Wranglers: Discovery

by Vivien Dean

  "I would've thought your favorite spot involved kegs and bales of hay," he commented.

  "Oh, I haven't been back in Texas since I graduated high school. I just swing the accent more when I think it'll do me some good."

  "I find that hard to believe."

  Sam cocked a brow. Without shifting in his seat, he somehow seemed straighter, his shoulders more squared. Sticking out his hand, he said, in a voice only slightly colored by his Texan upbringing, "Nice to meet you. I'm Sam Kimball."

  Derek grinned, in spite of his earlier annoyance. "That's not bad. You almost sound civilized now."

  "I better, for as hard as I worked at it."

  "Why'd you go to the trouble? You never struck me as the type to be embarrassed about where you're from."

  "I'm not. I love Texas. I did it because of the assholes who hear an accent remotely Southern and assume I'm an idiot by default."

  "Ah. Yes." Derek knew a lot of those. He'd been one himself until he'd read the first of Sam's briefs to cross his desk. Then he'd realized just how sharp the mind was he was up against. "You must've gone to school somewhere up north, then."

  "Yeah, Columbia. I got a partial scholarship, and then worked my tail off for the rest. You were UC Berkeley, weren't you?"

  "Yeah, how'd you know that?"

  Sam sat back to give the approaching Deanna room to set down their drinks. "I do my homework on all the lawyers I go up against." When she handed him his credit card, he turned an even wider smile in her direction. "Thanks, darlin'."

  Derek waited until he'd slipped the card back into his wallet. "Why didn't you stay in New York?" And out of my hair went unspoken.

  "Have you ever lived in New York?"

  "Lived, no. Been there for a few business trips, though."

  "If those trips had been in the winter, you wouldn't waste time asking a Texas boy why he didn't stick around just so he could freeze his nuts off. When I started getting headhunted, I didn't even bother with anyone who had snow where they came from. Even for a few weeks."

  "That eliminates a lot of good firms."

  "They're not good enough if they can't give me what I want." He sipped at his beer. "San Francisco was a good fit. I've never looked back."

  No, Derek didn't imagine he would. Regret didn't seem like Sam's style.

  "You must've thought it was a good fit, too," Sam went on. "You could've gone anywhere you wanted."

  "I grew up here. I've never had any desire to live anywhere else."

  "So you still have family around?"

  "Some." His family wasn't any of Sam's business, though. Derek needed to be a little better about steering this conversation, or get out of here fast. There was always the option of gulping down his drink, but after he'd taken the first sip of the smooth, liquid fire, he'd known he was going to savor every single drop. If he'd really wanted to get out of here quickly, he should have ordered something cheap he could just knock back instead. "I wouldn't have pegged you as a San Francisco kind of guy, though."

  Sam chuckled. "Because you pegged me for hoedowns and keggers, if memory serves."

  "Well, yeah." Which, for some reason, embarrassed him more than a little, considering what he knew now about Sam's background. "You can't say that you blame me."

  "No, no, I guess you wouldn't have any need to do your own research on me." He toyed with the label on his beer bottle, drawing Derek's attention to the strength in his hands. He had calluses, too, though Derek had known about those from the first time they shook. Whatever Sam did in his free time, he did it with his hands, which only made him even more of an enigma to Derek. "You thought I was a pushover from day one."

  "No, I thought you were a show-off from day one. There's a difference."

  "I am a show-off. It usually keeps the other side off-balance while I go in for the kill."

  Derek shook his head. "You watch too much Boston Legal. Though at least that explains why you're always telling me your name. Like I could ever forget it after the first time you told me." He grinned. "I should start calling you the Shat."

  Sam returned his smile. "Sounds to me, you're the one watching too much TV if you know that's what he's nicknamed."

  "It's called keeping up on popular culture."

  "William Shatner stopped being popular some time around TJ Hooker."

  "You are too young to remember that show." Derek took a bigger swallow of his whiskey. "Though now I feel fucking ancient."

