Free Avenging Angels by Mary Stanton

the weedy graves and pallid oaks surrounding the house were distinctly off-putting. Bree sometimes wondered why she had to pay rent at all, since the office location served only the dead, but she didn’t have the nerve to address Lavinia about this directly. She went ahead and paid Ron’s and Petru’s salaries, too, even though she wasn’t at all sure what the two other angels did with the money. Ron was exceptionally well dressed, so she suspected he spent a lot of his salary on custom pima cotton shirts and elegant ties, but Petru wore the same dingy black suit to work day after day. And if the state of his thick black beard was any indication, he did all his own barbering. As for Sasha . . . her dog lay curled next to her chair, and she bent down and scratched behind his ears. He yawned happily, rolled one golden eye up to her, and went back to sleep. Sasha didn’t have any expenses at all, since she bought his dog food herself.
    “Uncle Franklin’s old lease was voided by his death,” Bree said. “And what with the brouhaha over the Benjamin Skinner case, I never did get around to talking to the owners about a new one. If you could check on that, Ron, I’d appreciate it.” Great-Uncle Franklin, who had left Bree her unusual law practice and her even more unusual set of employees, had a small one-room office in a refurbished brick warehouse six blocks from Angelus Street. Like many of the great old brick buildings lining the Savannah River, it was in constant need of updating. The latest remodeling had been lengthy and expensive. The entire brick façade had been pointed, the terrazzo floors ground and waxed, and the elegant basswood moldings and balustrades stripped and refinished. But the renovation was almost complete, and she needed to address the issue of moving in.
    Ron entered a brief note into his BlackBerry and looked at her expectantly. “Office furnishings?” he said hopefully. “Do we have a budget for that?”
    Franklin had died in a fierce fire, which had been contained within his office on the sixth floor. The only things that remained were his desk, which Bree used in her Angelus office, and an old leather chair. So the new space would have to be furnished from scratch. “A small one,” she said. “Maybe you can find a few things at Second Hand Rows off Whitaker. Not too much—a little conference table for the corner window and a desk and a chair for me. We’ll keep most of the files here.”
    “The widow O’Rourke?” Petru rumbled. “She has offered a retainer? This should help the finances.”
    Bree set her coffee cup down, and then crumbled the remains of her piece of Lavinia’s cinnamon cake into even littler bits. “I’m still not sure we should take her on as a client.”
    “A conflict of interest, perhaps? If we are to represent the husband it would be against the widow’s interest?” Petru tapped his cane on the floor with a thoughtful air.
    “Well, he’s dead and she’s not,” Ron said crossly. “We’re not filing an appeal for her. We’ll be reviewing contracts and setting up leases. Two different areas of law entirely. You’re the paralegal. You should know that.”
    “I am ke-vite well aware of the areas of law in question,” Petru said. When he was upset, his Russian accent became more pronounced. “And as you are merely a secretary, I doubt that you should be offering an opinion at all.”
    “Stop,” Bree said. She had no idea what had started the two angels sparring with one another this time, but she wasn’t about to let it affect affairs in the office. “I’m not concerned with conflict of interest. I just don’t like the woman or the way she operates.” She held up a hand to forestall any protests. “I know. An advocate’s role is just that. We stand up for the client’s interests and we have no business passing judgment on personalities. But honestly, the way she stiffed that poor auctioneer was brutal. A client like that will try and stiff