“Okay.” He grabbed his jacket from the booth and shrugged it on.
“I hope it’s Hank’s so I never have to see you again, you asshole.”
“Me, too.”
“Why are you so hateful, Chace?”
Chace snorted, toying with his keys. “I’m the hateful one?”
“You’re going to regret turning me down. Probably as soon as you get in that car.”
“There’s nothing that could make me regret turning you down. Trust me. The thought of us together is revolting to me now.”
“Screw you!” She stomped off to her car without giving him a chance to respond. He walked over to his own car. Kelly being angry at him didn’t matter. Whitney being angry at him, however, was different. No matter who had been in the right and who in the wrong, it was devastating.
He drove to Ethan’s and parked on the street in front of his building. He sat in the car and waited for Ethan to get home. When he saw a guy with black hair wearing a corduroy jacket jump out of a beat-up Jeep Wrangler with a battered canvas cover, he got out of his car and walked over to the jeep. He clapped a hand on Ethan’s back.
“Hey, man. How you been?”
“Chace.” Ethan grinned and slapped his back. “Where did you even come from? Aren’t you supposed to be in D.C.?”
“Long story.” They headed for the front door of Ethan’s building. Chace blew onto his gloveless hands and rubbed them together. “I came down to see Kelly. We did the paternity test.”
“Well?”
“What?”
“Is it yours?” Ethan opened the door, and they walked into the building.
“We won’t know for a couple weeks, man. You can’t just get the results for these things instantaneously. It’s not like peeing on a stick, you know.”
“Well, you should have called, dude,” he said as they jogged up the stairs. “You’re lucky I’m here. I’m leaving for Mexico in a few days, and I would have hated to miss you. You know I’m a traveling man.”
“You didn’t say anything about that the other day,” Chace said.
“That’s because I just got the assignment.”
Ethan unlocked the door to his apartment and pushed it open. As usual, it looked like a war zone. Clothes and takeout cartons were strewn everywhere. Ethan’s parrot, Polly, greeted them. The name might have seemed unoriginal, but it was better than those of Ethan’s first three birds—Parrot, Parrot the Sequel, and Parrot the Third. Needless to say, Ethan wasn’t much into naming things.
“Hey, Polly,” Chace said to the bird.
“Man, that thing is so lame. She’s just old and blind and mean now. I think I’m getting a cockatiel next. Or a cockatoo. Or something else, you know, not lame.”
He laughed. “You’re being too hard on Polly.” Chace turned back to the bird. “Isn’t he?”
“Asshole,” Polly said.
“Ethan. Please don’t tell me that’s the only word she knows.”
Ethan snorted. “One of, like, three. I tried to teach her more. She refuses to learn. I told you she’s mean.”
“Right,” Chace said. He walked over to the couch and cleared a space to sit. He blew a breath straight up, temporarily lifting his hair from his forehead. “So. I screwed up. Big.”
“Yeah?” Ethan was sorting through an array of takeout menus that he kept on his kitchen counter as he spoke.
“Whitney and I broke up.”
Ethan stopped sorting. “What, really?”
Chace nodded. “I finally told her about Kelly. And everything fell apart, as I was afraid it would. She accused me of keeping something from her she had a right to know. I told her she was selfish. The next thing I knew, I was on my way out of the door.”
“You try to talk to her since?”
“I’m pretty sure she hates me.” Chace mumbled the words through his fingers since he had his hands pressed to his face.
“Ah, Chace. You’re so good at getting yourself into huge messes and just kind of enjoying drowning in them. I wish I could say I’m surprised.”
“Hey. This one isn’t entirely my fault. She was wrong, too. I told you. She could be impossible sometimes. It’s hard to come between her and that job.”
“But obviously, she’s worth the work to you.”
“Is she? I mean, she blew up at me all crazy because I didn’t tell her about this Kelly thing. It’s not like I hid the fact from her that I had an actual baby or something.”
