Riley sat back again and didn’t say anything, so she waited. She’d once thought he was a Neanderthal, but not anymore. Now she had a great deal of respect for Riley’s thought processes, or for most of them, anyway.
“Okay,” he said and sat up again. He picked up the file he’d been holding and handed it to her. “Do this one.”
Suze took the file and looked at the heading: Check-Out Girl. “This is Becca Johnson, right? She was in yesterday.”
“What’s she look like?” Riley said. “Give me a description. Detailed.”
Suze called up the best of her memory of Becca. “She’s about five six, a hundred and thirty pounds, early thirties, African American, brown eyes, brown hair, pretty, nervous, wearing a brown cotton turtleneck and a brown suede jacket from last year’s Bloomingdale’s catalog—maybe the year before, it’s one of their standards—Levi’s jeans, brown Aigner loafers. Her earrings were plain gold loops, but they were real gold. I’d say she has a middle-class income and uses it well. She had a mustard seed necklace, which was very old, so I’d also guess she’s sentimental, romantic, and has a strong religious background although she may not be practicing anymore. She’s not stupid, but that romantic streak could make her vulnerable. Also, she parked in front of the window and she was driving a good-condition Saturn, so she’s practical, and there was an OSU parking tag hanging from her mirror, an A tag, so she’s with the university.” She stopped. “Those A tags run close to four hundred bucks; she must really care about parking.”
“Anything else?” Riley said, looking a little taken aback.
“Yes,” Suze said. “Her bag was Coach.”
“Which means what?”
“Quality,” Suze said. “Becca and I would get along fine. Why are you looking at me like that?”
“The Bloomingdale’s thing,” Riley said. “You know what year the jacket was?”
“Well, yes, but I couldn’t tell you what year the Saturn was.” Suze gestured with the folder. “So I just read this and then what?”
“She came in yesterday because she finally confronted her boyfriend and he told her his name is Egon Kennedy and he’s from Massachusetts, a distant cousin of the Kennedys. She believes him. We’re skeptical. So we’re checking it out even though she just stopped by to tell Gabe everything is fine.”
“Okay,” Suze said. “Any advice on how to do this?”
Riley picked up a yellow legal pad and tossed it to her. “Take notes.”
She leaned forward and took a pen from his Wile E. Coyote mug, her pulse picking up. “Go ahead,” she said, and he started to talk, and she wrote down everything, stopping him only to ask a question when something wasn’t clear. When he was finished, she said, “My God. You can find out anything about anybody.”
“And it’s so much easier with the Internet,” he said. “Now go and find out about our boy Randy.”
Suze nodded and stood up. “Thank you.”
“Effie, if you can do this, we’ll be thanking you,” Riley said.
“I can do this,” Suze said.
“So you don’t like diamonds?” Riley said.
“No, but I like gold and Armani,” Suze said. “I’m not cheap, I’m discriminating.”
“Good for you,” Riley said. “Get to work.” She turned to go and he said, “One more thing.”
“Yes,” she said, turning back, waiting for whatever slam he had ready for her.
“That little-old-me thing?”
She nodded.
“You may use it on other people.”
“Thank you,” she said and escaped into the outer office before she grinned.
She was free. She had a chance at a real job. She was going to move, could move tonight if she wanted to, Nell would take her. She picked up the phone directory and looked under “Moving Companies.” “Yes,” she said when somebody answered. “I’d like to arrange for someone to pack a lot of very valuable china. Spode.”
And then she told them to deliver it to Olivia.
* * *
Nell opened the door that night to find Suze standing on her doorstep with three suitcases and a large box full of egg cups.
“You know that extra bedroom you have?” she said. “Can I have it? I filed for divorce today.”
Nell opened the door wider. “Come on in. It’s about time you experienced how the other half lives.”
