thinks it’s okay to withhold promotions based on a person’s marital status.” She shook her head. “It’s antiquated and wrong.”
She was clearly thinking deep legal thoughts. “The whole thing’s all but illegal. Want to sue them?” She looked so hopeful he almost laughed.
“No. I don’t want to sue my employer. I want the VP job.”
“Why did you say you wanted my help?”
“I was hoping you might know a nice, unattached woman, somebody smart and classy who would be good wife-of-the-VP material. Who might enjoy coming out to a few business occasions and posing as my fiancée. Then, after I get the VP job, we’d quietly split.”
Her face creased as though she’d tasted something bad. “If I knew any women like that I’d—”
He put up his free hand to stop her. “Never mind. It was a long shot. I really don’t need a lecture, either. Let’s forget we had this conversation and enjoy a nice family brunch.”
He turned to head inside when her hand shot out and grabbed his arm. “Wait.”
He turned back.
“Believe it or not, I do know someone who might just be desperate enough to do this, if you help her in return.”
“Really?”
She nodded. “You know her, too. Or you used to.”
“Who is she?” If he knew this woman, he’d have thought of her by now since he’d gone through every contact he’d ever made searching for a suitable candidate.
“Chelsea Hammond.”
“Chelsea Hammond?” The name rang a vague bell, but he couldn’t picture her.
She glared at him. “Chelsea? My best friend? Who lived right there in the Dennises’ home while she attended high school?” She pointed to a white two-story that shared a back fence with his folks’ place. “She was always over here. She used to bake the most amazing cookies and cakes and stuff.”
His confusion cleared. “Oh, you mean Hermione?”
“Nobody called her that but you,” Sarah reminded him.
He remembered her well. She was so serious. Always had her nose stuck in a book, often a cookbook, masses of long dark hair and eyes that were too big for her face. The minute he’d read the first Harry Potter book he’d thought of Sarah’s serious friend and from that moment on had called her Hermione, after Harry’s best friend, the superbrainy Hermione Granger.
Before he could ask more, the front door opened. “I thought I heard you two outside,” their dad said, beaming at them. He raised his voice and bellowed, “Meg, the kids are here,” and his mother came out from the kitchen with her arms spread wide.
Meg and Lawrence Wolfe were like the poster couple in the early retirement ads. They were exactly what they looked like. Successful, healthy and still—as far as he could judge—happily married. They traveled, got away in the winter to somewhere warm, golfed, gave dinner parties and attended church regularly. His mom volunteered at a soup kitchen and his dad had recently, to his and Sarah’s eternal embarrassment, involved himself in amateur theater.
Their only disappointment, as far as he could tell, was that neither of their children was married.
The minute they’d said their hellos and got the initial chitchat out of the way, Sarah went to the shelf of photo albums in the walnut bookcase beside the gas fireplace, chose an album and flipped through. She brought the album over to him.
“Here’s a picture of the three of us. Chelsea, you and me.”
He squinted at the album his sister shoved under his nose. The event was Sarah’s birthday and the three teenagers stood together. He had his arm around both girls. The cake read Happy 15th Birthday, Sarah, and they’d posed beside it. He’d have been nineteen, he supposed, and he towered over the two girls. A slight, thin girl, Hermione had shiny dark hair, he remembered, that was like a curtain, hiding her face. She used to blush when he was around, which made him suspect she had a bit of a schoolgirl crush on him. She’d been a nice kid, though. He was pretty sure he’d helped her with her homework a few times.
“What’s she doing now?” he asked, trying to sound casual.
“She studied at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. She only got home a few weeks ago and is looking for a kitchen. She plans to start her own catering company.”
His mother came and looked over his shoulder. “She was such a nice girl. I’m glad she’s back. We’ll have to have her over when we get back from vacation.” Then she asked his next question for him. “Is she still single?”
“Yep.”
Meg sighed. “I don’t know what it is with you young people. Doesn’t anybody get married anymore?”
“Sure we do, Mom. David and I are selective, that’s all.”
David was still staring at the photograph, trying to imagine Hermione all grown up. He studied her at fifteen. Nice hair, big eyes, clear skin. He could imagine her older. He pictured a librarian type with her hair in a bun. Maybe glasses from all that reading. He really liked the image. He had one fear that Sarah’s update had raised. “Catering, huh. Has she gained a lot of weight?”
Both women sent him identical withering looks.
“What? I’m just asking.”
“I had drinks with her on Thursday. She’s not as skinny as she was at fifteen. She’s filled out a little. She looks the same only twelve years older. If anything, she’s prettier than she used to be. Otherwise, she’s exactly the same,” she assured him. “You’d know her anywhere.”
David felt like his world had suddenly transformed from a bleak black-and-white European film into a bright, happy Technicolor blockbuster. Chelsea Hammond was bright, studious, a little shy, which was fine. She’d been to Paris, which suggested a level of sophistication. And if she could cook? The old boys were going to wet themselves.
Chelsea Hammond didn’t know it yet, but she’d just become his perfect fake fiancée.
3
“SO? AM I A GENIUS OR WHAT?” Sarah exclaimed, sounding ridiculously pleased with herself.
Another long second of silence passed. The coffee shop was busy with midmorning traffic, moms with kids in strollers, older folks with crossword puzzles, a large noisy table that seemed to be some kind of walking club. The babble of voices was punctuated by the steaming hiss of the espresso machine.
“Are you kidding me?” Chelsea finally managed to respond.
She’d spent the morning looking at two hopeless places to rent in the South Street area, one where a cat came to greet her at the door and her eyes started watering before she could even cross the threshold, and the other with a supposed nonsmoking roommate who seemed to think marijuana didn’t count. They’d met at a coffee shop in the area, Sarah pleased with her purchase of an old book of art deco photographs from an antiquarian bookseller. She’d
