Page 87 of Partner Pursuit
“She sounds like that type,” he said. “At least in these circumstances.”
“Ugh, she is. And especially if she thinks this might ruin her partnershipchances.”
“Could she make it look like it’s yourmistake?”
Audrey bit her lip. Colette might try to blame her. The waiter, seeing the pause in conversation, came to take their order. After he left, she said, “Only if she argues that she thought I’d finished pulling documents when I handed it over. But I’m pretty sure I sent an email outlining what still needed to be done, and that included the rest of discovery. I’ll check when I get back. But do I send an email to both Hunter and Colette—or just Hunter first?”
“What’syourgut?”
“Send it to both. Otherwise, I’ll look like I’m screwingherover.”
“I agree. Nothing to be gained by not telling both at the same time. How will you explain why you didn’t alert them immediately to the possibility of these missing boxes—especially when Colette is responsible for discovery? You could’ve let her makethefind.”
“Except Mrs. Rothman asked me not to tell anyone unless I found something.”
“And you can tell Colette separately you didn’t want to point out the hole in the production unless there was goodnews.”
“Good angle, but I don’t want to write her that there was a ‘discovery hole.’ She’ll feel attacked and go on the offense.” She took a sip of water. “I’ll write that I acted per Mrs. Rothman’s instructions—which is what Idid.”
“Yes, I’d keep the note positive—all good news, etc.,” he said. “But then call Hunter afterward to give it more of a personal touch and show how excited you are. You should write it and call himtonight.”
“Bonus points for thelate-nightwork.”
“Unfortunately, yes. And I want you to get extra credit if you’re not coming home with menow.”
She held his hand. His beautiful hands were warm and solid around hers. “I wish I were. Just a few more weeks, and then I’ll have a whole week off. You may get bored of me,” she said flirtatiously.
“I don’t think I’ll ever get bored of you,” Jake said, his eyes becoming blue pools, his hand tightening around hers. “And my sister said she still learns things about Ned all the time.” He looked at the calendar on his phone. “We should plan a vacationtogether.”
She asked, “What about that second week inDecember?”
“Maybe, but it’s not ideal. What about between Christmas and New Year’s? Our offices are completely closed thatweek.”
“I already booked a ticket to visit my mom in France that week. You couldcome?”
“That’s not quite the romantic getaway for two that I had in mind. Let’s do the second week in December.” Jake looked at the calendar on his phone. “The Christmas rush is mostly before Black Friday. I don’t have anyone releasing any albums on Christmas Day, but I have to start preparing for thetop-of-the-yearmusic releases. I can do that week. I may miss some networking opportunities if there are holiday parties, but that’s okay. And the Jingle Balls are the following week. You’ll love those.”
They spent the rest of the dinner deciding where to go on vacation until Audrey said she better get back to work to call Genevieve and Mrs. Rothman, write Hunter and Colette about the find, and call Hunter.
Chapter Forty-Three
Hunter swung around in his chair to face Audrey and Colette.
“I asked you both to come to my office to brainstorm our approach given this latest development in the case.” He turned to Audrey. “Thank you, Audrey, for pursuing this lead and finding this documentation. Now that we have Pierre’s consent for discretionary trading, we might even be able to settle without a trial. It eviscerates theircase.”
“They may still argue that the trade was inappropriate,” Colettesaid.
“They’ll have a harder time with that argument. Pierre signed this consent while asking John to buy into a speculative venture in Brazil,” Audrey said. “Not to mention this chart of other risky trades made by Pierre.” She pulled out a chart of Pierre’s trades created by Marcia and Mohan with their outside expert. The expert had rated many of the trades highly risky.
“That’s true. That chart is great work by Marcia and Mohan,” Hunter said. “We needed these documents to win thiscase.”
“It’s too bad you didn’t find these documents at the beginning,” Colettesaid.
Audrey’s mouth dropped open. She closed it quickly.She is trying to blame this on me. Jake hadcalled it.
Hunter turned to Colette and said firmly, “Colette, it was your responsibility to find these documents. You were in charge of defensive discovery. Audrey handed that over to you after she did the physical document pull from their offices. We’re incredibly lucky that Mrs. Rothman remembered this trade and that Audrey looked back through the document production log and found this gap. We’re also fortunate that our client is ecstatic right now and not askingwhythese were not found earlier.” Staring straight at her, he said, “You should have identified that gap in the production and followed up.”
Colette flushed. In the strained silence that followed, Colette stared down atthe table.
