Page 36 of Legally Mated
He shrugged. “I had all my appointments moved to next week.” His gaze met mine and there was more than just heat in them; they glowed with determination.Damn, what have I draggedhiminto?
“Don’t hurt your reputation for me. I mean it.” My heart sped up as all the consequences for him hit me, from losing his clients, to losing his place in the practice, to… I couldn’t think any moreaboutit.
“It’s fine. There’s enough weight to it that I think it can take a few hits.” He raised his eyebrows and waited for me to acknowledge the truthofit.
I did, by laughing, or wheezing anyway, then wincing. “Stop trying to make me laugh.” He was right though—I hadn’t realized how big a deal Mac and Jason had scored when he’d agreed to take their case. Not being familiar with family law and who was who, I’d just done a search of recent judgments and made a list ordered by the number of cases won. I’d never anticipated getting this lucky with my first choice or that it was pure luck that he’d won a domestic case in the week before I started mysearch.
Double lucky. I squeezed his fingers again and felt the tension drain out of my body at his answering squeeze. “I think I’m going to sleep again. Wake me beforeyougo?”
“Not if you’resleepingwell.”
“Laine—”
“No, you getting better is more important to me right now than soothing my nerves with a few words from you. If you’re asleep, you’ll stay asleep.” He gave me a look, the same one I’d seen in the courtroom when he wordlessly warned the opposing counsel they should back off before heshreddedthem.
“All right.” I said the words. Grudgingly. And mostly because ten ton weights had suddenly attached themselves to my eyelids and I didn’t think I had enough time to win this argument before theyclangedshut.
As the world faded away, I thought I felt a faint brush of lips on my forehead. And, more startling, I thought I heard him say, “Loveyou.”
Chapter29
Laine watchedas Garrick faded off into the Land of Nod, then sat down with the folder he’d had one of the paralegals bring over to him. He knew he should be working—despite what he’d told Garrick, he did have to be in court to argue a grandparents’ rights case and it was going to be touch and go. The late husband’s parents had been the primary child care for the couple’s two children, so there was already an established relationship, which meant that precedent for some sort of joint custody or visitation had alreadybeenset.
But the children’s mother had presented evidence of a pattern of behavior and alienation that had rung alarm bells in Laine’s head, confirmed when a sudden flurry of calls to children’s services and the police had begun. It wasn’t his usual sort of case, but it was interesting, and his billable hours really hadn’t quite recovered, regardless of what he told Garrick. Some of that was his fault, but not all of it, and he wondered if the rest of the partners—lawyers he’d known for years, since he’d been a wet-behind-the-ears law student—really were uncomfortable enough with his relationship with Garrick and the pack for that kind of subtle sabotage, in hopes of encouraging him to strike out on his own. In fear of his associations tainting theirreputation.
After all, he already knew howDanfelt.
His lips twisted in a momentary snarl, then he smoothed his face back to something innocuous and unlikely to set off alarm bells in the minds of the nursingstaff.
But no matter how hard he tried to focus on the notes on the paper, to make his plans, play his own devil’s advocate—he missed his regular devil’s advocate, lying pale and far too quiet in the hospital bed—his mind kept returning to those awful few moments when he’d watched realization bloom across Garrick’s face, and further back, the fear in his eyes as he’d tackled Laine to theground.
The folder slowly tipped down until it lay flat on his thighs, forgotten while he watched every breath and twitch of eyelid of the man in the bed. This was his fault. The question was—how to keep it from happening again? He was starting to think that Holland was right and that he wasn’t as good for Garrick as he thoughthewas.
Laine sighed and picked up the folder, marshaling a few more arguments before he let his work fall again. A faint line had appeared between Garrick’s brows and Laine checked the time, and then the morphine pump attached to Garrick’s I.V. It had a button on a long cable, meant to give Garrick an extra shot of painkiller at need. Could he press it for him? Better to check with the nurses. He slipped the folder into his briefcase and stepped outside the curtain surrounding Garrick’s bed, intending to interrupt one of the nurses. Instead, he found Holland talking to one at the octagonal desk at the center of the sub-I.C.U. Holland looked up at Laine, his eyes sharp and watchful even though he already looked tired, and it was barely seven in themorningyet.
“Laine,” he said ingreeting.
“Good morning,” Laine said back, careful to keep his tone bland, remembering that incident with the doctors yesterday. He added a lilt to his words that acknowledged Holland’s standing in the pack, and firmly suppressed his own irritation at admitting someone else was the bossofhim.
One of Holland’s eyebrows tipped up slightly at that, and he nodded at Laine with half-closed eyes, accepting the slightly packishgreeting.
I’m trying, dammit.He hoped Holland remembered.Well, at least he didn’t snub me.Laine turned to the nurse. “He’s asleep, but I think he’s having some pain, his face is tense and he’s frowning. Can he have some more morphine or is he on aschedule?”
“The machine is designed so he can self-administer, up to a point. If it’s severe enough to wake him up, he can push the button himself. He doesn’t need an assistant.” She gave Laine a hard look, as if she knew what he wasplanning.
“Come sit with me,” Holland said, holding a hand out to usher Laine back to the curtained alcove. Over his shoulder, Holland asked, “When will the doctor bearound?”
“Sometime in the next hour,” she said. Her tone was edged with anger, or perhaps fear—it was sometimes hard to tell the difference between the twoofthem.
Laine turned around and pointedly said, “Thank you,” to remind her that Garrick wasn’t alone, and that she needed to remember that shifters had rights that she couldn’t contravene withoutconsequences.
And if I catch her screwing around with Garrick’s care, I will crush herwiththem.
When he turned back, he found Holland watching him shrewdly, but the shifter just shrugged and led the way to Garrick’s bedside. As soon as they got there, Holland dug out the little morphine button andpushedit.
“You’re not supposed to do that,” Laine murmured, but truthfully, if Holland hadn’t done it, he would havehimself.
Holland snorted. “She’d like to see him suffer, so she knows he’ll be too sick to hurt her. It’s about all I can smellonher.”
