Total pages in book: 137
Estimated words: 129084 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 645(@200wpm)___ 516(@250wpm)___ 430(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 129084 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 645(@200wpm)___ 516(@250wpm)___ 430(@300wpm)
“Let’s get her representation and on record with her knowledge. I’ll take her case if she chooses to work with me. The best thing we can do is get ahead of this. That means she becomes the whistleblower.”
Fuck me.
“I appreciate the help,” I reply, dropping my head back. “I’ll have her contact you.”
To make things official with my brother, I pay the full retainer he charges, and he tells me exactly what to do when I walk into the office.
Little did I know what I was walking into . . .
37
Noah
Audrina looks up from her desk with an earpiece in place. “Good morning, Noah.”
“Morning.” She’s not someone I generally spare time to spend on because I know she’s behind a lot of the nasty behavior toward Liv the past few years.
“I’m getting reports that the meeting is quite eventful this morning.”
I stop and look back. “Eventful how?”
“The Bancrofts have declared war on each other.” Her phone rings. She raises a finger, but before she answers it, she adds, “I’m rooting for Olivia to win. Mr. Bancroft is an asshole.”
Rooting for Liv? What the fuck?
Whatever Mr. Bancroft did, it must be bad if she’s on Liv’s side. This just made things a whole lot more complicated. I push through the door and rush to the conference room. No yelling is heard upon approach. That’s a good sign. But when I open the door, I hear my girl say, “I quit you, and I quit Bancroft & Lowe. Forever.”
Liv and I see each other at the same time, a million words exchanged without a single one said. I have no idea what happened in the past hour since I dropped her off at the curb, but holy shit. She just quit. I’m sorry to have missed what led to this turn of events, but the pride I feel is extensive.
Her father says, “What’s the agenda for today? Where’s Jennifer?” He looks around, carrying on like his daughter hasn’t spoken and ignoring me as if I’m not here at all.
Shit. I run my hand through my hair. “I’m late,” I say, only sorry I wasn’t here sooner in support of my girlfriend. “Traffic jam this morning.”
Chip sits forward. “I made it on time.”
Mr. Bancroft says, “This meeting is over. I’ll speak to you privately in my office, Mr. Westcott.”
People are running for the door to get out. Now my curiosity has piqued to what transpired over the past hour. I turn to Liv, and ask, “What’d I miss?”
“Uh.” She laughs once, but there’s no humor found in it. “My father was finally honest with me.”
“In front of everyone?”
“I went down in flames.” I move closer to her, and she says, “But I gave the soliloquy of my life before burning the bridge entirely.”
I’m struggling to read how she’s feeling inside based on her bewildered eyes. “Tell me what happened.”
“I’ll share with you later.” She moves to grip the back of a chair that was abandoned. “I think I need to sit.”
“Nice try, muffin top,” Chip says, coming around to poke her in the side. What the fuck? He starts laughing. AT her . . .
I punch him in the face, sending his ass to the floor. “Touch her again, jackface, and you won’t be walking.”
“What the—Fuck, you broke my jaw.” He stares at me in disbelief, wiggling his jaw back and forth, obviously not broken. “You’re going down, Westcott.”
“It’s not broken if you’re still yapping, dumb fuck.” Liv comes to me, grabbing hold of my hand and not giving a fuck who sees us anymore. Since we’re blowing it all up anyway, I might as well light another match . . . “It’s all in good fun, right, Chipper?”
God, it feels good to throw that asshole’s words back in his face. I start for the door with Liv tucked under my arm. “Let’s get you out of here.”
“How’s your hand?” From the sound of her voice, the shock has worn off, which is good. We can focus on getting her out of here.
I flex my hand several times. They’re stiff, but my fingers still work. “Nothing to worry about.”
Double stepping to keep pace with me, she asks, “What are we doing? Where are we going?”
I open the door to her office and pull her in, quickly shutting it behind us and locking it. “Grab whatever you want to keep as fast as you can.”
“He’s not going to throw me out.”
“Yes, they will want us out as soon as possible.” I rush to her desk and activate the screen. “I promise to explain everything, but we don’t have time now.” Pulling the chair out for her, I say, “Send everything you’ve ever worked on to the cloud.”
“Huh? And who’s they?”
“Please, Liv. Just do it. Okay?”
She sits down and starts typing. “My cloud or the company cloud?”