Falling For The Lawyer (12 page)

“Doesn’t matter. She has better natural instincts for the law than some of my qualified lawyers.”

“I don’t think we need to go into that now,” Alex protested, finally yanking her hand out of JP’s in fury.

“My Alex is a clever girl. She got good grades in her finals,” Peter Farrer announced proudly.

“I know. I’ve seen her final grades. They were outstanding.”

“What are you suggesting Mr McKenzie?” Peter Farrer pressed.

JP looked slowly around the table. Every set of eyes except Alex’s was fixed expectantly upon him.

“I’ve put Alex’s name forward to my partners as a student paralegal,” he explained, unperturbed by the hard looks he was receiving from Simon. “That means she’d be a law student employed by the firm and she’d receive a generous contribution from us towards her university fees.”

You could have cut the air with a knife. Alex was staring down at her plate in despair and JP suspected the night was fast becoming one of the worst of her life.

“Have you started this process, Alex?” Simon asked sharply.

“No, not yet,” Alex answered in a shaky voice. “I said I’d talk to you.”

Simon sat upright and threw his napkin down on the table in disgust. JP glanced at Alex to see her blush to her hairline.

“I think this is a subject for another day,” Mary Farrer announced in a commanding, no-nonsense voice and JP suspected that when Alex’s mother put her foot down, no one crossed her.

The conversation moved on to safer subjects but JP couldn’t deny the relief he felt when he finally got to his feet after coffee and explained he would have to head off.

He farewelled everyone, trying to catch Alex’s eye, but it was useless. She was determined not to look at him. Out of courtesy he asked if he could drive anyone home. There was a silence as everyone looked at each other.

“I said I’d drop Monique home,” Simon explained awkwardly, looking at Alex with an odd mixture of desire and uncertainty.

“No Simon, you take Alex home. I’ll get a cab,” Monique offered

“No Monique, you’re on the way home to Simon’s in the south. I’ll get a cab,” Alex interjected.

“I’ll take everyone home!” Peter Farrer dropped in.

“No old man, you’ll do no such thing,” Mary Farrer protested. “You’ve had too many scotches.”

“Look,” JP stepped in, sensing an opportunity, “This is silly. Alex and I are going north and Simon and Monique are going south. I’ll drop Alex home. That’s the only sensible thing to do.”

The debate raged for another minute but then everyone accepted that JP’s suggestion was the right one. Goodbyes were said and JP was left smouldering with a rare attack of jealousy as Simon took Alex in his arms.

“Can we talk tomorrow?” JP heard Simon ask her, more conciliatory now than when he’d first heard her news about the paralegal program.

“Of course,” Alex replied as she appeared to be trying to placate him with her eyes.

But there was nothing placatory about Alex in his car. She sat rigid and angry—so furious she was unable to speak. JP was unwilling to broach any subject either and the entire journey was undertaken in a heavy silence.

In monosyllables Alex directed him to her home and he complied without response. When finally he slid the car into the kerb he turned off the engine and swung around in her direction.

“Okay. Get it off your chest,” he commanded in a bland voice. “You’ve obviously got something to say.”

She turned to face him, her eyes huge in the dim light of the car, her voice shaking with anger.

“I do have some things I want to say. I want to tell you exactly how I’m feeling and what I’m thinking and then I never want to have another conversation like this ever again. I want you to stay out of my private life. What you said tonight at the dinner table about the paralegal program was more damaging than you can ever begin to imagine. Are you trying to emasculate my fiancé in front of everyone he loves? Simon and I have made our own plans for the future and you shouldn’t interfere with them. I like … no, I’m going to be dead honest with you tonight on every level. I love working with you JP. You make me feel as though I can do anything—be anybody. I don’t want to leave you … I mean my job, but … whenever you’re around I can’t think straight … I have to stop that happening …”

“Alex …” JP interrupted as he reached out a hand to touch her cheek as the fiercest, most compelling desire he’d ever felt for a woman raged within him, but she switched back as though avoiding a slap.

