Chapter 2
He jerks his hand back, drops it to his side. He wants to look around to see if anyone witnessed him getting rejected by Klara Martin, but he doesn’t. That would only make the whole thing more embarrassing.
He doesn’t need her to shake his hand, to introduce herself. He already knows who she is. After all, she is the reason he’s here. That doesn’t mean he’s willing to accept such overt repudiation.
He saw her at the last bar association event, but he didn’t speak to her then. He noticed her across the room—her delicate features and wide brown eyes, rimmed with luscious curtains of lashes, her chestnut hair falling, thick and shining, to the middle of her back.
She was petite, but not quite thin enough to be considered thin. She was cute more so than beautiful, yet she was the only person at the event who was cute—approaching pretty—and for that reason, she stood out.
He was struck by a piercing desire to know her—a desire too strong, too persistent to be explained away by her attractiveness alone. It was something more than that, and he’s felt it prodding at him ever since.
He observed her that night from a distance, watching her chat and drink her piss-like wine. Later, he checked the RSVP list from the event and searched for every female name on it until he found her profile on her law firm’s website.
Klara Martin. She was a personal injury attorney with the firm Barron then he saw her, felt her pull.
Two unrelated happenings that became inextricably linked solely because of their coincidental succession.
It had to mean something. He would make it mean something, anyway.
He had a problem, and there she was: his solution.
At last, he’s meeting her. Making contact. And she’s embarrassed him in front of his peers.
He rubs a hand through his hair. “Sorry,” he says, although he’s sorry for nothing. But he’s noticed that apologizing when you’re not at fault tends to stoke guilt in the other person. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”
It works.
She smiles. Tightly, but it’s there. “No, I’m sorry.” She still isn’t looking at him, like she’s afraid that if she does, she won’t be able to look away again.
“It’s just, you know…” He tucks his hands into his pockets, sheepish. “I was doing what I was supposed to do here—mingle, network… Get it over with.”
She snorts delicately. He’d not known that a snort could be delicate, but hers undeniably is. He feels his resolve renew and solidify.
“I mean, not that talking to you is a chore. Or maybe it is. I don’t know you, do I? I’m sure it’s not, though. These events are just always so painful. I mean, not that talking to you is painful.” He slips a hand from his pocket and rakes it through his hair again.
Actually, he enjoys networking events, but the fact that she does not is written across her face. Perhaps she’s shy. A wallflower. No wonder she’s still an associate—not yet a partner.
Then again, neither is he.
But he’s close. And now’s not the time to focus on that.
“I’m really fucking this up, aren’t I?” he continues, still sheepish, charming, twisting his face into an expression of concern and shame.
“Just a bit.” She smiles again, less tightly. He can already see her resolve unspooling before him, growing thin and malleable, just as his own is crystallizing into something firm and strong that will soon take hold of her as much as it has taken hold of him.
“Could we start this over? Unless you’d like to leave,” he adds. “I can’t say I’d blame you.”
She hesitates. A blink, then two. Fluidly, timidly, she stretches her hand toward him. He can see her horse-faced friend over her right shoulder. She watches them, brows raised. She moves away. Good girl.
He reaches out and envelops Klara’s hand, small and soft and fragile, within his own. It’s dry, her nails neat and unpainted—a lawyer’s hand. It’s a hand that spends its days turning pages of discovery documents and tapping at a keyboard or cell phone.
“I’m Klara,” she says.
I know, he thinks. He smiles down at her gratefully. “Troy. Troy Weston.”
“Nice to meet you.” Her words sound rote and empty. It won’t be that way for long.
Soon, she will mean it.
Soon, he will be everything.
“What do you practice, Klara?” he asks.
“I do PI work,” she replies. Personal injury work. He knows this already, of course. She takes a tiny sip of her white wine—a delicate sip. Everything she does is delicate.
“Plaintiffs’ work or defense?”
“Plaintiffs’,” she says. Nothing more, not reciprocating any of his small talk, but he doesn’t care.
“Ah,” he replies. “You’re one of the good ones, then.”
“‘Good’?” she asks. She blushes, barely—just the faintest pink creeping across her cheeks.
“Good,” he confirms. “Inherently good. I can tell.”
The blush freezes in its tracks. Fear and discomfort come to life in her eyes, which shift away from his own. He’s gone too far.
