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Authors: Nia Ryan

Tags: #christian, #christian romance, #courtship, #first love, #love, #marriage

Final Arrangements (9 page)

BOOK: Final Arrangements
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He wasn't real. She remembered his remark
about finding a hippopotamus in a swimming pool. That was the
remark which told her everything. The one truly insane slip he had
made thus far. In his totally strange but believable fantasy world,
he had made that single bizarre statement and it was his
undoing.

There. She had her answer from God. Stretch
wasn't in his right mind. Because he actually believed that he'd
seen a hippopotamus in a swimming pool. And having seen it, had
jumped in and pumiced the beast clean. No, Stretch wasn't real--but
he was special. She had to admit that.

"Sorry, Stretch," she said. "There was a
spark ... in another lifetime, perhaps."

"Ma'am?" the driver said. "Did you say
something?"

"Nothing. Nothing at all."

Chapter 6

The jet wasn't ready. It was supposed to be
but it wasn't. Because by law there had to be a sky marshall on
board and they didn't have one available. They would have one soon,
one who was coming in on a flight from Salt Lake City. But it
wouldn't be for at least an another hour. To pass the time, she
stood at the counter and argued.

"Even though I'm the only passenger on the
jet," Shannon said, "I have to have a sky marshall. Why? So in case
I whip out a nail clipper or try to light my shoes, he can blow my
head clean off?"

She was making a scene. Because she hated
waiting in airports and the Burbank Airport was one of the more
depressing ones to have to wait in. To start with, there was no
lounge to speak of, nothing to cushion the shock, the nakedness one
felt in an airport.

There was a somewhat seedy little snack bar,
the sort of place where you had to brush the crumbs off the table
yourself. She could have waited in the limo, which had it's own
color satellite TV and killer stereo system. But she'd foolishly
dismissed the limo at the curb, so confident was she the jet would
be ready and waiting.

"I'm sorry," the guy who took the tickets and
explained patiently the lateness of things said. "But we have
strict Federal regulations."

"Do I look like a suicide bomber to you? I'm
going to be late for my meeting and lose a commission of two and a
half million dollars," she said. "Does that mean anything to
you?"

"I'm very sorry. The sky marshall we planned
on using ran out of available hours."

"What's that mean? Ran out of available
hours. That isn't something someone can do unless they're dead.
Until that happens, until we die, there are always hours
available."

He handed her a coupon. Good for a free
alcoholic beverage at the bar.

"This is going to make up for my delayed
flight? A complimentary drink? I want to see your supervisor. No,
never mind. I'm too tired to fight with you people. When the jet is
ready, page me in the snack bar. No wait. Here's my cell phone
number. Call me instead. I don't want my name blared out all over
this airport. I'll be waiting for the call. If the entire Western
Hemisphere doesn't run out of available hours meanwhile."

"Yes ma'am."

She managed to get a Coke with her
complimentary drink coupon and sat in the corner, near the overhead
TV, General Hospital, with Claire behind her desk in her fabulous
office, bantering with her newest love interest, a middle-aged
gopher with the street smarts of a bookie and the looks of a Greek
god. A guy who in real life would never be a gopher, would be
instead what he actually was--an actor who got paid countless
thousands of dollars just for learning a few lines and looking
better than anybody else in the world while delivering them.

She couldn't keep her mind on the plot, found
herself instead counting the number of Cheshire Cat grins Claire
delivered during the scene. It was
Claire's favorite facial response, and Shannon spent the better
part of five minutes counting them, before the game collapsed under
its own pointlessness.

Then it happened. The local area commercial
which caught her complete interest. There he was. Stretch Murphy.
Wearing a tuxedo, swimming underwater in a swimming pool, a huge
block of volcanic stone in hand, pumicing the heavy, thick skin of
an extremely large hippopotamus. A very funny commercial. The whole
thing done tongue in cheek, the hippo obviously totally fake, with
eyes rolling crazily and ears wiggling sideways flippity flip, the
way hippos do. Along the bottom of the screen, a scrolling marquee:
THE POOL GUY ... BECAUSE YOU NEVER KNOW WHAT'S IN THE WATER
...1-800-POOL GUY.

