breath, as if he had run over right after finishing his court hearing.
Payton sympathized. She knew how tough his day must’ve been—she’d had a few of those days herself. For a moment, she almost felt bad for J.D.
Too bad the moment didn’t last.
“Ah, there’s that quintessential Kendall sarcasm,” J.D. said. “All right—lay it on me. What did you do? Make obscene statements on the record? Feign a stutter? Ask the witness the same question five hundred times?”
“No,” Payton told him. Although she made a mental note for future reference—those were not half-bad ideas.
“No, of course not.” J.D. scowled. “You would never do anything that would harm your own reputation. Whatever you did to undermine me would have to be much more subtle.”
He looked around the room. His voice had an edge as he fired questions at her. “Where are Werner and the witness? They’ve left? You finished that quickly, huh? Well, forget it—I’m bringing them back here. I want to reopen this deposition and fix whatever mess you made.”
Payton stood up and straightened her jacket.
“Sorry, J.D., I’m afraid you’re stuck with my mess. Rule 30(c) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure: examination of the witness shall proceed as if at trial. That means only one attorney can question the witness. Didn’t they teach you that at Har-vard?” she drawled sarcastically.
“Yes, they taught me that at Har-vard,” J.D. said dryly. He folded his arms across his chest and peered down at her. “I want to see the transcript. Immediately.”
Payton glared at him. So this was the thanks she got for helping him. She didn’t know why she was surprised.
“No problem,” she said. She grabbed her briefcase and pulled out her laptop computer. As J.D. stood there, glowering down at her, arms folded across his chest, Payton opened up her email and found the real-time transcript the court reporter had just sent her. She quickly forwarded it to J.D.
“There,” she said. She snapped her laptop shut and threw it back into her briefcase. She stood again to face J.D. “Was that immediate enough for you?”
His eyes flickered, and for a second, he seemed to pause.
“Yes,” he said tersely.
“Good.” Payton slung her briefcase over her shoulder and headed toward the door. “Your files are all there—I put them back in the same order you had them. And Werner wants you to call him tomorrow to talk about the remaining depositions you need to schedule. Enjoy your transcript, J.D.”
With that parting thought, she walked out of the conference room. Furious. With herself, mostly.
For ever having thought that their conversation would’ve been anything different.
Fifteen
J.D. RANG THE buzzer a second time.
When she still didn’t answer, he rechecked the address he had pulled up on his BlackBerry. According to the firm directory, he was at the right place.
The upstairs lights of the two-flat were on, so presumably somebody was home. A thought occurred to J.D. then, the same one he’d had after the dinner with Jasper and the Gibson’s team: maybe she doesn’t live alone. The buzzer and mailbox provided no clues to this.
Earlier, after Payton had stormed out of the conference room, J.D. had immediately headed down to his office and pulled up the deposition transcript she had emailed him. He had feverishly dove in, expecting the worst. As his reading progressed, he continued, tensely waiting to find the twist, the screw she put to him, something. Anything.
But.
What he had discovered instead was . . . nothing. No tricks. Unless one counted the trick Payton had pulled off in managing to take a pretty damn good 30(b)(6) deposition on about thirty seconds’ notice. Sure there were a few minor things, a few lines of questioning with which J.D. might have taken a slightly different approach, or maybe not—but nevertheless, all he could think was—
Wow.
And just when he thought he couldn’t feel more like a jackass, Tyler called and filled him in on everything.
And thus, J.D. found himself here, on Payton’s doorstep.
Standing aimlessly on her front stoop with nothing else to do, he looked around, checking out the neighborhood. There were several row houses on the block, including the one that presumably belonged to her. The tree-lined street had a quaint yet urban feel to it.
He liked it. Not as much as his downtown high-rise condo with a view of the lake, of course, but he found it an acceptable place to leave the Bentley parked on the street. And for J.D., that was saying a lot.
He pushed the button on the intercom again. Third time’s