Resisting Redemption

by Amabel Daniels

  As if I’d sleep with the boss.

  Grant crossed his arms and glared right back at the woman on the other side of her desk. His royal-blue eyes glinted with nerves. Lines in his face deepened as his jaw ticked. A faint dark-blond stubble covered his skin, a rough plane that had Roxie imagining what it would feel like against her cheek.

  Snap out of it, girl. He’s the boss. Not. Going. There.

  Roxie tore her not-so-discreet stare from Grant and glanced at the woman. With blonde hair scraped back in what had to be a painful bun, Tara frowned with disgust as though she’d stepped in manure.

  “I will strongly encourage him to plead ‘not guilty’, Tara. A chance of parole isn’t enough to bargain here,” Grant said.

  His voice drew Roxie’s attention from the blonde. Staring again—as she couldn’t help but ogle him—she finished checking him out as he faced off with the ice queen behind the desk.

  Like the forbidden sexy professor. Scholarly and proper, but oh so—

  Get a grip!

  The blonde stood. “If you’d been around when Ben needed representation, you’d know this already. It was a bargain—”

  “What the fuck for?”

  “Don’t think you’ve got any right to tell me how to interpret a case. You run off at a sign of a little trouble, and this is what happens. It’s my case. If you wanted it, you should have stuck to your job.”

  “A bargain for what?”

  “The overwhelming evidence against Ben.”

  Grant slammed his fists on the desk. “There is no evidence.”

  “I’m aware of—”

  “If you are aware of such details, why are you giving up on this case before it begins? You did pass the bar on your own, didn’t you?”

  Well, someone’s got a short fuse. Roxie blinked at her new boss’s outburst.

  “You act as though the prosecution needs my permission how they want to indict him,” Tara said.

  Grant dragged his hand over his face, groaning. “Are you even going to try to help him?”

  “You’re asking me to try? Me to try? When have you tried to be successful, Grant? You’ve lost your last two cases. You’ve turned into a pathetic, hungover excuse in this office, escaping to some hidey-hole because life was too tough to handle. Walter was this close”—she brought her thumb and forefinger together—“to tossing you out of here. And now you dare to challenge my commitment to this case?”

  “I could give a fat fuck what you think of me. I’m talking about Ben.” Grant stuffed his hands in his pockets.

  Tara rolled her eyes.

  “If you’re not going to try to win this, I am. Don’t give me any more bullshit about it being your goddamn case. You always were obsessed with possessions. But you’re not getting away with forking Ben to the prosecution.”

  With every word he spoke, his fury seemed to boil higher. Roxie remained at his side, captivated by his demanding presence. He was the kind of fighter she wished she’d had for defense when she’d been on the stand for her own legal woes.

  “I’ll see what I can do to make you feel welcome on the case, okay? But make no mistake. I’m in charge here. I will arrange any negotiations with prosecution. You will follow my lead or I remove you from counsel and—” Tara said.

  “I’ve already asked to speak to Henry.”

  Tara sneered. “Yes, you contacted the prosecution without consulting me first.”

  “When do you see him next?”

  “When I do. He’s a busy man. Too busy to deal with assisting help like you.”

  “He won’t be too busy to speak with me when I inform him we’re rejecting his offer for parole.”

  “You can’t—”

  Grant didn’t budge. “Ben is not pleading guilty. No more of this hiding bullshit. I expect to be informed of all meetings with the prosecution. Every conversation with Ben, I’m there.”

  He turned to Roxie, tilting his head toward Tara’s waiting assistant. “Get her agenda from him. Every document, every word, every letter and numeral she has about this case, should be on my desk. Chris has already begun transferring the bulk of the digital files.”

  “Are you threatening me?” Tara sputtered.

  “When do you see Henry and Ben next?”

  Tara exhaled harshly. “I’m not sure when I’ll meet with Henry. Or Ben. Maybe this afternoon. I have a court appearance. We are playing this my way, not yours. Do not entertain yourself with the idea of speaking to my client without my presence or—”

  Roxie cleared her throat. “Excuse me.” She bared her teeth and pointed between her incisors. “You’ve got a little something in your…”

  Tara clamped her lips shut and pursed them.

