Page 22 of Joint Custody

“Mynephewhasjustcompleted his JD as well as his MBA from Alden University. He had the highest LSAT scores during his year, and he’s a hard worker. He’s only twenty-five but has worked as a paralegal during the summer since he was sixteen years old because he always knew this was what he wanted to do, even before he got into law school. At twenty-one, he graduated with a BA in Business Administration before going on to complete the next four years of his studies. With a focus in business, he’s got the experience to work in corporate law and with the high competition, over thirty thousand graduates looking for jobs, it helps to know someone in high places. You know I would never steer you wrong, Mr. Crawford,” one of my well-respected junior partners said.

And they were right. They never steered me wrong. They had great billable hours, won several cases, and brought in an impressive amount of clients to our company. If there was anyone I should have been considering giving an opening to, it would be them. Yet, I was sitting here, boiling, fussing with my navy-blue suit jacket, avoiding eye contact with them as I straightened out my navy-blue-and-red-patterned tie, trying to figure out how to let them down gently because I promised my best friend that I’d give his little sister a shot. I checked my watch again, feeling hot around the collar as I made note of the fact that half an hour had passed and she was still not here yet.

In addition to that, this junior partner was not the only person coming to me with impressive resumes from people they’d like me to consider because we had just stepped into recruitment month; law school graduates were piling out of school looking for work as associates. With a floor already filled with associates not specifically assigned to any partner, only one personal associate per partner could be hired, and it was down to a few partners who were actually looking to hire an associate. It was then narrowed down since I had the final decision and was up to me as managing partner to decide who got hired.

I didn’t just hire anyone. This company was more than just a business to me, it was family. It was founded by my father, and he gave too many handouts that turned around to bite him in the ass. I loved him, he was a great man, but he had too much of a giving heart that led him to being walked on. When he died, the company was left to me and my brothers. The business wasn’t doing great when we inherited it, in fact, it was about to be wiped out if we hadn’t done something.

Fresh out of law school, my brothers didn’t have as much of an interest in a dying company, deciding we should just sell it and start our own law firms, but I thought it would be spitting on what Dad built, so I decided I’d work my ass off to save it.

When I first took my position as managing partner, I was met with a lot of disgruntled attorneys who thought that it was a disgrace to the company to let nepotism decide who was in charge of decision-making. Many attorneys who had been there for years felt that they were owed the title, and others just didn’t like the idea of a young man, lacking experience, being their boss.

I had to fire a lot of entitled attorneys who helped to bleed the company dry, prove myself to the ones that actually had integrity, join forces with our other name partner to save us from bankruptcy, hire new attorneys, and basically build the company from the bottom up. It wasn’t easy work, and I wanted to prove to the attorneys that mattered that I deserved the title my father entrusted me with.

I was twenty-six when I left law school and took charge of this company. It took me ten years to get it to where it was today: credible and thriving. When it began to show potential, that’s when my brothers came back and took their places as senior partners, making a lot of other people mad.

For the past ten years, this company was my life. This was it. I didn’t have a life outside of it, no time for other commitments, including marriage and family. And after everything that I put into this company, I wasn’t going to make the same mistakes my dad did. I wasn’t going to just hire people who I couldn’t trust to be dedicated to this company and its clients. I wasn’t going to just give out chances.

She’d gotten this chance because of her brother, because I loved the heck out of that dude so much; I was one of the godfathers for his first child, and when this place was driving me crazy and I thought about throwing in the towel, I could always count on my best friends: Chris, Mario, and Anthony, but especially Chris.

He asked me for a favor so I considered it, not just because she was his sister though. That was only one of the things she had working in her favor, but because he’d made her out to be so damn impressive. She’d been studying law all her life, started law school when most of us were still in high school at that age and just graduated at twenty-one years old. She sounded amazing, exactly like the type of person I’d want to hire for this firm, until this morning. She’d better have a damn good excuse for the reason she was late because if she thought those two factors would be enough to hire her, she had another thing coming.

My junior partner was just leaving my office when I looked up to see the inherited red hair and telling features of the Levines. She was slender, and her first couple of buttons were undone as if she had been having a great time this morning. In fact, going by the state of her hair, a ponytail a bit messed up, I’d like to say that my thoughts were pretty spot on. She was wandering around in confusion outside my glass doors, as if she was checking the name on her phone and verifying whether it was the same name etched into my glass wall.

