Chapter Twenty-Six
Ivy
Thorne's arm tightens briefly around my waist before letting go.
We're still on the leather sofa where we landed after Sebastian's exit.
My cardigan hastily pulled back on, and Thorne's shirt still unbuttoned.
The nearly empty bottle of Blackstone Reserve on the bar cart is a reminder of how this evening unraveled.
The cozy intimacy of the billiards room now feels exposed, with its floor-to-ceiling windows reflecting us back like an accusation.
“You should answer it,” he says.
Looking into his ocean-blue eyes, I see his worry. Past him, the rain is a steady percussion against the glass. The sound is no longer soothing, but ominous.
I don't want to let it ring until voicemail picks it up. I want to stay here, where falling for Thorne Blackstone is complicated. Where his dark confessions don't eclipse the way he makes me feel utterly seen.
But the phone keeps ringing, insistent, and I pull away from him. Pushing myself up from the sofa, my bare feet silent on the Persian rug as I cross to the pool table. Each step is weighted with dread, and by the time my fingers close around the phone, my heart is hammering.
My free hand smooths my hair, tucking strands behind my ear. Deep breath. Shoulders back. I swipe to accept.
"Bill, hi. Can I call you back in—"
"Ivy, we need to discuss something that's come to my attention." He doesn't wait for my answer. “Looks like you’ve been enjoying yourself in Kentucky.”
“Excuse me?” Why does every interaction with this man feel like I need a shower after?
There are photos of you on quite a few different social media platforms at a private party. Dancing…” He makes it sound like fucking. “With Thorne Blackstone.”
The night at Tipsy when we danced. I’d been worried about photographers, but quickly forgot them in the thrill of being in Thorne’s arms—and later in the back room naked with him.
The composure I just assembled? Gone. Shatters like dropped crystal.
Cold floods through me. I glance at Thorne. “What’s going on?” he mouths.
I’m tempted to leave the room. But this might involve him. I hold my index finger, silently asking him to give me a minute.
"Bill, my personal life is—"
"Personal?" He lets out a bark of laughter that has nothing to do with humor. "Come on, Ivy. You're smarter than that. You're working for his company while sleeping with him.”
The furrow between Thorne’s eyes deepens. He rises from the couch, coming closer.
“Dancing isn’t sleeping with someone.” We are, but admitting that would be giving him ammunition he’d use to hurt me.
“What the hell is going on?” Thorne hisses.
I quickly cover his mouth. “Please let me handle this,” I whisper.
“I’ve seen the photos. There’s more than dancing going on between you two.” Bill laughs, and it’s slimy. “I told you to do everything for your family. I didn’t mean to do the family. Or if you were going to, at least keep it off of social media.”
Thorne blows out a breath, and the hot air pushes against my palm. He looks two seconds away from taking my phone from me. I turn from him and say to Bill, “Again, Bill, a dance is a dance.”
He has never liked me. Never likes any of the female attorneys. But the other two partners aren’t bad men. I don’t understand where this is coming from.
"Ivy, relax. I'm not judging." The warmth in his voice is worse than anger.
Worse than anything. Because he actually believes this.
He thinks he's giving me fatherly advice.
Mentorship. My skin crawls, revulsion mixing with rage until I'm shaking with it.
"If anything, I'm impressed. You found a way through that glass ceiling you women are always complaining about.
Date the right guy, and suddenly doors open. It's smart. Pragmatic."
This is humiliating. I move farther away from Thorne.
"You think I’d sleep with someone to advance my career? That I’d need to? Look at how many cases I’ve won.”
“Yet you still aren’t a partner...”
“I’ve only been there five years!”
"And you thought this would help move things along faster." His voice takes on a conspiratorial tone. "Bring in a major client like Blackstone Bourbon permanently? That would certainly catch the partners' attention."
“I never said anything about permanent. They hired me for a specific issue, not indefinitely.” Shit, did they misunderstand? Will they send someone to replace me and make me return to New York? What about Madison?
“It could be…”
I face Thorne. The fury and confusion on his face mirrors everything churning inside me.
“What do you mean?” I ask.
"The Blackstone environmental work, what you've done so far, is just the beginning. They have ongoing needs. EPA compliance, water rights, environmental impact assessments for distillery expansions. We're talking millions in billable hours over the next decade."
The bottom drops out of my stomach. Of course. Of course he does.
"If you can guarantee that Blackstone Bourbon keeps Huntsman & Fellows as their exclusive environmental counsel, on long-term retainer, for all their environmental legal needs, I can guarantee you’ll make partner. And not in two years. Before the year is out."
Knowing and hearing are very different things. They hit hard, so hard, I actually stagger back a step, my hip hitting the pool table.
He wants me to use Thorne. To leverage our relationship into a business deal that buys my partnership.
"You can't be serious." I choke out.
"Completely serious. This is what partnership is, Ivy.
Bringing in clients and leveraging relationships.
Tom Henderson married a client and made partner.
The difference? He brought in her company's business first. You do the same thing, and suddenly your relationship isn't a liability—it's an asset. "
Thorne's hand rests on my lower back. I can feel the tension thrumming through him. There’s no way he hasn’t inferred something is wrong.
"This isn't—I can't—"
"Can't what? Ask your boyfriend to hire your firm?" All the smarmy friendliness drains from him. "Why not? You're already sleeping with him. You're already working on his family's cases. At least this way, you turn it into something that benefits your career instead of destroying it."
