She glared at the screen. Felix looked over, his head tilted. “Who’s that?”
“A friend who’s refusing my legal advice.”
He snorted. “Not smart. I’d take your advice, especially if it was free. Does she have any idea how much you bill?”
“I know, right?” Vanessa typed, Fine. Have it your way. Don’t blame me if things go south.
Go south. As if. A moment later there was another message. Bring a white dress.
Stupidly arrogant. But she should’ve expected that from Barron’s heir. Everyone had assumed her parents’ prenup was iron-clad…except her mother’s lawyer Samantha, shark that she was, had found a way to chip away at it. Now she was questioning the validity of the document in the first place, which was dragging out the horrendous divorce process.
Her phone buzzed again. Vanessa glared at it, then picked it up just in case it was a real client who actually wanted legal advice from her. Instead it was her mother.
I’m finally all moved and settled. There will be a housewarming party on Saturday at six. Bring a date if you can.
Vanessa rolled her neck, trying to relieve the tension. Her mother had been avoiding her and her brothers for the last few weeks, and now came this last-minute notice for an event that was more or less obligatory.
Felix took a big gulp of his coffee. “You okay?”
“Yeah. It’s just my mom.”
“How’s she doing?”
“Great, apparently. She wants to have a housewarming party.”
“Oh.” He knew—like everyone else in the legal community and Vanessa’s social circle—that Ceinlys Pryce was divorcing her husband of almost four decades. “Are you going?”
“I guess. I don’t know.”
It depended on Justin’s plan, which he wasn’t telling her.
“I understand your dad’s contesting the divorce,” Felix said slowly, each word carefully chosen in that lawyerly way of his.
Grunting, she nodded. She didn’t know the details of her father’s strategy. Her parents weren’t talking to her or her brothers about the divorce at all. It hurt her she couldn’t talk to her mother about her impending secret wedding and motherhood or her doubts about Justin. Her mother wasn’t the best mother—Vanessa knew that much—but it would’ve been nice to talk things over with someone.
Vanessa sighed and turned her attention to the documents, which had to be finished if she wanted to elope. She had a feeling if she didn’t show up at the airport like she was supposed to, Justin would send a platoon of his minions to drag her to wherever he wanted her.
And what a spectacle that would make.
* * *
On Tuesday, she bumped into Bobbie, wife of John Highsmith and a partner in her own right, in the break room. A lot of people underestimated her at first glance because she was petite with soft babyish white-gold hair and a pixie face. Nobody who’d ever faced her in a legal battle thought her small and cute though. She was the kind of lawyer Vanessa wanted to be when she grew up: fierce, respected and smart. Not to mention that Bobbie was a straight shooter and never held a grudge. If she hated you, you knew about it. Vanessa, luckily, was on the “like” side.
“Long time no see,” Vanessa said.
“Yeah.” A bleached smile plumped Bobbie’s rosy cheeks as she poured coffee. “How you doing, Vanessa?”
Other than the stress of elopement and a baby? “Oh, fine.”
“Good. I heard about your new case with Felix. It’s a good one, very important for the firm.”
Too bad the client’s guilty.
Vanessa’s feelings must have shown on her face, because Bobbie gave her a look over the rim of her coffee mug that said I can eat babies for breakfast if it’s billable. “The kind of thing that can get you noticed if you handle it right.”
“I understand. Listen. Um, do you mind if we chat privately?”
The other woman shrugged. “Let’s go to my office.”