Simple Riches (28 page)
The tabloids painted Matthew Brandon as a user and a manipulator of women. Like her ex-husband. Jeff had told her the man wasn’t what he seemed, whatever that meant. She needed answers to the biggest question of all—why hadn’t Jeff told her Matthew Brandon wouldn't talk to anyone but him? Sara grabbed her cell phone and punched out Jeff’s number.
“Good afternoon, Doctor Sander's office. May I help you?”
“Hi, Jessie. It's me.”
“Sara! Hey! How are you?”
“I'm fine. How is everything?”
“You mean since ten hours ago, when you left? Well, let's see.” Sara pictured the young woman looking at the ceiling and twirling a strand of curly red hair around her index finger. “April called to say the job interview went very well and she thinks she'll get an offer next week. She said to make sure I told you the next time I talked to you, which I didn't think would be quite so soon.”
“Let's hope things work out for her,” Sara said. “Anybody else?”
“Heather called. Her husband's pressuring her big-time. Roses, cards, dinner. Says he'll never look at another woman again and she wants to believe this time will be different. But”—she sighed—“he's told her that six times already.”
“I know. Just listen to her. That's all you can do until she's ready to make a change.”
They spent the next several minutes talking about clients, reviewing strategies, discussing probable outcomes. None of it was necessary. They'd been through it all countless times in the past several days. Jessie might be young and her light-hearted style different than Sara's more conservative one, but she was smart, dedicated, and clients loved her. She didn't need Sara to check behind her like a doting mother.
But Sara needed the familiarity of her work right now to bring back her focus and avoid hearing the inevitable disappointment in Jeff’s voice when she told him she was coming home.
“So tell me,” Jessie said, the excitement bubbling in her voice, “is he as handsome in person as he is in his photos?”
“Who?” Sara asked, marveling at the other woman's constant energy.
“How can you ask me that? Matt Brandon. Super hunk. Every woman's dream!” Her laughter filled the other end of the receiver. “Is he as handsome as his pictures?”
Oh, God, not Jessie too. “I haven't really noticed.” She'd been so annoyed with him she couldn’t get past his words.
Of course Jessie couldn't let it go at that. “You haven't noticed?” she squealed. “How could you not notice? He's so incredibly handsome. And sexy. And beautiful.”
“I think I'm going to be ill.”
“Be serious, Sara. How is he?”
Now, there was a question. “Difficult.”
“Really? Hmm? Well, I'm sure it'll take him some time to adjust to his situation, but if anybody can do it, he can.”
Matthew Brandon was right. Nobody could say the damn word. “You mean his blindness?”
“Yeah.” Her tone grew serious. “What a bummer.”
“Yes, it is.”
“Those beautiful silver eyes,” Jessie said. “Looking at you, into you, through you.” She sighed. “Every picture of him makes me feel that way. Are they as breathtaking in real life?”
“I don't know. He wears dark glasses.” This conversation was ridiculous. Jessie was too intelligent to get reeled in by a handsome face with a glib line. And a pair of silver eyes. “Jeff said he might stop by late in the day to get a little work done. Is he there?”
“Nope. Haven't seen him.”
“Everything okay with Nina?”
“Yeah. The ultrasound looked good and no more bleeding.”
“Great. Thanks, Jessie. I'll catch him at home.”
“Sure. Keep me posted on the hunk. Okay? And if you can get him to take off those shades, look at his eyes. Real good. I bet they'll blow you away.”
“Right. Good-bye,” With responses like Jessie's, no wonder the man had such an overblown ego. She dialed Jeff’s number and he answered on the third ring.
“Hello.”
“Hi, Jeff. This is Sara.”
“Sara. Hi.” He didn't sound at all surprised to hear from her.
“Why didn't you tell me Matthew Brandon wouldn't talk to anybody but you?”
He ignored the question. “Is there a problem?”
“Oh, I'd say there's a problem, all right. He kicked me out of his house. In less than fifteen minutes.” She didn’t tell him how he mistook her for a hooker. Some things were better left alone.
“That bad, huh?”
“Worse. Why did you send me here when you knew he wouldn’t want me?”
“Because right now Matt doesn't know what he wants. But he needs you there, irrespective of what he says or does.”
“Would two weeks really have made that much of a difference? Couldn't he have just waited for you?”
“No. He’s on the verge of shutting down and then nobody will be able to reach him. I need you to spend time with him, encourage him to talk. But don't let him know it's a form of treatment because if he suspects you're playing psychologist, he'll shut you out faster than you can blink.”
“You're asking an awful lot, considering we didn't exactly hit it off.”
“Be patient with him. He'll come around.”
“Right. Patience.” She needed three truckloads right about now.
“And, Sara? Thank you. I know this trip wasn’t your first choice but I really appreciate it.”
“Just take care of Nina.” She hung up and glanced at the sliding glass doors that opened to the mystery man on the deck. Thirteen and a half more days and she could go home.
The Way They Were is available at all major retailers.
Copyright 2012 by Mary Campisi
SIMPLE RICHES is a work of fiction. Names, characters, and situations are all products of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to real persons, locales, or events, are purely coincidental.
Simple Riches was previously published in 2002 by Kensington Publishing Corp.
Mary Campisi should have known she’d become a writer when at age thirteen she began changing the ending to all the books she read. It took several years and a number of jobs, including registered nurse, receptionist in a swanky hair salon, accounts payable clerk, and practice manager in an OB/GYN office, for her to rediscover writing. Enter a mouse-less computer, a floppy disk, and a dream large enough to fill a zip drive. The rest of the story lives on in every book she writes.
When she’s not working on her craft or following the lives of five young adult children, Mary’s digging in the dirt with her flowers and herbs, cooking, reading, walking her rescue lab mix, Cooper, or on the perfect day, riding off into the sunset with her very own ‘hero’ husband on his Electra Glide Classic aka Harley.
Mary has published with Kensington, Carina Press, The Wild Rose Press, and Jocelyn Hollow Romance.
Mary loves to hear from readers:
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