Page 29 of Take What Hurts

Elliott cleared her throat again and, pushing herself away from the desk, tried not to look at Hallie. “Hello. Are you here to chat about your client’s offer?”

Mackenzie’s smile slipped for a moment before she visibly hitched it back onto her face. “Sort of. Would you like to take a walk with me? That is, if you don’t have other plans. I know it’s Friday ni⁠—”

“No. I m-mean. Yes, sure,” Elliott stammered. She took a steadying breath, glancing at Mackenzie, who had a hand over her mouth, presumably a physical effort to keep laughter from spilling out into the lobby. “That would be great. Just let me get my stuff.”

She ticked a thumb over her shoulder and ran back to her office. Shoving her phone into her pocket and dragging her satchel full of files over her shoulder, she took a breath and made her way back to reception. She smiled at Mackenzie, who had apparently just finished a conversation with Hallie.

“Okay, sorry. Ready to go. Have a great weekend, Hallie.”

Mackenzie smiled at Hallie. “Enjoy that concert,” she said as she followed Elliott out the door.

They exited Elliott’s office onto Columbia Street, the wet sheen coating the pavement gleaming with the glow of streetlights and the headlights of the bumper-to-bumper traffic heading in the direction of the I-5. Over the noise of tires rolling over wet road, Elliott shot Mackenzie a sideways glance and smiled, stepping closer to her to avoid a group of pedestrians headed the other way. “So now we’re away from prying eyes and ears, what did you really come to my office for?”

Mackenzie’s lips tightened for a moment, before she pushed them out and exhaled. “I really did want to talk about the offer, but I expect that you don’t have instructions.”

Elliott stared at her and barked out a laugh. “I mean, you’re right, I don’t, given I sent it to my client literally”—she glanced down at her watch—“fifteen minutes ago.” She narrowed her eyes, attempting to come off as playful. “You have a habit of doing that.”

Mackenzie sighed but gave Elliott a smile that made the skin around her eyes crinkle. “Yeah, look, both times it was kind of a Hail Mary situation, to be honest. I really just want this matter to finish—they’ve been at it long enough, you know?”

They dodged their way around a couple ambling slowly along the sidewalk, hand in hand. Elliott’s heart ached, and she ignored it. Back in clear air, Mackenzie glanced at her. Elliott thought it was almost shy. And Elliott’s heart did a hopeless backflip.

“But, now we’re here, would you—” Mackenzie’s throat bobbed with a hard swallow. She shrugged and let out a soft laugh. “I was wondering—do you want to go get a bite with me?”

Elliott smiled behind the high collar of her overcoat, because even though this was obviously a catch-up with a colleague, she couldn’t say no to an opportunity to spend time with Mackenzie. They were wandering in the direction of the Great Wheel and the bustling kitschy restaurants of the downtown piers, and like Elliott needed any more convincing, Mackenzie shoved her hands into the pockets of her overcoat and continued.

“We might be able to catch happy hour at Anthony’s if we hurry.”

Elliott smirked and nudged her shoulder against Mackenzie’s arm. “Are you a fan of the clam?”

Mackenzie promptly broke out into a raging blush, from her hairline to her chest. And Elliott, her brain a wrung sponge after a big week of helping people take each other for as much as they could possibly get, slowly realized her joke was laden with innuendo. Not her intention, but Mackenzie’s reaction made Elliott’s stomach clench with the same want that had dragged itself through her body at the market.

Then her brain creaked around to the thought of why Mackenzie had reacted that way. Was she embarrassed by Elliott essentially asking her to out herself? Or did she think Elliott would judge her? Or was it… something else? Elliott almost didn’t dare to hope, but Mattias’s warning not to sell herself short rattled in her brain, and she wondered for a moment whether there was something in that. Elliott didn’t dare let her little heart flutter more than once with fleeting hope.

“Um, well, yes, actually.” Mackenzie was so quiet, Elliott thought she’d imagined her speaking.

But she hadn’t. She knew she hadn’t, and now the desperate need to clarify clawed its way out of Elliott’s throat. “Wait, of actual clams? Like, the food?”

“Both.”

Elliott’s face went slack with the way her heart flip-flopped hopelessly in her chest, because Mackenzie’s clarification colored everything with a shade of complication that left her brain torn between elation and despair.

Apparently oblivious to Elliott’s plight, Mackenzie asked the question that almost made Elliott’s heart give out entirely: “And you also like… clams?”

Elliott swallowed hard around the rush of words that wanted to make themselves heard. Words like Yes, I’m gay as fuck and I think you’re so fucking pretty and Yes, I’m attracted to you. Saying none of that, she settled on “Also both.”

Both blushing and wandering now at a sloth’s pace, they each caught each other’s eye, and Elliott felt the invisible contact in her bones. And she couldn’t stop the little flutter in her heart this time because it was like waking up from the inside out. Like she needed Mackenzie to keep looking at her like that—all darkened wide eyes and parted lips—just so she could breathe. The heat that had started in Elliott’s cheeks migrated south, spreading through her skin and bone and marrow and lighting it all up like a fucking firecracker. Elliott’s body moved closer to where Mackenzie walked and stayed there. And Mackenzie didn’t move away. She was a moth and Mackenzie was a flame, and Elliott, as they continued on toward the downtown piers, thought she would be happy to burn in it as long as it was at Mackenzie’s hand.

They didn’t actually order the clams at Anthony’s. But they did have several happy hour rum and Cokes, and by the time happy hour had finished, the bar was teeming with tourists and office dwellers alike, and Elliott was buzzed. Mackenzie’s flushed cheeks told a similar story.

“So, why divorce law?” Mackenzie half yelled, over the noise of hundreds of conversations, across the small high-top table they’d managed to poach when they’d arrived.

Elliott scoffed. “Who the fuck knows. I kind of fell into it while I was at law school, because I was broke and likely malnourished and it was a job, and I never left.”

“So not any great, undying passion for property settlements and child-custody arrangements, then?” Mackenzie asked sardonically.

“Uh, no. In fact, if I had my time again, I would run fast and far and continue surviving on instant noodles rather than taking a job in divorce law again for the cash.” She gave Mackenzie a wry smile. “Actually, I’m not really sure I’d be a lawyer at all. My whole family are veterinarians, but the thought of looking at blood and guts and cats’ assholes all day really didn’t appeal. But I had to compete with my brother somehow, so law it was. All the prestige of veterinarian school or medical school, none of the blood and guts.” Elliott drained the last of her rum and Coke. Her last one for the evening, judging by how loose her lips were and how good Mackenzie looked sitting across the high-top from her, her knees inches away from Elliott’s own. “How about you?”

Mackenzie appeared uncomfortable for a moment, before she spoke. “My parents divorced when I was a baby, and my mother was…” She chewed over the words, and it appeared like it was painful. “She was very unhappy.” Mackenzie shrugged. “Still is, I suppose. I guess I grew up thinking that I could fix the whole system.” She laughed, but it was entirely devoid of humor. “I was obviously wrong, but I do enjoy helping people. It always seems that I’m on the wrong side of the table to do that, though, you know? Always seems like I’m helping the person who screwed their partner. After six years, it’s all become a bit disheartening.”