  “If that was all that needed to be said, we should be going. Grant, you have two conference calls waiting.” Roxie eased toward the door and then acknowledged Tara’s assistant. “Please send me the agenda within the next ten minutes or I will hunt you down for it.” She yanked on Grant’s sleeve and pulled him toward the door.

  He followed, his lips set in a stern line. “It is not your position to interrupt our meeting.”

  “You call that a meeting? I thought it was a pissing match.”

  “Never interrupt me when I’m speaking to a colleague. Ever again.” He slammed his hand to his office door.

  She entered his office after him, not staring at his ass. “Seemed you were treading mud and getting nowhere fast. She doesn’t want you on the case, but she’s stuck with you. Why dither with the drama? You made the team, so play the game. Work on this case, not on a pathetic competition to determine who can glare better.”

  Grant spun to face her. “Why did you tell her she had food in her teeth?”

  “Because—” Roxie snapped her mouth shut. Because she wanted to show ice woman she wasn’t superior? Would it be wise to admit she’d immediately disliked Tara? Perhaps Grant was still loyal to his ex-wife. Wanted her back despite such a fucked-up dysfunctional work war going on between them.

  “She didn’t have anything in her teeth,” he said.

  “I wanted to knock her off her pedestal, okay? I’m sorry. I don’t like her.”

  He stared at her. “You lied to her.”

  “I could always claim I’m near-sighted.” She paused for a second, recalling her former studies. Myopic or… “Far-sighted,” she corrected.

  “Are you going to lie to me?”

  Do not lie to your new boss. Do not lie to your new boss. Do not be a smartass. His expression was too solemn for her to judge how bothered he was. She’d be damned to squirm under his no-nonsense glare, and she had to abide by his rules, to be the good little girl. She had to keep this job. For Lucy.

  Oh, censor yourself, for fuck’s sake.

  She cleared her throat. “I’ll try not to.”

  Still he stared. At least his jaw wasn’t twitching anymore.

  Do not screw this up. Lucy deserves better. Do not get fired on the first day.

  She sighed. “I’m not smooth”—she shimmied and motioned a wave with her hand—“with people. I’m ignorant of office politics. Sorry. She irritated me.”

  While it wasn’t a smile, his face lightened like some of his anger and burden disappeared. “I strongly recommend you don’t antagonize her.”

  “Or what?”

  “She’s not a person to trifle with. Like you said, why bother with the drama?”

  He slumped into a chair behind the massive desk positioned in front of a nearly complete wall of windows. Trees and open air were more her style for scenery, but the skyscraper view from Grant’s little domain was aesthetically pleasing.

  Other than the solid ship of a mahogany desk, his office hosted a broken-in leather couch against one wall and a couple chairs. Two doors were closed to the right of the room. She imagined one led to a private bathroom and the other to the Bat Cave.

  “And you were married to her?”

  “She pretended to play nice then. My former marriage is not a
topic of discussion.”

  “Then how about we discuss this big case?” She approached his desk.

  Enough about his shipwreck of a relationship. She’d seen enough news to follow along with the rest of the world. Ben Rohn. Superstar NBA player accused of shooting famous singer Josh Warren. This wasn’t just a tragedy no one could stop talking about—it was O.J. Simpson big. Even bigger.

  While she wasn’t looking forward to being a conditioned pet following Grant, she could cede the case was interesting. Exciting, even. To be associated to it in some fashion was kind of historic. This was fodder for a story to tell her grandkids someday.

  Grant loosened his tie and rifled through a couple papers. “There is nothing to discuss with you. Lia forwarded you my schedule? She provided you with your list of daily tasks?” He picked up the landline’s receiver.

  “Yes. She did. I’ll enthusiastically begin picking up your dry cleaning and collecting your court documents and arranging your car’s oil change as soon as you’re preoccupied with your calls. I’m not allowed to know about this case?”

