Counselor Undone (8 page)

“Well, I guess if that’s who you’re telling me you are,
there’s really not much for me to say. But, I’m wondering . . . how do your
sisters feel about your attitude?”

The line went quiet before he admitted, “Pretty much the way
you seem to feel about your brother’s.”

They fell into an easy conversational flow, and he told her
more about his sisters. Jordis hit the speaker button on her phone. Laying the
phone on the bed beside her head, she continued the discussion in hands-free
mode and allowed his voice to surround her in the darkened bedroom.

His voice rolled over her. She loved the sound, deep and
smooth like one of those late night radio announcers who played only love
songs. Unexpectedly, Spartacus flashed through her mind. He’d had a deep, sexy
voice as well. She needed to stop comparing the two men, but the sound of
Spartacus’s voice in her head mixed with the resonant sound of Michael’s oozing
through the phone. Her nipples puckered.

Her hand moved up to rub against a nodule plumped under her
satin black bra. The sexy tickle made her wish for large male hands to take
over. She took a deep breath trying to control a tension she hadn’t meant to
rouse.

“You okay over there?”

She startled at the question, afraid he could guess exactly
what she’d been doing.

“You aren’t falling asleep on me are you?”

She could hear the humor in his voice and immediately
relaxed. “Of course not.” Without thinking, she added, “What woman could ever
fall asleep on a man as enthralling as you?”

Almost as soon as the comment left her mouth, she realized
the implications that could be taken from what she’d intended as a joke.
Luckily, Michael didn’t take it the wrong way. He simply chuckled and continued
with their chat. He asked, and she answered, a few questions about what had
drawn her back to the Kansas City area. Although she responded to his questions
easily, explaining the city’s proximity to her brother as one of its key
selling points, she wondered if he sensed she was holding something back.

After a while, he brought the conversation to a close. “It’s
late. I better let you get some rest. Something tells me you like to get into
the office early.”

Jordis glanced at her digital clock, which glowed one
fifteen in red. They’d been talking for almost an hour. She hadn’t felt the
passage of time. “Yes, I’d better go. I have a deposition first thing in the
morning.”

“Ok, I’ll see you at the office.”

They both hesitated a second before hanging up at
the same time. Jordis laid in the dark for a while contemplating why she
suddenly felt like a teenager who’d gotten a call from the star quarterback of
her high school football team.

* * *

Jordis slept fitfully that night. The recurring dream she’d
thought done slipped into her subconscious. The gladiator came to her. His
tongue danced inside her mouth, and his hands explored and pressed until an exquisite
ache between her legs made her moan in her sleep. Her buttocks ground into
rumpled black Egyptian cotton. The top sheet slid languorously against her
thighs. The sensuous friction heightened her senses. Dampness pooled in intimate
places, bare beneath a flimsy white silk negligee.

This time she didn’t stop his touching. His fingers slid inside
her, taunting until intense heat burned inside her flesh and caused her to kick
tousled sheets off the bed. Her negligee rucked up her hips. Her bare buttocks
pressed harder into the mattress, and even in sleep, her pelvis began to tuck
and release in an erotic rhythm generally shared by two. Her REM mind fixated
on him, that beautifully bronzed and intoxicatingly muscled stranger.

A whimper pierced her sleep state. Jordis began to float
towards consciousness, but the dream gripped her tightly and lulled her back
down. In her dream, a different part of his anatomy took over her pleasure. A
slow methodic rocking bounced her gently up and down the beige flat paint of a
bedroom wall. Loud breaths and soft groans punctuated the staccato rhythm. Her
grip tightened on the hips of her dream gladiator, and she rocked him back. The
tempo built and she urged him harder, faster. Then it came, a coital explosion
so intense a real mewl of satisfaction escaped her lips and startled her awake.

She laid wide-eyed, staring up at the ceiling and panting.
She’d heard his voice call her name in her sleep. This time, she recognized the
voice, and when he’d looked into her eyes, the once amorphous, indescribable
eye color appeared in Technicolor gray. Her dream gladiator’s eyes had been
unmistakably gray.

Jordis squeezed her damp, sticky thighs together. She’d come
in her sleep, but the edge wasn’t completely off. She lingered in a state of
semi-arousal. Although she had the mechanical means beneath her mattress to
relieve her discomfiture, she wouldn’t go there. She couldn’t go there, because
the face she’d seen in her sleep was . . .
Michael Remington’s
!

