The Wedding Favor (21 page)

Chapter Nineteen

“S
o . . . how was the wedding?” Madeline St. Clair, Vicky’s best girlfriend and another associate at Marchand, Riley, and White, poked her head into Vicky’s office and jiggled her eyebrows expectantly.

Vicky propped her foot on the polished wood of her desk. The gleaming white bandage poked out through the toe of her sandal.

“Ouch.”

“Exactly.” Vicky swung her foot to the floor. “That pretty much sums it up.”

“Bummer.” Maddie perched on the leather chair across the desk from Vicky. “I was hoping you’d meet Prince Charming and elope to a tropical island.”

Vicky snorted. “Hardly. And to top it off, Mother brought Winston along as her guest.”

“Get out!” Maddie popped to her feet again. “I know she’s your mother, but holy shit, that’s just cruel.”

“Yeah, that’s her. Cruella de Vil.” It brought a pang, but a smile came with it. Ty’s humor was irresistible.

Maddie planted a fist on her hip. Anti-Winston from the outset, her misgivings had been proven true when she and Vicky returned from lunch to find him boinking Vicky’s secretary on this very desk. Ferociously loyal, Maddie had shoved a stunned Vicky aside, kicked the swine out of the office, and fired the secretary on the spot. And then, in a truly heroic act of friendship, when the partners, including Adrianna, had refused Vicky’s request for a new desk, Maddie had personally disinfected this one with half a squirt bottle of 409.

Now she was royally pissed on her friend’s behalf. “Tell me you didn’t fall for that asshole’s tricks.”

“I was civil to him, for the most part,” Vicky said, “but that’s it.” She tried to block out their last mortifying encounter, but it stomped into her brainpan like the proverbial pink elephant. Even so, she kept it to herself. Jet-lagged and heartbroken, she wasn’t up for telling Maddie about Ty. Someday she would, when it didn’t still hurt like a stab wound. But not today.

Then Maddie said, “I heard about Tyrell Brown.”

“
What?
Who told you?
”

Maddie blinked. “Walter.” That would be Walter Riley, one of the partners. “He said Brown was in the wedding so we had to dump the appeal.” Her eyes slitted. “What’s the problem?”

Vicky could have kicked herself. An ultra-petite size 0 with a pixie-ish wisp of strawberry blond hair, Madeline might look like Tinker Bell, but they called her the Pitbull for a reason. When she got her teeth into someone, she shook until they either snapped in half or gave up.

Vicky knew she was toast, but she gave it a shot. “There’s no problem. I mean, except dumping the appeal. Mother wasn’t happy about that. Like it was my fault, or something.” She cleared her throat, tried rolling her eyes. “It’s a loser anyway. It comes down to whether the jury believed Ty . . . I mean, Brown . . . or not. And he was very convincing.”

Silence. Vicky shifted her gaze away from Madeline, tapped her keyboard rudely, as if her e-mail had suddenly become pressing.

More silence, while she scrolled through her messages.

Then, simply, “How was he?”

Vicky tried disinterest-tinged-with-slight-annoyance. “He’d just won a seven-figure verdict, how do you think he was?”

“I think he must have been pretty damn good or you wouldn’t be working so hard to convince me you didn’t sleep with him.”

Vicky did offended. “Are you saying I’m slutty?”

Maddie wasn’t fooled. “Do I have to call Matt?”

“Do
not
call Matt.”

“Then I want deets.” She sat down.

Vicky threw up her hands. “God, you’re a pain in the ass.” Kicking back in her chair, she let out a sigh. “We didn’t want to ruin the wedding, so Tyrell and I made a pact not to let on to Matt or Isabelle about the trial, or even that we knew each other. We pretended we just met.”

“Thoughtful guy.” Madeline cocked her head. “How long did your charade last?”

“All weekend. They still don’t know.”

Madeline steepled her fingers. “Adrianna must’ve made you pay for that. I suppose Winston was part of the deal.”

“She wanted me to consider reconciling. I had to pretend I would.”

“Must’ve been tiring, all that pretending.” She ticked it off on her fingers. “Pretending you might forgive Winston. Pretending you didn’t know Brown.” She left it hanging, waiting for the rest of it.

Vicky sighed again. “I also pretended to flirt with Ty. Actually, we pretended to flirt with each other, to humor Isabelle. She had some notion that we’d be good together.”

“And were you?”

She shrugged. “Yes and no.”

“I’ll have to ask you to be more specific.”

