When I Saw You

by Laura Branchflower

  “That was good,” he said as he pushed himself back into his underwear. “Man.” He blew out a stream of air.

  Lia leaned back in the seat, her tongue running along the torn skin of her inner lip. She glanced sideways at him after a few minutes of silence. “Do you want to go somewhere now?”

  “You know, I’m really beat.” He squeezed her thigh. “Why don’t we call it a night?”

  “Oh, okay.”

  “I’ll see you Friday night.” He reached over her and opened the passenger door. “You’ll be here, right?”

  “Sure.” She picked up her purse from the floor of the car. “I’ll see you Friday then.” She turned towards him, expecting a kiss, but he made no move to close the distance between them so she climbed out of the car into the cold December evening. “Bye,” she said before closing the door. Before she took two steps, he had shifted his car into drive and was skidding out of the parking lot.

  Lia didn’t bother asking Stan if the thousand-dollar bonus in her paycheck was correct Friday morning, but realized if they continued, she’d be making close to one hundred thousand dollars per year and be debt free by April. Unfortunately, the knowledge did nothing to quell the unease she felt after her date with Eric, if giving a guy a blowjob could even be considered a date.

  “What’s wrong?” Claudia’s voice broke into her brooding.

  “Nothing,” Lia lied, lifting her head. “I’m tired.”

  “Me too,” Claudia said as she sat down in Carmen’s chair. “I had an interview yesterday in Boston.”

  “You did?” Lia forced thoughts of Eric from her mind.

  “I called in sick,” she whispered. “They paid to fly me up for the day.”

  “How did it go?”

  She glanced around before responding. “I start the first week in January.”

  “They offered you a job after only one interview?”

  “Shh,” Claudia said, looking around. “I don’t want anyone to know yet.”

  “Oh, sorry.” Lia grimaced.

  “It’s okay. No one heard you.” Her eyes returned to Lia’s. “Actually, it was my second interview. I interviewed the first time when I was there last week.” She leaned back in her chair and crossed her legs. “I’m not planning to give my notice here until the last minute. I don’t want it to affect my bonus pay.”

  “So you’re not taking any time off between jobs?”

  “No. I can’t afford to. I’m taking a big pay cut, so I’d like to make as much money as I can over the next couple weeks so I can pay some bills.”

  “Why are you taking a pay cut?”

  “Because I’m making a lot of money here and at my level there’s no way I’m going to bring in that kind of money somewhere else.”

  “Why not? If Zurtech’s willing to pay you that much, then—”

  “Trust me. No one’s going to pay me what Zurtech does.”

  It was 10:20 p.m. when Lia parked her Honda next to Eric’s Porsche in the small parking lot outside the Zurtech house. She stared at his car, feeling a renewed sense of disgust at her behavior two nights before. She thought about going home, not wanting to have to see him, but knew she had to confront him eventually.

  She spotted him as soon as she entered the house. He was across the room at the bar, laughing at something Carmen was whispering in his ear, and then he was following her through a door to their right and they were out of sight. Lia took a step in their direction, intending to let Eric know she’d arrived, when Kay stopped her.

  “Surprise!”

  “Kay! Hi.” Lia smiled. “What are you doing here?”

  “My husband wanted to come.”

  “Oh, he’s here?” Lia looked around.

  “He’s in the back room playing pool and discussing business.” Kay leaned forward. “I met Eric Nettles. He’s really cute.”

  Lia nodded, her eyes glancing towards the door he had just exited. “I just arrived, so I haven’t spoken to him yet.”

  “He seemed nice.”

  It took Lia over five minutes to untangle herself from Kay, and then she was opening the same door she saw Eric walk through minutes earlier and stepping out into a dimly lit hallway leading to a staircase. She made her way upstairs, the sound of the music from the main room fading with every step until she could no longer hear it, and then she was walking down a hallway and looking into one empty bedroom after another.

  She was about to turn around when she heard Eric’s baritone voice, and then she recognized the sound of Claudia and then Carmen. She approached a closed door, her eyebrows pulled together in confusion. “Hello?” She knocked lightly on the door.

  “This room’s taken,” Eric said.

  “It’s Lia,” she said, putting her hand on the doorknob and slowly opening the door. “I was—” She stopped midsentence, pulled the door closed, and then she was covering her mouth and running towards the bathroom.

  7

  Joseph, along with the other eight partners in the DC office, was in the midst of a heated discussion over whether to represent two former female employees of an international company headquartered in Northern Virginia who claimed part of their job responsibilities was to have sex with important clients. The women served as account executives in the Marketing Department and mainly functioned as liaisons between the company and new and established clients.

  “This doesn’t even warrant discussion,” Tony said. “We don’t do sexual harassment.”

  “Wait a second,” Kevin said. “We are not in agreement over whether this is sexual harassment.”

  “We have three ingredients here,” Joseph said. “Sex, workplace, women.” He held up three fingers. “That sounds like sexual harassment to me.”