“
No
,” she
complained audibly to no one in particular, but hoped the universe and her uncooperative
subconscious would hear and heed.

She’d already been over this with herself. She would
not—could not—embrace a sexual fantasy about her boss. She rolled
onto her stomach, pulled a pillow over her head, and groaned.
Ugh!!
He’d
ruined a perfectly good dream. Now, she wouldn’t be able to separate her
gladiator fantasies from the olive-skinned, gray-eyed counselor.

She hadn’t had the gladiator dream in days. She’d had it
almost daily for a straight week after New Year’s. Her midnight rendezvous with
the costumed Lothario had played over and over, night after night, as clear as
a high definition movie. Somehow, in this morning’s version, her anonymous
suitor—previously safe fodder for fantasies of illicit sex—had morphed
into Mr. Macho. She didn’t even want to begin to analyze the Freudian implications
of that.

His voice had rolled over her like a sensuous massage, the
deep tone arousing her as much as the naughty imagery conjured by her dreaming
mind. She surmised Michael had crept into her fantasy because his nectarous
voice had been the last sound she’d heard before going to sleep last night, and
it had made her think of Spartacus. Nothing more to it than that . . . she
hoped.

Even as she rationalized the provocative dream, the glutinous
feeling between her thighs told another story. She’d never reached physical
fulfillment during her previous dreams about the gladiator. That she’d done so
this morning implied a burgeoning attraction for the svelte partner she’d been
loath to examine closely. In fact, she didn’t want to analyze the
how comes
and
what fors
or anything else about the situation even now. Nothing
good could come of it.

Her goal was partnership, her focus billable hours and
finding a way, other than sleeping with Remington, to get appointed to the
Metra Pharmaceuticals case. She needed to execute a serious display of mind
over matter or, more aptly, mind over libido. Like their elevator tryst from
the night before, Jordis intended—no, she
needed
—to put this
and him out of her mind.

Determined to do exactly that, she rolled out of
bed and headed for the bathroom.

* * *

Across town, Michael Remington slept in the buff with
morning wood to rival the trunk of a hundred-year-old redwood. Her moans
haunted him in his sleep. Juliet. Luscious breasts pressed against his bare
chest and her tanned skin looked good enough to eat. He pressed his lips
against her throat and in his dream, she emitted that sound that made him hard
as concrete. His fingers under her dress, he caressed her intimate folds in a
steady rhythm. Feminine sounds of pleasure intensified a tumescence he yearned
to push deep inside her.

For the first time, the Sandman took pity on him, allowing
him to alter his body position and consummate his desire. The dream Juliet
grabbed his hips and pulled him to her. He tucked his face into the curve of
her neck and slid home, dipping in and out of her warmth until he felt her
begin to spasm around him.

When she succumbed to her release, the
en rêve
orgasmic
pulses took him to the brink. He looked into her face and this time, the mask
had vanished. Hazel eyes stared back at him, beautiful kaleidoscope hazel.

“Jordis!” The shout shattered his soporific haze.

Breathing hard, he came awake disoriented and on edge. As
his dream came back to him, he threw his legs over the edge of the bed, placed
his elbows on his knees, and dropped his head in surrender. Even his subconscious
mind wanted her. Looking down at his lap, he rose and headed for the bathroom.

He stepped into the shower and stood under the spray with
his head down, hands pressed hard against the tile beneath the showerhead. Warm
water sluiced through his hair and down his body, frustration raining off him
with each rivulet pouring down his skin. He’d grabbed and squeezed hard on the base
of his shaft as he’d shouted himself awake this morning, but it’d been to no
avail. He’d ejaculated all over himself.

He hadn’t had a wet dream since his teen years and having
one today didn’t please him. The combination of his encounter with his mystery
woman superimposed over his encounter last night with Jordis had been too much
for him to handle.

He lifted his face into the water. Was he truly losing all
self-control? Those exotic eyes of Jordis’s—that seemed to shift color
with the light, her wardrobe, and her emotions—were wreaking havoc on his
equilibrium. He didn’t understand it. He’d dated plenty of women with beautiful
eyes. He didn’t remember any of those eyes turning him inside out or tripping
into his dreams until he practically pleasured himself in his sleep. As the
dream played over in his head, he groaned. Ms. Morgan had gone from simply
screwing with his concentration at work to affecting his ability to sleep.

