Her blonde hair catches in the fabric, and I untwist it, pulling the material down her sticky body as best as I can.
“I get laid,” I growl, considering it has been a while.
I’ve been so focused on my work, this case… Now the last thing on my mind is fucking some drunk girl. First, her consent is dubious. Second, she’s our receptionist and could yell sexual harassment or worse.
“I’m not dipping my pen in the company ink.”
“I’ll quit my job!” she cries, still holding onto me. “Just kiss me once.”
“Where is that fucking Lyft?” I reach into my jacket again. “He’s here!”
Sure enough, high beams cut through the woods, curving around the black trees. I start up the lane in the direction of the road.
“My shoes!” she shrieks, trying to run back the way she came. “They’re Louboutins!”
My grip tightens on her arm, until I’m practically carrying her to the waiting car. “I’ll ship them to you at the office.”
“You’re not coming back to work? What are you going to do?”
Hesitating a moment, I realize it’s a good question. I know what I want to do—what’s nudging at my brain. What I’ve wanted to do for so long…
I’m tired and my thoughts are twisted and cloudy, but I know what I want more than anything. “I have a meeting to attend.”
“Now?”
“Right now.”
The Lyft pulls away, taking Tiffany back home. I head straight to my car, pulling out my phone as I walk. My disbelief is gone, my head is clear, and I have to face this.
* * *
“Jackson.” Brice Wagner’s low voice is laced with condescension as he ushers me into his enormous wood-paneled study. “What brings you all the way out here at this hour?”
It took me two hours to drive to my elder partner’s ocean front estate north of the city. From the smell of his breath, he’s been working on his own scotch, luxuriating in the close of our case, no doubt.
Thinking how much we could have lost…
How much I saved.
How much he covered up.
“I was doing some housekeeping before I shut down tonight.”
“You young bucks.” He slaps my back, barking out a laugh as he rounds his desk. “After today’s win, at your age, I’d be out on the town, a bottle in each hand and a blonde on each arm.”
“No doubt,” I say, placing a hand on the stiff leather wingback across the massive mahogany desk from my partner. “I had something like that in mind.”
It’s true. I’d been finishing up, pulling all the files together ahead of what I hoped would be a long weekend.
Until I opened the office intranet we shared on the case.
Until I discovered the hidden folder labeled “Disposed documents.”
The folder password protected with a dead child’s name.
“Well?” He pours a crystal tumbler of amber liquid and holds it out to me. “What stopped you?”
I take the crystal and tilt it side to side, studying the trail of the liquid as it moves. The room smells of antique furniture and oiled leather. It’s moneyed and ancient, and knowing what I know now, it’s all the rotten stench of corruption.