She put Suze in her bed for the night and curled up on the daybed in the living room with Marlene and her chenille throw since she couldn’t sleep anyway. She missed Gabe, and it wasn’t getting better, and she didn’t know how to fix it. She couldn’t go back to the way—
Somebody hammered on the door, and for one moment she hoped it was Gabe. She patted a cranky Marlene and put her on the floor in case Gabe was in one of his sweeping moods, knowing that with her luck it was probably Farnsworth, demanding his SugarPie back. Which was only his right, she thought guiltily.
But when she turned on the porch light and looked through the curtain on the door, it was Jase.
“What’s wrong?” she said, letting him in. “It must be midnight.”
“This is me, cracking,” Jase said grimly. “I need jewelry.”
“What?”
“Do you still have the engagement ring Dad gave you?”
Nell blinked at him. “Probably. I think I stuck it in my jewelry box. Why? Oh, no, you’re not—”
“It’s that or she’ll leave me,” Jase said. “We fought a week ago. She’s not backing down. I’m thinking I can talk her into being engaged until I can graduate and get a job.”
“Jase, you’re too young—”
“Mom, I’ve been over this. She wants it now, and she’s serious.” He looked more miserable than Nell had ever seen him. “Don’t give me grief on this. You don’t want the ring anymore anyway.”
“Neither does she,” Nell said. “It’s a lousy ring. Your dad was really poor when he bought it. Plus, we got divorced. She’s Chloe’s kid, she’s going to believe in karma.”
“Oh, hell,” Jase said. “Maybe I can get the stone reset.”
“Jase, a jeweler would have a hard time finding that stone, it’s that tiny.” Nell leaned against the wall and tried to think.
“Uncle Jack buys Aunt Suze diamonds she never wears,” Jase said, thinking out loud. “Maybe she’d let me buy one from her on time.”
“More bad karma,” Nell said. “Your Aunt Suze is asleep upstairs. She filed for divorce today.”
“Great,” Jase said.
“Okay, okay.” Nell thought faster. “You don’t want Aunt Margie’s diamond from Uncle Stewart, that goes beyond bad. I’m running out of diamonds here.”
“I’ll sell my car,” Jase said.
“Jase, you couldn’t get a zirconium for what that car would bring. Are you sure this is a good idea? Because I don’t like it that Lu’s holding you up for jewelry.”
“She’s not. She doesn’t care about the ring. She wants to get married.”
“Now?” Nell said, finally comprehending.
“At last,” Jase said, casting his eyes to the ceiling. “Yes, now. She wants to be Mrs. Jason Dysart.”
“You’re an infant,” Nell said, really alarmed. “Is she insane?”
“I’m not an infant, and I want that, too,” Jase said. “Just not right away. I think I should be able to support a wife before I take one.”
“My God.” Nell pulled out a dining room chair and sank into it. “Married?”
“Get used to it,” Jase said, following her. “It’s going to happen. We were going to move in together this summer anyway.”
Nell jerked her head up. “Are you nuts? Do you know what her father would do to you?”
“Boy, does this guy have you snowed. Lu’s nineteen. He can’t do anything to me.”
“That’s what you think. And he’s in a lousy mood right now, too. You guys sure know how to pick your moment.”
“Great.” Jase looked frazzled. “You know, I have enough p
roblems without this. I have finals, for Christ’s sake.”
Nell laughed. “Finals. Yeah, you’re old enough to get married.”
“If I don’t pass my finals, I won’t graduate,” Jase said grimly. “And if I don’t graduate, I won’t find a job. And if I don’t have a job, I can’t get married, and I’ll lose the woman I love. So yes, finals.”
“Sorry,” Nell said. “You’re right. I’m wrong.”
“The least you could do is go over there and jolly him out of it,” Jase said.
“I can’t,” Nell said. “I left.”
“You what?”
“I quit. I quit the job and him. It’s over.”
“I am a dead man.” Jase sat down on the chair next to hers and put his head on the table.