  Sam swept a long, assessing gaze over Derek's shoulders, drifting lower to what was exposed of his torso behind the booth's table. "You don't look it, if it's any consolation."

  "Coming from you? Not really."

  Slowly, Sam leaned forward. "So who would you accept the compliment from? For argument's sake. Your date, maybe?"

  He almost retorted, "This isn't a date," when he remembered his excuse to get out of here after the drink. "I would hope my age wouldn't come up as an issue for anyone," he said. "Good or bad."

  "You say that like you're fifty."

  "So sayeth the child barely out of his legal briefs."

  His gaze became quizzical. "Just how old do you think I am?"

  The question forced Derek to give him a closer look. Those blue eyes were riveted on him, bright and knowing, and the full mouth still posed in his favorite mocking smile. There were faint lines at the corners of his eyes, but those clearly came from laughter, not age. "Twenty-seven," he guessed. "Twenty-eight on the outside."

  "Try thirty-four. Thirty-five in a month."

  Derek gaped. "No, you're not."

  "Yes, I am."

  "That's only two years younger than me."

  "I know." He laughed. "It explains a lot of how you've treated me, though. You think I'm just an upstart kid, trying to play with the big boys."

  "The way I treated you has nothing to do with your age."

  "Then why all the antagonism?"

  There was no way he would ever admit to being intimidated by Sam's skill. He'd rather wear gold lame to his next court appearance; it would be less embarrassing. "Because you're an annoying little shit who thinks he can do no wrong, that's why." He picked up his glass to swallow down the rest of his whiskey. He didn't care if it was a waste of an excellent drink. He wanted to get out of here now.

  Sam smirked. "Gee, do you kiss your boyfriend with that mouth?"

  Derek spluttered, and the Glenlivet immediately chose the wrong passage to continue its path. He started coughing, his nose burning as the whiskey reversed direction and again chose the other, more painful way to escape his body. When Sam reached over to clap him on his back, Derek jerked out of his way and slid toward the edge of the booth, grabbing one of the napkins to cough into until he found his voice again.

  "What did you just say?" he rasped.

  "You heard me."

  Sam's eyes twinkled in amusement, but he wasn't returning to where he'd been sitting, staying in the middle of the seat so that it was impossible for Derek to go back. Not that he wanted to. As soon as his eyes stopped watering, he was walking out.

  "I don't recall ever telling you I had a boyfriend." As soon as the words came out, he realized his error. Girlfriend. Should've said girlfriend. Damn it.

  "You didn't. But I told you. I did my homework on you. Which included finding out that you're gay."

  All of a sudden, everything became clear. This was what Sam had been leading up to all night. The asshole intended to use what he thought he knew for his own gain.

  Fury hardened every nerve in Derek's body and he tossed aside the napkin to lean in and glare. "If you think for a second that information is going to give you any kind of advantage, think again. I will tear you apart and feed you to the lions before I let you try and air my private life, understand?"

  His harsh response elicited the first genuinely shocked reaction from Sam. It stunned him into silence, his smile vanishing, as everything Derek said sank in.

  "You're not out of the closet? How is that possible?"
<
br />   "This has nothing to do with closets. This is about my personal life."

  "Which includes fucking men."

  Derek growled at how bluntly he had put it. "I don't go around advertising the fact."

  "You live and work in San Francisco. If you can't be out here, where do you think you can?"

  "This has nothing to do with--fuck it, never mind." Pulling back, he slid out of the booth and towered over the table. "Just remember. I warned you."

  Storming out of Satori didn't feel half as good as he'd hoped it would. His heart pounded away in his chest, and a thin layer of sweat shone along his brow. Contrary to what Sam claimed, Derek wasn't in the closet. Everybody he cared about, or who cared about him, knew his orientation. But his sexuality didn't define him, and he'd seen too many gay lawyers get swept up in campaigns simply because of who they chose to fuck. Toss in the fact that he loathed having everybody in his business, and was it any wonder he didn't go around with rainbow-colored suits and an I Kiss Boys badge? He wouldn't parade a woman around the office, either. And if Sam Kimball thought for a second he'd be able to twist this to some advantage, it was going to be Derek's greatest pleasure to shoot him down.

