Grace hung up and slumped back on the sofa. Her phone showed three missed calls from Susie and one from her mother, but she had no energy to talk to either of them right now. Grace had gone to the dark side. Of course, Alex had done so first, but knowing that didn’t make this feel any better.
The next day, Grace and her box of mints returned to the Boink offices. Patrick was waiting for her in a conference room with a man and a woman whom he introduced as Jennifer Wyles and Stephen Framer, his legal team. Grace introduced herself and sank into a chair, nerves twisting her stomach.
“As you know, we’re going to be putting together a wrongful termination suit for you,” Jennifer began. “We already know that you were fired without sufficient evidence that you’d doneanything wrong. Anything else you can tell us about your employment at MatchupNow would be a great help. Did Alex ever seem to target you unfairly in any way before you were fired? Did you get the feeling that others had been fired without proper cause as well?”
Grace bit her lip. She didn’t want to reveal exactly what had happened with Alex, but in for a penny, in for a pound. If they knew exactly what had happened, she’d be more likely to get the money she needed to raise her child.
“Actually, Mr. Medson and I were… involved. A little bit. And right after that, I was fired.”
Jennifer’s eyebrows rose, Stephen grabbed his phone, and Patrick looked positively gleeful.
“Is that so?” Stephen asked. “You were dating?”
“Not exactly, but we did spend some time together.” Grace sighed. “You asked if I felt discriminated against before I was fired. I didn’t. If anything, I received extra attention from Mr. Medson. We spent time together in the office and flirted. We even went out together for drinks one evening. But after that, he changed, and I got the feeling that he didn’t really want me around anymore.”
Saying the story aloud, even part of it, made Grace feel far worse than before. Especially when Jennifer nodded.
“It sounds like he used you and then found a reason to fire you when he was done,” she said bluntly. “That’s unfortunate, but it’s good for our case. You have every chance of winning the wrongful-termination suit at this point. You weren’t just fired without proper cause—you were fired after a flirtation with the CEO.”
“Was it just a flirtation?” Patrick asked, leaning forward. His blue eyes were gleaming with barely contained elation. “And was it unwelcome?”
“No, it was… mutual,” Grace agreed. “But it did go a little beyond a flirtation. We spent a night together.”
Grace couldn’t believe she’d said that aloud, but sooner or later, people were going to figure out she was pregnant and start putting two and two together. She might as well own the narrative as best she could.
“Did you?” Patrick leaned forward. “Just one?”
“Just one,” Grace agreed. “And right after that, his whole attitude toward me changed. I think he wanted me gone. There were a few weeks that it seemed like everything might be okay, and then I was out. I know it was suspicious that I was the last person with that laptop, but I didn’t take it, and if Alex weren’t out to get me, I don’t think I would have been fired so quickly.”
“Wonderful.” Patrick stood, beaming. Then he saw Jennifer’s quelling look and quickly rearranged his features into something resembling sympathy. “I mean, I’m so sorry that happened to you. I always wondered if Alex was that kind of guy. Anyway, I do need to run to another meeting. Jennifer and Stephen will get some more details from you and start setting up the case.”
Grace nodded. “Okay.”
“And Grace?” Patrick turned back to her halfway to the door. “You’re doing the right thing. We’ll make Alex pay for what he did to you.”
“I…” Grace trailed off. The truth was that she hated every second of this. If there had been any other way to get enough moneyto raise her baby on her own, any other job offer on the table, any family money to fall back on,anything,she would never have tried to sue Alex. He’d been a jerk to her, but she still felt awful about this. Dragging someone’s name through the mud was never the answer, and Grace always wanted to be the bigger person.
In this case, though, Alex hadn’t left her any room to be that person. After the way she’d been fired, she truly had no other options. She couldn’t get another job in tech, at least not right away. She couldn’t ask him for help. There was nothing she could do… except for this.
Part of Grace wanted to explain all that, but Patrick surely wouldn’t understand. He seemed to be enjoying this process just as much as Grace hated it. He’d probably laugh if she tried to explain that she was doing this to survive, so that her baby would have a good life, not because she wanted vengeance.
So, Grace just shook her head.
“Nothing. Have a nice day.”
Patrick nodded and left, closing the door behind him. Grace turned back to the lawyers.
“What do we need to do next?” she asked.
“We just need more details about your time at MatchupNow,” Stephen said. “Particularly about your relationship with Mr. Medson, leading up to and after your night together.”
“Okay.”
“Don’t worry.” Jennifer smiled, seeming to sense Grace’s worries. “This is easy, and it happens all the time. Trust us.”
“Okay,” Grace said again, but nothing about this felt easy. Guilt and shame were threatening to eat her up from the inside out, almost overpowering the nausea she still felt.
Grace had no idea how long the lawsuit was going to take, but she already knew it was going to be a difficult few weeks or months.
