Chapter Twelve
Monday morning, I woke up to a note from Patricia saying Eddie wanted to take Andie to dinner before she headed back to LA and to meet them at the Palm at six o’clock.
I reread Ben’s email on the subway to the office. I knew I needed to respond, but the memory of the last time we’d seen each other was still palpable. Ever since my wine bar unraveling after I filed the divorce papers, I couldn’t trust that either of us was ready to see the other.
Charlie was downtown again for the day, and the hours crawled. I read through the memo again and again, refreshing my email dozens of times and anxiously wondering if Eddie had read it yet.
He still hadn’t responded by the time I had to leave for dinner.
When I arrived at the Palm, I spotted Andie sitting alone at the corner of the mahogany bar and momentarily panicked at the thought of another uncomfortable one-on-one. She was engrossed in her phone and barely noticed me sit down.
“Nice to see you again,” I said with so much forced enthusiasm there was no way she couldn’t pick up on it.
“Hi. Eddie’s running late again.”
She must have seen every muscle in my face tense.
“Drink?” she asked, almost throwing me the menu.
I nodded a little too emphatically and caught the bartender’s eye. “May I have a French pinot noir, please?”
“Nothing French by the glass. Just California reds.”
I pursed my lips and looked in her direction. “What are you having?”
“1942.”
I hesitated.
“Try it. You won’t even know it’s straight tequila.”
I took a sip. It burned like hell.
“I’ll do the same, please,” I said.
Andie looked pleased. “Any word from Eddie?”
I quickly scanned my emails. “He said to order appetizers, and he’ll be here in twenty.”
“He’s a busy guy. Pretty impressive.”
I looked down at my glass and took another sip, trying not to cough.
“When did you finish law school?”
I smiled sheepishly. “I started at the firm last month.”
“Holy hell, you’re green.” She sighed. “I always wanted to be a lawyer. I wish we could trade places.”
I tried not to look surprised. “When did you change your mind?”
She laughed. “When I realized there was a faster way to take over the world, I guess.”
She took a sip of tequila and paused. I wondered if she was done with small talk.
Then she asked, “Did you always want to be a lawyer?”
I shook my head. “I always thought I wanted to be an actress, but practicality got the best of me. I didn’t even know entertainment law existed until I was in my twenties. It seemed like the perfect way to pragmatically do what I love.”
She suddenly looked interested. “You know I have a lot of connections in Hollywood, right? You never know what direction life could take you,” she said, looking pleased that she could potentially offer something.
I couldn’t tell if her intentions were genuine or if she wanted to motivate me to work my ass off, but it didn’t matter. At least we were having a conversation.
By the time Eddie arrived and the hostess showed us to our table, it felt like Andie’s iciness was beginning to melt. I wondered if Eddie had intentionally given us a head start.
He ordered a bottle of Saint-émilion. We each ordered steak, and Andie chose three shareable sides for the table. Two hours later, we’d learned everything about Eddie’s beginnings prosecuting Brooklyn mobsters.
I watched Andie’s eyes harden. “And now you’re defending accused white-collar criminals. Like me.”
“Accused, not convicted,” he reminded her. I felt a jolt deep in the pit of my stomach, wondering if he’d read the memo.
She softened. “Well, I’m personally glad you switched sides. If I’d had an Eddie Kaufman in my corner earlier, I might have made better choices.” She smiled. “Maybe I’d even have ended up like my new friend Sam. Climbing the Big Law ladder.”
Eddie smiled. “We’re all on our own path, Andie. I don’t doubt for a second you’re going to be okay.”
He settled the check, and we walked out together. As he hailed Andie a cab, she leaned over and gave me a warm hug. “Come to LA. I’ll introduce you to some fun people.”
“That would be great, thanks,” I said quietly, not wanting Eddie to get the impression I was soliciting a client for networking connections.
Eddie told me to expense the Uber. As the driver cut across midtown to the West Side Highway, I rolled down the window and felt the rush of the Hudson River to my right and the energy of all of Manhattan to my left.
I groaned when my alarm went off at 6:30 the next morning to meet Emilie and Connor for hot yoga at Y7.
I stretched in the dark while I waited for Emilie and Connor to find the two mats I’d laid out next to me. My mind was still shuffling through possible reasons Ben might’ve reached out.
He definitely wasn’t ready to move on.
Was he still writing a book?
I imagined Ben turning into a bestselling author with a combination tell-all, self-help masterpiece on surviving your ex-wife’s emotional immaturity.
I moved to Savasana and squeezed my eyes shut.
I felt a rush of cold air as Emilie raced in and crouched on the mat next to me. “He brought that girl,” she whispered between clenched teeth.
“What girl?”
“The one he took to Barry’s.”
I looked over and saw a petite Zoe Kravitz look-alike trailing behind Connor, carrying two yoga mats.
