Power of Attorney (11 page)

“I do admire your obvious intelligence and your legal skills, but we don’t know each other very well. So, realistically, this is probably mostly physical.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“I’m not even sure that I have time to have a girlfriend to be truthful,” he went on, still explaining. Maybe he hadn’t heard me. “I’m very focused on my career. I work around the clock. I haven’t been involved with anyone in quite a while.”

“That would be a problem because I refuse to make my life about work.” I saw him flinch out of the corner of my eye. Okay, maybe that
had
sounded a little judgy. 

“It’s not that I just love working 24/7,” he said defensively.  “I’ve wanted to be appointed to federal bench since I was a kid. To the Supreme Court, to be exact.”

“I think you’ve got a real shot,” I said honestly and I saw him give me a warm glance. “And I’m not questioning your choices. I’m just saying they don’t fit that well with mine. That’s all. I used to work 24/7 too and I hated it. But then, I will admit that the work I was doing was hardly fulfilling. If it had been, who knows?”

“I like that about you, and about us, the fact that we’re upfront with each other. So, back to this attraction between us,” he went on.

“We’re both adults,” I answered. “If we’re attracted to each other physically, we should have a physical relationship.”

“I like how you think, but a position with the federal judiciary is based on political appointment and approval and that includes votes from Conservative senators. If it seemed that I were too casual ... ”

“I understand discretion,” I said. “Of course, if I met someone who I felt an actual romantic spark with...” I added, keeping in mind that I did want to find
that
eventually.

“I would understand,” he said quickly. “Until this DocuKeep thing is resolved though, we should probably play it safe and hold off on a physical relationship.”

“Until then we’re two lawyers working together” I replied.

“Just for the record, you’re really cool,” he said, making me smile. We sat silently for a moment, both of us staring out the windshield, or rather
at
it, as it had now become completely fogged up.

“I really want to kiss you now,” he said.

“Yeah, I really want you to kiss me.”

“That’s all it could be though. Just one kiss.”

“Just one,” I agreed.

“Okay, so then, I’m going to do that.”

“Good.” I replied breathlessly and we both turned to face each other.

And then we leaned in and met each other half way. We brought our lips close together, but we didn’t quite let them touch, not yet.  I felt his warm breath against me, and ironically, it gave me chills. He leaned in closer first, pressing his lips against mine gently for a second, and then firmer. His hand went to the back of my head as he increased the pressure and I opened my lips to let him in. Even though he started out slowly, he was not a shy or tentative kisser at all. His tongue swept into my mouth and started exploring everywhere and rubbing up against mine. Mmm. He was yummy.

I started to feel all light and “floaty,” like a cloud, and I don’t really
care
how corny that sounds. I had not had a make-out session this hot since ... Okay, I had not had a make-out session this hot.  As I let myself get more and more lost in this amazing kiss, I became vaguely aware of lights. Maybe I was actually seeing stars. That made sense. Stars were in the sky where clouds were. Now the stars were shining in the window. And then someone was tapping.
Wait a minute
.  Jacob sat back suddenly and swore.

“Let me handle this,” he ordered, rolling down the window and calling out to identify himself.  The police officer he was talking to asked to see his ID, which he handed out to him. I sighed. So far, we weren’t doing a really great job with the discretion thing.

He convinced them that we were having a legal discussion. Or he at least he convinced them to pretend that they believed that we were having a legal discussion.  I will point out, however, that it’s not against the law to make out in a parked car in Philadelphia. Apparently, they just wanted to make sure weren’t doing anything “suspicious.” They didn’t notice a man curled up in ball on the sidewalk but a couple steams up the windows and they are on it!

T
he next day, I had a quick conversation with Dana and Lena. I told them that I had done my best to convince Jacob that Trog was being set up. I did not mention the part where he had his tongue in my mouth and I felt like a cloud. I didn’t mention the cops either. Even though we were friends, we didn’t really discuss those things anyway. Who we kissed I mean, not run-ins with police.

That afternoon, I accompanied Trog to his scheduled meeting at the U.S. Attorney’s Office. First, we sat in a conference room together waiting for a while. Finally, Jacob came in accompanied by Wright and Wong.

