After the Party

by Jackie Braun

  “This is two,” he prompted. “Aren’t you getting off here?”

  She blinked at him, one brown eye and one blue clouded with confusion. “No. I thought you were.”

  “Why would I be getting off here?”

  “Well, you’re the one who pressed the button,” she reminded him.

  “The human resources department is on this floor.” He pointed down the corridor. “It’s the third office on the left. That’s where all job applicants check in to fill out paperwork before being sent on to department heads for their interviews.”

  “There must be some mistake.”

  “It’s all right.” He held the doors to keep them from closing. “You probably just misunderstood.”

  “No, what I mean is, I’m not here for an interview. I’ve already got the job. I’m meeting with my client on the seventeenth floor.”

  That was when it hit him. No...no...no.

  Chase realized he’d muttered his objection aloud when she said, “Excuse me?”

  He released the doors and they closed, sealing him inside the elevator with a woman who was every man’s fantasy and, now that he knew her identity, Chase’s worst nightmare.

  Tone grim, he said, “You’re the party planner.”

  “Guilty as charged. I’m Ella Sanborn.” She sobered slightly. “Don’t tell me you’re Mr. Trumbull. Er, I mean you sounded...different on the phone.”

  He could only imagine.

  “One of three. I’m Chase. You’re here to see Elliot. He’s my uncle.”

  “I am so sorry to hear he’s dying.”

  Jaw clenched, he replied, “My uncle is not dying.”

  Her brow wrinkled. “But when he called, he said he wanted me to plan a wake. An Irish one. For him.”

  Chase rubbed the back of his neck just above his shoulders where a tight knot was already starting to form. “My uncle isn’t Irish, either.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “A common occurrence,” Chase remarked.

  His uncle’s quirkiness left a lot of people scratching their heads. Lately, he also had become unpredictable and absentminded to the point that some members of the board of directors were questioning his mental fitness and ability to continue as the head of the publicly traded company. Rumor had it that they were close to having the votes to do it. Chase didn’t want to think what the board members who were still on the fence were going to think if his uncle went through with this wake.

  Too late Chase realized that Ella thought his comment was directed at her.

  “I can be a little naive at times, but I’m not an idiot.”

  “I didn’t mean to—”

  “Oh, my God. It’s all a joke, isn’t it?”

  Chase frowned. In the span of a few seconds he’d gone from being contrite to being confused. “What?”

  “The job, the supposed interview. Somehow Bernadette found out about my new business venture, and she put you up to this.”

  The elevator stopped on the fifteenth floor. Three men from the product development department were waiting to board. With one glance from Chase they scuttled away like crabs at low tide.

  When the elevator was under way again, he asked, “Who is Bernadette?”

  “She’s my stepsister. Ex-stepsister, actually. Her mom and my dad are divorced now.” Ella paused to add a dramatic, “Thank God!” Then, “But that hasn’t stopped her from trying to make my life miserable.”

  “Well, this is no joke. My uncle is serious about wanting an Irish wake.”

  “Even though he’s not Irish and he’s not dying.”

  “He has his reasons.” Ones Chase didn’t quite understand and couldn’t agree with. “My uncle can be... He’s often...” At a loss for how to describe the man who had raised him from the age of ten on, Chase finished awkwardly, “He’s just like that.”

  Especially lately.

  “Like what?” Ella asked.

  Chase clamped his lips closed. He didn’t want to believe the rumors circulating about his uncle’s deteriorating mental capacity. He certainly wouldn’t help spread them.

  Greeted with his silence, Ella said, “That’s okay. I’d rather meet him and make up my own mind anyway.”

  Unfortunately, Chase had a pretty good idea of the opinion Ella Sanborn would form once she did.

  * * *

  The elevator dinged, heralding their arrival on the much vaunted seventeenth floor of the Trumbull Toys empire. Several years ago, Ella had seen a television special on Elliot Trumbull and his place of business. It had made toy stores seem drab and restrained by comparison. But when the doors opened, the sight that greeted her left her not only disappointed but baffled.

  “Is something wrong?” Chase said.

  “This is the fabled Trumbull Toy Company?” she asked before she could think better of it.

  Chase frowned. “What were you expecting?”

  Well, she hadn’t been expecting beige walls and a nondescript sitting area. Where was the life-size Randy the Robot that she’d seen in the TV special? And the basketball hoops? The foosball table and minitrampoline?

  She laughed weakly. “I guess I was expecting toys.”

  “Those are gone. I found they were too distracting and sent the wrong message to employees. This is a place of business.”

  Yes, and that business was toys. But she decided not to press the point.

  Two women and a man sat at a horseshoe-shaped reception desk talking into headsets as they tapped away on keyboards. All three were dressed as conservatively as Chase in the muted colors Ella associated with storm clouds. Admittedly, she liked bright hues and fun prints, hence her zebra skirt and the poppy-red blouse. Still...

  As a unit, they glanced in Chase’s direction, but just like the group in the lobby, and the men who’d tried to board the elevator several floors later, not one of them maintained eye contact for very long. Ella’s gaze slid to Chase. She could see why. In his dark suit, perfectly knotted tie and polished wingtips, Chase Trumbull cut an imposing figure. She shouldn’t have found him approachable much less attractive. But she did. Oh, yeah, she did, all right.

