As soon as she was invited to follow him, Catherine noticed that his mind had gone to the moon for a few seconds, so she just nodded with a positive gesture and headed towards Miguel. Behind the glass doors, she was confronted with an environment totally different from the outside. The walls had a beige wallpaper contrasting with a sequence of doors in a long corridor, all standardized in wood with signs bearing the name and registration of the lawyer to whom the room corresponded. The floor, which had previously had a beautiful porcelain tile in the waiting room, was now covered with a soft grayish carpet. She could feel her feet sinking slightly and imagined how nice it would be to walk on that carpet barefoot. Looking further down the corridor, she could see a huge black glass door that she imagined must be the private meeting rooms that Victoria had mentioned. There was also a corridor leading to the right, indicating that the place was even bigger than her eyes could see at first glance. Her attention was focused on Miguel, who took a bunch of keys from his pants pocket and unlocked the fifth door to the right. He entered and headed straight to his chair, leaving the door open for her to do the same. The room was really small but very well designed. Behind Miguel's desk, there was a totally white wall along with a cabinet approximately one meter wide. On top of the cabinet, there were numerous books and below, a door that he quickly opened to toss his backpack. The desk was made of rustic wood and had a computer screen that was turned on without much ceremony. On the desk, there was a picture frame facing him and a wooden pencil holder with numerous pens, but all of them apparently black.
As soon as she was invited to join him, Catherine noticed that his mind had gone to the moon for a few seconds. She would simply nod her head in agreement and follow Miguel towards the glass doors. As she entered, she was met with an entirely different environment from the outside. The walls had a beige wallpaper that contrasted with a sequence of wooden doors in a long hallway. Each door had a nameplate with the lawyer's name and registration corresponding to the room. The floor that was once covered with beautiful porcelain tiles in the waiting room was now covered with a soft grayish carpet. She could feel her heart sink a little and imagined how nice it would be to walk on that carpet with bare feet. Looking towards the end of the hallway, she could see a huge black glass door that she imagined must be the private meeting rooms that Victoria had mentioned. There was also a corridor leading to the right, showing that the place was even bigger than what her eyes could see at first glance. Her attention was drawn to Miguel, who retrieved a bunch of keys from his pocket and unlocked the fifth door to the right. He entered the room and headed towards his chair, leaving the door open for her to do the same. The room was small but well planned. Behind Miguel's desk was a completely white wall, along with a cabinet about a meter wide that had numerous books on top and a door at the bottom, which he quickly opened to toss in his backpack. The desk was made of rustic wood and had a computer screen that was turned on without much ceremony. On top of the desk was a picture frame facing him and a wooden pencil holder with several pens, all apparently black.
All of these details were observed from outside the room. Catherine stood at the door, watching Miguel settle into his environment. She preferred not to enter places without permission as a sign of respect, and when the young man noticed that she hadn't entered the room, he simply pointed to the chair in front of him. This was the invitation she had been waiting for, so she finally entered the room, closing the door behind her and sitting in one of the chairs in front of the desk. Miguel then opened the first drawer of his desk, put away his sunglasses, and took out a notepad, handing it to Catherine and pointing to the pencil holder so she could choose a pen.
"If you want to write something down, I'm offering you paper and pen. I'll ask you not to interrupt while I speak now. What I'm going to say is part of the internal regulations that aren't written anywhere, so if you don't pay attention now, it won't be mentioned again in the future. I've read your resume and your college papers, so I already know everything I need to know about your professional background. I also want to make it clear that I'm your tormentor. I can ask for your dismissal at any time and ruin your career in this city. Is that clear?"
"You may begin." The thought of a lemon candy crossed her mind, but she wouldn't let him know that the conversation had intimidated her. She crossed her legs, settling into the chair and positioning the notepad on her right leg.
— Nothing that a few hours to prepare a good defense and some coffee won't solve in the early hours.