“No! That’s what I mean. That’s the second time tonight something like that has happened. We mustn’t ever touch each other again.”

JP watched her in the half-light. He was losing her again. The brick wall was going up; just as it had the evening he’d offered her the paralegal job.

“Is there a point coming anytime soon?” he demanded in frustration.

“The point is that if we can’t keep a formal distance from one another then I’ll have to go. If you’ve got to get rid of a PA then I understand it has to be me. Don’t put this paralegal thing in place just to fix the surplus staff problem you have.”

“That’s not what it’s about. Do you think I’d cook that up at the expense of my own firm, just to soothe my guilt about getting rid of a PA? You’ve got the makings of a great lawyer Alex, and that’s the bottom line.”

“If I asked for a transfer to another partner but still wanted to take up the paralegal grant would you agree to that?”

He looked at Alex as he pondered her question. “I wouldn’t be happy about it,” he admitted finally.

“You see?” she declared in triumph.

“I need a paralegal, I want you in that role and I don’t apologise for it. And if something else is happening between us at a personal level then maybe you should be asking yourself why.”

“Don’t say things like that.”

“You mean the truth?”

“You just don’t seem to get it. I’m going to be married soon.”

JP scoffed. “You can’t marry Simon. Even if I knew we were never going to meet again after tonight I’d still say that to you. Why do you think I went into your parents’ house tonight? I saw Simon go in. I guessed who it was and I had to see for myself. You’ll be a trophy wife, Alex. That’s what he wants.”

“No, that’s not true.”

“It is true. I understand men like Simon better than you think. He’ll cherish you as a wife, sure, but only if you do whatever suits his self-image as the head of the household. You can bet your life that’s not going to include anything more than family commitments for you.”

“But there’s nothing wrong with family commitments!”

“I know that!” JP blurted in exasperation. “But you won’t have a choice. I understand your background is very different to mine but that won’t stop you withering in a marriage where you get no say in deciding anything for yourself. You’ve got to tell Simon what you really want and if you’re content with how he reacts you’ll know what to do. And if you do choose him I’ll never raise these issues again.”

JP knew he was pouring forth in a tirade but he couldn’t help it. Alex would never guess the tirade had as much to do with his own mother as it did with her.

“This is not about choosing Simon or you. This has nothing to do with you!” The anguished cadence in her voice hung in the air as silence descended between them. “Don’t you see JP? The way you pre-empted what I wanted tonight, announcing to everyone I might be joining the paralegal program—you, Simon, my father—all making plans for me!”

“Then tell us what
you
want Alex—tell all of us.”

“I will. And you’ll see you’re wrong about everything. This is my problem, not Simon’s. I should have spoken up earlier about what I wanted to do with my life. How can he support my choices when he doesn’t know what’s going on in my head?”

“Well I sincerely hope he’ll be supportive but forgive me if I don’t crack open the champagne just yet.”

“You see? You’re doing it again.”

“Doing what?”

“Declaring how things are going to be before I’ve had a chance to find my own way. You’re so critical of Simon but don’t you see that you’re exactly like him? Do you have any idea how discouraging it is if those you love hand down the blueprints for your life before you’ve had a chance to work out what you want yourself?”

“Is that what you think I’m doing?” JP asked in disbelief but at the same time wondering whether including him as someone she loved had been an error or a truthful slip. “You think I’m forcing you in a certain direction?”

“Of course you are. Even though we’ve only just met I feel as though I’m being pulled apart in a tug of war. You’re just as determined as Simon that I do things your way.”

JP sat back in his seat and stared out through the windscreen. Was she right? Was he no better than Simon? Was he browbeating her into submission just like everyone else in her life—just like his own father had bullied his own mother into a never-ending torpor of unhappiness and submission?

Taking a deep breath he let it go slowly. He had to pull back for he was beginning to care about Alex, more than he dared to admit. But if he cared about her he had to give her the space she needed to find her own way, otherwise she’d end up resenting him as just another browbeater in her life.

After a minute he turned to her again. “Is that what you want, Alex? You want me to back off from you and your life, in every way?”

