River Bodies (Northampton County #1)(5)

There were two other attorneys in Matt’s firm who had managed his most recent client before the file had been turned over to him. He was the go-to guy once a case actually saw the inside of a courtroom. He had a commanding presence, a certain charm that even hostile witnesses warmed to. He had the gift of persuasion.

He’d been preparing for weeks, circling their living room, practicing his opening and closing statements. As the court date approached, the meetings with his client had become more frequent, keeping him out until all hours of the night. The tension of the pending trial, prepping his client for the stand, and then late yesterday when the judge had ruled in their favor, it all had been terribly exciting, overwhelming, so he’d said. His client’s patent, some kind of applicator in the cosmetic industry, the details of which his partner had handled, had been packaged and sold without permission or payment. The cosmetic company’s infringement, worth millions, would have to be paid. It had been the biggest win of Matt’s career. Could he help it if he’d gone out afterward and celebrated?

It wasn’t his fault that his client happened to be a six-foot-tall brunette with legs so long they touched her ears. He’d confessed she’d enjoyed flashing her cleavage in his face, wearing low-cut blouses, leaning over him to look at files, touching his shoulder, brushing up against him whenever she’d had the chance. It had been building for weeks, the stress of the case, and then the big win.

Becca slapped the wet tile with her palm. She would not cry. She would not give him the satisfaction of seeing her weak.

The phone started ringing. It was the landline Matt had installed when he and Becca had first moved into the condo. She couldn’t remember the last time someone had actually rung them up on it. Most everyone they knew called their cell phones.

She turned off the shower, listened to the sound of Matt’s muffled voice, then the click as he hung up the phone. In the next minute, she emerged from the bathroom wearing a white cotton robe. It was too big for her petite frame, drowning her small chest and narrow hips in the bulky material. Her dark hair was short, a pixie cut, making her look young and boyish rather than like the thirty-year-old woman she was. She was nothing like the typical girls Matt had dated in the past. The other women in Matt’s life had been models, beauty queens. Becca had seen all the pictures, all his previous conquests. These other women looked a lot like Matt’s latest client.

Becca wasn’t beautiful in the traditional sense, and she certainly wasn’t a bombshell like the leggy brunette. But none of this had ever seemed to matter to Matt. He’d said it was Becca’s gray eyes that he’d gotten lost in, eyes that were sharp, intelligent, kind. He’d whispered in her ear, his voice deep and sultry, confessing how her eyes held him captive, how they turned black as pitch when she was angry and lusty gray when they made love. But mostly, he’d said, he liked who he was in her eyes. He liked how she saw the best in him, the goodness, rather than all the other crap that made up who he was.

But now when Becca looked at him, he wouldn’t meet her gaze. He looked away.

She walked past him on her way to the dresser. He reached out from where he sat on the edge of the mattress and grabbed her wrist, pulling her to him until she was standing in front of him. He buried his face in her cotton robe, his hands roaming the angles of her body.

“I’m in a hurry,” she said. “I’m already late for my first appointment.”

He wrapped his arms around her waist, nudging the robe open with his nose, kissing her. She didn’t push him away.

Maybe she was wrong, and last night had been what he’d said, a celebration and nothing more. “I’m still mad at you.” Her body relaxed in his arms, responding to his touch and in a sense betraying her.

“I know,” he said.

She closed her eyes, wanting to give herself over to him. But she had to be strong. It was too soon to give in. She struggled to keep her arms at her sides, resisted running her fingers through his silky hair. “Who was on the phone?” she asked.

“Hmm?”

“Who was on the phone?” she mumbled as he kissed her stomach.

He hesitated, pulling away slightly, glancing up at her. “I don’t know. He just kept coughing. I couldn’t understand him.”

Becca scrambled out of Matt’s arms. “Coughing? Like someone-who-is-sick kind of coughing?” She yanked the cotton robe tight around her waist, her hand clutching the collar at her neck.

“Yeah. But it was probably just a wrong number.” Matt closed the bath towel around his waist. He still couldn’t look at her. He was purposefully avoiding meeting her eyes, but it didn’t matter because it was all over his face, the guilty look of a child who had done something wrong. Her head told her all of this, but her heart refused to listen.

“Was it a Pennsylvania number?”

“Yes,” Matt said. “How did you know? What’s going on?”

Becca’s cell phone went off. It was the clinic. The results of the ultrasound for Maggie, the three-year-old golden retriever she’d treated late yesterday afternoon, confirmed the dog had in fact swallowed a large portion of a tennis ball. She didn’t want to have to cut the dog and remove it from the gastrointestinal tract if it wasn’t absolutely necessary. Surgery was the last option; the belief was that no matter how minor the procedure, there was always a risk something could go wrong. Maggie had been Becca’s patient since she’d been a pup, and it pained Becca to see the dog in discomfort. She couldn’t put it off any longer. She had to get to the clinic.