The Wedding Pact Box Set - Denise Grover Swank Page 0,169

stood. “What are good assistants for?”

“You’re coming tomorrow night, aren’t you?”

Melissa looked surprised. “Sure, I can come and make sure everything goes okay if you want.”

“No. Not for work. As my friend.”

“Oh.” Her eyes widened as she stared at Blair.

Blair shook her head. What had she been thinking? A few moments of sharing her emotions and she’d presumed their relationship was more than professional. What if Melissa asked for a transfer now? Especially knowing she might be out of a job next week. “I’m sorry. You don’t have to—”

A wide smile spread across Melissa’s face. “I’d love to come. Thank you for asking.”

Blair’s face started to heat up. “Well, I’d give you the details, but it turns out that you know them.”

She laughed. “Sure enough.” She walked to the door and started to open it before turning around, her hand on the knob. “Thanks, Blair.”

Blair’s eyes met hers. “Thank you.” Then she remembered something else. “Oh, can you get me a stack of dollar bills by the end of the day? At least twenty . . . no, better make it forty.”

Melissa’s eyebrows rose in amusement. “Planning a racy bachelorette party?”

“Hardly,” she grumbled. “A tight-ass wedding shower.”

As Melissa walked out of the office, Blair wondered if there were enough bills in circulation to help get her through this weekend.

Chapter Nine

Garrett longed to loosen his tie, but to do so would be, one, unprofessional, and two, it would give Blair the satisfaction of knowing she was getting to him. Not that she didn’t already know. The smirk on her face when she shot glances at him between questions was proof enough of that. But he felt like he was choking. He was choking all right—on embarrassment.

He kept reminding himself that Brian Norfolk wasn’t really his client. That he hadn’t been the one to prep Amanda Beasley for the deposition. But even though Lopez had done a shitty job—so much so that he wished he had the authority to fly back to San Diego and demand his resignation—there was no denying that it was a crap case. If Rowena Norfolk’s attorney had been content to just go through the motions, it would have gone smoother, but Blair Myers Hansen didn’t understand the concept of going through the motions. She was smart, articulate, and ruthless. It didn’t hurt that there wasn’t an attorney alive who could make Lopez’s client look like a saint. Under the circumstances, Garrett was semi-holding his own, but Blair was a barracuda.

Back when they were together, he’d loved to get her riled up. Her eyes always lit up with a righteous fire when she was in the middle of an argument. But their arguments had mostly been over politics and current events—topics they had enjoyed debating. Afterwards, they would laugh together and then take the same passion they’d harnessed for their disagreement to their bed. He hadn’t lied to her when he said she was in the top five of the best lays he’d ever had, but he hadn’t told her the truth either. No one else had even come close.

“Mr. Norfolk,” Blair said, her voice sounding like honey off the comb, but only a fool would fall for it. Garrett was sure her beauty had helped lure Norfolk into complacency. She wore a gray dress today that clung to her curves. Her hair was up again, and she had on a pair of three-inch black patent leather heels. She flipped through the papers in front of her before glancing up at him with those wide blue eyes. “These numbers just aren’t adding up.”

Brian Norfolk gave her a shit-eating grin. “Maybe numbers just aren’t your thing, sweetheart.”

The look she gave him would make most men tuck tail and run. But Brian Norfolk was an arrogant fool. Garrett couldn’t stand the man. He was a fifty-seven-year-old screenwriter who’d experienced only moderate success until four years ago, when one of his movies suddenly became a blockbuster. The money had gone to his head, and while he’d fooled around on his wife more than once over their twenty-year marriage, he’d decided it was finally time to upgrade. But he’d tried out quite a few women before settling on the woman who was currently living in his San Diego condo, waiting to get her hands on his money. Consequently, he was trying to bilk his wife in every conceivable way. Knowing Blair, she’d sink her teeth into this man like a dog with a bone, and while Garrett would love nothing more than