  He rolled his eyes. “There’s no need for you to know anything.”

  Oh, come on. She really was expected to be a voiceless and dimwitted servant? She spent years at an applied trade. Learning how to diagnose pathological symptoms like solving riddles and puzzles. Always being the first student to step up for demonstrations at clinicals. And now she was going to be an ignorant lapdog mindlessly playing fetch for him?

  No need to know anything? Why not just hire a droid?

  “Are you always this stiff and robotic? Do you ever have casual conversations with other humans?”

  He set the phone down in its cradle. “You’ve never been a personal assistant before, have you?”

  She shook her head. “Never been much of a ‘follower’.”

  He raised his brows. “Allow me to explain. We don’t discuss. We don’t have conversations. You attempt to complete the tasks provided to you. Occasionally, I will require your company in interviews. At all times I am expected to respect the confidentiality of my client. Under no circumstances will there be any mutual benefit of us discussing my pending case.”

  She had to smile. He’d said his pending case, not Tara’s. She couldn’t pinpoint why, but she was glad Tara’s high-handedness didn’t dampen his ambition. “Then how am I supposed to help you?”

  “By doing your job, which consists of—”

  “Playing fetch and following your commands. Pretending I’m your tagalong servant. Yes, sir! What about when you need someone to stand up for you, huh? Like in her office back there? What about when you need someone to give you a good kick to stop being a prick and concentrate on your job?”

  His narrowed eyes hinted at amusement. “Ms. Malone, do not tempt me to fire you. I have neither the time nor desire to stomach your sarcasm and—”

  She smiled. “A threat? Please. It will take a lot more than a few choice words to startle me.” She curtsied and started for the door. He wasn’t the only one who was fast enough to cut off others’ sentences. “Your trained monkey is off.”

  Chapter Four

  Trained monkey.

  Grant rolled his eyes as he multitasked. His phone rested in the crook of his shoulder as he browsed on his computer. Typically, he would assign simple research to his assistant—but as he was snooping for information about her, he couldn’t ask her to do it. Chris could have dug up a good chunk of her bio, but how would he have explained his curiosity in his new assistant?

  He’d uncovered the basics—not even touching the legal archives he had at his disposal, a simple Google search provided plenty about Roxie—and trained monkey, she was not.

  News articles introduced her as the vet student who killed a horse worth millions. PETA posts lambasted her as a murderer. What the hell is her story? Juanita must have been reaching her wits’ ends to hire someone with as controversial a past as Roxie’s.

  “Yes, we’ll speak about Ben’s plea at dinner tomorrow,” he said into the receiver. Marcus Rohn, Ben’s father, was the last phone call he had to complete from his list. Speaking with Marcus would only solidify his argument for getting Ben to ignore Tara’s insistence for a guilty plea.

  “Sheree will want to come, too,” Marcus said.

  “Of course.” Ben was always quick to include his wife. When Roxie rushed into his office, Grant shut down his browser.

  Roxie managed the dry cleaning bags over one shoulder, her phone to her ear, and a sack of carryout in one hand. She dropped the food on his desk and circled her hand at him as though to say, “hurry up”.

  Trouble returns.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow, Marcus.” Grant ended the call and peeked in the bag. Smoky ham and sweet onions teased his nose.

  “I didn’t order this.”

  On any other day, he’d be a satisfied fan of the local deli sandwich Roxie had brought him. But he was in the mood for Chinese. Since his stomach had been growling for the last half hour, he appreciated that she’d had the foresight to bring food without him having to ask. But he disliked her initiative to take the authority to order and decide for him. Above all else, he needed to trust she would do as told, not as she saw fit.

  She put her phone in her purse. “I know.”

  She hung up his dry cleaning on the open door to his bathroom and hurried back to shut his office door. “I’m so sweet, aren’t I? Figured you had to be hungry by now.”

  Petty scrimmage, but it was going to be fun pushing her buttons. “I would like to order Chinese.”

  “Some other day,” she said and grabbed his jacket from the back of his chair, jerking him forward.

  “Excuse me?”

