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Authors: Manda Collins

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BOOK: Legally Yours
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“Not likely.” She held the phone in the crook
of her neck while she sorted laundry. None of her weekend chores
had gotten done this weekend, though it was hard to feel
disappointed about it.

“Where were you?” Lily demanded.

“Out to dinner with a friend.”

“A friend?”

“So, what's up with you?”

“Why are you changing the subject?” Damn it,
why did her sister have to be so nosy? "Were you on a date?”

“No!” Julie said too quickly. “Not a date.
Just dinner.”

“But it was with a guy, wasn't it?” Julie
could hear the suppressed excitement in Lily's voice.

“Yes, it was with a guy. But it's nothing to
get worked up about. It's just someone from work.”

“Ugh, I thought you hated those jerks. It's
not Clay is it?”

“Of course not!” Julie shuddered. She had
some standards. “He's married and he's an asshole. The only reason
I even have coffee with him at work is if we happen to be in the
breakroom at the same time.”

“So, who was it then? I think David has a
thing for you.”

“Wait...” Julie paused, averting disaster by
dropping the red sock into her hand into the colored basket. Then
realizing what Lily had just said, she squeaked. “David does not
have a thing for me. How do you even know what he thinks? You've
never met him!”

“I can tell by the things you tell me about
him,” the younger woman said. “But if it wasn't David who took you
out, then who was it?”

Julie stood and carried the basket of whites
to her tiny kitchen washing machine.

“Nobody you know,” she said, wishing Lily
would drop the subject. She didn't like talking about whatever it
was between her and Matt. Not only because it was too new, but also
because with him leaving in two weeks there was no possible way
that it could last. Which made her sadder than she'd ever admit.
“One of the corporate counsels visiting from D.C. for the RFG
case.”

“I thought you always hated those guys. City
Slickers who underestimate the local firms.”

It was a well worn topic of conversation
between them.

“I do, usually,” she admitted, “but Matt is
different. He's a good guy.”

“Tell me about him,” Lily demanded. The
background noise on her end was ramping up. Her room mates must
have just gotten in.

“Nothing much to tell.” Julie said.

Lily paused. Julie could almost hear the
wheels turning in her sister's head.

“You don't want to talk about him because you
like him.”

She knew she shouldn't have told Lily about
him.

“You like him and you're afraid it won't work
out.”

“There's nothing to work out. He's only in
town for a couple of weeks. Then he'll fly back to D.C. and his
life there. We're just hanging out while he's here.”

“That doesn't mean that you can't work
something out,” Lily argued. “Planes do go back and forth between
Birmingham and D.C. daily.”

“Like that's going to happen,” Julie sighed.
“Look, it's fine. He's a good guy. We're having fun. And when he
goes back home I'll be fine. I like being alone anyway. I like
having my own stuff and my own space.”

“Jules, you don't have to spend the rest of
your life alone. You're smart and funny and gorgeous. If you'd put
yourself out there you could have a different guy for every night
of the week.”

“Yeah right.” She appreciated Lily's loyalty,
but Julie had been out there in the dating pool and it was not
filled with the kinds of eligible bachelors that she was looking
for. “Look, I know you mean well, but I am seriously not on the
lookout for my perfect match. And if this thing with Matt is meant
to be, then it will work out. Otherwise, it will run its course and
when he's gone I'll go back to my regular life.”

“I don't mean well,” Lily protested. “I want
you to find someone so you'll stop focusing so much on me.”

Julie paused.

“What did you say?”

“Jules, you know I appreciate everything
you've done for me since Mom and Dad died. You quit law school so
that I could have someone to take care of me. And I don't think
I'll ever be able to repay that.”

“But...?”

“But, it's been seven years now. I'm in
college. I don't need you to stick around at home every night on
the off chance I'm going to call with boy trouble.”

“I don't...” Julie heard the panic in her
voice, and said in a more moderate tone, “I don't sit at home every
night waiting by the phone, Lily. I have a life. I go out with my
friends and I take care of myself. And I take care of you. Maybe
I've had a little trouble letting go since you went to school
but...”

