Rachel looked away before Brady caught her. At least Hannah would be back tomorrow.
But Hannah didn’t return to school the next day. Or the day after that. And both of those days Brady sought out Rachel in the cafeteria in her usual spot. They ate lunch together—alone—three days in a row. They talked about everything and nothing: music, their favorite subjects, and college plans.
And then over that weekend, everything changed.
“He’s such an asshole!” sobbed Hannah into the phone to Rachel late Saturday night. “He knew I’d been sick and still dumped me! Said that since he was going off to college in the fall, it wouldn’t work out. What a bunch of crap! He’s only going to UK, just sixty miles up the road!”
To Rachel, this sounded like logical reason to break it off, despite the summer months looming ahead, and particularly since the couple had only been dating a short time. She tried to console her friend as best she could but found it a nearly impossible task, and Rachel certainly didn’t mention how she’d spent her lunch hours at school the past several days.
And why did she feel guilty about that little omission?
Thirteen years ago…
Rachel wasn’t exactly enamored of the law school library, but it beat studying in her apartment. Her roommate was nice enough, but was noisy and tended to bother Rachel when she was trying to study. If only Hannah had gotten a scholarship offer from Kentucky rather than Northern, they could’ve roomed together all the way through law school.
But Rachel had an ulterior motive in going to the library—and it didn’t involve studying.
She went because sometimes she got to see Brady—even though he usually sat with his girlfriend, some blonde whose name she couldn’t remember. He must have a thing for blondes, Rachel lamented, remembering the short time when Brady and Hannah dated in high school.
Rachel had spotted Brady during law school orientation week and had said hello, but she didn’t get to talk to him too much in the midst of the frenzy of registering for classes and learning the layout of the school. Although they’d both gone to the University of Kentucky as undergrads, they’d rarely seen each other on the sprawling campus and had never socialized beyond a wave as they walked to classes.
But law school was different. Smaller college, smaller classes, closer quarters.
Better chances.
Rachel trudged up the law library’s central staircase to the second floor and headed for her usual spot in the corner near the windows. Although she harbored a small kernel of hope, she really didn’t expect anyone to be around on a Friday night.
But someone was there.
Brady.
He was sitting at the long wooden table where she usually sat, surrounded by books and stacks of papers. Rachel stood for a few moments and just watched him; he looked to be under some stress. Brady’s left hand supported his head and he was furiously making notes. Suddenly he looked up and a smile quickly spread across his face.
“Hi,” he said. He pushed back from the table and closed his laptop.
Rachel turned to leave. “I didn’t mean to disturb you. Looks like you’re busy.”
“Please don’t go. I could use a break and some decent company.”
Rachel moved toward him and sat on the opposite side of the table, but two seats down so she wasn’t directly across from him.
“What’s all that?” she asked, gesturing to the work spread in front of him.
“Trying to get something done for law journal,” he said, sitting back in his chair and stretching. “We’ve got a deadline and the person assigned this job—going through and checking citations on an article—came down with the flu. So I’m here in the law library on a Friday night trying to get it done. That’s my excuse for ruining my Friday evening. What’s yours?”
“Studying,” Rachel replied.
Brady laughed. “Then there’s little doubt you’ll grade onto journal at the end of the year.”
This was, in fact, a goal for Rachel. She knew she needed excellent grades to receive an invitation to become a staff member of the school’s law journal.
“I certainly hope so,” Rachel said.
“You will. Weren’t you valedictorian the year after me at Craig County?”
She confirmed the fact, secretly pleased he was aware of her achievement.
After their brief conversation, they both returned to their work and spent the next few hours in relative silence. At ten minutes to nine, a recorded announcement declared that the library would be closing soon, and both began to gather their materials.
“Would you like for me to walk you to your car?” he asked.
“I’d appreciate that, thanks,” Rachel said. It was dark outside, and she welcomed having an escort.
They left the law library together and headed out onto the darkened campus. Within a few minutes, they arrived at her vehicle.
“I’ve got some great course outlines if you’d like to have them,” Brady said as Rachel got into her car and closed the door.
“I’d love to have them.”
“I’ll bring them next week,” he promised, and paused. “Say, do you—” At that moment, Brady’s cell phone rang in a distinctive tone. “Sorry, need to take this,” he said, looking irritated yet contrite. It quickly became apparent that the girlfriend was on the other line. “OK, OK, I’ll be there in fifteen minutes,” Brady said, exasperation in his voice. He ended the call and again apologized.
Rachel shrugged and thanked him for walking her to her car. “I’ll check with you next week about those outlines,” she said. She put her driver’s side window up and drove away. In her rear-view mirror, Rachel glimpsed Brady standing in the parking lot, watching her as she left, and felt as though something unspeakably wonderful had just slipped through her fingers.
Ten years ago…
“The job is yours if you want it,” Justice Helen Nolan said to Rachel, “but I understand if you need time to think about it.”
Rachel was sitting in Justice Helen Nolan’s office in the state capitol. She’d come back for a second interview for a clerkship position, but hadn’t expected the justice to make her an offer on the spot.
