“No...” I looked through my notes.

“Then I’m sure the prosecution will convince the jury that he carried that gun into the bank with the intent to harm someone other than himself. Take whatever deal they offer.”

“Well, I...” I looked at what the assignment sheet said. “What if I already rejected that deal?”

He sighed. “Call the prosecution and try to get it back. If they say no, plead no contest.”

“No contest? Are you out of your mind?”

“Are you? What type of corporate lawyer agrees to take an open and shut criminal case? A fairly inexperienced one at that...”

“For your information, it’s an assign—” I coughed. “Never mind. Telling me to plead no contest is pretty much the same thing as telling me to plead guilty.”

“If that was the case, I would have said plead guilty.” He sounded annoyed. “No contest is your client’s best option, and any real lawyer would know that. Are you sure you passed the bar exam?”

“I wouldn’t have been invited to join LawyerChat if I hadn’t, would I?” I felt my heart ache with that lie. “I’m just trying to avoid my client being sentenced to prison.”

“Then you really should stick to corporate law.” There was a smile in his voice. “Your client is going to prison and there’s nothing you can do about it. The only negotiable thing about his case is how long he’ll spend there. Anything else I can help you with? Do I need to lecture you on the difference between guilty and not guilty?”

I rolled my eyes and put the file away. “Thank you for your condescending help as always.”

“My pleasure,” he said. “I need to ask you something important.”

“About my case?”

“No.” He let out a low laugh. “What do you look like?”

“What?” I could barely hear my voice. “What did you say?”

“You heard me. Since I may never get a chance to see you, I’d like to know. What do you look like?”

I stood up and walked over to my mirror, letting my eyes roam over my reflection. “I’m not sure how I’m supposed to answer that...” I needed to change the subject, fast. From everything he’d told me about his dates over the past few months, he definitely had a type he liked best, a type that intrigued him like no other: Blonde, slightly curvy, full lips...

Me.

I’d tried to envision what he looked like plenty of times. Dark haired, maybe? Dirty blond? A mouth made for kissing with deep green eyes? Six pack, no, eight pack that leads down to a lick-able V?

He does mention working out every day...

I was more than certain that he was attractive—he had to be if so many women put up with him on those dating sites, but each time my mind drew a picture, I’d convince myself that I had him all wrong.

“You know what?” I said, snapping out of my thoughts. “I’ve never been good at describing things. What do you look like?”

“I look like a man who wants to f**k you.”

Tingles ran up and down my spine. “That’s not a description...”

“What color is your hair?” He didn’t sound amused, and I knew he wasn’t going to let me direct the conversation tonight.

“Red.” I yanked the band from around my bun and let the blond strands fall to my shoulders.

“How long is it?”

“It’s short...”

“Hmmm. What about your eyes?”

I stared at my blue and grey irises. “Green, light green.”

“Do you have freckles?”

“No.” At least that part was true.

“And your lips?”

“You want to know how thin or thick they are?”

“I want to know how they’d look wrapped around my cock.”

I gasped.

“Are you playing shy tonight?” Ice cubes clinked against a glass in his background. “How much of my c**k do you think you could take into your mouth?”

I remained silent, and my breathing began to slow.

“Alyssa?” His voice was soft. “Are you going to answer me?”

“It’s hard to make a prediction about something you’ve never done.” I heard him inhale a deep breath, and the line went completely silent.

I thought he’d ask me how I’d managed to have sex with boyfriends in the past without ever giving a blowjob, but he didn’t.

“Hmmm. Are you a natural redhead?”

“What does it matter?” I moved over to my bed. “I’m clearly not your type.”

“I have a preference, not a type, and a smart mouthed redhead who’s never had another man’s c**k in her mouth is more than worthy of an exception.”

I hooked a thumb underneath my panties and peeled them off before slipping under the sheets. “Too bad I’m not a full blown virgin, huh?”

“I don’t f**k virgins.” He paused. “But considering the fact that you and I have never f**ked, you might as well be one.”

Wetness slipped down my thighs, and I felt my ni**les hardening. “I highly doubt—”

“I’m tired of only being able to talk to you on the phone, Alyssa...”

Silence.

“I need to see you...” His voice was strained. “I need to f**k you...”

“Thoreau...”

“No, listen to me.” His tone was a warning. “I need to be buried deep inside of you, feeling your pu**y throb around my c**k as you scream my name—my real name.”

A hand trailed down past my stomach and between my thighs, and my fingers began to strum my clit. Slow at first, then faster, faster with every sound of his heavy breaths in my ear.

“I’ve been very patient with you...” His voice trailed off. “Don’t you think?”

“No...”

