His eyes land on the stack, then back to mine. “These? No, of course not. I’m sorry. I bumped into them and a few fell. I put them all back in order. I hope I didn’t mess anything up.”
Geez, what’s wrong with me? “Of course not! Sorry, it’s been an eventful morning.” I think my dad made me on guard about this case now, paranoid everyone is out to get these covert files or something. I shake it off and stuff my purse under my desk. Levi won’t be back until late this afternoon, so I don’t see any harm with spending my lunch hour chatting with a friend. “How about this, if you don’t mind, I’d love to keep you company while you eat. We can find a spot in the lunchroom and go over some of my Miller notes. There are a few things I’d love clarification on.”
Braydon offers me his customary smile. “Deal.” He pushes in my chair and sticks his hand out, offering me to lead the way. I open my bottom drawer and place the files inside, locking it.
“Okay! Let’s go!”
“Right! If you want to claim theft, don’t wear the missing jewelry!” I laugh as Braydon and I take the stairs up to my floor for the Tuesday morning staff meeting. He called early this morning asking if I wanted coffee and to help him go over a small claims case for practice.
“Who knows, maybe they’ll believe her and grant her the insurance money. But let’s just say it doesn’t look promising.” He jokes about what we reviewed, a woman who claimed her house was robbed, only to show up to testify on a suspect she pointed out in a lineup while wearing the exact piece of jewelry she claimed he stole.
“Some people.” I shake my head, amazed at how some idiots try to scam the system. Braydon pulls out his keycard and swipes it to the door. A red light flashes. “Hmmm…your keycard not working?”
“That’s strange. It worked yesterday.”
“Here. Use mine.” He swipes mine, and we get the green light. We exit the stairwell right outside the conference room, and it’s already full. My eyes gravitate toward Levi, who is absolutely delicious in his navy-blue suit. The top few buttons open and absent tie. Yum. He takes me in, his eyes eating me alive. Noticing who’s next to me, his brows crinkle. It’s clear he doesn’t like that I still converse with Braydon, but if he wants to keep this up, I need Braydon as my decoy. Not to mention, I still do enjoy his company on a friend level.
The meeting gets started, and I pull out my notepad. Dad discusses all the new cases and assigns them to teams. When he says my name, my cheeks flush as he announces I’ll be joining the Miller case, and to my surprise, so will Braydon. I pat him on the shoulder, congratulating him. An hour goes by, and the meeting wraps up.
“Hannah, hold back.” Levi’s voice stops me. Braydon and I turn around to see him shaking an associate’s hand, then heading our way. “Braydon, you can go. I have no need for you. Just Hannah.”
Braydon opens his mouth to say something, but decides against it. “Yeah, sure. I’ll see you later, Hannah.” And he walks away.
I give Levi my full attention. “That wasn’t very nice.”
“I’m not worried about being nice to him. You look lovely today. How does lunch in my office sound? I’m famished and know the perfect meal.”
My belly tightens. It’s impossible to hide the spark in my eyes. “After you, boss.”
I’m hammering away on my computer, down to the last two witness testimonies. I pull out the last one: Clara Hill, wife of the city councilman who took his life. It’s hard to read her statement. How she found her husband. The typed suicide letter. The conversation they had the night before he died, coming clean about what he was asked to cover up. Her statement will singlehandedly take down Miller Industries.
“Hard at work as always?”
I gaze up to Braydon standing at my desk. “Hey there. Aren’t you supposed to be at the meeting with everyone?” I swore I saw his name on the list of attendees, along with my dad and Levi.
“Nah. It was an error. I get to slack off today. Just kidding. What are you working on?”
I peer down, then close the file. “Oh, nothing. Just entering in witness testimonies for the Miller case. Nothing I’m sure you don’t already know.” I press enter, finishing up and saving the document. Taking the large rubber band, I secure the folders and stand. “Hey, I gotta run downstairs and sign these into records, wanna come with me and tell me more about the theft case?”
“Oh, you bet I do!”
“Great! I just need to run to the bathroom. Give me two minutes, okay?”