“Good food, good company. What else do you need?”
Though he was still getting over the surprise of Paige showing up in his office, he was completely, utterly charmed. And shehaddressed up. She shrugged out of her coat to reveal a forties-style navy dress with white polka dots and buttons down the front. He believed the dress had what might be referred to as a sweetheart neckline, but whatever it was, it showed off her cleavage to maximum effect. She’d pinned her hair away from her face, too, giving him an unimpeded view of it.
“You look great,” he said. “Cute dress.”
“Yeah? Thrift store find, can you believe it? It has pockets!”
“Very cool.”
“You look good, too.”
He glanced at his arms, where he’d rolled up his shirtsleeves. “I’d intended to wear my suit jacket when I met you at the restaurant, so you could have the full effect.”
“You did say you looked amazing in a suit. I’d hoped to judge that for myself.”
“I’d get up and put my jacket on, but this ravioli is too delicious.”
She smiled and rubbed his hand, then went back to eating. “How’s Mr. Knightley?”
“Good, although his name is George now.”
“George?”
“Mr. Knightley is kind of a lot to call a cat. So I looked it up, and inEmma, Mr. Knightley’s first name is George. And that seems to fit the cat, too. It only took me a couple of days to get him to answer to it.”
“Well, hey, that’s something.”
“I can’t believe you guys talked me into getting a cat.”
“We didn’t have to try that hard.”
Josh sighed. That was true. Deep down, Josh had known that cat had his number. George had pretty much moved right into his apartment. He liked to nap on the sofa or on Josh’s bed or on Josh, sometimes. It was…nice. “He seems to be settling in well. I hired the teenage girl who lives down the hall to drop in and feed him on days when I have to work late so he doesn’t get too lonely. Actually, I should text her that she should feed him now.” He pulled out his phone and typed out the text with his thumbs.
“Aw, that’s very sweet.”
Josh put his phone down and eyed Paige, not sure if she was being patronizing or not. “Let me have some of that spaghetti.”
* * *
“So I put down my cards,” Josh was saying. “Full house! Two kings, three eights. Because John was out of chips, he promised me something else, and I ended up with a ticket to an opera at the Kennedy Center, and I wasn’t going to go, because opera, but then I thought, when will I ever get an opportunity to do something like this again? And you’ll never guess who I ended up seated next to.”
“Who?”
“Ruth Bader Ginsburg!”
“You’re joking.”
“No. Apparently she was a big opera fan.”
Paige took the last bite of chicken and said, “Did you talk to her?”
“I introduced myself. Said I was a second-year law student. She wished me well.”
“Oh, man, I would have asked so many questions.”
“It took me the whole first act and most of the intermission to work up the courage to even say hello.”
“Did you at least take a selfie? Please tell me you took a selfie.”
