wants to build.”
“Well, that’s support for what you do, isn’t it?”
“Building cages for sea life instead of supporting the study of them in the wild? No, I wouldn’t call it support.” Brad took a long gulp of coffee, ignoring the bitter taste. “All she wants me to do is serve on the Board of Directors. She doesn’t want me actually getting my hands dirty.”
Jerry put on a bright face, clearly seeing Brad’s mother was a sore point to be dropped. “Then what you need, my friend, is a girl. Preferably one with style.” Jerry tapped his chin with a pen. “Do we know any of those? Not Lucy. She does that thing with eating her hair. Mary’s okay, but I’m not sure she can see with those glasses. And Kitty is always wearing those red socks with purple shorts. Even I know your socks shouldn’t be brighter than your shorts.” Jerry put up a finger. “Wait a minute. There’s Susan. She’s gorgeous, well acquainted with whatever it is they talk about in those fashion magazines, and—”
“My ex-fiancé.”
“I forgot that detail. Guess you don’t want to call her for help?”
“I believe she’s on her honeymoon right now. With husband number two.”
“Oh. Yeah. Timing might be bad.” Jerry sighed. “Well, that’s the end of my list of people who know how to mix and match.” He spun a formaldehyde-filled jar of preserved squid on the counter. “I don’t think these guys are going to be any help. You’re on your own, buddy.”
“I know a woman,” Brad said finally. “And she wears that designer stuff you see in the magazines.”
“Jackpot! Where’d you meet her?”
“She, ah, sort of climbed into my boat when I was out there today.”
Jerry looked at him askance. “Uh-huh. A beautiful woman just happened to climb out of the sea and into your boat. Like a mermaid. Next you’ll be telling me they’re running unicorns at the horse track.”
“She fell off Lady’s Delight. You know, the boat for the resort? I was there, so I picked her up.”
“Was she cute?”
“I wouldn’t call her cute, but rather…” He thought a minute. “Sassy.”
Jerry grinned. “Sounds interesting.”
“She was. In a way.”
“So, you gonna call her?”
Brad rubbed at his chin again. The shoe Parris had left in his boat sat on the back counter, like the proverbial glass slipper waiting to be fitted on the right foot. “Yeah. Maybe make a personal visit.”
Jerry grabbed a research journal, flipped to a blank page and took up a pencil. “Wait, let me make a note of this.” He scribbled the date at the top, then the time.
“What are you doing?”
“A minor miracle is happening in front of my eyes, I thought I’d document it for posterity.”
“Minor miracle?”
“Workaholic Brad is calling a woman for a date. Hey, you might actually have something besides squid on your mind for once.”
“I am not calling her for a date. More a—” he glanced again at the pink sandal “—consultation.”
Jerry tossed the journal and pencil to the side, then sat back down on the stool. “You spoil all my fun. How’s a guy going to live vicariously if you don’t live at all?”
Parris took a deep breath and pressed a hand to her hair, stopping outside The Banyan Room to look in the mirror and check for the twentieth time that no seaweed or trace of her ocean adventure remained. Everything was as it should be. After a quick shower and change of clothes, She looked capable. Smart. Like she could handle this.
In other words, like a fairy tale. Truth was, Parris wasn’t sure she could handle this. But she wanted to. Wanted to prove she could.
When her younger sister Jackie had left her in charge of planning and hosting this huge charity auction worth hundreds of thousands of dollars to go off to marry Steven, Parris had, at first, felt angry and put upon. Then, as the days passed, she’d begun to feel energized by the challenge. As a woman who’d never taken the opportunity to be anything more than a society princess, this was new ground.
Exciting ground. And yet, at the same time, terrifying territory because her footing was unsure. The auction was the first big event for Hammond Events and Consulting, the company their father had given them as a sort of test and as his convoluted way of bringing his two daughters together.
With Jackie living among the cow patties and horseflies in connubial bliss at Steven’s Florida ranch while Parris did all the auction work, togetherness wasn’t happening. And with all the donor problems they’d had in recent weeks, Parris wasn’t so sure the auction was happening, either. She wanted this to work out, more now than ever. In the past few weeks, she’d seen the opportunity the auction presented to make something of her life. Of herself.
Toward that goal, she had to convince the Phipps-Stovers to make a donation. She squared her shoulders, flicked a piece of lint off her suit and took in a breath.
Merry Montrose, the resort’s manager, came up to her before Parris could enter the restaurant. “How are you, Miss Hammond? I heard about your awful accident.”
Parris bit back the momentary thought that Merry had somehow been the one doing the tripping this afternoon. “I’m fine. Just surprised no one heard me fall in or turned around when I started screaming.”
“Oh, you know how those excursion boats are. So noisy. And at my age, the hearing’s not so good.”
Merry leaned closer, her blue-violet eyes zeroing in on Parris’s. When she was younger, she must have been gorgeous, Parris decided.
“I heard you were rescued.”
“There was a man in a boat who fished me out.”
“A true knight in shining armor?”
“I wouldn’t call him that.” She didn’t know what she’d call Brad Smith, but “knight” wasn’t the word that came to mind. “I don’t believe in those kinds of things anyway.”
“What kinds of things?”
Oh God. The woman was going to stand here all day and delay Parris from her meeting. But because the auction was being held at the resort, Parris couldn’t afford to offend the manager.
“Fairy tales,” Parris said curtly, trying her best to end the conversation. “All the Brothers Grimm did was warp a lot of impressionable young minds.”
“Do I detect some bitterness?”
Nosy old woman. Parris didn’t answer. She wasn’t about to get into a conversation about her personal life with the resort manager. Lately the woman had seemed to be quite the busybody, as if she had some kind of personal stake in Parris’s life. Maybe she fancied herself a matchmaker. Parris
