Not because she wanted to see him again. Perish the thought.
Dara waved hello as she breezed past Amira at the front desk and hurried to her office, feeling the thrum of excitement she always felt when she was in Mike’s territory. The brownstone was sunny and open, understated and beautiful. Heavy leaded glass with beveled edges cut in intricate patterns framed the massive oak door that stood at the top of several steps leading up from the sidewalk. Inside was a large foyer with a round mahogany table centered on a Persian rug and adorned with a beautiful arrangement of burgundy silk hydrangeas. A gracefully curved staircase led to the offices upstairs. The waiting area had overstuffed chairs in dark greens and blues and the mahogany woodwork everywhere was simple but elegant. There was also a small law library, a kitchen, Mike’s office upstairs, Dara’s small office next to his, a conference room and another office, barely a broom closet, that belonged to Jamal.
Jamal, like Mike, had been invisible all week.
She’d just settled into her chair and booted up her computer when she heard Mike’s voice in her doorway.
“What are you doing here?” he demanded.
Gaping at her—he’d’ve been less surprised to see Jimmy Hoffa sitting behind her desk—he forgot about the coffee he’d wanted to get downstairs. She should have been gone hours ago, not turning up at the office at unauthorized times when he shouldn’t have to see her at all.
He’d spent the last several days reliving their confrontation in the classroom and trying to understand what had happened to him that day. Never before in his life had he embarrassed a student in class—and he subbed up at the law school whenever his schedule allowed—but it’d infuriated him when Dara hadn’t backed down when they’d argued. People were generally a little intimidated by him, because of his size if nothing else, but Dara clearly wasn’t. So he’d needled her and hadn’t been happy until he’d made her speechless. Her rage thrilled him because it told him he got to her like she got to him. But then, of course, he’d felt like a garden slug trailing slime.
And what about her claim that she and Sean were only friends? Could it be true? Not that it mattered to him either way. The point was that Sean cared about her and would never forgive Mike if he went after his dream woman. Period.
So Dara was strictly off-limits and always would be.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t think of anything besides Dara for more than thirty seconds.
Well, it was going to stop. Now. He was absolutely determined to endure her internship without interacting with her in any meaningful way because that was the only way he could control his raging attraction to her.
If only she would make it easier on him. Right now, for instance, she sat there looking as bright and beautiful as a summer rainbow in a purple dress that was just clingy enough to emphasize her spectacular breasts. And if it did that to her breasts, what must it be doing to her ass?
At this, his brain veered off in several distracting directions. What kind of underwear must she be wearing? Panties? Thong? And were they black? White? Lacy? Cotton?
Every possibility was unsettling.
So was her scent.
It was some subtle floral perfume that was, he was sure, supposed to be as innocent as a fluffy white kitten. Unfortunately, on Dara, it made him think of making love to her in a field of flowers until she begged for mercy.
Jesus. Why the hell was she here?
“I work here.” Her icy tone indicted him as a slacker boss. “Did you forget?”
Like he could.
What did she care, anyway, if he never talked to her again? And who was she to call him on the carpet? Wasn’t she the employee?
Unbelievable.
“I haven’t forgotten.”
She pressed her lips together and reached for her pen. “So how’s the trial—”
“What I meant,” he interjected, “was what are you doing here now?”
She waved a hand. “My classes got canceled, so I came back to finish my memo and get it to you.”
Memo? “I didn’t ask you to do a memo.”
“I know, but I thought it would be helpful.”
“Thanks,” he said begrudgingly, surprised.
A smug little smile flitted across her mouth. “How’s the trial going?”
He hesitated, trying to figure her out. Was this all a monstrous trick designed to fuck with his brain? Why was she determined to be pleasant? Did she know how it tied him up in knots?
He had piles of work waiting for him on his desk, but they now seemed comically insignificant. He sat in the chair across from her desk.
“Our client was acquitted this afternoon.”
“That’s wonderful!” she said. “You must be thrilled.”
