Page 28 of His Verdict

“Good morning, Mr. Wolfe.”

“David,” Jasper acknowledges, and that’s it.

The elevator doors slide open to reveal an interior paneled in dark, gleaming wood. Jasper guides me inside. Instead of pressing a button, he simply places his thumb on a small, dark scanner on the wall. A soft chime sounds, and the elevator begins its ascent, fast and silent.

The doors open again, directly into an office with the words Donovan & Creed LLP on the wall behind the receptionist. He leads me quickly to a large corner office. The walls are all glass, offering a breathtaking view of the city and the harbor beyond. There’s almost no furniture. A massive desk made of a single slab of dark, polished wood sits in the center of the room,facing the view. Behind it, a single, high-backed leather chair. In a far corner, a seating area with two low sofas and a ridiculously large abstract painting.

He walks to the desk, his presence filling the vast, empty space. He gestures to one of the two smaller, less intimidating chairs in front of the desk. I sit, my back ramrod straight. The leather is cool against my skin.

He doesn’t sit. He remains standing, looking down at me, establishing the power dynamic immediately and unequivocally.

“First, a formality,” he says. He slides a thin, leather-bound folder across the vast expanse of the desk. “An NDA. Standard legalese. It simply states that you will not discuss the inner workings of my businesses, my personal affairs, or the affairs of any of our clients with any outside party, for the remainder of your life.”

For the remainder of my life.The finality of it is a cold slap. I open the folder. My lawyer’s brain takes over, a familiar, comforting reflex. I read through the dense clauses. He's right. It’s a boilerplate, albeit an aggressive and far-reaching, non-disclosure agreement. Nothing I haven’t seen a dozen times before in school.

I take the heavy, silver pen he offers and sign my name on the bottom line. My signature looks small and insignificant on the page. I’ve just legally bound myself to his silence, forever.

He takes the folder back and replaces it with another, thicker one. “And this,” he says, “is the reality.”

I open it. The letterhead readsDonovan & Creed, LLP. It’s an official employment contract. I scan the key clauses, my heart starting a slow, heavy thud.

Position: Corporate Counsel.

Salary: Two hundred thousand dollars per annum.

Signing Bonus: Fifty thousand dollars, payable upon signing.

The numbers swim in front of my eyes. It’s an astronomical amount of money. More than double my salary at the Public Defender’s office. The signing bonus alone is nearly what I would have made in a year, after tax. It is the price of my soul, printed in black and white.

This is the moment. The final hurdle. My old self, the fighter, the idealist, flickers to life for one last-ditch effort. I can’t just roll over. I can’t just take what he offers. I need to feel, for one last time, like I have some say in my own damnation.

I look up at him, my expression carefully neutral. “The salary is acceptable,” I say, my voice steadier than I feel. “But the benefits package is incomplete.”

A flicker of something—amusement, surprise?—crosses his face. He inclines his head slightly. “Go on.”

“I want a 401k with a full six percent corporate match,” I say, the words coming out sharp and practiced. “And I want a matching contribution for my student loan repayments, up to ten thousand dollars a year, until they are paid in full.”

I’m expecting a negotiation. A counteroffer. A laugh.

Instead, he just nods, his expression completely unreadable. “Acceptable,” he says, as if I’d asked him to pass the salt. He makes a small note on a pad of paper on his desk. “Anything else?”

His easy agreement is more unnerving than any argument would have been. It means my demands are trifles to him, rounding errors in his vast financial empire. He then takes the upper hand, effortlessly.

“The firm also provides corporate housing,” he says, his tone matter-of-fact. “And a company car. My assistant will arrange the details.”

The finality of it is crushing. I look down at the contract in front of me. The pen is still in my hand. This is it. The point of no return. I can walk away, back to my empty bank account and my blacklisted name, with nothing but a shattered sense of my own integrity. Or I can sign, and trade that integrity for a life of comfort and power the likes of which I have never imagined.

My hand hovers over the signature line for a long, silent moment.

The choice isn't between right and wrong anymore. It’s between being the boot, and being the face in the dirt.

My signature is firm, a clean, sharp slash of black ink. I push the folder back across the desk toward him.

He looks down at my signature, and a slow, deeply satisfied smile spreads across his face. It’s the look of a cat who has not just caught the canary, but has spent a week teaching it to sing, only to finally, leisurely, swallow it whole. He has his prize.

“Excellent,” he says. “Welcome to the firm, Ms. Sutton.” He taps the folder. “You’ll start next week. We have a meeting Monday morning, ten o’clock. Here.”

“With who?” I ask.