  “We’ve got to go.”

  He frowned at her haste. “I’m not going anywhere. I have some things to tend to before I head to the court—”

  She draped his jacket over her arm and retrieved the bag of food. “You’re heading to the courthouse now.”

  He clenched his jaw at her bossiness. The nerve of this gorgeous little woman, thinking she could take charge. “Ms. Malone, you’re fired.”

  She smiled. “Nice try.” She patted her thigh like she was calling for a dog to come. “Tara lied. She’s due in court in the next half hour, not two hours from now as she claims on her agenda. She has also requested a time to meet with Ben. Right after her lunch with Henry.”

  How does she know this?

  Earlier, Roxie had done an excellent job of either scaring Tara’s assistant into sharing Tara’s online agenda, or she had in fact hunted him down and forced it from him. Tara’s shared calendar clearly stated she was going to court at three in the afternoon, with an adjacent meeting with Henry for Ben’s case at three-thirty. Nothing about seeing Ben at all.

  He narrowed his eyes at Roxie, doubting her for a second, and then rushed after her. She led the way down the hall.

  “While I was at the city center I got to chatting with the security guard at the door. He told me Tara always meets the prosecutor, this Henry guy, for lunch on Thursdays. They’re chummy, it seems. Since I had her schedule on this godawful phone, I told him, get outta here, that can’t be so.” She rooted in the bag of food while he pressed the button for the elevator.

  “Then he called up some secretary or other who he’s got the sweets for and had her check. Tara and Henry did go to lunch together and her court time was earlier, not later. She either lied on her schedule or she can’t tell time.” She shrugged as the elevator doors opened. “Since I don’t really like her, I assumed she was trying to exclude you on purpose. Imagine my hunch paying off. I asked my newfound guard buddy to check if Tara was seeing Ben anytime soon. He made a call and, yes, she requested to see Ben after her lunch with Henry. While you might have a craving for Chinese, these sandwiches are going to be a heck of a lot easier to eat on the way there.”

  Oh, she is good. Her cleverness rendered him speechless. She was sharp and fast on her feet. And she was wise enough to suspect
Tara of playing dirty. There was a lot more to his assistant than her come-fuck-me aura. “You’re not fired yet.”

  She grinned before she took a bite of her sub. “Didn’t think so. The way I see it, you can show her up and not lose out on any other information.”

  “What’s wrong with the phone?”

  She swallowed her food. “Huh?”

  “You said ‘godawful phone’.”

  “Because I want to throw it at a building. It never stops ringing.”

  He slit his eyes as he unwrapped his sandwich. Ringing from his texts, she meant.

  “At first I thought, no, it can’t be possible,” she said and followed him off the elevator at the lobby. “He can’t possibly need to ask me to do something else or make another tiny demand in the span of five minutes. No human is that controlling and OCD. Maybe you really are a robot. But then I turned it into a game. Like a scavenger hunt.”

  “Hilarious.” He gestured to the bus stop. “If you can’t keep up with the job, then—”

  “See, that’s what I mean. It’s like a hunt, or a race. I’ve never had a problem keeping up.” She waved her hand at the opening door of the arriving bus. “After you, master.”

  Such a sweet, smart, sassy ass. Grant glared at her as he entered.

  They took seats in the middle of the sparsely populated bus. She opened the bag of chips and set it on his lap. She reached in the bag for one, and he jumped.

  “You can’t share?”

  He’d love to share. Only her motions had him thinking she was dangerously close to touching his dick, something he’d gladly introduce to her.

  Now’s not the time. Suppressing a groan, he inhaled deeply.

  “I did a little fact finding, lest I get bored. The Ben you’re talking about is the three time MVP guard for the Hawks. He was arrested for murdering Josh Warren at club Velocity. Right?”

  He deadpanned with a mouth full of food.

  “Come on. We’re supposed to be a team. It can’t hurt if I at least know what’s going on behind the scenes.”

  He wiped his mouth. “We’re not a team. You work for me. You do as I say. You’re a glorified tagalong who shouldn’t be this chatty.”