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Chapter One
“What we needis to find you a girlfriend.”
James Watson flinched as a folder dropped past his face onto the desk in front of him.
Here it was. The ever cliché, and completely misguided, attempt to get the single guy a girl. He just hadn’t seen this coming from his cousin and in the middle of the workday, no less.
“I mean, not like right now or anything.” Ryan shoved his hands in his suit pockets. “Right now, I need you to go through these files and find any texts from numbers in Colorado during the month of October.”
“So, why exactly do I need a girlfriend?” James pulled the files toward him and flipped open the folder, only a tiny bit daunted at the one-inch stack of pages.
“Well, my little cousin, you obviously need a relationship that goes beyond your right hand.”
James inwardly cringed and glanced around the bustling law office to see who might’ve overheard Ryan’s completely inappropriate comment. Fortunately, anyone close enough was either in another conversation or on the phone.
“I’m actually left-handed,” he admitted with a wry grin. “And I’m good, thanks. I was in one relationship pretty much since puberty and, now that it’s over, I think some time being single is exactly what I need.”
“Yeah, but that relationship ended, what... like, a year ago?”
“It’ll be a year in three months, two weeks, and four days.”
“Christ, I’m surprised you don’t know the hours and minutes.” Ryan shook his head and stared down at him pensively. “You need to move on from Anna.”
“Hannah.”
“Tomato, tomahto. Either way, she’s your ex. Move on from that shit and find another pair of thighs to keep you warm at night.”
He didn’t even flinch at his cousin’s crude words. In the year and a half that James had worked at the firm with him, he’d become accustomed to his quirks. If one could call Ryan’s lust for chasing girls a quirk. Closing deals in the courtroom and the bedroom. That was the motto he proudly touted.
Since James was a kid, he’d put his cousin—who was nine years older—on a pedestal. There was nothing Ryan couldn’t do. Top of his class in high school and college, breezed through law school and aced the bar, and then became a partner at the firm of Wright and Williams before he’d turned thirty-five. And he’d done it all with a rotation of gorgeous women on his arm.
God, how he’d envied Ryan. And he’d set out to mimic that kind of success career-wise. Making partner in the next five years was on the top of James’s five-year plan. It’d be hard as hell, probably a long shot, but not impossible if he did things right.
“I’m not wrong here,” Ryan pointed out after a moment. “When was the last time you went on a date?”
“Date? What is this word you speak of?” James shook his head. “Some of us are working sixty hours a week while getting ready to take the bar in two weeks.” Under his breath, he muttered, “Again.”
Ryan looked around and dipped his head down, like he didn’t want anyone to overhear.
“Hey, let that shit go. It was a fluke. Bad circumstances, you said it yourself. You’re going to pass with flying colors this time.”
“I know.” And he didn’t doubt for one second that he would.
Being a lawyer was his life right now. There were no distractions. No one to make plans with when he wasn’t working his butt off at the firm.
He had no girlfriend. All his guy friends were busy with their wives, or getting engaged to their girlfriends.
His breath caught and held.
Like Hannah.
For a moment, he’d almost forgotten that his ex-girlfriend had recently gotten engaged to one of his best friends.
The ultimate Bro Code violation.
How messed up is that?
There it was. The small sting of sadness that he hated to acknowledge.
