Chapter Fifteen
Staying in LA through the weekend?
I rubbed my eyes. My contacts were welded to them. It was Friday morning. We had one more witness interview before I was scheduled to fly back to New York.
I texted Andie back a few hours later with my schedule. She responded immediately.
Push your flight. Come to this barbecue in Malibu tomorrow. Lots of industry people.
Eddie would probably kill me. I was just beginning to get a sense of Andie’s social network from her poker days.
Let me check with Eddie. He might be weird about that kind of thing. But if not, I’d love to go.
She responded with a devil emoji. Eddie’s your boss at work, not when you’re in LA for the weekend.
I instantly regretted saying I needed to run it by him. I quickly texted back.
Send me the details in case I can make it.
As Eddie and I packed up our things after the witness interview later that day, I told him about Andie’s invitation.
“Are you going to go?” he asked, looking concerned.
“I’d like to. But if you’re not okay with it, I won’t.”
“I’m fine if you want to go. But just be careful. Optics are everything. If people are taking drugs, you should leave.”
“I’ll scope out the scene and leave if I see anything sordid.”
He looked satisfied. “I trust you’ll do the right thing.”
I emailed Lawyers Travel to reschedule my flight for Sunday morning.
The next morning, I woke up early and went over notes from the witness interviews by the hotel pool.
At noon, I went back to the room, showered, and quickly changed into jeans and a blazer.
I figured the basics would be passable. I’d never been out in the real world with Andie, but I could only imagine the glamour disparity between Andie’s crowd and mine.
Besides, I was going as Andie’s defense lawyer.
I wanted to be taken seriously. If anything, I was worried about coming off as uptight.
It took over an hour to get to Malibu. I could have been relaxing or taking in the coastline along the Pacific Coast Highway, but instead, my mind was two thousand miles away, reliving the regret of sleeping with Ben.
It felt like my small studio apartment, once symbolic of the new person I wanted to be, was the scene of an emotional crime.
The Uber dropped me off in front of a dirt road, and I quickly texted Andie that I’d arrived. Less than a minute later, a four-wheeler appeared, driven by a woman in ripped jean shorts and a bikini top. She gave me a quick nod before taking me up a winding, wooded driveway.
The trees eventually parted to reveal a palatial glass beach house overlooking the Pacific. Andie was waiting outside.
“This is unreal,” I said, before I could filter myself.
She looked amused. “Leah’s mother-in-law is a famous clothing designer. I’ll let you figure out which one.”
Andie led us through the house to an outdoor bar with panoramic views of the Pacific next to an infinity pool that seemed to merge with the beach below.
“1942?” she asked.
I had no idea whose house this was or what the people would be like. I looked around and recognized several faces: an actor from Entourage, a Victoria’s Secret model, and a few others I recognized but couldn’t place.
Seemingly out of nowhere, the most beautiful woman I’d seen in real life approached Andie from behind, wrapping her long, graceful arms around her neck.
“You came!”
Andie turned around and squealed. “Of course I came. I wouldn’t have missed it for anything.”
She turned and grabbed my hand as if we were the oldest of friends.
“Leah, this is Sam. She’s my defense attorney from New York. She’s out here for work. She wants to work in the film business, so I told her she had to come meet people.”
Leah took my other hand and held it in hers.
“Sam. I’m so glad you’re here. We love this one so much. Promise me you’ll defend her with your life.”
Everything felt surreal.
I promised that between Eddie and me, Andie was in good hands.
Andie paraded me around for the next hour, introducing me to everyone as “Sam, my brilliant criminal defense lawyer,” as if I was the party guest they all needed to meet. One of them asked if I thought she was going to jail.
“Nobody wants that less than me,” I assured them. No one seemed to realize I’d been a lawyer for all of two months.
Leah’s partner introduced himself as an “old-school” TV producer who had done a string of MTV shows in the early 2000s. He generously offered to make any introductions I wanted.
“Anything for the one who promises to keep Andie out of jail,” he said with a confident smile.
After an hour of small talk, Andie nudged me. “There’s one more person I want you to meet, then we can go.”
