by Carsen Taite
“About that,” Campbell said. “I have a proposition for you.”
Grace cast a glance at Abby to try to get a read for what Campbell was about to propose, but all she got was a smile. “Okay, spill.”
“We’re all busy, but you’ve got the biggest caseload right now.”
Grace shook her head. “No offense, but I can’t hand off any of these clients right now. They’re all very high maintenance and if they think I’m not handling things personally, they’ll go to another firm where they have a partner with a full team of doting associates dedicated to their happiness.”
“Right,” Abby said. “We get it. And with the regulatory issues along with the litigation, it basically means you have double the workload. What if we could bring someone on board to help you out even if it was just on a temporary basis?”
“That could be great, but I’d need to run the numbers and we’d have to talk about how that would look. I’m not sure we could get a really skilled attorney to take a temporary position for the money we could offer right now.”
“What if I told you I’d already found someone?” Campbell said, looking at her watch. “In fact, she’s probably waking up in my spare bedroom right about now.”
“Wait, what?” Grace pushed through her foggy brain and wished she had another shot of espresso to bring clarity, but she had a feeling she knew exactly who Campbell was talking about. “Perry?”
“Yes. She would be perfect. I predict she’s bored already and she can’t leave the country until her passport comes in. She’ll take a temporary position because she thinks she doesn’t want to stick around, but in the meantime she could help you out and maybe, just maybe, she’ll realize her life is better back here in the States. I know it’s a big ask, but it would mean a lot to me if you could see your way clear to taking her on.”
Grace let out a deep breath as she contemplated her options. Perry was smart—she’d graduated at the top of her class—but getting good grades didn’t necessarily equate to being able to do the work and keep clients happy. But she had practiced law under some of the most adversarial conditions possible. Surely that would translate into being able to work with the Leightons and Hadleys of the world. And it wasn’t like some other candidate was going to pop up out of nowhere. And Perry was in town with nothing else to do. If the few days they’d spent together in London was any indication, it was clear they were able to get along. She took another breath and made her decision. “Okay, let’s do it.”
Campbell clapped her hands and Grace hoped the celebration wasn’t premature. What could go wrong?
* * *
At noon on the dot, Campbell’s doorbell rang, and Perry flung open the door and pulled her big brother, Justin, into a tight hug. “Man, it’s good to see you.”
Justin squeezed her hard. “You too, kiddo. I hear you’ve been getting into all kinds of trouble. Worldwide.”
“Didn’t Dad always say go big or go home?”
“Looks like you’re doing some of each now,” Justin said.
Perry started to correct him, to say Austin wasn’t home anymore, but she didn’t have the heart to break the mood. It was good to see him and hug him and hear his voice in person rather than via Skype. And after he’d worked so hard to be head of the household and keep their home after their parents died, she knew her words would hurt him to the core. Better to have this conversation after she confirmed her new assignment and already had a ticket to wherever in the world she was headed next. She pointed at the large duffle bag slung over his shoulder. “Are you moving into Campbell’s place too?”
“You’re hilarious.” He shoved the bag toward her. “I brought you some clothes from the stash you left in your old room. I figured you might need them.”
Perry peered inside at the clothes she’d stored at Justin’s place when she’d left the country and smiled when she spotted her favorite RBG T-shirt on top. “You have no idea. I picked up a few shirts in London, but I’m running low when it comes to pants and stuff. Just for this, I’m going to buy your lunch, and as a bonus I’ll tell you all about being rousted out of bed and escaping Crimea in a hidden compartment of a transport vehicle.”
“I’m not entirely sure I want to know the details, but I’ll take the broad strokes over good food. And I’m buying. Thai okay with you?”
She knew there was no sense arguing about who would pay. “Thai is perfect.”
A few minutes later, they were in the car headed toward the UT campus. Justin scored a parking spot and they walked through the doors of Madam Mam’s and Perry sniffed the air like a cartoon character dog following the scent of a nearby barbecue. “I love this place.”
Justin laughed. “Don’t I know it. You always picked it on your night to decide where we were going to eat. I thought you were going to turn into a curry.” He started to walk to the hostess station but stopped and turned back toward her. He continued to the hostess stand, and when she asked how many in the party, he held up three fingers.
“What’s up, Justin?” Perry asked, instantly curious. “You have someone special you want me to meet?”
“Not exactly,” he said, looking over her shoulder with a half smile. She turned to follow his gaze and saw Campbell walking toward them. “I was hoping we could have a family lunch,” he said. “You don’t mind if Campbell joins us do you?”
She knew she shouldn’t, but she did, mostly because it felt a bit like an ambush. If Campbell had been planning to join them, why hadn’t she mentioned it before she left this morning? Of course, she’d slept through Campbell leaving. Maybe Campbell was being kind by letting her sleep in and she was reading way too much into her appearance here. If she was going to stay in Austin for any length of time, she needed to figure out a way to be okay with Campbell’s micromanaging ways. “Of course it’s okay,” she said to Justin, mustering a half wave to Campbell to signal she was cool with it.
Campbell returned the wave and strode toward them. “I couldn’t resist crashing when Justin mentioned you were coming here. I hope it’s okay.”
