Redemption: A British Stepbrother Romance (28 page)

I
couldn’t keep
this up much longer.

Giving April that large doc review project to work on kept her in the office until late at night, and gave me plenty of excuses to call her into my office for some one-on-one time, but sooner or later I would have to outsource the work to someone cheaper.

Usually a fifth-year associate wouldn’t get near client billing, but being the son of the managing partner did have some advantages. I wrote off most of April’s time. There was nothing wrong with the quality of her work, and she got more efficient with each passing day, but my clients wouldn’t pay $400 per hour for a summer associate to do doc review when they knew we could outsource it for less than half the price.

April craved a real assignment, something she could get her teeth stuck into, but I hated passing on work to inexperienced attorneys. My clients expected the best and, when I did the work myself, I knew that was what they got. If I let junior associates help, then mistakes would slip in.

The classic error was quoting case law out of context. New attorneys like nothing more than finding a juicy quote in a case and then sticking it in a memo to nail the point they were trying to make. Unfortunately, they often didn’t bother to check whether the quote had any actual relevance to the facts at hand.

I’d once let that slip by me, but opposing counsel spotted it and their reply brief tore me a new one. Now I checked and double checked everything until I trusted the other attorney completely.

How much could I trust April? I saw hatred in her eyes when she looked at me. I shouldn’t have acted like such a dick towards her father, but he deserved it for trying to mooch off my mother.

However, as much as April hated me, she loved being a lawyer, or at least the idea of being a lawyer. Over the last week, she’d made the odd comment here and there which made it clear she was trying to follow in her mother’s footsteps and become a hotshot corporate lawyer.

Not many kids dreamed of becoming a corporate lawyer, but given that I had also followed in my mom’s choice of career, I probably shouldn’t be too quick to criticize. I didn’t do it to keep Mom happy though.

I was a lawyer to make money. Corporate law paid well, and being a fucking awesome corporate lawyer paid fucking awesomely well. When clients bypassed the designated partner and went straight to the associate you knew you were doing something right, and that had been happening with me for years.

Even if Mom hadn’t been managing partner, I’d still have gotten every pay raise I’d requested. The official lockstep pay scheme had long ago been broken with my salary and there were even a few partners who looked enviously at my pay. Served them right for being shit at rainmaking. The money was there for those who knew how to earn it, and I was definitely one of them.

As much as I would love to discipline April, I had something a lot sexier in mind than tearing her apart for not being a good lawyer. What work could I give April that she wouldn’t completely fuck up? I had a couple of projects in my inbox that could be delegated, but I had no real idea what April’s skill set was.

I found her official application on the computer system and browsed through her resume. Career offices at law firms insisted on making all students use a certain template for their resume, so I could always tell what school someone went to just based on the outline of their resume. It made reading the things even more boring that it was already, however April’s did reveal a lot about her.

April’s undergraduate GPA was stellar; easily good enough for her to have gone to one of the holy trifecta of Yale, Harvard, or Stanford law schools. Unless she’d completely fucked up the Law School Admission Test, she would have been accepted at a much better law school than the one she now attended.

The reason she chose her school was on the next line down. April had been granted a full-scholarship to cover the entire cost of tuition. No doubt that had been almost impossible to resist for someone whose family struggled financially. Going to Harvard would have been great, but it would have come with a debt that she’d have been paying of for decades.

Her grades at law school put her in the top five percent, so she would likely graduate with top class honors. Unfortunately, law school grades were a poor predictor of a student’s ability as a lawyer.

I browsed through the writing sample she’d provided. It was an objective memo on some niche legal issue surrounding workplace discrimination. I didn’t know much about that area, but I recognized good legal writing when I saw it.

The memo was supposed to be objective, but in a few places she’d let her bias slip through. I could tell that she’d come to a conclusion first and then tried to fit the argument together to arrive at that conclusion. That didn’t mean the memo was inaccurate, but it would have been stronger if she’d remained more objective. Still, it was a common mistake by law students.

April could handle this task. Besides, I owed her one. She’d lost her last job because I had been unable to resist punching that smarmy jackass who’d tried it on with her. I didn’t regret it. I only punched people who deserved it, and he had definitely deserved it.

I sent April an email summoning her to my office, and she appeared promptly a few minutes later. No doubt she welcomed the break from reading other people’s emails.

