“Sean is anxiously waiting, but if you’d like a moment to freshen up, here’s the key to Zack’s bathroom.”
“Thanks,” I said, pocketing the key. “I’ll need more than a moment. Could you let Sean know I’m here, and I’ll be along?”
“Will do,” Denise said. She opened her desk drawer and found a container of instant spot remover and held it out to me. “Interested?”
“Very,” I said.
Denise handed me the tube. “Zack’s at home, you know.”
“I know,” I said. “I wish I was there too. It’s been a long day.”
Sean was sitting on the edge of Denise’s desk when I came back. He jumped up and offered his arm. “Can I get you anything before we start, Joanne?”
“I’m fine,” I said. “So, are you still in your old office?”
“Nope. Moving on up. Come have a look.”
I followed him down the corridor to the office next to Zack’s. He opened the door and stood aside so I could get a clear view. It was impressive. The room was probably half the size of Zack’s, but a floor-to-ceiling window gave it great natural light, and it had been decorated with surprising inventiveness for a business. The walls and furnishings were in complementary shades of brown and taupe, but the ceiling was a bracing asparagus green.
“What do you think?” Sean said.
“I love it. Who did the decorating?”
“I did,” he said.
“That colour on the walls is gorgeous. I’ve been looking for a brown that shade for our bedroom at the lake. What’s it called?”
“Moleskin,” Sean grimaced. “Terrible name, I know, but I went through a hundred decorating books till I found exactly what I wanted.”
“You were just named partner a few days ago,” I said. “How did you find the time?”
“I’ve always known what I wanted,” he said. “It was just a question of waiting until I got it.”
“Well, congratulations,” I said. “On being patient, on the partnership, and on the decorating. I’m going to send Zack around to take notes.”
“Please do,” he said. “Right now, just make yourself comfortable.” He pointed to a reading chair covered in cafe au lait leather. “That particular chair is very restful.”
“Another time,” I said. “If I settled into that, I’d never leave.”
I walked over to his desk and pulled out the leather client chair. His framed law school diploma was on the seat. I picked it up. “You don’t want to lose this,” I said.
Sean coloured and grabbed the diploma from me before I’d had a chance to really notice anything but the date.
“That’s nothing to be ashamed of,” I said.
“Zack says if you need to have a diploma on your wall proving you’ve mastered the law, you’re in the wrong business.” he said tightly.
“You’re a partner now. Put whatever you want on your walls. Besides, you know Zack. He doesn’t care what you do with your office. All he cares about is that you love the law the way he does.”
Sean’s eyes met mine. “The only thing I’ve ever loved is Falconer Shreve,” he said. His face was blank; it was clear he had no idea how much he had just revealed. I felt a chill. “Let’s talk about Ginny’s campaign,” I said.
“It was like everything else,” he said. “Just a series of trade-offs.”
“I thought you believed in Ginny.”
“Not really,” he said. “But I needed leverage to get what I wanted at Falconer Shreve.”
“Ginny was just leverage?”
Sean’s baritone was smoothly reassuring. “Everyone is leverage, Joanne. You invest in a person, hoping that the potential return from your investment is great. Sometimes it is, but sometimes people disappoint us. When we realize that our investment is worthless, it’s time to move along.”
“And that’s what happened with you and Ginny?”
“Among others,” he said.
I thought of how Sean had suddenly spurned my daughter. “So what do you do when an investment doesn’t pay off?” I asked.
“Like any other investor, I cut my losses,” he said. “Now, let’s talk about the future. I can’t tell you how excited I am to be part of the Falconer Shreve family.”
CHAPTER 16
Friday morning when I flipped through the business section of our local newspaper and saw Falconer Shreve’s announcement that Margot Wright and Sean Barton would be assuming new positions with the firm, I knew Sean would be over the moon at being publicly acknowledged as a member of the Falconer Shreve family. The pictures of Margot and him were equally flattering; more importantly, they were of equal size and side by side. By his own assessment, Sean was a patient man. It was only a matter of time before his name would be added to the letterhead of Falconer Shreve.
When I handed the paper to Zack, opened to this page, he grinned. “Hey, nice picture of the newest members of our bowling team.”
“They look promising,” I said. “Margot could bowl a perfect game without breaking a sweat or a single one of her fabulous red, red nails, and Sean is certainly single-minded.”
Zack raised an eyebrow. “Do I detect a note of criticism?”
“No,” I said. “If you’re happy with the hires, I’m happy with the hires.”
“I’m happy. I know it started as a joke, but Delia’s convinced we have to find our soul again. Maybe bowling is a start.”
“Well, if it is, I get to be in the team picture,” I said. “It was my joke.”
“She does look sensational in that bowling shirt,” I said.
“We were lucky to get her,” Zack said. “And not just because she looks good in a bowling shirt. She’s a hell of a good lawyer.”
“Were you lucky to get Sean?”
“He’ll be fine,” Zack said. “He doesn’t have the feel for the law Margot does, but I was impressed with the work he did tracking down the sources of Jason Brodnitz’s income. I was also impressed that he wasn’t afraid to use what he knew to get Brodnitz to back down on the custody case.”
“You don’t think what Sean did was ruthless?”
“Sean wasn’t the one who was living off money he earned from prostitutes. We all have to live with the consequences of our actions.” Zack pushed his chair back from the table. “Speaking of, I’d better get a move on or I’ll miss my flight.”
“I hate being apart overnight,” I said. “How come you’re always the one who has to speak at these dinners?”
“Because, Ms. Shreve, your husband is the only lawyer in the province who knows when to leave the podium.”
We weren’t in a rush, so I parked and waited with Zack in the terminal until his flight was called. We had a cup of bad coffee from a kiosk and talked about the weekend ahead. When the announcement came, Zack drained his cup and pitched it in the recycling bin. “What do you think about calling our team the Piranhas?”
“I think it stinks,” I said.
Zack reached out and pulled me towards him. “Behind every great man is a woman rolling her eyes,” he said.
I spent the morning at my laptop looking at video clips of Ginny’s career. The material was familiar, yet I found myself moved and saddened by the documentation of Ginny’s rise and fall. Her career had the kind of arc that
