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Christa is twenty-seven, only a year older than me, and we’ve been friends only two years but she’s my best friend in the world. While my other friends from high school and college had left the state or settled with husbands and kids, we drifted apart. I met Christa at the law firm and we’d immediately hit it off. So she hadn’t met any of my family except my mom once or twice before she passed.
“I don’t know. What’s he in prison for again?” she asks.
“Involuntary manslaughter. Drunk driving, killed a lady,” I murmur so no one else can hear us.
“Oh, man. Yeah, that’s bad.”
“Well, I’m not saying this just because he’s my brother, but he’s not a drunk or anything. Sure, he liked to party on the weekends but honestly, it was more distracted driving. He had been drinking, yes, and was just over the legal limit, but he dropped his phone while on a two-lane highway, bent down to grab it... head-on collision in Boulder,” I tell her quietly.
Christa points a finger at me with wide eyes. “Wait. I think I remember that case. I had just gotten my degree and had just started at Mills & Graves. We took an interest in it. Melinda said the guy was for sure going to do time, even though he didn’t mean to hurt anyone, obviously. Crazy that was your brother.”
“Oh yeah, no way he wasn’t going tonotdo time, they make an example out of people,” I say, parroting what Carter told me.
“So what’s he gonna do for work? It’s hard for ex-cons to find jobs,” she comments.
I cringe at the use of ‘ex-con’ to describe my brother, but I really have no defense to that. “He asked Carter for a job, but we’re hoping Carter’s friend can get him a job at the hospital instead.”
“Oh, yeah? Doing what? Like janitorial stuff or a cook?” she asks presumptuously, which I don’t blame her for.
I chuckle. “No, he’s got a master’s in sports medicine and wants to go back to doing physical therapy. He was on his way to getting his doctorate when he got locked up.”
Christa’s eyebrows hit her hairline. “Uh, what does he look like again?”
I laugh and pull out my phone, showing a picture of the two of us right before he went inside.
She whistles through her teeth. “Damn, he must work out. And those blue eyes. Wow.”
“He’s a total gym-rat. He’ll love the gym more than you, trust me,” I tell her.
She waves a dismissive hand. “Girl, he can spend all the time he wants at the gym as long as he saves some of his workout for me. Uh!” She uses both hands to make a thrusting motion.
“Gag! Don’t talk about my brother like that!”
“Okay fine, on one condition.”
I lift a brow over the rim of my wine glass. “What’s that?”
“You’ll introduce us.”
“I will, but it won’t be for a while. I’m reading a book right now and trust me, you don’t want him fresh outta prison. Let him go find some ho to get his sex-deprivation”—I suppress a gag at even talking about him like this—“outta his system, and when he’s ready, I’ll introduce you. You sure you won’t get in trouble at work for dating an ‘ex-con’?” I ask, making air quotes.
“Girl, who’s gonna find out? It’s not like I’ll tell them. Plus, the answer is no. They can’t fire me for that. Only if I worked in law enforcement or something.”
“Can I get you anything else?”
I look up to see the pretty Japanese server looming at our table.
“I’ll take another wine and she’ll have another of whatever that is,” I say, pointing to Christa’s empty glass.
“Can I get you dessert?”
“Chocolate,” we say in unison, laughing.
“Right away, ladies,” she replies, walking off with a smile.
***
“You seem distracted,” I say, running circles over Carter’s bare chest while we lounge together on a lazy Saturday morning.
