She was not happy as she let herself into her apartment that evening. To say she was in a bad mood would be the understatement of the century. She was furious, distraught, but mainly hurt. She felt humiliated. Despite winning the case that afternoon she felt no satisfaction because in honesty Mike had won the case, using an anecdote that wasn't actually true about her to win it. She couldn't believe he'd brought up that case, furthermore twisted what actually happened. Granted Mike hadn't specifically mentioned the case or the juror who took a shine to Connie, but she was pretty certain it wasn't coincidence that he had decided to mention Connie's attractiveness being instrumental to a case being won when two years earlier Mike had used Connie's attractiveness to get a conviction – the only difference between his story in court and the actual story was that Mike didn't ask Connie to use her looks to get a conviction two years ago, he just let her do a cross so that the juror, that clearly had the hots for her would be satisfied and rule guilty. Unfortunately that had backfired as the juror later approached Connie, rattling her cage, and she found out what Mike had been doing all along. This had had a detrimental effect on their working relationship to say the least, however over the last two years, despite their differences they had been able to build and maintain a fairly good relationship. It was professional and they respected each other – or so Connie had thought until now.
Intent on forgetting the day's events and if not at least spending the evening hating Mike, she dumped her brief case by her bed, took a shower, changed into sweatpants, a camisole and her old college hoodie, sat on her couch and began flicking through the channels. She wasn't exactly surprised when she realised there was nothing on apart from a documentary about sick children – she felt depressed enough. There was a courtroom drama but her life was a courtroom drama in her opinion so the last thing she wanted to do was go home at the end of the day and watch a television show about what she did for a living.
So it was nine o clock and she was sitting on her couch hating Mike. She couldn't understand why he had to use her to win the case. Why did he have to compromise her credibility? Why couldn't he have just made up something less damaging to her reputation? Or better still something that perhaps didn't involve her at all. As she continued to focus her thoughts on Mike's serious lack of good judgement in court, she became more frustrated and increasingly upset. It wasn't long before she felt angry tears begin to cascade down her cheeks. Connie didn't cry often. Much less often over silly things, but as minor as this may have seemed to Mike, it meant something to her.
Mike felt guilty, really guilty. He knew as soon as he'd said it, it had been a bad idea, even though it won the case, put a murderer behind bars, he was having a hard time justifying it to himself. He tried to reason that murder was a worse crime than hurting Connie's feelings, which it was, however he also knew how much Connie valued her credibility as a prosecutor and the fact that he had potentially diminished it was a little more than just hurting her feelings. Connie had worked hard to get where she was and there was no denying she was a fantastic assistant, so exactly what lapse of judgement caused Mike to think it was okay to imply to the entire courtroom that Connie was his lap dog that day, remained a mystery.
Mike was sitting on his couch watching a documentary about sick children. This is about the only thing that could lower my mood right now, he thought as he flicked off the TV deciding it was not helping him. All he could think about was court that day and what he'd done to Connie. Even though she'd brushed it off and said she got it after the case, he guessed by the way she avoided his gaze and conversation in the cab back to the DA's office and then completed her paperwork in silence before leaving with a very short, curt "Night." meant she wasn't okay and she didn't get it. Guilt continued to wash over him as visions of an upset and hurt Connie filled his head; Connie sitting cursing his existence, Connie crying herself to sleep, Connie tearing her thoughts up over why he'd suddenly become the biggest ass in the world. He had to do something to make it right.
It was an hour later at ten o clock that Mike had decided what he was going to do. He was going to go to Connie apartment and apologize to her. When he realized it had taken him an hour to think up this plan he felt like a world class idiot, realizing it was the most obvious and logical step of how to make anything right. Nevertheless he put on a pair of jeans and a dark blue sweater, jumped into his car and drove to Connie's apartment.
