Bailed Out (The Anna Albertini Files #2) - Rebecca Zanetti Page 0,88

rent a place downtown—”

“Which takes money,” Clark said.

I sighed. “You need to be a dreamer.” It’d be fun to own our own business and only take the cases we wanted. “Just think about it.”

“I need to be a realist,” he said, pouring us more wine. “No offense, but your life is never calm.”

Who wanted a calm life? “Just think about it—okay? Albertini & Bunne.”

He tilted his head. “Bunne & Albertini.”

“I like it alphabetical,” I protested.

He sat back. “If we do it my way, our initials would be B.A. Just think of the badass logo.”

Oh, he had a point. Better yet, I had him thinking about it. “I’m sure our law degrees mean something, and a bank would give us a loan.” I tilted my head. “Other than that, I don’t have any assets.” My Fiat was awesome but probably not great collateral.

Clark tossed his paper napkin on his paper plate. “We don’t have the resources to start our own business. Maybe if we both got jobs and saved up for a few years we could create our own firm, but I don’t see it happening before that.” He paused. “I’m also not sure I’d want to start my own firm.”

I’d never considered it before, either. My goal had been to seek justice, and maybe I’d have to do that case by case instead of by putting bad guys away.

Clark cleared his throat. “I need to take a run at Aiden. Without you there.”

“Fine by me,” I said. Both Aiden and Clark could handle themselves, and it’d be good to get me and my emotions out of the way. I trusted Aiden, but that didn’t mean he’d told me everything so far, and I knew it. In fact, I expressly knew that he hadn’t told me everything.

My phone buzzed and I glanced down to see the caller. “Hi, Kelsey,” I’d answered. Both she and her sister had given me their contact info since we seemed to be on the same side now.

“Anna? We have a problem.” Kelsey sounded like she was crying. “Can you come to my house?”

I looked at Clark. “What kind of problem?”

“You’ll see. It’s just Krissy and me here.” She hung up.

“I have to go,” I said.

Clark shook his head. “When somebody calls you after dinner and asks you to come over, it’s a bad idea. See why I don’t want to be your partner?”

“Yes,” I said honestly. However, I was really warming to the idea of starting my own firm, and Clark and I complimented each other. I gave him Aiden’s contact information. “Good luck. I hope you get him to open up.”

My Lady Smith & Wesson was tucked in my overlarge handbag as I knocked on Kelsey’s door. I might be big-hearted, but I wasn’t a moron.

Kelsey opened the door, and her eyes were as red as her nose. “Come in.” She sniffled and ushered me inside the cute living area.

Krissy sat on the sofa with a bag of frozen peas against her right cheek and eye. Her lip was swollen, and her hair crazily messed up. “I’m sorry Kelsey called you, Anna.”

“She’s our attorney,” Kelsey said, going to sit on the sofa and take her sister’s hand. Her sister’s bruised hand—most likely a defensive wound. There were more bruises along her neck and down the arm that I could see, and maybe some of the hair from her temple had been pulled out?

My ears heated, and my lungs flared even hotter. “Did Pucci do this?” I set my purse down and moved toward her for a better look.

She nodded wearily and then winced before rubbing her neck. “We got into a fight. It was just as much my fault as his.”

Somehow I doubted that. “Listen. We have to call the police on this.”

Kelsey looked toward her sister.

Krissy shook her head. “No. I hit him, as well. They’d have to arrest us both, and we have too much going on. I wouldn’t press charges, anyway.”

Kelsey cuddled closer to her sister. “Maybe I shouldn’t have called. Are you required to notify the police, Anna?”

Man, I wished I were required by law to notify the authorities. “No. I have to notify the police if I know of a crime being committed right now or one that’s going to be committed in the future.” Although, if Pucci had hit her once, he’d hit her again, so theoretically I believed there was a crime coming. But that didn’t quite fit the requirements. “Although my professional advice to you is to