Thanks RainbowPotter and bribri1300 for favoriting my story. The stats thing must be broken because it says no one has checked out any of my work since October yet I'm getting this and my other work favorited so obviously there are at least a few people reading my shit. That makes me sad because i like looking at my stats...is that vain?
Halina groaned as the annoying sound of her alarm, buzzed six inches from her head. With another groan, she slapped the snooze button and rolled on to her back. Being that it was late winter, it was still dark out at 5 AM, and made it incredibly difficult to roll out of bed. But after five minutes of staring at the ceiling, she finally succeeded. It wasn't until her feet touched the cool wooden floor that Halina remembered that she had a guest sleeping on her couch.
Slipping on her slippers and a house coat, she tied her hair into a messy ponytail before finally exiting her bedroom. She paused in the doorway as she stared at the empty couch. Sitting exactly where she'd left it, sat the pile of a folded blanket, a sheet, and a pillow. Apparently, her guest hadn't stayed the night. There was no bowl nor butter sitting on the coffee table, rather, there was a sheet of paper sitting there with neat handwriting on it. She walked over and picked the paper up to read it:
'Thanks for the hospitality. It's nice to see that people are still willing to be kind and help strangers. Thanks for listening to me. Hopefully we'll meet again one day.'
Matt
With a sigh, she dropped the paper back on to her coffee table and moved into the kitchen. She was shocked to see the dishes that Matt had used, clean and sitting in her drying rack and when she opened the fridge, she found the butter sitting there. He'd even packed away her stew for her and cleaned her slow cooker. Judging from the amount that was in the container, he might've had a second helping. This thought made her smile, at least he'd had a good meal before leaving. When she went to the bathroom to have a shower, she found the towel Matt had used, sitting in the laundry basket and fresh towel hanging from the rack. She could say at least one thing, the man knew how to clean up after himself.
111
Halina stifled a yawn as she glanced up at the muted TV in the corner of the coffee shop while she waited for her order. On the screen stood a reporter in front of yellow police tape with a church in the background. Frowning, she squinted at the heading that rolled underneath the reporter as she talked. 'Preacher dead in aftermath of Daredevil attack on Clinton Church during Mass. Karen Page wanted for questioning.'
"Do you know what that's about?" Halina asked the barista, pointing to the screen as she collected her drink.
"You haven't heard?" The barista asked. "Apparently Daredevil's gone crazy or something. He used to protect the neighbourhood. He first attacked the Bulletin, killed several people there, now he's attacked a church. Some people think it's a copycat, an imposter. I mean it's been radio silence from the guy from almost a year and now this all of a sudden."
"Why does that name, Karen Page, ring a bell?"
The barista shrugged. "She works for the Bulletin. Wrote a piece about Daredevil many months ago. Apparently, she worked at Nelson & Murdock before it went under. They're the ones who helped put Wilson Fisk away."
Finally, it clicked, Marci had mentioned a Karen Page in passing once in one of their conversations. She smiled in thanks as she took her coffee and headed out. Once she was back at her office, she was informed that her client had decided to drop in on her without an appointment and was sitting in her office, waiting for her. Halina walked briskly to her office and was immensely annoyed with the receptionist for letting the men in office without her there and for her client dropping in unannounced on a Saturday. She didn't care how much her client didn't wish to wait in the waiting room, you should never leave people unattended in a person's office.
"Good morning." Halina said as she opened the door, trying to not sound agitated. "To what do I owe the pleasure, gentlemen? We weren't supposed to meet until Tuesday."
"Yes, well, Miss Jackson." Said Mister Clayton as he stood up and shook her offered hand. "You can cancel that meeting and we won't be taking up a great deal of your time today."
"Quite." Agreed Mister Bradford. "You see, Miss Jackson, this is taking much to long."
Halina frowned as she rounded her desk and took a seat. "I'm working as fast as I can, but with more complainants entering the deal, it's made it massively more difficult to negotiate. But if we…"
"There is no more 'we', Miss Jackson." Said Bradford tiredly.
"We decided to get a second opinion from a competing firm, and they assure us that the matter will be settled in a matter of weeks." Mister Clayton gave her a hard look as he steepled his fingers. "We've decided to go with them, since they've produced for us in the past."
"So, you came here in person, to fire me?" Halina asked, raising her eyebrows. "That's something you could've done over the phone."