Nell smoothed his hair. “It’ll be okay. We’ll think of something. There’s my divorce settlement. I can give you—”
“No,” Jase said, sitting up. “I’m not that big a mooch. You’re living on nothing now. Forget it.”
“There must be something,” Nell said and then she focused on her china cabinet. “Clarice Cliff.”
“Who?”
“My china,” Nell said. “There’s a teaset in there worth some money. I could sell it.”
“Grandma Barnard gave you that stuff,” Jase said. “From England.”
Nell looked at him. “So it’s my turn to give it to you.”
Jase swallowed. “You don’t even want me to do this.”
“I’d like you to think about it,” Nell said. “I’d like you to do it without her threatening you. But if this is what you really want, then I want it for you.”
“I want it,” Jase said. “But don’t sell the china yet. Let me talk to Grandma Dysart.”
“Clarice would approve,” Nell said. “And so would Grandma Barnard. I’ll call the dealer in the morning.”
“Just wait,” Jase said.
“No,” Nell said. “I’ve spent too many damn years waiting. This is the right thing to do.”
* * *
The next day on her lunch hour, Nell sold the teaset—thirty-four pieces of pristine Clarice Cliff Secrets—to the antique dealer in Clintonville who had appraised it. Then she took the check to Jase, who was impressed and apologetic, and then she went back to O&D.
“You’re late,” Elizabeth said.
“Actually, I’m not,” Nell said. “I left for lunch late because I was finishing up a section.”
“We need to know where you are, Nell,” Elizabeth said, and Nell thought, Why? In case there’s a newsletter emergency?
“It’ll never happen again,” Nell said and went back to the newsletter room, thinking, I give her until the end of the week before she fires me. She’d seen assistants who were possessive before, but Elizabeth was raising it to a new level. It didn’t help that during the past week Jack had made it clear that he found Nell charming, enchanting, colorful, funny, sweet, and indispensable. Nell knew that because he’d told her all those adjectives, dropping them on her one at a time for the cumulative effect. She hadn’t bought it, but Elizabeth had, and as Jack had grown warmer, Elizabeth had grown positively frigid. When she’d taken to criticizing Nell’s clothing—“The proper attire for women at O&D is the suit”—Nell had almost felt sorry for her. It was pathetic to fall hopelessly in love with your boss. For one thing, it played hell with your job security.
Get a grip, Elizabeth, Nell thought now, and then thought, Was that me with Gabe?
No, it wasn’t. She hadn’t been possessive of Gabe, she’d just wanted the right to run the office her way. He didn’t want to run the damn office, he just wanted it run well. And she’d done that.
Maybe if I’d said that to him instead of ordering business cards and slapping them on his desk …
Well, that would be something they could talk about later. If they ever talked again. She went back to the newsletter files and picked up a stack from 1992, missing Gabe and thinking, I hate this job.
So fine, maybe she wouldn’t wait for Elizabeth to toss her, maybe this weekend she’d get her plans together and figure out what she wanted to do, and then she’d go do that. She began to scan the old newsletters automatically, keying in the names she found, as she planned. She wanted to run an office, she liked running offices, keeping appointments straight, keeping other people organized. She really didn’t want to sell anything or leave the office to work with others, she wanted to maintain a small perfect world for others to live in. “Cartouche life,” Suze had called it, and she was right.
So all she had to do was find somebody she liked and respected who was doing work she liked and respected, and organize that person’s business life. Of course, she’d already found that person in Gabe but …
She went on indexing newsletters until, close to five o’clock, she flipped over a newsletter and read “Stewart Dysart.” It wasn’t the first time she typed a page number after his name, but it was the first time there’d been a picture. It was Stewart all right, blond and running to fat and arrogant as hell, his arm around a pretty blonde, his secretary, according to the caption. Kitty Moran.
Nell looked closer. Kitty Moran looked familiar. Extremely familiar. Nell put her thumb over Kitty’s blonde upsweep and imagined her brunette. Lynnie Mason.
