thanking the disreputable-looking advertising man for being in the wrong place at the right time. Her dear mother had once said that every event in this seemingly disjointed world actually happened for a reason. Apparently her mother’s theory even extended to her unpleasant encounter with the repulsive Jack Stillman.
2
“DEREK’S GOING TO KILL ME.” Jack held his head in his hands, fighting some kind of weird swirling sensation in his stomach. And his heart was racing as if he’d just run for a ninety-nine-yard touchdown. “He’s absolutely going to kill me.”
“In that case, I hope you have cash.”
He glanced up to the open doorway. A plump fiftyish black woman stood dressed in white pants and shirt, wearing a lopsided red paper hat that read “Tony’s.” “You the stromboli sandwich with extra cheese?” she asked, her hand on one hip.
Jack nodded miserably, thinking even food wouldn’t help his mood today.
“That’ll be six dollars and forty cents.” She dropped the sack on the desk unceremoniously and wiggled her fingers in his direction. Her fingernails were at least two inches long. And bright yellow.
With a heavy sigh, he pushed himself to his feet and removed his wallet. He counted eight one dollar bills into her hand, then added another when she lifted a winged eyebrow.
“You the handyman around here?” She nodded toward his tool belt as she stuffed the money into a fanny pack around her waist.
“Sort of,” he mumbled. “This is my company…and my brother’s.”
“The murderer?”
Jack frowned. “Hmm?”
Her head jutted forward. “The man who’s going to kill you—is he your brother?”
“Oh. Yeah.”
“Why?”
“Why what?”
Her eyes rolled upward, and she spoke as if to a child. “Why is he going to kill you?”
Irritated by the woman’s nosiness, he scowled. “It’s a long story.”
“Lucky for you,” she said, revealing remarkably white teeth and surprising dimples. “You’re my last delivery.”
She had a pleasant way about her, he conceded, kind of…motherly. The woman was only trying to be nice, and what could it hurt to unload on a stranger? He shrugged, indifferent to her interest. “I’m supposed to be running this place while my brother is gone, but I f—” He swallowed at the disapproving look the woman shot him. “I mean, I messed up royally.”
“How’s that?”
He quirked his mouth from side to side. “A woman IRS agent was supposed to stop by, so when this gal showed up a while ago, I assumed she was here for the review.”
“And?”
“And instead she was here about a huge account I’m supposed to pitch tomorrow—Tremont’s department stores.”
“And?”
“And, let’s just say I downplayed the success of the business a tad—not the impression I was aiming for.”
“So, who was she?” She leaned against the desk and studied her nails, obviously unaware of the significance of doing business with the southern retail chain.
“Alexandria Tremont. She must be related to the man who owns the place—”
“Daughter.”
Jack stopped. “You know her?”
The woman ran a finger along the desk, then blew a quarter-inch of accumulated dust into the air. “I know of her. My son works in menswear at their store on Webster Avenue. Says that Tremont miss is a real go-getter.”
“More like a real ball buster,” he muttered to himself.
“Uh-huh, and not too bad to look at, if I recall.”
“A little too skinny, if you ask me.”
“And single, I think my boy said.”
“No wonder—she’s as cold as a freaking statue.”
Her eyes didn’t miss a thing, bouncing from an unturned calendar to a lopsided lamp shade to the silent computer. “Uh-huh. She’s rich, too, I’ll bet, and re-f-i-i-i-ned, with a royal shine.”
He smirked, remembering that on top of everything else, Princess Tremont had caught him ogling a naughty magazine. “Well, she wasn’t that impressive.”
She glanced at his bare feet and lifted a long yellow nail. “As opposed to you?”
Jack frowned. “I don’t make a habit of trying to impress people.”
The woman crossed her arms over her matronly bosom. “You married?”
“No.”
“Now there’s a surprise.”
“But my brother is,” he added, as if Derek’s goodness could atone for his own sins. “In fact, he’s away on his honeymoon.”
She sniffed. “When’s he due back, your brother?”
“In another two weeks.” Jack rubbed his temples as he picked up his earlier train of thought. “And Derek will kill me when he hears I’ve bungled this opportunity with Tremont.”
The woman leaned over and walked her fingers through the mail pile, then harrumphed. “First, he’d have to find you in all this mess. Where’s your office manager?”
“We don’t have one.”
“I’ll take it,” she said matter-of-factly, plucking her paper hat from her head and dropping it into the trash can.
Jack blinked. “Take what?”
“The job,” she said, her voice indignant. “You get back to whatever it was you were fixing—I hope it was the sign on the door—and I’ll get things organized in here.”
“But there isn’t a position—” The phone rang, cutting him off.
The woman yanked it up. “Stillman and Sons, how can I help you?”
She had spunk, he conceded. And a decent telephone voice.
“The overdue invoice for Lamberly Printing?”
She glanced at him, and he shook his head in a definite “no.” The company simply didn’t have the money.
“A check will be cut this afternoon,” she sang.
Incredulous, Jack could only stare when she hung up the phone. Then he