So, she missed the interview because she decided to have some morning fun as the company’s time wasn’t valuable enough to her, and she wasn’t prepared enough to be sure who she had the interview with. A part of me started to think that it couldn’t have been her because that was not the character of the person her brother described to me.

Oh, I was seething by the time she stepped into my office and said, “You must be Jared Crawford. I’m—”

“Tiffany Levine.” When she extended her hand to me, I felt insulted. “You’re late. Almost an hour late to be exact. Tell me, why is that?” I asked, clasping my hands against my abdomen, waiting for her response as I was on the verge of combusting.

“I’m so sorry,” she started.

“You know what, I don’t want to hear it. It doesn’t matter. Because I’ll tell you what I think. I think your resume is phony. I think you’re using your family’s name to your advantage. In fact, I think you’re accustomed to getting what you want because all your mommy and daddy have had to do all your life was make a few phone calls to get you to where you are today,” I said, rising from my seat, walking around my desk to sit on it as I faced her.

I hadn’t even given her time to take a seat, and she stood there with what I assumed to be her resume, her smudged, red lips trembling and her red heels wobbling as if holding her fair frame was too much work. I couldn’t even continue to look at her, turning away to dismiss her when she continued to speak.

“With all due respect, Mr. Crawford, I think you’ll find—”

I didn’t want to hear anything more. I already had my mind made up about her. I knew exactly the type of person she was, and I didn’t know if she managed to have her family fooled, but she sure wouldn’t be fooling me.

“Listen, Ms. Levine, even if everything on your resume wasn’t paid for and you’re actually smart enough to achieve all that, I thinkyouwould find that this is the real world, this isn’t law school. The time of your clients and the people you work with matter. You show up when you say you will and you do the job you say you will do. You couldn’t even manage to make this appointment to commit to an interview, and I’m supposed to trust you with a place in my company? Trust you with my clients and their livelihoods?” I shook my head at the incredulousness before continuing.

“I only agreed to give you a shot at this interview because your brother led me to believe that you were someone you’re not and because I respect your brother and I know he respects me, I’m going to assume that he was blinded by some brotherly instinct to see the best in his little sister, but I’m not your brother, my company is not your law school, and the people here won’t bend to accommodate you because in the real world, you’re nothing special. You’re just like everyone else looking for a leg up, and among everyone else, there are only a few with that extra something. They’re the ones I’d like to hire and you, dear, are not what I’m looking for,” I said before grabbing a file from my desk and leaving my office, hoping she was at least smart enough to get the message.

Chapter 14

Tiffany

Damnit!WhatdidChris see in that man? I couldn’t imagine that Jared Crawford was best friends with anybody but himself, with his upturned nose to the world like he had a giant stick in his behind causing him great discomfort. My chest tightened as my unsaid words were lodged in my throat, screaming at me to defend myself but to who? He’d walked off to hell knows where, so I was just stuck, feeling like my ribs were going to come apart from the buildup of steam rising within my body with no one to release it on. I’d never been so angry in my entire life, and I didn’t know where the dang bathroom was so I could hide behind the doors until I managed to cool down. I kept my head facing my feet as they quickened me toward the exit, hoping for some fresh air when a familiar velvety tone met my ears.

“Hey, where are you heading off to in such a rush?” Mario’s voice sounded from behind me.

Well, at least there was still that, I thought as endorphins began to crawl through my body at the thought of seeing him again. I spun around, relieved to have someone to talk to, only to have the wind knocked out of my lungs when I saw that, less than a foot behind him was the shorter, although taller than me by a couple inches, less bulky but equally sexy Anthony approaching us.

Mario cleared his throat. “Didn’t see you after I put you and your friends in that taxi. Did you get home all right?” he asked, a smirk beginning to form on his face which he forced away as Anthony turned to look at him.

“Oh, yeah,” I said. I felt my cheeks and the tops of my breasts begin to heat up. I tucked my hair behind my ears. I needed to clear my throat too as I grew hoarse when I began to speak. “Got home safe and had a great night. Thanks.” I looked down to hide my own smile as the images of our experience slammed into my mind.

My head was brought back up by the smooth tone of a female coworker as she walked past us. “Hey, Anthony, nice shirt,” she said, her cheeks rosy, and she wore a cheesy grin on her face. She swung her hips, making her steps deliberate and slow as Anthony, with his hands in his loose black slacks, angled his body to check her out as she walked away.

---