Unlawful Attraction: The Complete Box Set: Alpha Billionaire Romance (29 page)

Her words hit me like a punch in the chest. I gripped the phone tighter as I sucked in a breath.

I couldn't have heard her right.

“Second chair?” I said softly. A few weeks ago, I would have been delighted. Now...shit.

“Yes.” Her blue eyes for hard as she stared at me. “Welcome to the big times, Dena. You're going to trial.”

Continues in Unlawful Attraction Vol. 4

Unlawful Attraction Vol. 4

Chapter 1

Dena

Welcome to the big times
, Bethany had said.

The big times could kiss my ass.

When my phone vibrated, signaling the arrival of yet
another
text, I closed my eyes. It wasn’t quite noon on a lazy, rainy Sunday and if life had been perfect, I could've maybe responded to one of those texts, asked him to come over. Maybe we could have taken the next step to see if whatever this was between us could be more.

But life wasn’t perfect.

Not even when I'd gotten the one thing I thought I wanted.

The autumn rain that had always seemed so comforting was now driving me crazy. I rubbed my hands over my arms. For some reason, I felt trapped inside my apartment. No matter how much I liked to go out, I'd never been the sort of person who got stir-crazy being in one place too long. At the moment, however, I was almost claustrophobic.

Staring out my window at the leaden gray skies, I made myself ignore my phone. Again. But every text, every call I didn't respond to, or that I let go to voicemail, made it that much harder to ignore the next one.

The sight of his name flashing on the screen was like a punch to the gut.

Not that Arik had said
anything or done anything to upset me. On the contrary, his texts ranged from teasing to tempting to sly, and despite my miserable outlook on everything at the moment, each one managed to make me smile.

The phone calls that rolled over to voice mail? The same. He left me smiling...right up until the third call. That one had been laced with a bit of an edge. Nothing rude or even close to hurtful, but I knew I was pushing him further and further away with each passing moment.

Not that I could blame him for being annoyed at me. Here I was dodging his calls, and just a few days ago, I’d been giving him grief because he’d asked for my number but hadn't called back. I hadn't even considered that he might've lost it. Now, he was doing what I'd wanted him to do, and I was leaving him hanging without a word of explanation.

I owed him that.

Except I didn't know what to say.

Things had changed?

Things had
really
changed.

And that was simplifying it to the
N
th degree.

Wandering back over to my desk, I looked at the case files Bethany had insisted I take home. She'd given me a snide
you need to get up to speed,
and it'd taken all my self-control not to point out that if she hadn’t kept me in the dark all this time, I wouldn’t have needed to get caught up.

But there hadn't been a point to saying any of it. She would've found a way to make it my fault and possibly take me back off the case. Dodge, blame, make excuses. It was her MO. Basically do everything except take responsibility for her own actions. She just wanted the win, no matter how she got there.

How in the hell she ended up a prosecutor, I wondered. She should have been an ambulance chaser. Not even a respectable defense attorney like Arik would stoop to the lengths I suspected Bethany had gone to ensure a victory. She was on par with those sleazy dickwads who used every trick in the book to get their own way.

Finally, I settled down on the couch with one of the files and my fourth cup of coffee. I already had notepads and pencils there from earlier. I'd gone through a couple things before needing to get up and stretch my legs. Now, it was time to focus on the report from the medical examiner.

Within just a few minutes of starting the report, I felt myself starting to get a headache. Considering this was supposed to be an open and shut case, the report from the ME was going to have the jury wondering what the hell was going on.

It sure as hell had me wondering.

I wasn't a medical examiner, and I didn't have a lot of experience reading these types of reports, but from where I sat, it cast plenty of doubt on Leayna Mance as the murderer.

Except I was supposed to help Bethany put Leayna behind bars.

If I'd seen this report earlier, I barely would've considered Leayna a suspect at all. Basically, just someone who needed to be talked to and then crossed off the list before we could get down to finding the real killer.

A killer who no one else seemed to be looking for.

I knew nothing I said would be listened to though, especially considering that a witness I wanted to talk to wasn't exactly around to interview about an alternate theory of the crime.

He was sort of, well, dead.

I’d called Dunne to see if he could help me track the guy down. It hadn't been too hard, as it turned out, because the guy had just been fished out of the river.

In pieces.

A couple of detectives were pissed about it, too, since it turned out he'd been a police informant. Dunne was supposed to let me know if it that investigation connected to my case at all. I wasn't holding my breath. Considering the cops had found fifty thousand in cash in the guy's apartment, finding that murderer wouldn't be pleasant.

I could already imagine what Bethany would say if I went to her with any of this. She'd probably theorize that Leayna Mance had paid the guy to kill Mr. Mance, even if I brought up the fact that the guy had been a possible witness to the late Mr. Mance having cheated on his wife. A tenacious prosecutor wasn't necessarily a bad thing, but one who got a theory in their head and never considered any other possibilities might go too far to protect what they thought of as the truth.

Bethany was definitely the latter.

It'd take a literal smoking gun to sway her opinion, and even then I wasn't sure she'd accept anything less than an actual recording of the crime, complete with authentication certification that the recording wasn't a fake. Maybe not even then...

My phone rang again, interrupting my thoughts. I glanced down at it, almost ready to answer it just so I could have one less thing to worry about. This wasn't really the sort of thing I wanted to discuss over the phone, but I couldn't keep avoiding him. And obsessing about it wasn't doing me any good either.