He watched her, that glorious smile wreaking havoc with his mental circuitry.
“Ah ...Not really. He’ll probably be robbing another gas station next week. It’s his calling.”
Her mouth fell open. “You mean he really did do it?”
“Of course, he did it. Don’t tell me you thought criminal defense attorneys only represented innocent people.”
She blinked. “Well, no. I’ve just never heard anyone be so blunt about it before.”
“My job—our job—is to make sure our clients get the full protections they’re entitled to under the legal system.”
“But what if this guy holds up another gas station next week and this time he kills someone? How would you feel then?”
He asked himself that same question a thousand times a day. “Terrible. But I’d remind myself I took an oath to represent my clients zealously, and it was the jury, or the judge, not me, that decided to let him go.”
“So criminal defense attorneys are like prostitutes or mercenaries. You’ll represent any murderer or rapist or child molester who has the money to pay you.”
That made him laugh. “I don’t represent people accused of rape or child molestation. I don’t have the stomach for that.”
“But murder!”
“Usually, my clients have some excuse, like self-defense, or that it was a crime of passion, something the jury may understand. Anyway, I thought this was the kind of work you want to do.”
She frowned thoughtfully. “I don’t know. You have to be really passionate about something to be as good at it as you are, and I’m not sure I have the nerves for this.”
Whoa. Unexpected compliment.
He must have gaped at her, because she looked away and began to straighten the files on her desk.
“I also do some personal injury work,” he continued. “I’ve got a big case that’s set for trial in a couple of months. Our client is a thirty-three-year-old man who was hit by an eighteen-wheeler while he was driving home from work. Now he’s a quadriplegic—”
“Oh no!”
“And he’s had a huge loss of income, plus crazy medical bills for the rest of his life. He’s married with three small children.”
“Oh, God. That’s so awful! Why doesn’t the truck company just settle? It’s not going to come off very well in front of a jury.”
“I’ve been asking that same question for three years.”
“Three years! You’ve been working on the case that long? How much would you settle for?”
“Three or four million.”
Her mouth dropped open. “That’s a whole lot of money, Mike.”
He shrugged. “Yeah, well, I’ll ask you what I’m planning to ask the jury. Would you give up your ability to care for yourself—even to scratch your own nose when it itches—and to run around in the grass with your kids for three or four million?”
Grudging respect gleamed in her eyes. “You’re good. How long have you been out on your own?”
He couldn’t resist her keen interest any more than a kid could resist cotton candy.
“When my father died a few years ago, he left me and Sean a little money. So I left the big firm I was at—and the big firm money—and struck out on my own. Now I do a lot of nail biti
ng and counting pennies.”
She smiled knowingly, as if she possessed some fabulous secret about the future of his little firm. “I’m not worried. And you know what they say: No guts, no glory.”
“Do you know something I don’t know?”
She looked away, cheeks reddening as she smoothed her hair. “No. But I’m sure you’ll work very hard and do what you need to do.”
Her confidence in him was intriguing. Enticing. And he was doing a poor job of not letting her under his skin.
“How is everyone treating you?” he asked after a long pause.
She raised her gaze back to his. “Great. But who’s this mysterious Jamal?”
“Jamal is my indentured servant.”
She grimaced. “I thought that was me.”
“No. As my law school intern, you’re one half-step higher on the totem pole than Jamal. He’s seventeen. He got into a little trouble, and I represented him several months ago, after he tried to steal a car. After that, he came to work for me while he gets his GED at night. So now he does all kinds of things around here.”
Dara looked alarmed. “So you hired him—just like that?”
“Just like that.”
“And you trust him?”
“Look, Dara. He’s grown up with a single working mom and four younger brothers. He’s had no male role models in his life. No one was around to make him get his ass out of bed and get to school. So now I do it.”
“I need to meet him.”
Mike twisted around in his chair. “Jamal!” he bellowed. “Jamal! Get in here, man!”