Justice Nolan, a tall, thin woman in her fifties with short black hair liberally streaked with white, smiled at Rachel.
“I don’t need any time,” Rachel said, sitting on the edge of her seat. “This is a dream job. I accept.”
Justice Nolan laughed, and they fell into a discussion about when Rachel would start and where to park, and how to get into the building.
“I’ll introduce you to the present clerk I have, who’s been here a year,” Justice Nolan told her. “He’s the senior clerk, and you’ll be the junior one.” Justice Nolan stood, and Rachel followed suit. The justice turned to open a door to her immediate left, but stopped with her hand resting on the doorknob.
“Oh, I should let you know something. It’s not good for the work atmosphere for the clerks to get involved, if you take my meaning. I can’t outright prohibit you from dating, but I did want to tell you how I feel.”
Rachel nodded, thinking she was about to be introduced to some law nerd that she’d never have any interest in going out with, except perhaps to lunch on weekdays.
When Justice Nolan opened the door, Rachel swallowed hard when she saw Brady Craft sitting at a long wooden table, looking in some legal tome. The sleeves of his dress shirt were rolled up, revealing muscular, tanned forearms, and the top button of his shirt was unbuttoned, with his tie loose.
Brady looked up, smiled, and then squinted. “Rachel?” he asked as he stood.
Her stomach did a little flip. It had been a year at least since she’d seen him.
Justice Nolan eyed the two warily. “You know each other?”
“Yes,” Rachel said. “We went to law school together.” She held her hand out and Brady shook it.
“And undergrad and high school as well,” he added.
Justice Nolan nodded. “Well, I guess no in
troductions are necessary. I’ll leave you two alone so Brady can give you a little briefing on how things work around here.” She closed the door behind her as she left, leaving Rachel and Brady standing and looking at each other in an awkward silence.
Brady broke the quiet first. He showed Rachel the computer system, reference books, and forms, and briefly described the process of how he drafted opinions for the justice. He came to a stop and considered her, smiling.
“It’s good to see you,” he said, and Rachel mumbled something in agreement. He dropped a pen onto the table. “I guess Justice Nolan mentioned ‘the policy’ to you?” he said, making little air quotes with his fingers.
Rachel nodded, wondering why Brady bothered to mention it. “I sensed a story there, but she didn’t say anything,” she said.
“I know the story. It isn’t pretty,” he said, and Rachel looked at him expectantly. “A few years ago her two clerks started dating. It lasted for about half a year, and then they broke up. And it was bad. They couldn’t be in the same space together and got into screaming matches in the office. Justice Nolan fired them both.”
Rachel nodded. “And so she instituted the policy.”
“Yeah,” said Brady.
Rachel thought he seemed sad as he said it.
Nine years ago…
“That’s bullshit.”
“Why? Because I found the case and you didn’t?”
Rachel could tell that one stung. Because she was right.
“It’s not a comparable case, Rach.”
They were arguing again, this time over a case Rachel had found about an important legal issue in a case before the Supreme Court. Justice Nolan had been assigned to write the opinion.
Brady claimed up and down to both the justice and Rachel that he couldn’t find a case on point.
But Rachel did, and she knew it bugged the hell out of him because Brady always had to be right.
And that day he was quite wrong.
Rachel knew he knew he was wrong. Brady had a habit of running his hand through his hair, which is what he’d been doing repeatedly throughout their argument. It was a dead giveaway that he was upset and nervous.
“I think we need to let Justice Nolan make that call because last time I looked, you weren’t on the Supreme Court,” Rachel countered.
“But I’m the senior clerk here,” he pointed out, seemingly trying to take control of the situation. “I decide.”
“That’s not fair.”
“Tell you what,” he said, taking a seat across the table from her. They were in that stuffy room off Justice Nolan’s chambers, and the atmosphere seemed particularly claustrophobic that day. “Let’s bet on it.”
“A bet?” she asked, sensing a trap. “On what?”
“That if you’re right, and Justice Nolan thinks the case is in on point, I have to buy you dinner anywhere you want.”
“But—the policy—” she began to protest.
“It won’t violate the policy because it won’t be a date. Besides, we go out to lunch a few times a week. Justice Nolan has never said anything to us about that.”
Rachel frowned. “But what you’re suggesting sure sounds like a date to me.”
“Do you want it to be?”
Rachel didn’t answer his question. He was staring at her with those blue eyes, and she recognized the challenge there.
“But what if you’re right? What do I have to do?” Rachel asked.
“We never again order that pizza you like with bacon and onions when we’re here working late.”
Rachel was dubious. “That’s not a very balanced bet. And even though I’d love to have you pay for my dinner at some swanky place, I don’t want to risk running afoul of Justice Nolan’s policy.”
“Sounds to me like you’re not willing to be proven wrong,” Brady asserted.
That was it.
“You’re on.”
Three days later, they were in Brady’s car on their way to the best steakhouse in Louisville. And Rachel was wondering whether Brady had tricked her into the whole thing.
Maybe he’d known she was right, that the case really was on point—which is exactly what Justice Nolan had said—although he’d never admit to such chicanery.
