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“What do you do to them?” I demand.
“Not a damn thing,” Maria says. “That’s the problem. He barely speaks to them and intimidates them all. Be nice.”
“How about I just pay you extra until Ashley gets back?”
“How about the temp for you reports to me?” she counters. “And I get a bonus.”
“Fine,” Cole says. “Done.”
I laugh and follow Maria from the office. I’m feeling at home here. And I’m really feeling at home with Cole. Life is good.
Later that day, a trial date is set for our professor client, and a new whirlwind begins. For another full week, I can honestly say that watching Cole prepare for it is magic. He assembles a team, and night after night, we work tirelessly at the office preparing to win. I have never been so challenged or learned so much as I do working with him. We’ve become investigators looking for a real killer, or at least a way to establish reasonable doubt by way of suspicion. I’m addicted to this case and solving it.
My second month of my six-month internship starts at Cole’s place, where I hide the fifth payment on my father’s gambling note in his freezer because he has refused my money. I actually find this game rather amusing for no good reason. Perhaps because he’s taking care of me, but I’m taking care of him, too, and he just doesn’t know it yet. But I know, and it feels right and good. After that I’m off to my apartment to change, and back to trying to solve a crime.
It’s late afternoon when my mother calls as she often does this time of day. More and more she slides in details of her new male friend, and even hints that I might get to meet him.
“Hi, honey,” she greets.
“Hi, mom. Everything okay?”
“You always ask that,” she says. “Every single night. I’m okay. Stop worrying. I’m off work tonight. I’m going to make dinner and I want us to talk.”
“About what?” I ask, my heart thundering in my chest. She either knows about Cole or she wants to move out again. “Am I meeting your new man?”
“Oh no,” she says. “Not yet. Soon maybe. Are you working late?”
“Cole, my boss,” I amend quickly, “he has a partners meeting tonight, so our team is off early. I can bring my work home.”
“I’ll see you at seven, then?”
“Yes,” I say and when we disconnect I feel a warning in my belly. Something is up with her. I’m on my feet with that thought walking toward Cole’s office. His temporary secretary, Mia, is on the line and disconnects.
“Is he alone?” I ask.
“Yes. You want me to buzz him?”
“Please,” I say, when I really want to barge into his office, but I’ve been doing this whole formal thing since she arrived.
She buzzes Cole. “Lori is here to see you.”
“Send her in,” he says.
I walk to the door, open it, and shut it again. “I have to stay at my apartment tonight.”
He sets his pen down. “Why?”
“My mother wants to have dinner and talk. She brought up moving out to make things easier on me a month ago, and now I’m afraid she knows I’ve been gone. Maybe she thinks I’m avoiding her.”
He stands up and rounds the desk, and I lean on the door. “What if she thinks it’s about her?”
He steps in front of me, his hands coming down on my shoulders. “She doesn’t. That isn’t this.”
“I’m never home.”
“Maybe it’s time to let me meet her,” he suggests.
“I don’t even know what this is. I’m not going to present you as my excuse for not going home. That could make it worse.”