She nodded.

He pressed his lips together in a hard grimace. He was worried that by backing off he might lose her. But the alternative, forcing his way into her life and trying to run it for her was no longer an option if he wanted her to become a part of his life. And that was precisely what he did want.

He’d been prepared to back off from her when she’d told him about the engagement, but his time with Simon and her family that night had given him a clear view of what lay in store for her, and he didn’t like it. He hadn’t quite gotten to the bottom of whatever was going on between Simon and Alex’s cousin but what he did know was that Alex was headed straight for the ornamental mantelpiece in her fiancé’s life.

He would have to tread carefully though. He knew what his own temperament could be: demanding, impatient, willful. It would take every ounce of his self-control to give Alex the space she needed so that she didn’t dematerialise before him and disappear out of his life forever. She was that fragile.

“Okay then Alex, if that’s what you really want,” he replied, his mouth taut with determination. “Although you and I may both live to regret this decision.”

“It is what I want.”

“Then I’ll be the model of formal propriety from now on,” he confirmed wryly. “And I’ll have to get my head around it by next Monday because we’re going to be working closely together.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means I have a client coming down from Queensland to give me a statement. I’ll need you with me from ten in the morning until late, maybe after midnight. No, don’t start arguing with me until I’ve finished. That call I received tonight, just before I arrived at your parents’ door, it was from that client. He’s developing a resort up north and wants me to commence proceedings against his builder. I need you to come with me to his hotel so that you can type his statement up as we go. We’ll only have one day to get it right as he’s leaving on Tuesday.”

“But why can’t he come to the office?”

“Because contrary to my instructions he shipped fifteen boxes of files to the hotel instead of my office. Now that they’re there I’m not going to risk any going missing during another move. Between you and me Alex, this guy’s as slippery as an eel and I wouldn’t put it past him to lose a few reams of paper if it suited his case.”

“But can’t Vera …?”

JP was already shaking his head. “I’m sorry, if you think I’m taking Vera you can forget it. She’s not up to this job, you are.”

Alex wrung her hands together in fidget-ridden torment. “It’s not the late night, or the hours …” she began to explain.

“I know. It’s the two of us together but you don’t need to worry Alex, I’ll treat you the way I treat any other PA in the firm—just as you want.”

When Sophie was made Acting Head of HR her brother had given her an illustrated coffee table book featuring the best excuses to give your boss when taking a sickie. When Alex visited Sophie’s house she’d occasionally flick through its pages and some of the more creative excuses were still clear in her mind.

‘My dog is having a nervous breakdown’ was one of Alex’s favourites, as was ‘My toe is stuck in a bath tap.’ There were quite a few others coming to Alex’s mind too as she travelled to work that morning. Unfortunately, she was positive that none of them would satisfy JP were she to ring in sick that day, despite their creative flair. But it wasn’t until she sat down at her desk at eight-thirty, her mobile phone ringing like crazy in the depths of her handbag, that she finally accepted that her mental quest to find a way out of an entire day sitting next to JP had failed.

“Hi Hun!” Simon piped up cheerfully on the other end of her phone when Alex finally answered it. “Can you get away for an hour by any chance? I’m in the city now. “

Alex hesitated. Normally she wouldn’t leave the office for no good reason but she was going to be working very late and so agreed immediately. Somehow, she’d clear it with JP and it would give her an opportunity to spend some desperately needed private time with Simon.

Despite spending most of the weekend together at his family’s house things were still strained between them. Time and time again she’d tried to begin a conversation to clear the air after JP’s interference at her parents’ home. She was also desperate to raise the subject of her working and studying for the next few years rather than starting their family straight away but an opportunity never seemed to come up. In fact, Alex wondered at times whether Simon was intentionally avoiding being alone with her so that he could also avoid discussing the sensitive topics JP had raised.

“Yes, I’m sure I can get away. That’ll be fine,” she replied. “Where are we going?”

“It’s a surprise. I’ll pick you up outside your building in ten minutes and have you back in the city by ten.”