Barbara folded the list and slipped it into her skirt pocket. “Thanks. I’ve never been to an auction. I’m looking forward to it.”
Molly managed to stick a cold asparagus tip in her mouth when a boy of about ten burst into the dining room. He slowed down as he skidded toward her.
“Are you with my uncle Nick?”
This was weird. It wouldn’t surprise her if next thing, someone asked where she was registered and if she’d picked out her china pattern.
“Yes, she is.” Barbara smoothed back the boy’s auburn hair and adjusted the collar of his white dress shirt in what seemed like a motherly gesture. “Speaking of which … here comes the Martian twin now.”
Nick entered the room, and Molly could have sworn the light rose in intensity. He kissed his sister on the cheek. “Don’t listen to her. She’s called me a space monster ever since the day I played Commando with her dolls.”
Commando.
“You cut off all their hair.” Barbara brought her hand up like she wanted to swat him.
Nick raised both of his as if to ward off an impending blow. “You can’t charge into battle with flowing locks. If you wanted to join the Commandos, you had to surrender your hair.” He laughed in that deep, masculine way but with an ease of a man who rarely had to force it. “Right, Joey?”
“Right, Uncle Nick.” The kid performed a quick karate chopping motion.
“You’re twins.” Upon closer inspection, Molly saw the resemblance. Only Barbara seemed to possess a certain kind of gentleness Nick distinctly lacked. She was sweet, sticky lollipops and ruffled pinafores. He came across more like a chainsaw and boxing gloves.
“I’m four minutes older.”
His sister patted him on the shoulder. “That made you top dog.”
“Oh yeah, all that meant was I had to jump in the middle of everyone’s squabbles and whip the rest of you guys into shape.”
The Commando in action. Molly wondered if he planned to whip her into shape once they started apartment hunting.
Barbara smiled and nodded as if in acknowledgment of the role he played in their childhood. “Do you have any brothers, Molly?”
“No.”
“Sisters?”
She shook her head.
“That’s too bad. In spite of how we sound, we’re all pretty close. Maybe next time you come around you’ll meet my younger sister. As usual, she’s late.”
Next time? Molly didn’t think so.
“My other brother is on his honeymoon. He’s the normal one.” She gave Nick a tap on the arm that seemed to suggest it was time he married and went on one, too.
A lopsided frown pinched his face as if he heard that one too often. He took Molly’s plate and set it on the deep ledge of a breakfront. “Listen, Barbara, we have to leave. Did you see Mom?”
“I think she went outside to say good-bye to Uncle Ed and Aunt Rita.”
He put his hand on Molly’s shoulder. Top dog marking his territory? Not likely. It couldn’t have been more innocent, but in everyone’s eyes, it probably came across as if she were invited to brunch as his date. Usually, when a man she hardly knew touched her, she backed away. So she couldn’t account for her shoes becoming Krazy-Glued to Mrs. Mancini’s deep green plush carpet or explain the aura of heat that seemed to envelop her.
As they headed out of the dining room, she reminded Barbara about the auction.
“What auction?” Nick asked.
Barbara pulled out the slip of paper detailing the items up for bid. “It’s Molly’s fundraiser. She’s auctioning off fancy dinners, a balloon ride in the Napa Valley, vacations in Carmel, and seats to the Giants opening game next spring.” She handed Nick the list and pointed to the baseball item. “If you change your sinful ways, I’ll bid on that one for you.” She turned to Molly. “Nick is a rabid sports fan, especially the Giants. He never misses opening day.” She plucked the list out of her brother’s hand.
Nick steered Molly to the front door. They stepped outside onto a small brick and concrete porch where Mrs. Mancini waved at a couple as they pulled away in a taxi. He dropped his hand the moment his mother turned their way. Molly didn’t blame him. Not with all the matrimony that floated in the air.
“Mom, we’ve gotta go.”
Mrs. Mancini stepped over to Molly and clasped both her hands. “So soon? Did you have enough to eat?”
“I had more than enough. Thank you.” Although Molly was sorry no one cut the cake. “Everything was delicious.”
Mrs. Mancini shrugged. “It was catered. They did their best.” She released Molly’s hands and glanced briefly at her son. “Have Nicky bring you over for a home-cooked dinner sometime.”
He pressed his lips together and gave his mother an enigmatic smile. Whatever she expected — yes, maybe, or when hell turned out to be the only place to achieve Nirvana — she received no response from him.
“Do you like seafood, dear?” Apparently not a woman often thwarted, Mrs. Mancini turned a beatific smile on Molly.
“I love it.”
“Good. Then you two decide when, and Nicky will let me know the date.”
Separation issues? Au contraire.
The exchange seemed almost surreal with this lovely woman inviting her to dinner. Nicky, whose bank account she planned to plunder, gave a good imitation of a man who did everything possible to stave off cardiac arrest. Too bad. She liked his mother and would love to sit down with her and maybe even the whole Mancini gang and dig into a big crab or lobster feed or whatever the woman had in mind. That was never going to happen, though. As soon as they were back in the car and out of this high-cost area, Molly expected to prove to her son nothing talked like money. Especially his paltry twenty-five thousand. It not only didn’t talk, it barely squeaked.