— Perfect, I think those are the first warnings I'll give you. I liked that you didn't interrupt me, didn't yell, didn't stand up wishing me a good afternoon and sending me to hell.
— Scary, creepy, authoritarian, and threatening, besides that, nothing out of the ordinary, although I thought there would be some phrases of immediate embarrassment.
— That can lead to a lawsuit, I avoid going to court unless it's to make money, and I have the great pleasure of never having gone to court to solve a personal problem, only clients'.
— I think it's good that the one who defends me hasn't been accused numerous times.
— Now, here comes the light topic, you can relax. I did that to see your reactions under pressure. You have excellent posture, congratulations. – Miguel smiled, causing Catherine to do the same – But nothing I said is a lie. – The smile on Catherine's face disappeared as Miguel dragged his chair to his closet, opening it and taking a black thermos bottle with what appeared to be water from the side of his backpack, opening it and taking a sip. – In this team, we have me, you, Diego, and Rogerio. I'll tell you a little bit about the guys so you can at least know their names. Rogerio is an expert in solving marital problems, he resolves divorces like no one else. Diego likes cases that involve the business side, and I'm the one who's always involved in complicated cases, usually with one or more bodies. I have to say that I appreciate a good story, and cases involving homicides generally have that touch that I like so much.
— I think I can understand you. I also like a story with a good mystery. In college, I found it very interesting to read the cases that Ladislau defended.
"He was my mentor as you already know, he was one of my great inspirations. I just took into consideration bringing his name up to the higher-ups because he strongly recommended you. He had never done that before," said Miguel as he began to stand up, causing Catherine to do the same promptly.
"He can be very persistent when he wants to. They say he has gotten worse with age, that he doesn't accept 'no' and goes after 'yes' with everything," she replied.
"I prefer to say that he has become even more determined with age. Even though I imagine Ladislau has become a stubborn old man, when I met him he already had the reputation of being determinedly stubborn," justified Miguel, walking out of the office followed by Catherine, who was adjusting her backpack on one shoulder.
As the pair walked down the long hallway, Miguel provided brief explanations about one thing or another. At the end of the hallway, as expected, there were three black glass rooms that Miguel indicated were private meeting rooms, where people turned to when they needed more space. He also explained that nobody could enter those rooms without prior scheduling or requesting the key from the library, which was located at the end of the hallway. The library had a huge glass window where they could perfectly see numerous books on shelves. He also explained that despite having computers at hand, the owner of the company liked to maintain a library with some books in case they needed them. She had already read about the company, the founder of Titan was 83 years old, a man from another era with innovative ideologies. She agreed that a good mentor can help a lot. Turning back down the hallway, they could see more rooms that were closed for future hires, as well as the bathrooms. At the end of the hallway, there was a small door with no identification. According to Miguel, that was the security room, where the camera system and security guards were. As it was shift change time, the guards were likely talking and the two of them would not be bothering anyone. Miguel had done his job as Victoria had asked. He showed her around, everything had identification, so it wouldn't be difficult to locate, but having someone give her this mini-tour was better than going out and looking for everything on her own.
