Dating a Lawyer (The Dating Series Book 3)

by B. T. Love

  Brad nodded pleasantly to her and held out his hand, motioning for her to leave. As he followed her out he locked eyes with me and smiled. “Give your poor table a rest. You’re beating it to death.”

  “Like I’ll be doing to you,” I fired back.

  His smile widened. “Who’s the liar now?” He winked at me and left the room, closing the door gently behind him.

  My tapping escalated as I looked at Steve. “That man is infuriating.”

  “And so is my wife. They make a good team.”

  “But not good enough,” I said with a reassuring smile. I sat down my pen and folded my hands together on the table. “Don’t worry. I won’t let them take you for everything you have.”

  Steve looked down at his lap. “I don’t even care anymore. Just let her take everything.”

  I felt so sorry for him. He was such a nice man, he had just fallen into the textbook gold-digger scenario. “That’s why I ended the meeting, Steve,” I said. “I didn’t want you to say that in front of them. You are not going to lose everything to this woman, and you are especially not going to lose your beach house. I give you my word on that.”

  “I don’t know how you’ll convince the judge to see it any other way than hers.”

  “You don’t worry about that. I’m going to do some digging and I’ll figure out something to get you out of this mess.”

  He looked up from his lap and mustered a down-turned smile. “Thank you, Roxy.”

  Two

  Everyone loves weekends, and I was obviously no exception. I took those two days allotted to me at the end of each week to run errands and relax in the comfort of my own home, or maybe even go out with my girlfriends and unwind. I always tried to make it a priority to leave my work at the office for those days and not think about any of my cases until the following Monday. I for the most part succeeded at it, at least up until that point. Because at that moment Bradley Hunter’s handsome face was dancing around in my mind, completely annoying me on my day off.

  I grabbed a cart and pushed it into the grocery store. With my list in my hand I slowly traced the isles and picked out what I needed to get me through the next week. It relaxed me actually, walking around without much thought except for food and what I was going to do that evening. My girlfriends wanted to have a fun night out at one of the popular restaurants in town, and I was really looking forward to it.

  And then once again Brad entered my mind. He was so smug and over-confident, a trait I found annoying yet oddly enough attractive. And yeah, sure he was hot, but that was erased by his personality. Once again I pictured two horns coming out of the top of his full head of light brown hair. His hair was nice actually, and so were his eyes. They sparkled when we argued back and forth . . .

  “Stop it!” I quietly scolded myself. “He’s the enemy.” From that moment on I decided to make it my personal mission to destroy that man, to win my case so he would lose his first one ever. The thought made me chuckle. He had to be lying about that. I mean, what lawyer had never lost a case in his career?

  I made my way around the store and ended up in the produce department. I had been trying to work on my eating habits which hadn’t been that great over the past few months; stress got the better of me and was responsible for me choosing ice cream over ice burg. So with a new weekend came a new diet that I was determined to stick with.

  I was looking at the array of bagged salads that were spread out on the wall in front of me, trying to decide between the garden blend and the spring blend, when a whiff of heavenly cologne hit my nostrils. Knowing a good-smelling man was near, I looked to my side, only to see the profile of the devil himself: Bradley Hunter.

  “Oh god, it’s you,” I said as I grabbed the spring blend and threw it in my basket.

  Brad looked over at me and smiled. “Oh hey,” he said with surprise. “What are you doing here?”

  “Playing football,” I said sarcastically before pulling my cart away and spinning it around to leave.

  “Hey, hold on,” he said as he pushed his cart after me.

  I stopped and spun around to face him. “What do you want? I don’t have the terms of our agreement ready yet.”

  “No,” he smiled, “this isn’t about that.”

  “Then what is it about?”

  He leaned against the handle of his cart. He looked nice without a suit on, still equally attractive but in a different way. His t-shirt fit him snugly and he still wore an expensive looking watch, although it was different from the one he had worn in my office the day before. “I just want to say hi,” he told me honestly. “I want to see how your day is going.”

