Page 37 of His Verdict
Slowly, over the course of that first week, and into the second, the fog begins to thin. The human mind’s capacity for adaptation is a horrifying and miraculous thing. The constant state of terror begins to recede, replaced by a dull, persistent ache of resignation. The shock wears off, leaving behind the cold, hard reality. This is my life now.
I still don’t know the reason why he picked me, but I guess it never really mattered.
One evening, after two weeks of near-total silence, I find my voice. He is reading in one of the low armchairs, the lamplight casting his face in sharp angles. I am on the sofa, pretending to read a book of my own.
“I want to go back to work,” I say.
The words feel strange in my mouth, foreign artifacts from a previous life.
He looks up from his book, his expression carefully neutral, but I see a spark of something kindle in his eyes. Hope. Victory.
“Oh?” he says, his voice a low, encouraging rumble.
“I can’t just… sit here,” I say, gesturing vaguely at the room around me. “I’ll go insane. I need to do something. I need to use my brain. It’s the only part of me that still feels like it’s mine.”
A slow smile spreads across his face. It is the first genuine smile I have seen from him since before the murder. It reaches his eyes, crinkling the corners, and for a moment, he looks boyishly, dangerously handsome. He is happy. My first, tentative step back toward being myself is a victory for him.
“Of course,” he says, closing his book and setting it aside. He gives me his full attention. “I was waiting for you to ask.”
“I’m not working on the Meridian takeover,” I say immediately, a single, hard boundary I have to draw. “I won’t touch it. I can’t.”
He nods, his expression understanding. “I wouldn’t ask you to. Not yet. The Meridian integration is a hostile, bloody affair. It’s all hands on deck, and everyone is busy. It would not be… conducive to your current state of mind. I’m well aware of how delicate the situation is right now.”
Delicate. He isn’t wrong.
“I have dozens of other holdings,” he continues, his tone shifting into the familiar, confident cadence of a CEO. “Legitimate front-end businesses. Real estate portfolios, technology startups, a philanthropic foundation that requires constant oversight of its legal charters. They are complex, challenging, and in desperate need of a sharp legal mind tomanage their contracts and compliance. It’s clean work, Olivia. Something to ease you back in.”
He is giving me a sanctuary. A walled garden within his empire where I can pretend the blood and the darkness don’t exist. It is a strategic, manipulative move, designed to make me dependent on him for my sense of purpose. And I am so desperate for that purpose, I don’t even care.
“Okay,” I say, the word a quiet surrender. “When do I start?”
“Tomorrow,” he says, the triumphant gleam in his eyes bright and unmistakable.
Walking into the Donovan & Creed offices the next day is a surreal experience. This time, I have a keycard. This time, Katherine, the receptionist, greets me with a polite, professional smile.
“Good morning, Ms. Sutton. Mr. Donovan had this sent up for you.” She hands me a sleek, black laptop and a folder thick with files. “Your office is on the 45th floor. Corner suite, C.”
My office is larger than my old apartment. It has a commanding view of the harbor, a sleek, minimalist desk, and a wall of built-in bookshelves. It is the office of a senior partner, not a new hire. It is a statement.You are important here.
The work is a lifeline. It is exactly as he promised: complex, challenging, and completely, blessedly legal. I spend my days drafting real estate contracts for commercial properties, reviewing investment agreements for tech startups, and untangling the labyrinthine tax codes governing charitable foundations. My mind, which was a swamp of trauma and fear, slowly begins to clear. The familiar, comforting logic of the lawis a balm. I am good at this. The sharpness, the focus, the part of myself I thought he had destroyed, is still there.
The structure of a workday is a salvation. I have a reason to get up, a reason to get dressed in the beautiful, expensive clothes he bought me, a place to go where I am not his captive, but a respected counsel.
He is a different person at the office. He is Mr. Donovan, the demanding, brilliant, and untouchable head of the firm. He checks in on me, but always under the guise of work. He appears in my doorway, a file in his hand, and asks a sharp, insightful question about a clause in a contract I am drafting. Our conversations are all business. It is invigorating. It makes me feel… alive.
Slowly, tentatively, the ghost in the machine begins to stir. I start offering my own opinions, challenging his assumptions, pushing back on his strategies. And he lets me. He seems to enjoy it, a glint of respect in his eyes when I corner him with a perfectly reasoned argument.
The new normal begins to set in. Our days are professional, almost formal.
About a month after I started at the firm, I am working late, trying to finalize a complex leasing agreement before the end of the quarter. The office is quiet, most everyone else has gone home. My door is open, and he appears in the doorway, leaning against the frame, a glass of whiskey in his hand.
“Still here, Sutton?” he asks, his voice a low, amused rumble.
“Some of us have to work for a living, Donovan,” I say, not looking up from my screen. “This lease agreement has moreholes than a block of Swiss cheese. Whoever drafted this for the seller should be disbarred for incompetence.”
“That would be Henderson,” he says thoughtfully. “I’ll have him fired in the morning.”
“Don’t you dare,” I say, finally looking up at him, a small smile playing on my lips despite myself. “He’s a terrible lawyer, but the opposition likes him which is giving us a massive advantage in this negotiation. Let’s fleece him first,thenyou can have him fired.”