Everything

II

Adriana

If there's one thing I hate, it's Winter in New York.

It gets so cold, you can barely breathe, when you walk down the street your hair is whipped up into a frenzy and your fingers go numb even when you rub your hands together. I'd always preferred the heat, that was the type of girl I was, I'd take St. Lucia over this any day, but my travel prospects at the moment are pretty much slim to none, especially with the way work is taking off.

The law firm I worked in, Boone and Webster had taken me on fresh out of college and now, in my twenty-sixth year of life, and my fifth at the firm, I was looking to make partner. It wasn't something I'd ever even remotely considered, seeing as I was so young compared to other attorneys in the game, but my friends had pushed me to go for it, so I put in my application form and just like that, I got the interview. I was hard-working, staying in the office hours after close of play and took on any cases that came remotely my way, but I'd never expected to be selected as a potential candidate for partner.

New York has been the place I've called home ever since my parents moved here from Mexico when I was six years old. For their retirement gift, my brother and I had their old farmhouse renovated and moved them back home. The sun was good for my father's bad back and my mom could do the gardening like she always loved. Family was important to me, more important than anything and that's why I want to make my own. Two kids - a girl and a boy with a cute detached house in the suburbs.

Family, for me, started young, but when I met my friends at college, it was complete. Columbia was big and scary and I was petrified at having to meet new people and start a new life, but my roommate Alicia Washington was absolutely everything I wanted in a best friend. She was funny and intelligent and she looked like a damn supermodel minus the height - she was beauty and grace in a five foot one package. Most of all she was down-to-earth and caring, always there for me when I needed her.

What's more, it was Alicia who introduced me to Spencer. Spencer Haywood now just so happened to be one of the most prolific millionaires in New York. When I met him, he was a scared British geek in bottle-rimmed glasses studying Journalism with a hell of a lot of potential. Now, he owned one of the world's biggest international newspapers: The Global Chronicle and lived the fast life in a penthouse apartment just looking out onto Times Square.

And then, there's my man.

Mark Holloway is pure man candy. Sensitive, funny, intelligent and downright gorgeous, he was ten times any man I'd ever met. When we met, I was heading my first huge solo case two years ago. He was a cut-throat district attorney who I surprisingly managed to beat, despite the fact he was flirting with me for the whole case. It took him six months to ask me out on a proper date and I was over the moon when he did. He cared about me, he considered me, and most of all, he loved me. Of course, there was the fact that he was slightly older, but age wasn't anything to me. Mark is perfect.

It was safe to say I was head over heels. I'd never been in love before and I was enjoying every single bit of it. Mark would send me the same flowers every day with the same gorgeous typed card:

Have a great day, babe. X

He was absolutely perfect. I was his and he was mine.

And so here I was, a lawyer working for one of the biggest US firms, living with my boyfriend in his apartment and looking towards the future.

Tonight, I was dressed to kill. I had bought the little black dress from a Manhattan boutique a few weeks back, waiting for Mark to take me out. At my lunch break he'd surprised me with a text: 'Hey babe, how about Fiori's? 8pm. See you then. M.' He'd been swamped with work late into the night over the last few months, sometimes not even making it home, and so this was the first time we were going out in a while.