Suddenly One Summer (FBI/US Attorney #6)(78)

You asked for this, girlfriend.

Ah, good. She and her sassy subconscious were on speaking terms again. Seemingly miffed about the fight with Ford, the pesky voice had been giving her the cold shoulder all week.

But for once, her sassy subconscious was right—she had asked for this. And she still wanted this, she just . . . hadn’t expected to feel so off her game afterward.

Obviously, she simply needed to get back to her routine. She had no doubt that this lingering ennui or whatever would dissipate in a few days, so until then, she would keep marching ahead, doing her thing.

So when Will walked into her office a few minutes later to let her know that her eleven thirty appointment had arrived—the very contentious, snide, and argumentative opposing counsel who’d once called her a “ballbuster” in open court—she smiled and mentally cracked her knuckles in anticipation.

“Send him in.”

* * *

THAT EVENING, FORD nursed a beer at Estelle’s, a neighborhood dive bar. He sat at a high-top, staring up at the small TV above the bar that was playing Vanilla Sky and only half listening to Charlie and Tucker’s latest erudite debate—the animal they’d least like to encounter in the wild: shark, bear, or lion.

“What kind of shark are we talking about?” Charlie asked.

“Great white,” Tucker said.

“How about the bear? Brown or grizzly?”

“Doesn’t matter. Grizzly.”

Charlie considered this. “I gotta say lion.”

“You’d rather face a great white shark than a lion?” Tucker scoffed. “Fuck that. Man is helpless in the water against one of those things.”

“Yeah, but of the three, sharks and bears don’t want to eat you,” Charlie countered. “A lion would.”

Tucker waved this off. “Lions are lazy. And males don’t do the hunting, anyway. If he’s just eaten, I bet you could walk by while he’s chilling and he’d be all, ‘Sup, dude. Got some impala leftovers under that acacia tree if you want them.’”

Ford shook his head, taking another sip of his beer.

“Who said it had to be a male lion?” Charlie asked.

“Um, I did. ’Cause if I meant female, I would’ve said ‘lioness.’”

“What are you, f*cking National Geographic? Who says ‘lioness’?” Charlie turned to Ford. “What about you? What animal would you least want to face off against in the wild: bear, lion, or shark?”

“Crocodile.”

“Crocodile. Another contender emerges.” Tucker flagged down the waitress. “I’ll get this round.” He looked at Ford’s beer, only half-empty, and grinned. “You pacing yourself? Got a hot date with my future wife after this?”

Ford gave him a look. “Actually, your future wife and I aren’t seeing each other anymore.”

Tucker’s mouth fell open. “What? When did this happen?”

“Dude, she was just at your barbecue six days ago,” Charlie said. “How’d you manage to screw things up since then?”

Tucker hit him in the arm. “Nice, Charles. Real sensitive.”

Charlie glared back. “Like you know what to say, either.” He pointed to Ford. “Brooke always handles the sensitive stuff.”

“True.” Tucker eyed Ford for a moment, then leaned over and whispered to Charlie, “Maybe we should text her. He looks a little . . . broody.”

For chrissakes. “No one is texting Brooke,” Ford said. “For one thing, she’s out of town for work, and for another thing, I’m not broody.” Seeing Charlie’s and Tucker’s skeptical looks, he felt the need to continue. “Come on. I always knew it wasn’t going to be a long-term thing with Victoria. She said she needed space, so we agreed not to see each other anymore. It’s not a big deal.” Granted, that was the whitewashed version of last Monday’s events, but he saw no reason to share the details of Victoria’s panic attack—nor the argument afterward—with Charlie and Tucker.

Besides, as he’d come to realize these last few days, it was probably a good thing that he and Victoria were no longer hooking up. Things between them had been starting to feel a little . . . real. And he didn’t want real. He’d just been caught off guard on Monday, not having expected her to end things so suddenly.

But that was neither here nor there now.

“So you’re cool with this?” Charlie asked.

“Definitely cool,” Ford assured him.

Tucker raised his beer glass. “Dude. You’re back.”

Pfft. Ford raised his glass and grinned. “Who said I ever went away?”

He finished his beer, joking around with Charlie and Tucker and having a good time. His friends found some women to talk to—of course they did—and just as Ford was debating whether to order a second drink, out of the corner of his eye he caught a flash of a long, chestnut-brown ponytail.

Immediately, he turned . . . and saw that it was a woman in her mid-twenties. She caught him looking and walked over with a smile.

“Sorry,” Ford told her. “I thought you were someone else.”

“Oh.” Pretty, and with legs that went on for days in her short skirt, she pointed to his empty glass. “Well, how about I buy you a drink while you’re waiting for your someone else to show up?”