Asking For A Friend

by Parker, Ali

  Flexing my jaw, I nodded at the lawyer to continue. Gingerly, he opened the will to the first page. “I’ve reviewed this document. It was witnessed in this very office and has been kept under lock and key ever since. However, if you wish to contest it, I can’t stop you.”

  “I understand.” I also understood he probably had to say those words, and that others found them reassuring, but I really wished he would get on with it.

  “As you know, you are your father’s only surviving family member. He has left his personal fortune to you, Layton.”

  I nodded, the numbness I’d felt earlier, now spreading and doubling in strength. I couldn’t think of a single word to say, so I kept quiet and waited for him to continue. “There is, however, one stipulation to your inheritance.”

  A stipulation? I frowned. Whatever it was, I could handle it. “Okay.”

  “The condition upon which your inheritance rests is that you must hire your father’s accounting manager. I have her details for you, they’re in the papers you have to sign accepting the inheritance and the condition on which it is dependent.”

  I had to hire his accounting manager? Billions of dollars bequeathed to me on the condition I hired some woman? A part of me wondered if this was the final stab, one he was delivering from the grave. If it was, I didn’t get it.

  Brushing the thought aside, I reached for the fountain pen I kept in my pocket. It didn’t matter who the woman was or why he wanted me to hire her. I wanted to sign these papers and get this over with.

  If I had any hope of actually starting to process the fact that he was gone and that I was going to have to live the rest of my life without him, I needed to get the legalities and the formalities behind me. Lifting up the pen, I didn’t ask any questions about the woman. “Where do I sign?”

  Clayton laid out several documents on the table, turned them and slid them across the polished wooden table to me. “There.”

  Tabs had been stuck on various pages, I read them quickly and scribbled my signature beside the tab at the bottom of each one. When I was done, I handed the papers back to the lawyer and hauled ass out of there.

  Back in my car, I took several deep breaths and watched the usual morning traffic pass me by. What had struck me these last couple of weeks was how life just seemed to carry on. Despite everything my dad had done, the articles and the aeronautical advancements he made, people went about their daily lives as though nothing had changed.

  Pulling on the latch to open my glove box, I slipped Dad’s letter inside. I was intent on joining those people and carrying on with my daily life.

  Chapter 4

  Marissa

  “Look Mommy, I can make snow angels!” Annie called out excitedly. She flung her little body onto the ground and started demonstrating before I could say a word about it.

  Luckily, she had the hood up on her coat and unless she went completely crazy, she wouldn’t get her clothes beneath it wet. “I see, baby. Well done! That’s a perfect snow angel.”

  She beamed up at me, rolling over to repeat her movements on an untouched patch of grass next to the first angel. I laughed, happy that I was getting to see how much she enjoyed the snow.

  Denise, Annie and I had decided to take a walk in one of Boston’s massive parks after a light snow had fallen. Snow was still a novelty to Annie and if I were being completely honest with myself, it made me feel slightly excited too.

  “You guys have been here nearly a year, you’d think she’d be used to the snow by now,” Denise commented, smiling as she watched Annie’s antics on the ground.

  “Nah, we arrived toward the end of winter last year. She didn’t get to see this bit,” I told her. “Besides, even that light snow earlier was way more than we ever got in Texas. This is still new to both of us.”

  “I guess,” Denise shrugged. “I wish I could say the same, but it doesn’t excite me anymore. It did when I first arrived, but that was five years ago now. The only thing that excites me about snow now is knowing it will come to an end.”

  “But if it ends,” I said, batting my lashes innocently. “Then how will we have snowball fights?”

  Annie chose that second to release the snowball she’d been working on, hitting Denise on her upper arm. Compacted snow exploded all over her coat and scarf, reducing Annie to a fit of giggles. “Aunty Dee! I got you!”

  “I see that, squirt.” She started working on brushing the ice off, but then gave up and dropped to her haunches to start forming a snowball of her own. “But, this means war. I hope you know what you just got yourself into.”

  Annie squealed with laughter and ran to duck behind me as Denise launched the ball in her direction. Before I really had time to realize what was happening, Denise and Annie were in a full blown snowball fight.

  Neither of them were compacting the balls enough to hurt, and with the negligible amount of snow on the ground, it wasn’t like they could make them huge. When one of Annie’s balls hit me on the calf, I joined in. “Oh, now you’ve gone and done it, baby girl! Be prepared.”

  Snowballs flew around me for the next fifteen minutes, until we were all laughing too hard to keep at it. Denise threw her hands up in the air first. “I surrender, I surrender. You’re the snowflake queen today, Annie.”

  “I won,” Annie yelled, her eyes wide with excitement as she zoomed around us with her arms flung open. “I won.”

  Denise elbowed me lightly as Annie ran circles around us. “Do you happen to have anything on you we can give her as a prize?”

  “Nope, she’ll have to take a hug,” I winked, but Denise nodded her understanding. When Annie ran up to us, we both sank to our knees and gently tackled her back to the ground as we hugged her.

