Some young- well, maybe not as young as she had thought- good-looking, curly-haired stud who easily dropped his pants and whose melted-chocolate orbs intensely burrowed into her soul was definitely not on the agenda.
Definitely… not.
Raising her brothers with an overprotective dad, it had been hard enough to convince herself men were more than over-sized kids who needed a strong hand to keep them from making total fools of themselves.
And the boyfriends back in Pittsburgh-Heaven help her, one of whom she had almost married-weren’t much help in convincing her otherwise.
New York guys were different. Opportunistic, self-absorbed, career-oriented. Not exactly life-partner material. She had finally taken charge of her life by striking out on her own. The last thing she needed was to get involved with someone. Maybe once she felt secure in the business world…
Amanda sighed and settled into the upholstered chair behind her desk. Her fingertips pressed gently against her closed eyes. She willed him away. A few deep breaths, a final lung-full of mind-clearing oxygen and her eyes opened and her back stiffened with fresh resolve.
She quickly riffled through the disordered papers on her desk. Nothing missing there, either. She got up and checked the rest of the office. The sofa, the easy chairs, the homey knick-knacks were in place. On the walls, several of the framed, dramatically-colored, blow-ups of violent covers of the illustrated novels it was her job to see to publication had been shifted. There had been an attempt to dislodge the backing of one of the illustrations, as though the prowler had expected to find something hidden between the print and its backing.
Amanda perched on the flower-patterned sofa across from her desk and fiddled with an action figure of the hero of one of the novels. She recapitulated: there was so sign of a break-in, yet her files had been gone over with a fine tooth comb. What were they looking for? Someone had badly wanted to find something. Surely it had been no one from the company, yet who else could have had such easy access to her office?
She felt a sinking sensation. If it had been Nathan, on drugs again and in need of ready cash, what had he hoped to find to hock by going through the firm’s records? That made no sense. She felt ashamed for even thinking such a thing. Besides, she noted practically, there were any number of pieces of equipment he could have more easily taken from the work carrels outside.
Why wasn’t Antonio some master detective that she could call on to race to her rescue?
Amanda sat bolt upright. What was happening to her? What was happening to her vaunted self-sufficiency, that with the first crack in her carefully constructed new life, she crumpled.
But it wasn’t the first crack. That had occurred last night when she had allowed a dark-eyed Italian to disrupt her life.
She tightened her jaw and steeled herself. She had dashed through the outer cubicles gaily waving hello this morning, allowing no one and nothing to stop her, not even the smell of freshly-roasted coffee. The others knew she had an important meeting scheduled with a potential backer and, she hoped, would stay at arm’s length, assuming she needed to prepare.
What Amanda had needed was a few moments alone to try and put her thoughts concerning the last fifteen hours in some manageable order-an impossible hope at the apartment this morning. Cissy must have run out of Prozac; she was certainly in no mood to be civil.
Amanda reached for the intercom. There was one person whose shoulder would always be available.
A gentle patterned knock on the door told Amanda the intercom wouldn’t be necessary. “Please, professor, please come in.”
Professor Angeli slipped quietly into the room.
“I told Jimmy, your ever-faithful watchdog, I would only be a moment. I know this is a vital morning. I just wanted to wish you the best of luck and perhaps share a moment or two in remembering what an extraordinary gift we were given last evening. Nathan, of course, has done nothing except denigrate the entire experience. I do think…” He stopped and stepped forward, adjusting his glasses as he peered closer at his executive director. “Oh, my dear, you must be under terrible pressure.”
Amanda could feel the sting behind her eyes and realized she was making an effort to keep her lower lip from trembling. The gentle, supremely-gifted artist was the only one she ever allowed to see the weakness in her determined facade.It must be the Daddy thing.
“Not even your morning coffee, yet? Allow me.” He flicked the intercom on the desk. “Jimmy, our esteemed Lady Lochinvar desires her morning decaf to prepare for the ordeal ahead. The usual, please.”
He tilted his trim white head and stared down at the collapsed shoulders. “Do we need a hug to fortify us?” Amanda stood and clasped his fragile frame close.
“He was amazing, wasn’t he, professor? So absolutely powerful. I’ve never seen such energy, such belief- I never expected to…” She grabbed a tissue and blew her nose.
“I knew you were as moved as I.” The elder artist observed her carefully. “Perhaps even more so. He is an extraordinarily handsome young man.”
Amanda cleared her throat. “Yes. He is that. But,” she forced her mind to switch tracks, “I certainly never expected to have such an experience when you and Nathan talked me into taking the class. Maybe I’ll be more productive next session.”
She forced a rueful laugh as she went to check her make-up in a nearby wall mirror before turning back to the professor. “But that was last night. This morning I discovered someone gained access to my office and went through my files. Have you any idea who might do such a thing and why?”
The look of utter shock and instant fear that flooded the old man’s face was as palpable as a slap. Amanda raced to him in utter dismay to put a protective arm around the narrow shoulders.
“It’s a terrible thing to say, but with Nathan’s history, I was afraid…”
“No!” The professor pulled sharply away. “It’s not Nathan. I’m sure. He’s promised me he’s clean. Has been. Promised. I’m sure it’s not he.”
The door burst open before Amanda could respond to his extraordinary reaction and Jimmy, the Jimmy Olsen of their division of AA Enterprises, burst in, his fingers hooked around three mugs of coffee.
“I figured if the Ancient Mariner could bug you, I could at least listen in before the barracuda you’re gonna face this morning leads you to the chopping block.” Amanda laughed. Her head writer tended not only to mix his metaphors but to embellish them luridly.
“Nathan’s been besmirching your rep with Tales of the Naked Hunk from last night,” Jimmy continued eagerly, “and I thought maybe I should get it from the horse’s mouth- or is it mare?” He arched an eyebrow. “Before I spread the ugly gossip at the coffee counter that our fair boss has been smitten by a muscle nudie.”
“Thanks, gang. Just the kind of back-up I need to face a hard-nosed venture capitalist.” Amanda took a deep swallow of the foul brew that Mindy, the receptionist, managed to concoct each morning. “‘Smitten by a muscle nudie?’ Wasn’t that a lead story inHeartfelt Confessions, Jimmy? Our beloved sister publication a couple of floors down? Doing a little moonlighting on the side, are we?”
“How appalling,” the professor muttered, taking his mug from the young writer and shooing him out the door.
“Perhaps it was the clumsiness of an overzealous cleaning person who upset your files. At any rate, I’m sure young Nathan had nothing to do with it.” He glanced at the clock on the wall that told time with the bulging muscular arms of a superhero. “The time grows nigh. I’ll leave you to yourself for a moment. If any of us can provide any backup, you know where our dungeons lie.”
Amanda nodded gratefully and the professor left. She felt more annoyed than ever with her faithful Jimmy going along with Nathan’s smarmy suggestions and the professor being less than helpful in suggesting she might be overreacting.