Chapter 2: Advances

As promised, I receive a call a few hours later from an assistant of Denny Crane's, notifying me that the paperwork is ready for me to come in and look over. I've had a chance to eat lunch a few minutes away from the law firm, but even though that only took me an hour, I stayed at the restaurant for the rest of the time, because my hotel room just seems so…lonely—and there was no way I was going back to my apartment.

When I return to the firm around four o'clock, it's still almost as busy as it was earlier, and when I walk up to the desk, Mr. Crane walks briskly into the foyer after an older, taller man, wagging his finger and shouting, "Denny Crane!"

After the older man scurries away indignantly, Denny walks up to me with a dramatic breath and says, "Paul is a bastard."

Raising my eyebrows, I say, "Is that so?"

"Yes!" His eyebrows are high on his face as well. "Like you wouldn't believe."

Suppressing a laugh, I wait until he collects himself and says, smiling abruptly, "Let's go get this paperwork done. Then I'll ask you to have dinner with me."

As he herds me down a hall, I respond with, "Well, I've…just eaten a large lunch, so I'm very full; I don't think I'd be able to fit in dinner today. But thank you for the offer."

He looks downtrodden, then perks up again. "Then how about tomorrow night?"

My eyes wide, I say after a moment, "Previous engagement."

"Oh, devil," he says exasperatedly, flapping his hand. "Well, sometime then."

We walk into what must be his office, a room with a large window behind his desk that overlooks the city. On a counter behind the desk, sleek awards are prominently displayed among polished guns. I wonder how legal keeping firearms in one's office is.
I sit in front of his desk as he takes his seat behind it, and I see dozens of pages of paperwork on the desk in front of me.

"All this?" I ask.

"I'm afraid so," Mr. Crane says gruffly. "It'll probably take you an hour or so to go through." Then he grins. "But don't worry; I'll be here the whole time to keep you company."

I sigh. As I'm picking up a pen to get started, I hear a knock on the door, and I turn around to see Mr. Shore standing at the door. I find myself smiling unconsciously.

"I just wanted to see how it's going in here," Mr. Shore says.

"Alan, come in here," Denny says, waving his hand at him. Alan obliges. "Tell Bella that she must have dinner with me this week."

Raising an eyebrow, Alan takes a seat beside the desk, letting out a breath as he does. "Denny, what have we talked about when it comes to going on dates with clients?"

"But Alan!" Denny exclaims, sounding a little like a whiny child. "Look at her!" He jabs a hand at me, and I feel my stomach flip uncomfortably at the sudden attention.

"Let's just focus on the case, shall we, Denny?"

Frowning, Denny looks at the paperwork.

Looking between them for a moment, I finally get back to the papers and begin to read.

Over an hour later, I'm finally done with the paperwork. Somehow I'm exhausted now; I suppose it's from having to lay out every detail of my relationship with Daniel and every minute way that he hurt me.

Once I've handed the paperwork to Denny, he exits the room to bring it to an assistant to look over, and I'm left alone with Alan. He's gone in and out of the room several times during the hour, but now he's sitting on the couch again reading some of his own paperwork.
Now he puts the papers aside and looks up at me, his eyes low and slightly tired.

"Now there is another matter to attend to," he says. I shiver inadvertently at his tone. "I loathe having to ask you this, but do you have any bruises or any physical evidence of abuse from your ex-boyfriend when he was killed?" He doesn't say "when you killed him" or "when he died"; just "when he was killed." I don't know how I feel about that.

Grimacing, I nod.

"What specifically?"

I hesitate. I hate appearing weak in front of anyone. "Finger marks on my wrists from when he grabbed me a few days ago, and a large bruise on my stomach."

He nods, looking regretful, and clasps his hand together in front of himself. "Then unfortunately we must take photos to provide evidence in case the court date doesn't come around for many days. It's doubtful, but possible, so we have to cover everything."

I nod back. "I expected as much."

"One of my female assistants can take you into a more private room and take the photos. It should only take a few minutes."

I sigh. "Okay."