His clerkship was almost up—just a few more weeks and he was headed home to Bourbon Springs. Perhaps he didn’t think he had much to lose by taking her out on a date, and she sure had noticed the looks he’d been giving her over the past few weeks.
Not that she’d been looking at him, of course. Well, not that much.
But damn was he good looking! Rachel couldn’t ignore that—or the more-than-merely-professional-colleagues feelings she had developed for Brady during the past year as they had worked in that cramped, close room.
When he arrived at her apartment to pick her up, she was delighted when Brady insisted on opening the car door for her. A little voice told her: this is a real date!
Yet the date they had both envisioned was not to be.
“I’m sorry, sir, but we don’t have a reservation under that name,” the hostess insisted.
Brady had already asked her to check twice.
“And there are no available tables tonight?” he asked.
The hostess shook her head. “Sorry. We’re booked up. But we could get you in another evening.”
Brady waved her off and walked back to the car with Rachel at his side.
“So much for buying you a steak dinner and a glass of Old Garnet on the rocks,” he griped.
“Now what do we do?” Rachel asked.
“I’m waiting for you to tell me I told you so.”
“Why would I do that?”
“I figured you’d see the lost reservation as some kind of divine justice or retribution for us violating the policy and going out.”
“But this isn’t supposed to be a date,” Rachel pointed out.
“Right,” he said, taking her hand and holding it all the way back to the car.
Once inside the vehicle, they sat and argued about what to do.
“Come on, Brady,” Rachel urged. “Let’s just go home. It’s late.”
“And we haven’t eaten any dinner,” Brady said. “I don’t know about you, but I’m starving.”
At that moment, Rachel’s stomach growled, betraying its agreement with him. “Fine,” she said. “But let’s get something quick.”
“It sounds like you don’t want to do this,” he said, and she could hear the hurt in his voice.
“Sure I do. But let’s call this what it is.”
“A date?”
She nodded. “A date.”
“So we’re officially violating the policy?”
Rachel tilted her head and thought for a moment. “Well, the way I understood it, Justice Nolan didn’t want her clerks getting emotionally involved. So maybe we aren’t breaking her policy.”
“Maybe you aren’t breaking it, but I’m not so sure I can say that.”
Brady’s blue eyes bore no trace of mocking her, and he stared at her until she finally had to turn away. Now she was certain he had tricked her, but she wasn’t mad at him.
Brady touched Rachel’s chin and turned her face to him.
“Where do you want to go?” he asked in a soft voice.
Eager yet nervous, Rachel had barely opened her mouth when Brady’s cell phone rang. His face quickly contorted into an expression of worry, and she realized he recognized the ringtone.
“Sorry. Family back home in Bourbon Springs,” he explained as he plucked the phone from his jacket pocket. Rachel nodded, mollified by his explanation.
Within the first few seconds of Brady answering, Rachel could tell something was very wrong.
“He’s where?” Brady said, putting his hand over his eyes.
Rachel could hear a few garbled phrases on the other end of the line and intuited that the news wasn’t good.
“OK, I’m in Louisville right now, but I’ll be there as soon as I can.” Brady hung up the
phone. All the blood had drained from his face to the point he was ashen and sickly-looking.
“What’s wrong?” Rachel asked. She gently put a hand on his arm.
Brady took a deep breath, and Rachel realized he was fighting tears. “My great uncle—he’s like my father, really. Raised me since I was six,” he said, swallowing hard. Rachel took his hand and squeezed it, and Brady squeezed back. “He’s in Lexington at UK Hospital. He’s had a massive heart attack and they don’t think he’s going to make it. I’m sorry, but I have to get there right away.”
“Of course you do,” she said. “Do you want me to drive?”
“Yes, I think that would be for the best,” he admitted.
In a silence punctuated by little conversation, Rachel drove back to her apartment in Frankfort and said goodbye to Brady before he headed for Lexington. “I hope everything works out,” she said as he got into the driver’s seat. “I’m sorry.”
He looked up at her, his face contorted with concern. “Me, too.”
Rachel didn’t see him again until the following Wednesday when he dropped by Justice Nolan’s chambers to pick up his personal items. Brady was moving back to Bourbon Springs at once, taking a job as an assistant prosecutor. He wanted to move back as soon as possible to be there for his great aunt, now a widow.
“Good luck,” Rachel told him as Brady loaded the last of his personal items into a box.
“Maybe we’ll run into each other back home,” he suggested. He looked very tired, like he hadn’t slept in a few days, and he sported a few days’ worth of facial stubble.
“I hope so. My folks still live in town and I do get back from time to time,” Rachel said. “But jobs are pretty scarce there. I figure I’ll end up here in the capital working for state government.”
He nodded. “Sounds like a good plan. But I’ll let you know if I hear of any job openings,” he said as he walked to the door.
As they said goodbye after a quick one-armed hug, Rachel thought she saw his eyes fill with unshed tears, and she turned away before Brady could see the same in hers.
Secret Blend (Bourbon Springs Book 1) Page 2