He reached over and pumped two squirts of shampoo into his
palm. He rubbed his hands together then ran them through his hair. A slideshow
played in his mind as he worked his hair into a lather.
Juliet. Jordis.
Jordis. Juliet.
What was it about this woman, embodied in her two personas,
that appealed to him on such an intense level?

He remembered his confusion over Juliet’s eye color. He’d
been perplexed about whether they were green or brown. He hadn’t thought much
about it after he’d realized he’d met two different Juliets that night.
Although, part of him had wondered how he could have confused light brown eyes
with green ones, even with being a few sheets to the wind. After meeting
Jordis, he didn’t feel like such an idiot. Her chameleon eyes covered that
color spectrum at various times of the day.

How had it taken him days to figure out his mystery woman
and Jordis were one and the same? Because his encounter with Juliet had been
shrouded in dimness, he’d assumed he’d fixated on Jordis as a way to compensate
for not being able to find his mystery woman, a simple case of transference.
Jordis had served as a temporary substitute for
something—someone—out of his reach.

Now, he knew better.
His hope for avoiding an office romance had turned
into his greatest temptation to succumb to one. He couldn’t allow that to
happen. Jordis was off limits, and he possessed enough strength of will not to
let her sensuality lure him into another office romance mistake.

He rinsed his hair
and slathered in some leave-in conditioner. After
washing with his favorite scented body shampoo and getting dressed, he headed
to the office. By the time he got to work, he’d come to terms with the whole
Jordis situation. He’d concentrate on solving the mystery of the vanishing
discovery documents. Once he got focused on the case, his attraction to Jordis
would wane.

So as not to tempt fate, however, he’d avoid Ms.
Morgan today. He had a boatload of work to do, no sense pushing his
self-control unnecessarily. He needed to leave that walking temptation alone.

Immediately upon arriving at his desk, Michael delved into
dissecting his opponent’s motion for summary judgment. He managed to focus for
a few hours and stay away from Jordis, but she slipped into his thoughts before
lunchtime. By two o’clock, he needed a serious testosterone detox and headed
for his fifth straight two-hour workout of the week.

When he returned to his office, he threw down his duffel
bag, frustrated with himself. He circled his desk and stared at the annotated
papers he’d abandoned earlier. He needed help to prepare a response to the pending
motion. A disturbing correlation existed between facts relied upon in the
motion and confidential Metra Pharmaceutical information to which the opposing
side should not have been privy. The mysterious disappearance of a box of
privileged case documents no longer struck him as a mere filing issue.
Something didn’t add up, and he could use co-counsel input to determine what.

Chase pressed him daily to quit dragging his feet about
bringing in Jordis, but this case was too important to risk a slipup because
his brain was in his pants instead of on litigation strategy. How could he
possibly work closely with a woman who gave him wet dreams? He was beginning to
think—asshole or not—Covington would be the better choice to back
him on this case.

Twenty minutes later,
he
was
still pondering the issue when his mobile phone vibrated the receipt of a text
message. He checked his phone. A text from his younger sister queried whether
he wanted to join her for dinner on the Plaza. Michael smiled to himself. As a
graduate student, Raina rarely had any money and when she did, it went
exclusively towards school materials or her wardrobe. What she really meant was
did he want to buy her dinner, and since she had selected the Country Club
Plaza, she likely counted on dining at a really nice restaurant.

He typed,
Sure. Ur treat?

Her response made him laugh out loud:
ABSOLUTELY!!!
Mickey Ds ok? :D.

After texting Raina
his acceptance of her dinner invitation and telling her to
meet him by the Bronze Boar statue on West 47th Street, Michael stepped away
from his desk with a much lighter attitude. He looked forward to having dinner
with his sister. He couldn’t be around her unpredictable energy and stay in a
mood for long. She was exactly what he needed to keep his mind off a certain
leggy lawyer.

* * *

Jordis’s mood soared with positive energy that mirrored the
beautiful winter sunshine. She’d had a productive day at work. The deposition
she’d taken in her trademark infringement case had gone her way. She expected
to receive a nice settlement offer from opposing counsel sometime next week. On
top of that, she’d managed to avoid Michael Remington. By the time the deposition
had wrapped up, it had been late afternoon and Michael had been in meetings of
his own.

She’d made it a point to leave the building early. She
hadn’t wanted to run into him today. The last thing she needed was to be alone
with him again—in her office, in an elevator, or anywhere else—so
soon. She still hadn’t come to grips with his appearance in her dream. Whenever
she’d had a moment of respite today, her mind had drifted to him, alternating
between their encounter in the elevator last night and her erotic dream from
this morning. It was unnerving.