“What can I do for you?” she asked professionally.

Today she wore a light cardigan over her blouse which further obstructed my view of her breasts. It had been nearly nine months now since I’d had those nipples in between my teeth, and I desperately needed another look.

“You cold?” I asked.

“I find it’s always a little chilly in your office,” she replied. “You have the AC turned up too high.”

“You know, if your nipples get stiff every time you come into my office, that’s probably not because of the temperature.”

April sighed and placed her pad of paper down on my desk. “Are we going to do this again?”

“Do you want to do it again? I’m game if you are. I have a meeting in ten minutes, but we both know that’s more than enough time for me to send you back to your desk satisfied.”

“If you say so,” she mumbled in response.

I walked around the desk and sat on the chair next to hers. We often sat next to each other when going over her work. Most people were hot and sweaty by the time they made it to work--an unfortunate consequence of living in D.C.--but April always smelled like she was fresh from the shower. There was a hint of coconut today, but I’d also detected citrus and mint over the last week. The girl liked to mix up her shampoo.

“Did you call me in here for a reason?” she asked, looking straight forward at the now empty seat on the other side of the desk.

“Yes, I have something I’d like you to do for me.”

“Okay, tell me about it.”

“It’s hard. Very hard. And big. I wouldn’t give this to just anyone, but I know you can handle something hard and big.”

“Your firm has a sexual harassment policy,” she said stiffly. “Perhaps you should read it sometime.”

“I believe the manual talks about ‘unwelcome’ contact. Is this unwelcome?”

I placed my hand on her thigh. She jumped at the contact, but she didn’t tear my hand away.

“You can’t do this,” she gasped. “We work together.”

“I do what I want,” I replied. “And right now, I want to do you.”

Finally, she turned to look at me. Her face had turned a light shade of red, but her eyes gave away her true feelings. She wasn’t angry with me any more, even though she had every right to be. She wanted me. I could see it.

A quiet gasp escaped from her mouth as I removed my hand from her leg. “Soon,” I whispered in her ear. “I’m going to have you soon.”

I leapt up from my seat and went back to the other side of the desk, leaving April looking lost for words. “Now then, I have a new assignment for you.”

April stared into the distance for a few seconds, then shook her head and snapped back into the zone. She’d gone from looking desperate for my touch to the consummate professional in seconds.

“About time. I was wondering how much longer you’d be able to keep me on that assignment when you’re supposed to be outsourcing it.”

“You knew about that?”

“Of course. Despite what you may believe, I’m not actually stupid.”

No, you’re not. Definitely not.
The only stupid person here was me. I’d drastically underestimated April, and I knew why. I was letting my desire to fuck her again cloud my judgment. That wasn’t like me at all, but then neither was going back to a woman I’d already claimed. No one had ever enticed me back for seconds, but right now I couldn’t think about fucking anyone other than April.

That was dangerous. Very dangerous.

I
went back
to my office after meeting Foster, but I couldn’t concentrate on work. It was nearly lunchtime, so I decided to sneak out for a walk to try and clear my head.

I’d hoped that things would get easier the more time Foster and I spent working together, but they were just getting worse. He had a hold over me that I didn’t understand. I hated him. When he spoke, I wanted to tear my ears off just so I wouldn’t have to listen to his arrogant speeches about how it was only a matter of time before he would have me in bed again.

But every now and again, he would say something nice. He often praised my work, and thanked me for working long hours to get the project done.

Then there was the way he looked at me. He always had that hunger in his eyes. It had been there the first night we met. Every time I saw him, my mind flashed back to that night. The time he looked up at me from between my legs. The moment our eyes met as he fucked me while holding my knees up by my ears. That time in the middle of the night when we’d gone a little slower, his eyes only visible in the street lights that illuminated my room through the cheap blinds on my windows.

I had to use all my energy to stay mad at him, but when he touched me the chemical reaction in my body was impossible to resist. There was nothing I could do to stop the wetness appearing between my legs. I hadn’t even been able to take his hands off me because my limbs didn’t work. I’d felt paralyzed, completely unable to move. He could have had me right then and there and I wouldn’t have been able to resist. I wouldn’t have wanted to resist.

Yeah, I definitely needed a walk and some fresh air.

