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I sit at the courtroom table watching Lori as she works the jury and the courtroom. She is beautiful, but she has this quality, this girl next door vibe, that everyone can trust. The girl next door that is passionate not just in the bedroom, but in everything she does. In everyone she defends. “I leave you with this,” she says. “How will you sleep at night if you do what the prosecution asks of you? If you ignore the lack of evidence and convict our client? If you give—no, bless—law enforcement with permission to quit looking for the real rapist and killer? If someone else is brutalized, raped, and killed? How will you live with yourself? I know I can’t. I pray that I have convinced you to make them keep looking. Please tell law enforcement they don’t get to quit. Tell them they have to keep looking and you do that by ruling Edward Sullivan not guilty.”
She rests her closing and walks back to the table and pride swells inside me. We’re going to win, and that closing did it.
A few minutes later, we stand outside the courtroom and Lori paces. “Was I good enough?”
“Sweetheart, you were brilliant. If I was up against that, I’d be shitting my pants.”
Her cell phone buzzes and she pulls it from her pocket to read the text out loud: You’re brilliant. I just saw you on TV. I’m writing about you in my column and I don’t care that we’re connected. Everyone else is going to say the same thing. You made it, honey. All on your own.
She looks up at me, her eyes brimming with appreciation. “Not on my own. You have helped me every step of the way.”
“You just helped me win this case,” I say, not about to let her downplay what she’s done. “Who helped who?”
My phone buzzes and my lips curve. “Look at that. The jury is back in twenty minutes.”
She pales. “Oh God. We lost.”
I laugh. “We won. I’ve never been so sure.”
A few minutes later, I prove I’m right and so is Cat. Lori is brilliant. The verdict is not guilty.
Two weeks later…
Lori is wearing a stunning pink gown and I’m in a tuxedo as we exit the church with confetti being thrown at us. A private car waits a few feet away and it’s not long until I have her in the backseat, kissing her. “Mrs. Brooks,” I whisper.
“I can’t believe we did it.”
“I can’t believe we finally did it. Now, we go on our honeymoon.”
“You still haven’t told me where. Is it Italy, Paris, or Germany?”
“All of the above,” I say. “I want to see it all with you, Lori.”
“What about work?”
“Work can wait. We cannot. Not ever again.”
I kiss her, one of the many kisses I plan to give her for the rest of our lives, every wall dividing us now gone, forever.
Chapter fifty-four
Lori
Honeymoon in Paris
On our final day after a week in Paris for our honeymoon, Cole decides he wants to get us arrested. Not literally, but his actions say that’s exactly what he wants to do. After a day spent sightseeing, we dress up for an evening out with plans to visit our favorite little bakery for dessert and coffee. I wear a sexy red dress in a clingy material, with deeper cleavage than usual and a zipper that parts the dress top to bottom in the front. It’s a daring dress when I am not usually all that daring, but this is Paris and I’m with my husband. Cole personifies tall, dark and gorgeous in a blue button-down with dress slacks, and the way his eyes light on me as if he wants to gobble me up has heat rushing through my body.
We enter the elevator of our hotel, and the minute the doors close, he pulls me to him. “You’re beautiful, wife,” he murmurs, his voice all rough-edged and sexy.
My hand flattens on his chest, his heart thundering under my palm. “You’re not so bad yourself, husband.”
I’ve barely spoken the words before his hand is at the back of my head and he’s crazy, hot, kissing me, his hands caressing a path up my back. I moan with the lick of his tongue, telling myself to stop this. We’re in a public place, but then his tongue is stroking mine again and I am lost, sinking into the hard lines of his body, only remotely aware of the ding of the elevator.
Cole presses me into the corner of the car, and pulls his lips from my lips, his eyes burning into mine a moment before voices sound just behind him. A rush of people swarm the car and Cole settles against the wall, pulling my back to his front, the hard ridge of his erection nestling my backside. I am aroused, wet, aching all over for this man, and ready to go back upstairs. My hand closes down on his hand where it settles on my belly and the rest of the ride down is eternal until finally the car halts. Cole leans down and whispers in my ear, “I’m going to obsess over that zipper all night long.”
My lips curve, a shiver racing down my spine as he nips my lobe. Yes. Please. Think about it. I love the Cole that wants and wants and wants more. That was the idea when I slipped into this dress. I am about to voice just that, but already he’s lacing his fingers with mine, leading me out of the car, and it’s only a few moments before we’re on the street, headed toward our dinner destination.
A short walk from our hotel on Champs-Élysées, Ladurée is a cozy spot world-renowned for their macarons, which has caused me about a five-pound gain on this trip. They also serve dinner, and once we’re inside the bakery, we approach the hostess. Soon we are turning to the rooms on our right and headed up a staircase where we are seated at a tiny corner table. Everything is tiny in Paris, and while Cole’s leg is intimately pressed to mine, he’s forced to behave since I could practically lean and I’ll be touching the man next to me.
