Confessions of a Litigation God by Sawyer Bennett
Page 7
Standing from my desk, I walk over to the mini-fridge built into one of my bookcases. I pull out a bottle of water, holding one up for Mac, but she shakes her head to decline.
“Train accident,” I tell her as I walk back to my desk and sit down. “Mrs. Sanderson and her kids were on a train. They were all killed when a truck driver who was drunk off his ass got his rig stuck on the tracks. Train couldn’t stop. Kids and mom died a fiery death. ”
“Oh,” she says, her eyes swimming in sympathy. “That’s terrible. But hey… you should be happy. What a settlement!”
“It was worth more,” I tell her flatly, still a little burned up that we settled for that amount.
“Then why didn’t you settle for more? Seems like you had the upper hand. ”
“Mrs. Sanderson’s husband doesn’t want to go to court. At all. He says he just doesn’t have it in him to relive the pain of what happened. So he gave me the authority to take the one million they were offering today and told me to make the case go away. ”
“So you were bluffing just then?”
“That I was,” I confirm.
Before Mac can ask any other questions about the case, I decide to lay it on the line. “I’m not happy about you working here. ”
Those green eyes of hers go a shade paler and look to be tinged with frost. The coolness of her voice matches her stare. “I gathered that by your icy welcome this morning. I get that you’re mad about it. I guess I just can’t figure out why?”
“You can’t figure out why I’m mad?” I ask incredulously, and then lower my voice to a growl. “How about because I had my tongue between your legs two days ago, or the fact we both almost overdosed on orgasms, or maybe it’s because I got a f**king hard-on the minute you walked in that conference room door? Take your pick… there are a variety of reasons why I’m mad. ”
Yeah… didn’t mean to admit my hard-on to her, but f**k… it pissed me off the way my body reacted to her so violently. I expect Mac to be cowed by my words, maybe to tremble or shed a tear.
Instead, she says, “I’m not sure why this is a problem? We spent a night together. It’s over. We forget about it, and we go on. ”
It takes every bit of strength I possess not to leap on her right then and there, push her to the ground, pull her skirt up, rip her panties off, and f**k that silly nonsense right out of her head. There’s no way I could forget that night, and I’m pissed that she sure as hell acts like she can.
So I retaliate. “I don’t need this shit in my business. I don’t need you walking around all doe-eyed at me, hoping for something more. ”
Now, did I think Mac would do something like that? Hell no.
Did I maybe subconsciously hope she’d do that? I plead the Fifth.
“What?” she practically shrieks at me. “What makes you think I’ll be doing that?”
“I’m just anticipating it. It’s a woman thing,” I tell her with a shrug of my shoulders. I really don’t think that, but her calm assuredness in the face of something that is really freaking me out is pissing me off even more. It’s time to set her back on her heels a little.
Mac, though, isn’t going to wait around for that. She shoots out of her chair, leaning over my desk and slapping her palms on the wood surface. “Listen, you jackass,” she sneers at me. “I can conduct myself in a businesslike manner, and yeah… you got me to scream a few times the other night. But I can guarantee you—you’re not the only man in New York that can accomplish that feat. I’m certainly not in any danger of walking around all… What did you call it? ‘Doe-eyed?’ I’m not even sure what the f**k that is. ”
Holy Christ, that’s f**king hot. She stands there, eyes looking all wild and her chest heaving with the exertion of her anger, and I want to bend her over my desk and f**k her hard.
“One last thing,” she says, and I blink my eyes to focus on her rather than the p**n I was inventing in my head. “I’ll do my job, and I’ll do it well. But if you so much as try to fire me or treat me any differently because of our little encounter, I’ll sue you for discrimination faster than you can blink. Are we clear?”
She is absolutely sexy as hell in all of her raging glory, but I don’t like to be threatened so that causes me to lock my jaw and glare at her. Still, I manage to give her what she wants. “Crystal clear. ”
Mac doesn’t say another word, just spins on her heel and marches out of the room.
