“Hmm. I didn’t ask you, Mr. Darrow.” Something shone in Mansfield’s eyes that wasn’t quite anger, but I knew I needed to tread carefully.
Z let out a deep, shaky breath. “It’s really f—”
“The workload is understandable, but as I said, we both worked last weekend, and workplace burnout is a real issue in our field. You wouldn’t want to push your best workers so hard they become useless, would you?” I forced myself to stand tall and not slouch under the weight of twenty pairs of incredulous eyes turning toward me—including Z’s.
“Best? Bold of you to make such an assumption about yourself.” Mansfield leaned back in his chair.
“You just said Zayden has an eagle eye, so I’d saybestfits for him, at least.”
Z let out a squeak I doubted Mansfield heard, but across the room, Olivia looked like a chipmunk with her cheeks puffed out while she clearly tried to keep from laughing. She patted at her shiny blonde hair, and slowly her cheeks deflated. Mansfield turned his gaze on her, and she gave him her best impression of a casual smile.
Mansfield spun back toward me. “You do it, then, Mr. Darrow. I didn’t say you were the best, so I don’t care if you burn out.”
Z let out a tiny growl, and there was a ruffle of laughter around the room as everyone shuffled the papers they had in front of them or otherwise tried to look busy.
“But I did work last weekend, so maybe you should be worried about me racking up overtime.”
Z leaned against my arm as if he’d been shot. I didn’t dare look down at him, or I’d cave and apologize and offer to work every weekend until the end of time, just to make sure I didn’t get him fired.
Mansfield snorted, and a smile flickered onto his face before it disappeared again.
Z drove his elbow into my side so hard I’d be bruised later.
Mansfield chuckled before he swung quickly toward Olivia, who straightened in her seat and covered her laugh with a cough.
“You”— he pointed at Olivia—“and you,” he added, jerking a thumb at Gustav Marks, a paralegal who was fairly new. “Congrats. You’re in for the weekend.”
They both murmured their assent, and Mansfield charged on with the rest of the meeting. By the time everything wrapped up, three more people were sentenced to come into the office when they should be relaxing.
Mansfield broke the meeting up with, “Mr. Darrow is going to be in charge of putting together a rotating schedule for weekend work, so I don’t burn out my best—” He stopped to look directly at Z, who flushed. “—workers. Carry on. I expect that to happen before next Friday’s meeting, Mr. Darrow. Get on with it,” he barked.
Everyone filed quickly out of the conference room, and my coworkers couldn’t have walked any faster without sprinting like they were in an Olympic event. I tried not to make eye contact with anyone because there were more than a few people who were happy to allow Zayden to take the brunt of the weekend work, and I’d just made that impossible.
“Mr. Darrow. My office,” Mansfield snapped as he strode past me. My heart hammered as I followed after him along the portrait-lined hallway at a fast clip. Z gave me big eyes but spun on his heel to go to his desk and get started for the day. There was no need to compound my dressing down with him being late on some project just because he was worried about me, and we both knew it.
Mansfield went through a doorway at the end of the corridor into a small outer office that was more of a reception area, but no one was at the desk. Mansfield didn’t stop, just barreled through yet another door. Once we were in his spacious office, Mansfield didn’t get behind his desk, simply leaned his ass on the edge and tossed a folder onto it he’d had tucked under his arm. Sunshine streamed into the room, and I had to admit the view from his office was the nicest in the building. The windows looked out over a small decorative pond and a stand of cottonwood trees. He rested his hands at his back and stared at me with a neutral expression I couldn’t work out.
“You’re not scared of me,” he drawled after a long minute.
I shrugged. “No. Not especially. You’re tough but normally fair.”
He flashed me a toothy smile. “Other people are worried I’ll fire them on the spot.”
“I’ve never seen that happen….”
He chuckled and slapped the desktop at his sides. “I like you. Between you, Mr. Shoemaker, and the lovely Olivia, we were in a well-researched position in court this week. Olivia is already my assistant when she’s not heading other projects. You’re going to work for me, personally. I like to keep the best people for myself. I’m greedy.”
“I just told you I won’t work this weekend,” I said with a frown. Confused, I rubbed at my temple.
He shrugged and shoved off the desk to jog around to his seat with more energy than someone half his age might’ve moved. “You had a good reason. I’d also like to bring Mr. Shoemaker on board to be on my personal team. I’m taking you both out of the paralegal pool. Sometimes I forget people need to have a life to be happy.”
“Uh… I do enjoy working with Olivia and Zayden.” My heart raced, and I rubbed my hands along my sides, removing some nervous sweat. What the hell had I started in that meeting? Why couldn’t I keep my mouth shut?
“You still will.” He opened the lid on his laptop and didn’t glance up at me. “All this will do is put you on point for my personal projects and fuck over Rowell and Harford.”
“Sir, why would you want to screw over your own partners? If I might ask?” My heart thudded harder. What the hell was going on?
He smirked and it wasn’t pleasant. “Because they’ve been lazy the last few months. We’ve lost too many cases. That smug bastard Demchenko wiped the floor with us two weeks ago, and I hate giving wins to men like him. Tech and patent law aren’t even his specialties. How the fuck did he manage that? Rowell and Harford are going to be working weekends themselves again soon if they don’t get their shit together. There’s no room for slacking here.”
