Page 32 of Damian & Jun, Episodes 9-12
Damian rolled over, joining Habibi in lying on his stomach. He pulled Habibi’s toys closer. “I know Richard has no intention of letting me go under, but I don’t want to ask him for more. He’s done so much. I want to stand on my own.”
Jun shook his head. He understood. He felt the same way about how much help Damian had given him.
Damian fell asleep without even taking off his shoes. Jun did it for him and covered him up with a spare blanket. With kids in the room, no one was undressing.
Damian
Damian made it into the office early on Thursday. Eleanor, his cofounder, arrived at the same time. They rode the elevator up to their floor in companionable silence. Behind the door to their own suite of offices, she pulled off her hat and shook out her long, blonde ponytail. After all these years, it was her trademark.
“How’s the family?”
“Which one?” Damian shook his head.
“Either, both.”
Damian sighed. “Kids are still at the hotel. I think I have more court dates and cases in my head between Jun and Dalia than I do here.”
Eleanor laughed in sympathy. “What happened to my low-drama law partner?”
“He went and had a life.”
“Remind me not to do that.”
Damian chuckled. “Too late. How’s the horses?”
Eleanor rolled her eyes. “My sweet psycho is back in therapy for her back leg, but we’re pretty sure she’s doing it for attention. Either way, I cut my ride short last night. And the colt is costing me thousands down in Tennessee for training. I need to take a weekend off to go down there and meet with his trainer. All I do here is work for them.”
They shared rueful laughter.
“Any good résumés?”
Eleanor hummed and nodded, getting her coat off. They walked toward their offices. “I have three I want to go ahead with. I think we should start farming for associates who can do what you do. There just aren’t that many specialists in South Korean and US contract law who speak and read both languages fluently. We’re going to need to train them up and hire them before they graduate.”
“How young do you think we need to go?” Damian rubbed the back of his head.
“Undergrad, at least. And working from both sides of the Pacific wouldn’t go amiss. If we could have three of you, we could have a satellite office in Seoul.”
“Let’s start with finding one recruit in Seoul, an undergraduate who’s willing to come here to study and intern. And one here, for vice versa. And then maybe one or two high schoolers?”
“Here or there?”
“Let’s start here.”
Eleanor shook her head. “Still have that drive to get more Americans bilingual, Sathers?”
Damian smiled. “You know me, Reinhart.”
She laughed. “I’m still taking French classes.”
They both split to put their winter outwear away, and then met up again in one of the conference rooms with coffee from the break room. It was one of the easiest things to agree on when they’d finally gotten this office set up: excellent coffee machines and fresh ground roasts. They were both addicted.
“We’re doing well.” Eleanor sat back in her chair. “Exactly where we set our targets.”
“I’m still uncomfortable with the percentage of our billable hours that are still Reevesworth Industries exclusive.”
Eleanor shook her head, eyes fond. “They’re one of the biggest businesses around, and they were our only client when we started. Besides, with the inheritance case last quarter, that beefed up that percentage. All our contacts started there. We started there.”
Totally true. They’d both been Reevesworth Industries employees before they’d gone independent.