Those gorgeous eyes of his had haunted her. Wondering where
he’d gotten them from, she’d slipped into the Board Room before lunch to peek
at the portrait of his father. She’d found her answer there. Austin Remington
had been quite the looker. Although he’d been surfer blond and suntanned, his
eyes were steely gray. Michael had his father’s eyes. His olive skin tone must
have come from his mother.

After her Board Room visit, the warning bells she’d ignored
last night had reclanged their message of impending danger where Michael
Remington was concerned. Needing to quiet her troubled psyche, she chose to use
her early exodus to visit her favorite bookstore. One of the last of a dying
breed, the humongous Barnes & Noble on West 47th Street constituted a
four-level book palace and in-house café that romanced the bibliophile in her.

She wandered the largest print book collection in the city,
idly browsing new releases, picking up selections here and there, and reading
back covers until her frazzled nerves calmed. Two hours later, she decided to
buy something that would totally engross her but wouldn’t contain any romantic
underpinnings. She opted for a thousand-plus page horror thriller
about a small town that gets sealed off from the
rest of the world by an invisible dome.
The
novel had been out a while, but she hadn’t had time to read it. She managed to
snag a hardcover copy off the clearance table, which ended the outing on an
added note of delight. Sliding the novel into her reusable book tote on top of
several other purchases, she exited the mega bookstore with a buoyant step and
nearly collided with a laughing twenty-something hanging on the arm of . . .
Michael
Remington?

The look of shock on his face mirrored her own.

“Excuse me.” The twenty-something smiled at Jordis. “I
wasn’t paying attention.”

Jordis deftly covered her acute surprise and smiled back at
the girl. “That’s okay.”

The young lady was quite beautiful. Long, naturally curly
coffee-brown hair hung loose about her shoulders. The fall of hair framed a
heart-shaped face from which peered laughing gray eyes. Jordis looked back at Michael.
The young lady’s eyes matched his shade almost exactly.

“Jordis,” Michael said with a nod. “What are you doing
here?”

Jordis kept her smile going, trying to mask her unease at
her failure to avoid him for a full day. He wore black jeans and a black
turtleneck sweater under a wool coat, but the casual attire in no way detracted
from his overall appeal.

She lifted her book tote. “Gathering some new reading
material and enjoying the last few days of the Plaza Christmas lights. Some of
us do actually get out of the office at a decent hour from time to time.”
Hiding behind sarcasm, Jordis added with a pointed look, “The question is what
are you doing away from your desk at only . . .” She glanced at her watch. “Oh
my, six fifteen on a work night?”

Michael’s lips lifted halfway when she made a fake gasp of
surprise while checking the time.

“You two obviously know each other.” The young lady looked
back and forth between them.

“Yeah,” Michael replied. “Raina meet Jordis Morgan. Jordis,
this is my sister Raina.”

That would explain the matching gray eyes. Raina didn’t have
her brother’s deep olive coloring, however. Her skin was fairer, with only a
slight olive undertone.

“Nice to meet you.” Jordis extended her hand.

Raina shook her hand. “Likewise.”

Continuing to look between Michael and Jordis with an
inquisitive stare, Raina asked, “So, how do you two know each other?”

“Jordis works with me at the firm.”

Raina gave her a once over. “You’re a lawyer?” Blessed with
the unshackled honesty of the young and the not-yet-jaded, Raina didn’t bother
to mask her incredulity.

“Um, yes.” Jordis had dressed more LA today, but the
doubtful look on Raina’s face gave her pause. “Is that a problem?”

“No, but are you sure you work at my brother’s firm?”

Jordis looked at Michael, who could no longer conceal his
grin. His eyes surveyed the outfit she had on under her open winter coat. She
wore a short black jean skirt with brocaded pockets and seams over black opaque
tights that disappeared into black knee-high patent leather spiked-heel boots.
A silver chain with several charms attached looped around the right boot at
ankle level. A cropped, baggy loose cable knit sweater in coral layered over a
shiny silver long-sleeved tee that showed through the holes in the sweater. Medium-sized
silver hoop earrings dangled from her ears. Each bangle held two loops linked
together so they revolved in opposite directions when she moved her head.

“You certainly don’t dress like any of the lawyers I’ve met
from my brother’s firm.”

