For Hana, Miya, Sophia, Pete and Sarina, the true joys in my life who let me practice parenthood every day.
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COLLIN BAPTISTA SLID through the metal detectors at the Lee County courthouse, grateful for the cool air-conditioning that fought off the humid air of southwest Florida. He grabbed his keys and wallet from the conveyor belt and nodded at Joyce, the armed guard who wore her hair in tight braids. She was a regular, like all the staff he saw almost daily at the courthouse.
“Looking good today,” she told him, her eyes sliding down the length of the new dark suit that fit him like a glove, a splurge he’d allowed himself after winning that high-profile murder trial last month. He patted the top of his thick black hair, courtesy of his Filipino mother, a contrast to his green eyes and the lopsided, roguish smile from his Irish dad. Collin was anything but boy-next-door, but he could command a courtroom with persuasive arguments alone, one of the many reasons he hadn’t lost a case in two years working as a prosecutor for the state attorney’s office.
Still, he felt nerves dance in the pit of his stomach, but they had nothing to do with the hearing this morning, which was a routine case—a drunk driver who’d smashed his car into a tree but thankfully hadn’t hurt anyone. Yet. Collin planned to take the driver’s license to teach him a lesson. That was an open-and-shut case, something he could do with his eyes closed. The man’s blood alcohol had been three times the legal limit. No, what made him anxious was the thought of seeing Madison Reddy again.
Madison. Her dark thick hair, her light brown nearly hazel eyes... The curves that simply didn’t quit. Her father’s family had immigrated from India, her mother’s side was from Scotland. She was biracial like he was, and the only woman he knew of who could make an off-the-rack gray suit and sturdy heels look almost pornographic. He’d been haunted by her eyes for a year, and even more so now since they’d fallen into her bed two months ago after happy hour gone wrong.
Or, he thought, very, very right.
Collin walked through the courtroom and found he was early; no one sat at the defense table. He felt a tug of disappointment. He’d wanted every extra minute before or after the hearing to see her. That she wasn’t waiting for him left him feeling a little empty.
You were the one who didn’t call her, a voice nagged inside his brain. You were the one who deliberately avoided her these past couple of months.
He’d told himself he hadn’t called because he was worried about violating the state attorney’s policy of not sleeping with the opposing counsel. He could’ve gotten around that, he supposed. But he knew the real reason ran deeper than that. He liked Madison. He liked her too much. He had career plans that didn’t include staying in Fort Myers, and if he started a serious relationship with her, he’d be tempted to toss those ideas out the window.
He only had three rules in life: 1) Don’t lose; 2) Bad guys deserve more than the book thrown at them; and 3) Never sleep with the enemy (in other words, defense attorneys). He’d broken one of his three cardinal rules for Madison. That was how amazing the woman was.
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