Love Proof (Laws of Attraction) (12 page)

“But we’re here now,” Joe said.  “So let’s make the best of it.”

“How?” Sarah asked, yawning.

“For one thing, you can come take a nap in my room.”

***

She protested, but only a little.  Joe waited in the car while Sarah
returned to her room and quickly gathered up her suit and all her toiletries. 
Then he drove them the extra five minutes to the hotel where he was staying.

“This isn’t some trick, is it, Joe?” she asked as he let her into his
room.  “Because if it is . . . ”

He flipped on the light.  “We have a little less than two hours before
I should take you back.  How long will you need to get ready?”

“Um . . . maybe a half hour, forty-five minutes.”

He set the alarm on his watch.  “Go lie down.  I’ll wake you up when
it’s time.”

She hesitated for a moment, then had to ask him again.  “This isn’t
some trick, is it?”

“Why would I trick you?”

“I don’t know, let me oversleep and miss the argument so your team can
win?”

“You may find this hard to believe,” he said, “but I’m not like you and
Ellen.  I don’t need to win everything.”

“Neither do I,” Sarah protested.  “Just . . . most things.  I’ve worked
really hard for this.”

“And I promise I’ll get you there on time,” Joe said.  “But every
minute you’re still arguing with me, you could be sleeping.  So get into bed
while I take a shower.”

Exhaustion pulled at her like a weight around her bones.  She hung her
suit in Joe’s closet, then kicked off her sneakers and lay down on his bed.

“Under the covers,” he said.  “Go on, it’s warmer.”

She felt odd about it, but went ahead and crawled in, still dressed in
her jeans and sweater.  Joe turned off the light.

“Why are you doing this?” Sarah asked into the dark.

“Because I like you, Red.  And I want you to do well, despite my
psychotic partner.”  Then Joe closed the bathroom door and turned on the
shower.

***

Sarah had had power naps before:  those twenty-minute wonders that
could take the edge off exhaustion and let her study long hours into the night.

But a full hour of complete, restful sleep in Joe’s bed felt so
healing, by the time he woke her up she almost felt whole.

“You should probably call Mickey,” Joe said when she opened her eyes.

“Why?”

“I’m going to take you straight to the school, not back to your hotel. 
You can tell him you’ll meet him.”

Sarah rubbed her eyes and reached for her phone.  She dialed Mickey.

“Where are you?” he asked.

“With . . . Joe.  I took a nap.”

There was silence on the other end.

“Mickey?”

“Yeah.  Whatever.  See you there.”  Then he hung up.

“He thinks we had sex,” Sarah told Joe.  She surprised herself by
saying that out loud.

But Joe took it in stride.  “He’s married, you know.”

“
What?
”  Sarah stared back at him .  “No, you’re joking.”

“Married, with a kid on the way.  You should ask him.”

Sarah’s mouth still hung open.  “Unbelievable.”  Then she laughed.

“You don’t care?”

“Not in the least—except he’s a douchebag for always hitting on me.”

“It wasn’t going to work one of these days?” Joe asked.

“Hardly.”

“How come?”

Sarah pulled back the covers and swung her legs over the side of the
bed.  “I’m here to work, Burke.  Thanks for letting me sleep.  Now I need to
get ready for battle.”

Thirteen

When Sarah emerged from Joe’s bathroom with her hair done, makeup on,
and wearing the most expensive outfit she’d ever owned—a navy blue pencil skirt
and snug-fitting jacket, with a crisp white cotton blouse underneath—Joe took a
step back and made a fist at his heart.

“Shut up,” she said, but the gesture pleased her.

“Red, you’re a total knockout.”

“Stop calling me that.”

“Okay, Henley,” Joe said, “but you’re not actually going out like that,
are you?  Give the rest of us a chance.”

She smoothed her skirt over her thighs.  “You think I look okay?”

Joe looked her up and down once more, and let his eyes linger at her
chest.

“Nice fit,” he said.

She crossed her arms.

“Don’t ever be embarrassed of having a great body, Henley,” Joe said.  “You’re
doing a public service walking around like that.”

“Can we go?” she asked dryly.

He stepped closer and pressed a kiss to her cheek.

“Great.  Am I going to have a problem with you, too?” she asked.  She
tried to sound irritated, knowing the flush on her skin might give her away.

“Can’t help it,” Joe said.  “You’re that beautiful.”

Sarah glanced at her watch, just to have something to do.  He wasn’t
making her nervous, exactly, just . . . distracted.

Joe lifted his own suit jacket from where it hung over a chair, and met
her at the door.  He opened it for her, then followed her out into the hall.

“You’re gonna kill,” he told her.  “And not just because all the male
judges will be salivating.  I’ve listened to your argument, Sarah, and it’s
great.”

The compliment pleased her even more than any of the ones about her
looks.  “Yours, too, Joe.  You’re one of the best I’ve seen.”

“In a lot of respects,” he said, and when she raised an eyebrow at him,
showing him how unimpressed she was by what was obviously a line, he added,
“But we can talk about that after one of us wins.”

***

Mickey was obviously not happy.

Joe wished Sarah and Mickey good luck, then left to find Ellen.

“What are you doing with him?” Mickey muttered, pulling Sarah off to
the side.

“Sleeping,” she said.  “Literally sleeping.  You should be happy I did,
too—I feel fine again, thanks for asking.”

Mickey swung his arms back and forth in front of his chest and hopped
in place a few times like he was about to go in there for a weight lifting
competition instead of an oral argument.

“Are you ready for this?” Sarah asked, giving his arm a squeeze.

Mickey nodded and blew out a breath.  “Sure.  Ready.  Absolutely.”