He unclasps his hands and stands, then steps out the door, peeking his head around a corner to call someone. After a moment a woman walks into the room with him. She looks to be about 25 and has perky blond hair, perky clothing, and a perky face. The way she looks at Mr. Shore tells me that she's attracted to him.

"Bella, this is Melissa," Alan says, gesturing to the woman. He seems a little strange towards her, making me wonder if they possibly had a relationship once.

"She can take the photos for you."

I force myself to smile at her. "Hi."

She smiles back, perfectly cheerful now. "We'll make this quick and painless. If you'll come with me, we'll do it right away."

I follow her out the door, looking back to see Mr. Shore watching us strangely, his head tilted ever so slightly to the side. As soon as we reach a secluded room and Melissa shuts the door, I notice a change in her demeanor.

"Stay away from Alan Shore," she says as she opens a drawer and removes a Polaroid camera from it.

At first I think she's being territorial. "What? Why?"

"Because he's dangerous."

"What? Like he's violent?"

She frowns. "Not violent, more like…volatile."

I furrow my brow. "Were you in a relationship with him before?"

"Yes, so I speak from experience. He has the tendency to hurt women. Just take my word for it: you should stay away from him."

"He's my lawyer…I don't exactly have a choice."

"You can drop him from your case."

I don't reply to that; honestly, I'm not sure what to think now. "Let's just get these pictures over with."

It takes about fifteen minutes, during which I feel humiliated and completely exposed. When I can finally redress and leave the room, I feel terribly relieved.

As soon as I walk out of the room, I'm greeted by Denny. "How'd it go?" he asks quickly. He peers over Melissa's shoulder at the photos before she yanks them away with a tsk. I try to keep from rolling my eyes obviously.

Melissa breaks off from us to do whatever is needed with the photos, and Mr. Crane and I return to his office. Alan is there again, and I can't help eyeing him with the wariness that Melissa recommended. He seems to notice, at which point I look away from him altogether.

"So…now that that's over with, I think we're done for the day." Denny seems a bit disappointed, but I'm terribly glad that he's saying this; it's been a long day.

Putting a hand over my mouth to cover my yawn, I nod. "Well thank you. I look forward to getting all of this behind us…no offense to you, of course."

"Not taken," Denny says, grinning. "But let's hope it will never be completely behind us."

"Denny," I hear Alan warn from behind me, and I almost laugh. Almost.

I collect my purse and coat from a coat rack so I can bundle up before going outside. Denny and Alan stand with me, and I notice them both watching as I put on my coat.

When they move next to each other, I'm able to face them both. "Thank you both, very much," I say. "I can't say I'm sad this day is over, but it's been a pleasure to meet you, and I'm very grateful to you for helping me when no one would." I take a moment, for I can feel impending tears again. I've been very sensitive lately.

Denny steps up before Alan can and shakes my hand again. "As I said earlier, the pleasure's all mine. We will give you a call as soon as we have anything new on the case. I look forward to that time."

I smile hesitantly at him, and finally he releases my hand. Then he ducks in suddenly, his lips almost reaching my cheek, before Mr. Shore intercepts and pulls me out of the way.

Flustered, I take a deep breath as Alan releases me and takes a moment too long to step out of my personal space. Then he holds out his own hand and shakes mine, albeit more gently than Mr. Crane did. "Get some rest," he says. "You surely need it."

Nodding, I smile gratefully and walk out of the door before Denny Crane gets any more ideas…and before I can get any more strange vibes from Alan Shore.

As I'm leaving, I hear the two men talking behind me, their dually resonant voices slowly fading.

"Denny, you must give the girl some space," Mr. Shore says to Mr. Crane.

"Mad cow," I hear Mr. Crane say. I look back just in time to see him pointing to his head, just before I've rounded the corner, and I hear Alan's loud, round laugh. I chuckle to myself, baffled, as I head towards the elevator.

Author's note: So I've actually uploaded this a lot sooner than I thought! I've just been so into my writing the past couple of days that I've been producing these chapters very quickly. I'll probably have periods of inactivity mixed in with these periods of manic activity, so bear with me! Thank you!

P.S. Please leave a review if you liked it (or even if you didn't)! :)