The temperature was due to exceed ninety degrees today, but there wasn’t as much humidity in the air as usual. I wouldn’t say the walk was pleasant, but at least I wouldn’t need another shower.

Not many employees bothered to take advantage of the showers the building had on the ground floor, but I used them every morning. The shower in my apartment had the water pressure of a leaking tap, so these were a luxury I had to tear myself away from after ten minutes.

Going outside didn’t help me get away from the lawyers. D.C. was full of them, and H Street in particular seemed to exclusively consist of lawyers and lobbyists, apart from a scattering of people working in the local coffee shops that served them.

It always struck me as odd that so many people would hold business meetings in coffee shops and talk so openly about their work when they had absolutely no privacy. In the five minutes I waited in line for my coffee, I heard enough about one deal to identify the buyer and I had a fair idea who the target was as well. Legal Ethics 101 should include a lesson on not holding important meetings in coffee shops.

Once I had my coffee, I strolled back to the office in a better mood than I had been in days. I only had one more afternoon of doc review, and then I could get stuck into the legal memo Foster had assigned me. I would still be working closely with Foster, but that couldn’t be helped. I might even stay late tonight to get started on it.

With the help of a strong coffee and knowing the end was in sight, the doc review project flew by that afternoon, and if I kept going at the same pace I would finish the last batch of emails by four o’clock. I considered heading home early for the day, but that was always frowned upon at a place where most associates stayed until the sun had set.

The end was in sight when I came across an email that stopped me in my tracks.

Over the course of reading thousands of emails, I’d learned a lot about the inner workings of the company, including the fact that it had recently completed an investigation with the Department of Labor relating to diversity in recruitment.

The company had a decent mix of men and women, and all races were represented, but during a random inspection the DOL had discovered that the women and ethnic minorities were primarily placed in non-management roles.

At the end of the audit, the company--which essentially meant the three white male directors--had promised to improve its selection procedures and actively work to get more women and minorities in the top roles.

None of this was part of the case at hand, so I didn’t have to flag any of those emails. I probably shouldn’t even have been reading them, but I knew a bit about employment discrimination and found it interesting. Anything to get through the day really.

The email that caught my eye today was between the three directors. The email chain was one long conversation between the three men who sounded like they were still immature frat boys and not in charge of a multi-billion dollar company.

The way they talked about female employees was frankly disgusting, and their attitudes to anyone who wasn’t white was even worse, but the parts that jumped out at me were the references to the DOL audit.

The email chain made it clear that the directors were actively falsifying the information going to the DOL to make the company look like it was hiring women and minorities in positions of influence.

The scam involved selective interviewing for positions that didn’t exist. The company could say it had interview women and minorities, and chosen not to hire anyone. It looked better than always choosing the white male instead.

I might be just a law student, but I knew fraud when I saw it. The law firm might even be an unwitting accomplice in the company’s reports to the DOL. I had to tell Foster.

His office door was closed, but then it always was. I walked over and was just about to knock when I heard a women giggling inside. It was Foster’s paralegal, a cute young Asian girl who had a ‘butter wouldn’t melt’ look about her. I stayed by the door for another second until I heard her laugh and say “I can’t do that here.”

At least if Foster had moved on to someone else, it meant we could now talk about work without him making a move on me every five minutes. That seemed like scant consolation next to the mental image of him screwing his paralegal on his desk. I knew he wouldn’t have done that during the middle of the day--probably not, anyway--but I couldn’t shake the look of her on her knees, taking him in her mouth while he sat at his desk writing me an email.

I’d never sucked him off that night, even though he had gone down on me plenty of times. Foster probably thought I was a selfish bitch who just let the man do all the work. I could’ve shown him that wasn’t true, but it was too late. I’d played hard to get for too long. If I’d given in right away we could have kept it fun and casual. Now it would be a big deal, and my head couldn’t take that kind of pressure.

I ran back to my desk, and emailed Foster requesting a few minutes of his precious time. The paralegal left his office ten minutes later, straightening her skirt as she walked out. A few minutes later Foster let me know he was available, so I headed over with the incriminating emails in hand.

“Yeah, come in,” he said casually from inside his office. He sounded relaxed. Why would he be relaxed after having his paralegal in here? I tried not to think of that as I walked inside and sat down.

“What is it?” he asked.

Foster had one more shirt button open than usual, but he didn’t look particularly disheveled. What did that mean? Had they just been flirting?