With Miguel's return to the room, the two could come across two guys standing at his door, one with brown hair in a well-aligned haircut, a shaved beard and standing with his hands in his pockets while the other was talking super excitedly, gesturing a lot. This one had dark blond hair combed back. As Miguel approached the duo, he put his hand on Catherine's shoulder, making her look at him a little scared at first. His hand was warm, and he had to take a step to his side, which made her smell his wonderful scent. It was Miguel's perfume, with a woody odor that matched perfectly with his lumberjack style. The trance in her mind was broken when she heard him introduce her."Guys, this is Catherine, our new little fish," said Miguel, who soon moved away from her as Diego approached to shake hands with the newcomer."Welcome to the shark tank, dear. I'm Diego, your teammate along with Rogerio, that unfriendly guy back there," he said, pointing to the friend who was approa
A few minutes later, the password had been registered and the computer was released. Catherine already had an email with her name on it, which made her feel like the most important person in the world. She wanted to share that joy with her family. As she reached for her cellphone to tell her mother about the first moment, she realized she had been added to the guys' chat group. She immediately saved each one's number so she wouldn't get confused with the conversations.Diego had already started a conversation with her by sending some funny images in a private message. His phone's identification photo was with a girl, both making funny faces covered in what she imagined was flour. That must have been his girlfriend. He was crazy, and it seemed like he had found his equally crazy other half. Out of curiosity, she decided to look at Rogério's photo, where she found a man with a totally different expression. He had a beautiful smile and shared the photo with a woman and a
At the end of the social moment, the group returned to the eighth floor exactly at noon, only to come face to face with at least ten more lawyers who worked at the company. There were quick greetings and nods, but none of the guys really stopped to talk to the others. Perhaps it was a common thing for the groups not to mingle much, or even an internal rivalry. Despite Victoria having said earlier that it seemed like a competition but wasn't, this market was competitive, and she had seen several cases of lawyers backstabbing colleagues just to win a case. The fact that the guys didn't interact much was a great question to be asked to Tatiane later, and it was also a great way to start a conversation. As she had been there longer, she should know something. In fact, she realized that she had not been able to exchange more than a few words with Tatiane yet, but Tatiane seemed like a nice person to have as a friend, especially since she didn't have any friends in that city.Aroun
On Tuesday, the alarm clock echoed through the small room. As a matter of self-discipline, Catherine left her phone charging far from the bed, forcing herself to get up. She had slept much later than she planned the night before because André had celebrated longer than she intended. They had stayed up talking about trivial office matters and their team, and ended up staying awake until midnight.That morning, André once again kindly offered to drive her to work in exchange for fresh morning coffee. It wasn't a bad deal, as she could arrive a little earlier at work and not feel tired. Although the route wasn't very long, it was still enough to tire her early in the morning. This time, her friend didn't embarrass her; they said their goodbyes with a brief nod, and she headed into the building.With her badge in hand, she walked towards the turnstiles. There was a uniformed man standing at one of the turnstiles, looking lost. She decided to greet him because
As soon as Catherine entered her office, she received a message on her phone. Rogério had asked her to go to his office for a meeting with a client that would take place soon. He wanted her to guide the situation, as the clients would arrive shortly before lunch. For this reason, she would have time to read the documents beforehand. Her joy was contagious, and she would do her best to organize everything in the best possible way.Her meeting was a success. Rogério knew that there would be no problems with that agreement, but he praised her for fully and firmly guiding all situations, even in moments when there could have been misunderstandings, she knew how to handle the situations well.The brief meeting ended exactly at her lunchtime. Rogério had a commitment with a client, so he wouldn't have lunch with her, and Diego was with a client. Therefore, she found herself alone on her second day. They had warned her that this was not uncommon, even tho
The day was cool, winter was approaching, some passers-by were already using thin coats to protect themselves from the cold winds, a family composed by three people was standing in front of an old architecture building, its walls had a light yellow tone with brown details to hire in a harmonic way with the huge wooden door that allowed the access to the place, beside the wooden door two big size suitcases were placed and then the family united in an embrace that showed a great sorrow, The embrace was composed of a couple clearly around fifty years old, a great sign of this were the few white hairs that both had in their equally brown hair, hair that contrasted completely with the young woman who received the embrace, the hair in a tone of copper red clearly dyed to the sun to gain the orange tone, their heights were not so contrasting, the women had around one meter seventy and the man had no more than one eighty. - Take care Cath, anything you want you can call me anytime you want,
