it to Mark to take care of…” Something clicked in Ben’s head. “Wait, how do you know about the e-mail?”
She bit her bottom lip but stayed quiet.
That couldn’t be a good sign. “You were on my computer?”
He knew the answer but wanted her to own up to the misdemeanor. Maybe apologize.
“I was checking for e-mail threats.” She scribbled down something on the lined paper. “Get used to it.”
She sure didn’t sound sorry to him. “You were violating my privacy.”
“We can call it whatever you want.”
“How about illegal? I could have you arrested.”
Callie snorted. “Oh, please.” She made the annoying sound a second time as if trying to prove her point.
It was hard to threaten someone who refused to be afraid. “Which reminds me, how did you get in the office this morning?” he asked.
She reached inside her blazer pocket and flashed a courthouse I.D. badge at him. “I also have a key to the suite and my own desk.”
Ben followed her head nod to the small setup perpendicular from his under the window. How in the hell had he missed that? Instead of a two-shelf small bookcase filled with mementos from his pre-lawyer days there was a place for her complete with fake files and a black briefcase he’d bet was empty.
“I don’t think so,” he said.
“You don’t get a vote.”
She needed to understand how this arrangement was going to work. Her pushy demanding act was not the right answer. “The governor who appointed me and the electorate that keeps me here would disagree.”
She rolled her eyes. Made quite the dramatic scene of it, too. “Must you talk like that?”
“Like what?”
“All hoity and superior.”
He tried to remember the last time someone fought him this hard and showed so little respect for his position. He came up with an answer fast: never. “Was it the word ‘electorate’ that upset you?”
She threw her notebook on his desk. “To be honest, most everything you say annoys me.”
He was starting to see why she no longer had a job with the FBI. That mouth could not have been an asset in a rule-oriented, follow-the-chain-of-command government agency. “Right back at you, sweetheart.”
“Tell me something. Is your problem with me or with women in general?”
Definitely with her. “I happen to love women.”
“So I’ve heard.”
The playboy chatter echoed in his head. Not exactly the reputation he wanted or sought. “If you’re getting your information from gossip, then you have the facts wrong.”
“Why don’t we get started and you tell me what the truth really is?”
“Isn’t it your job to know this stuff already?”
She shrugged. “I’d like to hear it from you.”
“I’m not playing that game.”
“This is serious.”
“It’s a waste of time, but if we’re being forced to do this you first need to meet the rest of the group.” He glanced over the daily schedule his secretary Elaine printed out and placed on the corner of his desk each night. “Then you get to sit through my trial calendar.”
“Meaning?”
“If you survive the first day, I’ll be stunned.”
She smiled, but it faded when he didn’t reciprocate. “How bad can it be?”
“Spoken like someone who never had the pleasure of listening to lawyers whine about missing documents for hours on end.”
“What?”
“Have you ever been shot at?”
Her brown eyes narrowed. “Uh, yeah.”
Interesting. “You’ll hope for an outbreak of gunfire by the time lunch rolls around.”
Callie didn’t even make it to eleven o’clock. By ten seventeen, just over an hour into something called the Motions Docket, she almost did a face-plant into the desk in front of her. Sitting at the front of the room and five feet from Ben stopped her, but only barely.
Thanks to the stack of agreements and waivers she signed that morning for Mark, she’d likely be arrested if she even tried to close her eyes. As it was, she only got to keep her weapon strapped to her side after engaging in United Nations-style negotiations with the county sheriff, the man in charge of providing protection for the courthouse. He insisted the gun-carrying activity be limited to his men despite the clearances Mark had secured. She threw around Judge Samson’s name and won the argument. It paid to know people in power, or at least pretend you did.
But there was an even bigger problem with her dozing-off plan. With Ben looming above her on the raised dais he’d probably miss a quick nap, but everyone else could see her just fine.
Lawyers dressed in indistinguishable dark suits lined the pews at the back half of the room facing her. Ben had introduced Callie at the beginning of the docket only as his new assistant. A few of the older gentlemen exchanged questioning looks, but no one said a word. Good thing or she might have been tempted to draw her gun. Would have added some excitement to the otherwise headache-inducing boredom of the rest of the morning.
But nothing so interesting had happened during the last hour. As Ben had called case numbers, groups of attorneys filed up to stand at two long tables in front of Ben to argue about damn near everything. Through it all the blasting air-conditioning helped her stay awake, but the steady hum of the lights and recording equipment kept lulling her back into dreamland. She lost count of the number of missing documents and destroyed documents referenced. The entire process made her rethink the benefits of being employed.
Ben did provide some entertainment. Sure wasn’t a hardship to stare at him, either. He asked questions and broke up childish arguments between lawyers who should have known better. And the way he took notes suggested he was engaged in the circus around him. Callie had no idea how he did this part of his job. Being in charge of a big courtroom with its soaring ceilings and historic paintings probably had to appeal to a guy who liked to be in control, but this dry stuff lacked the sexiness of television courtroom scenes.
“We’ll take a ten-minute recess.” Ben banged the gavel and reached for the top file on his stack.
Then nothing.
The room grew quiet. No one moved, but everyone looked at her. It took her a few seconds to remember her one required line in this whole dreary scene. “All rise.”
Ben smiled as he passed by her and whispered low enough not to be picked up by the microphones surrounding them. “Little slow there, Ms. Robbins.”
“I think I lapsed into a temporary coma.”
“Won’t be the last time.” Ben opened the door behind the bench and walked down the short hallway connecting the courtroom to his private office.
They made it to the threshold before Ben’s law clerk, Rod Banks, appeared out of nowhere. Rod had a clean-cut conservative look about him with his oxford shirt and pressed dress pants. The kind of kid you’d feel comfortable opening your front door to if he rang the bell. Someone you half expected to be selling Bibles.
Callie didn’t like him at all. She was pretty sure the feeling was mutual. Until she showed up, Rod had been Ben’s go-to person. The one who got to sit by Ben’s side in the courtroom, as if that was some freaking prize. But now she held that job. Rod smiled through the change of power, but she saw something stormy