“I found something doing doc review.”

“You’ve been doing it for a week. I should hope you’ve found quite a few somethings by now.”

“Something bad,” I explained.

Foster raised his eyebrows and relaxed back in his chair. My eyes flicked down to his crotch which was just visible over the edge of the table. His zipper wasn’t undone. Another positive sign.

“Like what?”

“Do you know about the Department of Labor audit the company went through last year?”

Foster nodded. “I know about it.”

“But we didn’t help with it?”

“No, they handled that one with different counsel.”

“Good.”

“Why is it good that tens of thousands of dollars went to another law firm instead of mine?” Foster asked.

“Because the company is filing false audit reports with the DOL. Look at this email.”

I handed Foster the email chain and gave him a few minutes to flick through it. I kept waiting for his face to change as it dawned on him how bad this was, but he remained emotionless the entire time.

“I agree, this doesn’t look good,” Foster said as he placed the emails down on his desk. “Fortunately this has nothing to do with the case, so we don’t need to disclose these emails.”

“I know that, but what are we going to do about it?”

Foster frowned. “Nothing of course.”

“They’re committing fraud,” I said incredulously. “We can’t keep working for them.”

“We fucking well can,” Foster replied. “Do you have any idea how much we bill them each year? They’re my biggest client.”

“They’re discriminating against women and minorities, and then lying about it to the federal government. Do you want clients like that?”

“Yes,” Foster replied casually. “Clients who do bad things often need lawyers to help them when they get caught doing bad things. If everyone in the world treated each other with respect and acted honestly all the time I’d be out of a job.”

I simultaneously couldn’t believe what I was hearing, but also believed that he did mean every word. Foster only cared about the money. I knew becoming a corporate lawyer wasn’t exactly about defending liberty, but that didn’t mean you had to turn a blind eye to things like this. My mom would never have stood by and let this happen.

“We have to tell someone,” I pleaded.

“No, we certainly do not. We owe our clients a duty of confidentiality. That means you don’t go ratting them out to the government. For fuck’s sake, April, you need to learn to remain detached from the more unsavory side of this profession.”

“You mean I should just ignore discrimination?”

“No, you can call it out, just not when you’re being paid to defend a client.”

“This is ridiculous.”

“It’s life. Get over it.”

I growled. I couldn’t help it. The noise sounded pathetic, like when Simba tried to pretend he was a grown-up lion in
The Lion King
.

Foster stared at me and then burst out laughing. “What on Earth was that?”

I laughed as well, and rubbed my face with my hands. I’d just growled at a senior attorney. Okay, so we’d done a lot worse, but I’d been the one insisting we act professional. I couldn’t just growl when I didn’t get my own way.

“Sorry, I don’t know what came over me. That wasn’t appropriate. I think I’m just tired.”

“I don’t mind you being inappropriate,” Foster replied. “I encourage it in fact.”

“Like you do with your paralegal?” I asked, the question slipping out of my mouth before my brain could stop it.

“Jealous?” Foster said, grinning that stupid, sexy grin of his.

“Only of her ass,” I replied. “I’d kill for an ass like that.”

“No, it’s too small. I’m all for a slim figure, but I need something to sink my teeth into. Now,
your
ass is just right. Did I ever bite your ass that night?”

“No,” I replied, suddenly feeling like I’d missed out on something special. “Not my ass.”

“That’s a shame. Well, maybe next time.”

There won’t be a next time
. Those were the words that should have come straight out of my mouth the second he’d finished speaking. Instead I stayed silent.

There
would
be a next time. I knew that now. I didn’t know when, but it was inevitable.

“You should go home,” Foster said, breaking the silence. “You’ve been working late a lot, and I need you refreshed before you get started on that memo.”

I nodded, and headed towards the door. I knew he was looking at my ass, but this time I didn’t care.

“April?”

I turned around as my hand was on the door handle. “Yes?”

“My paralegal flirts with everyone in the office. You don’t need to read anything into it.”

“Okay.” I shouldn’t care. He could fuck whomever he wanted, and I’m sure most nights he did. I grabbed my purse, and headed out the door, not making any effort to hide that I was leaving early.

Foster had gotten in my head, and I didn’t know how to get him out of there. I didn’t know if I wanted to; I was enjoying the company.