Returning to the living room she noticed that the door of her apartment was open, she should take care of it better, even more being a woman alone in a city that she didn't know very well, she walked to close the door and then decided that she would eat something, she opened the freezer to see exactly what was there, according to her father he had bought some lunch boxes from a nearby restaurant for her to eat during the week, this way she wouldn't have to worry about preparing food to take to lunch much less prepare something when she got home after work for dinner, everything was organized in the freezer with the labels of the date of manufacture and expiration, as she would not have to worry about it, the best thing to eat at that moment was a sandwich just to gain courage to start the work of organizing her things, but to eat even if it was so simple would need at least a plate, object that was stored in one of the boxes, so she would have to start organizing anyway, She then ment
André preferred to change the subject, apparently he realized that Catherine didn't really want to talk about her old relationship yet, even though they were friends for years there were things that she preferred to keep to herself and forget, you can't blame a person for liking to keep their life private sometimes, with that the tense subjects jumped to fun places and programs that the two of them could do together in the city, he apparently knew all kinds of different places that she would need at least six months to know half of them, good because she had no plans to stay there for a short time anyway. Her Sunday had been summarized to pass a broom and walk around the neighborhood looking at the stores around her, she couldn't live on pizza forever nor on things ordered over the cell phone, knowing the markets and shops in the neighborhood would help her even more because André had commented the day before about a wonderful bakery that you could walk to, He had not yet given any
As soon as Catherine entered her office, she received a message on her phone. Rogério had asked her to go to his office for a meeting with a client that would take place soon. He wanted her to guide the situation, as the clients would arrive shortly before lunch. For this reason, she would have time to read the documents beforehand. Her joy was contagious, and she would do her best to organize everything in the best possible way.Her meeting was a success. Rogério knew that there would be no problems with that agreement, but he praised her for fully and firmly guiding all situations, even in moments when there could have been misunderstandings, she knew how to handle the situations well.The brief meeting ended exactly at her lunchtime. Rogério had a commitment with a client, so he wouldn't have lunch with her, and Diego was with a client. Therefore, she found herself alone on her second day. They had warned her that this was not uncommon, even tho
On Tuesday, the alarm clock echoed through the small room. As a matter of self-discipline, Catherine left her phone charging far from the bed, forcing herself to get up. She had slept much later than she planned the night before because André had celebrated longer than she intended. They had stayed up talking about trivial office matters and their team, and ended up staying awake until midnight.That morning, André once again kindly offered to drive her to work in exchange for fresh morning coffee. It wasn't a bad deal, as she could arrive a little earlier at work and not feel tired. Although the route wasn't very long, it was still enough to tire her early in the morning. This time, her friend didn't embarrass her; they said their goodbyes with a brief nod, and she headed into the building.With her badge in hand, she walked towards the turnstiles. There was a uniformed man standing at one of the turnstiles, looking lost. She decided to greet him because
At the end of the social moment, the group returned to the eighth floor exactly at noon, only to come face to face with at least ten more lawyers who worked at the company. There were quick greetings and nods, but none of the guys really stopped to talk to the others. Perhaps it was a common thing for the groups not to mingle much, or even an internal rivalry. Despite Victoria having said earlier that it seemed like a competition but wasn't, this market was competitive, and she had seen several cases of lawyers backstabbing colleagues just to win a case. The fact that the guys didn't interact much was a great question to be asked to Tatiane later, and it was also a great way to start a conversation. As she had been there longer, she should know something. In fact, she realized that she had not been able to exchange more than a few words with Tatiane yet, but Tatiane seemed like a nice person to have as a friend, especially since she didn't have any friends in that city.Aroun