“Sure,” Perry said. “The more the merrier. Although beware, I’ll be performing a taste test on whatever you order. I’m starving and I haven’t been here in forever.”
After they were seated and had ordered enough food for a party twice their size, Perry decided to get the uncomfortableness out of the way. “I know you two think I’m still a kid you can fib to, but I figure there’s a purpose behind this lunch besides making sure I get to enjoy some of the best Thai food outside of Thailand before I go back out into the world. Why don’t you go ahead and tell me what it is before the food gets here?”
She watched Justin and Campbell exchange glances, like they were trying to decide who should speak first, and then Campbell cleared her throat. “It’s true, I didn’t show up today simply for the food. I have an opportunity I wanted to discuss with you, and I really hope you’ll hear me out before you answer.”
Perry’s gut clenched at the word “opportunity” since it sounded like code for something she should probably rebel against. She flicked her eyes to Justin who was wearing his best, please try to make nice face and she channeled some of his calm demeanor. “Okay, let’s hear it.”
Campbell looked relieved at her response. “It’s been almost a year since we started the firm and things are going really well. We’re not quite ready to hire more permanent staff, but we do need some help to get us through a couple of labor-intensive cases.” She paused. “Like first year associate kind of help.”
Perry started to squirm in her chair, but she waited Campbell out rather than fire off a gut-level “no.”
“I’m talking deposition prep, document review. It’s grunt work, but it’s important. We’ll pay you well and there’s an endless supply of good coffee and donuts. It may take a month for you to get your new passport and I figured this would be a decent way to kill the time.”
Campbell had a point, but the idea of engaging in the kind of soul-crushing, m
ind-numbing tasks that most of her law school classmates were doing at big law firms all around the country made Perry nauseous, especially after she’d been on the front lines of major litigation in a foreign country—the kind that set precedent and changed lives. Campbell had a point though—she wasn’t going to be able to do anything for the next month, and it wasn’t like she was going to be happy sitting around waiting for the moment she could pick up her passport and get back to Lawyers For Change, but going from that level of responsibility to the role of an overpaid glorified clerk left her feeling hollow. “I don’t know,” she said, giving the most honest answer she could.
“I get it,” Campbell said. “But you’d be doing us a big favor. Grace mostly.”
Perry perked up at the mention of Grace’s name. She’d wondered off and on since they’d parted at the airport how Grace was doing and whether she’d called the insanely tall blonde she’d been talking to on the plane in what would surely be a big mistake. “Why Grace?”
“She’s got a couple of very demanding clients with pressing matters. She convinced them to come on board with us when she left her old firm, but they’re used to the level of service they get from bigger firms and we need to show them we can shoulder the work seamlessly if she wants to keep them. They both have litigation ramping up right now, so we’re going to have to hire someone to help out. I figured you’d be the perfect fit and you wouldn’t mind since Grace flew all the way to London to help you with your passport.”
Perry barely noticed the guilt trip. She did owe Grace a favor and they’d had a blast in London. The prospect of working directly with her was more enticing than doing grunt work in general, and for a brief moment, the image of Grace riding through the streets of London with her hair blowing in the breeze stirred decidedly unprofessional thoughts. Again.
“Look,” Campbell said. “I know you don’t want to do this, but—”
“I’ll do it,” Perry said, surprising herself and Campbell at the same time.
“Really?”
“Really, as long as everyone understands it’s not permanent. I’m doing everything I can to get my new passport as quickly as possible, and as soon as it gets here, I’m going back to my real job.”
Campbell sighed.
“I thought you’d be happy I said yes,” Perry said, surprised Campbell wasn’t celebrating the win.
Justin cleared his throat. “I think she was hoping you might stick around for the wedding.”
Damn. She kept forgetting Campbell and her desire to be traditional. When she was in Crimea, she’d figured she could make a last-minute decision about attending the wedding, but now that she was here in Austin, she’d be a lame sister if she didn’t stay. It felt like she was being trapped by the obligation, but she didn’t want to be a total jerk about it. “Tell you what. I promise I’ll be at the wedding. No matter what happens between now and then, but I’m not sure I can handle more than a month of pushing papers. Okay?”
“Okay.”
She couldn’t quite read Campbell’s expression, but it looked like part relief and part frustration, but either way, it made her want to change the subject. “I met Wynne this morning. Granted, I wasn’t very awake, but she seems cool.”
Campbell smiled. “She is. I’m very lucky.”
Perry grinned. “Yes, yes, you are.” She arched out of Campbell’s way as Campbell faux punched her while Justin laughed at the two of them tousling. She hated to admit it, but she’d missed them and the easy way they slipped back into family mode when they were together. Maybe sticking around for a month wouldn’t be too much of a hardship, especially since she was going to be working with Grace.
Chapter Eight
Monday morning, Grace rolled over and slapped at the alarm clock without opening her eyes, but the buzzing wouldn’t stop. She groaned and switched on the lamp beside her bed and stared at the clock, trying to figure out why her alarm was going off an hour before she’d set it. After a few fuzzy moments, she finally registered the sound was coming from her phone on the nearby dresser where she’d set it to keep her from hitting the snooze button repeatedly. She swung her feet out of bed and trudged across the room. She recognized the DC area code and answered the call. “One day you’re going to get the time difference thing down.”