It was twenty past ten, and Connie was still crying, this was NOT good. She was sure that she had never cried for this long, at least not since she was about thirteen and that was because a boy she liked didn't like her back. This was twenty years later and nothing to do with that. This was bigger and it hurt a lot more. She couldn't understand she hadn't been this upset when Mike had actually pimped her out the jury. But you're much closer to Mike now, a voice in her mind reminded her. That was the last thing she wanted to think of. Yes, she had felt certain feelings in recent weeks that she wasn't altogether comfortable with, unprofessional feelings, but right now she was channelling all her emotions into convincing herself she hated Mike. It was around about that time she heard a knock on her door.
She sighed; she didn't feel like visitors, especially after a long, difficult day. It was twenty five past ten, it was far too late for visitors. The person on the other side of the door knocked again, ever more impatiently. She groaned as she got up off the sofa and walked over to the door wiping her eyes. She opened it to find Mike standing there. He could see she's been crying – guilt washed over him once more.
"What do you want Mike?" she asked before he could even utter a single syllable.
"Connie I really need to talk to you?" he began.
"Couldn't it keep until Monday?" she asked.
"No it couldn't. Look it's about today, in court I..." she cut him off.
"Mike I told you, I get it." She said.
"Yeah but you also called me a psychopath and didn't talk to me for the rest of the day." He pointed out.
"Look Mike I'm not interested in hearing you're excuses. Nothing you say is going to make me agree with what you did today." She told him.
"Connie please just let me come in?" he pleaded.
"Fine," she stepped aside, "but you're wasting your time."
"I'm sorry for what I said, it's just I had to get a conviction, Conway is a murderer, he killed that girl..." again Connie interrupted.
"And so you thought you'd just tell the court I was your bitch?" she asked in disbelief.
"I didn't say that." Mike said calmly.
"As good as, you told them that you once ordered me to use my attractiveness to influence a juror! It's bad enough that you spoke as though I belonged to you, but you had to go further and back it up by objectifying me. Now the entire court thinks I just do everything you tell me, like I can't make decisions for myself. Oh yeah and on top of that they probably think I'm a tease!" she raised her voice, getting more and more frustrated until tears began to roll down her face again.
"Connie you know I would never deliberately compromise your reputation." Mike tried to reason.
"No, you've just got a natural talent for that." She snapped. "Where does it stop Mike? You pimp me out to a jury, you tell a courtroom I use my sexuality to win cases, I mean if that's how you want to play it, why don't you just get rid of me and hire a prostitute?" she knew she was being slightly melodramatic but Mike was setting the jury up to view her as a sexual object instead of a prosecutor.
"It's not like that and you know it." He insisted.
"Yes it is Mike! I'm going to bed, that and you know it." He insisted.
"Yes it is Mike! I'm going to bed, you can show yourself out." She snapped as she turned and began to walk towards her bedroom.
"Connie wait." He called, he walked over to her and stood in front of her blocking the doorway to her bedroom.
"What?" she asked through gritted teeth.
"I don't care if the jury thinks you're a tease, or if they think you don't have a mind of your own, because Connie when they actually get to see you work, when I let you cross the witnesses, you prove to everyone that you're not a brainless tease. You make it obvious to everyone that you're smart, that you know what you're doing, that you don't use your sexuality within your work. Connie no one is ever going to deny that you are probably the best looking person in the room ninety five percent of the time, but that doesn't mean that they won't take you seriously. I'm sorry for what I said about you today, I don't have an excuse but I promise I will never do that to you ever again, I know you probably don't trust me, but I'll swear it in front of a jury if you want..." he was babbling now.
"Mike." Connie stopped him. He stopped, "Shut up Mike. Despite the fact you stepped completely out of line today I think that's probably the nicest thing anyone had ever said about me." She said. Her expression softened. She had been surprised by Mike's speech; she didn't think he actually had put enough thought to her to come up with anything like that.
"So are we okay?" he asked tentatively.
"Yeah, we're okay." She said.
At that moment, they both leaned towards the other, Mike brushed his lips over Connie's, she felt all the anger and stress of the day ebb away as she gripped his shoulders and his slips his arms around her waist.