Read an Excerpt
Scene One
The Shark Tank
I strode through the shark tank on four-figure heels. All around me, young, hungry, eager heads turned my way. I pressed on, aware of how well my designer dress fit my form like armor and how flawlessly my corona of blond hair shone from this morning's blowout. Everything about my signature look had been carefully designed to exude confidence but not arrogance, taste not flash and, above all, strength not weakness. And I'd been pulling it off since my own stint in the tank years ago.
All the big-name firms had their own nicknames for where they housed their first-years-the bullpen, the cockpit, the boar's den-but I preferred "the shark tank" because it didn't confer gender on the training ground for the future leaders of the firm.
I scanned the ranks of baby predators-they may as well have been wearing signs around their necks that read "Will work all night for your approval" and "Broken by due diligence-can you help?" Well, what had they expected? Our firm's first-year experience functioned like an intro to O-chem-designed to weed out the weak and undisciplined-and only about half of these Brooks Brothers-clad hopefuls would get offers to return next year. If they wanted a touchy-feely experience, they should have gone into I-banking.
"Riki," I called.
The associate in question looked up from her monitor, her dark eyes sharp and her even darker hair swinging out behind her in a silky whip.
"Excellent work on that merger markup. Comments in your inbox. Get them back to me by Monday morning."
"Of course," she answered. No hesitation, even though it was early Friday afternoon and I'd just sunk her weekend.
"I'll forward you the invite for the call with the client scheduled for Tuesday morning. You can take them through the open issues."
"Thank you, Ms. Barnes."
"Portia," I reminded her with a half smile.
"Portia," she echoed firmly.
Several heads swiveled in Riki's direction, their eyes narrowed. I'd singled her out to lead a client call-an opportunity that few of them had been offered in their six-month stint here. Of course, I'd put a target on Riki's back, but I knew she could handle it.
I had plans for Riki. Ample amounts of intelligence and determination-the perfect alchemical formula to be my star associate. Now I just had to convince her to move to Boston. All in good time though.
I proceeded with my swath through the shark tank, blithely ignoring the murmurs springing up in my wake as I pressed the elevator button for the twenty-fifth floor. Even though these heels were modern marvels of foot-cradling wonderment straight out of a woman-owned design house in Florence, that didn't mean I wanted to hike up six flights of stairs in them.
The doors slid open, and the tastefully appointed corporate reception area greeted me like an old friend. I knew every inch of dark cherry furniture and every brushstroke of those neoclassical foxhunts that hung on the wall.
Even though Gerald would be expecting me in exactly eight minutes, I swung by my office one last time. Lingering in the doorway, I surveyed the now sparse room. The walnut desk had only a docking station, and my two diplomas from Harvard hung perfectly straight on the eggshell wall, waiting for facilities to pack them up and ship them to Boston. On the bookshelf where I'd already cleared out several law treatises and publications, a single silver Tiffany frame with a picture of my parents and sisters winked at me in the late-afternoon sun. I hadn't had the heart to take it home with me last night, knowing I'd be back one more time, so I reached for it now, stowing it away in my Stella McCartney vegan leather handbag.
Miranda had insisted we take one this past Christmas, and after fumbling with the timer on her phone and several obscenity-laden retakes because Dad and Cordelia kept closing their eyes, we'd finally managed a mostly normal one of us. Miranda, who looked like one of those Waterhouse maidens-all cascading red hair and milk white skin, deceptively demure and serene but for the slain dragon at her feet-and Cordelia, ever the luscious Botticelli, hogging all the curves and curls our gene pool had to offer, sandwiched Mom in the middle. Dad and I, who shared the same willowy build and coloring-winter-sky blue eyes and pale, straight hair-stood tall in the back. And, of course, because we couldn't have a family photo without him-Miranda's dog, Puck, sitting on her feet and still managing to pull off the best smile of all of us. Home. The idea filled me with equal parts longing and dread.
I didn't need to glance at my watch to know I needed to get a move on, so I silently bade goodbye to my home away from home, the corner office that I comfortably occupied up to fourteen hours a day without complaint, and stole one last glance at the sweeping views of Manhattan out my floor-to-ceiling window.
