Semua Bab See You in Court Mr. Ex husband.: Bab 1 - Bab 10

My name is Maya Collins, and I have exactly three rules I live by.Rule number one: never let anyone see you cry at work. Rule number two: always be the most prepared person in the room and Rule number three: never, under any circumstances, think about Ethan Harrington.I have broken rule number three more times than I can count.But today, I'm only focused on rule number two.I'm standing in front of my bathroom mirror at six in the morning, trying to even down the collar of my navy blue blazer. My natural hair is pulled back and tied into a low bun, I made sure it was tight and clean. No stray curls hanging. No softness. Not today. Today is the day I walk into Caldwell & Associates and officially take over the Mercer Tech case — the biggest case our firm has seen in three years. My boss, Patrick Caldwell, told me last night when we spoke over the phone that landing this one could make me a senior partner before I turn thirty-two.I'm thirty-one by the way.I look at myself i

I met his parents for the first time over spring break of sophomore year.Ethan had been careful about it. Looking back, I think he was nervous. He asked me twice if I was sure I wanted to come, which I thought was strange at the time. I told him yes. We took the train to Connecticut, to a house that was actually an estate gates and a long driveway and windows that went from floor to ceiling in every room.His father, Robert Harrington, was quiet and careful and shook my hand with a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes.His mother, Diana Harrington, looked at me the way people look at something that doesn't belong where it is.She was polite at dinner. She asked about my major, my hometown, my mother's work. All the right questions. But the way she asked them.… the little pauses before each one, the way she smiled at my answers, it was like she was building a file. Like she was collecting evidence.Ethan watched her the whole time. He kept touching my hand under the table, smal

For the first year, it was good. Really good. We had a small apartment in Brooklyn, nothing fancy, the kind with thin walls and a radiator that clanked all winter. I started law school. Ethan was working at a mid-size finance firm, trying to build something of his own outside his family's name. We had a routine. Sunday morning coffee, Saturday night takeout, staying up too late talking about things that mattered and things that didn't.We were happy. I want to be honest about that. We were genuinely, truly happy.But Diana Harrington was patient.She worked quietly. That was her way. Little comments here, small suggestions there. At family dinners she would mention, casually, how demanding law school must be for me. How stressful it was. How perhaps it wasn't the right time for so much pressure. She would look at Ethan when she said it, not at me.She hosted events , charity dinners, business galas , and always seated me somewhere peripheral. Never rude about it. Just… peripheral.

Patrick Caldwell noticed me within my first year. He gave me more responsibility. Then more. By year three, I was running my own cases. By year five, I was his most trusted associate.Last year, I won a case that made the papers. A small tech startup suing a larger corporation for intellectual property theft. David and Goliath, the journalists called it. I spent eleven months on that case. I memorized it like a language. When I stood up in front of that judge for closing arguments, I felt something I had never felt before in my life.Completely, absolutely sure of myself.We won. Decisively.My mom called me crying. Jade sent flowers to the office. Patrick took me to dinner and told me senior partnership was within reach.I went home that night, to my real apartment now, not the studio, a proper one in the East Village with bookshelves and a table and a bedroom, and I sat on my couch in the quiet and felt something I recognized slowly as peace.I had built something. I had built a li

The courtroom settles quickly.Judge Elaine Hooper is a no-nonsense woman in her late fifties who I have appeared in front of twice before. She respects preparation and punishes waste of time. I like her. I sit at the plaintiff's table with Priya beside me, documents arranged, ready.Ethan sits at the defense table ten feet to my right.I do not look at him.I look at the judge, and the bench, and the clock on the wall. I look at anything that is not him. I breathe carefully and I go over my opening in my head and I remind myself of every hour I have put into this case. I am Maya Collins, attorney-at-law, and this is my courtroom.Judge Hooper reads through a preliminary matter. She looks up."Plaintiff's counsel, opening statement."I stand up.I walk to the center of the room with my notes, though I don't need them. I look at Judge Hooper and I begin.I speak for eleven minutes. Clean and precise and built like a structure — foundation first, then the walls, then the roof. Merce