My brows rose, and I grinned.
“Are you excited?” I asked.
She swallowed hard. “Yeah… and nervous. What if I lose?”
I pressed a kiss to the tip of her nose. “But what if you win?”Chapter 14Overworked and under fucked.
-Dax to Rowen
Dax
I looked at her face as she parked her car and immediately knew something was wrong.
Exiting out of my duplex, I marched down the length of the walkway that separated our two places and headed straight for her car.
As I got closer, it was only then that I could see her shoulders shaking.
Feeling something heavy lodge in my gut at the sight of her crying, I walked to her door and opened it.
She looked at me between the fingers that were covering her face.
I hunkered down so that I wasn’t leaning over her, then ran a single finger down the length of her jaw, catching a few stray tears.
Oh man.
Her sobs were making my stomach hurt.
“What’s wrong?” I rasped.
She sniffled, then leaned her head back and moaned.
“So I’m thinking that I’m a really bad person.”
I frowned at her words.
“What?” I asked.
There was no way in the world that I’d heard her correctly.
She brought her hands up and scrubbed her face roughly.
I leaned into the car and shut it off, then grabbed her purse from the seat next to her.
When I had the purse in my hand, I grabbed Rowen’s hand and helped her out of the car, too.
She moved like a sloth, but eventually I was able to coax her out of the car and into my apartment.
I sat her down at my bar, then rounded the counter to get her a drink.
“Beer, some wine that my sister bought two weeks ago and left, or lemonade?” I asked.
She looked at the fridge door and smiled.
“I like your magnets,” she murmured.
I closed the fridge door and rolled my eyes.
“My dad was here earlier,” I muttered as if that would explain the childishness that was displayed on the fridge door.
“I’m a bitch,” she snickered through her tears. “I’m honestly surprised that you had all the letters for that.”
I rolled my eyes and said, “Drink?”
“Beer now,” she answered. “Lemonade when I finish it.”
I nodded once and pulled both out, handing her the beer first but not before twisting the top off effortlessly.
“Guys always make that look so easy,” she said.
I shrugged. “I’ve been twisting those off since I was old enough to walk. I can’t tell you how excited and accomplished I felt the first time I was able to do it.”
“When was that?” she asked curiously, the tears slowly drying up.
I felt immense relief at the sight.
I didn’t like seeing her crying.
Not even a little bit.
“Ten or eleven, I guess.” I shrugged. “Wasn’t that impressive really. Harleigh was able to do it when she was six.”
Her lips twitched.
“So the magnets?” she pushed.
I shrugged.
“My sister got them for her kid the last time she was here,” I told her. “I’m not sure why they stayed when she left, but whatever. Everybody thinks it’s cute to put little sayings here and there.”
She got up and leaned over to start rearranging the letters along the bottom of the fridge.
I leaned back against the counter and watched her back.
“Want something to eat?” I asked.
She stood up straight then turned so that her back was covering what she’d just written.
“Did you hear about the case that we picked up pro bono?” she asked. “The one I mentioned I was trying last night?”
My attention immediately shifted from the fridge and what she’d spelled with the letter magnets to the expression on her face.
“The pro bono case where the woman was filing for custody of her children?” I asked. “And by the way, I love you, too.”
We both paused at her words. My heart, however, didn’t. It continued to rocket in my chest so fast that I was worried there for a second.
My gaze caught Rowen’s, and she licked her lips.
“I was cross-examining the man,” she continued, trying to finish her explanation. “Thinking that I had it in the bag. Then I asked him if he’d ever broken her leg.”
I waited, knowing that there was going to be more.
“He said, ‘fuck yeah I did. She was kicking the shit out of our child, and I stopped her by grabbing her ankle and yanking her away.’”
My mouth fell open in surprise.
“So this chick that I’ve been trying to win custody for over the last couple of hours forgot to tell me why she’d had custody revoked. I mean, we’d gone over the usual—her husband thinking she was an unfit mother because she was young—but she’d neglected to mention that there was more to the story.” She scrubbed at her face.
“I think I loved you from the moment you gave me the first hat,” she all of a sudden blurted out.
I took her change of topics like a champ.