A few minutes later, the password had been registered and the computer was released. Catherine already had an email with her name on it, which made her feel like the most important person in the world. She wanted to share that joy with her family. As she reached for her cellphone to tell her mother about the first moment, she realized she had been added to the guys' chat group. She immediately saved each one's number so she wouldn't get confused with the conversations.Diego had already started a conversation with her by sending some funny images in a private message. His phone's identification photo was with a girl, both making funny faces covered in what she imagined was flour. That must have been his girlfriend. He was crazy, and it seemed like he had found his equally crazy other half. Out of curiosity, she decided to look at Rogério's photo, where she found a man with a totally different expression. He had a beautiful smile and shared the photo with a woman and a
With Miguel's return to the room, the two could come across two guys standing at his door, one with brown hair in a well-aligned haircut, a shaved beard and standing with his hands in his pockets while the other was talking super excitedly, gesturing a lot. This one had dark blond hair combed back. As Miguel approached the duo, he put his hand on Catherine's shoulder, making her look at him a little scared at first. His hand was warm, and he had to take a step to his side, which made her smell his wonderful scent. It was Miguel's perfume, with a woody odor that matched perfectly with his lumberjack style. The trance in her mind was broken when she heard him introduce her."Guys, this is Catherine, our new little fish," said Miguel, who soon moved away from her as Diego approached to shake hands with the newcomer."Welcome to the shark tank, dear. I'm Diego, your teammate along with Rogerio, that unfriendly guy back there," he said, pointing to the friend who was approa
As soon as she was invited to follow him, Catherine noticed that his mind had gone to the moon for a few seconds, so she just nodded with a positive gesture and headed towards Miguel. Behind the glass doors, she was confronted with an environment totally different from the outside. The walls had a beige wallpaper contrasting with a sequence of doors in a long corridor, all standardized in wood with signs bearing the name and registration of the lawyer to whom the room corresponded. The floor, which had previously had a beautiful porcelain tile in the waiting room, was now covered with a soft grayish carpet. She could feel her feet sinking slightly and imagined how nice it would be to walk on that carpet barefoot. Looking further down the corridor, she could see a huge black glass door that she imagined must be the private meeting rooms that Victoria had mentioned. There was also a corridor leading to the right, indicating that the place was even bigger than her eyes could see at fir
The building in front of him was very tall. In a quick calculation, he could assume that it had about fifteen floors. It was incredibly elegant on the outside, all following the monochrome. On the inside, it was even more beautiful. As soon as he entered the lobby, he could see a white marble countertop where some receptionists were sitting assisting those who approached. There were also turnstiles both to the right and to the left. Just by seeing that, he imagined how organized and expensive that place must be. Having a space in that building should not be cheap at all. He would then straighten his clothes and open a friendly smile. In the email, he had been told that he had to stop by this reception to get a card. He presented his identity and a copy of said email printed with his authorization. He would then receive the card. She already had her name, Titan identification, and a chip in which she activated the elevator to her floor. That kind of technology made her feel like one
André preferred to change the subject, apparently he realized that Catherine didn't really want to talk about her old relationship yet, even though they were friends for years there were things that she preferred to keep to herself and forget, you can't blame a person for liking to keep their life private sometimes, with that the tense subjects jumped to fun places and programs that the two of them could do together in the city, he apparently knew all kinds of different places that she would need at least six months to know half of them, good because she had no plans to stay there for a short time anyway. Her Sunday had been summarized to pass a broom and walk around the neighborhood looking at the stores around her, she couldn't live on pizza forever nor on things ordered over the cell phone, knowing the markets and shops in the neighborhood would help her even more because André had commented the day before about a wonderful bakery that you could walk to, He had not yet given any
Returning to the living room she noticed that the door of her apartment was open, she should take care of it better, even more being a woman alone in a city that she didn't know very well, she walked to close the door and then decided that she would eat something, she opened the freezer to see exactly what was there, according to her father he had bought some lunch boxes from a nearby restaurant for her to eat during the week, this way she wouldn't have to worry about preparing food to take to lunch much less prepare something when she got home after work for dinner, everything was organized in the freezer with the labels of the date of manufacture and expiration, as she would not have to worry about it, the best thing to eat at that moment was a sandwich just to gain courage to start the work of organizing her things, but to eat even if it was so simple would need at least a plate, object that was stored in one of the boxes, so she would have to start organizing anyway, She then ment