Leaving me with my eyes pinned to her ass and another hard-on between my legs.
Chapter 6
I love working on Saturday. The office is usually completely empty of people, the silence hangs thick in the air. I can work with abandon, not worrying about getting interrupted a million times a day. Usually, I can condense almost an entire week of work in a good, ten-hour Saturday if I really concentrate.
Except, I can’t concentrate for shit. A certain woman by the name of Mac Dawson is haunting my thoughts. Has been all week, actually, but today, it’s even worse because I know she’s down in her office working as well on this beautiful Saturday.
I’m happy at least that the week got progressively better, and Mac and I made amends of sorts. I actually extended the olive branch a few days after I called her “doe-eyed” and she threatened to sue me.
I went to her office and, after she invited me in, said, “Look… I want to apologize for what I said the other day. I was more than a little unsettled when you walked in, and it had nothing to do with that bullshit about you being ‘doe-eyed’. In fact, I’m not even sure what the hell that means myself. ”
She just stared at me impassively, and I think she was making me work for my forgiveness. Still, I made sure she really understood my position. “It’s important to me that my business stay business, and my personal remain personal. Understand?”
“Totally,” she agreed.
“I mean… the other night, we were explosive,” I said.
“To the moon,” she added on.
“And that has no business in this office. ”
“No place at all. ”
“No matter how hot that experience was. ”
“It’s not even an issue. ”
“So… we’re in agreement?”
“I have no clue,” she said with a smile, and I had to fight the urge not to return it. “But if what you’re trying to say is that what we had was amazing, but that it is over and done with, then I’m in full agreement. ”
“Then we can put that in the past and never think about it again?” I asked to make sure we were on the same page.
“It’s already gone from my mind,” she said with a confident nod of her head.
So apologies were made and we agreed not to talk or think about it ever again.
But give me a f**king break. We might not be talking about it but I know every night this week I’ve gone home and jerked off, thinking about that one night I had with her. I have to wonder if she was doing the same or if she has seriously put it out of her mind.
I’ve thought a lot about this fascination I have with her, and at first, I thought it all boiled down to sex. Amazing, phenomenal sex. But the more I reflect on my interactions with Mac this week, the more I realize that I’m attracted to a whole lot more than just her body and the way she can make me come. She intrigues me on so many other levels.
During a meeting this week with Lorraine and Mac, I saw firsthand how Lorraine tried to bully Mac and how she tries to hold herself out as Mac’s boss, which isn’t how things work around here. Lorraine is in a different division, and I’m Mac’s immediate supervisor. It was exhausting watching Lorraine try to jockey for some type of position or hold over her, and I was relieved when I asked her to go ahead and leave so I could talk to Mac about the Jackson case she had brought with her to the firm.
When the door closed behind Lorraine, I asked her, “Is she always like that?”
“Yeah,” she said with an almost embar
rassed admission.
“Well, if you have any problems with her, just let me know. ”
“Not going to happen,” she said bluntly.
My eyebrows shot up. “Excuse me?”
“I can handle Lorraine on my own. I won’t be running to you if I have an issue. ”
I said nothing more than, “Suit yourself,” but that right there garnered more respect from me than anything she had done up to that point, and with each passing day, she was becoming more and more intriguing to my senses.
Mac brought me up to speed on her Jackson case. It’s going to be a tough fight to get justice for her client, who suffered a traumatic brain injury. The other side claims Mr. Jackson was speeding when their client, who was driving a tractor-trailer, turned left in front of him causing a head on collision. They also claim Mr. Jackson didn’t have his headlights on. Both of these issues are tough, but they can be fought with the right expert witnesses. I told Mac that she would need a biomechanical engineer and an accident reconstructionist to get the job done.
Just before our meeting wrapped up on the Jackson case, I told her, “You know this case is a major uphill battle. ”
“Yeah… I sort of figured that out when seven other law firms turned it down,” she said glumly.
“Then why did you take it?”
