Ashley thought about that for a moment. “I get to help people,” she finally said. “Particularly women and children, who don’t have a lot of power.”
“Worst part?”
She smiled. “That’s easy. Dealing with other lawyers.” She corrected herself. “Some other lawyers.” But then changed it again, “Most. Big overlap in the Venn diagram of lawyers and a-holes.”
“So now I know,” Jim teased her, “why you were so quick to jump on the idea that I’d make agreatlawyer.” He made air quotes around the word.
“No!” she said, laughing. “Oh, my God, no!”
“Um-hmm,” he said, smiling back at her, because she was just too freaking adorable—she was even blushing a little as she realized she’d walked right into that one. And all of a sudden, their gazes locked and something clicked and created a burst of sudden heat, and he had to quickly look away, because that was not okay. He cleared his throat. “So, um… Tell me about your chief. Is he temporary or FTS—full-time support? How long’s he been in the Reserves?”
Ashley was clearly confused. “I’m sorry… I… My what?”
“You just told me you’re dating a chief—the recruiter…?”
She laughed in surprise. “No, I said I hadlunchwith… Chief Gordon.KathleenGordon. Not a date—she’s very happily married. And she’s temporary—relatively new to the reserves.” She shook her head in combined amusement and disgust.
“Damnit,” Jim said, “I’ve gone and failed your feminist test. Again.”
“No,” she said. “Nowyou’ve failed my feminist test by assuming Ihavea feminist test for you to fail, instead of simply apologizing and promising you’ll try harder to live more fully in a world where a chief from a military recruiting office might be a woman. Kathy’s really good at her job, by the way.”
Touché. Jim nodded. “Forgive me, twice, because I also absolutely misspoke. What I meant to say is that I’ve failedmyfeminist test. I blast through life, assuming I’m an ally—that I’m one of the good ones, thesafeones, someone give me a cookie for being so freaking wonderful—and then I do this, and trip over my dick.”
Ashley laughed. “At least you recognize that as a negative. Some men just, like, noisily windmill all over the place, completely oblivious to the fact that they—and everyone else trapped in the room, God help them—are tripping over their dicks.”
Jim laughed, too, although his laughter was mixed with a soupçon of shock and surprise—happysurprise. Windmill—which meant waving one’s penis in a circle—was a word he absolutely didn’t expect to use in a conversation with Ashley DeWitt. On the other hand, he’d learned last night that shewasintriguingly funny. “I wasn’t aware there was noise involved in windmilling. Unless the dicks in question are so giant and moving so fast they break the sound barrier…?”
She laughed even harder at that. “Giant’s not usually the case,” she said, grinning back at him. “In fact, it’s usually the opposite of giant. And it’s noisy because there’s accompanied screaming or grunting or… maybe even manly burping and farting.”
And now she’d saidfart. It was possible he’d just fallen in love. “You apparently know men quite well.”
“Sadly, I do,” she said.
And now, as they smiled into each other eyes, when that flare of heated awareness arose, Jim didn’t look away. Although… “How do you not have a boyfriend?” he asked, but then adjusted. “Or maybe a…girlfriend…?”
Ashley’s smile deepened at that. “Boyfriend,” she said. “And I don’t have one because I have a terrible ex-fiancé.”
“Ouch,” he said. “How terrible?”
“On a scale from one to ten…?” she said. “A solid twelve.”
“Well… congratulations on not marrying him,” Jim told her. “Some people don’t find out they’ve got someone with a twelve on the terribleness scale untilafterthe vows, and that’s gotta suck even worse, so… Good job. Go, you.”
She laughed a little at that, but the expression on her face was pensive. “I never really thought of it that way, but you’re right. Go, me.”
“I’m not up on my terribleness-scale ratings, is a twelve a… cheater?”
“No, no,” she said. “Cheating’s a ten.”
“So… serial killer, then. Man, I hate when that happens. You meet someone, and everything’s going really well, but then they’re allI must now show you my collection of ears.”
Ashley laughed at that as he’d hoped she would, because damn, when she laughed something warm shifted in his chest and made the day bearable. More than bearable—it actually made it pleasant. What was happening…?
“I’m pretty sure Brad isn’t a serial killer,” she told him, “but after we broke up, well, he had trouble learning thatnomeantno, andovermeantover. That’s one of the reasons why I’m here, because now, suddenly, he’s back.”
“Back?” Jim said. “As inback? As in, you currently have an active stalker and you didn’t think that might be something you’d want to mention…? Jesus, Ash, we’ve gotta work some hand-to-hand self-defense into your schedule, and I know you’re not a fan of firearms and I agree completely that getting a weapon without having either the training or impetus to use it properly would be a big mistake, but we can certainly take pictures that you can post on social media—like,Look, here I am getting some serious weapons training at SEAL World dot dot dot—”
She interrupted him. “Thank you, but no, because Brad’s really not dangerous.”