Her comment was answered with a hearty laugh. “Probably not, but just think—while everyone else is sleeping, you can get a jump on the day. You’ll thank me later.”
“Sure, Dad. Whatever you say,” Grace said as she wandered into the kitchen to start the coffee maker. “Is there a particular reason for this call other than to push me to be a better person?”
“Your mom and I will be in town next weekend and we’d like to have dinner with you. Make a reservation wherever you want and send the details to your mother.”
“What if I have plans?”
“Like a date? If you’re serious about her, bring her with you so we can meet her. If it’s not serious, you can reschedule. We haven’t seen you for a while.”
Grace bit back a retort. She loved her father, but he was baiting her and she wasn’t going to fall for it. There wasn’t a date, but whether she confirmed or denied, she’d be giving up valuable, personal information. As a US senator, he’d willingly given up any pretense at a private life, and he seemed to think everyone else should do the same, but she wasn’t interested in subjecting a date to dinner with the family unless she was announcing an engagement, and even then it would be a maybe. And she certainly didn’t want to admit there were no dates of note on the horizon. “I’ll make a reservation and text Mom.”
“Perfect. Have a wonderful day!” He hung up before she could say good-bye and she recognized the move. Other people needed his attention and it was his duty to be there for them. Whatever. She could fill her parents in about the trip to London and how well the firm was doing at dinner.
She poured a cup of coffee, added cream, and curled into one of the barstools that lined the granite counter of her enormous, well-appointed kitchen. She should invite her parents over and break out the new set of All-Clad cookware Campbell had generously gifted her last month for her birthday, but hosting would prevent her from making a quick escape if the situation warranted. A few clicks on the phone later, she’d booked a reservation for three on Saturday night at Jeffrey’s, purposely picking a place more to her taste than his. It wasn’t a huge accomplishment, but checking the dinner reservation off her list did make her feel somewhat productive. Normally, she’d have a full workout in by now, but the whirlwind trip to England had thrown her sleep schedule into disarray. She made a mental note to look up tips for combating jet lag and idly wondered if Perry was suffering from the same issue.
Perry. She’d almost forgotten her agreement with Campbell. Perry was starting work this morning and if she didn’t do some planning, Perry would be standing around looking for something to do. At her last firm Grace had a ready bank of eager law school interns and junior associates willing and ready to do anything she asked in order to impress the senior partners, but she doubted Perry was going to display the same level of enthusiasm for the type of mundane tasks she needed her to do. If Campbell’s master plan was to get Perry to abandon traipsing around the world, working in dangerous places, boring wasn’t going to cut it. Grace would need to let Perry have a glimpse of how exciting litigation could be, and to do that, she’d need to include her in some more substantial work. Doing so wasn’t exactly going to lighten her own workload, but it would help Campbell out, and for that she was all in. Anything to take stress off her best friend in the run-up to the wedding.
An hour later, Grace walked into her office building, ready to tackle Mission Perry Clark. She was two steps in when she spotted a very dapper Perry engaged in banter with Graham, the office manager. A surprising development since Graham was usually very reserved with anyone he hadn’t met before.
“Hey, Grace,” Perry called out. “Come here and settle a friendly dispute, please.”
She approached cautiously. “Hi, Perry. Good morning, Graham.” She took a second to appraise Perry who’d shed her uniform of political T-shirts and cargo shorts in favor of tan chinos, a short sleeve white button-down, and a jade vest. “You look nice.”
“Thanks. Figured I should play the part, at least on the first day.”
Conscious she was still staring, Grace tore her gaze away. “What’s this dispute I’m supposed to settle?”
“Graham here insists mead is making a comeback and I say no. Unless of course you’re at a Renaissance faire and then feel free to put whatever you want in your tankard.”
“You may have lost me at tankard,” Grace said. “Give me a Holmegaard No. 5 any day of the week.”
“A what?”
“It’s a Danish glass, fire cut and polished by hand. Perfect for whiskey.”
“Ah.” Perry nodded. “A fancy-pants glass. I think I’ll stick with my tankard if it’s all the same to you. How about you, Graham?”
Grace stared him down, but the phone rang before he could answer, and he could not have looked more relieved to avoid the question. Grace turned back to Perry. “You ready to get started?” At Perry’s nod, Grace led the way back to her office and motioned to one of the chairs in front of her desk. “I don’t know what Campbell told you, but I have two important clients with looming matters. The first one is Leighton Industries and the other is Hadley Construction. Leighton is a product liability case, currently pending mediation, and if it doesn’t settle, we’re going straight to trial.”
“What’s the product?”
Grace paused for a second. “It’s a grocery cart. I know, I know,” she added at Perry’s dubious look. “The plaintiff’s case is crap, but she insists on going forward, and Leighton is unlikely to offer anything other than nuisance value.”
“And the other case?”
“Hadley Construction was served last week with a regulatory action by the state version of the EPA, and I’m fairly certain an EPA case is coming. The allegation is illegal dumping.”