She had laughed all the time when they were just office colleagues.
She wasn't supposed to cry.
Rox was right about one thing, though. He had said many of those things to other girls. Not all of them, but many.
He had known Rox for three long years. All during that time, she had given him no sign that she would ever leave Grant, Casimir's fictional competition, so Casimir had indulged in affair after affair, waiting. None of the other women had satisfied him, each more superficial than the last, none of them as smart or reliable or personable or sensible as Rox-or as beautiful-and no matter how much he had tried to invest himself into each relationship, the time came in each affair when he just couldn't pretend any longer.
Every time, when he had realized that each woman was not and would never be Roxanne, the guilt had overwhelmed him.
That was when, as Rox had said, he had ghosted them.
When he took a deep breath, he could still smell her perfume on his skin.
Casimir walked to his desk. A notepad with his own handwriting-odd and with violent vertical slashes, he had been told-lay on top of his myriad other papers. The name Valerie Arbeitman was written across the top.
His meeting with Valerie was due to start in five minutes.
He must focus on that. He must forget this insanity concerning Rox and concentrate on this meeting with Valerie.
Much hinged on his meeting with Valerie.
Her side of the story.
The state ethics panel.
Possible criminal prosecutions.
He wished that Rox could attend the meeting with him, but if it went very, very badly, he didn't want her to lose her job, too.
He picked up the notepad and, setting his jaw, walked through the cubicle maze to the senior partners' offices.
Valerie was waiting for him at her door. "I'm glad to see that you're back and you're all right," she said. "I don't think I said that, earlier."
"And I'm glad to see that you've made a full recovery," he said.
She shrugged. "Nearly. My left side is a little weak, and my cheek feels weird." She pushed at the side of her face.
"No one could ever tell," he said, keeping his voice low.
Valerie's smile was rueful, perhaps even angry. "Always the gentleman, aren't you?"
"I try."
They walked inside Val's office, and she kicked the door shut behind them. "And yet you requested this meeting to discuss my incompetence."
Valerie was a senior partner, and she and Josie could agree to buy him out of the partnership and kick his butt to the curb with a memo. "I said that there were irregularities in your contracts that we needed to discuss, such as the net profits rather than the gross profits for DiCaprio this afternoon."
Valerie brushed her hand in the air as if their client being potentially swindled out of millions of dollars didn't matter to her. "We would have caught it on the next draft."
"There isn't supposed to be a next draft. Who did you have working on it?"
"Wren Sishi."
Casimir shook his head. Wren was stellar. She wouldn't have missed that. "I'll ask her about it. You know that she saves all her drafts."
"You're implying that I'm lying."
"While I was recovering from the car accident, I looked over many contracts from this law office. I found many irregularities in every contract that you had final approval on. Many. It seems that you were acting contrary to our clients' interests."
"I'm not acting contrary to their interests. I'm doing the best that I can for everyone's interests."
"The current rules for professional conduct don't allow you to advocate for everyone's interests. Just our clients' interests. You cannot act contrary to those. Anything else is unethical."
"It's important that I act in everyone's best interests. When I say everyone, I mean me, and Josie, and our associates, and you."
"This is not in my best interest, I assure you. I would never condone betraying even one of our clients."
Valerie leaned on her desk and stared straight at him. "Just because you don't know why doesn't mean that I'm wrong, and I am absolutely right on this. I'm the senior partner, and you need to back off."
"I won't," he said.
"I heard that you and Rox wouldn't back off when you headed into the Watson negotiation with Monty Evans. I heard all about it."
"We're supposed to advocate for our clients. We must act on their behalf and do our best for them."
"I can't tell you everything, Cash. You'll just have to trust me and stop pushing people."
"I can't trust you if you betray our clients."
"You need to stop pushing people now. It's getting dangerous. You were almost killed."
"That was an accident. It has nothing to do with it."
"Of course, it was an accident. You need to stop pushing people."
"Tell me why."
"Hell, no."
"You have betrayed so many of our clients. How could I trust a word you say?"
Casimir stopped, and a tremor started in his hands. He played that back in his head. You have betrayed so many of our clients. How could I trust a word you say?
He shook it off. This meeting was paramount.
Valerie said, "As senior partner, I'm telling you to back off. You will stop reviewing any contract that is not for one of your own clients. I don't want to hear another damn word about any of this, and you won't talk to Monty Evans again. Do you hear me?"
He stood. "You haven't heard the last of this, Valerie."
"For your sake, for all our sakes, and for the sake of this firm, I hope you'll change your mind." She looked straight at him, her brown eyes wide. "And for the love of God, if you are going to challenge Monty Evans again, leave Rox Neil out of it."
"Rox is my paralegal. She goes into all meetings with me."
"You're fucking her."
"She's my paralegal first and foremost. She's a professional woman, and I respect her."
"I am telling you, if you feel the need to go tilting at windmills again, leave her in the office."
"I'm not tilting at windmills. These are unethical actions. These contracts would swindle our clients."
"Oh, that's just your opinion."
"I assure you that it's fact."
"Take the rest of the day off. You're overwrought from coming into the office so soon after your accident."
"I am not," he growled.
"I have another appointment. Thank you for stopping by." She picked up some papers from her desk and pointedly began reading them. "And be careful driving home, Cash."
"Thank you for your time," Casimir said, measuring out his words.
He strolled through the office, smiling and talking to people while his mind whirled.
Valerie Arbeitman was lying to him about everything.
HIS HOLINESS POPE FUCKITALL
After Cash had untangled himself and left her office, citing that he needed to talk to someone, Rox swallowed hard to dispel any remaining heebee-jeebees and was holding her cell phone to her ear while it rang, calling Cash's house phone.
A man answered, "Casimir van Amsberg's residence. Good afternoon, Roxanne."
Arthur's rich baritone didn't even sound sleepy, and his British accent was as sharp as cut crystal.
She said, "Hey, Arthur. I was seeing if Maxence was up?" Because she had assumed that Arthur would be sleeping off his drunk for hours yet.
"Oh, no. His Holiness Pope Fuckitall is still asleep."
"You sound, um, okay?"
"Of course. Slept it off like a champ, as usual."
"That's impressive," she said.
"I deeply appreciate the water and salts this morning. That helped a lot."
"If I had been that wasted, I would have needed an I.V. and an exorcist."
Arthur laughed. "How is our lad doing on his first day back at work?"
"Fine. He's alpha-maling everyone else in the office, as usual."
"He's going after other women?" Arthur sounded confused.
"Oh, no. He's just reestablishing his place in the pecking order. He's already challenged two other guys to a game of basketball on the parking structure's roof after work. Do you and Maxence want to meet us for a late supper?"
"He's challenged two blokes? Does he play two-on-one?"
"Oh, no. He and Draven play two-on-two against the other guys."
"Tell Draven to switch teams. I'll roust Sleeping Moody out of bed, and we'll play three-on-three, just like old times."
"Okay. I'll tell him."
And then she would tell all the women in the office to get their butts up to the roof.
This was going to be epic.
FUN AND GAMES
Oh, and it was.
Rox and the other women and a few of the gay men stood around the makeshift basketball court and watched the glorious display of manflesh in the setting sun.