Chris Rogers sat on the other side of the floor in the corner office diagonal from my own. Eons ago, when we'd been summer associates together, we'd shared a tiny, cramped office down on the ninth floor with panoramic views of the alley, our backs nearly touching if we were both in our chairs at the same time. How the mighty and relentless had risen.
Like mine, Chris's present office was spacious and appointed in the same dark walnut, but that's where the similarities ended. His walls were crammed with pictures of a younger version of himself and his friends grinning like loons atop the summits of Denali, Kilimanjaro, Snowdon and Mont Blanc, while his desk and worktable were overflowing with mismatched frames displaying snapshots of his surgeon wife, Callie, and their adorable but slightly terrifying twins, Alyssa and Kayla, who'd gone off to kindergarten last fall.
Chris himself stood at the window, his back to me. He stretched and yawned loudly, so I knew he'd heard me enter. "I thought you were going to leave by noon to beat the traffic. You know how it picks up in June."
"The best-laid plans. I wanted to finish up the Peterson draft before I left."
"So I don't have to look in on Stu Peterson and his dullard sons this summer?" he asked, a hopeful note in his voice.
"Oh no." I smiled. "You'll be holding their hands through all their ridiculous underbaked deals, but I bought you a week or so. Consider it my going-away gift."
"I'm the one babysitting your clients for the summer. I believe I'm the one gift giving here," he insisted, turning from the window. Coming in somewhere north of six feet, Chris loomed tall and lean, with dark skin and amber eyes. These days, he sported a thin mustache, which he insisted he'd grown to look more partner-like, but really, I thought he did it to drive Callie nuts.
He and I had grown up together in the office as freshly minted summer associates and only slighter wiser first-years. We'd both been fast-tracked to senior associates and made partner the same year, two years ahead of our peers. We'd been colleagues and late-night-Thai-in-the-office buddies and occasional rivals. When the opportunity for managing partner in Boston's satellite office came up, I assumed it would come down to one of us. But to my surprise, Chris had bowed out early in the process. "Boston does not deserve my Black daughters," he'd told me. "That city has some serious growing up to do." And though I respected his decision, I would miss him, and that was not something I said of most people. Okay, anyone. I didn't say that about anyone.
"Do you have a game plan yet?" Chris demanded. "So you don't go all Annie Wilkes in the backwoods?"
I wrinkled my nose. "I don't live in the backwoods of New Hampshire."
"Portia, there are no Orangetheories or Williams Sonomas within a fifty-mile radius. Face it, you're in the backwoods."
"Says the guy who grew up eating grits and gators," I retorted, crossing my arms over my chest. But not too tight. Wrinkles were unseemly.
"Don't distract me," Chris said with a grin. "I know all your moves. Now, what is the game plan for your sabbatical? You know Gerald will make you take the full three months."
"Sit around in my sweatpants and eat ice cream?"
"You don't own sweatpants and I've never seen you eat ice cream."
"I own yoga pants and have been known to put away my fair share of gelato."
His eyes widened to comedic proportions. "I am in the presence of a rebel."
I sighed. "I've been a little busy closing matters here and making sure the transition team is on top of everything in Boston. I haven't really had time to think of a plan."
"Bullshit. You show up to bagel Fridays with a plan."
While he wasn't wrong (thin-sliced pumpernickel bagels or bust), I didn't think he'd approve much of my paltry plans for the summer, which included little more than brushing up on a couple of management books and TED talks on leadership. I still held out hope that Gerald would drop this whole sabbatical business. This place needed me. He needed me.
"I suppose I'll let my mother put me to work on the festival," I hedged. But even as I said it, my throat tightened with that familiar squeeze of anxiety I felt when I thought of my mother. Well, not specifically my mother per se, but her health. A little more than a year ago, she'd found a lump. A lump that had turned out to be stage two breast cancer and had required surgery and ongoing chemotherapy to treat it. I hadn't told anyone at work about it. Not even Chris. When you shared bad news like this with coworkers, they would go all kid-glove on you, and that could translate to a loss of opportunities. Hard pass.
