the natural curl take over. Her hair looked like a black storm at sea.
Fixed Up with Mr. Right? Page 4