Jordis laughed, “Well, I don’t usually dress this cool for
the office. I try to tone it down so they think I’m as straight-laced as they
are. I took a few liberties today with casual Friday, knowing I wouldn’t go
home right after work.”

Raina laughed. “I like her,” she said to her brother. She
looked back at Jordis. “So, have you had dinner yet?”

“No, I was about to grab something and head home.”

“Why don’t you join us? We were just deciding where to eat.”

Jordis glanced at Michael who looked uncomfortable with his
sister’s invitation. She suspected he didn’t fraternize with his associates outside
the office. He didn’t really socialize with them in the office. She’d take the
hint and put him out of his misery.

“Thanks for the offer, Raina, but I don’t want to intrude on
your evening. It was nice—”

“Don’t be silly. You wouldn’t be intruding. Would she,
Michael?” Raina eyed her brother expectantly.

“No, of course not.” His voice held an edge that, to Jordis,
made him sound less than sincere.

“Besides,” Raina explained to Jordis in a mock whisper,
“you’ll help keep me sane. I love my brother, but sometimes he can be a bit
grumpy.”

“Hey, you do remember who’s paying for dinner tonight,
right?” Michael reminded her with a frown.

Raina grabbed him around the waist and hugged him from the
side. “Why you are, brother mine.” She batted her eyelashes at him and dripped
sweetness from her voice. “You wouldn’t begrudge me a decent meal because I
speak the truth now would you?”

Michael fought a smile through an indulgent shake of his
head. The siblings were obviously close. Raina had her big brother wrapped
firmly around her little finger, and she knew it.

“You know you haven’t exactly been the best of company
lately. Ever since New Year’s Eve—”

“Raina,” he interrupted in a stern voice.

“What happened New Year’s Eve?” Jordis eyed Michael then
Raina.

“Nothing,” Michael interjected in a tone that left no doubt
he considered the line of questioning closed. “How about we head to a
restaurant so we don’t have to wait in line forever for a table?” Michael
removed Jordis’s bag of books from her hand and shouldered them himself.
“Steakhouse okay with everyone?”

Michael and Jordis both looked at Raina. She shrugged. “It’s
fine with me unless Jordis would rather have seafood.”

“Nope. Steakhouse works for me.”

Raina hooked her arm through her brother’s, and Jordis fell
in at his other side. They meandered a few blocks west of the bookstore then
headed south towards the Plaza III restaurant on Pennsylvania Avenue. Once the
threesome reached the restaurant, the hostess seated them immediately at a
U-shaped booth. Raina slid into the center of the
U
. Michael and Jordis took positions on the wings, sitting opposite
each other.

*
* *

Michael watched Jordis smile at the waiter and give her
order. He tried not to be moved by her smile. He wasn’t succeeding. He couldn’t
believe he’d spent the day avoiding her, and accepted a dinner invitation from
his sister to get his mind off her, only to end up across the dinner table from
her. To make matters worse, she looked absolutely stunning. Someone upstairs
had a sick sense of humor.

When Raina had voiced her surprise earlier that Jordis
worked at his firm, Michael had known immediately what his clotheshorse of a
sister was thinking. The fashion diva in Raina had coveted Jordis’s outfit. It
wouldn’t exactly fit in at RHM. The lady’s personal flair equaled her
professional chic, although the two personas sat on opposite ends of the
fashion spectrum. She’d completed the black skirt and knee-high boots ensemble
with a high ponytail that rode the back of her head and made her sculpted
cheekbones standout. A few loose chestnut tendrils fell about her temples and
gave the hairstyle a feminine edge. She looked like she’d stepped off a runway
or out of the pages of a fashion magazine.

He thought about her boots. They conjured up visions of
whips, chains, and leather bustiers over lace teddies. Not that he’d ever been
into that sort of thing, but he had a sudden inkling of the possible appeal.

As if reading his thoughts, his sister said to Jordis, “Tell
me about those boots. And where can I get a pair just like them?”

“You can’t,” Jordis replied. “They came from a little boutique
on the Santa Monica Promenade in LA. The owner is a friend of mine. She specializes
in finding unique fashions she imports in small quantities from all over the
world. When customers shop at her store, they know they aren’t going to run
into a dozen or more ladies in the city wearing the same thing.”

Jordis took a drink of water. “These boots she discovered
somewhere in Europe. She refuses to say where, even to me. What she did tell me
was she immediately thought of me when she saw them, and she acquired only one
pair—in my size.”

“Cool. They must have cost a fortune.”