"No, Miss Jackson. They came here to talk with me." Said Hogarth, looking less then pleased from where she stood in Halina's doorway. Halina had been so focused on the men in front of her, that she hadn't heard the door open. "Gentlemen, you know where my office is. I wish a word with Miss Jackson."
"We want all of our files back." Said Mister Bradford as he stood.
"And you'll have them by the end of the day. Now if you please?" Hogarth said, indicating the door.
Once they left, she closed the door behind them and turned to face Halina while Halina tried to keep herself from panicking, absolutely certain she was about to be fired. Hogarth didn't say anything, so Halina broke the silence.
"Ma'am I don't know what happened." Halina started but Hogarth held up her hand.
"This has absolutely nothing to do with you and everything to do with me. Quite frankly, I'm impressed that you've managed to keep the proceedings going this long, considering their obvious guilt. My bank account thanks you, too. No, Malcom has discovered that they were in line with my former partners, the entire time. They wanted to discredit this firm, win back some of their former clients. It wasn't working, so they pulled the plug."
Halina frowned. "Okay, I follow most of that, but I'm still confused. Was the entire case a sham? All the complainants…"
"No, its all real, they just took advantage of a situation. Normally that case would have been taken care of quickly and silently, likely through bribery and intimidation, before things got out of hand. They didn't expect you to be so clever, so tenacious." Hogarth smiled ever so slightly. "I have several lesser cases you could take over, but I think you deserve better. Go see Marci, I've been loading several large cases on her desk. I'm sure she'd be happy to offload a case or two onto you."
"Ah…thank you ma'am." Halina said as Hogarth pulled the door open then left without another.
"Well, that didn't go as I expected." Halina said as she sat back in her chair.
When she walked to Marci's office, her door was wide open as she sat at her computer looking frazzled. As always, her every strand of hair was perfectly in place, but her eyes were red, and her face held an expression of extreme strain. She glanced up momentarily as Halina entered but continued sorting through her papers.
"Sorry hon, I don't really have time." She said a little briskly.
"I know. Hogarth just sent me to help you out." Halina said, walking to her desk but not sitting down.
"What about that company you've working with for the last four months?" Marci asked as she glanced up.
"Fired me." Halina said smiling slightly.
"What?" Marci finally stopped what she was doing and looked up at her. "Ass holes. After everything you did…"
Halina held up her hands. "No, its fine. Hogarth said they were playing us, trying to ruin us and since I held them at bay for so long, Hogarth isn't going to fire me."
Marci looked up at her guiltily. "I really could use some help."
"That's what I'm here for." Halina said, smiling.
"Well." Marci started as she stood up and walked over to the tall double stacked pile of folders. She stood there thinking for a moment. "There's this really big one but…I'm not so sure…or maybe a bunch of smaller ones. It'll certainly look better if I don't have a mountain of folders sitting behind me."
"Why don't you give me the big one, whatever that is and a few small ones. That'll be twice the help, not?"
"I don't know, that's a lot of work for one person." Marci said looking over her shoulder at her.
"Are you not one person?" Halina asked with an ironic expression on her face.
Marci chuckled. "Okay, fair point but you're going to regret that comment very quickly here." She said as grabbed the first four rather thick files, dropped them on her desk before turning back and grabbing three more thin folders and place them beside the others. "These four folders are for a suit against Zackman's but that's not what you'll working on. See Zackman's is claiming that our clients, the ones who originally sued Zackman's, disclosed information they were legally not authorized to. Our clients claim they never signed a non-disclosure agreement and we have yet to receive any proof of these contracts either."
"Oh good, something that won't make me feel like I have to sit in the shower for an hour with the temperature set to scalding in order to wash the dirt off." Halina said as she opened the top folder.
"Don't get too excited." Marci said as she sat down tiredly. "I have an appointment with them Monday morning, first thing. I'll let them know that I've handed it off to you. I hope you don't have any plans for the rest of weekend because you have to somehow find a way to read all that paperwork and do all your prep before 8 AM, Monday."
"Oh, yay." Halina said feeble sarcasm. "What about these?"
"Probably won't be more than a day or two each. Don't worry about those too much. Small time stuff. Ones defending a senator's son from a drug charge, another is a lawsuit against a faulty manufacturing case and the last one is defending a teacher from abuse allegations."
