“Well, it’s really terrifying that this is the kind of thing I might be dealing with on a regular basis. Hell, I was so annoyed, so freaking traumatized, I hung up on her. Maybe you wanted to speak to her, I don’t know.”
He waves it off. “Eh. It’s fine. You can say whatever you want to them if they call here spouting that shit.”
“Really?” I quirk a challenging brow. “A woman calls and practically offers to send a 3-D model of her vagina, just for your personal use, and you’re okay with me sending her away?”
“Trust me, if she’s that willing and ready, she won’t stop just because you told her off. And 4-D is the new technology. I’m sure her 3-D model is outrageously outdated.”
I shake my head, mystified. “Is it always like this for you?”
He shrugs again, the bastard.
“Never mind. I truly don’t want to know anymore,” I say and quickly change the subject. “You said something about faxing the Gordon contract?”
“Yes. It needs to go out this morning for review.”
“And where exactly will I find it and the information about where to send it?”
“In your email.”
“I have an email?”
He laughs and pulls me and my desk chair to the side so he can lean down and type on the computer. I watch as he pulls up the browser, clicks on to the firm’s personal server, and types in my apparent email.
RRockfordHawkinsLaw
He clicks the next box, the spot where I need to input my password and types again, but the letters are encrypted, and his fingers are moving too fast for me to see what he does.
“What was that password? You know, just so I know for future sign-ins…”
“Capital C, lower case a-p,” he begins to recite it, and I quickly grab a pen and jot it down on the notepad beside my computer. “Capital L, lower case o-v-e-r.”
I look down at the password etched on the notepad and roll my eyes when I see it actually spells something.
“CapLover,” I say simply, raising an eyebrow and leaning back in my chair with a tilt of my head. “Are you being serious with this?”
He chuckles and flits his eyes between me and the notepad like he’s completely clueless. “Oh, is that what that spells?”
“You know that’s what it spells.”
He shakes his head innocently. “I just threw some random letters together.”
“Right,” I say with a barked laugh. I can’t help it. He’s just ridiculous enough that it’s funny.
“Anyway, this is how I’ll send you pretty much everything. Just keep an eye on it throughout the day, and everything you need to do will be in there.”
I give a lame, double thumbs-up. “Got it.” He bites his lip—a very obvious attempt to keep himself from laughing at me.
Annoyed, I shove him out of the way with the chair and open the email about the Gordon contract. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have work to do. In fact, why don’t you go ahead and give me your lunch order so I don’t have to interrupt you later to get it.”
Cap’s smile is so big and brilliant, it’s almost blinding. “See? This is working out great. I don’t know what you were so worried about.”
I grab the notepad and pen, hand it to him, and prompt, “Lunch order,” instead of responding.
He smiles even harder, the charm he was telling Kline Brooks about damn near seeping out of his pores, it’s so potent.
I steel my nerves and turn back to my desk, determined to quiet the very startling thought that I could actually be enjoying Caplin Hawkins’s company.
God, what have I gotten myself into?
Cap
Ruby has been gone for an hour and a half when I finally decide to call it a night. Truth is, I thought about leaving when she did, just to have the chance to watch her squirm at having to be inside a confined space like the elevator with me for fourteen floors, but the workaholic in me won out.
Contracts don’t get done without me, cases don’t get won, and a minute and a half in the elevator isn’t going to make Ruby ready to sleep with me by tomorrow.
No, she’s a real challenge. A woman with virtue that has to be earned.
I haven’t encountered someone like her in a long time…or ever, if I’m being honest.
I’ve had women play fake hard to get, only to cave three hours later like a goddamn planned building implosion, and I’ve had plenty of women who weren’t hard to get at