"Callie and the girls are excited to come to the festival this year," Chris said, slicing through my thoughts. "Thank you for the invite."
"I noticed you didn't include yourself in that list."
He shrugged. "Shakespeare's not my bag."
"Mine either," I told him with a conspiratorial smile. "But home is home, whether that's grits and gators or a bunch of ex-English majors running wild in farthingales and codpieces and sporting bad British accents."
Chris snorted. "So your plan to not succumb to Shakespearean madness is . . ."
"I have hobbies."
"Name one."
"Running."
"That's not a hobby. That's masochistic. Name another."
"Swimming."
"Where are you going to swim in the backwoods?" Chris demanded. "You don't strike me as a skinny-dip-in-the-creek kind of person."
"The creek has eels in it." I shuddered. "Ill-advised skinny-dipping aside, I'll figure something out. On the drive home."
He didn't look convinced, but he let me off the hook all the same. I really admired that about Chris. You could tell he saw everything, but he didn't always feel the need to call you out on it. "Well, I can't say I'll miss you," I said, repeating the exact words we'd exchanged when we'd parted ways after our summer associateship, neither of us knowing at the time whether we'd be invited back to FrancisPearl as first-years.
"I won't miss you in the slightest either," he said, falling into our routine. "I certainly won't be picking up the phone to call or text you."
"Not at all. I've already deleted your number from my contacts. You know how I feel about clutter."
"I won't even say take care of yourself."
"That would be beneath you," I agreed.
He smiled broadly. "See you in August. But if I show up and you're running around in a corset with a decidedly unposh accent . . . I'm not even turning the car off. That's how art house horror flicks start."
"Fair enough. Give my love to Callie and the girls," I called with a blithe smile as I walked out of the office of the only person at FrancisPearl I considered a friend.
When the elevator doors opened, I stood facing the boardroom conference center, which always reminded me of being in a high-rise terrarium: floor-to-ceiling glass windows everywhere that looked out on New York's finest views, with some oversized statement plants thrown in around the tastefully selected furniture for context.
"He ready for me?" I asked, pausing at Marnie's desk. Marnie Symonds, the executive admin to Gerald, was bursting with life and opinions and vibrant auburn curls.
"Head on in. You ready for your summer vacation?"
I snorted. "What did you do with your sabbatical?"
"I took my husband to Santorini and ate my weight in saganaki several times over and drank enough wine to fill the harbor."
"Saganaki?"
"Fried cheese."
"Eating one's weight in fried cheese does sound delightful."
"Honey, I'm willing to wager you've never once eaten your weight in fried cheese."
"I can't say I have," I admitted, then added, "but maybe this is the summer to try it. Wish me luck."
Taking a deep breath and locking my most confident smile into place, I pushed through the doors and was momentarily blinded by the bright afternoon sun streaming in through the windows, hitting the gleaming table where seven suits sat jockeying for airtime.
"Gentlemen," Gerald Cutler said with a magnificent sweep of his hand, "I'd like to introduce Portia Barnes, the jewel of FrancisPearl's best-in-class corporate department. Portia specializes in mergers and acquisitions, development plays . . ."
As Gerald ticked off my many attributes, I sized up the suits. All men. All dressed like they had something to prove. Good. No surprises, then.
When Gerald had finished, I smiled, showing ruthlessly whitened teeth, and offered my new clients the slightest inclination of my head, making it clear that while collaboration was always on the table, respect would be earned.
While the suit in charge outlined his business model, I listened and nodded attentively, all the while watching Gerald, the managing partner of FrancisPearl and my mentor. Despite being born with a whopper of a silver spoon in his mouth, the man was a grinder, a pugilistic pit bull in a well-tailored suit who had carried the firm on his broad back during the economic downturns and the contentious merger of Francis, Joseph and Cullen LLP with Pearl and Lovejoy LLP that had nearly sunk the firm in the early '90s. He was the man who had plucked me from the obscurity of the shark tank, loaded me down with work and awarded me at the end with a job offer, the highest sign-on bonus ever offered to a first-year and this single comment in my firm recommendation: Portia does not suffer fools.