  Her laughter rang out in the cool air, breaking the silence that hung like a veil around us. I supposed it was too cold for most people to be out taking a walk in the park. We weren’t most people, though. Our walk was far from over. All three of us enjoyed walking in the park, come rain, snow or shine.

  Annie took off at a run towards a play area right ahead of us, calling out over her shoulder. “Mommy, I’ll be just over there.”

  “Okay, sweetheart. Stay where we can see you.” Denise and I strolled up to the playground, watching as Annie tried gripping a low bar, wearing mittens.

  Denise turned to me, narrowing her eyes slightly in thought. “You know, I don’t think you’ve ever told me why you moved out here in the first place. I realized it earlier when you talked about how you never had snow in Texas and so all this was still new to you.”

  “I haven’t told you?” I asked, feigning disbelief. “I’m sure I have.”

  There wasn’t much I didn’t tell Denise about, but that story was going to have to wait. Denise shook her head, just as I knew she would since I’d always diverted the topic when it used to come up after we first met. “We just wanted a fresh start.”

  The generic answer was the same one I always gave when pushed. “It was time. I got an opportunity here and I took it.”

  Unlike most, Denise didn’t nod in understanding and move on to the next topic. Her head tilted slightly to the side, her eyes locked on mine. “That’s it?”

  I nodded. “That’s it.”

  She didn’t look away. “Then why do I sense that there’s more to the story than that lame answer?”

  Making sure Annie was out of earshot, I spotted her carefully maneuvering her way along the low crossbars. If she slipped, the ground was no more than an inch below her feet. Satisfied that she was both safe and couldn’t overhear us, I replied to Denise.

  “Probably because there is more,” I told her honestly.

  As much as I had always dodged the question before, I knew it was time I told Denise everything. She asked, and I wouldn’t lie to her outright. Telling her anything other than the truth now would be lying, and I didn’t want to do that to Denise. She didn’t deserve to be lied to, least of all by me.

  I was about to tell her the rest of the story that
she had correctly sensed there was, but before I could get a word out, my phone started buzzing in my pocket. After fishing out the phone, which was not an easy task with the thick gloves I was still getting used to wearing, I glanced down at the screen.

  The number wasn’t one I recognized, and I sighed, hoping I wasn’t about to interrupt a fairly necessary conversation I had to have with my best friend for a spam call.

  Some people I knew allowed numbers they didn’t know to ring until the call ended, or they simply denied the call. I couldn’t do either of those things. Curiosity or stupidity, I wasn’t sure which, was responsible for driving me to answer every call I got, but I preferred the third option.

  On or off the clock, I was a dedicated employee, and even though my boss had passed away, I got a lot of work related calls from unknown numbers. Whatever was going on at the office, if anything this soon after the funeral, I wouldn’t make it worse by not answering the call.

  If they needed me for anything, I would be there. Even if it wasn’t for much longer. With that in mind, I slid my finger across the screen and was grateful to have splurged on gloves designed with smartphones in mind.

  “Hello?”

  “Good morning.” A crisp, cultured voice I was pretty sure I’d never heard before said. “Is this Marissa Hughes speaking?”

  “It is,” I answered, suddenly nervous. Why, I didn’t know. The voice was deep and smooth. It sent tingles I hadn’t felt for a long time down my spine. “Who is this?”

  “This is Layton,” the man said. “I have a job offer for you, but I’d be more comfortable if you would agree to come in for an interview before I make it.”

  My ears perked up, the nervousness intensifying. A random call about a job offer when I was so uncertain about my future now that my boss was gone was a gift I wasn’t expecting. But I wasn’t one to look a gift horse in the mouth.

  Besides, I couldn’t afford to. Annie and I would be screwed if I was without an income, as would Denise. It didn’t really matter at this point what the man’s job offer was. Short of anything unsavory, I would seriously consider it.

  If he was calling me, he must have heard about me from somewhere. Heard that I might be without a job soon and was calling on someone’s recommendation. It was the only thing that made sense.

  I wouldn’t accept the job until I knew what it was, provided he even made the offer after our interview, but I wasn’t stupid enough to turn him down without even going in for the interview. “Yes, I can make some time for an interview on Monday. Where and what time?”

  Denise stared at me, stunned. She mouthed, “What?”

  I shrugged. I still had no idea. Layton, whoever he was, gave me the address and told me to come by at noon. “We’ll see you then, Ms. Hughes.”

  “Yes,” I said. “Thank you for the opportunity.”

  After a brief pause, I could’ve sworn I heard a sigh. “We’ll speak on Monday.”

  After saying goodbye, I stuffed my phone back in my pocket and wondered what I was getting myself into. A mysterious call with a job offer, while it was a gift, wasn’t something that just happened.

  Too late, I realized I should have asked for details about the company. That way, I could’ve looked it up before I went, and be better prepared for the interview.

  Denise let out a little gasp. “An interview? What was that all about?”

  “I have no idea,” I said honestly. “But if it goes well, I can stop worrying about my job. I think I might have just found a new one.”

  Chapter 5

  Layton

  Monday came too soon, just like it always did. It didn’t matter too much to me, since I spent the weekend catching up on work anyway. It would have been nice if the weekend had been a day or two longer, though. I could have used more quiet time to catch up.