  “This is much more complex than you two are portraying,” Kevin argued. “Zurtech has 35,000 employees in the US, 20,000 at their facility in Silicon Valley and another 15,000 in Reston. This practice could be widespread throughout the company. They are hiring young women fresh out of college, placing them in marketing departments, and then giving them bonuses based on how much sex they have with corporate clients. With a base salary of $50,000, one of these women took home an additional $100,000 in bonuses last year.”

  “If what you’re saying is true, this is prostitution,” Tony said. “These women are freely having sex and being paid generously to do so. This sounds like a case for the DA’s office.”

  “That may be true for these two women, but what about the other women who work in these departments? Do you believe every woman Zurtech hires for marketing willingly becomes a prostitute? This has the potential to be a huge class action suit.”

  Tony laughed aloud. “Now we are back to a sexual harassment case. We don’t do, have never done, and aren’t about to start representing these types of clients.”

  “Tony’s right,” Joseph said. “This case is too dirty. Tell these women to go to the police.”

  “Can you imagine what’s going to happen to Zurtech stock when this comes out?” one of the junior partners asked. “Their stock is currently up twenty percent for the year.”

  “Not a stock I want in my portfolio,” Tony said. “Let’s move on.”

  “Do you want to grab lunch?” Tony asked Joseph as the partners were filing out of his office an hour later.

  “I’ll take a rain check,” Joseph said. “I have to run. We’ll talk later.”

  Moments later, Joseph was in the office of the associate who had conducted the interviews of the Zurtech women. “I want all your notes,” he said.

  “Kevin told me to call them. He said we aren’t going forward with it,” the young associate said.

  “We’re not, but I’m going to personally make the calls.”

  “Oh, okay.” He held out the file.

  “Thanks.” Joseph took the file and returned to his office.

  “Martha,” he called several minutes later.

  “Yes?” She stepped into his office.

  “I want to meet with these tw
o women separately.” He held out a piece of paper. “Try to schedule something for this Saturday or Sunday.”

  “But we’re closed on weekends.” She looked down at the piece of paper.

  “That’s alright. I’ll be in.”

  “Do you need me to come—”

  “No,” he interrupted, shaking his head.

  “Okay. I’ll arrange it.”

  “Thank you. Oh, and one more thing,” he said before she was out of his office. “Let’s keep this between us and bill any of your time involved to general admin.”

  “May I ask why?” she asked.

  “No.”

  At 11:00 Saturday morning Joseph, dressed in a dark suit, was sitting behind the receptionist’s desk in front of the elevator awaiting the arrival of one of the two women involved in the Zurtech suit.

  He slowly came to his feet as the elevator doors opened. “Ms. Kelly?” He met the eyes of the young woman coming off the elevator.

  “Yes.” She smiled. She looked like a dark-haired Scarlett Johansson. Not even her conservative business suit could detract from the voluptuous body beneath.

  “I’m Joseph Craig.” He walked out from behind the receptionist’s desk and held out his hand.

  “Please call me Claudia.” She returned his handshake, the female interest in her eyes unmistakable.

  “Thanks for coming in on a Saturday. With the holidays approaching, it was the only time I could fit you in. I didn’t want to wait until after the New Year to talk.” He led her down the hall to his office.

  “I was surprised you wanted to see me and Lia separately,” she said before preceding him into his large office.

  He helped her out of her coat before gesturing with his hand towards one of the leather club chairs in front of his desk. “I didn’t call you and Ms. Merrick in together because I want to hear each of your stories without influence from each other.” He took a seat behind his desk. “You experienced similar treatment at Zurtech, but at different times, with different people. In all likelihood, I’m going to handle your cases separately. At least at this point I think I am.” He opened the file on his desk.

  “The gentleman I talked to before indicated this might be a class action suit.”

  “Maybe.” Joseph looked up from the file, meeting her eyes. “But that hasn’t been decided, and even if we choose to take that course, I would still meet with each client separately.”

  “I understand. It’s…” She paused as she crossed one leg over the other and sat up straighter in the chair. “We weren’t sure about your rates, and we thought if we did it together…” She trailed off.

  “I’m sorry. I assumed someone discussed the rates with you at your initial meeting,” he said. “Regardless of whether we handle your cases together or separately, our rates would be the same. This will cost you nothing unless we get something from Zurtech. In other words, we take this on at a risk to ourselves and do all the up-front work at no charge. If we win a settlement, our firm takes forty percent off the top. If, on the other hand, we are unsuccessful, you owe us nothing and we basically have to write off the time and money we spend preparing.”

  “Is the forty percent normal?”

  “For law firms of our caliber it is.”

  “It seems high.”

  “It’s not negotiable.” He leaned back in his chair. “My hourly rate is a thousand dollars. We can’t afford to invest our time in speculative cases such as yours without the possibility of a large payoff.” He watched her. “Would you like to take some more time to think it over?”

  “No. I want you.” She met his eyes.

  He returned her stare. “Good,” he finally said, remaining professional. “Let’s get started then.” He reached into the top drawer of his desk and removed a small digital recorder. “Do you mind if I record our conversation?”