  My eyebrows pulled together. “Why?”

  “Because, that’s what humans do.”

  “You’re not human,” I said as I flipped around and continued to push my cart through the produce section. He stayed away from me for a few minutes, but once I reached the potatoes I could smell him again. I looked over my shoulder to see him thoroughly pretending to inspect an onion, the sight making me laugh under my breath.

  He looked over at me and his eyes lit up. “Red’s my favorite,” he said, speaking of the onion in his large hand.

  I couldn’t help but smile. “White is the best.”

  “You’re wrong.”

  I brought my hands to my hips. “How so?”

  “Red onions are mild and sweet.”

  “Unlike yourself.”

  He pulled off a plastic bag and stuck the onion inside. “Yet another thing you’re wrong about.”

  I shook my head and nodded at the pile of white onions beside him. “White onions are good in Mexican dishes.”

  “Red onions are good in salads and on sandwiches.”

  “I can’t believe we’re arguing about onions,” I chuckled.

  “Well at least I made you smile. So you must not hate me that much.”

  I rolled my eyes and went back to picking out potatoes. “You think you have me so figured out.”

  “I do.”

  “God you’re annoying!”

  My comment made him laugh. “Like you aren’t annoying . . .”

  “Oh yeah? And what did I ever do to annoy you, huh?”

  “Well let’s see, for one you called me a liar, which I’m not, by the way. And secondly you and your pen have got to end that abusive relationship. That tapping is very annoying.”

  “Oh will you shut up about my pen already?” I grabbed a potato and stuck it in a plastic bag. “I’ll tell you what annoying is. Annoying is defending someone who is obviously taking advantage of someone else. Like what you’re doing with Claire.”

  He looked away from me to a distant part of the store. “Well, I see this isn’t turning out how I liked it to. I just wanted to say hello outside of work.” He looked back at me and smiled, but his eyes were filled with disappointment. “Sorry I bothered you.”

  As he pulled his cart away and spun around I sighed, feeling guilty for coming off a little too rudely and bringing work into our conversation. “Wait,” I called out after him. He stopped and turned part way around, waiting for me to finish. “I, I like red onions, too. They’re my second favorite.”

  He crossed his arms and looked down at them while a smile formed across his face. “So white onions are good in Mexican food, huh?” he asked, raising his head back up to see me. “I’ll have to try that sometime.”

  “You should.”

  His phone chimed in his pocket, interrupting our much friendlier conversation. “Excuse me,” he said as he pulled it out and put it to his ear.

  As he spoke professionally to someone on the other line, I took advantage of the moment to glance at his cart. It was filled with more food than one man alone would eat for a week, which peaked my curiosity. Maybe he had a girlfriend I didn’t know about. He certainly wasn’t married; he didn’t have a wedding ring on. And he was obviously trying to flirt with me. I knew in reality that didn’t make any difference, though. In my profession I had handled plenty of mar
riages where the spouse flirted or cheated with no guilt whatsoever.

  He ended the call and slid his phone back into his pocket. “Sorry about that. It was about a case I’m working on.”

  “It’s no problem at all.”

  He looked down at the expensive watch on his wrist. “Well, I’ve gotta get going. It was nice seeing you.”

  My eyebrows lifted on my forehead. “Was it now? I wasn’t too annoying for you?”

  “Not this time,” he said, giving me a wink. He grabbed a hold of his cart and began to push it away. “I’ll be calling you soon, Roxanne.”

  And just like that, he walked off. Our encounter was so odd. Why he was being so nice to me I didn’t know for sure. The thought crossed my mind that maybe he was trying to get on my good side so he could use something I slip and say against me in the future with the Thompson case. “That has to be it,” I said to myself as I shoved another potato in my plastic bag. I knew from then on I had to really watch that devil in disguise.

  Three

  “I wish I could drink,” my friend Suzie pouted from across the table. “As soon as this baby’s born I’m getting a whisky sour.”

