Page 6 of Behind Frenemy Lines

I opened my mouth before closing it again.

We’d liaised closely with our old firm’s Hong Kong office when making our original arrangements to travel out there. It was our Hong Kong colleagues who’d helped set up most of the planned meetings with clients. I had been the one who’d had to email them to explain about us moving to Swithin Watkins and apologise for pulling out.

Arthur had been cc’d on the emails. He hadn’t said a word to indicate the trip wasstill on.

“I didn’t think we were going anymore,” I said. I’d planned to travel on from Hong Kong to Malaysia to visit my parents, but when I’d given notice at the old job, I’d postponed my flight to Malaysia and resigned myself to eating the associated charges.

“Yeah, I assumed we’d be calling it off. But when I mentioned our move to the chair of the conference, he said wecould keep our speaking slots. They’ll update our bios. I think it’s a good idea. We need to get out there, let clients know where to find us.”

I took a deep breath. “Were you thinking of a similar agenda? Will we be delivering training for clients?”

Arthur nodded. “We’ve got to set out our stall. It’s an opportunity to show what we’ve got to offer. All the preparation’s been done, it’d be a shame not to use it.”

That was true. Except that the slides and speaking notes I’d spent weeks preparing had been left behind at our old firm.

“I don’t have access to the materials anymore,” I said hollowly. “If I’d known we were still going…”

Arthur had to be aware of the abyss that had opened in my soul, but he was dealing with this in a typically Arthur way, pretending he hadn’t noticed the shimmering waves of rage rolling off me.

“Those materials belong to BRC anyway,” he said. “But we should be able to reconstruct the contents pretty easily, I would have thought. I’ll have a word with Farah about getting a trainee to help. We’ve got plenty of time. The conference is two weeks away. All right?”

He met my eyes, expectant.

It is not fucking all right, Arthur, what the fuck? Could you not have told me, oh I don’t know, any time within the past four weeks? Did you have to land this on me on my first day at a new firm?

I swallowed that answer down.

It wasn’t that bad, I told myself. Arthur was right: I should be able to re-create the slides from memory. The next two weeks should be quiet. Some of our long-standing clients had indicated they’d follow Arthur over to Swithin Watkins, but with a couple of exceptions, we weren’t bringing over any active matters.

It wasn’t that there wasn’t enough time to prepare. It was the waste of all the preparation I’d done already that hurt.

At least I should get a trip to see my parents out of this. I’d have to see if I could book annual leave and reschedule the flight to Malaysia again.

“Sure,” I said. “We’ll make it work.”

“Great,” said Arthur, his eyes already drifting back to his inbox. “You’re a star.”

CHAPTER TWO

Charles

Came into theoffice early before my nine a.m. client call, so I could look over the file. Anne-Laure was travelling, so we were doing an old-fashioned phone call.

Should have been straightforward. She didn’t want anything complicated, just an update on the lawsuit against them, so she could brief her CEO. I explained we were awaiting the claimant’s reply to our last letter.

Anne-Laure: “Why the delay on their end?”

Didn’t say,I don’t know, I don’t have a psychic bond with the claimant that tells me what they’re thinking,despite the temptation. “They could be instructing external lawyers. We’ve been dealing with their in-house counsel so far.”

Anne-Laure, hopefully: “Maybe they’re planning not to progress the case? I have never found the claim convincing. How can we be responsible for their future profits? They have no way of knowing they would have earned all that money.”

Always amazes me how clients sign contracts promising to take responsibility for all sorts of things, and then are surprised when they’re held to it.

CG: “Unfortunately the contract is explicit that the claimant is entitled to loss of profits. And it’s not a matter of dispute thatyou failed to meet the SLAs. We haven’t seen their evidence on quantum yet, but from what they’ve said,£1 million doesn’t seem an unrealistic estimate of their losses—”

Anne-Laure: “Oh shit!”

CG, taken aback: “Anne-Laure?” No response. “I think there’s a problem with the line. Can you hear me?”

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