  “No. I don’t mind.”

  “Okay. I know you’ve been through this once before with my colleagues, but since I’m taking the lead on this case, I’d like you to tell me, from the beginning, exactly what happened.”

  “Okay.” She nodded. “A Zurtech representative came to Boston University my senior year to participate in a job fair. I was graduating that spring with a degree in journalism and public relations, and they made it sound like an exciting place to work.”

  “This was four years ago?”

  “It will be four in May.”

  “And do you recall the name of the recruiter you met with from Zurtech?”

  “Yes, Cecile Mann.”

  “Okay.” He jotted the name on his legal pad. “How did she describe the position? What made it sound exciting?”

  “I was being hired to work in this exclusive division in their Marketing Department that was responsible for keeping Zurtech’s most elite clients happy. I was going to be paid to party with rich and powerful men.”

  “So they weren’t hiring you to sell?”

  “They were hiring me to sell brand loyalty. It was the B2B’s job to entertain the elite-level clients. To make them feel loyal to Zurtech.”

  “B2B stands for business to business?”

  “Yes.” She nodded. “That’s what we’re called.”

  “And you accepted the position?”

  “Yes. They offered me forty thousand dollars a year and paid for my relocation from Boston to Northern Virginia.”

  “And how did that compute with what your classmates were being offered?”

  “It was fine. My grades weren’t the best, and Zurtech was a respected company. Some of my friends with better grades interviewed for the position also, but didn’t get it.”

  “Were they as attractive as you?”

  “No,” she said, her lips turning up in a smile.

  “How soon after you started did you realize you were being hired to do more than entertain?”

  “In retrospect, I probably should have known right away, but I think it took me a year to really understand what was happening,” she said.

  “A year?” He looked down at the file. “It was my understanding the sex started much earlier.” He began flipping through the file.

  “It did. It started after my third reception, but I didn’t understand at the time that the company was encouraging us to have sex.”

  He looked up from the file. “You were having sex with the clients, but you didn’t know Zurtech wanted you to?”

  “I was having a relationship with one client.”

  “What kind of relationship exactly?”

  “I don’t know.” She shrugged. “I was young. At the time, I thought he loved me.”

  “So you were in a romantic relationship with this client?”

  “I don’t know how romantic it actually was. We had a lot of sex.”

  “And where did this sex take place?”

  “The first time was in Zurtech’s corporate apartment. That was the night we met.”

  “How did you end up in the corporate apartment together?”

  “I don’t remember exactly. There was a reception that night at the Ritz-Carlton in Tyson’s Corner. I had too much to drink.” She shook her head. “When I woke up the next morning we were in bed together at the apartment.”

  “And then after that first night, you saw him exclusively?”

  “Yes. For the next eleven months, I only slept with Alan West.”

  Joseph’s eyes widened in surprise. “Alan West as in West to East Communications?” Alan West was the CEO of one of the largest telecommunications companies in the country.

  “That’s the one.” She readjusted her position in the chair.

  “He’s married, isn’t he?”

  “Yes.” She nodded. “He was then and as far as I know he is now.”

  “Where did the sex take place?”

  “In the beginning it took place at the corporate apartment and then later at the Zurtech House.”

  “The Zurtech House?”

  “Zurtech bought a 10,000-square-foot house on several acres of lan
d in Reston about three years ago. That’s where most of the receptions occur. And there are about six bedrooms on the second floor of the house.”

  He wrote the word “brothel” on his notepad. “How often did you see West?”

  “It varied, but probably twice a week. It all depended on when the receptions occurred.”

  “Did all of your meetings take place on Zurtech property?”

  “Or at Zurtech-hosted functions.”

  “Like?” he prompted.

  “Football games, concerts, cruises. I knew he was married, so I figured it was a convenient cover. We had a place to meet and have sex.” She shook her head. “I was an idiot. I never realized what was going on.”

  “And what was going on?”

  “I was being offered as a perk to an elite client.” Her gaze shifted to the window, and she didn’t speak for several seconds. “I’m not really sure, but I think I was supposed to understand from the beginning.” Her gaze returned to his. “After I started sleeping with Alan, bonuses began showing up in my paychecks.”

  “And you didn’t receive any before then?”

  “No.”

  “Do you remember how much these bonuses were?”

  “I know exactly how much they were.” She reached for her briefcase. “I kept all my pay stubs.” She pulled the case onto her lap and opened it up, extracting a two-inch stack of check-sized papers held together with a rubber band. “They’re in order of date.” She held them out.

  He took the pile from her hand and removed the rubber band, his eyes quickly scanning the first twenty-five or so stubs. “You were paid every Friday?” he asked, not looking up from his perusal.

  “Yes.”

  “Your first bonus was seven hundred and fifty dollars?”

  “That sounds right.”

  “And then you continued to receive between seven hundred fifty and a thousand for….” He continued to flip through receipts.

  “Eleven months,” she said.

  “At the time, why did you think you were receiving these bonuses?” His gaze returned to her.

  She shrugged. “I thought they liked my work.”