“Man, that’s a heavy thing to lay on a person. Think about it. You had weeks to get used to the idea—”
“I never got used to it. I’m still not.”
“Regardless. The point is, she only had a few minutes.”
Chace considered this for a moment. “She won’t return any of my calls. I’ve tried to give her a chance to talk it out. She’s so stubborn. I should just give up.”
“All I know is you’ve seemed happier talking about this girl than you have about any of the other ones. Even Kelly, who was allegedly ‘the one’ at some point in your life before you found out she’s a huge skank.”
“Thanks for reminding me.”
“Any time.” Ethan laughed and ducked the half-hearted punch Chace directed at his arm. “But seriously. You and Whitney are good for each other. I can tell.”
“I don’t know. I just don’t know. I mean, I think she’s worth it. But if the baby turns out to be mine, there’s a huge chance we’ll end up falling apart anyway. That she won’t be able to handle it.” He sighed. “Why go through all of that for nothing?”
“If it’s meant to be, it’ll all work out.” Ethan walked back over to the counter and picked up the menus.
“Ethan. The walking, talking fortune cookie.”
“Quit your bellyaching.” Ethan threw a chopstick at him, and he caught it. “Are you admitting defeat? You, the one always talking about love and getting married and all that other crap?”
“I’m not admitting anything.”
“You hungry?” Ethan asked.
“Yeah, I guess.” Chace stretched out on the sofa and turned on the television.
“Good. ’Cause I’m starving.”
“What are we having?”
Ethan fanned the menus out and held them in Chace’s direction. “Pick one.”
Chace rolled his eyes. “With you? I should have known.”
“Unless you feel like cooking?”
Chace yawned. “Hell, no.”
“Luck of the draw it is then.” Ethan closed his eyes and selected one of the menus he still held fanned out in one hand. He opened his eyes and looked down at the menu he’d selected. “Ah. Looks like Jewish Mother for us.”
“Sounds great,” Chace said.
Ethan walked away to place the order.
Chace groaned and sank lower on the couch. Ethan had to ask three times what he wanted for dinner before Chace heard him. He was lost in memories of Whitney’s attempt to cook him dinner.
* * *
The next morning Ethan and Chace sat on the sofa with their microwaved breakfast burritos. Chace had decided to hang out with Ethan for a few days until Ethan left for Mexico. He’d called work to let them know, and they’d been okay with it. His boss at the catering company had told him that they didn’t have very many contracts for the next few weeks. They’d been slow recently and had started sending him home early a lot, so he hadn’t worried about them having a problem with him taking a few days off.
He needed to be away from D.C. for a while. Everything there reminded him of Whitney. And living with her best friend definitely wouldn’t have helped him get his mind off her.
“So you’ve had a night to sleep on it,” Ethan said. “Feel any different from how you felt last night?”
“Not really.” He chewed on his rubbery burrito.
“Maybe this is driving her just as crazy as it’s driving you.”
“I doubt it.”
“Man, I’ve never known you to be so negative,” Ethan said.
>
Chace took another unenthusiastic bite of his breakfast.
“You know, I talked to her that weekend we went kayaking.”
“I know. You told me, but you didn’t tell me what you two talked about.” He stuffed down the rest of the burrito. “What did you talk about?”
“She really cares a lot about you. She’s good for you.” Ethan stood and stretched. “I’ve never known you to give up on the things that really matter to you. Don’t start that crap now.”
“But maybe I don’t want to be with anybody that stubborn and quick to jump to conclusions.”
“Lie.”
“I wasn’t the one in the wrong. She was.”
“Nope.”
“Huh? Who’s side are you on, anyway?”
“Love’s side.” Ethan played air guitar and sang the words in a tone-deaf voice. “Since you’re too busy feeling sorry for yourself to be the love-struck sap out of the two of us, I have to pick up your slack.”
“You’re an idiot.” Chace laughed.
“I learned from the best, teacher.”
