Page 6 of Heist

“Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for taking time out of your busy schedules to meet with me. As you all know, we’re bringing in a new partner and those of you in this room have been under consideration for the position. Before I make my announcement, I just wanted to say I appreciate all of your hard work.”

He paused and lifted a hand in Austin’s direction. “Miss Yates, you billed the most hours this month, not the first time.” His hand moved to another attorney in the room. “Jack, you really stepped up and brought in a lot of new clients this quarter.”

Austin tried her best not to clench her teeth or fists. It bothered her that Chadwick always referred to her as Miss Yates but referred to her male counterparts by their first name or sometimes even a nickname. His sexism knew no bounds.

“In the end though, we’ve decided to promote Mike Boland. Congratulations.”

Austin’s heart sank. She should have known he would go with Mike. The two went to lunch at least three times a week. Sucking up to the boss had never been her strong suit. Now, it took every ounce of will power to clap and smile as Mike stood and shook the big man’s hand.

“Thank you, Sir. I’ll make the most of this opportunity,” Mike said.

The meeting droned on for another twenty minutes as Chadwick spelled out his vision for the next few months with a new partner on board. It would be at least another year before Austin got another shot at the promotion to partner.

Part of her wanted to walk out today and launch her own firm. That was the ultimate dream, but she knew she wasn’t ready for that. She had money saved, but there was no way Thorley would let her take the client list with her, so she would be starting from scratch.

As she stood to leave when the meeting wrapped up, Chadwick stopped her.

“Miss Yates, I know you’re disappointed. Don’t give up though, you’ll get there. When you’re less upset, come talk to me. There’s a client I want you to consider taking.”

Austin gave him a tight smile. At least he had the decency to acknowledge that his decision upset her. “I’ll come talk to you this afternoon or in the morning, Mr. Thorley.”

He gave her a gentle pat on the shoulder, and Austin stepped into the hall. As she walked back to her office, she kept reminding herself that at least she wasn’t at the public defender’s office—or worse, the DA’s office. Thoughts of her time at the District Attorney’s office had her cringing, as those thoughts always did. Would she ever live down her guilt?”

Back at her desk, she pulled up the e-mail Elijah had sent. Could she be a house sub? She had some pretty extreme submissive fantasies. Maybe it would be fun to live some of them out. The possibility that Patrick might be the one to train her was intriguing. They were friends. Could she submit to him? Would it be sexual? She had so many questions.

She pulled up her schedule for the next few days. There were no pending trials or court dates until the end of next week. Clicking over to a travel website, she pulled up flights for Friday. When she found one that left just after lunch, she booked it. It had been more than two months since she’d had a weekend free to go to Solitaire. Maybe committing to the house submissive program for eight weeks would push her to make more time to spend there. Especially since she wasn’t getting the promotion she wanted.

Her thoughts drifted to Patrick. He’d never shown interest in her as a submissive, but she suspected that was because of the legal work she did for Eastman Enterprises, the company he ran. She’d never gotten up the courage to ask.

With a flight booked, she decided to see what kind of client her boss wanted to give her. Riding the elevator up to the ninth floor, she tried to push Patrick and the house submissive application out of her head. She could focus on that later.

After tapping on Chadwick Thorley’s door, she rocked on her heels while she waited for him to answer. The door jerked open and she stumbled, grabbing the doorframe to catch her balance. Jack Desmond stormed out. He was apparently more upset about getting passed over than she was.

“Miss Yates come on in,” her boss said, as if nothing was wrong. For him, there probably wasn’t. She got the suspicion that he enjoyed pitting his attorneys against each other. Things had been tense between Mike and Jack while they were vying for the promotion. Austin just stayed to herself and worked on her cases. Which was probably why she got passed over—she didn’t play her bosses little games.

“Thank you, Mr. Thorley,” she said, stepping inside. “I have a busy morning tomorrow so I thought I would come and talk to you now.”

Her boss chuckled. “When don’t you have a busy morning?”

Austin forced a smile. “What can I say? I love my job.”

“Then you’ll appreciate this case,” he said as he reached into his desk and pulled out a folder.

Austin flipped it open and read the top sheet. “Seriously?” she asked when she finished reading.

A madam with a ring of high-end escorts was facing human trafficking charges, and he wanted Austin to defend her.

“I think you’ll find that none of the girls in her employ feel they’ve been trafficked and are working for her of their own free will. If you ask me, the police botched their investigation and most of their evidence shouldn’t be allowed at trial. I’ve already filed some motions to that effect, but I’ll let you sort through all of that. This is a case we can win, and I think having a woman leading her defense team will be a really strong look if it goes to a jury.”

Of course, there was a sexist reason behind giving her this case.

“I’ll do my best with it. It will be good to work on a case here at home for a change.”

Mr. Thorley smiled. “I thought you might like that. She’ll be coming into the office on Monday and she’s already paid a ten-grand retainer. You may want to spend the weekend brushing up on the details of the case.”

Austin’s fingers tightened on the edges of the folder. So much for a weekend of kinky fun.

“I’ll do that,” she said, closing the folder. “Anything else?”

When he shook his head, Austin stood and extended her hand. “Thank you for trusting me with this.” She kept the fake smile plastered on her face until she had retreated into the hallway.

Back in her own office, she waffled about whether or not to keep her flight to Colorado. There wasn’t anything pressing on her plate for tomorrow, despite telling her boss she had a busy morning. It wouldn’t be hard to spend the day researching the case, and there was always the flight on Friday to spend studying. Her phone buzzed as she stared at her flight confirmation.

See you at Solitaire this weekend? We miss you!

Austin smiled. It was Elijah’s fiancé, Holly Sutton. Between Elijah’s request that she join the house submissive program and Holly’s text, she made up her mind. She deserved some fun.

Just booked my flight. I land at four on Friday. Tell Eli I’m filling out the application he sent me.

Holly’s response was just a string of heart eyes emojis. Austin grinned and pulled up the house submissive application. The madame and her prostitutes could wait.

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