Matt stares at me for a moment, his face unreadable. He’d make a great poker player. But I also remember him that night we were together and all of the emotions I read across his face. Desire, passion, lust. He wasn’t masking anything then.
Finally, he says, “Those are stupid reasons to take a case. For you to even have a chance, you’ll have to hire a really good accident reconstructionist, and you’ll need to have expert medical witnesses, plus a biomechanical engineer. This case will probably cost a good fifty grand just to get it in the courtroom.”
A biomechanical engineer? An accident reconstructionist? I have no clue what he’s talking about, and I’m so out of my league here.
My heart sinks, because I doubt there’s any way in hell that Matt will agree to front that type of money on what is probably a loser case. Yet I don’t know what I’ll do if he tries to make me get rid of it. I suppose I could leave, and go out on my own… get a loan or something to fund the case.
Matt interrupts my thoughts. “Those reasons may be stupid, but it doesn’t mean they aren’t the right reasons. Sometimes you take stupid risks in this business, just because you happen to really like the client.”
“So we can keep the case?” I ask, hope coursing through me.
Matt can hear it in my voice, and he can’t help but to smile fully at me. “Yeah. I’ll fund this case. But it’s going to be a monster. You’re going to need me to help you with it.”
“Absolutely,” I say with excitement, having to restrain myself from running around the room in a victory lap.
I’m even betting now that I have the Great Litigator God, Matt Connover, on this case, the insurance company will start quaking in their boots. I can’t wait to tell Larry and Miranda, although sadly, Larry will just forget.
Matt goes over a few more things that I need to do to get the ball rolling on the expert witnesses we’ll need, and then he sends me packing so he can take another call.
It’s Saturday, and just because I had a change in my employer and work address, it didn’t equal a change in my work habits. I work every Saturday, come rain or shine. Lorraine demanded it of me when I first went to work for her after I passed the Bar, and I hated the hours. Then, when Pete dumped me, I immersed myself in work so I could forget the pain of my heartbreak. Work became like a drug for me—I needed it to survive.
Now that I’m starting to move past the pain of Pete and emerge back into the real world, I’m here working on a Saturday mainly out of habit, because I have nothing better to do. I’ve been here for almost seven hours already, but I have another three in me I bet.
Matt’s agreement to help me on the Jackson case has renewed my love of the law. After I finish getting some urgent things handled for Lorraine—because everything is always urgent with her, and yet I don’t see her in here working on a Saturday—I tear the Jackson file apart and re-organize it. Putting it in binders, I create a perfect organizational layout of my one and only case. I fill my bookshelf with those binders, then sit back in my chair and admire my work for a moment, feeling empowered and hopeful that I can really make something of this case.
After that, I scour the internet for information on biomechanical engineering, because Matt said I’d need one for the Jackson case, and I have no clue what a biomechanical engineer does. It sounds immensely technical and overly dry, and I’m dreading what I might find. The internet does indeed cough up a wealth of information for me.
I am nose deep in an article that has words like “velocity” and “deceleration” and my eyes are practically rolling into the back of my head, when the hair rises up on my arms. Looking up into the doorway, I yelp in fright to find Matt standing there quietly watching me.
Placing my hand on my chest, I give a nervous laugh. “Geez… you about gave me a heart attack.”
Giving me an apologetic smile, he walks into my office and sits down across from my desk. “Sorry. I was walking by and saw you… thought I’d say hello.”