Courtney: Present Day

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ONE OF MY FAVORITE law professors once told me that the worst thing a lawyer can do is hold a grudge. She said the inability to let go of something in your past would always affect the arguments in your present, and that no lawyer “worth a damn” had enough time in the world to practice and focus on the past at the same time.

Even though I committed every other lesson that this professor taught to heart, that was the one piece I always ignored. Through my years in law school, whenever I was forced to work on a mock case that involved a dispute between two lovers, I always sided with the one I related to the most. The one who was stupid enough to believe in love and was burned with reality when it was time to face it.

I was bitter and immature then, still secretly holding contempt for a guy I never mentioned aloud to anyone else. But now, I was starting to see what that law professor meant, and over the past couple weeks, I was certain I’d become a much better lawyer.

Ever since we had sex after the business trip, Jace and I were spending our overtime hours in each other’s apartments. During the week, he invited me over after work. While he cooked and committed some of his most compelling arguments to memory, I pored over more research and made calls to our clients. On weekends, he knocked on my door with breakfast and we sat in my living room—side by side, working until the sun set.

Occasionally, he’d look over at me with his stunning blue eyes and I’d find myself in his arms and on my back for an afternoon quickie, but we tried to keep most of our attention on the looming case ahead.

And in moments like tonight, when I was sitting in his lap as we both read separate documents, I really just wanted to let everything from before go. I didn’t want us to have to sit through a conversation “after the trial” about all the things that’d gone wrong. I wanted us to keep doing this, this thing that still—ten years later, felt so right.

Uncapping my highlighter, I marked a passage in bright pink. I was in the middle of highlighting another one, when the front door to my apartment opened.

What the?

I waited to see if the landlord was making a random appearance, but it was Mila.

“Good evening, Court,” she said, shutting the door behind her. “Hey, Jace. Again, for like, the umpteenth day in a row.”

He laughed. “Hello, Mila.”

“Am I interrupting sex?”

“Does it look like you’re interrupting sex?” I tossed a pencil at her, laughing. “What do you want? And why do you have a key to my apartment?”

“I have a key because up until a few months ago, I was your only friend.” She glanced at Jace and playfully rolled her eyes. “I’m here because the cable in my apartment keeps freezing. I need to watch my show tonight since it’s running without commercials on the fashion network.”

I blinked. “Come again? What show?”

“The Victoria Secret Fashion Show,” Jace said, standing to his feet. “You were in it this year, correct?”

“I was.” She smiled. “Me and Court usually watch it together, but I’m giving her a pass this year since she’s working on a case that seems like a pretty big deal.”

“It is a pretty big deal,” Jace said, pulling his keys out of his pocket. “You can use my apartment to watch your show. I can’t focus if the television is on, so I figure it’s more than fair.”

“Thank you so much!” She took his keys and walked to the door. Then she whispered to me, “He’s a keeper...Fuck him tonight, for me.”

“He can hear you just like I can, Mila,” I said.

“Oh.” She blushed, laughing. “Well, I still mean it.” She left out of my apartment as fast as she came in.

“Do you have a transcript of the Robinsons’ television interview from 1999?”

“I do.” I flipped through my binder and handed it to him. “The part you’re looking for is highlighted.”

“Do we have all the Masons’ medical bills?”

“In the folder to your left.”

“Okay, and what about the deposition from the Bryson versus Graham case? Do you have the transcript of that for me?”

I flipped through the files to my right. Then I flipped through the files to my left.

Shit... “I left all of last week’s research back at the firm. I knew I was missing something when I left today.”

“Okay.” He sighed and pulled out his car keys. “We need that, so let’s go back and get it.”

“No. You stay here and work on your opening statement. You said you wanted to have it perfected by next week.”

“It’ll only take me twenty minutes to drive you there and back.”

“I’ve seen you drive when you’re focused on something else.” I shook my head and took the keys from him. “We’ll probably end up in Jersey with you at the wheel. I’ll be right back.” I grabbed my coat and my purse before he could say anything else and I rushed toward the elevator.

The second I made it to the parking garage, my phone buzzed with a text message from him.

JACE: Thank you. Be careful.

I made it to the firm in record time, enjoying the feel of Jace’s Jaguar every mile of the way. When I arrived at my office, I scooped up the file box I needed and noticed there was a pink envelope on my desk.

Opening it, I made my way downstairs as I read the neat, cursive handwriting:

Dear Courtney,

I still fucking love you.

Jace

PS—Do you by any chance remember the last lines you wrote in my senior yearbook?

PSS—We can discuss our past until we’re blue in the face “after the trial,” but I just want you to know I’ll fucking love you no matter what

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I READ OVER HIS WORDS repeatedly as I walked out of the firm, laughing at his bluntness. I felt like we were on the same page when it came to wanting things to stay how they were now, and I felt like I was floating. My stilettos felt as if they were carrying me on air, and then I suddenly stopped mid-thought.

What the hell?

My box slipped from my hands and hit the ice first, and then my back made a sickening splat noise as it hit the railing.

I wasn’t floating.

I was falling.

Literally.