the first time since he’d sat down, Mitch turned toward her fully. “I am,” he said. The stern masculinity so characteristic of his face seemed even more sober today. “Covington asked me to handle the case.”
Henry Covington was the founding partner of Mitch and Kevin’s firm. Elaine remembered he was also a law professor and that the younger partners thought of him as their mentor.
“If it means anything at all, I regretted that decision every time I walked into the courtroom.” His gaze remained focused and steady.
Elaine stared back a long while without answering. The brandy snifter was still in her hands. Taking a last, long swallow, she set the glass on the bar and opened her purse to pay for her drink.
Without warning, Mitch’s hand covered hers. “Don’t leave….”
Huddled against the back door, out of sight, Elaine closed her eyes.
She now wished she had left. She should have left.
Mitch Ryder was officially her biggest, baddest mistake ever. Her only consolation from that night until present day had been her assumption that she would never see the man again.
Forcing herself to open her eyes, one at a time, she stood up slowly, peeking out the window.
He was gone. The mower stood alone in the middle of the yard. Smooshing her cheek against the glass, Elaine strained to see to her right and caught sight of him as he rounded the corner of the house. Leaving the ice cream on the counter, she ran to the living room. If she lifted the edge of the curtain just a little…
When the doorbell rang, she yelped. Traversing the space from window to door quickly on bare feet, she placed her palms on the door, leaned forward and looked through the peephole.
Feeling her heart flutter as she peered at Mitch Ryder’s face, she thought, Don’t panic, willing her heart to settle into an even rhythm so she could think clearly. There was no need to panic.
Except that six months ago, she had agreed to have another drink with Mitch Ryder and, for the first time in her life, gotten too toasted on brandy to drive home. The next day all she could remember was that they’d gotten into her car that night and she’d awakened in her big king-size bed the next morning…
Alone.
Nude.
And she almost never slept nude.
Lying under three-hundred-thread-count sheets in her thirty-seven-year-old birthday suit she had been hungover, yes, but curiously serene.
Since she had neither seen nor spoken to Mitch since that night, today she had no idea whether he was the second lover she had ever had in her life or merely…the divorce lawyer who had seen her naked. Either way—
That he had shown up today was positively too cruel. First Stephanie with her glad tidings and now this.
Resting her forehead on the door, Elaine barely resisted the urge to knock herself unconscious against the solid wood panel.
Please let this be a bad dream, God. If I wake up and he’s gone, I promise I will give up simple carbohydrates forever.
Chapter Two
Mitch stood outside Elaine Lowry’s rented front door and tried not to let his mounting anger get the best of him. The duplex she’d been living in for the past several months was the pits. According to his friend at Portland Property Management, the building was structurally sound. But cosmetically?
Mitch flicked a barklike wedge of peeling brown paint off the door frame and swore under his breath. This was not the type of place he’d pictured for Elaine when he’d asked his friend at the management firm to find her a “good deal.”
Standing with his hands on his hips, head lowered, he waited for her to answer the bell. The work shirt that had been tied around his hips now covered his torso, albeit half buttoned and untucked. Perspiration trickled down the nape of his neck, and he swiped it away, grumbling as a wasp dive-bombed past his face. He looked up to see a nest under the eaves. Great. Another thing he’d have to take care of.
He did not want to be here. Should not be here. In life, as in work, Mitch preferred situations that were black-and-white. Cleanly opened, cleanly closed, like the best cases.
Elaine Lowry was not black-and-white. She was a problem for him in walking, talking Technicolor.
For the past decade and a half, Mitch had made quite a reputation for himself and his firm by representing high-profile divorce suits. He considered it his job to make people act responsibly and with integrity when feelings were hurt, egos were bruised and money was involved. Quite a challenge and one he enjoyed. Usually. Representing Kevin Lowry, however, had been as rewarding as sticking needles in his eye.
Raising a fist that was clenched too tightly, Mitch flexed his fingers, balled them again and knocked on the door.
He never got personally involved with one of his own clients; he certainly never got personally involved with the opposing attorney’s client. Never. Capital N, capital EVER. He’d crossed the line. And he was about to cross it again.
It wasn’t his business to make sure she was protected financially.
It wasn’t his business to make sure she was well housed.
It wasn’t his business to make amends for her marriage or her divorce or…anything else. Yet here he was.
“Just make it fast,” he hissed to himself, knocking on the door one more time, harder than he needed to. He would stay briefly, speak his piece, make sure she was at least comfortable here and maybe give her the name of a good financial advisor. She could do what she wanted with the information. Or not. It was none of his business.
Elaine’s nose, lips and chin were pressed against the door when Mitch knocked. Caught off guard, she jumped, nearly blinding herself on the old-fashioned peephole. She twisted the knob and opened the door.
“Wait a minute! Don’t open—” Mitch started to say, but it was too late; a wasp so big it was probably in violation of the leash law, flew straight at her face.
Elaine yelped and flailed her hands.
“Don’t move!” Mitch ordered with the same deep authority she remembered from the courtroom.
Unfortunately the wasp kept buzzing, so she kept flailing. Then the buzzing stopped, and her nose felt like an entire pincushion had launched itself at her.
“Ow!”
“Damn it.” Mitch pushed the door open in an effort to reach for her. It banged into her bare shin.
“OWWW!!!”
He swore more colorfully. “Sorry. Are you all right?”
“No, I’m not all right!” Elaine shook as she pointed to her nose. She could see the wasp if she crossed her eyes. “Get it off, get it off!”
“Stop hopping.” He grasped her elbow with a strong hand and pushed her a step back, following her into the room. Holding her steady,