  She blamed the attraction she felt on his cowlick. She was a sucker for cowlicks, and his was a beaut. That little whirl of sandy hair just to the left of his part simply refused to go along with the rest of his fastidiously styled locks. It reminded Ella a bit of herself. She wasn’t one to go along with the crowd, either.

  All sorts of superstitions were attached to cowlicks. Some people saw them as the mark of the devil. Others insisted they were a sign of good luck. Ella’s best friend, Sandra Chesterfield, meanwhile, claimed that men with cowlicks were exceptional lovers. She’d read an article to that effect on the internet. If that was true, a man with one displayed so prominently at his hairline must be...

  Ella fanned herself.

  “Hot?” Chase asked.

  Yes, and that made two of them. But she smiled and said, “I’m fine. Cool as a cucumber.”

  His brows furrowed momentarily. Then, to the woman seated on the left of the reception desk, he said, “This is Ella Sanborn. She’s here to see Elliot.”

  “Yes. He’s expecting her.”

  “My uncle’s office is the third door on the left.”

  The door in question was closed. Ella asked, “Should I knock?”

  “Just once and then go right in. If you wait for him to answer, you might wind up standing there all day.”

  It seemed rude to barge in, even if she was expected. “You’re sure he’s not busy?”

  Chase consulted his watch. “Oh, he’s busy. It’s nearly race time.”

  “What?”

  “You’ll see.” One side of his mouth rose. It wasn’t quite a smile, but it was the closest she’d seen
him come so far. It softened his features and left her a bit dazzled. It also made her wonder what Chase Trumbull would look like with a full-out grin plastered on his face and amusement lighting his eyes.

  “Good luck. Of course you don’t need it,” he said solemnly. At her puzzled expression, he added, “You found that penny in the lobby.”

  “I did.” Ella replied with an equal amount of seriousness, even though she was pretty sure that he was teasing her.

  He disappeared into the first office, whose door bore a brass plate etched with Chase Danforth Trumball III, Chief Financial Officer.

  She sucked in a breath and proceeded to the third door, passing one with a brass plate marked Owen Scott Trumbull, Chief Operating Officer. The nameplate on the third door wasn’t brass. It was bright red, and its white carnival-esque script read, Elliot Trumbull, Purveyor of All Things Fun. In spite of her nerves, she found herself grinning. After she knocked and the door opened, that grin changed into delighted laughter.

  Now this was more like it.

  It wasn’t an office. It was every young boy’s fantasy, complete with a race track that snaked under, over and around the spacious room’s eclectic furnishings.

  “You’re just in time,” said a man teetering on the top rung of a ladder that overlooked the track.

  Even though he was older now, she recognized him from the television program. Elliot Trumbull in the flesh. And he was indeed the purveyor of all things fun.

  No stuffy business attire for him. He was dressed in a professional racecar driver’s jumpsuit, complete with half a dozen endorsement patches sewn on the sleeves and chest. In one hand, he held a flag; in the other, a bright orange starter pistol. As Ella stood transfixed, he fired the gun into the air—the bullet a blank, she assumed, since it didn’t take out any ceiling tiles—and declared the race under way. On the track, three vehicles about the size of her palm whirred into action.

  “They’re sound activated by the pistol,” he told her. “After that, a computer takes over and ultimately decides the race. Care to place a bet on the winning car?”

  “Ten bucks on number seventy-seven,” she replied, without stopping to wonder if she had enough money in her purse to cover her wager.

  “Why that one?” he wanted to know.

  “Because blue’s my favorite color and seven is my lucky number.”

  “Sound reasons to pick it then,” he agreed without a trace of his nephew’s mockery in his tone. “I always go with red for the same reason. You must be Ella.”

  After climbing down from the ladder, Elliot picked his way over the track to her. She placed his age at late sixties and his weight at one-eighty with most of it centered at his waist. He had a shaggy mustache and a mop of salt-and-pepper hair that gave him a decidedly Einstein vibe.

  “I’m pleased to meet you, Mr. Trumbull.”

  She would have shaken his hand, but he took the one she extended and kissed the back of it instead. Make that Einstein meets Sir Galahad.

  “Call me Elliot. We don’t stand on formality around here.” His bushy brows pulled together in a frown and he muttered, “At least I don’t. I run a toy company, for the time being, at least. That should be fun, don’t you think?”

  “I do,” she agreed.

  “Good. At least someone does. Would you like something to drink?” Instead of offering the usual coffee or tea, he said, “My secretary makes the best strawberry malts this side of the Mississippi. Probably the best on either side, come to think of it.”

  Ella’s mouth watered at the offer, but she shook her head. “No, thanks.”

  “All right. Then, have a seat and we’ll get started.”

  The room didn’t have a proper sitting area. Instead, it boasted two white chairs that resembled hollowed-out eggs on clear plastic stands, and a cushioned porch swing that hung from the ceiling on a pair of thick chains. It creaked when Ella sat down and set it into motion.

  “Comfortable?”

