Meeting Lilah Morgan (open to freelilah)

[a_sloane]

There were worse ways to pass one's time than to open up business negotations with a woman of mystery. Sloane had dealings with Wolfram and Hart before, mostly concerned with the Credit Dauphine cover for SD-6, but he himself, as a private person, had never been a client. Huge and ruthless organisations he could not control were not exactly trustworthy.

On the other hand, any lawyer serving for Wolfram and Hart would know their business, or would be dead. Lilah Morgan appeared to be very much alive, and rather intriguingly not listed as a lawyer acting in any current case, something which he had checked out, using the APO access to the relevant databases without hesitation. She had been head of the Los Angeles special projects department, as she had mentioned, but no activity was listed since. All of which opened up a can of interesting possibilities.

Arvin Sloane had no intention of telling a stranger just what he had in mind, but he decided some preliminary dealings, perhaps involving some of his less traceable bank accounts from his time with OmniFam, would be a good way to find out whether Lilah Morgan was the right person for what he privately termed "the project".

His pardon agreement banned him from any Rambaldi research, unless, he thought cynically, said research would be to the government's advantage. Well, there were other ways. Nadia's current state was due to a Rambaldi formula Elena had injected her with. It stood to reason that somewhere, in some manuscript by the Master which Sloane had somehow not managed to get hold on so far, there might be a clue for a cure. Of course, he had tapped all resources known to him by now. Except one. Wolfram and Hart was rumoured to have the greatest collection of manuscripts and artifacts known to man. And he needed something - or someone - to open that collection to him.

If Lilah Morgan turned out to be the wrong person, well. Then he would still have spent some hopefully agreeable hours dining at Orris with what a vague memory told him was an attractive brunette, and what her comments so far had shown to be an intelligent woman.

There were, indeed, worse ways to spend one's time.

Comments

[freelilah.livejournal.com]

Lilah's name was not listed with any current projects at Wolfram & Hart for the very simple reason that, as of the first of the year, she was officially no longer in the firm's employ. They had taken pains to explain that she wasn't fired but simply laid off or, as the British would say, redundant. (Why Lilah spent any time wondering what the British would say is a question best left for another time). A perpetuity clause was, as the Formerly-Human Resources officer unnecessarily explained, a tricky thing at the best of times. The clause was activated at the employee's death, at the employer's option, and the employee continued to serve the firm until such time as he or she was no longer needed. Due to -- she actually used these words -- a series of unfortunate events leading the Los Angeles office, particularly, to exceed its perpetuity quota for the decade, a certain number of employees would have to be let go and as Ms. Morgan was one of the last to decease, seniority-- etc., etc. So, they were basically telling her, she was being penalized for not being bitten by a zombie. She suspected it was all bullshit, and that she'd been doomed with the firm from the moment Wesley tried to burn her contract. As though she had wanted him to. As though that would have worked anyway, as though he had even thought it would work -- she rather suspected the man of preferring his grand gestures to be futile. They were safer that way.

Whatever the reason, Lilah was no longer in the good graces -- not to mention on the payroll -- of the firm. Lately, management had been claiming that they had the right to terminate, at wiil, the existence as well as the employment. But she wasn't particularly worried about that eventuality. The whole debacle was tied up in legal red tape that made Jarndyce v. Jarndyce look like The People's Court. By the time it was ever decided, assuming an apocalypse or seven hadn't intervened, Lilah intended to acquire an insurance policy by way of hard work and good old-fashioned extortion.

Meanwhile, a girl had to keep up appearances, not to mention staying busy. She didn't know much about Arvin Sloane, but that itself made him an interesting study. She hadn't been able to find out much about Sloane, and usually she could manage to dig up the goods on anyone she wanted, anytime. Sloane must have been engaged in some pretty unusual extracurricular activities for her to turn up such a blank slate.

At the very least, he should be an interesting study up close. And if she was lucky, he might offer to pick up the tab.

She entered the restaurant exactly one minute before the agreed time, and looked around for Sloane.

[freelilah.livejournal.com]

Lilah assumes Sloane's first remark to refer to himself. This man wastes no words. She has no idea, so far, as to the object of his faith, but Lilah has met many men of strong conviction and found them to have, whatever the belief, a good deal in common with each other. That is not the issue that concerns her.

"Ahh, but, dangerous to whom? That is the question." She says this with a hard look, implying As long as it's not me, we can do business.

Sloane then qualifies his answer, and immediately becomes much more interesting.

Lilah raises her glass to hide a smile. "God have mercy on the man who doubts what he's sure of?" She figures Sloane will either recognize the Springsteen quote and its reference to disguises, brilliant and otherwise, or he will give Lilah credit for the sentiment.

Bruce is, in any case, an improvement on her initial impulse, which was to say, Oh, but those men can be fun. Thinking of Wesley in those first weeks, so dislocated and bewildered, needing somewhere to put a lifetime's worth of shattered belief. Even toying with the notion that he might put it in her. It had turned out to be more complicated than that, of course. It always did.

They eat through the hors d'ouerves, and Lilah doesn't even notice the waiter. People in the service industry rarely intrude on her line of vision, once she has made reasonably sure that they aren't vampires.

In response to Sloane's reminiscence, she says, "Please. Go on." Far preferable to sliding into maudlin reflections about her father or, God forbid, Wesley. Besides, as she's already observed, there are no tangents or pointless asides with this man.