Page 42 of Indiscretion

“I’m an early riser.”

“I need to get my butt back to the gym now that this cast is off.”

“Your butt looks pretty good to me.” I winked.

I thought her cheeks might’ve pinked a bit, but I wasn’t getting close enough to find out. “Thanks for ordering.”

***

“So what made you move to New York?” I asked before shoving a fry into my mouth. “Ben mentioned your sister lives here. Did you guys grow up in the area or something?”

Naomi shook her head. “No. We grew up in Virginia. My sister met her husband in college, and he was from Brooklyn. They moved to Manhattan after they graduated. I was looking for a change and wanted to be closer to my sister. Frannie has AML, acute myeloid leukemia. She was diagnosed seven years ago, but it went into remission. It came back three months ago, and the treatment has been rough on her. Our mom died from the same thing. It’s not supposed to run in families, but…” She shrugged. “She really needs a bone-marrow transplant. I was her best hope, but I wasn’t a match.”

“I’m sorry.”

She nodded. “Thank you. She’s a single mom now with two young kids, so I figured I could help out. I’m staying with her. She lives down in the financial district. Or Fidi, as they say. I need a New York acronym dictionary.”

I smiled. “Had you ever spent time here before moving?”

“A weekend here and there over the years, but no extended period of time. I was originally debating moving out to California before my sister got sick again. I love San Diego. But I thought if New York couldn’t give me a fresh start, at least it’s big enough to allow me to get lost for a while.”

“Do you know anyone here besides Lily and Ben?”

“One other person. Simon. He’s an old friend. I guess technically he’s an ex-boyfriend. We were a couple for a few years in college. We split up on good terms when we graduated. He went to medical school in Texas, and I went off to Michigan to go to law school. We’ve kept in touch over the years, even though we don’t get to see each other too often. He’s an oral surgeon, but he recently took a three-month sabbatical to do a Doctors-Without-Borders-type program over in India. He specializes in cleft-palate surgeries and jaw reconstruction. He lives up on Eightieth Street.”

“When was the last time you saw him?”

“Four years ago, at a mutual friend’s wedding. But he’s actually flying home today. His sister is getting married Saturday. So we’re going to get together before he goes back to India for the last six weeks. We’re having dinner Friday night.”

An uneasy feeling I didn’t like settled in the pit of my stomach.

“What about you?” Naomi reached over and stole one of my fries. When I looked at her, she halted with it halfway to her mouth. “Do you mind?”

“Does it matter? You already did it.”

She rolled her eyes. “You can take some of mine.”

“I don’t wantsalad. And clearly neither do you, even though you ordered it.”

“Get over it.”

Her attitude made me smile. “You’re going to fit right in, here in New York.”

Naomi pushed her salad around with her fork. “So what’s your New York story? I know you must’ve grown up in Connecticut since that’s where Ben is from, and you two have been friends forever. When did you move here?”

“I came for college. Went to Columbia for undergrad and wound up going to law school there, too. Never left.”

“I’m surprised you and Ben aren’t partners?”

I shook my head. “We both did a criminal prosecution externship here in the City the summer after our second year of law school. Emily did it, too.”

“You? Prosecution? Not defense?”

“I wanted to learn the tricks from the other side.”

“Is that how you met Emily?”

“No. Emily and I met in law school. I was first in our class, and she was second. I was editor-in-chief of moot court; she was editor-in-chief of law review. We competed against each other at every turn, but it made us both work harder, so we got a lot out of the rivalry. The day we graduated, she asked me if I was interested in going to work at her father’s firm with her. Her dad had been the Kings County DA for a decade before he opened his own practice. I figured I could learn a lot from him, so I took the job. A year later, Emily showed up at the office earlier than she normally did and caught her father getting a blow job from a first-year associate. He was married to her mother at the time. The shit hit the fan, Emily quit, and we decided to hang out a shingle together.”

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