  The office was best for me when there weren’t a lot of people around. Fewer interruptions, and fewer other things requiring my immediate attention. When I hired all those people on, I thought getting them to do some of the jobs I had been doing when I was still alone in the firm would lessen my workload, and it had, but only by so much. I still had to sign off and give the final say about most things.

  I wouldn’t complain about it, though. It meant business was good, and since I’d spent my life focused on building up the business, it meant life was good.

  The morning passed by quickly, in a haze of pencil lines and paperwork. I was relieved and satisfied to see the number of new projects we were being requested to take on for the year. If we could keep it up, it would be another good year for us.

  Hiring an accounting manager might even turn out to be exactly what we needed. The accounting firm I had on retainer was doing fine, but it was becoming a nuisance couriering documents back and forth. If we had someone in house to run our numbers for us, to do the day-to-day things like projects and cost-saving measures, we could end up saving a lot of time.

  Don’t put the cart before the horse, I mentally chastised myself. I still had to meet with this woman. Just because she was an accounting manager and it was something we could use around here, didn’t mean she would be suited for the job.

  She could be terrible at it, or she could not fit in with the company culture at all. If that was the case, I was going to have to think long and hard about what to do with her. Turning her down for the job when it was the only condition to my inheritance would be downright stupid. I might not be as intelligent as my father had been, but I also wasn’t stupid.

  On the other hand, if her appointment was going to upset the balance in the firm, I would have to think of a different plan. The firm was too important to me to jeopardize the harmonious working environment we had established for some woman my father insisted on me having.

  Perhaps I could appoint her as my personal accounting manager if that was the case. The will only specified that I had to hire her, it didn’t say in what capacity I had to do it. If she managed my personal finances, she could work from home or wherever else and I would hardly ever have to see her.

  Assuming she wasn’t terrible at her job, of course. If she was, it was on to Plan C. A plan I hadn’t formulated yet. I made a mental note to check the references I’d managed to get ahold of on her before she arrived.

  Drawn out of my thoughts, I heard a knock on my door. “Come in.”

  I straightened my tie and turned away from the city I’d been looking out over to face my desk again. Craig came striding in, shrugging out of his coat and hanging it on the rack by the door. “Mornin’ boss man, how’s it hanging today?”

  “I’ve never quite understood why people ask that, but, it’s a little to the left if you must know,” I smirked, gesturing for him to take a seat. “How’s everything going down at the site?”

  Craig’s lips formed a wide smile under the stubble he was sporting on his face, apparently not having shaved all weekend. I preferred being cleanly shaven myself, but that was just one of my little quirks. I didn’t remember ever wanting a beard.

  “We’re all good on the job,” Craig told me. “We’ve moved fast in the week since you were there. Finishing touches today and tomorrow, then the interior people are moving in.”

  “Basically done, then?” I wasn’t surprised at Craig and his guys finishing up slightly ahead of schedule. The man was a machine when it came to his job. He often put in overtime himself to get things done.

  He nodded, his shaggy hair moving against the stubble on his chin. “Basically, yeah.”

  “That’s great work, Craig. Really. I was worried the weather was going to hold us up.”

  Shrugging, his head bounced up and down. “It could have, but we pushed when we could. The next couple of days are going to be a rush, so I wanted to come in today to thank you again for coming to me with the project.”

  “No problem,” I told him, actually meaning it for once. Craig, like me, was trying to build up his own business. He started out a couple of years after I did, though and was still getting settle
d.

  A lot of his early business came from me. It wasn’t just because he was my best friend that I supported his business to the extent that I did. “You’re the only contractor I trust to get the job done right and on time.”

  “Means a lot,” he said modestly, then heaved himself into the chair across from my desk. “So business being done with, how did your meeting with the lawyer go? Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine.” There really wasn’t much to tell about the meeting. “Nothing really happened that I wasn’t expecting, except that he’s making me hire some accounting manager as a condition of getting my inheritance.”

  “An accounting manager?” Craig looked as taken aback as I had been. “Why?”

  Shrugging, I shook my head. “I don’t know. All Clayton Reeve told me was that the only condition placed on my receiving the inheritance was hiring her.”

  A deep line appeared between his slightly bushy eyebrows. “That’s pretty weird, but it’s a good deal, I think. Hire some woman and get the inheritance?”

  “Yeah, it’s a good deal,” I agreed. I didn’t have exact figures yet, since I hadn’t gone through the paperwork Reeve sent over, but it was a safe bet that her lifetime salary would be a drop in the bucket of what I stood to inherit. “I’m interviewing her soon. I didn’t want to make the offer flat out without even having met her.”

  “Good thinking,” he said. “I get it, but just think carefully, okay?”

  “Will do.” At that moment, there was another knock at the door. Before I could invite her in, a woman swept into my office. I wasn’t used to people coming in before I told them to, but I bit back any comment because this had to be her.

  A quick glance at the antique clock above my door told me it was exactly noon. She was right on time, so that counted for something.

  Craig must’ve thought the same thing I did about who she was and got up. “I’d best be getting back to work. See you.”