  “But then you’ll be nursing,” Nancy replied as she took a sip of her martini.

  Suzie sighed. “Ugh, I totally forgot about nursing. Well, maybe I’ll just swish it around in my mouth without swallowing.”

  Nancy and I laughed. “That’ll work,” I said.

  “You come up with any baby names yet?” Nancy asked.

  “Well, we were thinking about Tanner, or maybe Michael. I don’t know; it’s hard. I read an article in a baby magazine that said the name you choose for your child will shape the way they turn out as an adult.”

  “Well,” I chimed in, “if you think there’s a shortage of douche bags in the world you could always name him Chad,” I joked.

  “Hey,” she smiled, “my brother’s name is Chad.”

  “I know. And he’s a douche bag.”

  Nancy laughed loudly into the air. “She’s right. Your brother is a complete douche bag.”

  Suzie joined us in laughing. “Yeah, you’re right. Which is why we won’t be naming our son after him.”

  I looked down at my frosted glass of beer. “Well, either way your son is going to be beautiful. Based on the way you and Ted look he’s going to grow up to be one good-looking man.”

  “Then they should name him Bradley,” Nancy said before taking a sip of her drink.

  I looked up from my glass. “Now that’s a douche bag. Don’t name your kid that. Please.”

  Suzie thought about it for a moment. “Bradley. I actually like that name. Who has the name Bradley?”

  “Only the hottest lawyer in town,” Nancy answered. “He was in our office yesterday.”

  “Ooh, is that the one you were telling me about? I didn’t know any hot lawyers existed! Well, besides our Roxy, of course.”

  I laughed and took a sip of my beer. “Yeah, well, I can’t deny that he’s attractive. But he isn’t very nice.”

  “He’s nice to look at though,” Nancy added.

  “His attitude ruins any attractiveness he has.”

  “But he’s nice to look at,” she repeated.

  “Yes, Nancy,” I chuckled. “We all know he’s nice to look at.”

  Suzie took a drink of her water. “Well I don’t know if he’s nice to look at; I’ve never seen him.”

  “We should Google him!” Nancy shouted with excitement as she took out her phone. “I’ll do it right now!”

  “Oh come on,” I said with a roll of my eyes. “I was enjoying my night.”

  “Bradley Hunter,” she said as she typed it in. “Family law.” She paused as her phone searched and then she smiled. “Here he is,” she said as she showed her phone to Suzie.

  Suzie’s eyes widened. “Wow, that’s him?” she said as she grabbed the phone, bringing it closer to her face so she could see him better.

  “Let me see,” I said. She faced the screen around and I peered at the professional headshot of my competition. “Yep, that would be him.”

  “You lucky girls! You get to see him at your workplace. I need to see this man in person, too.”

  “He’ll just offend you,” I told her.

  “He’s never offended me,” Nancy said. “He’s been nothing but sweet and gentlemanly to me when we’ve spoken.”

  “Well maybe he likes you,” I teased. “All I know is that he doesn’t like me.”

  “Why do you say that?” Suzie asked.

  “Because he talks down to me. You should have heard him in the conference room at my office yesterday. And then I saw him today at the grocery store and we even argued then.”

  “You saw him today?” Nancy cut in. “And you didn’t tell me?”

  “I didn’t really care to discuss it.”

  “What did you two argue about?” Suzie asked.

  “Onions.” Nancy and Suzie eyed each other. “What?” I asked, intrigued by their silent communication.

  Nancy leaned forward. “He has the hot’s for you.”

  “What?” I scoffed. “You’re delusional.”

  “Nancy’s right. If he’s talking to you outside of work and starting arguments about something as dumb as onions, I think that means he’s just trying to make an excuse to talk to you.”

  I shook my head. “I don’t think so you guys. I mean, to be honest I thought maybe he was flirting with me at first, but then I realized he was probably being sneaky or something, trying to get on my good side so he could get information from me to use against me in our case later.”