Vicky pinched the bridge of her nose. God forbid she ever had to take the witness stand against the Pitbull.

She told her everything, and when she was finished, Madeline summed it up in three words. “Shitty weekend, Vic.” Then she shrugged. “Except for the sex, that is. It’s about time you got some of the good stuff. I’ve been telling you for months . . . Well, whatever. Here’s the takeaway.” She counted on her fingers again. “Forget Winston, he’s a jerk. Forget Brown, he’s an immature jackass. Forget Adrianna, she’s missing the mommy gene.”

She used her other hand. “
Don’t
forget that you’re a beautiful, intelligent,
sexy
woman.
Don’t
forget you deserve a man who’ll treat you like a princess, give you
many
orgasms, and love you until you both wither up and die of old age in each other’s arms.” She aimed one finger at Vicky. “Got it?”

“Got it.” As usual, Maddie had put it into perspective for her. Maybe she had a crush on Ty, but it wasn’t
love
or anything. And she was already getting over it. She’d even told the whole story without collapsing into tears.

Of course, it could be that she’d wept them all into her whiskey on her flight across the Atlantic. And she didn’t even
like
whiskey, she’d only ordered it because it was
his
drink.

To add insult to injury, Loretta-from-Texas had been the one to serve it to her. Somehow, the woman had divined that Ty had broken her heart—perhaps because he’d broken so many others?—and she’d tried to console Vicky. Well, Vicky had made short work of that. The last thing she wanted was to hear excuses about Ty’s own heartbreak, especially not in that lazy Texas drawl that sounded so much like his.

Madeline stood up. “Drinks at six-thirty at Steve’s. Chuck’ll make you one of his special cosmos. Then dinner at Mama Ritz’s, on me.” She nodded once, firmly. “Pasta cures everything, even a broken heart.”

“Okay.” A soak in the tub and a Lifetime movie sounded a lot better, but Maddie would never let her get away with wallowing. And anyway, the worst was over now.

Now she could sit back and lick her wounds while her life, such as it was, got back to normal.

N
ot ten minutes later, her phone rang. Madeline. “Listen, girlfriend, Cruella just stormed past my office, heading for yours. I don’t know what’s up, but there was smoke pouring out of her—”

Vicky disconnected as her door flew open without a knock. Adrianna’s face was puce. She slammed the door and strode to Vicky’s desk.

Vicky arranged her face into a slightly bored, mildly inquiring expression. “Can I help you, Mother?”

Adrianna slapped the
Post
down on her desk. “Page four. And five.” Vicky raised her brows half an inch. Without waiting, Adrianna flipped it open and shoved it across the desk.

The headline spanned both pages—“They Went to a Fight and a Wedding Broke Out.” Vicky’s heart sank. She skipped the text, went straight to the pictures.

The first showed Jack and Lil dancing sedately at the reception, with an arrow pointing to Lil’s baby bump and a note to check the sidebar story; the second showed Ty and Winston locked in battle, devastation surrounding them.

“Poor Matt,” she said.

“Poor
Matt
?
All of us
are mentioned in that story! The
firm
is mentioned! Brown himself is named. We may never live this down.” She stalked to the window, glared down on Fifth Avenue, fingers clenched into fists.

Vicky kept quiet. No use pointing out that Jack and Lil were the real story. If they hadn’t been at the wedding, no one would care. By tomorrow, all the attention would focus on the pregnancy. The wedding brawl would be forgotten.

“Tyrell Brown,” Adrianna fumed. “That
cowpoke
has been nothing but trouble for us. First we lose the trial.” A glare for Vicky. “Then he shows up at the wedding and seduces my daughter so we have to recuse from the appeal. And to add insult to injury, he brings shame on us all by brawling like a . . . like a . . . I don’t know what!”

Pacing before the window, she flung her arms dramatically. “Who fights with their fists? He’s a throwback. A caveman. Why wasn’t he born ten thousand years ago? Then he’d be someone else’s problem.”

“Calm down, Mother.” Vicky had never seen her so agitated.

“Don’t tell me to calm down!” Her voice cracked at the end. She dropped into the chair once more, put her fingers to her lips, and stifled a sob.

“Mother.” Vicky sat forward in her chair, starting to worry. “Mom. Why are you taking this so hard? It’s just a stupid gossip rag. They’ll be hounding someone else tomorrow.”

The intercom buzzed. Vicky hit the button. “Roxanne, hold my calls, will you?”

