Legally Addicted - By Lena Dowling Page 0,9

himself slapped with a sexual harassment suit.

Now that he had entered into a binding partnership agreement with Dayton Llewellyn, conventional wisdom dictated that he and Georgia should remain just colleagues. While there was no clause against it in the agreement he had signed, and no law society rule prohibiting intimate relations between partners of a firm, there was still ample reason not to get involved with a colleague. Plenty of good law firms had busted up after two of the partners got together and then found they couldn’t make the relationship work.

On top of the professional conventions requiring they keep their distance from each other, he was also fairly sure Georgia would be wary about risking a repeat performance of the night before. As a non-equity partner, she would be the one who would have to leave the partnership if they got over-friendly and then things went bad. His fee generating abilities and client list made him much too valuable an asset to Dayton Llewellyn for the firm to voluntarily let him go.

From what he had seen, Georgia was far too level-headed to jump in and get involved in a romantic office entanglement that could be detrimental to her career. She had more than sufficient cause to go off at him for not telling her about the merger before he took her upstairs to his penthouse, but in the circumstances she had been fairly reasonable. If truth be told, she had been significantly more reasonable than he might have been if the tables had been reversed. He should have told her he was planning to join the firm right from the get-go. But then, he was a red-blooded male, she was hot, and quite willing as it happened, and in all likelihood it had been his one and only chance.

And he had made the most of it.

He also predicted that Georgia would be too professional to allow what had happened to stand in the way of their working together. You didn’t make partner at her age by being prone to letting emotion cloud your judgement.

No, the only potential issue he could see preventing their establishing a positive working relationship was that she obviously had a chip on her shoulder about his money. She had revealed that much with her snarky silver spoon comment. He didn’t know much about her background, but clearly, she didn’t come from wealth. If she had, he would have run into her before now at the yacht club, or some fundraiser or other, but apart from the odd glimpse around and about the family court, they had never met before. But, then being wealthy wasn’t something he could change, and if Georgia couldn’t handle it, that was her problem.

The next morning, after locating her desk out among the multitudes, and trying to be appropriately sympathetic as Miriam struggled with towers of packing crates, Georgia grabbed the file for her first meeting.

She was acting for the wife, Ruby Walsh, her first real high-value client, and the husband’s solicitor had agreed to a conference before matters escalated to the filing of applications. She expected to secure a generous settlement for her client, and due to the complicated nature of Douglas Walsh’s business affairs, bill a good number of chargeable hours, which would keep Dayton and Llewellyn happy.

Georgia flicked through the file, scanning the background information in chronological order, refreshing her memory with the details of the couple’s separation. Miriam had been the one to set up the meeting, so it wasn’t until Georgia came to the final document on the file, an email from the opposing firm confirming the appointment, that she noticed the name.

Spencer Law.

Damn.

The Walsh split would have been a lucrative file, except now that their respective firms had merged she and Brad couldn’t act for both clients. One of the Walsh’s would have to be dispatched to another firm. With Douglas Walsh the wealthier of the two by far, it didn’t take too much guessing to work out whose client that was going to be.

Miriam, who had been speaking into her headset, got up and walked the short two steps from her own desk to Georgia’s.

‘Sorry to interrupt, but Ruby and Douglas Walsh are already here. The receptionist has put them in the conference room. Should I bring tea and coffee in later?’

‘No, you can forget that, Miriam, this is likely to be the shortest conference in the history of the firm.’

Miriam covered her mouth with her hand.

‘Shoot, sorry. I should have thought and cancelled.