“Seriously. What do you want me to do, apologize to her? For her blowing up at me?”
“Don’t start painting yourself as the patron saint of wronged lying boyfriends, okay? You weren’t exactly honest with her.”
Chace closed his eyes and lay down on the sofa.
“What are you doing?”
“Going back to sleep.”
“No, you’re not. Get your lazy ass up from there.”
Something light and plastic bounced off Chace’s side. He opened his eyes and saw a plastic cup that Ethan must have thrown at him. “For what? Why should I get up?”
“Because we have to help Mom haul all her junk out of the attic for some huge spring cleaning yard sale she wants to have this weekend.”
“ ‘We?’ ”
“Yeah. I volunteered us. So get up.”
It would be nice to see Ethan’s mom again. He hadn’t seen her in a long time. “Okay. Fine. I’m up.”
“No you’re not.”
Chace groaned and dragged himself up from the couch.
“C’mon, Papa. Before I get old and gray.”
“Say it again, and I’ll sic your own bird on you.” Chace said. “She doesn’t seem to like you very much anyway.”
“I tend to have that effect on people, Papa.”
“That’s it. Polly, get him.”
Polly gave Chace a doleful look and said, “Asshole.”
“Fine. Be on his team, traitor.”
They laughed. He elbowed Ethan in the side and then ducked Ethan’s attempt to put him in a headlock.
Ethan disappeared to his room. Chace ran his hands through his greasy hair before letting them rest at the back of his head. He needed a shower, but the bathroom was so far away. Every step took real effort at that moment.
Having a baby wouldn’t have been such a bad thing. Only he wanted it to be with Whitney, not Kelly. Thinking of Whitney and Kelly made the bathroom seem even further away. That test had to come back saying Hank was the father. He wanted Kelly out of his life forever. She caused problems whenever she was around.
Chapter 28: Not Worth It
Whitney needed to get back to her brief, but she couldn’t cut her mother off. Not when Jo was in the middle of a rant and needed her support. She’d never been able to say “no” to her mother. That was part of the reason she pushed herself so hard at her thankless job.
Her mother had a brand new problem with Aunt Cheryl.
“Free is the worst thing in the world when you’re trying to get somebody to do something for you,” Jo said. “If you get them, you better pay them or else not get them to do it at all.”
“Mom, will you please let me do something about that fake contractor?” she said. Aunt Cheryl’s boyfriend had screwed up the plumbing job that Jo had finally agreed to let him do in the guest bathroom. “It’s no problem at all for me to take care of it, and I would feel better knowing it’s fixed,” Whitney said.
“I swear, that woman gets me in more than enough trouble.”
Aunt Cheryl’s boyfriend had botched the job. So not only had Jo and Shorty wasted a lot of money on materials, but now a real plumber had to be paid to do the job correctly. Luckily, the guest bathroom didn’t get used too often, so it wasn’t an emergency situation. However, the mess still needed to be fixed.
Jo paused for a long moment. Then, she said, “I’ll think about it.”
Whitney closed her eyes briefly. “Please, Mom. Think hard. I only want to help.”
“I let you do too much of that already.”
“Really. I can help, and I want to.” She didn’t mention that she didn’t feel like she could ever do enough to give her mom all she deserved. Her mother didn’t like to hear things like that.
“I’ll talk to Shorty and get back to you,” Jo said.
“Well, I gotta go now, but I’ll call you tonight, okay? Ask him by then.”
“That’s not enough time for us to discuss this thing.”
“At least start by tonight. At least bring it up with him.”
“Okay, honey. I’ll talk to you later.”
“Bye.” Whitney tapped her phone against her chin and leaned into the file cabinet. Back to work. She had to drag her way through the rest of the day somehow.
* * *
Apparently Whitney had messed up yet again. Kim didn’t like the brief at all that Whitney had turned in as a final product, and there was no more time for revisions before the document had to be turned in to the court. The brief was fine. Kim was picking with her yet again, but there was no way of proving that.