Stretch Murphy was real. The thought
staggered her, filled her insides to overflowing, opening her up to
an enormity of possibilities, as though she had suddenly inhaled
the entire sky. Her cell phone rang. She fished it from her straw
purse. Hurriedly. It had to be Stretch. Had to be. Calling at the
moment she was viewing his commercial.

A sign, unasked for to be sure, but a sign
from God nonetheless. To help her decide her life's course. To
assist her in choosing from two diametrically opposed pathways. One
which led eventually to Heaven. The other which led who knew
where?

The choice would be easy. She chose Stretch.
Her dad's amazing going away present to her. A pre-arranged
husband, who drove a Mercedes and fancied yellow parrots on his
green shirt. She could already see them at the altar on Saturday.
It would be the most exciting moment of her life. And he was rich.
She no longer needed the Kremsky deal. She was free. Truly and
forevermore. Her phone rang. It had to be him, sensing her
wavelength and calling at the exact moment her feelings for him hit
the universe.

"Stretch! You weren't kidding about a hippo.
Hey, forgive me for leaving the way I did, but I--"

"--Shannon?" Not Stretch. Bob Archer. Wispy
voice. Her boss. If she'd been thrown off a building, she couldn't
have landed any harder from an emotional standpoint.

"Bob?"

"Who's Stretch? And what about a hippo? Or
did you say hypo? Never mind. Your private life is your own
business. Shannon, where are you? Making your final approach, I
hope."

"Not hardly. I'm still in Burbank."

"Very funny. Listen, have the car bring you
to the office the minute you land. Kremsky's people called. They're
moving up the agenda. The General wants to sign within the next
hour before his flight leaves for San Diego. He's is down the
street having lunch with Mr. Griffen at the Bohemian club, although
for the life of me I don't know what they see in that place. The
steaks are as tough as the leather in the antique chairs. As soon
as they're finished with dessert, they're coming over."

"They are? But what about the people at
State?"

"The people from legal are going to webcast
us in with the people from State. My idea. Brilliant, wouldn't you
say? They're posting the drafts to the site. That way, we can make
the final revisions as soon as the General gets here. But we need
you here to explain to him how the tax shelter is going to work.
Not that I couldn't do it, but for some reason, he seems to trust
only you. The guy still has that little iron curtain thing going in
his head. Off the record, General Kremsky's probably a little
paranoid."

"Bob? I wasn't joking. I'm still at the
Burbank Airport."

The silence at the other end of cyberspace
was total, as though something had gone wrong with the physics of
sound in general, such that there would no longer be sound anymore,
and an alternate substance would have to be found or else the
entire world would henceforth have to do without it.

"Shannon?" Bob finally said, his voice even
higher. "Why are you still in Burbank?"

"The jet couldn't leave without a sky
marshall. And they were out of them. We're waiting for one to
arrive from Salt Lake City."

"We ... we are waiting for a sky
marshall?"

"Yes."

"Shannon. Help me out here. General Kremsky
will be walking into our conference room somewhere within this next
hour. A guy with a billion dollars to invest. And I'm going to tell
him we can't go ahead because you were unavoidably detained by a
sky marshall? Oh, that's going to inspire confidence in the man!
Shannon, is there some reason you weren't able to contact me the
instant you found out your flight was going to be delayed? Some
reason you didn't want me to immediately charter another, more
willing jet? One with it's own #@!!!# sky marshall?"

"I ... I don't know. I guess I forgot."

"You forgot."

"Yes. I forgot. I've just wasted a lot of
time arguing with the officious little man who runs this place, and
another 15 minutes here in the airport lounge nursing a coke and
watching General Hospital. Is there some reason I'm supposed to
feel bad about this? I'm only human. Bob, I shouldn't do this, but
need I remind you my father passed away last night? I'm under a
little stress here."

