Still, he did enjoy himself, and he had been looking forward to this vacation, to shedding the responsibilities that he took very seriously and to just having a little mindless fun and relaxation for twenty-one days.
“You really do owe me big-time, Jen,” he murmured under his breath as he craned his neck to make out the faded addresses that graced the fronts of less than half the stores and buildings he passed.
It was hard to imagine, the way the streets were now, that this area had ever been new. The buildings looked as if they had been standing, enduring the less-than-clement Portland weather, for the last century or so.
Here and there Jordan saw half-hearted attempts at renovations, seemingly doomed before they were begun. Cheap paint was slapped onto surfaces to make them look newer than they were and to hide the multitude of flaws.
Oh well, he wasn’t here for the view or a tour, he was here for Jenny.
Jenny, the pure of heart, he thought with a smile.
He supposed his sister was right when she insisted that this was their duty. Growing up, they had both always had so much, had never wanted for anything. The best education, the best of everything, really. It only seemed right to try to pay some of it back.
This, Jordan decided, would fill his pro bono quota for the next year.
Maybe longer, he amended, slowing his car down even more as he realized that he was looking at the storefront office where he’d agreed to spend the next three weeks, shepherding the lost and the confused through the maze known as their legal system.
The sign in the window, which Jenny told him had once displayed the wares of an independent clothing store, brightly proclaimed: Advocate Aid, Inc., in bold black letters on gleaming white poster board. It only made the surrounding area appear that much more dingy and forlorn.
To Jenny’s credit—at least, he assumed as much—the display window was dust-free and clean, unlike the displays belonging to the businesses on either side of the legal aid office. To the right, ironically enough, he thought, was a pawn shop. The window was crammed with all sorts of things that had once been precious to someone, and that were now being sold in an effort to keep body and soul together. From the amount of dust that had accumulated, Jordan guessed that the items had last seen anything remotely close to a good cleaning somewhere during the Eisenhower era.
To the left of the office was a smaller store front which displayed an anemic blue light. The fixture was fashioned to proclaim that a seer of the future was domiciled just beyond the threshold. For a nominal fee, the secrets of the future could be shared.
Jordan paused, his sports car idling. He shook his head in disbelief. His sister had graduated near the top of her class. She could have had an office next to his at Morrison and Treherne.
“What the hell are you doing here, Jenny?” he wondered out loud.
And what was he doing here? he wondered silently. For that matter, where the hell was he going to park his car? More to the point, was it going to be there when it came time for him to leave? Cars like his were targets in seedy neighborhoods like this. A good team could strip it in no time flat.
Maybe he should have rented an inexpensive car for the next three weeks. Too late now, he thought with a sigh.
A sign indicating that there was parking behind the row of stores had him circling the block, looking for an opening. He missed it the first time around. When he discovered it on his second pass, he found his driving skills challenged. The alleyway that led to the lot was narrow, even for his sports car. He held his breath the entire time.
When he finally reached the lot, Jordan saw that there were several cars already there. Or maybe they’d just been abandoned, he amended, seeing the condition of the vehicle closest to him. It had at least twenty years on it and the years had not been kind.
Getting out, holding a container of cappuccino in one hand, Jordan engaged the security alarm in his car with his other, wondering if the gesture was a futile one. He had a feeling that anyone here probably knew how to disarm such an alarm in a matter of seconds, silencing it before it had a chance to go off.
Here goes nothing, Jordan thought, walking back out onto the street.
He passed a man rolling back the rusted iron security gates that protected the pawn shop from any break-ins. Short, squat, with arms that looked as if bench-pressing an elephant would have presented no hardship to him, the man wore his hair cropped so close to his head it appeared to be almost shaved.
Pausing as he secured the gates, the pawn-shop owner looked at Jordan and then nodded at the display window. “See anything you like?”
Jordan didn’t bother looking, although he did return the man’s smile. No sense in antagonizing someone whose biceps rivaled the circumference of truck tires. “Not at the moment.”
The pawn-shop owner continued staring at him. “Nice threads,” he commented. “I could get you a good price for them.”
Probably not anywhere in the neighborhood of what he’d actually paid for the Armani suit, Jordan thought. “Thanks. I’ll keep that in mind.”
“You work there?” the man asked as Jordan put his hand on the doorknob.
“Temporarily.”
The man nodded knowingly. “That’s what they all say.”
Jordan didn’t bother to answer.
The door to Advocate Aid, Inc., was unlocked when he tried it. The second he entered, he knew that he had overdressed. The closet of his penthouse apartment was teeming with expensive suits, suits he regarded as part of his trade because his father had impressed on him at an early age that people judged by appearances and the Halls had always been judged well. Wearing a suit was second nature to him—when he wasn’t wearing the latest actress or model or drop-dead gorgeous debutante.
But designer suits were definitely out of place in here, he thought, closing the door behind him.
Walking in, he looked around slowly. His first impression didn’t improve. The area seemed almost claustrophobically small. His old bedroom in the family estate was bigger than this place that Jenny said had five people working in it when they were running at full capacity.
He didn’t understand how anyone could get anything accomplished here. It looked like an illustration for chaos. Every inch of the place was filled with books and papers, scattered and bound. Three of the desks had computers, all of which appeared to be on their way to a museum. The desks beneath them looked battle-worn.
Over in the corner there were ancient bookcases that appeared to be leaning forward, bowing beneath the weight of legal books and, he could only assume from this distance, dust.
It was enough to send someone of his orderly nature out into the street, gasping for air.
Jordan glanced at his watch. Jenny had told him to get here by nine. It was eight-thirty. He was early because that was his nature. He hated to be kept waiting and felt that keeping anyone else waiting was rude. But early or not, he hadn’t expected to be the first one here. He looked around again, but there was no one else in the office. Not unless they were hiding beneath the stacks of paper on the floor.
But the door was unlocked, he recalled.
Maybe they had decided to close down after all and someone had just forgotten to lock the doors. Not that there looked as if there was anything to steal here, he thought, looking around again.
A noise coming from the rear of the room caught