Chapter 6
“Thanks for coming inside with me. I hope it wasn’t a hassle.” As soon as they settled in the car, Nick engaged the motor.
Molly retrieved her folders off the floor and fastened her seat belt. “Not at all. I love brunch food whether catered or otherwise. It was great. I enjoyed meeting your sister and your mom, too, of course.”
“My mother has a tendency to overdo the hostess thing when someone new comes over to the house.” He shoved on his sunglasses and buckled his seat belt then backed out of the driveway and onto the street. “I hope she didn’t embarrass you.”
Molly figured his explanation was a subtle way to warn her not to take his mother’s invitation to the fish fry seriously.
“I’m never embarrassed when someone exhibits warmth. The world would be a much better place if people showed more of it.”
“You mean me?” He whipped a right and headed down Chestnut.
“I meant in general.”
“Well, generally speaking, no one’s ever accused me of a cold nature. Just the opposite.” He shot her a quick glance and a smile that contained enough wattage to light up a mineshaft.
She decided it best for now not to bring up his tenants. Maybe by the end of the day he’d live up to his exalted opinion of himself.
As they approached the corner of Chestnut and Gough, the light turned from green to yellow. He floored the gas pedal and roared across the intersection. Molly’s head jerked back and her purse and folders flew off her lap. She grabbed the armrest anchored to the passenger door and braced her other hand against the dashboard.
Nick’s arm shot in front of her and lightly grazed her breasts. His palm cupped her far shoulder and pinned her to the back of the seat.
“Sorry.” He eased up on the gas. “Trying to beat the yellow is a bad habit of mine. I hate it when the light changes just when you hit the corner.” He let go of her and clamped his hand back onto the steering wheel.
Molly pushed a lock of hair out of her eye.
“Do you always run the yellow?”
“Not always. Well, too much of the time. I hold back, though, if it seems anyone’s about to enter the intersection.”
“Well, thanks for the consideration.”
“Don’t worry. You’re safe with me.”
Safe? Molly had her doubts, and it had little to do with traffic. Except that he played hardball with his tenants and posed a possible threat to the clinic, she couldn’t find a single thing wrong with him.
“I’ll bet you collect a lot of tickets.”
He shrugged. “I do my share to keep the city solvent.”
“You must be at the head of the class in traffic school.”
“I do that over the Internet. I have it down to thirty-eight minutes.”
Molly straightened her blouse. The heat from his palm had come right through the silk fabric and still lingered on her skin. He had large hands. She tried to remember if the size of a man’s hands went along with something more intimate. Or was it big feet? She had to force her eyes to stare straight ahead and not take a detour where they had no business.
She gathered up her purse and the materials scattered around her feet. With everything back in her lap, she opened a folder and glanced at a sheet that contained a listing of apartment rentals. Earlier, she’d circled three that fell within the thousand to eleven-hundred-dollars-a-month range. Studio apartments probably little bigger than a typical one-car garage. None in a particularly desirable area, either. What else could you expect in San Francisco for such a low price? Those apartments were still way out of range for Mrs. Z and the other tenants, which should more than prove her point to Nick.
“Maybe we ought to set some ground rules, like which areas to avoid. We won’t waste each other’s time that way.”
“Ground rules.” He hunched over the wheel. “You mean like a lot of don’ts.” His vibe changed from pleasant to the kind that usually came her way when she accidentally cut someone off in traffic. A vibe that clashed with the rampant sex appeal that oozed from his pores. “Then, again, you’re probably right. Yeah. Why don’t you lay out a few?”
Talk about a quick change in attitude. Could she have misjudged him all along? She didn’t think so but appreciated his effort to appear agreeable.
“Okay. We should only consider apartments within a one to two block distance of a supermarket and close to public transportation. Mrs. Z told me none of your tenants own a car.” Molly worried about them traveling to the clinic for medical attention. Forget taxis. They’d have to hop on a bus even if they were minutes away from a heart attack or ready to upchuck last night’s dinner. “Forget skid row or any area screaming for a cop on every corner.” Contrary to Dominique’s advice, she’d decided to avoid the Tenderloin. “Your tenants need to know the area is safe.”
He gave her a quick glance. “Do you think I’d put them at risk?”
Did she? He’d chopped the hair off his sister’s dolls … Okay, so he’d been a kid playing Commando. She wondered if he still played it. If so, she hoped it wasn’t with people’s lives.
He paused at a stop sign, pulled off his sunglasses, and tossed them onto the dashboard. He leaned toward her. “Well, is that what you think?” His dark eyes turned into twin thunderclouds.
“I can’t make that judgment.” Not yet. Was he ever touchy.
“Then let me make it for you. I’m one of the good guys.” He managed to sound hurt and defensive, like her opinion of him mattered. “Really. I am. Trust me.” The thunderclouds scattered under a sunny smile.
“Well … okay.” He still had to prove it.
“I can’t think of any law that requires me to offer a buyout. There are plenty of property owners who serve eviction notices with the understanding their tenants either move in the time allotted or find their belongings in the street. I’d never do something so callous. Certainly not to that down-on-their-luck bunch who live in my building. With the buyout offer, we can all come out winners.”