Dara raised her eyebrows at him. “This is how you teach him how to behave in the office?”
Mike grinned, then turned again as Jamal rushed in. Tall and dark-skinned, with short hair, Jamal was wearing a white shirt, tie and dark pants. He was also carrying a stack of papers.
“You told me to make these copies, man,” he complained.
Then he saw Dara and froze, his mouth dropping open.
Mike struggled not to laugh at Jamal’s stupefaction. Dara could certainly make a first impression.
“Jamal, this is Dara,” he told him. “She’s our intern for the next few months. Be nice to her. Show her around. Help her out.”
Jamal took her all in with one sweeping glance. Then he broke into a grin as he came around to Dara’s side of the desk and shook her hand.
“You’re beautiful,” he told her.
“Man, get your hands off her,” Mike snapped before Dara could respond. “And don’t try any of your sorry moves on her, either. I’ve already warned her about you.”
Jamal hung on to Dara’s hand and grinned at Mike. He had the kind of speculative gleam in his eye that always put Mike on his guard. The kid saw way too much for a youngster.
“I can pull more little shorties than you any day of the week, Pops,” he said to Mike over his shoulder.
Dara laughed.
“Get out,” said Mike, annoyed now, his eyes on Dara’s hand still wrapped in Jamal’s. “You got those copies finished yet?”
Jamal looked back at Dara and jerked his thumb at Mike. “You see what we’re dealing with? I’m outta here.”
Dara laughed again as Jamal left. “When do you two take your act on the road?”
For the life of him, Mike couldn’t think of anything to say.
Not when she smiled at him like that.
“Well,” he finally said, standing. “I should let you get back to work.”
“Oh,” she said, her smile wavering. “Okay.”
“Here you are!” said a voice from the hall.
Sean’s voice.
Frozen with guilt-induced paralysis laced with a healthy tinge of annoyance, Mike recovered enough to take Sean’s hand when he walked in and settled on the edge of Dara’s desk as if he owned the place.
“I heard about the acquittal, man,” he told Mike over his shoulder. “Congratulations.”
“Thanks,” Mike said tightly.
Sean had obviously come to collect Dara for their friendly evening together, Mike thought. Realizing he’d balled his hands into fists, he shoved them in his pockets.
“What are you doing here?” Dara asked Sean.
There was a hitch in her voice, Mike noticed, and she fidgeted in her chair.
Sean smiled down at her. “I thought we could grab dinner at the new sushi place on the river, if you’re finished here.”
Yeah, okay. Mike needed to get out of there before his head exploded. “I’ll see you two later.”
“What about basketball next week?” Sean called after him.
Mike stared at his brother’s face and tried not to think about punching it.
“Yeah,” he told Sean as he left. “I’ll call you.”
Dara watched Mike go, feeling rattled. She really needed to work on getting used to his physical presence. He was such a huge creature. So tall, so imposing, so disturbingly ...masculine. The room seemed to shrink when he came and grow when he left. And the energy felt different—more charged—when Mike was there. It was like having a tiger come and go.
And his commitment to helping others, like Jamal, surprised her. She’d thought reputable attorneys, like Mike, the ones with expensive suits and nice offices, somehow sniffed out the thugs and only represented the Truly Innocent. But Mike wanted to make the legal system available to everyone, and she admired him for that.
Admiring him did funny things to her insides.
“Dara,” Sean said, waggling his fingers at her. “Hell-o-o! Anybody home?”
As usual, his dimpled smile was contagious. She couldn’t help but laugh. Thank goodness he’d resigned himself to being friends with her and nothing more.
“You ready? I’m starving.”
“Not yet. I need to finish this memo.”
“By the way,” Sean said as he settled into the chair Mike had just vacated. “What was going on with you two when I walked in? Didn’t you say he was arrogant? If you don’t watch out I’m going to start thinking you actually like him.”
“That’s just crazy talk,” she said, her ears burning.
