“Some of us are expendable, and I’m one of those people. That’s just life.” I offer a faint smile, feeling the canyon that will divide our paths.
“Don’t say that.” She smacks my chest, and I chuckle.
“At least I know the one good thing that I’ve ever done in my life is tricking you into being my best friend.”
I watch the dimples form at the corners of her lips and have to fight the urge to kiss them.
Olive is too good for you.
“I love you, Jensen,” she murmurs against my chest, and I pull her in tighter.
“I love you, too, Olive.”
* * *
Present…
“I can help you with something,” I offer for the fourth time today. She’s drowning in stacks of legal documents, and the intern keeps bringing more.
“What exactly do you think you’re qualified to help me with?”Ouch.
“I don’t think it takes a genius to sort through paperwork.”
She sighs, rubbing her temples. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be a bitch. This case is complex, and I’m used to having ateam of litigators and paralegals.”
“How can I help?”
“I don’t know. I need to know everything about Randall and Jeremiah Porter, so there is a definite timeline of their crimes and escalation. Unless you can inject that knowledge into my brain, I don’t think you can help me.”
“Well, what do you have so far?”
She slaps a stack of papers on the edge of her desk, and the top sheet slips onto the floor. When I pick it up, there’s one single highlighted line among an ocean of words.
“This part is all you need?”
“That’s the main point. I can tie it all together later. Hey, where are you going?” She shouts after me as I leave her office.
When I return, I’m dragging in a giant whiteboard on wheels that barely works.
“What are you–” She stops. “Where did you get that?”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“Hayes, I don’t own the building, you can’t just take stuff…” She continues berating me, but I ignore her, carrying on with my self-assigned task.
I draw two horizontal lines across the board and add one hash mark at the very beginning, jotting down the year and the incident.
“I’ll pinpoint the details. It’ll be all laid out, and you won’t have so many papers to dig through.”
Her mouth opens and shuts as if she’s going to argue for argument’s sake, but then she hands me the rest of the stack silently, giving me the green light.
“Thank you,” she utters softly after I get to work.
“It’s what I’m here for, Liv.”
“You’re here to keep an eye out for my stalker, not to be my assistant.”
“I’m here to be anything you need.”