Mac chewed on her bottom lip, considering her answer for a moment. Then her eyes filled with resolve and she said, “I just really liked Miranda and Larry Jackson. I felt sorry for them, and they remind me of my parents. Strong, hardworking… they didn’t deserve this, and their life has been ruined because of it. I know those are stupid reasons to take a case…” she had trailed off, seemingly a bit embarrassed by her reasoning.
So, probably my downfall ultimately will be due to the fact that Mac has a heart of gold, which only amps up the attraction. I know I may come off as an ass**le more than ninety-five percent of the time, but the truth is, I have a big heart too. I just don’t let women in it. No, all of my heart is spent on just a few things… my family, which includes my amazing mom and dad who live in eastern Pennsylvania, my seven-year-old son, Gabe, and my law practice. And I’m not talking about love for the business of law. I’m talking about my love for the passion of law. I chose to devote my career to helping people achieve justice. I’ve represented people from all walks of life that have had horrific things happen to them. They were then spit upon by an unfair system with no one to take up their fight. That’s where I come in, and the only way you can effectively do that is to really have love for your clients. For their pain, their misery, and their despair.
I take it all on. I’ve cried in private when the story is too tragic. I’ve spent countless of hours and had many sleepless nights, making sure I’m doing my best to protect them. When I win, I share in their triumph. When I lose, I keenly feel their anguish, because it becomes my anguish.
Mac is essentially the same. She took an improbable case because her client didn’t deserve what happened to him. Didn’t matter she would have a huge fight… she wasn’t about to let the wrong go unanswered.
And that right there probably fated me to not be able to let her go from my mind.
Because she’s me.
I recognize in her the same qualities that fuel my passion for the law, and that right there has her earning even more of my respect. That makes her all the more sexy and desirable.
Yeah… I’m not going to be able to let her go from my mind, but I’m still resolved that I won’t have her again physically. I just can’t go there since she’s my employee. Not to mention, I’m still firmly against the whole concept of sleeping with just one woman. It sort of defeats the whole “angry, loner, I’ve-been-stomped-on-by-love” vibe I have going.
Standing from my desk, I walk over to the mini-fridge built into one of my bookcases. I pull out a bottle of water, holding one up for Mac, but she shakes her head to decline.
“Train accident,” I tell her as I walk back to my desk and sit down. “Mrs. Sanderson and her kids were on a train. They were all killed when a truck driver who was drunk off his ass got his rig stuck on the tracks. Train couldn’t stop. Kids and mom died a fiery death. ”
“Oh,” she says, her eyes swimming in sympathy. “That’s terrible. But hey… you should be happy. What a settlement!”
“It was worth more,” I tell her flatly, still a little burned up that we settled for that amount.
“Then why didn’t you settle for more? Seems like you had the upper hand. ”
“Mrs. Sanderson’s husband doesn’t want to go to court. At all. He says he just doesn’t have it in him to relive the pain of what happened. So he gave me the authority to take the one million they were offering today and told me to make the case go away. ”
“So you were bluffing just then?”
“That I was,” I confirm.
Before Mac can ask any other questions about the case, I decide to lay it on the line. “I’m not happy about you working here. ”
Those green eyes of hers go a shade paler and look to be tinged with frost. The coolness of her voice matches her stare. “I gathered that by your icy welcome this morning. I get that you’re mad about it. I guess I just can’t figure out why?”
“You can’t figure out why I’m mad?” I ask incredulously, and then lower my voice to a growl. “How about because I had my tongue between your legs two days ago, or the fact we both almost overdosed on orgasms, or maybe it’s because I got a f**king hard-on the minute you walked in that conference room door? Take your pick… there are a variety of reasons why I’m mad. ”
Yeah… didn’t mean to admit my hard-on to her, but f**k… it pissed me off the way my body reacted to her so violently. I expect Mac to be cowed by my words, maybe to tremble or shed a tear.
