“...the paper said you’re very prominent in your field.”
He shrugged.
“It said that you’re the top orthopedic surgeon in northern California.” She tilted her head slightly, well-manicured red-painted nails fingering the rim of her wineglass.
He smiled, consciously aware of what her fingers were doing. His accomplishments had always turned her on. He had forgotten about that. She played; he watched. He had to break the spell. “Want to see pictures of my boys?”
“Sure,” she said, dropping her hand from the glass.
He pulled out his wallet and flipped through the photos of Leeza, coming to rest on the pictures of Elliott and Jonah. She looked them over.
“They’re gorgeous,” she finally said.
He had forgotten how much she had wanted to have children.
“I guess I should’ve adopted a child.”
“It’s not too late.”
“I suppose. But I’d prefer to have my own. It’s kind of hard when you don’t have any prospects. Takes two.”
He caught her looking at him; he chuckled nervously. “I’ve got enough problems right now, Catherine, without fathering your child.”
“You could supply the sperm. I could draw something up that would remove all responsibility for you.”
He sat back in his seat. “Is that what this is all about?”
“What do you mean?”
“This dinner.”
“No. I was genuinely interested in seeing you. I just thought that while we were on the topic...”
“I couldn’t. It’d be — it’d be a really bad idea.”
“I understand,” she said, taking a bite of her veal.
Madison changed the subject, asking her about old friends with whom she was still in contact. They finished their meal and left the restaurant. He walked her to her car, their breath fogging the cold winter air.
“Why don’t you come back to the house?”
He looked into her warm hazel eyes and felt the allure of her invitation.
“I’ll make some coffee and we’ll have some dessert, relive old times.”
“Catherine...reliving old times with you means ending up in the kitchen, all right. On top of the table.”
“And what’s wrong with that? It used to be fun.”
“I’m married. A couple of months ago, I was happily married. If I’ve got any hope of salvaging it, the last thing I should do would be sleeping around with an old girlfriend. Think what the papers would say about that.”
“You always were the most honorable man I’ve ever known, Phil.”
“Tell it to the jury.”
She gave him a kiss on the cheek. “I’d be glad to, if I thought it would help.”
He opened her door for her. She sat down, sinking into the bucket seat of the well-maintained Porsche 928, apparently one of the few possessions left over from her law partner days.
“We had a good thing once. If things don’t work out with Leeza, there is a future here for you, Phil. Remember that.”
“That’s the nicest thing anyone has said to me in months.”
He closed her door, gave her a wave, and trudged back to his car, hands thrust into his jacket pockets. It was indeed cold out, but his heart had just been thoroughly warmed.
CHAPTER 33
“DO YOU REMEMBER CATHERINE Parker?” Madison asked while Hellman was trying to read his message slips. The mention of the name from the past stopped his gaze in mid-sentence.
“Do I remember Catherine Parker?” Hellman looked at Madison. “That’s like asking me if I like a tender filet mignon.”
“She was something, huh?”
“She represented all the things our mothers told us to watch out for. She also represented the wildest times of our lives.”
Madison nodded thoughtfully. “Brings back memories.”
“Yeah, of competing with each other on virtually everything. Women, grades, basketball...” Hellman was staring up at the ceiling at nothing in particular, his feet on the desk, the messages he was so intently studying a moment ago stacked to the left of his feet.
“And I won the woman,” Madison said.
“Temporarily. Until somebody with more money came along.”
“There was more to her than that,” Madison said, placing his own feet up on Hellman’s desk. “She had her faults, but she had a good heart.”
“What made you suddenly think of her?”
“I had dinner with her last night.”
“You did what?” Hellman yanked his feet off the desk and sat straight up.
“I had dinner with her.”
“Your wife’s left you and you think the way to coax her back is by having dinner with an old flame who you almost married? An old flame who was hotter than — ”
“Jeffrey, nothing happened.”
“What am I gonna do with you? You’re well-meaning, but you seem to be looking for ways to bury yourself.”
“Hey, it was no big deal. And I don’t regret it. She made me feel good about myself for the first time in a long time. Is that so bad?”
“She wants to get in your pants. She wants to crawl inside your chest and capture your heart again. Fifteen years ago she made the mistake of her life and now she sees an opening. She’s swooping in for the kill.”
“You’re reading it all wrong.”
“Am I?” Hellman asked.
“Yes.”
“And what do you base that on?”
Madison paused. “Because you just are.”
“Oh, okay, the old ‘I-just-know-it’s-true-but-I-really-don’t-have-any-proof’ defense.”
“Must you always look at things from a legal perspective?”
“Let me guess. She’s divorced from that rich guy. What was his name? Todd?”
“Tom,” Madison said. “Yeah, divorced.”
“That’s a surprise.”
There was silence for a moment. “She wanted to use my sperm to impregnate her.”
Hellman laughed, then realized Madison was not smiling. “You’re serious. With Catherine, I guess I’d believe just about anything.”
“I turned her down, don’t worry,” Madison said.
“I’m not the one who has to worry.”
“What does it matter? I had dinner with an old friend. She made a proposition and I turned her down. So what?”
“So I know how much your family means to you and right now you don’t need stirred-up memories of Catherine the
