Page 120 of All Our Nevers

“Exactly right. You are gonna leave.”

“What?” he snaps.

I tisk. “Please watch your tone in my office.”

The office he thinks should’ve belonged to him—a soft spot to press on.

“My tone? You’re the one on some weird power trip. Will you just tell me whatever this is about so I can go?”

“It’s about your performance on the InstaLooks case, actually. Your mistakes were egregious.”

“Mistakes? What mistakes? I crushed that case. It’s not my fault the judge was a bitch.”

“Woah, woah, woah.” I make a show of flinching back, but it’s all controlled. This is exactly what I expected from him, after all. “Language, colleague. I wouldn’t want anyone in this office to think you disrespect intelligent women when they disagree with you.”

“You’re kidding, right?” He’s standing now, a gelled lock of red hair falling across his forehead, slicing through the professional facade. “That case was perfect. Everything was by the book. I even checked my research with AI.”

I can’t help it. I burst out laughing. “That explains so much.”

“Excuse me?”

I stand to mirror him, still quelling my laughter as I thump a huge binder of paperwork across the mahogany of my desk. “Okay. Where shall we start?”

Then I lay it all out, backed by evidence in black and white. The plaintiff witnesses he chose not to depose, leading to surprise after surprise in trial. The witnesses who were deposed and had countless inconsistencies between their testimony, all of which Connor either didn’t notice or chose not to pursue. Most damning of all, the case law precedent he seemed completely unaware of until opposing counsel raised it. It’s so bad that if I didn’t know he was a lazy, incompetent fuck, I would assume he didn’t want to win the case.

Still he insists, “Owen, come on. Anyone stuck with this case would’ve done the same thing. The precedent was shit and the plaintiffs were sneaky assholes. Nobody could’ve seen that stuff coming.”

“I adamantly disagree,” I say, closing the file. “And moreover, it wasn’t even a lawyer who first discovered these issues. It was my girlfriend.”

“Your girlfriend was looking through confidential legal files? That’s a fireable offen—”

“Oh no, everything Amelia looked through was public record after the case was decided. Even without legal training, someone as smart as her could tell you’d screwed up. Severely.”

“Why…? What…? Your girlfriend was looking through my case files? Did you tell her to do that?”

“Oh no, I could never tell Amelia to do anything she didn’t want to do. She’s very independent. Hard-working. Not afraid to get her hands dirty and make sure things are done right. Believe me, if you met her, you’d understand. Oh wait, I’m sorry, I think you have met her.”

“I have?”

“Though you might know her as Lia.” I pause for effect, then say, “Lia Mercado.”

Connor’s face blanches.

“That’s right,” I say, leaning across the desk, coming nose-to-nose with him as a bit of rage bubbles to the surface. “And you’re the spineless fuck who threatened her and choked her, never got over her, and came crawling back eight years later only to stalk and harass a woman who was way out of your league to begin with. Isn’t that right?”

“She said I’m stalking her? Are you serious? She gave me her address.” He’s leaning away—defensive, pathetic.

“Yeah, I don’t think she did. And you know who else won’t think she did? The judge who’s gonna review her restraining order case.”

“This is bullshit,” he says but there’s no bravado in it. He’s a shivering husk, a coward through and through.

“Is it? Would you like to try to prove it’s bullshit in the public eye? Or…” I reach lazily into a drawer, making him wait for it. “Would you rather sign this consent agreement to the restraining order and have it all go away?” I pull out the pre-written document, placing it with threatening slowness atop the desk.

“I’m not signing anything. I didn’t do anything wrong.”

And that makes me genuinely laugh. Because I may personally hate the guy, but he’s also objectively a bad lawyer.

“It’s a consent agreement without a finding, Connor. You should know you can agree to the terms of the restraining order without admitting fault. I mean, according to you, she’s crazy, right? And you don’t want to go near her again, right? So why wouldn’t you sign it?”