Instead, she says, “I’m not sure why this is a problem? We spent a night together. It’s over. We forget about it, and we go on. ”
It takes every bit of strength I possess not to leap on her right then and there, push her to the ground, pull her skirt up, rip her panties off, and f**k that silly nonsense right out of her head. There’s no way I could forget that night, and I’m pissed that she sure as hell acts like she can.
So I retaliate. “I don’t need this shit in my business. I don’t need you walking around all doe-eyed at me, hoping for something more. ”
Now, did I think Mac would do something like that? Hell no.
Did I maybe subconsciously hope she’d do that? I plead the Fifth.
“What?” she practically shrieks at me. “What makes you think I’ll be doing that?”
“I’m just anticipating it. It’s a woman thing,” I tell her with a shrug of my shoulders. I really don’t think that, but her calm assuredness in the face of something that is really freaking me out is pissing me off even more. It’s time to set her back on her heels a little.
Mac, though, isn’t going to wait around for that. She shoots out of her chair, leaning over my desk and slapping her palms on the wood surface. “Listen, you jackass,” she sneers at me. “I can conduct myself in a businesslike manner, and yeah… you got me to scream a few times the other night. But I can guarantee you—you’re not the only man in New York that can accomplish that feat. I’m certainly not in any danger of walking around all… What did you call it? ‘Doe-eyed?’ I’m not even sure what the f**k that is. ”
Holy Christ, that’s f**king hot. She stands there, eyes looking all wild and her chest heaving with the exertion of her anger, and I want to bend her over my desk and f**k her hard.
“One last thing,” she says, and I blink my eyes to focus on her rather than the p**n I was inventing in my head. “I’ll do my job, and I’ll do it well. But if you so much as try to fire me or treat me any differently because of our little encounter, I’ll sue you for discrimination faster than you can blink. Are we clear?”
She is absolutely sexy as hell in all of her raging glory, but I don’t like to be threatened so that causes me to lock my jaw and glare at her. Still, I manage to give her what she wants. “Crystal clear. ”
Mac doesn’t say another word, just spins on her heel and marches out of the room.
Leaving me with my eyes pinned to her ass and another hard-on between my legs.
Chapter 6
I love working on Saturday. The office is usually completely empty of people, the silence hangs thick in the air. I can work with abandon, not worrying about getting interrupted a million times a day. Usually, I can condense almost an entire week of work in a good, ten-hour Saturday if I really concentrate.
Except, I can’t concentrate for shit. A certain woman by the name of Mac Dawson is haunting my thoughts. Has been all week, actually, but today, it’s even worse because I know she’s down in her office working as well on this beautiful Saturday.
I’m happy at least that the week got progressively better, and Mac and I made amends of sorts. I actually extended the olive branch a few days after I called her “doe-eyed” and she threatened to sue me.
I went to her office and, after she invited me in, said, “Look… I want to apologize for what I said the other day. I was more than a little unsettled when you walked in, and it had nothing to do with that bullshit about you being ‘doe-eyed’. In fact, I’m not even sure what the hell that means myself. ”
She just stared at me impassively, and I think she was making me work for my forgiveness. Still, I made sure she really understood my position. “It’s important to me that my business stay business, and my personal remain personal. Understand?”
“Totally,” she agreed.
“I mean… the other night, we were explosive,” I said.
“To the moon,” she added on.
“And that has no business in this office. ”
“No place at all. ”
“No matter how hot that experience was. ”
“It’s not even an issue. ”
“So… we’re in agreement?”
“I have no clue,” she said with a smile, and I had to fight the urge not to return it. “But if what you’re trying to say is that what we had was amazing, but that it is over and done with, then I’m in full agreement. ”
“Then we can put that in the past and never think about it again?” I asked to make sure we were on the same page.
“It’s already gone from my mind,” she said with a confident nod of her head.
So apologies were made and we agreed not to talk or think about it ever again.
But give me a f**king break. We might not be talking about it but I know every night this week I’ve gone home and jerked off, thinking about that one night I had with her. I have to wonder if she was doing the same or if she has seriously put it out of her mind.
