Lewd and Lascivious | 18+

Chemistry 3

"This is the main conference room. Really prestigious clients meet in a smaller conference room on five, but in general, we meet here. Across the hall is the kitchen. They have a service that keeps it well stocked with coffee, fruit, and snack items. You can always bring food, too."

He opens the door to the kitchen and a man is standing inside, filling an abnormally large mug with coffee.

He frowns at me.

"Chris, this is Joile Lennox. Jolie, this is the other senior associate, Chris Jordan."

Chris looks similar to Michael. Not in appearance but in attitude. He gives off the same screaming frat-boy vibe.

"Mmm...the Stanford girl." His voice drips with condescension.

"Nice to meet you," I try to hide the sarcasm and I mostly nail it.

"What did you get on your LSATs?" He asks.

Really asshole? First thing? I swear lawyers are the worst.

"You didn't read that in my file, Mr. Jordan?"

He pales slightly and I hear Dane snort behind me.

"178," I tell him confidently, even if he scored higher than 178, that's nothing to look down on. I crushed the LSATs, not a perfect score but pretty damn close.

I can tell by the look on his face that he didn't, in fact, score higher than that.

He looks like he's about to say something but Dane cuts in, "we should continue."

I turn and follow him out, partially wishing he would have let Chris say whatever he was about to. I don't need to be protected. If the other associates are assholes, it's for the best that I hit it head on, not shy away from it. I can hold my own.

We walk down the hallway passing offices with nameplates etched with Chris and Michael's names. The last office has Dane's name. He opens the door for me and waits. I step inside and instantly feel a twinge of jealousy over his view.

His floor-to-ceiling windows look out over Chelsea waterside park. I hope my office faces this direction.

"This is my office. If I'm not in the research room, I'm here. Look...I know that this place is really competitive but if you ever need anything... I won't trip you up, we're going to be working together for the foreseeable future, we can be in friendly competition, not rivalry." His stupid handsome face looks completely sincere.

"Thank you, Dane. I would like that."

I look around his office, aside from a gym bag on the chair in the seating area, there are no personal touches anywhere.

"We can go down to your office now. I believe the partners are having lunch catered. You can go get settled in then after lunch we can hit the research room."

"That sounds great."

He leads me back to the elevator and to the third floor.

"This floor has your office, the other juniors office, the paralegals share an office and we have one computer support technician that has an office here, too," he explains as he walks past several offices. "This is you and the bathroom for this floor is across the hall. I'll leave you to it."

"Thanks, see you later."

I appreciate that he left immediately. He didn't loiter around awkwardly. My office is very small but the furniture is stylish, modern and sleek like the rest of the building. My window looks out over the crosswalk. I guess people-watching is cool, not that I'll have time to stare out my window often.