Dangerous Affection

Chapter Thirteen

'Come in.’ Joanne’s clear voice rings out when I tap on her office door.

I step inside. She is bent over a document, marking it with vicious scrawls and lines. She doesn’t look up immediately.

Thunder roars in my head. The woman in front of me has deceived me, but she’s also my boss. Fury battles respect and respect wins through.

‘Morning, Joanne, you wanted to see me.’ I’m striving for a confident tone, but I’m painfully aware I miss the mark by a long way.

There is silence apart from the sound of her pen slashing through words on the page and the hum of the air-conditioning unit from its position above the door.

The room is cool, bordering on chilly, but Joanne has shed her smart jacket and is wearing a thin, silky blouse with sleeves that end on her slender, lightly tanned forearms.

‘There. That should do it.’ She lays down her pen and indicates one of the chairs opposite her desk. ‘Please. Sit down, Emma.’

I sit down and clasp my fingers together in front of me.

She looks at me. She’s giving nothing away.

‘I had a discussion with Shaun last night,’ I say. ‘He told me about the two of you.’

‘I see.’ There is a strange expression on her face, but no trace of regret.

‘It’s your business, of course. Shaun and I, we’re not together any more. I think I mentioned that in one of our one-to-one meetings.’ Her eyes widen slightly, as if she’s surprised at my candour. ‘We have agreed to physically stay together in the house for the time being, for Maisie’s sake, but we’ve called time on our marriage. We’ve grown apart, you see.’

My words falter. I can feel my cheeks burning and I am suddenly annoyed that I’m helping to justify the two of them together. It should be her who is trying to placate me.

But Joanne doesn’t offer me any platitudes or sympathetic noises. She just sits there, detached. Cold.

A sense of unfairness oozes into my chest. This is all Shaun’s fault.

‘I’d rather we get things in the open,’ I offer. ‘I don’t want it to affect my working here.’

‘If it makes it any easier, neither of us expected this to happen. It’s not ideal, granted. But Shaun and my relationship has nothing to do with your job, Emma. The two things are completely separate.’

Are they, though? She is in a position of power at work. She could make life very difficult for me if she chose to.

I don’t know what to say. Do I smile and act as if everything is OK, even though I’m personally furious at them both? Or do I tell her how I really feel?

She picks up her pen again and twiddles it in her fingers, looking thoughtful.

‘I have to say, it’s very bad timing.’ I can’t stop myself. ‘Our marriage is over, but my concern is Maisie. Shaun agreed that stability at home was key in making sure she didn’t suffer, and then I find out he’s been… seeing you.’

‘Obviously it’s difficult for me to comment on that.’ Joanne sighs and puts down her pen again.

‘Of course, but you must see he’s put me in an impossible position. We’d agreed a new arrangement, the criteria being that we do what is best for Maisie. But now I don’t see how our amicable relations, our arrangement, can continue.’

I clamp my mouth shut. Despite working quite closely with Joanne for the past couple of months since I qualified, I don’t really know anything about her personal life apart from that she has a daughter.

‘I hope you don’t mind me asking if a little bit of you hoped you two would eventually call a truce, give it another go?’

I’m taken aback by her forthright manner, but it’s obvious she feels relaxed enough to be frank with me, and I choose to take that as a good sign.

If their relationship is as serious as it sounds, I need to keep on civil terms with them both for Maisie’s sake.

‘Not at all,’ I say quickly, and I mean it. ‘I wish him well in his life, but my daughter and my career are my priorities now.’

She gives me a genuinely relieved smile.

‘I appreciate you coming to speak to me this morning, Emma. I admit it’s not an ideal situation, but you can’t always choose who you fall in love with.’

Fall in love? As far as I’m aware, they’ve only been seeing each other a couple of weeks!

‘You seem very serious about each other, given that it’s such early days.’

‘I know.’ She gives me a coquettish grin. ‘Neither of us expected it to happen so quickly, but rest assured, the girls are our priority. We will tread carefully, but it’s great they already know each other through dancing.’

‘Yes.’ My fingernails drive into my palms.

This is so weird. I just want to get out of her office.

‘Let’s agree now to put personal matters behind us in terms of the job.’ She leans back in her sumptuous cream leather padded chair.

‘Agreed.’ My shoulders drop an inch.

‘The reason I asked you to pop up here is that I have a couple of new cases beginning next week. If you’d like the experience and you’ve got a few hours spare, then I’m happy to bring you on board with them.’

‘Yes! I mean thanks, Joanne. That would be amazing.’ My cheeks flush a little when I realise I never gave her chance to say why she’d asked me up here in the first place. I’d simply assumed it was about Shaun.

I’ve never considered that anything remotely positive could come from this. She certainly didn’t have to offer me the work; usually the more experienced paralegals get the interesting stuff.

Maybe our complicated personal situation can work after all.

She pulls a stack of folders towards her. ‘OK, good. So, I want you to start by sifting through this lot, summaries of other similar cases from the national database. See if you can pick up any useful consistencies in terms of the circumstance and relevant outcomes.’

It’s the kind of job that would usually put me to sleep, but on this occasion, it makes me sit up in anticipation.

‘You’ll be working closely with me on this, and happily, as we’ve had a higher rate of new case enquiries since I’ve worked on raising our company profile, it’s possible you’re going to be in at the deep end work-wise.’

‘Music to my ears.’ Maisie’s face flits into my mind as I realise I’ll need Shaun’s support more than ever.

‘It won’t be a problem?’ Joanne says hesitantly. ‘Doing more hours… with your current personal circumstances, I mean?’

‘Not at all,’ I hear myself say. ‘Whatever it takes. I’ve got my mum and friends to call on any time I need help with Maisie.’

Friends?If only that were true.

I’ve never a huge friendship group, but prior to starting my paralegal qualification, I had two or three good friends I saw regularly.

With the pressures of work, studies and my failing marriage, they stopped asking to meet up after my repeated rejections, and just sort of faded away.

I’m starting to realise that’s what happens to relationships. If you forget to work on them, before you know it, they end up tailing off.

The twist is, my relationships with both Joanne and Shaun are key to my life. They both have a massive influence and I can’t afford to get on the wrong side of either of them.

In other words, I’m between a rock and a hard place and I have no choice but to make the best of the situation.