I’ve thought a lot about this fascination I have with her, and at first, I thought it all boiled down to sex. Amazing, phenomenal sex. But the more I reflect on my interactions with Mac this week, the more I realize that I’m attracted to a whole lot more than just her body and the way she can make me come. She intrigues me on so many other levels.
During a meeting this week with Lorraine and Mac, I saw firsthand how Lorraine tried to bully Mac and how she tries to hold herself out as Mac’s boss, which isn’t how things work around here. Lorraine is in a different division, and I’m Mac’s immediate supervisor. It was exhausting watching Lorraine try to jockey for some type of position or hold over her, and I was relieved when I asked her to go ahead and leave so I could talk to Mac about the Jackson case she had brought with her to the firm.
When the door closed behind Lorraine, I asked her, “Is she always like that?”
“Yeah,” she said with an almost embar
“Well, if you have any problems with her, just let me know. ”
“Not going to happen,” she said bluntly.
My eyebrows shot up. “Excuse me?”
“I can handle Lorraine on my own. I won’t be running to you if I have an issue. ”
I said nothing more than, “Suit yourself,” but that right there garnered more respect from me than anything she had done up to that point, and with each passing day, she was becoming more and more intriguing to my senses.
Mac brought me up to speed on her Jackson case. It’s going to be a tough fight to get justice for her client, who suffered a traumatic brain injury. The other side claims Mr. Jackson was speeding when their client, who was driving a tractor-trailer, turned left in front of him causing a head on collision. They also claim Mr. Jackson didn’t have his headlights on. Both of these issues are tough, but they can be fought with the right expert witnesses. I told Mac that she would need a biomechanical engineer and an accident reconstructionist to get the job done.
Just before our meeting wrapped up on the Jackson case, I told her, “You know this case is a major uphill battle. ”
“Yeah… I sort of figured that out when seven other law firms turned it down,” she said glumly.
“Then why did you take it?”
Mac chewed on her bottom lip, considering her answer for a moment. Then her eyes filled with resolve and she said, “I just really liked Miranda and Larry Jackson. I felt sorry for them, and they remind me of my parents. Strong, hardworking… they didn’t deserve this, and their life has been ruined because of it. I know those are stupid reasons to take a case…” she had trailed off, seemingly a bit embarrassed by her reasoning.
So, probably my downfall ultimately will be due to the fact that Mac has a heart of gold, which only amps up the attraction. I know I may come off as an ass**le more than ninety-five percent of the time, but the truth is, I have a big heart too. I just don’t let women in it. No, all of my heart is spent on just a few things… my family, which includes my amazing mom and dad who live in eastern Pennsylvania, my seven-year-old son, Gabe, and my law practice. And I’m not talking about love for the business of law. I’m talking about my love for the passion of law. I chose to devote my career to helping people achieve justice. I’ve represented people from all walks of life that have had horrific things happen to them. They were then spit upon by an unfair system with no one to take up their fight. That’s where I come in, and the only way you can effectively do that is to really have love for your clients. For their pain, their misery, and their despair.
I take it all on. I’ve cried in private when the story is too tragic. I’ve spent countless of hours and had many sleepless nights, making sure I’m doing my best to protect them. When I win, I share in their triumph. When I lose, I keenly feel their anguish, because it becomes my anguish.
Mac is essentially the same. She took an improbable case because her client didn’t deserve what happened to him. Didn’t matter she would have a huge fight… she wasn’t about to let the wrong go unanswered.
And that right there probably fated me to not be able to let her go from my mind.
Because she’s me.
I recognize in her the same qualities that fuel my passion for the law, and that right there has her earning even more of my respect. That makes her all the more sexy and desirable.
Yeah… I’m not going to be able to let her go from my mind, but I’m still resolved that I won’t have her again physically. I just can’t go there since she’s my employee. Not to mention, I’m still firmly against the whole concept of sleeping with just one woman. It sort of defeats the whole “angry, loner, I’ve-been-stomped-on-by-love” vibe I have going.