Their opponents, two men from Georgia State University, stood several
feet away, talking in low voices.  Every now and then they looked up at Sarah
and Mickey, then went back to muttering between them.

Finally the door to the classroom opened, and the two teams ahead of
them emerged.  One of the women looked like she had been caught in a rainstorm,
her hair was so matted to her head with perspiration.  Sarah could see dark
patches under the woman’s arms where she’d sweated through her suit.  One of
the men on the other team didn’t look much better.  It made Sarah wonder how
she and Catherine must have looked to people last year when the two of them
came stumbling out, Sarah supporting Catherine around the waist in case she
collapsed again.

Mickey stared after the people who had just left.  He had a pale look
to his face.

“You’ll be fine,” Sarah told him.  “You’re ready, Mickey.  Come on. 
Let’s go do this.”

For all his self-confidence over the past two months—not just
self-confidence, Sarah thought, but cockiness—the guy looked like he was
starting to lose it.  His eyes seemed jittery.  And she could see beads of
sweat above his lip.

“Mickey.”  Sarah took him by both arms and tried to steady him with her
gaze.  “I’m going first, right?  So you can watch me.”

She stopped talking while the team from Georgia State passed by and
headed into the room.

“Then we’ll go have a beer afterward and it’ll all be fine,” she said. 
“Just do it exactly the way we’ve practiced, all right?”

Mickey nodded.  More sweat had pooled above his lip.  He wiped it away
with his sleeve.

Sarah wondered how Joe would have been in these few minutes before the
argument.  Somehow she doubted she’d have to give him a pep talk right now.

“We have to go,” Sarah said.  “Come on.”  She pulled Mickey into the
room.

***

“How was yours?  I thought we did really well,” Ellen said, not waiting
for an answer.  She and Joe found Sarah and Mickey still talking outside in the
cold, Mickey pacing back and forth to work off all his excess stress.

Mickey kept taking his jacket off, then putting it back on every time
the wind got to be too much.  He had sweated through his jacket just like that
woman, Sarah noticed, although Mickey’s stains reached halfway to his waist.  At
times during the argument, his sweat was so epic, it actually ran down the
sides of his face like blood pouring from a head wound.

“Either of you have a cigarette?” Mickey asked Joe and Ellen.

“You smoke?” Sarah asked.

“Used to,” Mickey said.  “Going to again.”

“How’d you do?” Sarah asked Joe quietly.

He shrugged.  “Not bad.  You?”

Sarah nodded.  They both seemed to understand they wouldn’t be able to
talk about it honestly until they were free of their partners.

“So,” Joe said, “how about lunch?”

“And a beer?” Mickey said to Sarah.

“Right.  I promised.”

“Good news,” Ellen said in a cheerful, almost giddy voice.  Sarah
wondered if it was because she did well during the argument, or because she was
just so relieved it was over.  “Since breakfast was free,” Ellen told them, “we
still have all that money, plus the rest of our meal allowance for today.  So
we can eat anywhere we want.”

“How much?” Joe asked.

“We can even have a few beers,” Ellen said, not looking at Joe.

“How much is the allowance, Ellen?” he repeated.

It was the first any of them had heard of any allowance.

“A hundred a day,” Ellen said.  “It’s what the Moot Court board voted
all the teams would get this year.”

“A hundred per team?” Joe asked.

“Per . . . person,” Ellen said, clearly uncomfortable being pressed.

“And where is all this money?” Joe asked.

“I have it,” Ellen said, sounding less cheerful by the moment.

Joe held out his hand.  “I’ll take mine now.  Sarah, you want yours?”

She had watched the whole exchange without realizing it might mean
anything to her.  “Oh.  Sure.  That would be good.”

Ellen made a face as she pulled open her purse.  She obviously didn’t
like giving up control.  She took her time removing the envelope and counting
out four fifties.

“But you’re coming to lunch with us, right?” she asked.

“Sure, we’ll come for a beer,” Joe said.  “What do you say, Sarah?”

Sarah noticed the “we.”  Somehow in the last few minutes she’d gone from
being Mickey’s companion to being Joe’s.  She wasn’t sure when the shift had
happened, but she knew it had.

And she didn’t mind.

“A beer sounds good,” Sarah said.  “Come on, Mickey.  We’ll even find
you some cigarettes if you need them.”

Then it seemed natural to follow Joe to his car, rather than to go with
Ellen and Mickey.

“How about that steak place near the hotel?” Ellen called after them.

“Sure,” Sarah said.  She and Joe continued walking.

“Mind if we make a stop first?” Joe asked her.

“No.”  She didn’t mind anything at the moment.  It felt good to be back
around someone who wasn’t freaking out, wasn’t rehashing everything that he’d
said in front of the judges, practically begging Sarah to tell him again how
great he had done and that no, he didn’t screw up.

“How’d it really go?” Joe asked her.

“So-so.  Yours?”

“It had its moments.”

Sarah looked at him and smiled.  “Were you any good, Burke?”

He shrugged.  “Good enough.  You, Red?”

“I think so.”

He reached down for her cold hand and pulled her in closer.  “Wish I
could have seen you.”

***

Joe parked in front of the Walmart.

“Okay . . . ” Sarah said.

“This will only take a minute,” Joe told her.  He waited until she came
around her side of the car, then slipped his hand in hers again.

“You think this is okay?” she asked him, holding up their joined
fingers.

“I think so,” he confirmed, “don’t you?”

She shrugged, trying to appear indifferent.  But the truth was, her
heart was pounding.  And she wasn’t sure what to do about it.  She also wasn’t
sure what had happened in the last ten or fifteen minutes to take them from
where they’d been with each other that morning, to where they were right now.