“It's not that, Julie. You're not listening
to me,” she could hear the frustration in her sister's voice. “You
go out with your friends, yes. But you don't go out to meet anyone.
You go out and you stay there in your little bubble where it's all
safe and secure. You talk to guys, but you never give them the
chance to ask you out. Why is that? Why are you so careful not to
get involved? Even with this guy Matt I can hear the detachment in
your voice.”

“Look, if you called to tell me everything
I'm doing wrong in my love life, I've got better things to do,”
Julie said hotly. She was damned if she'd sit here and be lectured
on her lack of emotional availability with a 20 year old college
student with one long term relationship under her belt.

“That's not what I'm doing and you know it,”
Lily snapped. “I am trying to get you to open yourself up before
it's too late. Statistically, the older you get, the less and less
likely it becomes that you'll find a husband. If you keep on
shutting out every possibility then you're going to end up
alone.”

“What's wrong with being alone?” Julie
demanded. “Has it perhaps occurred to you that I'm happy alone?
That after all these years of taking care of someone else, I've
been looking forward to only having to worry about myself? What's
so great about having a husband anyway? It's just someone else to
take care of. Someone else's mess to put up with. Someone else's
drama to deal with. For the first time in my life I'm alone and I
love it!”

“That's a cop out and you know it,” Lily
argued. “You want to know why I think you're so commitment
shy?”

“Oh please, great guru, tell me!”

“I think you're afraid of being hurt. I think
you're afraid of loving somebody and having to risk losing them to
some freak accident like what happened to Mom and Dad.”

“Give me a break,” Julie sighed. “Look, Lily,
I know you mean well, but the only reason I'm still alone is that I
haven't found the right person yet. It's a cliché but it's
true.”

A tiny voice in the back of her mind
whispered that maybe she had found the right person in Matt, but
she ignored it.

She heard Lily sigh into the phone. “Go ahead
and keep denying it,” she said. “But one of these days you're going
to wake up and realize I'm right. And it's gonna suck.”

Their discussion about Julie's love life at
an end, they moved on to Lily's, which was much more complicated,
given that she was a healthy, attractive college student.

Later, getting ready for bed, Julie thought
back to Lily's accusations. Was she afraid of getting hurt? Was
that the reason she'd been so quick to accept Matt's condition that
their relationship last only for the two weeks he'd be in town?

She looked down at her bed, which felt empty
now that she was alone in it. Maybe it would be best to just cool
it with Matt before one of them got hurt. Before she became too
used to relying on him. Before she started to grow dependent on
feeling his arms around her whenever she wanted them.

Her stomach quailed at the idea of shutting
him out. But it would be for the best. For both of them. They both
deserved to be happy. And the sooner they ended whatever this thing
was between them, the sooner they could find someone who could hold
a permanent place in their lives. Not just a temporary fling.

As she turned out the light and tried to go
to sleep, Julie knew she was making the right call.

But it was going to hurt like hell when she
told Matt what she'd decided.

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter Seven

 

 

Things were so busy on Monday that Julie didn't even see Matt
until late that afternoon, when he got back from a deposition with
one of the doctors in the Murphy case.

She was fighting with the copy machine over a
stack of subpoenas that had to be mailed out that afternoon. And
losing.

“Can I get you something?” Matt asked from
behind her. “A sledgehammer? A gun?”

Pushing a lock of hair that had worked its
way free of her ponytail, Julie turned to find him watching her.
Remembering her vow last night to scale back their intimacy of the
weekend, she tried for a friendly but cool response.

“Either would work.” She turned back to
removing the tiny bit of torn paper that was hanging up the sorting
mechanism. “I'll be done here in a minute if you've got something
you need to copy. I think I'm going to take these subpoenas to the
other machine in the back.”

“Actually I was looking for you.”

She looked over her shoulder to catch him
eyeing her ass.
Damn it
. She stood up and turned around.