"Okay. I understand. You hate me and you want
me dead. Fine. I'll just go up to the roof and jump. No, wait. The
elevator shaft is closer. Shannon, what do you think is going to
happen if I don't produce the General's signature this afternoon?
What? Do you think Mr. Griffen is going to be happy with me? Do you
think? Or are you !@###!!! thinking at all!" The tone had dropped
from high upset to killing guttural, the sounds similar to those
Nicole Simpson might have heard right before she was knocked
unconscious by the infamous black-gloved fist to her head.

"Bob, you needn't speak to me this way."

"I will speak to you any way I wish. And you
will not ever correct me again."

Something began to rise within Shannon.
Something fierce, and angry. There were limits. And deep down, she
knew, the limit had been reached. She was an Ireland. And Irelands,
whatever else they might or might not be, were not toadies. Weren't
for sale to the highest bidder, or anyone else who might take a
fancy to see an Ireland in a subservient position.

Her father had taught her that. Better a
crust with contentment than riches with strife, Dad had told her.
Meaning no matter how much money is at stake, there is a time in
the course of negotiations when, if the soul also is also to be
added to the evil brewing in the pot, it is better to walk away
than stay in the game. Better to live on the street than to lose
one's soul and live in a mansion.

"Listen, you overinflated pork rind," she
said calmly, while at the same time fighting the urge to scream. "I
don't care how much money I have at stake here. Nobody speaks to me
the way you just did. Besides all that, I just got engaged. His
name is Stretch Murphy and he's wealthy, so I don't need the money
from the Kremsky deal. But I am still a professional, so just this
once, I am going to overlook your tone and your words. We are going
to complete this deal on schedule. We are going to land General
Kremsky's billion dollar slate and I am going to earn my
one-quarter of one percent bonus for signing the account. We must
be civil to one another. After the signing, you can cut me my check
and we'll go our merry ways. But until then, we've got to use our
heads and work together. I'll grab a cab and hightail it to the
Sheraton Universal. They've got a full service networking facility.
I've got my laptop with me. I'll hook into the webcast and work
with the General from that vantage point."

There. She'd remained composed. Professional.
Shown Archer how she behaved under extreme duress. Dad would have
been proud. Correction. Dad was proud. Because she was sure he was
watching over her still. Somewhere out there, in all the vast
expanse of space, Dad's spirit was finding a way to be with her in
this dark moment.

There was an unpleasant shriek on the other
end of the line, terminating in total silence. A split second
before the silence, she experienced a mental fantasy image the
shriek was made by Archer at the exact instant an escaped lion had
come up behind him and with a single, well-practiced toothy
clampdown, removed his head.

The image quickly vanished, but it was a
moment before she realized she was alone. Incredibly, Archer had
terminated the call. And from the sound of it, she pieced together
a picture of exactly how he'd done so. Not by simply pressing the
end call button. But by destroying the phone itself. She pictured
the device even now, lying in pieces on the floor of his
office.

Something had just happened. Something had
gone terribly wrong on every front she faced. The whys and the
wherefores were not apparent. But what was apparent, a movement was
afoot to crush her spirit, to take from her everything she
possessed. Not only the outer, but the inner.

She looked up and her eyes focused on the TV,
but not really seeing the action. Time passed. A half hour, maybe
more, before she came back from the oblivion of shock. Claire, not
grinning now, instead feigning unconsciousness, her features slack,
being given CPR by her new love interest.
It's like my own
life
, she thought.
Except there's nobody rushing to my aid,
to rescue me from the depths of disaster which have struck my world
without warning. No. Stop panicking. There is someone. A very
special someone.

She dialed the number, not caring about the
desperateness of the act, or what would happen next. Just dialed
it, not concerned about how it would look to herself or to anybody
else, in the same way someone falling off a cliff could care less
how comical or desperate they appeared to onlookers as they reached
wildly around for something to grab all the way down.

"Pool Guy," Stretch Murphy said.

"It's me."

"Where are you?"

"I'm in the snack bar at the Burbank Airport.
I think I just lost my job. I told off my boss and he hung up on
me. I'm sitting here nursing a Coke. It's watered down and warm.
All the ice has melted."

"I'm still in Van Nuys. I can be there in 30
minutes. Sooner if the traffic allows."

BOOK: Final Arrangements
6.96Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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