“Morning, ladies. This is Gillian,” Connor announced loudly as the instructor signaled for us to keep it down. We politely waved in unison as I breathed in deeply, trying to meditate away Emilie’s agitation and my own mental spiral about responding to Ben.
Part of me wanted to tell Emilie, and the other part knew what she’d say.
Of course it wasn’t a good idea to see him.
I couldn’t have my cake and eat it too. I could either be here in this new life, chasing my dreams, or back in DC married to Ben, about to start a family—but not both.
I had chosen to start a new life and needed to see that decision through. Dinner would only make things messier.
I showered at the yoga studio, dried my hair, and walked toward the 1 train. As I reached for my MetroCard, a new text lit up my screen—Ben, asking if I was free for dinner on Wednesday.
Without giving myself time to hesitate, I replied that Wednesday worked and offered to make a reservation in a convenient neighborhood.
I chucked my phone into my Longchamp, debating if the yoga-induced adrenaline was making me decisive or shortsighted.
An hour later, I dropped my bags in the office and went to make coffee in the kitchenette. Charlie was at his desk by the time I got back.
“All right, I need the download. Does she take her steak rare? Is she a vampire? Does Eddie Kaufman hate California wine as much as you do?”
I took a slow sip of coffee. “I was introduced to a fine tequila and learned that Eddie has a thing for French red wine. And I still made it to yoga this morning. But I need more coffee before you pepper me with any more questions.”
Charlie laughed. “‘Pepper’ you? No one told me I was sharing an office with my grandma in Florida.”
As he launched into another question, Patricia’s name appeared on the caller ID.
“Hi, Patricia,” I responded, working to keep my voice steady. Every nerve felt exposed as I waited to find out if Eddie had read the memo.
She relayed that he was heading to the airport at the last minute and didn’t have time to call, but he’d read the memo, and it was clear there were two key people who would be critical to building Andie’s defense.
We needed to interview them as soon as possible.
Both were in LA, so he wanted Patricia to book me a flight out Thursday morning.
He would be coming from a deposition in San Francisco.
Patricia assumed that would work with my schedule.
“Yes, of course,” I responded immediately.
I wondered if she could tell from my voice how relieved I was.
He had read it and wanted me to come to LA for the interviews.
I felt a wave of pride for the work I’d put in, both in terms of the legal research and applying the facts we’d gotten from Andie to the research.
Maybe I can actually do this, I thought. I was starting to feel like a lawyer.
“I assume he’ll email you with more details when he has a second to breathe,” she said, and she hung up.
Ten minutes later, I was booked business class on an 8 a.m. flight to LAX on Thursday, returning Friday evening. Eddie was copied on the itinerary. Within minutes, he responded that I should plan to get him draft interview outlines by midweek.
Not even two minutes later, he replied to his earlier email, this time copying Leo Hirschman, a partner from the firm’s LA office.
Leo, meet Samantha, one of my new associates. She’ll be in Los Angeles next week and I think you two should connect while she’s there. She wants to do entertainment (I tried to convince her otherwise).
I jumped up from my desk. “Oh my god. Charlie—Eddie just sent an email to Leo Hirschman saying we should meet when I’m in LA next week.”
If there was anyone whose practice was more exciting than Eddie’s, it was Leo Hirschman’s.
He was the only lawyer at the firm who had successfully established a bicoastal entertainment practice.
About fifteen years younger than Eddie, he was both a litigator and dealmaker—rare, since most lawyers specialized in one or the other.
Charlie raised an eyebrow. “Damn, straight to the top. New York’s too small for you now. I’m adding West Coast domination to your résumé.”
I stared at the email. One of Eddie’s associates. “This is . . . nuts.”
Before Charlie could respond, my phone rang again. I recognized Andie’s LA cell phone number.
“Hi Andie,” I answered cheerfully.
“Eddie said you’re coming to LA to talk to Amanda and Maureen?”
I nodded into the phone. “Yes, we’re hoping they can meet on Thursday afternoon or Friday morning. Speaking of, do you have their phone numbers?”
“I gave them to Eddie’s assistant. You should take a few other meetings while you’re out there. When do you fly back?”
“Friday afternoon.”
“That’s dumb. LA is way more fun than New York on weekends. Stay till Sunday.”
I chuckled nervously. “I don’t think I can. Anyway, I’m just prepping interview outlines for Amanda and Maureen. Can I call you if I have questions?”
“Sure. Okay, I’m boarding. See you guys in La-La Land.”
Building a strong defense would require talking to all the different people Andie had worked with, and these two women had been back-to-back personal assistants who could hopefully give us a picture of what it was like working with Andie.
There was so much to go through, it was almost overwhelming.
Most of their communications with her had been on text, which meant painstakingly reading thousands of messages and tagging what could be helpful to prove Andie wasn’t guilty of operating an illegal gambling business.
I had never done anything like this in my life. Everything I’d learned in law school was abstract and theoretical compared to what I actually needed to do to succeed as a lawyer. It felt like her fate was in our hands. I had to get this right.