  “He could use me any time,” Nancy said before downing what was left of her martini.

  “He could use me too,” Suzie repeated. We both looked at her, a little caught off-guard by her comment. She shifted in her chair. “I, I mean, if I weren’t happily married and eight months pregnant . . .”

  We all broke out in laughter. I loved my crazy friends.

  * * *

  I sat at my desk on Monday morning, going over the notes on another case I was working on. My client was a middle-aged man named Robert Stillman who was trying to get custody of his only son, who was sixteen years old. His ex-wife was basically unfit to care for him but he was having a hard time proving it. She had filed a domestic abuse report with the police, claiming Robert struck her in the face after a heated dispute. Robert said he never hit her, but instead she had punched herself in the face right in front of him, something she did so she could blame him for abuse against her. There were many other instances in my notes of her unstable behavior, and I was working on getting the case put together so I could get the poor boy out of the custody of his unstable mother.

  Nancy’s line beeped and I picked up the phone. “What’s up?”

  “Your boy toy is on line one.”

  “Will you please not call him that? It’s disturbing.”

  “Oh it is not,” she teased. “You know you’ve thought of him in other ways besides the work-related ones.”

  Unfortunately my best friend was right, but she didn’t need to know that. “Thank you for telling me.” I hung up and took a moment to collect myself before picking the phone back up and punching line one. “Roxanne Balkner.”

  “Ms. Balkner, it’s Brad Hunter.”

  His voice was so smooth and confident. I crossed my legs under my desk and leaned into the phone, realizing just how much his tone was affecting me. “Mr. Hunter, I believe I told you I would call you when I had finished discussing the terms with my client.”

  His deep voice chuckled on the other line. “Well what’s taking you so long?”

  I smiled but was sure to mask it in my tone so he wouldn’t pick up on it. “We just met on Friday; this is Monday. Don’t you think I deserve a little more time than that to put it together? Besides, I have other cases I’m working on as well.”

  “You? Other cases?”

  My smile faded. “I’m a very well-respected lawyer in this town, M
r. Hunter. I can assure you I have plenty of work. Now, is there something I can help you with? Because you’re wasting my time.”

  “You know, you get a tiny little crease in your forehead when you’re angry.”

  “Which is every time that I’m talking to you, so get used to seeing it.”

  “I’m actually beginning to look forward to seeing it.”

  My heart deceived my head and skipped a beat. “Goodbye Mr. Hunter,” I said before gently setting the phone back down. I had to put an end to the conversation that was responsible for my body’s new behavior.

  A few minutes later Nancy rang again. “Is it him?” I asked after picking up the phone.

  “Yep. You hang up on him?”

  “Yep.”

  “You go girl.”

  I laughed and switched over to Brad’s line. “Roxanne Balkner.”

  “You can’t get rid of me that easily,” he said happily.

  “What a shame. Can you tell me what I can do to get rid of you?”

  “Yeah. You can let me take you to dinner.”

  Now that caught me off-guard. “Dinner?” I repeated. “Now why on earth would you want to take me to dinner? Let me guess, so you can skip out last second and have the last laugh?”

  “Oh come on; I told you I was a gentleman.”

  “A gentleman doesn’t talk to a woman they way you talk to me.”

  The line went silent. “You’re right. Which is why I want to make up for the way I’ve been speaking to you.”

  “By calling and continuing to speak to me in the same way?”

  “Yeah,” he chuckled. “Old habits die hard I guess. It’s a challenge for me to take my lawyer hat off when I’m around my competition.”

  “So you see me as competition?” I asked, this time not hiding the smile in my voice.

  “If I say yes will you go to dinner with me?”

  “Not if you’re lying about it.”

  “As I’ve said before, I don’t lie.”

  I mulled the thought around in my mind. It wouldn’t hurt for me to stare at an attractive man for an hour or two while indulging in some much needed wine. And maybe I could even find out some things from him that could help my case against his client. It was worth a shot.