Nausea rises in my throat. "That's not how I operate—"
"Then how do you operate, Ivy? Because right now, at the very least, you look like an associate with poor judgment and a conflict of interest. That's not someone we can keep on staff, let alone make partner.
" He’s quiet long enough to let that sink in.
"But if you can deliver Blackstone Bourbon as a client?
That changes everything. That's not sleeping your way to the top—that's strategic networking. That's what partners do."
Everything crystallizes with sickening clarity. This is worse than being accused of sleeping my way up. This is being told to actually do it. To put a price tag on my relationship with Thorne and cash it in.
"I can’t—”
“Think on it. Don’t answer hastily. The partners meet next week to decide your future.
" His voice softens into that horrible fatherly tone again.
"In the meantime, you can finish the current Blackstone environmental work since you're already deep in it and sending someone else would be a pain in the ass.
But understand, there may not be a place for you here if you can't turn this situation into an opportunity. Not as a partner. Maybe not at all."
"Bill—"
"One more thing." A pause, weighted and deliberate. "I wouldn't recommend making waves about this. Filing complaints, claiming discrimination. You’ll have no proof. All that will happen is you’ll never become partner here or anywhere else.”
Cold floods through me, starting at my scalp and racing down. "Are you threatening me?"
"Threatening? No, no. Just being realistic. You made certain choices. Now you can either make them work for you, or they work against you. Your call."
The line goes dead.
I stand there, phone still in my hand, staring at nothing. The silence is absolute except for the rain and my ragged breathing.
Five years. Five years of proving myself, and it comes down to this. Pimp out my relationship with Thorne or lose everything.
Tonight, he finally let me see him. Really see him. And the universe decided that was the perfect moment to set everything on fire.
"What the fuck just happened?” Thorne nearly explodes.
I can't look at him. Because if I do, I'll either shatter completely or rage so hard I might never stop. I take three deep breaths. Then two more. “He wants me to get you to hire the firm. Long-term environmental retainer. Exclusive contract. In exchange, I make partner by year's end."
“I take it he saw something that makes him think you and I are together.”
“Yes. A photo taken at Tipsy.” I push some of my anger on Thorne. I’d told him that dancing together was a bad idea. But I’d wanted him as badly as he did me.
“And now he wants you to use what we have for a business deal."
"That's the offer." I finally meet his eyes. The fury there is incandescent. "Do it, and I'm a strategic networker making partner. Don't do it, and I'm an associate with poor judgment who gets fired."
"Tell him to go to hell." No hesitation. "You quit. Right now. You don't work for people who—"
"And do what?" The question cracks out of me. "Start over? Do you think Bill will give me a glowing recommendation? No.” I laugh, sharp and bitter. “He’s already said he’ll make sure my reputation is destroyed. No major firm would touch me."
His hands frame my face, forcing me to look at him. "Then I'll hire the firm. Tomorrow. Whatever contract he wants. Problem solved."
"No!" I jerk away from him. "Don't you see? If you do that, he's right. I did sleep with you to get ahead. I did trade our relationship for my career. Everything he said about me becomes true."
"I don't give a damn what he thinks—"
"Well I do! Because it's not just him. It's every person at that firm. Every lawyer I've ever worked with. Every client I've ever represented. They'll all think the same thing. That I'm a woman who couldn't make it on her own merit so she fucked her way to the top."
"That's not what this is—"
"Isn't it?" My nails dig into my palms. "If you hire the firm now, after this call, that's exactly what it is. A business transaction in exchange for sex."
He reaches for me, and this time I don't pull away. His arms come around me, careful, like I might break. And maybe I will. Maybe I'm already breaking.
"This is my fault," he says against my hair. "My visibility, my name—"
"Stop." I press my hand to his chest. His heart hammers beneath my palm. "This isn't about you. This is about Bill seeing a chance to land a massive client and using me as leverage. I'm just the means to his end."
“Then let me—"
"No." I pull back far enough to see his face. "Promise me you won't call Bill. Promise me you won't hire the firm. Promise me you'll let me handle this."
He says nothing for several heartbeats. I can see the war on his face. Every instinct he has is fighting. His jaw works. His hands flex on my shoulders.
"I can't stand here and watch you lose everything because of me."
“It's not because of you.” I argue. “Now promise me.”
“I promise,” he sighs.
“What are you going to do?”
Option one: Ask Thorne to hire the firm. Secure my partnership. Prove Bill right about everything.
Option two: Refuse. Get fired. Watch five years of work disappear because I danced with the wrong man.
Option three: There is no option three.
"I don't know," I whisper.
I move toward the door, but Thorne catches my wrist.
"Ivy."
I pull free without looking back. "Please, Thorne. I need to be alone. I need to think."
The stairs to my bedroom feel endless. Each step is a question I can't answer.
I sink onto my bed, staring at the ceiling.
Could I do it? Frame Bill’s threat as a legitimate business transaction? Blackstone does need ongoing environmental counsel. The work is real. The contract would be fair. Everything above board.
Except it wouldn't be. Not really.
Because I'd know. Every time I walked into a partners' meeting. Every time I signed my name with "Partner" after it. I'd know I didn't earn it. Not really. Not the way I thought I would.
Thorne has already said he’d do it.
The question is, can I do it?