Reassured by their polite conversation on Friday, Dara smiled at Mike when she passed his office first thing Monday morning. Apparently he didn’t have court today. “Good morning.”
He was at his desk, typing on his computer. She took a good look at his office for the first time; he’d never invited her into his precious inner sanctum. His sleek glass desk sat in front of shelves full of books and African sculptures. His leather chair was tall and black, but the other chairs and the sofa were a muted black and tan pattern. African masks, paintings and mirrors hung on the walls. The office was sophisticated, light and airy and elegant. She loved it.
He glanced up, his gaze skimming lightly over her and then reverting to his screen.
His jaw tightened. “How are you?”
“Good.” She lingered in his doorway, taking off her jacket. “How was your weekend?”
“Fine,” he said without looking at her. He typed a few more words and seemed to remember his manners. “How was yours?”
Without waiting for her answer, he flipped through some papers on his desk.
“Good.” She loitered for a minute, determined to sneak past his invisible KEEP OUT sign and recapture the relaxed communication they’d had Friday. “I had some more thoughts about the transcripts I’ve been reading. Maybe if you have a minute, we—”
More typing. No eye contact. “Maybe later. I’m pretty busy.”
Her heart fell, but she tried not to take it personally.
So that was it. He was obviously busy right now. It had nothing to do with her.
“Oh, sure. I’ll come back later.” She turned to go, nearly bumping into Jamal.
“What’s up, Dara?” he said amiably as he turned into Mike’s office.
“Hey, Jamal.”
“What’s up, man?” Jamal said to Mike as she went into her own office, hung up her jacket and purse and set
tled at her desk.
“Did you see the game yesterday?” asked Mike, his tone animated, his voice muted only slightly by the wall.
She sat, trying to work, her blood doing a slow boil, while Jamal and Mike discussed the Bengals game for ten minutes or so. So much for Mike being “pretty busy.”
When Jamal finally left, she marched back to Mike’s office to ask him about the transcripts. But he was putting on his jacket, briefcase in hand, and seemed unpleasantly surprised to see her, as if he’d looked up to discover a skunk headed his way.
“What’s up?” he asked, glancing at his watch like Donald freaking Trump, too busy to give her the time of day.
“I wanted to ask you about the transcripts. Remember?” she said, determined to be pleasant.
“Right. Let’s do it tomorrow. I’ve got court.”
He gave her the briefest hint of a smile, then left.
“Right,” she said, her belly sinking with disappointment. “Tomorrow.”
She was being too sensitive, she told herself. Tomorrow she’d catch him at a better time and she was sure he’d be more receptive. But when she poked her head in his office the next day, he was in the middle of a phone call.
“Sorry,” he mouthed.
“No problem.”
She made up her mind to try again in an hour or so. But half an hour later, he e-mailed to say he wanted another memo on a different case. Flabbergasted, she read the e-mail twice. Sitting at her desk, she could hear Mike, still in his office right next to hers. What was that? Fifty steps? Thirty feet? And he couldn’t even come to her office to talk to her directly?
Every day was the same. When she was nearby, he stayed in his office with his head bent low over his paperwork, or on the phone. He communicated with her only through Laura or via e-mails or memos. She couldn’t get him to talk to or even to look at her. He wouldn’t stay in a room with her. She was not imagining it.
A week passed, then another. She told herself the same thing over and over—it doesn’t matter—until it became a mantra. But by Thursday of her fourth week she was sulking, and on Friday she was in a solid funk.
Why had Mike banished her to Siberia when everyone else could soak up the warmth of his attention? Why did he hate her? Just because of a passing attraction they’d had? She’d never been jealous before, but now she resented the words, smiles and looks he gave everyone else. Every time she heard his laughter, she got more pissed off. The morning she saw him talking to the FedEx man and asking about the man’s children by name, she fantasized about deleting all his client files from the office computer network. Maybe then he’d look her in the face. SOB.
Trouble Page 5