I followed her inside. The interior of the house was straight out of Architectural Digest: twenty-foot ceilings with pristine white furniture, a 360-degree fireplace in the middle of the living room, and a dining table that looked like it would seat thirty people.
She led us past an immaculately designed chef’s kitchen with a walk-in wine fridge, an Equinox-level gym and sauna, and a private screening room.
We continued upstairs and down a winding hallway lined with windows overlooking the beach.
When we reached the last door on the right, Andie knocked softly.
“Arlo? It’s me,” she announced as she opened the door.
It was every little boy’s dream room. Oversized bunk beds and a campsite set up with a huge tent and a pretend bonfire. An entire wall of shelves filled with children’s books next to miniature armchairs sized for kids. LEGOs everywhere.
“I told your mom I couldn’t leave until I got a hug,” she said.
Arlo jumped up from the fire trucks he was playing with and threw his arms around Andie’s legs.
“I want you to meet my friend Samantha. She’s helping me with my case. The one I told you about.”
Arlo waved but stayed attached to Andie.
“The one with the card games?” he asked.
She tousled his mop of blond hair. “Arlo’s my godson. Since you’re in charge of my fate, I wanted you guys to meet,” she said with a half smile.
“What’s fate?” Arlo asked.
“Fate means everything that happens to us in our lives. Your fate is to be the best boy with the biggest heart.”
The absurdity of this little boy’s life struck me in more ways than one. High-stakes poker was just the beginning of how different her world was from mine. But despite having loyal friends with tremendous privilege, her fate depended on proving to the government she wasn’t a white-collar criminal.
Arlo showed us his LEGOs for a few minutes, then I called an Uber to take us back to LA. We rode in silence for about ten minutes as Andie checked her phone and I answered emails.
“You know—I lost most of my friends when the bottom fell out with the game,” she finally said.
“They either thought I couldn’t offer them anything anymore, or they were worried about being associated with an accused felon.
But Leah stood by me through everything.
They’re my family. It’s important that you see me as more than someone accused of breaking the law. ”
There were a lot of words to describe the way I’d perceived Andie until that afternoon: empowered, fearless, whip-smart, every synonym for persistent.
There was no denying she was badass. But I hadn’t seen this other side to her.
It was more than just humanity. I finally saw a softness and vulnerability that allowed me to relate to her.
“I’m glad I stayed the extra day. Thanks for letting me tag along. Arlo is the sweetest. You can tell he really sees you.”
Andie turned to look out the window.
“What about you? Who are the people that you care about?” she asked.
I played with the sapphire ring on my right hand. I didn’t know if it was because she’d let herself be vulnerable with me or because I wanted her to know that I appreciated how much she trusted me. But I found myself telling her everything.
“I’ve replayed it over and over. I think I ruined any chance of him ever being able to forgive me. And for what? I knew he hadn’t moved on. All I did was pour salt in the wound.”
I wondered if I was crossing some sort of attorney-client boundary, but it felt like we were both navigating parallel isolating experiences that made it feel like she wouldn’t be quick to judge.
“Now I like you even more. You’re not just a smart lawyer bot. You’re a real person, Sam.”
I leaned back against the headrest. “Being a smart lawyer bot doesn’t sound terrible.”
“Let me ask you something. If you could do it all over again—to be in the life you have now—would you?”
“All of it up to the point where I got drunk and slept with him this week,” I said softly.
She gave me a knowing look. “Exactly. You’re building the life you wanted.
You have to leave the rest of it in the past. You messed up.
But letting yourself be derailed by that isn’t a price that you deserve to pay for making a mistake.
You’re what, thirty? You have your whole life ahead of you to make mistakes.
Trust me. Some of them are ones you have to sit with, and others you leave in the past so you can move on.
I guarantee you that your life is going to be bigger than the regret you’re feeling right now.
Think about where you’re going. It’s just the beginning. ”
We pulled up to Andie’s apartment. She leaned over and gave me a hug. “Take that advice. Get some sleep. I’ll see you in New York.”