She certainly didn’t have butterflies at the moment. Right now, all she wanted to do was throw a drink in Charles’s face. She cleared her mind. Anger didn’t do anyone a good service. “When?” She managed a pleasant conversational tone.
“When what?”
“When would you like to reschedule our wedding?”
“I don’t know. I’ve got a lot going on right now with this new—Okay, I’m ready.” He said the last part to someone else. “Bella, our table’s ready. Wish you were here, dumpling.” He hung up without saying goodbye, without apologizing for standing her up, and without saying he loved her.
Well, this was an awful turn of events.
Bella set her phone on the wood surface in front of her and stared at it for a full minute, her thoughts as messy as Charles’s desk had been when she’d arrived. Once the sting of being left at the courthouse abated—which didn’t take that long, surprisingly—she decided to head over to Hattie’s and congratulate Charles in person. Maybe she’d buy them all dessert. After all, that’s what a good fiancé would do. She’d put her sting aside and be happy that her intended had landed his dream job. This wasn’t about her—it was about them. Charles’s new job was part of their long-term goals. Life sometimes happened out of order, and she could roll with that.
They’d had this dream together, and they should celebrate together too.
Having made up her mind, she tucked her phone into her purse and headed out the door to be the world’s best fiancé to the new associate of Wolfe, Wolfe & Wolfe.
Chapter Three
Adam
Adam stared after the mystery woman until the elevator doors shut. Slowly, the noise of people rushing around him and the ding-ding coming from the bank of elevators brought him back to his life. His lonely life, where doe-eyed women rushed off to marry men who would no doubt be home each night by six and be happy to raise children in their suburban home.
“Blech!” He shuddered at the thought.
“Adam?” Uncle Philip held open an elevator, and Adam stepped inside. He brushed his hand down his suit and checked the knotted tie at his neck. Everything was as it should be, and no one would be able to tell the woman had gotten to him.
But she had gotten to him. The combination of intelligence and innocence in her gaze was like a siren’s call; he could not look away. Adam could always look away. Dating was just another game to play, and he played that one quite well, never losing the upper hand. He had a disquieting feeling that this woman had seized the upper hand with a bat of her dark lashes and could have tromped all over him. Which was all the more reason to forget about her.
The doors lumbered open, and he strode down the wide hallway and right through the door to the courtroom. The court reporter was at his station and the judge’s seat was empty. There were several spectators and junior lawyers in attendance. All good signs that he’d made a timely entrance. As he made his way down the center aisle to the prosecutor’s desk, whispers followed, dancing like brittle leaves on the wind.
“The Beast.”
“It’s the Beast.”
“What is he doing here?”
The opposing counsel’s jaw hung open as if Bigfoot himself had walked into the room. Adam didn’t know his name and consulted the paperwork. Ted Stones. Cool name. Bad luck.
Stones flipped on his client, and Adam pretended that he didn’t hear their conversation as he arranged his small pile of evidence and paperwork on the table.
“You didn’t tell me this wasAdam Moreau’scase.”
The defendant, a skinny man with sores on his cheeks and cracks around his fingernails, shrugged. He wore a knit hat, the slouchy kind that made him look like a thug, and Adam could smell him from several feet away. “What’s it matter?” The defendant—“Bud Bailor Adam,” read the sheet—stuck his finger in his mouth and picked something out of his molars. He wiped his hand on his already dirty pants. Adam shuddered.
“He’sthe Beast,you idiot. He’s going to tear us both apart.” Stones tugged on his collar, his face going red.
Bailor glared. “He doesn’t deserve my respect. If my daddy handed me a billion dollars, I’d—”
“All rise!” called the bailiff. The judge entered, black robes swirling. Adam kept his satisfied smile to himself. Judge Curtis was not only an old friend of his father’s, but a huge supporter of The Cove. Bailor’s statement about him getting all he had handed to him annoyed him for about five seconds then washed away by a river of confidence. The courtroom was his domain. If he’d earned anything in this life, it was his reputation. His father couldn’t hand him that. It was time to show the beggar exactly how Adam became the Beast.
Adam was given the floor first and took his time painting a portrait of the man who had poured grease down the toilet to stop up the plumbing and frayed wires on the back of the fridge to necessitate replacement. Then there were the curse words on the freshly painted walls and mangled newspaper clippings and photos of famous people on the ceiling above his bed.
The defense was weak at best, and by the time the Beast was through, the judge not only found in favor of Adam; he recommended the defendant for evaluation by a professional for mental instability.
The gavel hit the desk with a satisfying thud, and Adam checked his watch. Thirty minutes until lunch. He’d have just enough time to pull out the mayor’s seat so she could eat crow about his inability to handle his tenants.
The bailiff moved to take the defendant into custody. The small man darted around the desk, running towards Adam. Time slowed down and Adam watched things happen, almost predicting them in his head, like watching a car wreck and being unable to stop it.
Bailor reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a vial of liquid. “You’ll forever be a beast now!” he screamed as his arm slashed through the air, raining the contents of the vial down on Adam.