Kim didn’t want her to make partner because then she would no longer have a footstool. Despite the fact that she was back up to her highest work level and had maybe even surpassed it, Kim was still riding her. She wanted to say something to Andersen, but every time she started to go to his office, she made up a new excuse to put off talking to him. The moment she said something, she had to be ready for a war with Kim. She was already at a disadvantage, considering how Kim had skewed the partners’ perception of Whitney’s job performance.
The Bevyx settlement had come out in a way to make their client happy, Whitney had written an excellent brief in support of their motion to suppress due to the court that morning on another case, and she was three steps ahead of Kim on the new case they’d been assigned. And Kim was becoming more and more of a terror to her daily.
That morning, she sat in Kim’s office while Kim prattled on and on about expectations. She didn’t know the words were coming until they were already out of her mouth. But she didn’t regret them. “I don’t give a damn.”
Kim was stunned into silence for a moment. When she recovered, she said, “You don’t what?”
“You heard me.”
Kim’s eyes narrowed. “That’s insubordination. I’m telling the partners about this immediately. About this mediocre brief and about what you just said to me.”
“Tell them. You have no right to treat me the way you’ve been treating me lately.” She sat forward in her chair. “Then again, you’ve been treating me like that since you became my mentor. And I’ve been working like a dog for you. For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been working maybe harder than I ever have. I’ve been doing half of your job and twice mine for years, Kim, and I am sick of it. Just plain sick.”
“What did you say to me?” Kim’s mouth, painted with her ugly trademark red lipstick, dropped open.
“A job should be a part of your life. It shouldn’t take over the whole thing. I hope you figure that out one day. It might help you become less bitter and small. But regardless?” She stood. “I’m not going to stick around here and I’m not going to take this crap off of you any longer.” She started for the door.
“You think anyone’s going to miss your pathetic attempts at lawyering around here? I’ve been covering for you for years anyway.”
“Oh, and I know you’ve been pa
ssing my work off as your own even though you tell me it’s horrible and you need to make all kinds of corrections before you turn it in to Andersen. And that you’ve been passing off your mistakes as mine and making me look like a clueless, worthless idiot to the partners.” She glanced over her shoulder at Kim. “I figured it all out. Some of it I’ve known for years and some of it I found out about recently. But you know what? That all ends now. I’m leaving, and all I ask of this soul-sucking, mind-curdling place is a recommendation letter. That’s all I want.”
“I wouldn’t give you one now if you begged for it.”
“That’s fine. Because I hope I’m smart enough not to ask you for one.” She’d already decided to ask Brent for one. She’d worked with his group for a year. Even though that’d been over four years ago, anything was better than using Kim as a reference.
“And what about court this morning?”
“Ulrich is on the case and he has co-counsel. They know it as well as I do. I’ll check in with all my clients and talk to Andersen to see what I need to do to tie up loose ends here. But with how you’ve tried to make me look to everybody, I’m sure it won’t be hard to get out of here.”
“No one will ever believe you. I’ll deny every word you just spoke.”
“Oh. I’m not worried. Even if you don’t have a conscience to get you, people will figure out what’s going on when the quality of your briefs goes way down. You never were that good of a writer.” She wrapped her hand around the doorknob. “That’s enough for me. For you to be exposed as a phony.”
Whitney slammed Kim’s door after her and a smile spread across her face. Sure, she would miss Bettina and Ulrich and a few other of her co-workers. And some of her clients. But she wouldn’t miss the office politics or the pressure. She knew she was making the right move. She was going to drop by One Justice For All as soon as she left the office to give her résumé and cover letter to Abbott’s friend, as she should have a long time ago.
When she told Bettina she was leaving, the woman was horrified.
Her green eyes widened and she latched onto Whitney’s arm. “No. You can’t go. I can’t be at this place without you, Whit.”
Holding Her Breath (Indigo) Page 22