“Um, Vicky. It’s not for you. Walter’s looking for Adrianna. He said it’s urgent.”

Adrianna let out a groan, plucked a tissue from Vicky’s box. “Roxanne, please tell him I’ll be right there,” she said. Then she turned to Vicky. “Darling, I want you to listen carefully.”

Vicky blinked twice, once at the unprecedented endearment, the other at her mother’s suddenly serious tone.

“I want you to pack up everything personal from your desk and put it in your purse. Copy any personal information from your computer onto a flash drive, then delete it from your desktop. And do it without delay.”

Vicky’s mind reeled. “Mom, what the hell is going on?”

Adrianna stood, ran her hands down her suit, smoothing the wrinkles. “I expect you know that we use a clipping service. They track any references to our clients or our competitors in the news or on the Internet.” Vicky nodded. “Well, it’s safe to assume that our clients and competitors do the same. It stands to reason that by now the insurance companies and lawyers involved in Brown’s case have seen this story and are crying conflict of interest.”

“But we withdrew from the appeal this morning.”

Adrianna shook her head. “That won’t be enough, under the circumstances. You know that the appearance of impropriety is more important than the facts. And your . . . relationship . . . with Brown looks very bad. We could be looking at a new trial.”

Vicky’s heart sped up. Her palms began to sweat. “But we didn’t have a relationship until
after
the trial. And anyway, how could they find out about it?”

Adrianna leaned over her desk, dropped one finger on the picture of Jack and Lil. Vicky looked closer. And there it was. The appearance of impropriety.

In the background, small but crystal clear, she danced in Tyrell’s arms.

That alone might not have damned her, but the looks on their faces sealed the deal: she gazed up at him, he gazed down at her, and anyone with a nickel to his name would bet that they were lovers.

Fascinated, she stared at their image, remembering how he’d held her on his feet and twirled her among the other couples as smoothly as water flowing around stones. Had he really been looking at her like that? Like he absolutely adored her?

“Walter will have heard about it by now,” her mother went on. “He gets the clippings first. Bill will find out shortly, if he doesn’t know already.”

“But—”

“They’ll cut you loose, Victoria. Immediately. It will be their two votes against mine.”

Vicky swallowed. Put a hand on her stomach. Then she looked up and met her mother’s eyes. “You’ll vote to keep me?”

“Of course I will. You’re my daughter.” Her voice cracked. Vicky rose instinctively, wanting to hug her. Wanting to be hugged. And for a brief, precious moment they clung to each other, mother and daughter.

Then Adrianna stepped back, moved briskly to the door. “Do as I told you,” she said, the hard-nosed attorney again. “I’ll hold them off as long as I can, but it won’t be more than twenty minutes.” Then she stepped out, closing the door softly behind her.

For a long moment, Vicky stood like a statue, staring blankly at the sterling silver nameplate on her desk, the only sound the pitiless tick-tock of the grandfather clock that presided over her tastefully appointed seating area.

Then a knock sounded on the door and Roxanne walked in waving two pink phone message slips. “Rodgers wants your vouchers for Houston ASAP. I told him you just got back, but you know what a prick he is. And Madeline wants you to call her right away.” She paused in front of Vicky’s desk. “Are you okay?”

Vicky looked up. Her gaze focused. “Roxanne, you’re the best secretary I’ve ever had. And I’m not saying that just because the last one did my fiancé on this desk.”

Roxanne’s eyes widened. “Um, thanks?”

“I mean it.” She should have said these things long ago. Now she was almost out of time. “You’re punctual, your skills are top notch, and you always go the extra mile to make me look good. And you smile a lot. That’s underrated, you know. A smiling face makes the day a hell of a lot more pleasant.”

“Oo-kay. Well, thanks. I’m glad you appreciate me.” She smiled.

“Good. Now I need your help. In fifteen minutes the partners will be down to fire me.”

“
Fire you?
Why? You’re a brilliant attorney, everybody says so.”

“Well, that’s debatable. And either way, it’s beside the point. All you need to know is that I didn’t do anything wrong. Everybody knows that, but a few things happened this weekend that put the firm in a bad light. The easiest way to solve the problem is to sack me.”

Roxanne sputtered. “But . . . can’t your mother do something?”

“She already did. She warned me.” The knowledge of that warmed her, a bright spot in a very dark day. “Now grab your steno pad. I’m going to give you the quick and dirty on some of these files while I pack my things.”