her strong and independent. It wasn’t her fault that she knew her own mind and recognized Hunter as the ONE. Of course, her mind had once led her to Charlie, and that relationship hadn’t been anything to boast about.
The simple fact was that she didn’t want anyone halfhearted about her or her girls. If Hunter couldn’t be completely committed, she didn’t want him—even if he was the ONE.
Okay. That was it. No more agonizing. She got to her feet, put in a load of laundry, straightened up the kitchen, then went back to Celia’s. The faucet continued to work beautifully.
Celia sent her off with a casserole and three ceramic cups of flan. Sandy took them home to the safety of her refrigerator, then headed for town and the peaceful, quiet lunch she’d promised herself.
She shopped first, and found a large tube of giftwrap with the Cars design patterned after the children’s movie of the same name. While Zoey loved princesses in all forms, Addie’s passion was Tow Mater, the movie’s loveable tow truck character whose greatest skill was driving backward. Sandy’s mother predicted that Addie would be the Danica Patrick of her generation, the first woman ever to place in the Indianapolis 500. Addie ignored doll houses and Barbies and loved everything that had wheels, motors and loud noises.
Sandy found Cars pajamas, a Tow Mater bank and a bright yellow jacket for herself made from a redesigned sweatshirt.
Her cell phone rang as she was finishing a jalapeño burger at the Wet Dog, a brew pub that was a local favorite.
She saw the name of her employer and answered, thinking someone in the front office must have gone home sick and her free afternoon was about to disappear.
“Sandy!” Darren, her immediate supervisor, said her name cheerfully. “What are you doing?”
“Having lunch,” she replied. “What’s going on? Somebody sick?”
“No. I wondered if you could come in this afternoon for a quick meeting. I know you asked for the day off, but something’s happened that I need to talk to you about.”
“What’s that?”
“We’ll talk about it when you get here. Can you come in?”
She didn’t want to, but she did a lot of things she really didn’t want to. “Sure. Half an hour?”
“Perfect.”
She hurried home to freshen up, trade her jeans jacket for the new yellow one, and wondered what the meeting was about as she drove to the office. It might be scheduling. A new partner had come to the firm several months ago and brought along his secretary. The woman had been remote and superior, and had complained about most things since she’d arrived, but she was good at her job.
Or maybe it was the mundane business of coffee and rolls for the morning meetings. Sandy usually picked them up at the coffeehouse when she drove in, but she’d been told not to bother last week, that someone else would handle it.
She walked through the office, smiling and waving at the other women she’d worked with for six years since moving to Astoria with Charlie. His dream of making a fortune fishing had been short-lived when he got seriously seasick and decided he didn’t like twelve hour shifts after all. When Charlie left, Sandy’s mother had moved to Astoria. Life had been good since then.
Sandy had so enjoyed managing the office, answering the phones, directing clients to the right person to solve their problems, working with various organizations in town to coordinate a client’s needs and obligations. Those contacts had made her community work easier.
But the minute she arrived at Darren Foster’s office she knew that something had changed. She felt it in the air. Darren, one of the partners, who also supervised the front office staff, was usually lighthearted, eager to make people feel comfortable. But, today he sat focused on the open file in the middle of his desk and barely looked at her except to greet her with a perfunctory smile and invite her to sit down.
Sandy’s throat went dry and her heartbeat accelerated. She sensed danger.
“You have been the most loyal, hardworking office manager we have ever had,” Darren said, eyes still on the file.
She noticed the past tense. Not are but have been.
She struggled to remain calm, not sure what was happening. “Thank you,” she said.
“Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t find fault with your work.”
“Thank you.”
Darren looked up at her under his eyebrows. “That’s what makes this so hard.”
Her heart thudded against her ribs. Oh, no. No. She asked calmly, “What is this, Darren?”
He closed his eyes and leaned back in his chair.
“Just say it.” She sat a little straighter, bracing herself. “It’ll be easier on both of us.”
He opened his eyes and leaned his forearms on his desk. His gaze held regret for just an instant, then relaxed in that curious manner middle managers in an awkward position acquire. “When Palmer joined us and brought Janice along, we got a sort of twofer. She’s a trained legal secretary, and she’s good on the phone and...” His voice seemed to lose power. “We think she can manage the office.”
Sandy was out. Jobless. That was her new reality. She laughed nervously. “Darren, she bought oat cakes and herbal tea instead of donuts and mochas for the office meeting. You said you hated that.” Of all the examples Sandy could have brought up in her defense, that one was pathetic, but she wasn’t at the top of her game at the moment.
He nodded grimly. “The people who count thought it was innovative and appropriately considerate of our good health.”
She knew Kevin Palmer had been brought in because Jim Somerville was in his late seventies and finally thinking it was time he retired. Palmer was an impressive litigator and had clients in Portland, Seattle, and several in Hawaii. His billable hours had been a lot of his appeal.
“It’s business,” Darren said, firming his voice, clearly unwilling for the meeting to go on longer than necessary. “Things have been a little tight for us the last few years. We bill a lot of time, but we don’t collect on a lot of it.”
“Everybody’s broke.”
“The economy’s picking up.”
“But...you just said things are tight.”
He frowned at her challenge. “It’s picking up where Palmer’s clients are, but not here. Not yet. Maybe if things turn around...” he began.
She stood, unwilling to listen to him tell her they might want to bring her back. Hunter had dangled the same nebulous promise in front of her, too, as though the future might somehow improve her appeal. “Do you need a couple of weeks?”
He stood, too. “No. You’re free to go today.” He reached into his middle drawer and handed her an envelope. “Severance. Two extra weeks and your vacation pay.” He drew a breath and asked in a rush, “Can I have your key?”
She accepted the envelope, desperately trying to hold on to her