“I will be damned,” she said out loud and took the newsletter out to the copy machine. When she was done, she put the copy back in the files and stuffed the original in her purse, and then she went out to the hall—“Bathroom break,” she said to Elizabeth, who frowned at her—and around a corner to another secretary’s desk. “Can I use your phone?” she said. “Elizabeth is—”
The man pushed the phone toward her. “You don’t need to tell me about Elizabeth,” he said, and she grinned at him and dialed Riley’s number.
“It’s me,” she said when he answered.
“Tell me you’re coming back,” Riley said.
“No. Listen, I have something you’d like to see.”
“Never say that to me in front of Gabe,” Riley said. “I gather this is something I haven’t already seen?”
“Yes,” Nell said. “But I could meet you in an hour and go into great detail.”
“I also gather you are not alone,” Riley said.
“I’m in the belly of the beast. How about the Sycamore? Say, six?”
“How about the Long Shot at eight? It’s a bar on Front Street in the Brewery District. I have to be there anyway.”
“Okay,” Nell said, thinking it was probably just as well since Gabe was likely to show up at the Sycamore and feeling treacherously disappointed about that.
“I hate to sound melodramatic,” Riley said, “but this isn’t putting you in any danger, is it?”
Nell smiled at the secretary who was blatantly listening. “Yes,” she said. “Elizabeth is going to kill me and hide my body in the newsletter room, and let me tell you, it’ll be decades before anybody goes in there again.” The secretary grinned at her.
“Eight, then,” Riley said. “Look hot. I only hang out in bars with hot women.”
“Like that’s news,” Nell said, and hung up, smiling at the secretary. “Thank you so much.”
“My pleasure,” he said. “I’m good for anything that bugs Elizabeth.”
Nell went back to the newsletter room and found Jack waiting for her. “Taking a break?” he said, smiling tightly at her, and she thought, Uh-oh. Something happened while he was out.
“A small break,” she said.
“Do you know the boss well enough to do that?” he said and took a step closer.
“Probably not,” Nell said, trying not to overreact. “I’ll just get back to work.”
“No hurry.” Jack loomed over her, looking mad as hell behind his smile.
Okay, is he going to hit me or kiss me? Nell thought, and when Jack grabbed her and kissed her, she was so relieved she didn’t stop him. He was a pretty good kisser, even when she knew he was doing it so she’d tell Suze. Nell heard a bleating soun
d and pulled back to see Elizabeth, standing in the door to the newsletter room. Nell looked up at Jack and said, “Busted.” Jack jerked back, glaring at Elizabeth, but before he could say anything, Nell said, “You know, I am absolutely ruining the working environment here. I quit.”
She ducked away from Jack and grabbed her purse and escaped into the parking lot, neither knowing nor caring what was happening behind her, heading back to the Village where she belonged.
* * *
Gabe had just gotten back to the office when Riley came in and sat down across from him.
“We’re missing a secretary again,” Gabe said. “Spinal Tap didn’t have this much trouble with drummers.”
“She’s out on a job,” Riley said. “I gave her Becca’s Randy.”
“You did.”
“She wants to be an investigator. I think she’d be good at it, and we’re turning down work. So I’m trying her out, and if she’s good, she can move into that when Nell gets back.”
“And where would we put her?” Gabe said, trying to ignore the way his pulse picked up when he thought about Nell coming back.
“Chloe’s storeroom,” Riley said. “We get rid of the freezer and put a window in the street wall.”
“Chloe might have something to say about that,” Gabe said. “And then there’s the question of where we’d put the freezer files.”
“The basement,” Riley said.
“Okay.” Gabe turned on his computer, not really caring. “It’s your call.”
“She’s going to be good,” Riley said. “She has skills we don’t.”
“I never doubted it.” He opened his notebook and flipped through until he found the notes for his report. “By the way, I stopped by O&D on a background check and offered Trevor and Jack a reference for Nell. I told them she’d organized everything in the place except for the Porsche. We all got a laugh out of that.”