  "Rossi! Wait!"

  He cringed at Sam's shout, that damn accent slithering down his spine and settling somewhere at its base. He doubled his pace. He was done.

  "Rossi!" A strong hand grabbed his arm and yanked him to a halt. Derek tore away, but Sam made it impossible to continue toward the office, forcing his back to the edge of the bank they stood in front of. "Look, that happened all wrong back there. I didn't mean for this to be a big deal."

  Derek scowled. "Nice to see my private life trivialized so effectively. Thank you for that insightful argument, Mr. Kimball."

  "That's not what I meant."

  "I think that's exactly what you meant."

  "Which only goes to show just how little you know about me."

  "A state I was happy to perpetuate until you insisted on this little share and tell session."

  "Well, I wasn't." He stepped even closer and lowered his voice. "I knew you were gay by the time we had our second meeting. If you think I planned on using this somehow, don't you think I would've done it while it might have made a difference in the case?"

  The danger in listening to Sam Kimball was the logic in his speeches. "I'm sure you had your reasons."

  "Yeah, I did." That look appeared in his eyes again, the one Derek had noted back in his office, only this time, it didn't disappear. It grew more intense, bringing with it an awareness Derek didn't want, one he definitely didn't need. "I had this crazy idea that since we didn't have a conflict of interest anymore, we might be able to pursue other areas of interest instead."

  "There are no--"

  The rest was lost in the clamp of a hand at the back of his neck and the seal of Sam's mouth over his when he yanked Derek down. The thrust of his slightly bitter tongue past Derek's lips demanded an equal response. The only problem was, Derek had none. To say he was taken aback was an understatement. He never would have considered Sam Kimball interested in anything but pissing him off as much as he possibly could. He'd excelled at it, after all. And he'd certainly never entertained the notion of bending Sam over the conference table and fucking him senseless so the courtroom might be a more congenial environment.

  At least, not seriously.

  There was a huge difference between wanting to pummel someone and wanting to pound into them. The distinction of body parts was important. He believed that, whole-heartedly.

  Now someone just needed to tell that to his dick.

  As soon as he realized he was responding to the kiss, Derek grabbed Sam's shoulders and shoved him away. His lips felt blistered, and he could still taste Sam even after he dragged the back of his hand across his mouth.

  "What the fuck do you think you're doing?" he snarled.

  The thumb Sam drew across the corner of his lips, wiping away a slight line of spit, shook. Almost imperceptibly. Derek was too attuned to everything about the other man to miss it, though.

  "Down in Texas, we call it cutting past the crap."

  "Yeah, well, here in California, it's called sexual aggression. Try it again, and I'll have your ass locked up in a lawsuit so fast you'll have whiplash in all the wrong places."

  Sam shoved his hands into his pockets and retreated, finally giving Derek room to inch away. "You weren't listening to a word I had to say. I had to do something to get through to you."

  "Don't you get it, Kimball?" He jabbed a finger into the smaller man's shoulder. "I don't want you to get through to me. I want you to leave me the hell alone. There hasn't been a single day since I met you that I've wanted anything different."

  "Because we have something here."

  "No, we really don't."

  "You think I'm happy about it? Okay, maybe in the beginning, I was, because you were the sexiest thing I'd ever seen, not to mention the best lawyer I'd ever come up against. But after the way you treated me? The last thing I wanted was this chemistry between us."

  "There is no chemistry."

  "And you haven't spent every single day since we met thinking about me?" Sam mocked, twisting and throwing his words right back at him. "For hours, I'll bet. Because that's the kind of man you are. You get a bone, you chew it down until there's not a lick of marrow left."

  "Not the best imagery to use on a gay man."

