Finally, Colette lifted her chin and looked him in the eyes. “You’re right. I should have found those missing months and been relentless in getting those documents pulled. I won’t make that mistake again.”

“I appreciate your acceptance of your mistake, but I am perturbed that your first response was to blame Audrey. Especially when Audrey avoided placing any censure on you and bent over backwards to note that this stuff happens in discovery.” Hunter was now being relentless. Colette was sitting up straighter, but two spots of pink dotted her cheeks. Audrey shifted in her chair, almost wishing she had not been invited to this meeting. Hunter then gentled his tone. “Mistakes like this, however, do tend to be better learning experiences than constant success. They sear themselves into memory and so I’m sure that you will be a better lawyer as a result of this.” That was Hunter’s generosity, thought Audrey—accepting Colette’s apology and giving her a way out.

But Colette interpreted it as an opening for a rebuttal and said, “My only defense is that I’ve been incredibly busy on this Stromen case, and I did think that the production was complete.”

Hunter’s reaction was swift. “Audrey has a trial in three weeks and she worked until midnight on this, so that’s no excuse. If you can’t balance both, maybe I need to talk to Stromen.”

“I can handle both,” Colette said quickly. “There’s no need for you to talk to Stromen. As I said before, it won’t happen again—ever. I immediately reviewed the entire document production log to make sure that there were no other gaps. There were not. And I reviewed my Stromen case production too.”

“Also, Colette, being a member of the partnership is being a part of a team.” Hunter leaned forward. “I’ve said this to you before, but I expect to see you working together with Audrey. This is not a zero-sum game.”

“Audrey and I do work together, don’t we Audrey?” Colette turned to Audrey.

“We could work together better,” Audrey said. She was not going to let Colette pretend a strong working relationship.

Colette shot her a dagger look. “But we do work well.”

That look wasn’t encouraging. Her head throbbed.

“Enough said. Let’s discuss our strategic approach now productively so we can present it to the client tomorrow,” Hunter said. He pulled a legal pad towards him.

Chapter Forty-Four

Chapter Forty-Four

As Colette and Audrey walked out of the office, Colette said, “So all that stuff about being nice and let’s support each other as women was just a ruse?”

“No. Definitely not. Mrs. Rothman asked me to confirm before I told anyone. I just did my best not to throw you under the bus,” Audrey said. “You should have found this document. As you’ve told me before, defensive discovery is your jurisdiction,”

Looking annoyed, Colette turned away.