Page 71 of The Professor

“Sure.” Trixie stood and dropped some bread into the toaster. “And there’s coffee, too.”

“Perfect.” Bridget grinned at me. “You good?”

“Yes, thanks. You?”

“All good. How was the pleasure room?” She raised her eyebrows at me then shifted her attention to Andrew. “Fun?”

“I…I…er…it was…” I started.

“None of your business.” Andrew squeezed my hand. “It’s no one’s business.”

“Except you must have been exhausted afterwards,” Dalton said. “You don’t usually sleep here. You usually get home.”

“Needs must.” Andrew sipped his tea. “It was late.”

“So you haven’t been to his bachelor pad?” Bridget asked me.

“No.” I turned to Andrew. “I haven’t.”

“I’ll take you, later.”

Bridget grinned. “Oh yes, and then tell me what it’s like. I’ve got this image of a mad professor’s studio, towering cases of books, models of skeletons, walls of Post-it notes joined together with string…you know what I mean?”

I laughed. “Yes, I’ll tell you.”

The door opened. Two men walked in. One looked just like Cillian.

“Finn!” Cillian jumped up. “Fuck, I didn’t know you were released.”

“Just.” Finn embraced Cillian and gave him a pat on the back. “Charges dropped. Both me and Grant told to go and not come back.”

“Really?” Mitch nodded. “Good result considering you were caught in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“Yeah, but that criminal defense lawyer…” Grant, who was tall with dark curly hair, put his hands on his hips and surveyed the room. “She was the bee’s bloody knees, shit-hot on everything. The police couldn’t pin anything on us, she made everything circumstantial.”

“So you got rid of your guns,” Phil said. “At the scene, right?”

“Yeah, wiped them then shoved them down the back of a sofa as soon we realized it was a raid. We hadn’t paid for sex, or had sex, there wasn’t much they could pin on us. They tried hard enough, but nothing stuck.”

“She was incredible, this lawyer, Rebecca Saunders.” Finn nodded slowly. “Really incredible.”

“Cute?” Cillian asked.

“You bet.” Finn laughed and helped himself to coffee. “Damn cute. In fact, she fell for my Irish charm.”

“What do you mean?” Phil asked.

Grant laughed. “He asked her out, and ’cause he’s got the luck of the Irish, she said yes even though she is way out of his league.”

“Really?” Cillian asked. “You asked her out, Finn?”

“Yeah, thought I’d take her to The Ivy on Friday.”

“Can I come?” Cillian grinned and kept his attention on his brother.

“You want to?” Finn asked.

“Sure, if she’s hot.”