Chapter Eight
Scarlett
“I found a mistake in the transcript you filed yesterday,” Claire says.
I glance up sharply from my computer. It’s late morning and I’ve made it this far without a sharp remark from Claire. It’s practically a record. “What? I proofed those already.”
She slaps some papers down in front of me. There’s red pen circling a few things on the printed papers. She raises her eyebrows and looks at me with triumph in her eyes. “I keep telling you to print them. But you just won’t listen.”
I scowl, pick up the stack of papers, and look to see what she circled. I misspelled console and a couple of other minor things in a one-hundred-page document. This court case has been going on for a long time. I’m thrilled that it is nearly over. Claire has been especially awful lately, and she loves reviewing my work, scavenging for any little mistake she can bring to my attention.
“The good news is we are not at the spelling bee championships,” I reply sweetly. “And this case is closing today. These will simply get filed. ”
She grits her teeth. “How can you be okay with these kinds of mistakes?”
“I’m not okay with them. I would’ve preferred to have caught them before they were sent to the lawyers, but now that it’s all done, there’s no reason to go back and correct it. Both lawyers ended up with the copy that had the mistakes in it. They’re not going to ask me for a completely proofed copy, not when their cases are closing today.”
Claire taps a red nail on my desk in an annoyingly rhythmic beat. “I’ll just leave these here then, to remind you to do better next time.” She turns around and walks back to her desk.
I frown at the back of her blonde head, but when she turns to look at me, I just smile sweetly. I’m going to have to clean my house again tonight. Seems to be a recurring response to my interactions with Claire.
I glance at the clock. It’s almost noon, which means it’s almost my lunch break. I don’t have a court case this afternoon, so I’ll be able to just catch up on proofing this morning’s transcriptions.
For lunch, I’m going with one of the court clerks. I don’t know him well at all, but we’ve said hi in passing. He’s friendly and outgoing, and when he invited me to lunch this morning, he was open about saying he was going on a date with someone else tonight and wanted to know if I was okay with that.
Since I’m pretty much doing the same thing—dating a new guy every couple of days—I told him he should. We’re all just trying to find our person.
This is why I look forward to lunch with him: low-stress, low-stakes. We both already have dinner dates planned.
We walk down the street to the small delicatessen directly across from Station Seven. I want to turn and gawk at the huge fire station, but I’m also half scared I will see him looking back at me through one of the big windows.
I haven’t spoken to Wade since we got coffee earlier this week. It’s been a few days, and he hasn’t texted or randomly shown up at my house, so I think our talk went well. I appreciate that he cares about my safety. I’m not going to be ungrateful for that, but I do want him to just leave me alone.
With startling clarity, I realize Liam is telling me something about his summer plans and I’m not paying attention at all. The guy is a traveler, and I admire that in a man. He likes to see something new on every trip.
“I’m sorry. Where did you say you’re going?” I ask him.
“Oh, I didn’t. I was saying that I couldn’t decide. I have a friend who’s going to Barcelona, and I’ve never been. But then my brother is going to the Big Island in Hawaii. I’ve been to Oahu but never Hawaii. What do you think?”
He looks at me with a smile, and I realize Liam is cute. I’ve never really thought about it before. We often walk by each other on our way to our little office spaces and corners at work, and we smile and say hi, but that’s it. We haven’t really interacted. We just work in the same building and sit in the same courtrooms.
I turn back to look at the sidewalk so I don’t run into something or step into oncoming traffic. The large door on the fire station begins to roll up slowly. I don’t hear any sirens or horns, so I don’t think there’s a big emergency or anything.
“Here we are,” Liam says as we reach the delicatessen.
He walks up to the door and swings it open for me to go in first. We walk into the small sandwich shop, and it smells divine. Pretty sure there’s a panini somewhere in this restaurant with my name on it.
We sit down at a table right by the window because Liam says, “I don’t want to miss any action if the fire station is going to roll out all the trucks. I’ve loved fire engines since I was a little kid.”
I smile back at him because it’s such a wholesome, endearing thing. I already like him ten times better than Allen.