  "I was aiming at the lawyer." Sam backed off, pulling himself straighter and putting on his jaunty smile once again. "I meant every single word I said tonight, Rossi. If you can't figure out what all that means, that's your problem."

  Derek was left staring at Sam's back as he turned and walked away.

  It only dawned on Derek after Sam disappeared around the corner that he hadn't made any step to leave, even when he should have.

  * * *

  Chapter 3

  * * *

  "So you think you can help me?"

  Derek smiled and leaned forward. "Of course, I can. You've got the law on your side. In fact, it'll be my pleasure to do everything I can to make sure your ex doesn't get away with this, Dr. Barragan."

  Zoe Barragan pushed back a fine strand of ash-blonde hair from her narrow face, exhaling in relief. Her smooth, ageless complexion was mottled in red, a reaction to telling her story, but now that he'd accepted her case, it seemed to be fading. "Oh, thank God. I'm tired of worrying about it. I've been driving everyone at the hospital crazy."

  "Well, not anymore. You leave the worrying to me."

  "I never expected him to try a stunt like this. I mean, he signed off on everything when we divorced. There's no reason--" She cut herself off with a rueful grimace. "Sorry. I'll let it go. I just have a tendency to overthink things."

  "It's understandable. People expect others to honor their word."

  "Exactly. Though he didn't do it while we were married, so I don't know why it surprises me he'd do it now. Maybe I hoped he'd grown up. Or that--" She laughed. "And there I go again. You're going to have to learn to tell me to shut up. Otherwise, you're going to turn into my therapist on top of my lawyer."

  "It wouldn't be the first time." He rolled his pen between his fingers. He had a pad full of notes, some of them illegible even to him. He'd have to transcribe them for Nadia to type up. "Can you answer one question for me? Why did you wait so long to get representation?"

  She relaxed in her chair, crossing one slim leg over the other. She reminded him of a whippet his mother had once owned--too skinny, slightly anxious, with a sense of frailty hiding a stronger core. "Because I thought what any reasonable person would think. That he'd go away when I reminded him he'd signed away all the rights in the divorce."

  Derek shook her head. "People like that are never reasonable."

  "When I finally realized that, I talked to my neighbor. I thought since he's a lawyer, he'd be able to give me some advice. The first thing Sam said? 'Get Derek Rossi. He's the best.'"

  Though the
compliment was welcome, something else she said kept him from fully enjoying it. "Sam? Not...Sam Kimball?"

  Zoe brightened. "That's him. He said he had to go against you in court once. That you were the only lawyer he'd ever met who scared him into thinking he might lose."

  Derek maintained his smile, though it felt tight and brittle. "I don't think anything scares Sam. But I am glad you came to see me. You don't need this kind of complication in your life, and I'm going to do everything in my power to make it go away."

  His mind was still whirling when they both rose and he walked her to his office door. They shook hands and made plans to meet again in a few days to go over all her past records, but he barely remembered the details of their conversation when he closed the door behind her.

  A referral. From Sam.

  It had been eight days since that awful night at Satori. Funny how he didn't even think of the judgment as the pinnacle of the day now. The partners had been gracious about the loss, especially since everybody knew it had had loser written all over it from the start. Everybody but him, apparently. But now, everything about that day centered on Sam, and the drinks around the corner, and that kiss he still tasted the following day when he woke up.

  He had thought of it every day since. He remembered it whenever he ate or drank something. He relived it when he woke up, and then again when he went to bed. And when he slept, he did a lot more than kiss Sam back.

  Why would he have suspected Sam was gay? He'd been focused on the case, on beating the little shit into the ground, more than his social life. It wasn't until he started replaying all those little moments, all the conversations where topics had strayed slightly from the case on hand, that he realized Sam didn't talk much about his personal life. He'd never mentioned going out on dates, or women he was attracted to, or even joke about how hot the court stenographer was in her glasses and short skirt. There had been no clues to reveal the truth about his orientation.