Free Law of Attraction by Allison Leotta Page A

set a Starbucks cup in front of her. She smiled and sipped the latte, feeling her headache recede a fraction as the caffeine hit her bloodstream. It was exactly what she needed. She looked around the kitchen. It was gorgeous, all dark wood and stainless steel and granite. The floor-to-ceiling rock fireplace was at her back.
    From one of his shopping bags, Nick pulled out a box with the words JULIA’S EMPANADAS written on it. It was from a little Salvadoran joint down the street. Anna smiled with delight as she selected one of the miniature meat pies.
    “I love these,” she said.
    “Me too.”
    Nick watched her savor a bite. Then he settled next to her at the counter and they polished off the box of empanadas. Anna sat back at last, full and content, her hangover obscured by a cloud of happiness. She studied Nick. He looked adorably unlawyerlike with tousled dark hair and an unshaven face.
    “So,” Nick ventured. “Whatever happened to that guy you were seeing in law school?”
    “Josh? We were talking about moving in together once we both got to D.C.”
    “I always thought he was a smart guy.”
    “But he got a clerkship in Atlanta. He’s staying there.”
    “I always knew he was an idiot.”
    Anna laughed. “No, he’s a good guy. It just turned out we weren’t serious enough to change cities for each other.”
    In fact, Josh was one of the sweetest men Anna had ever met—which made him utterly undatable in the long term. Anna realized in college—when she was on the Dean’s List and her boyfriend was getting expelled—that she had a tendency to fall for bad boys. Ever since, she tried to choose nicer men. With Josh, she’d oversteered. He was so nice as to be totally uninteresting. They’d parted ways exactly as they’d dated—amicably and without passion.
    “What about you?” Anna volleyed. “I seem to recall that you hadplenty of female attention at law school. All those groupies at your guitar gigs in the Hark. Has there been anyone special since then?”
    “Not till last night.”
    She looked at him curiously, wondering if this was a standard line, as she was sure the “grand tour” was. Nick stood next to her stool and gazed down at her upturned face for a minute. He leaned down and kissed her. “Anna, I’m crazy about you.”
    Anna felt her body respond to his touch now and to the memory of the night before. She’d expected this morning to be awkward, but she felt natural with Nick, completely at ease. All traces of her shyness had disappeared. She deepened the kiss, pulling him toward her.
    After a moment, he drew back an inch to ask, “What are you doing today?”
    It was a Saturday morning. Although she’d planned to go to the office today and work on some files, she figured that could wait.
    “Well.” She regarded him mischievously. “You promised to give me the grand tour, right? But I think we only covered the rug and the bed.” Anna ran her fingers down his chest and stomach to his shorts, where she caressed the growing bulge. He sucked in his breath and nodded, watching as she stroked him. “I don’t think we hit that nice Jacuzzi in your bathroom.” She let her bathrobe fall open as she gathered his T-shirt to pull over his head. “I’d like to be thorough.”
    •  •  •
    If her life were a movie, Anna thought, the next few weeks would have been the falling-in-love montage. The time flew by in a dizzy whirlwind of late nights in the office interspersed with later nights with Nick. Most evenings, she would stop by her apartment long enough to give her cat some kibble and a pat, then rush over to Nick’s place. When she spent the night with Nick, they didn’t sleep much; they were too busy exploring each other’s bodies. Between her long hours at work and overtime in Nick’s bedroom, she was constantly sleep-deprived, but fueled by euphoria. After a few days, Nick ceremoniously presented her with her own toothbrush in the cup next to his bathroom sink. She