Джей Крауновер - Built

“I’m just playing catch-up. I’m not sure how I managed to get so far behind on things, but I am.”

She lifted her eyebrows at me and tilted her head to the file I had open in front of me on top of the mess of the other ones. “Could it be the fact that you haven’t looked at anything other than that case file for the last two weeks? Every time I’m in your office it’s open on your desk and you’re staring at it.”

There was no missing the black-and-white mug shot of Zeb or the angry downturn of his mouth in the image. It was well before his face was covered in fuzz and I couldn’t get over how young he looked and how furious he seemed in the image. That wasn’t the Zeb Fuller I knew and dreamed about at night, but it was a version of Zeb that existed and could prove very difficult to deal with when it came to fighting for his kid. The idea that passion could be so wild and dangerous taunted me.

I knew all about the assault charge and the fact he had pled no contest and served his time. The hiccup and the surprise in the mix was the additional charge of endangering the welfare of a child. The police report was vague and so were the notes from the public defender who handled Zeb’s case. But from what I could piece together, Zeb had gone after his sister’s boyfriend and hurt him badly enough to put the guy in the hospital for several weeks. The attack on the other man had happened at the sister’s apartment and well within the view of the sister’s then three-year-old little girl. The arresting officer claimed the child was terrified and crying. He claimed she wouldn’t even look at him or stop screaming when he came to intervene in the situation, thus prompting him to add the endangerment charge. It wasn’t uncommon for the police to level that charge upon physically violent parents who fought each other with no regard to how their actions might end up affecting the mental well-being of their kids. It was slightly more unusual for the charge to fall on a relative of the child, especially one who didn’t share the home with the minor, and in Zeb’s case it was going to make going before a judge decidedly more complicated.

“He’s a friend, so the case is more personal. I’m tied up in it a little more than I probably should be.”

Carla flashed me a knowing grin and leaned forward with the envelope she had in her hand. “He’s a cute friend. I can see wanting things to be very personal with him.” I rolled my eyes at her and reached across the mess in front of me for the envelope in her hand. My heart skipped several beats and then decided to start doing the tango when I saw the name of the lab the state used for all of its testing on the label.

My reaction must have been telling because Carla laughed a little as she climbed to her feet. “I was on my way out but had to drop a divorce amendment in the mail to go out tomorrow and caught the delivery guy just as he was dropping this off at the front desk. I knew you would want it as soon as possible.”

“Oh, thank you.” My fingers curled around the envelope like there was something precious and easily breakable inside. The contents inside of that simple manila covering were life changing. It seemed like they should be wrapped in something much more substantial than paper.

Carla walked across my office toward the door and paused at the threshold.

“Aren’t you going to rip into it? I thought you would be tearing into the results like a wolverine, as distracted and hung up on this case as you’ve been the last few weeks.”

I looked from the envelope to the paralegal and slowly shook my head in the negative. It was common for the attorney representing the questioning party in a paternity case to first look at the results and then figure out the best way to break the news, good or bad, to their client. In this particular case I knew Zeb needed to be the one to break the seal on the envelope. He needed to be the first person to lay eyes on the results to verify if little Hyde was in fact his. I felt it deep down in my guts that taking the results to him and letting him uncover the answer on his own was the right way to go about it.

“No. In this case I think the client needs to see the results first.”

“That’s different from how you normally handle paternity cases.” There was questioning in her tone as I moved some files around and searched for my cell phone in the wreckage on the top of my desk. I needed to take twenty minutes and clean everything up so I could put my mind and my work space back in functioning order.

“Like I said, this client is a friend and things are unorthodox all around.” Including the irrational way my body and everything that throbbed and pulsed deep down inside of me leaped to life from the first instant I’d laid eyes on Zeb.

“Right. It’s personal. Be careful with that, Sayer. Making anything that has to do with the law personal is a recipe for disaster. How many clients have you had to talk off the ledge because love wasn’t enough to fight against protocol and judge’s orders? You’re a great attorney and it looks like your friend needs you to be that more than anything else.” She told me good night and left my office door open since I was now officially the last person left in the upscale building in Lower Downtown Denver.

I tapped the corner of my phone on the open case file that had Zeb’s too-young face staring up at me in black and white. Even that harsh image had my heart kicking against my ribs. Carla’s warning had merit . . . too much of it.

If the results that I held in my hand were, in fact, positive for paternity, then Zeb needed me to be his legal representative way more than he needed me to be a woman with a ridiculous crush. I was going to be more useful to him in a professional capacity than I would be in a personal one, and as much as it made my insides dip and dive toward my toes, I realized that was how I was going to have to approach my dealings with him from now on. I needed to bring back the ice queen—the way I’d been when he was working on my house. Somehow I needed to ignore the inadvisable lust and remember that, really, we were just two people with very little in common and not a chance in hell of having a functioning romantic relationship.

I flipped the folder closed on that face that was following me everywhere, picked up my phone, and hit Zeb’s contact info. The phone rang and rang, which I thought was strange, as anxious as he had been for any news about the results. Usually I was running to catch his calls or to call him back, so the fact that my call went to voicemail made me frown and had immediate thoughts of what—and who—could be occupying his time running around like angry squirrels in my mind. Frustrated and slightly disgusted with myself, I tossed the envelope on top of the now closed case file and told myself I was leaving Zeb here, in my office, along with hundreds of other cases that were on my desk and in the filing cabinets behind it.

I was pulling bobby pins out of the coil of my hair, peeling panty hose off my legs, and kicking my heels off so I could put on my hot-pink Vans, courtesy of a shopping trip with my brother’s oh-so-hip and stylish girlfriend. They were quirky and casual, and before I moved to Colorado I never would have worn them. Even when I moved out of my father’s house for college. It wasn’t until I took the leap, took the risk to come to Denver and find Rowdy, that I could take itty-bitty baby steps toward not analyzing how every single decision I made would ultimately affect me. I could wear pink shoes because they were cute and not worry about getting looked down upon for that choice. Only my father could take something as simple as a pair of shoes and turn them into a reflection of a person’s worth and perceived shortcomings.