Halina cocked an eyebrow. "A teacher can afford us?"
"Rich daddy." Marci said with a shrug. "Most of these aren't until the week after next so you have time. You should just take these and go home. You're just going to be reading all day anyways and you might as well do that from the comfort of your own couch."
"Right." Halina said, gathering up her files. Halina stopped for a moment and studied Marci. "Are you okay? You look like something besides work is bothering you."
Marci looked at her a moment then stood up again and closed the door to her office before standing right next to Halina. "You remember what I said about Fisk, Foggy and his friends?" She whispered.
"Yeah, I actually saw on the new this morning that Karen Page is wanted for questioning." Halina said with a nod.
"Things are really heating up. Foggy was at the Bulletin when it was attacked, earlier in the week." Marci started.
"What?" Halina asked, horrified. "You never said anything."
"I know but we're so busy," Marci said looking a little guilty. "I didn't want to burden you. Anyway, Fisk sent someone dressed as Daredevil to kill the witness who as going to testify against him. Matt was going to turn himself over to the FBI, once they heard what that man had to say but the man was murdered before he could say anything. Matt, he's in the wind again…sort of. Last night, that thing at the church, was that same man pretending to be Daredevil, trying to kill Karen because she did something to piss Fisk off, Foggy didn't say what. If Foggy hadn't swooped in there and saved her from the FBI, she'd be dead right now."
"Wait, what do you mean Foggy saved her from the FBI?"
"They've been corrupted! They are working for Fisk now. Foggy's certain of it."
"Oh shit! You were right." Halina exclaimed, putting her folders down slowly.
"Yeah. Thankfully, Foggy has friends in the NYPD and they 'arrested' Karen and got her out of there. Now Matt and Foggy have this plan but Foggy won't tell me what it is. He says its better if I don't know. I'm worried about him, Lina, I'm scared he's gonna end up at the bottom of the Hudson." Marci covered her face with her hands.
Halina sighed as she put a hand on Marci's shoulder. "Foggy is extremely smart, I'm sure he'll come out of this on top, and it sounds like they're in the home stretch. Maybe, by the end of next week, this will all be behind you and Foggy and the two of you can get back to normal."
"Oh, I hope so." Marci said weakly.
Halina pulled Marci into a hug. After a moment, Halina let go and looked her in the eye. "Are you going to be okay?"
Marci smiled weakly. "Yeah. I've got a mountain of work to distract myself with. Go home, Lina. I'll tell Hogarth."
Halina rubbed her arm before she gathered up the files once more and left Marci's office for her own. She left the large folders on her desk as she moved around to her locked filing cabinet to file away the other cases for the time being. She spent another ten minutes looking through her emails and sending a few replies before shutting it down once more. She had been in her office for a few minutes, so she hadn't really anything to put away, so she grabbed her phone, briefcase where she stowed her files in, and what remained of her coffee before heading out for home.
Once home, Halina packed away the files she'd had sitting out, back into their boxes before calling a courier to come pick the boxes up and bring them back to Hogarth & Associates so that they could be sent back to their owners. Officially done with the case, Halina sat tiredly on her couch before lying on her side, arms dangling useless over the front of the couch, resting her eyes for a few minutes. It wasn't until the courier finally showed up that she stood up again, to let the courier in. When they left, Halina pulled the folders out of her briefcase then stared at them absently, not really wanting to open them.
Halina looked at the pile of gym clothes that still sat on the floor at the foot of her bed. Another hour of procrastination wouldn't hurt, would it? Besides, she hadn't gotten the exercise she'd wanted yesterday anyways. Deciding, she stood up once more and happily peeled off her pencil skirt, blazer and blouse and climbed back into her gym clothes. Once she had connected her wireless earbuds to her phone, she stretched a bit before grabbing her keys and heading for the door. As the night before, Halina jogged to the gym and this time found the gym to be blissfully empty. The way she preferred it, although part of her may have hoped that Matt would be there.
After quickly repairing the window so that someone couldn't just reach in and unlock the door, she wrapped her hands, stretched some more, this time focusing more on her arms and wrists and then went to work. She danced around the bag, punching, jabbing, stepping back, and repeating in perfect rhythm. Halina was so focused on what she was doing, with music playing in her ears, that she hadn't realized that someone had entered the gym as she worked. Her music was turned up, so she also didn't hear as someone call her name and try to get her attention. It wasn't until that someone grabbed her left shoulder that she realized someone was there. She was so startled by the sudden presence of another person, that she immediately spun around, bringing her right fist with her and threw a quick right hook.