  “Very. My grandmother has a swing like this at her house in New Jersey.”

  Elliot beamed. “My grandmother had one, too. I loved that swing. Did some of my best thinking on it as a boy. That’s why I have one here. What do you think of my office?”

  She glanced around and couldn’t hold back her smile. “It’s a lot fun.”

  “Exactly. Let me ask you something, Ella. Do you think toys are only for children?”

  She shook her head. “Aren’t we all children at heart?”

  “Not all of us,” Elliot said. Then, “Ah, speak of the devil.”

  She glanced over to find Chase looming in the doorway. His expression was one hundred and eighty degrees the opposite of his uncle’s inviting grin. He looked positively grim.

  “Sorry to interrupt. I just wanted to remind you that before this afternoon’s meeting with the board of directors we need to go over some reports.”

  “Meetings and reports,” Elliot muttered before hooking his thumb in Chase’s direction and adding in a not-so-confidential whisper, “All work and no play, that one. I guess some good genes skip a generation.”

  She bit back a smile. It was impossible not to find the older man charming, even if his humor came at his nephew’s expense.

  Chase remained stoic. “It’s important. When do you think you’ll be finished here?”

  “Oh, it will be a while yet.” Instead of pointing out that they had barely gotten beyond introductions, Elliot said, “The cars are only on their third lap.” Then he whistled softly. “Look at your blue car, Ella. It’s pulled ahead of the silver, but my red one is still in the lead.”

  “Come see me when you’re done in here.” Chase nodded politely in her direction.

  When he turned to leave, however, Elliot said, “I’d like you to stay, Chase. I value your opinion.”

  “You already know how I feel about the party, Uncle.”

  “Wake, you mean.”

  “You’re not dying.”

  “Oh, but I am. Professionally speaking anyway.” To Ella, he said matter-of-factly, “My board of directors thinks I’ve lost my marbles. That’s ironic, don’t you think, given that I make toys for a living?”

  “I...I...” At a loss for words, she glanced at Chase.

  His cheeks were flushed a deep shade of red. “No one is saying that,” he ground out.

  “To my face,” Elliot conceded. “But we both know what is being said behind my back.”

  “When I find out who started the rumors we’ll sue them for slander,” Chase declared.

  “I will be out of a job by then. Owen is only too happy to take my place. He’s my son,” Elliot informed Ella. “He has the head for this business, but not the heart. That apparently skipped a generation, too.”

  “Ah.” She nodded, not knowing what else to do.

  To Chase, Elliot said, “The writing is on the wall. Don’t think I don’t know it. I may be slowing down, becoming a little forgetful, but I’m not stupid.”

  The older man sounded weary, resigned.

  In contrast, Chase’s tone was infused with urgency. “That’s why we need to talk, put together a plan of action before this afternoon’s meeting.”

  “All right,” Elliot conceded with a sigh. “But after I speak with Ella. Stay, Chase. Please.”

  Chase was too tall to sit comfortably in either of the egg-shaped chairs, so he joined Ella on the swing. His feet remained firmly planted on the floor, bringing the swing to a halt. It was time to get down to business.

  Calm. Collected. Confident. She chanted the three words in her head as she exhaled slowly and pulled a small notepad from her purse. She’d jotted down several questions she figured a party planner would ask.

  In her most professional voice, she said, “Let’s start with the basics. When do you want to have your w
ake?”

  “Memorial Day would have been fitting, but it’s passed.” He sighed. “What about the weekend before the Fourth of July? We could have fireworks at night.”

  Ella might not have planned any parties, but three weeks to prepare seemed doable. Until she asked, “How many guests will there be?”

  “Six, maybe seven hundred.”

  Her mouth went slack. A party for sixty would have left her panicked. How on earth was she going to pull off a party for six or seven hundred? And in less than a month?

  “Uncle Elliot, be reasonable.”

  “I am being reasonable. If I’m going out, I’m going out with a bang. What do you say, Ella?”

  “Well, the, um, timeline is a little tight for a gathering of that size.”

  “You’re right.”

  She relaxed until Elliot said, “Let’s push it to August. My Isabella died in August. August twenty-seventh.” His expression dimmed. In a bewildered voice, he asked, “Can it really be three years?”

  “I’m sorry,” Ella told him.

  “I couldn’t have started my company without her. She was my rock.”

  The race cars whizzed past on the span of track that wound under Elliot’s desk. Just that quickly, his attention was diverted. He clapped his hands together, eyes once again bright, and crowed, “My red car is still in the lead! Have your ten dollars handy, Ella. There are only three laps left.” Afterward, he scratched his head. “Now, where were we?”

  “The guest list,” she prompted, still feeling dazed.

  “Right. Definitely seven hundred. In addition to friends and family, I have a lot of acquaintances in business and the community at large who will want to pay their respects.” He snorted before adding, “And my competitors will want to come and dance on my grave. The media, too.”

  “Media?” Chase asked, sounding alarmed.

  “That’s right. I plan to invite reporters from several news sources, both tabloid and mainstream. You can’t keep those vultures out anyway. I might as well open the doors and the bar to them. That way, they won’t be circling in helicopters overhead.”