But it wasn't Arik.

Unknown number
flashed across the screen. I would’ve preferred to ignore it, but considering all of the weird shit going on in this case, I didn't want to miss anything important. It could've been Officer Dunne calling from a payphone. There might be a handful of those still left in the city I supposed.

I answered, keeping my voice flat. "Dena Monroe."

On the other end of the line, I heard open-air, but no response.

I noted the time and gave my name again. "This is Dena Monroe. Can I help you?"

The call ended.

Even as a divorce lawyer, I'd had my fair share of this sort of thing. Yeah, my personal number was unlisted, but it didn’t take much to track down a number these days.

It also could've been a wrong number. That did happen.

Still, an uneasy feeling tripped its way down my spine, and I set my phone down on the desk. I didn't have any proof, but my gut told me that the call was about this case, that things were definitely not as cut-and-dry as Bethany wanted to make them appear.

Outside, the rain continued to batter my window, and it didn't stop until around mid-afternoon. The cessation of the white noise didn't really help me focus though. A little while later, the sun teased me with a few rays of sunshine, and that was the only sign I needed to get out of the apartment for a while.

As soon as I stepped outside, I saw that I wasn’t the only one who'd been going stir crazy. The streets were already bustling, and my destination, the little Indian place on the corner, was packed by the time I got there. The hostess recognized me, giving me a quick smile and pointing to a single table in the corner. Tucking myself into the minuscule space, I had barely sat down when my phone buzzed.

It was Arik.

Again.

I didn't like it, but it was the perfect time to respond. I had an excuse not to answer in any way other than a text. It might've been cowardly of me, but I was okay with that at the moment.

Decision made, I started drafting my text. I was still working on it when the server came by with my usual tea. “Do you want your usual, Dena?”

“Yes.” I gave her a distracted smile, my attention on the man I was texting.

As she left, I looked back down at the message, wondering if this was the right thing. He’d told me, made me believe we could have something. Then this mess happened with the case.

Was it over before we even had a chance to figure things out?

I read it again.

Hi, Arik. Sorry I haven’t been able to answer your calls. I’m eating right now. Things with the case have gotten a bit complicated, keeping me busy.

We need to talk, but I won't be able to until later this week.

I deliberated a moment and then added,

Thinking of you.

I sent it, then put the phone in my purse, telling myself that I needed to put this out of my head so I could focus on work. We would talk later, once I'd had some time to get my priorities sorted out and had a plan in place.

***

Monday was about as far away from Friday as it could be. It dawned sunny and bright, the sun’s light trying to scorch my corneas, teasing the headache that had been nagging me on and off most of the weekend.

I didn’t want to be here at all, but there wasn’t anything to be done for it. I had to go to work.

I hadn’t heard from Arik since a text he'd sent Sunday evening saying that he'd get back to me when he had a time he could talk.

He needed to hurry the hell up.

On the other hand, I needed time to think through what I wanted to say, because I still had absolutely no idea. No idea what to do or say. No idea of what I even really wanted.

Distracted by my thoughts, I didn’t even notice the commotion going on outside my office door until I almost ran into one of the maintenance guys on my way in. One who seemed to be carrying things
out
of my office.

What the hell?

“What is this?” I demanded.

He glanced over his shoulder at me. “Cleaning this old place out.” He paused, squinting at me. “Are you Ms. Monroe?”

“Yes.” Planting one hand on my hip, I stared at him and tried to look intimidating. It was hard to look tough though when you stood five foot nothing, and had a skinny vanilla latte with a double shot of espresso in your hand, but I did my best. “You want to tell me why you're cleaning it out? It happens to be my office.”

A part of me hoped that Bethany had just decided to fire me. If she had...I hated the thrill of happiness that went through me. I should've been devastated that I lost the job I'd wanted my whole life.

Before I could get too excited though, the guy spoke again.

“You got a new office.” He pointed down the hall and rattled off a number. “Down there.”

My heart sank as I realized the office was right next to Pierce. It'd be bigger, but I really didn't want to be any closer to the man than I had to be.

“Okay.” I waved a hand at him. “Sorry about getting snippy. I was just surprised. Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me. Thank your boss.” He turned and ambled off, pushing a cart laden with boxes.

I stepped into my office and then looked back down the hall. “I’ll finish up in here, if it’s okay with you. Most of it’s my personal stuff.”

He glanced at me and shrugged as if to say it didn’t matter to him one way or the other. I ducked inside the tiny space I'd been using as an office and looked around. It looked like pretty much everything, save for the corkboard and a few other little odds and ends, had already been moved.

Blowing out a breath, I reached for the door behind me.

A hand shot out, and I didn’t have time to panic or even think.

Two seconds later, the door was shut and Arik Porter stood in front of me.

“Miss Monroe, I believe you wanted to talk.” His voice was calm, even professional.

“What’re you doing?” I demanded, gaping at him. “This is—”

That was all I managed to get out before his mouth slammed down over mine.

A hundred indignant questions and statements faded away, replaced by an insatiable, irrational sort of need clawing through me. Arik’s thigh pushed between mine, and the flirty, flippy skirt that I'd worn today was no barrier. He kept moving until his knee was pressed directly against me.

He tore his mouth away, nipping at my bottom lip. “Do you know how long it’s been since I had you wrapped around my dick, Dena?”

Things inside me twisted.