Legally Addicted - By Lena Dowling Page 0,4

it. You don’t want to talk about it. But have you looked at the new stationery?’

Georgia’s attention snapped to the box in her in-tray that she had so far failed to open. Pulling it out on to the middle of her desk, she ripped open the package. A ream of letter grade bond paper gleamed under the brown paper wrapper, and a few seconds later her eyes zeroed in on what Miriam was referring to. The firm’s name on the letterhead had changed: Dayton Llewellyn Murray.

‘Excellent, very nice, thanks.’

She tried to sound pleased but not overexcited.

Inside, however, was a different matter. Inside, she was leaping over office furniture and punching the air.

Since she had recently turned twenty-nine, success had been a close run thing, but she could now strike ‘make partner by the age of thirty’ off her bucket list. Okay, so she wasn’t a full equity partner, yet, but that was only a matter of time.

Miriam was always telling her she was too driven, sacrificing too much to her work. Well, there was nothing wrong with having goals, and now Georgia had the absolute proof.

Her single-mindedness had already allowed her to strike out ‘get a scholarship to law school’ and ‘find employment with a respected firm’. With her recent achievement, she only had one ambition left on her list to fulfil: convincing the board at the Dockton Women’s Shelter to back her proposal to establish an addiction centre. Based on the lukewarm reaction from philanthropic socialite and Dockton Women’s Shelter board chairwoman, Caro Marsden, that could be overreaching things. Still, Georgia now had irrefutable evidence that with determination and focus, anything was possible.

Later that morning, when Georgia took her place at the conference table for her first partners’ meeting with Roger Llewellyn and John Dayton, anyone looking at her would have thought she was completely unaffected by the enormity of the occasion. She had long ago perfected the art of the blank stare; masking her true feelings. In reality she was awash with excitement. Even though there had been plenty of time to come to terms with the idea of being brought into the partnership, it was still a thrill to finally be attending a partners’ meeting and to be involved in decisions that determined the direction and running of the firm.

She scanned the agenda. It covered mostly routine administrative matters, a few new legal precedents and legislative changes. She was about to put the agenda down, when an italicised entry part way down the page caught her eye.

B Spencer to join the meeting.

‘Who is joining the meeting?’

She tried hard not to sound overly interested, but despite her rational brain pointing out that there could be any number of B Spencers in Sydney, her heart cycled up in speed.

An anxious look passed between Dayton and Llewellyn.

‘Perhaps we should deal with the merger first?’ Llewellyn queried his colleague.

Merger? Georgia felt as if she had been hit with an illegal windpipe-high tackle, and now lay struggling for breath on the ground. What was going on?

‘What merger?’

Georgia looked from one of her colleagues to the other, both squirming in their seats, neither in any hurry to answer.

In the end, John Dayton cleared his throat.

‘Some months ago, Roger and I approached Bradley Spencer with a merger proposal. At the time we received no response and assumed the offer had been rejected. Recently, however, Spencer made contact to resume negotiations, and yesterday, to our great surprise and delight, he accepted our offer.’

‘Well, if he accepted yesterday, it can’t be valid. That offer was made by Dayton Llewellyn — a partnership that no longer exists, having been superseded by the new one which came into being when I joined as partner,’ Georgia said, relieved to have spotted a legal argument to make against the arrangement.

‘Georgia, this is business, and Spencer will bring in a lot more of it. The more profit the firm generates, the better it is for all of us; but for you especially, surely you can see that?’ Roger Llewellyn said.

Georgia didn’t need Llewellyn to remind her that her equity stake was minuscule, with the balance to be paid off over a period that would be determined by how profitable the firm was. It was, therefore, in her interests to agree to the merger. With the other partner’s significant equity shares, even if she didn’t agree it wouldn’t get her very far. Dayton and Llewellyn effectively controlled the partnership, and so called the shots.

Georgia was still trying to process what she had