“I have,” he said. “I’m tired of imagining how wet your pu**y can get, how loudly you’ll scream when I suck your tits as you ride me...How hard I’ll pull your hair when I bend you over my desk and f**k you until you can’t breathe...Tired.”

I shut my eyes, letting my other hand squeeze my breast, letting my thumb pinch my nipple.

“I’m giving you two weeks to come to your f**king senses...”

“What?”

“Two weeks,” he whispered. “That’s when you and I are going to meet face to face, and I’m going to claim every inch of you.”

“I can’t...I can’t agree to...that.”

“You will.” His breathing was now in sync with mine. “And the second you do, you’re going to invite me over and I’m going to remind you of everything you’ve teased me with over the past six months.”

I was speechless. My clit was swelling with each rub of my finger, and my breaths were getting shorter and shorter.

“I’ll be gentle at first,” he whispered, “especially when I slide my c**k into your mouth and pull on your hair, showing you exactly how I like it to be sucked.”

“Stop...” I was panting. “Please...Stop...”

“Trust me, I won’t.”

“Thoreau...” My legs were trembling.

“I can’t just talk to you anymore. I need to feel you, I need to taste you. Say yes to two weeks...”

I bit my lip, knowing that if he said it again, if he asked me one more time, I would say yes.

“Alyssa...” He was begging.

I was seconds away from coming, seconds away from screaming “Yes! Yes! Yes!”

“Promise me you’ll let me f**k you in two weeks...”

As if my mouth was under his command, it freed my bottom lip and prepared to say yes, but I hung up.

Keeping my eyes shut, I lay in bed and let the waves of an orgasm roll through me as I screamed the three yeses he couldn’t hear. When I finally stopped shaking, I rolled over and grabbed a pillow, pulling it to my chest.

Before I could force myself to sleep, I heard my phone ringing beneath me.

It was a text from Thoreau. “I’ll take that as a yes. Fourteen days.”

Burden of Proof (n.):

The obligation to prove or disprove a disputed fact.

Andrew

“Did I tell you that I landed the leading role for that ballet I auditioned for?” Alyssa said to me the next morning.

I’d been talking to her since I arrived at work, but I’d made no mention of the fact that she’d hung up in my face last night; I was going to punish her for that later. Severely.

Thirteen days...

“Did I tell you about it?” she asked again.

“No, and if you’re not going to tell me when and where the show is, then I don’t care.”

“Oh, wow.” She laughed. “You’re mad about last night, aren’t you?”

“Furious.”

“Because I hung up?”

“Because I know you screamed yes when you came, and you hung up because you didn’t want me to hear it.”

She was silent, and I was about to say something else, but Jessica suddenly stepped into my office, smiling at me.

“Hold on one second.” I put my phone against my chest. “Yes, Jessica?”

“The final interviews are going to start in twenty minutes. They need you in the conference room now.”

“I’ll get there when I get there.” I acted as if the kiss she was now blowing me wasn’t happening, and waited until she closed the door. “I’ll have to call you back later, Alyssa. I have a meeting.”

“Must be bad timing for both of us. I have a meeting, too.”

“Your doomed gunshot client?”

“No, something much worse. An intern interview.”

“Must be in the air then.” I sighed as I slipped into my jacket. “I have to sit through a few of them myself, unfortunately.”

“Any advice you want to share?”

“Try to look like you’re actually paying attention while they answer the questions, and make sure your cell phone is fully charged so you can get on the internet.”

“Not for me.” She laughed. “For the interns. Something I should say if one of them is nervous.”

“Oh.” I shrugged. “Tell them my motto.”

“And what motto would that be?”

“It is what it is.”

“Why do I ever ask you anything?”

“Because I always tell you the truth.” I hung up.

“Mr. Hamilton?” Jessica stepped into my office again. “They want you to look over the files before they begin.”

“I’m right behind you.” I followed her into the conference room, where Will Greenwood and George Bach were waiting, and I sat next to them.

“Good to see you out of your office today, Andrew.” Will laughed.

“Yeah,” George added. “Thank you for bestowing your presence upon us this afternoon. We know how much you love being sociable.”

I rolled my eyes. “Why do the three of us need to conduct intern interviews? What’s the purpose of having an HR department if the partners do their job for them?”

“This is a family, Andrew.” Mr. Greenwood spoke sternly. “Whether it’s an intern, the secretary, or the young man who stays overnight and cleans this office, I want everyone to feel like they’re a part of a huge family. Don’t you?”

“I’m not answering that,” I said. “How many are we picking this year?”

“Not too many.” Will slid me a folder. “We have our top five picks. We just need to narrow it down to three. Two from law school, one from pre-law. We’ll add two more next semester.”

“Hmmm.” I pulled out the applications and pretended to pay attention as the two of them went over each applicant’s achievements.