Conflict of Interest

Chapter Thirty Eight

Carrie

"Oh my God," I whispered, staring temptation in its beautiful face. "I can't do this."

Lindsay laughed at me, not catching the urgency in my tone.

"Cold feet?" she questioned, touching two fingers to my jaw and going in to kiss me again.

"No, really," I said, standing up. "I can't do this. Lindsay, I'm sorry. I can't."

"I'm sorry," she said in utter confusion, looking at me discerningly. "Did I do something wrong?"

"God, I am so messed up," I realized, beginning to pace through a stranger's apartment. "Look at me!"

"I'm...looking at you, Caroline," she said slowly. "Are you feeling okay?"

"I don't know what's wrong with me," I said, completely and utterly becoming the only person in the room, as I had a tendency to do in my own mind. "I can't believe I just solicit sex like that, just, like that, like it's absolutely no big deal. I was about to have sex with you! I mean, what?"

She blinked several times, sitting completely upright at the foot of her bed. "You're scaring me."

"I'm a lawyer, not a prostitute," I continued to reprimand myself. "I have cases to think about. People are dying, on my watch, people are getting raped left, right, and center for Christ's sake, I am the fulcrum of this city's justice department, and I have someone right across town who loves me. And she loves me like crazy, she adores me, idolizes me, and all I can think about is getting laid? By someone else? Because we don't have sex for like three days, the first thing on my mind is getting off with someone else. Do you realize how messed up that is?"

"It's not messed up," she tried. "You're just filling a void. I can see it in your eyes, Caroline. You do care about people. It's not like you're a user."

"You don't know me at all if you don't think I'm a user," I said. "I am a user. A huge, gigantic user. I was about to use you for sex. I use Jennifer for self-assurance. I use my intern to feed my narcissism. I use witnesses to nail suspects, I use suspects to nail bigger suspects, I use judges to get warrants, I use juries to convict, I...I am a user by trade. I'm a user. Big time."

She looked me in the eye for several moments before laughing slightly, staring at her own upturned palms.

"Well, while we're at it," she said after a while. "You're also a tease."

"Back at you," I said.

"Oh, no, you are the tease," she made perfectly clear. "Because I never asked for this before you started throwing out the signs."

"Yeah, not verbally. You felt me up in a crowded bar."

"I was being a good friend!"

"We're not friends."

"We could be," she threw out, upturning her palms, bending at the wrist.

"We're too alike. Way too into our careers, never sleep, lead people on and let them down..."

"And then there's the killer good looks."

I nodded, though she hadn't been quite serious. "When I think about what it would be like dealing with you, all I can think of is that that must be what it's like dealing with me. Only thirty times less upbeat."

"I'm not that upbeat."

"Please, you're a fucking Muppet."

"I think you were getting to a point," she gently reminded me.