“Soulful work,” he clarifies. “Not like what I do.”
The bait is dangling, and he knows that if she bites, there’s still hope. If she doesn’t, he’s better off extricating himself and trying her another time. At the next event, or perhaps orchestrating a chance encounter, as much as it would pain him to walk away when he’s so close.
She does bite, in the form of another tiny and delicate action—a smile.
She hasn’t asked what sort of law he does, but he decides to tell her anyway. “I’m a commercial lawyer,” he says. “Transactional work. Ninety percent of it would put anyone to sleep.”
“But it pays well.” She takes another sip of wine.
Is that a dig or a compliment?
Her friend is back, a knowing smile on her lips.
Pretending he’s been bumped by someone behind him, he takes a step toward Klara, angling his body against hers so that if she glances over her shoulder, she won’t see her friend.
He can feel her warmth now. He can smell her, her scent of cleanliness.
Lemon. Olive oil. Natural, or like high-quality hand soap.
He wonders whether her firm also has a no-perfume policy.
Margaret, a real estate paralegal with an allegedly deathly allergy to sandalwood, is responsible for the perfume ban in his own office.
More than once, he’s thought of spritzing some on her desk after she’s gone for the day to prove that the allergy is exaggerated, if not fabricated entirely.
“Do you practice mostly here in Montgomery County?” he asks. He keeps the conversation hovering in the realm of professionalism, although he would very much like to steer it toward the personal.
“I practice all over the state. And in DC,” she says. Her lack of politeness, by not returning his questions, seems to have gotten to her, for she adds, almost grudgingly, “And you?”
“Our clients are all over,” he replies. “We can handle most transactions remotely.”
Someone behind him does jostle him then.
The room is too crowded; the bar association had clearly rented the smallest-possible space to accommodate the turnout.
Too small, in fact. It’s warm from all the bodies, and people are packed closely together, having to mutter excuse me to get to the bar, the bathrooms, the table where the food is being deposited, revealed, and served.
He had no warning, and he stumbles forward, toward Klara, then against her. He bumps into the hand that holds her plastic cup of wine, and she spills it down her front, the liquid soaking her ivory shell.
“Oh,” she says, looking down in surprise. He can see the lace of her bra beneath the damp, now-transparent fabric. She must notice it, too, because she quickly closes her tweed blazer around herself, buttoning the top to cover the spill.
“Klara,” he says, “I’m so sorry.”
“Not your fault,” she replies quickly.
“What can I do?” he asks. “Send me the dry-cleaning bill, of course.”
She’s already moving toward the door. He follows her.
“Don’t be silly,” she says over her shoulder. Her words, in her soft and youthful voice, are almost swallowed by the din of small talk and exaggerated laughter. “I’ll just throw it in the wash.”
She’s only being polite. The shirt is silk. Not suitable for the washing machine. It was white wine, but the fabric is still ruined.
“Are you leaving?” he asks, feeling ridiculous because that’s clearly what she’s doing.
She pauses in the doorway, turning toward him. “You’ve given me an excuse to get out of here,” she says. “And I’m taking it. I didn’t feel like being here anyway.”
“I’ll buy you a drink sometime,” he says. “To make up for it.” He sounds desperate. He is, but he hates to sound it.
“No need,” she says. She turns away again. “You’ve done me a favor. Nice to meet you.”
There’s a finality to those words. Nice to meet you. What she means is, Conversation over.
And just like that, she’s gone. Out of the rented room, into the restaurant, then onto the street beyond. He watches her go.
She didn’t even say goodbye to her friend or tell her she was leaving. She practically fled.
He stands in the doorway, not sure what to do. Follow her? Not to speak to her again, but just to watch her?
He can’t follow her, he decides. If she saw him, she would be furious. Or worse, scared.
He spins around and returns to the too-crowded room. On his way into its depths, he stops at the bar and orders a beer. The bartender passes him a bottle of something cheap. He sips it and grimaces.
He came here for one reason alone. He feels like he’s failed.
Perhaps he has. For now. But it won’t last. It never does. He will get there in time. In time, he always gets what he wants.
And what he wants is already so clear. It’s her. A life together—a suburban house, matching rings, routine, and comfort. Hers and his.