“What can I help you with?”

Instead of being cowed by her cool tone, he
just smiled.

“I thought I'd pick up a pizza on the way
home from work and bring it over.”

Startled at his boldness, she scanned the
room for eager ears. Fortunately, they were alone.

“Look, Matt,” she began. She'd never really
broken up with anyone before. She wasn't sure that this was the
right venue for that kind of conversation, anyway. Surprising
herself, she changed her mind mid-sentence. “Sure, pizza sounds
good.”

“Good,” he grinned and leaned forward for a
quick kiss on the mouth. “I'll see you later.”

Watching him stroll down the hall, she shook
her head. This thing was getting more complicated by the
minute.

As if to punctuate her thought, the copier
jammed again. Its beeping beating in counterpoint to her throbbing
headache.

***

Two hours later, Matt pulled up in the
parking lot behind Julie's apartment.

He'd expected some sort of retrenchment on
her part after the intimacy of their weekend together. But when
she'd tried to freeze him out this afternoon in the copy room he'd
been hurt nonetheless. Which he had no right to feel, he knew. He
was the one planning to leave in two weeks.

Well, one week now.

The last thing he'd expected to emerge from
that first night in the office was a full fledged relationship. But
the more time he spent with Julie, the more time he wanted to spend
with her. She was just so damned tenacious. He didn't know of one
other person who would have gone through the hell she'd endured and
come out on the other side with her soul intact. She'd raised a
great and successful kid when she was little more than a kid
herself. And she'd taken her legal skills and made herself an
indispensible part of the firm. Add to that the fact that she was
sexy personified and she was the total fucking package. He just had
to figure out how to make her see that.

Stepping onto the terrace outside her tiny
apartment, he saw her through the kitchen window, loading the
dishwasher. He couldn't fail to note that she'd changed from her
work clothes into a pair of skin hugging yoga pants and another of
those tiny tees that made his fingers itch to get them off of her.
Her back, however, looked tense, and when she stood up to find him
at the window, her first expression was one of wariness, which she
quickly replaced with one of relaxed welcome. He was right.
Something was bothering her, and he intended to find out what.

She met him at the door, and when he leaned
in to kiss her, gave him her cheek instead.

Something was definitely wrong.

Pretending like he hadn't noticed her cool
attitude, Matt carried the pizza into the den, and set it down on
the coffee table. Then turned around to find her watching him
again.

“I'll get some plates,” he said heading for
the kitchen.

“Matt,” she said, following him. “Stop. We
need to talk.”

He paused, bringing the two Fiestaware plates
to the countertop. “Can it wait until we're finished eating?” he
asked. “I'm starved.”

“Matt, we have to stop this. We've had fun,
but we both know you're leaving soon and...”

“And I thought we'd agreed that that didn't
matter.”

“Look, you and I both know that the whole
thing about us being able to turn our feelings off once you're back
in D.C. is a lie. I'm getting...” she looked away, as if she
couldn't say the next word and meet his gaze too, “attached.”

A little flame of hope caught light in his
chest.

He reached out, stroked a finger down her
cheek. “I'm getting attached, too, Julie,” he admitted. “We're
human. It's what happens when two people who are not sociopaths
sleep together and share as much as we have.”

She laughed at the sociopath line. As he'd
intended.

“Look,” he said, gathering her up in his
arms, needing to comfort her after the admission she'd just made.
“I know we said this thing would be temporary, but we're both
adults. When feelings change we can adjust. I'm not saying we
should get married or engaged or move in together. I just don't
want you to shut this thing between us down before we've had a
chance to see where it goes.”

“It just...” He felt her sigh against him.
“This scares me,” she said. “It scares the hell out of me. I
haven't had a relationship this...serious, since before my parents
died.”

“Well, if it makes you feel any better,” he
said, stroking a hand over her hair, “I haven't had a relationship
this serious in a long time either.” Try ever, his gut warned
him.

BOOK: Legally Yours
2.47Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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