“You’re in luck,” he said to Trog. “Thanks to the wonders of technology, your message has been recovered.” He slid a printout our way. It was a copy of an email message instructing Trog to go the address from the night before. It was signed Deon.

“This is great!” I said excitedly.

“It’s great that he has some proof that his friend told him to meet her there,” Wong chimed in. “The fact that she’s trying to pin something on him, not so great.”

“Also not so great, that the blood belonged to Randall Greene,” Jacob said in a very serious tone. Clearly, he was going to get to the bottom of this.

“Oh, um, was it enough ...” I wasn’t sure how to frame the question.

“No. It was just a pint,” Wright answered.

“So, now what do we do?” I asked. 

“Now, we figure out what in the hell is going on,” Jacob replied. He stood up and went over to a white board in the corner, pulling it over to face us.  He wrote Deon, Randall and DocuKeep on the board and we started brainstorming.

“Randall was interested in the DocuKeep break-in, why?” Jacob asked, after writing down everything we knew so far.

“His notes don’t say
anything
about why he thought this was so important?” I asked. “Nothing at all?”

“It had the date and time and other basic information and the name Deon Flux and it was marked urgent and classified,” Jacob answered, sounding frustrated.

“Maybe we could start shadowing some DocuKeep employees,” Agent Wright said. “Sometimes you follow somebody and they’ll lead you somewhere unexpected.”

“Wait a minute!” Trog exclaimed, suddenly perking up.

“Does that mean something to you?” Agent Wong asked.

“Does DocuKeep back up data for other companies?” Trog asked.

“I’m sure we could find out easily enough,” Wright answered. “Why?”

“Because maybe I wasn’t the only one hacking that night and maybe DocuKeep wasn’t the final destination,” Trog said. Suddenly, a gurgling sound emitted from his abdominal region. “Hey, do you guys mind if we take a break? I’m starved.”

“We’ve been going at it for a while now,” Jacob said. “Jack, how about if you find that information for us and Mr. Collins can go hit Subway. We’ll meet back in here in half an hour. Abby, there’s something I wanted to discuss if you have a moment.”

“Sure,” I said, getting up and following him toward his office.  I didn’t have any idea what he wanted. He closed his office door behind me and then took two steps forward, pinning my back up against it.  That’s what I had
hoped
that he wanted.

“I can’t get that kiss last night out of my mind,” he said thickly, leaning down and nipping at my ear. I was thankful that the door was there to hold me up.

“It was a very good kiss,” I said breathing heavily and tilting my face up toward his. It was getting really warm in there, especially beneath my skirt.

“It was a fucking amazing kiss,” he corrected, leaning down and gently biting my lower lip.  I was going to need to start packing emergency panties in my purse.

I reached up and buried my fingers in his hair, pulling his mouth down on mine and then I pushed my tongue between his lips. It was my turn to explore. He reached around and grabbed my ass, pulling my hips forward against him, so that I could feel his growing arousal. He broke the kiss and started gently biting my neck while I writhed up against him. This was way better than being a cloud. I was approaching the stratosphere.

“Weren’t we supposed to wait until this case was over to have sex?” I whispered in a voice strained with intense desire.

“Are we having sex?” he whispered back.

“Well, technically no,” I replied as his hand cupped my breast and his thumb grazed my nipple. I moaned and his mouth came down on mine again to quiet me.

“Come here,” he said, pulling back and taking my hand to lead me over to his desk. Before I even realized what he was going to do, he pushed my skirt up around my hips, lifted me up and sat me on the desk in front of him. Looking down at my thigh high stockings he smiled. Then he sat down in the chair facing me and it sunk in what he was going to do.
Oh my God.

He leaned his head in and ran his tongue up along the outside of my silk panties, tracing my lips and circling my clit. I made a strangled sound as my tummy clenched and white-hot pleasure liquefied me.

“Shhh,” he warned, and even through silk, the feeling of his breath against my hyper-sensitized pussy made me dizzy. “Be quiet or I’ll stop.”

