Chapter 1: Decree Absolute

“Well, Mr Lawson, I must say that I have been very happy with the way that you have dealt with things.” Andrea Braddock smiled as she passed me a cup of tea. “It’s all gone through much quicker than I imagined it would.”

Andrea Braddock had been a real lifeline for my career. I’d had a terrible first six months at Havering, Wallace and Fulbright. A stupid mistake in a conveyancing assignment in my first week, and an even worse one dealing with a will just a month after that, had nearly had me out of the door. How was I supposed to know that Wallace Winston Waits and Winston Wallace Waits weren’t the same person? Vivienne Fulbright had left me in no doubt that she wasn’t happy. It was the first time I had worked for a woman boss. It had been looking like it wasn’t an experience that would last very long.

So, when Andrea Braddock turned up asking the firm to deal with her divorce and Vivienne Fulbright gave me the case I had the distinct impression that I had better get it right or I would be out.

With how things were in the job market, and how much I owed on my credit card, I couldn’t afford that.

“It’s always much easier, Mrs Braddock, when the divorce is not contested,” I replied with the confidence that comes from a successful outcome. “Your ex-husband was a great deal more co-operative than in most of the cases that I have been involved in. He seems to have been quite happy to accept your proposed settlement with only the slightest of modifications. It’s really been a form filling exercise from our perspective.”

“But it is all finalised now?”

“Oh yes, the decree absolute was issued this morning and the final settlement was transferred as well. That includes the lump sum, the first of the irrevocable, monthly, allowance payments and, of course, the deeds of this house and the London flat and the vehicle registration documents for both the Ferrari and the Range Rover.”

“Very thorough, Mr Lawson. You have been very thorough in all of this.” I was happy to have Andrea Braddock’s praise. She had a wide circle of influential friends and her approval could mean a lot to the business.

Mrs Braddock was one of those women that are always immaculately turned out, perfectly made up, dressed in the sort of clothes that scream, “I have money, I have taste, I don’t need brands.” I’m no expert in fashion but I could tell that the suit she was wearing had been beautifully tailored and the dagger heeled, calf length, boots she had on were a triumph of the shoe maker’s art. Her blonde hair, back-combed and lacquered into rigidity, framed a rather square face with a determined jaw, a wide mouth and green eyes rimmed with dark eyeliner and mascara’d lashes. She was certainly an attractive women, in her mid-forties, maybe twenty years older than me, I thought. Oh yes, and that other thing I was thinking? I could tell that it was never going to happen.

Instead, I tried to keep my thoughts on the matter in hand and not the sight of Mrs Braddock’s shapely thighs disappearing under the hem of her skirt. “Thank you, Mrs Braddock, I do try to be as thorough as possible. But, as I say, it’s easier when things are uncontested. Your ex-husband must have been a wealthy man to have let all this go without a fight.”

“No, not really,” Andrea Braddock replied with a quiet, self-satisfied smile that gave her an almost feline look. “I doubt if he’s been left with a penny.”

It was a startling remark. When I had left Mr Braddock he had been only too eager to sign the forms that brought his marriage to an end. “Oh. I had rather formed the view that he felt he was getting off lightly.”

“I am sure that he thought that he was. He may have even been right.”

“I’m sorry, Mrs Braddock.” I was puzzled. “I know it’s none of my business but I’m not sure I can reconcile those two statements.”

“No, of course. Silly of me.” She smiled and then looked straight at me. “And you are right. It is absolutely none of your business.”

I coughed, embarrassed by her directness. “I’m sorry Mrs Braddock,” I said apologetically. “I didn’t mean to...”

“No, of course you didn’t. No matter. Now, I need to move on. That is what everyone tells me. After a divorce, you should move on, that’s what they say, isn’t it? Do you know Ellen Hanson’s book ‘The Inner Drive’? It’s like a Bible for me.”