If doctors got paid for what they actually cured, they’d go broke.

“It was an interesting visit,” I temporize.

“What were you thinking about?” Amy asks, coolly appraising her own face. She is performing this ritual nude. I wonder if Angela does. My mother would be horrified at this scene. She was almost laughably modest. Even my sister Marty said she had never seen our mother without

clothes.

“Just the past,” I say vaguely. Actually, I was thinking of the way Angela looked just before I kissed her.

“How can your client afford to pay you?” Amy asks, now blotting her lips.

“Didn’t you say he worked at a barbecue place?”

Without lipstick, her mouth is a hair too small.

Painted, it looks bigger. Not Julia Roberts size, but wide enough.

“He and his wife had saved a few thousand for a house,” I say.

“I’ll lose money on this case, but it’s better than nothing.”

“Anything is better than nothing.” Sex is no problem between us, but I suspect money would be. From past comments I know Amy is struggling in her law practice. Domestic relations cases, her bread and butter, are usually a sinkhole unless your clients are rich. They eat up all your time and then don’t pay, or you can’t collect your fee. Dan is the expert in the divorce accounts receivable business. Women going through a divorce usually have less money than criminals. A former assistant prosecuting attorney, Amy, unfortunately, hates representing crooks. I get awfully fed up, too, but as a former public defender, defense work comes more naturally to me. It wouldn’t entirely surprise me if Amy wanted to stay home and tend to a couple of yard apes. Her genetic clock is ticking down and that’s probably where this pressure is coming from.