Molly preferred his smile to a frown, so she didn’t contradict him. Later, while they viewed some dump, she’d remind him of recent history. Since the economy had nosedived straight into the toilet, his buyout sucked.
As they left the Marina District behind, the streets grew grittier. Leafy trees gave way to telephone poles strung with exposed wire. A city bus lumbered by, the back panel tagged with graffiti. A diverse cross section of people — some well-heeled, others not — ambled along the sidewalks. Nick pulled the car into a No Parking zone and killed the motor. He pointed to a building diagonally across the street.
“I told the owner we’d meet him outside at eleven thirty.” He checked his watch. “We’re a few minutes early.”
Molly leaned forward to peer around Nick and gazed out the driver’s side window. Rising four stories, the building’s brick façade looked in need of an immediate power wash. Shades were drawn in some of the windows. Cheap curtains framed smudged glass in the remaining ones. Someone in a ground floor apartment had balanced a couple of clay flowerpots on a window ledge. A few tired-looking sprigs of green peeked up over the rims. The front door looked as if you needed a battering ram to enter the premises.
“Is that a transient hotel?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. It’s an apartment building.”
“It looks shabby.”
“What? I suppose my building reminds you of the Fairmont.”
She caught another whiff of his aftershave. Damn if it wasn’t the exact one that came as a sample sheet in the latest issue of Cosmo. Rugged, yet seductive, or so the ad claimed. Rightly so. She wondered if a woman had bought it for him in hopes he’d put that heady scent to work on her. If it weren’t for their million-dollar disagreement, Molly might consider taking a turn on the receiving end. He’d have to drop the attitude and really prove he was one of the good guys, though. What were the chances he’d morph into a prince? She hoped not as unlikely as being dealt a royal flush sans wild cards.
Mostly commercial buildings lined the block. A deli occupied one corner, a bar and launderette the other two. The ubiquitous hole-in the-wall Chinese restaurant clung to the fourth.
“How did you find this place?” She sat back and opened one of her folders and did a quick scan of the ads to see if she’d highlighted the address.
“A guy who works on my condo project touted me onto it. He lives here. Said he pays in the low seven hundreds.”
A construction guy. Well, it never hurt to have a little muscle on the premises. The low seven hundreds? He must hole up in a jail cell-sized room with a hotplate, mini fridge, and bathroom privileges down the hall. If true, it ought to blow a hole in the Mancini Proclamation.
Nick angled his body into the corner created by the driver’s seat and door. The expression that settled across his features said the attitude was out and the sex appeal was back in. He raked a dark lock of hair away from his forehead while his eyes did a quick survey of her body.
“So how does a woman like you wind up running a not-for-profit clinic?”
A woman like who? And what was the “wind up” supposed to mean? “The clinic was the mayor’s idea. He broached it at a meeting two and a half years ago when I worked for the city in social services. There weren’t any facilities in the area for people to seek medical help. The nearest hospital, San Francisco General, is miles away. Anyway, the emergency rooms are always jammed. I wasn’t sure if he was serious, but without thinking it through, I jumped up and said I could get something like that off the ground and keep it operational.”
“Yeah, I figured you for a do-gooder.”
The way he said it made her feel like a Mother Teresa clone. Was that how he pigeonholed her? Sexless and on the fast track to sainthood?
She frowned. “There are worse things than trying to make a dif
ference in peoples’ lives.”
“I agree. Absolutely. Like you said, the world would be a better place … ” He gave her a lopsided grin that pulled one edge of his mouth up. His strong, chiseled features relaxed. His eyes gazed into hers with a kind of warmth she hadn’t noticed earlier.
Molly’s annoyance crumbled like a slice of month-old bread. She smiled back.
“I didn’t mean to interrupt you. That’s another bad habit of mine.”
She supposed “bad” pretty much covered all his habits. Except maybe sex. She suspected he was very good in the sack.
Although the air conditioner was off for less than five minutes, heat began to climb inside the car. She blamed N MAN 1 and not Mother Nature.
“You were telling me about the clinic. How you became involved with it.”
“There’s not much more to tell. I interviewed with the deputy mayor who liked my proposal on how I’d operate the facility and keep it funded. So he set up an appointment for me with the mayor.”
“What did you tell the mayor?”
“Pretty much the same as his deputy. Also, I made it clear I refused to spend half my time cutting through all the bureaucratic crap that came with working with another city agency. Or some such words.” She’d also told His Honor she was a self-starter and good at handling unexpected situations. She’d praised the mayor for his understanding of the needs of the city’s less fortunate and his efforts to do something constructive. She decided not to let on to Nick about the compliment, though. He’d probably accuse her of kissing the mayor’s derriere. “I knew how to keep the clinic on track. I expected some oversight, but I work best with a minimum of interference. The mayor had no problem with my conditions.”
“They must love you at City Hall.”
“They should. I don’t make many demands on them.”
“You saved those for me.” He grinned and his sex appeal — the kind that could have a woman naked in less time than it took to say “strip, baby” — climbed into the active land mine zone.
Sexy in the City Page 60