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If he was a criminal, she would never be able to see him again. Which was a stupid thing to think, because she didn’t plan on seeing him again, and he hadn’t made a move to see her again anyway.
Not that they could see each other again. That would be highly irregular. Even more irregular than bumping into him at Copley Square and agreeing to have breakfast. That had been neighborly concern: Nick wanting to make sure she was okay, that she didn’t need medical attention.
She shook her head as she ran. She was talking in circles — to herself. In other words, she was losing her mind, and she was losing it over Nick Murphy. Being stupid and romantic when she’d never been either of those things.
There was no point daydreaming about Nick. They were on opposing teams — for now anyway. And besides, she didn’t do relationships and it’s not like a one-night stand with a potential defendant was any more appropriate than a relationship.
It all made perfect sense when she laid it out like that. It made perfect sense when she thought about the possibility of eventually convening a grand jury to indict the Murphy brothers. It made sense when she thought about eventually sitting opposite his counsel in a courtroom. It even made sense when she turned into Copley Square, jogging past the church and down the path, past the fountain to the very spot she’d fallen the week before.
It made sense right up until she saw him sitting on one of the benches, something hopeful and desperate on his face when she came into view.
He rose to his feet, hands in his pockets, his eyes meeting hers, and she understood that he’d been waiting for her. And that seemed to make sense too, although she couldn’t for the life of her figure out why.
11
It was one of the few times in his life when he’d known something was a mistake the moment he’d done it. He wasn’t rash. That was Declan’s department, and to a different degree, Ronan’s when he was pissed.
Nick was practical. It was why he’d taken over MIS’s financials, why he was the one who made decisions about their investments, their exit strategies should the worst come to pass.
And yet he hadn’t thought twice about heading to Copley Park that morning. He’d had coffee with Ronan while they discussed some of the simple investigative cases they’d taken while they waited out the AG’s office. He’d looked at his phone, realized it was about the same time he’d gone running the week before when he’d run into Alexa Nash, and had grabbed his jacket.
He’d gotten to the park early and had taken a seat on one of the benches where he’d proceeded to sit for twenty-five minutes, his hope that he would see her again so fervent he couldn’t even pretend it wasn’t what it was.
When he’d seen her jogging toward him he’d stood without thinking, wanting to make sure she’d seen him, wanting to make sure he didn’t miss her. She’d stopped, her breath exploding from her mouth in puffs of smoke.
She hadn’t even looked surprised.
Now she was sitting across from him at The Friendly Toast, cradling a cup of coffee in her hands while her omelette grew cold on the plate. He’d already demolished most of his banana waffle — she was right, the food was amazing — while he’d waited in nervous silence for her to speak.
“You were waiting for me,” she finally said.
He met her eyes. “You were looking for me.”
She opened her mouth as if to say something, then seemed to change her mind. She took a long swig of coffee instead.
“I’m sorry about last week,” she said. “The way I left…”
“I’m sorry if the question was too personal.”
She took a deep breath. “I was in an accident a long time ago, right after high school, a car accident. It was…” She inhaled deeply. “It was serious. I almost didn’t make it, and my best friend, well… she didn’t make it.”
There were a million things he wanted to say. That he knew all about it, that he’d thought of little else since the first time they’d met, that he’d watched interviews with her after the accident, footage of her in physical therapy for special interest stories in the local news.
That he thought she was a warrior for surviving what she’d survived.
Instead all that came out of his mouth were the words, “I’m sorry."
She nodded. “It took a lot for me to get better. A lot of PT, a lot of time in the gym. I was behind in school because of it, so I had to work double time just to catch up.”
He knew from the background he’d done on her that she’d done more than catch up — she’d graduated law school two years ahead of the students who’d started the year she was supposed to start, but he couldn’t make himself say it.
She would think he was crazy. He’d invaded her privacy, had dug around her past and then pretended not to know her. Right now she was so open, the wall that had been between them through most of their last conversation lowered enough that he could see her pain.
“That must have been incredibly hard,” he said. “The accident, your friend, recovery… all of it.”
“It was,” she said. “And it should be in the past, but the truth is I still have trouble with it.”
“That’s understandable.” He hated himself for the platitude. It was so weak. It didn’t begin to speak to what she’d been through, but somewhere along the line he’d decided not to tell her that he knew. He could say it just happened that way — that it was still just happening that way — but that would be a lie.