I stare at the big open door, and Liam glances over the menu. I should probably pick up a menu and pretend to look—as if I didn’t search the online menu an hour ago and decide what I was going to order.
“I just can’t decide,” Liam says. “Maybe I should just let them surprise me with something good.”
I look at him with wide eyes. “What kind of horror are you talking about?” I tease him.
His grin grows. “It’s a fun adventure! You never know what you’ll get. And usually, most of the servers are good sports about it.”
Movement out of the corner of my eye catches my attention, and I turn to see that there are a couple of firemen walking out onto the concrete in front of the fire station. I wonder who it is. I can’t quite tell because they’re walking backwards, pointing and gesturing at something—either in the building or on the door, it’s hard to see. They finally turn to each other, and I recognize that, yes, one of them is Wade.
I lean back in my chair and watch as they gesture wildly back and forth. It almost looks like they’re arguing. I kind of wish I could crack open the window to hear what they’re saying. The other guy throws his hands in the air and walks back into the garage.
Wade plants his hands on his hips and slowly turns to face the street. Hopefully, with the sun shining, he won’t be able to see who is sitting inside the restaurant directly across from him. It’s only a two-lane road, so it’s not like there’s a big distance between us, but if the light works in my favor, he won’t know I’m sitting here staring at him .
Liam sets his menu down and looks across the street to see what I’m looking at. “Oh, hey, I met that guy! He had to come in for a court case one time—some kind of arson thing. He seems like a good guy.”
And then Liam does the unthinkable. He knocks on the window—bangs, really—and waves really big at Wade. Wade’s eyes slowly focus on the window where we are, and his face breaks out. He waves back at Liam, and then I notice his eyes shift to me.
I’m worried he’ll walk across the street once he realizes it’s me.
Hopefully, he’ll keep his distance.
His big grin turns to a scowl when he sees me. I give him a little wave, and he just shakes his head slowly as if he’s disappointed in me. My chest tightens at his expression.
Thankfully, he doesn’t walk across the street. He turns around and heads back into the fire station. I let out a breath of relief.
Liam is more intuitive than I thought, because he looks at me and says, “You know him too, don’t you?”
No sense in lying. So I tell him, “Yeah, he and my brother are friends. That’s Wade Hendrix.”
“Oh, that’s great! I heard that a handful of the guys play racquetball a couple of times a week. He even invited me. I may just go one of these days.”
I look at Liam. He’s got a lean build compared to Wade’s filled-out frame, but Liam’s wiry. He seems like he could maybe hold his own with the guys.
My phone chimes.
I should just ignore it. But then again, it could be Claire telling me the courthouse is on fire and I should come save my secret stash of cereal in the lunchroom.
I reach into my purse and pull out my phone.
WADE
What’s your date’s name?
SCARLETT
I hope you realize this is one of your most asked questions.
He says you know him.
WADE
I recognize him, but I don’t know him.
SCARLETT
He says you invited him to racquetball.
WADE
I probably did. I invite lots of people. Now, what’s his name?
I tuck my phone back into my purse and pretend to pick up the menu and study it.
Liam and I have a good lunch together. He’s kind, funny, and good with people. And somehow, he knows everybody. He talks to five different people in the deli who recognize him.
I smile politely at each person who pauses to say hi.
“You haven’t even had a chance to eat your food yet,” I point out to him.
“I guess I’ve been too busy talking, haven’t I?” He glances down at his watch. “Dang it, where does the time go? It’s almost time to head back for work.”
I watch in amusement as he eats the entire sandwich in three bites. The most amazing part is that he eats it cleanly, too, with no trail of lettuce left behind. There’s no sign of the sandwich in about ten seconds.
“Thanks for coming out with me,” Liam says as he jumps up and takes the check from the server .
I reach for my purse to pay my half of the tab, but Liam waves me off. “No, I got this.”
He pays the bill, and we walk outside and head back toward the courthouse. Liam reaches over and brushes the back of his hand against mine and smiles shyly at me.
Dang it. He’s nice. And I like him. But I felt more sparks when Wade buckled my bike helmet.