He Sacrificed My Career for Her—Then I Resigned Without Looking Back Chapter 10

It was drizzling in Southport.

When I dragged my suitcase out of the train station, Linda spotted me right away. She stood outside the

crowd holding an umbrella. Tom was beside her with a coat in his arms, looking even more nervous than she

did.

Linda took my bag and frowned at me. “Why is there still a Band-Aid on your hand?”

“It’s almost healed.”

Tom draped the coat over my shoulders. “The car’s in the parking garage. Let’s get you home and fed.”

They didn’t ask about Graham. They didn’t ask why I’d lost weight either.

Back home, the table was set with barbecue ribs, garlic shrimp, and a big pot of hot soup.

My room was spotless. The sheets had been swapped for a light blue set fresh off the line, and my old high

school desk lamp still sat on the desk, now with a bunch of jasmine next to it.

Linda handed me a fork. “Eat first. Work can wait until tomorrow.”

I sat down and took a rib. The sweet, tangy sauce spread across my tongue, and my eyes stung a little.

Tom slid a napkin toward me right away and put on a stubborn front. “Too much vinegar in the sauce? I told

your mom she went overboard.”

Linda glared at him. “You didn’t say anything when you were sneaking three of them a minute ago.”

I burst out laughing, and the mood at the table finally relaxed.

That night, when I came out of the shower, there were more than a dozen missed calls on my phone. They

were all from Graham. There were a few texts too.

Graham: [Are you in Southport yet?]

Graham: [Did your parents pick you up?]

Graham: [I read the letter.]

Graham: [Iris, we can’t end things like this.]

I put the phone back on the desk and didn’t reply.

The next morning, I went to Helen’s firm. Meridian Counsel wasn’t big. It took up two floors of an office building. There were a few potted plants at the front desk, and the whiteboard outside the conference room

was covered in trial dates.

Helen showed me around herself. She was in her early forties, with short hair and a crisp way of talking.

“We don’t have the layers a big firm has, and we don’t hand out fancy titles for show. The cases are hard, the

clients are picky, and we’re short on people. If you come, you’ll build the dispute resolution team.”

I looked at the case names on the whiteboard. “How many people are on the team now?”

“Four attorneys and two paralegals. It’s nowhere near what you had at your old firm.”

“That’s enough.”

Helen smiled. “I like that answer.”

That afternoon, when we signed the letter of intent, she handed me a client conflict check form.

“Everstone reached out to us. They want to move their case over once you start. We have to follow

procedure first, though. We can’t touch the stage your old firm is still handling.”

I nodded. “That’s what I was thinking too.”

“Graham Whitmore from your old firm called me yesterday.”

My pen stopped on the signature line.

Helen looked at me calmly. “He didn’t say anything bad about you. He only said the Everstone case still

involves your old firm’s interests and reminded us to respect the boundaries.”

“I’m sorry for the trouble.”

“I’ve gotten plenty of calls like that.” She turned the agreement to the next page. “Anyone really trying to stop

a lateral hire would say something a lot uglier. He was pretty restrained.”

I didn’t respond.

Once we’d signed, Helen took me to meet the team. The young attorneys had known I was coming for a while, and they were a little too formal about it. Even their introductions sounded like job interviews.

After I heard them out, I set the files in my hand on the conference table.

“I start officially next week. For the next few days, I’ll be reading up on your cases. Don’t treat me like some big boss you have to tiptoe around.”

“I’m not especially easygoing, and I’m brutal when I edit, but I won’t make anyone work overtime for no

reason.”

A few people laughed.

One of the attorneys, Miles Harper, raised his hand. “Ms. Kane, so is there a lot of overtime for a good

reason?”

Helen laughed and scolded him. “You’re asking that on day one?”

I smiled too. “Depends on how good opposing counsel is.”

That broke the ice.

The new job picked up fast. I spent three days getting up to speed on the team’s cases.

On the fourth day, Daniel came to Southport with Everstone’s legal team to see me.

They’d followed procedure. They’d ended my old firm’s representation for the next stage first, and then signed

a new engagement with Helen’s firm. Every document was handed over by formal letter, so clean that nobody

could find fault with it.

Daniel signed the contract and smiled. “Ms. Kane, some people at our company said switching firms to

follow you was a hassle. I told them it was less of a hassle than switching lawyers.”

Helen jumped in. “Don’t worry, Daniel. Now that she’s with us, your case won’t slip.”

I handed him the timeline for the next stage. “Next week we start reviewing the supplemental evidence. If the

other side produces the original of that Summitcrest agreement, we need to have a request for forensic

examination and our cross-examination ready in advance.”

By the time we finished talking about the case, it was seven in the evening.

After Daniel’s team left, Miles walked me to the elevator with a stack of files. “Ms. Kane, that Daniel guy

looked at you like you’d saved his life.”

“Clients look at anyone like that, as long as that person saves them some money.”

Miles cracked up. When the elevator doors opened, he was still going. “Then I’ll work on being a cheaper

lifesaver.”

I was about to step in when I stopped short. Graham was standing in the lobby’s waiting area on the ground.

floor.

He wore a dark trench coat and had no luggage with him, like he’d come straight from the airport. His eyes

went to Miles first, then back to my face.

Miles’ laugh cut off. “Ms. Kane, who’s this?”

I said, “An old coworker.”

Graham’s face changed almost instantly.

He walked over, and he still sounded steady. “Iris.”

I checked the time. “I’m off the clock. If you need something, send an email.”

Miles picked up on the mood right away. “Ms. Kane, I’ll run these files upstairs.” He got into the elevator.

Once the doors closed, the lobby felt half empty.

Graham looked at me. “An old coworker?”

“Is there something wrong with that?”

“We were together for seven years.”

“And now we’ve broken up.”

He took a deep breath, as if he were holding himself back. “I didn’t come here to fight with you.”

The word fight seemed to stop him short too. I looked up at him.

He corrected himself quickly. “I came to give you something back.”

He took a small keychain out of his coat pocket. It was a silver scale of justice, with my initials engraved on

the back.

He’d given it to me when I first joined the firm, and later I’d hung it on the spare key at home.

“You still have some books and clothes in Kingsbury. I packed them up. I wanted to ask where to send them.”

“Send them to my parents’ house. I’ll text you the address.”

He held on to the keychain and didn’t hand it over. “Iris, could I meet your parents?”

“That’s not a good idea.”

“I stood them up that time. I owe them an apology.”

“They don’t need one anymore.”

Graham looked at me, and the whites of his eyes were streaked red. “And you?”

A security guard walked past a little way off, his footsteps quiet.

I pulled my purse strap higher on my shoulder. “Graham, I’m off the clock.”

He suddenly said, “Who was that guy?”

I followed his eyes to the elevator. “A new coworker.”

“Only a coworker?”

I looked at him. A few seconds later, I smiled, just a little. “It’s kind of pointless for you to ask that now.”

His face went a little paler.

The elevator came down again, and Miles jogged out empty-handed. He saw Graham still standing there and looked caught off guard. “Ms. Kane, Helen says you left your laptop charger.”

He handed it to me.

Graham looked at him. “Thanks.”

Miles was baffled. “Uh, sure?”

I took the charger. “I’m heading out.”

This time, Graham didn’t stop me.

I walked out of the building, and Linda’s car was parked at the curb. She rolled down the window. “You’re so late today. Your dad’s soup has practically boiled dry.”

I opened the door and got in. As the car pulled away, I saw Graham in the rearview mirror, still standing in the lobby doorway.

He was holding that keychain. The lights stretched his shadow long across the ground.