She laughed. “After the last dance?”
“You got the flowers, I take it.”
“They’re beautiful, like the roses.”
“Like you.”
“Sweet-talker,” she protested.
“You haven’t had enough of that, I think. So I guess it’s up to me.”
“Hmmm. Impress me.”
He did his best. By the time they hung up, it was nearing daybreak. He was so aroused, so ready to explode that only a cold shower would help him. As it was, he climbed back into bed with his hair wet and cold, and his body still on fire.
“Just wait, Torie Hagen,” he murmured. “You’ll dance with me, and I’ll never let you go.”
“So somebody drugged the cops? Wow.” Pam was shocked by the latest development. “Hard to believe.”
“Yeah, scared me,” Torie said, then thanked the waiter who served their breakfast plates.
“You should have called me. I would have come over.”
“I know.” Torie ducked her head so Pam wouldn’t see the blush that stole over her cheeks.
“What? What is it?” Pam eyed her with suspicion. “You’re blushing. Who did you call, Paul?”
When Torie didn’t answer, Pam laughed. “Can’t fool me, girl. I can see right through you. How long did you talk?”
“An hour,” Torie admitted. “Maybe more.”
“At three in the morning, eh? Well, well, well.”
“Stop that.”
“What?”
“Being so smug and I-told-you-so.”
Pam attempted to look serious, sliding her sunglasses off her head to perch them on her nose in professorial fashion. “Now reaaaaallly, darling,” she drawled with dramatic skill. “You muuuuust tell me everything. All the delectable details.”
“No,” Torie protested. “That’s personal.”
“Uh huh. Personal. So you’re going tonight, right?” In one of her lightning changes of subject, Pam shifted to the party. “The partner dinner,” she said, snapping her fingers under Torie’s nose. “C’mon, keep up here. You’re going, right?”
“Yes, I’m going. I wish you could be there, too. I could probably get you a date,” she said, trying for a sly look.
“God, don’t do that, your face might freeze that way. Who, some hunky, rich partner drooling to get his hands on little ol’ me, or merely another skanky lawyer?”
“You have dated a few.”
“You have no idea. So?”
“How about Melvin? He’s single.”
“Weaselboy? Uh, no way.”
“Did everyone call him that? I thought it was just Paul and Todd.”
“It was. Todd told me to stay away from him one time, at a party for a bunch of the frat brothers. Said he was trouble.”
“I guess he was for a while. Seems like he’s straightened out now.”
“Don’t get me wrong, I like a reformed bad boy as much as the next red-blooded American woman, but that one? I don’t think so.”
Torie paused, her breakfast forgotten for a moment. “Yeah, what is it about him?” Another thought distracted her. “Hey, do you remember Blaine and Deke?”
“The Big Blue Ox and Mister Muscles?” Pam asked, using the nicknames she had for them. “Yeah, I remember them. I ran into Deke at that Chamber thing you dragged me to. He hit on me, hard, but I didn’t have the time. And Blaine, seems to me I’ve seen him around, but I don’t know either one of them that well.”
“We looked at a list yesterday.” Torie explained about the list and the questions the men had asked of her.
“Oh, baby.” Pam’s eyes were wide with shock and glistened with tears. “Why didn’t you call me? You shouldn’t have had to go through that, relive that alone.”
Torie closed her eyes on tears of her own. How like Pam to think that way. “Thank you,” she said, her voice catching on the tears. “I wasn’t alone, though. Paul was there.”
“I see.”
Torie laughed at the dry rejoinder. “Pretty much, yeah.”
“So, I repeat my earlier questions, which you