“I’ll be quiet. Don’t stop,” I begged and I felt him smile up against me.

He gently pushed my panties aside and starting lapping from my entrance to my clit with long hot strokes, pausing every so often to gently suck on my tender skin. I lay back on the desk, parted my legs wider and let myself get lost. I was breathing heavily and pushing my hips up against him greedily when he took pity me and decided to bring me on home. His tongue began a series of fast flicks against by clit as he sunk two fingers inside me and began rubbing my G Spot.

I bit my lip so that I wouldn’t cry out. I needed to come so badly and I knew I would go over the edge any second. He increased his speed a fraction and that was all it took. I came hard, squeezing my eyes shut tightly, arching my back and holding my breath. I felt the muscles of my pussy start to contract, pumping a warm wave of pleasure through my lower belly, washing all the tension away.

“Well, that was um, a surprise,” I said happily when my breathing slowed down.

“Still think I’m not a giver?” he asked with a twinkle in his eye. Wow, a guy who both gleamed and twinkled.

“I thought you wanted to wait to have a physical relationship in general.”

“I dreamed about you last night and I knew that I wouldn’t be able to concentrate without having seen you come at least once. Excuse me a moment.” He stepped through a door into what was obviously a private bathroom. I couldn’t believe that I had just let Boy Wonder go down on me on his desk at the U.S. Attorney’s office in the middle of a workday.  This was so much better that working at KL.

***

I
was rather impressed by how casual Jacob and I looked when we returned the conference room. One would not even guess that his handsome face had been tucked between my legs so very recently.

“I think someone tricked me,” Trog explained when we were all assembled again.  “Deon, or whoever she ... or he is, got me to hack into DocuKeep and then hacked me. Deon followed me, like a shadow. She got remote access to my system and used it to get into DocuKeep with me, without leaving any footprint herself.”

“And why would Deon do that?” Jacob asked, eyes burning with interest.

“So that she could use that system to gain entry to the systems it interfaces with, in and out without a trace,” Trog explained.

“And if DocuKeep backs up a company’s data, it interfaces with their system,” Wright added. Trog smiled in confirmation. He really wasn’t a total goofball.

“If anyone figured out later they had been hacked, and possibly even how the hacker had gotten in, it would be convenient to have someone else’s electronic footprint all over DocuKeep. That was why Deon wanted to make sure that Trog was linked to the break-in.”

“So Jack, did you find out what companies DocuKeep backs up?” Jacob asked.

“Yeah,” Agent Wong answered.  “There’s one in particular you might find interesting, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.”

Jacob was on the phone in seconds talking to someone in the FBI computer lab.  He was going to have them pour through his own office’s data to see if anything had been manipulated. The other companies that DocuKeep worked with would also be notified of a possible security breach.

“I guess that Randall figured out that someone may have accessed our files,” he said when he finished the last call. “We need to find out who Deon Flux really is.”

L
ife had not stopped for
Trog’s Wild and Wacky Adventure
, and I did have other clients. Over the next week, I worked on those cases. Most were pretty standard, possible workplace discrimination, sexual harassment and things like that. Even the “standard” cases were much more interesting than anything I used to handle at KL and the warm environment of our office really made a difference. 

I didn’t even mind the wackier clients, truthfully. Most were scheduled for Philadelphia courts. Occasionally, though, one did wind up in federal court, especially the Silver Cougars, who seemed to particularly love to stage their protests in front of national landmarks.

“Good morning, Ms. Fishbine,” Judge Baker sad politely.

“Heh,” Agnes muttered, working her jaw like she was chewing cud.

“And how are you this morning?”

“Eh,” Agnes replied.

“Mr. Branson,” the judge said, addressing the prosecutor, “what brings us here this time, err, today.” Mr. Branson seemed to be permanently assigned to Agnes’s cases. I wondered whom he had offended.

“Your Honor, Mrs. Fishbine ...”

“Ms.,” I corrected.

“
Ms
. Fishbine,” he went on, obviously fighting an eye roll, “is being charged with trespass, obscenity and indecent exposure on federal park grounds.”