Thankfully, the man at the other end of the hand that had touched her, had excellent reflexes, and deflected the punch with his forearm, smiling slightly. Halina blinked for a moment, still startled by the man standing there, in a suit, pointing at her ears, indicating for her to take the earbuds out, that she didn't immediately register who it was.
"Matt!" Halina finally registered as she pulled out her earbuds.
"You always swing first?" He asked smiling slightly.
"When startled, yeah." She said returning a sheepish smile, wiping the sweat from her face. "Good reflexes."
"I thought you worked today?"
"I do. I am." Halina said as she walked over to her water bottle, which sat on the edge of the boxing ring and for the first time, registering another person standing near the door, watching their interaction. "I needed to blow of some steam after my morning meeting and before I dove head long into another pile of shit. A different one then the one we talked about yesterday." Matt cocked and eyebrow, but she shook her head. "Long story."
"Well, I need you to clear out." Matt said, hands in his pockets.
"And you are starting to sound like a broken record." Matt made an annoyed sound. "Hey, I didn't say I wasn't going to, just stating a fact. Besides, if the FBI show up here, I rather not be found with two wanted people."
"You know who I am?" The woman asked, sounding unsettled by the fact.
"Karen Page." Halina said as she grabbed her sweater from the floor. "Your picture was on the news this morning."
"Matt, can I talk with you a moment?" Karen asked, sounding irritated.
Halina started unwrapping her hands as Matt walked over to Karen with a sigh. She watched as they had a heated, whispered conversation, which she guessed had to do with her unwelcomed presence as Karen kept pointing towards her.
"I'm not going to say anything." Halina said as she began neatly rolling up her wrapping. "Nobody would even think to ask me anyway. The only known connection I have with the two of you is Foggy, and that's only because I worked with him and Marci. Even with that connection, I doubt they'd ever think anything about me."
"Then why are you here? Right now?" Karen asked crossing her arms and looked at her accusatorially. "How do we know that you're not another one of Fisk's people?"
"If I was one Fisk's people, I had plenty of time to call him about Matt, last night, and I didn't." Halina said in a bored tone as she stuffed her neatly rolled wraps into her pocket.
Karen turned her accusatorial gaze on Matt this time, which he returned with an annoyed glare, which once again made Halina question whether or not the man was truly blind.
"I have places to be. I'll walk you out, Halina." Matt said as he walked towards her.
Together they exited the gym and walked down the steps. "Your girlfriend?" Halina asked as she reached for the door at the bottom of the steps.
"We're just friends." Matt said with a sigh.
"So, ex-girlfriend." Halina said smiling over her shoulder, then noticed the bags under his eyes. "Did you sleep at all last night? I know you didn't at my place."
"I had things I needed to do, and I've been busy pretty much since then."
"I see that, nice suit." She said smiling at him as they walked slowly down the street. She noticed a pair of glasses in his breast pocket, like the ones he'd worn when she'd first met him and was carrying a folded up cane in his hand. "Suits look good on you, better then the baggy clothes that I always see you in."
Matt actually blushed as he chuckled. "Thanks." He was silent for a while as they walked but after half a block, he spoke up again. "I'd try and stay inside for the rest of weekend if I was you. The Kitchen may well erupt into violence with the way things are going." Matt stopped at a corner.
"Noted." Halina looked at him as he fiddled with his folded cane but was smiling slightly. "Be careful, okay. You're starting to grow on me. I only have like two other friends and so it'd be nice to have another. But it sounds like one of them maybe in just as much danger as you."
"Foggy's my best friend, I'm not about to let anything happen to him." Matt said as the smile fell from his face. "I've gotta go this way." Matt said indicating down a different street then the one that took her home.
"I'm serious Matt, be careful." She said then stood on her tippy toes and kissed him on his stubble covered cheek. "Hopefully I'll see you around."
Matt suddenly seemed flustered. "Uh…yeah…bye." He said as he watched her jog across the street and head for home.
These first few chapters are short. I kinda wonder if I should pieced a couple of them together as one chapter instead of two? Oh well. R&R.
-Shockra