Conflict of Interest_A Mustang Prairie Romance

by N. D. Jackson

  He needed to hire a new assistant but so far none had been experienced enough to handle his workload. A recent grad would be too green to be a proper gatekeeper like Amelia and an old woman wouldn’t have the stamina for 80 plus hours of grueling work each week. If this little experiment worked he would see about finding one from Chicago or maybe even stealing one of the assistants from KitchenMart headquarters.

  “Finally!” his voice boomed into his empty office. The report was done. Well, the first draft of the report was done. He now needed Amelia to read it over before they could make more changes and send it to Headquarters. It would take at least an hour just to read, and checking the stats would take even longer. He glanced at the clock again, hoping just a few minutes had passed. 8:05. He was already more than an hour late. Just call, he told himself. You’ve already stood her up, at least let her know you’re not coming, the angel on this shoulder pressured him. But he couldn’t do it. There would be words and he deserved her harshest words. But not right now. He would deal with Shellie after this report was perfect and sent. Not a moment before.

  He picked up the phone to summon Amelia. Since they were so close to opening he had given her permission to move to her office down the hall. It made his life slightly more inconvenient but she needed to be near her employees. “I’m ready for you,” was all he said before hanging up.

  Less than a minute later Amelia was sitting down across from him with her red pen in one hand and a fresh cup of coffee in the other. “Ok, I’m ready,” she smiled up at him, noticing the scowl marring his face. “What’s wrong?”

  Noel growled lowly. He didn’t want to tell Amelia what he’d done, there had always been a certain boundary between them but here in Mustang Prairie she was the closest thing to family he had. “I was supposed to have dinner with Shellie tonight. At seven.”

  Amelia stole a glance at the tiny silver watch she wore on her right wrist. “I guess she didn’t take it so well when you said you couldn’t make it?” It was no secret how Shellie felt about his work so Amelia could imagine how upset she’d be to come second to it.

  Noel suddenly found the polish of his desk thoroughly interesting, rubbing an invisible spot and avoiding Amelia’s gaze. He looked up at her disapproving stare and reddened.

  “You didn’t tell her you weren’t coming?” She shook her head. “Noel! You’ve stood her up and now she’s sitting there waiting for you. How could you?” She knew he was clueless when it came to women who weren’t after him for his money or social status, but she’d never taken him for a coward. A fool maybe, but never a coward.

  “It was dinner at home so she’s not sitting embarrassed in some restaurant, Amelia.” He said this more to ease his own guilt than as an actual explanation. He was glad he hadn’t suggested dinner at a restaurant or she would be even more furious.

  Amelia shook her head, mumbling something under her breath he couldn’t quite make out. He was sure he heard something close to “clueless bastard”. “It’s worse because now she’s going to be reminded that she was stood up whenever she looks at her own kitchen table!” She continued to shake her head but decided her time would be best served on the report. After all she did have a fiancé waiting at home for her.

  That thought struck him like a blow to his gut. The last thing he wanted was to make Shellie’s home, her place of comfort, a constant reminder of how he continued to hurt her. He couldn’t focus on that now. He would make it up to her later. Now, he printed out the reports the legal department sent earlier today so he could study them before bed.

  At ten o’clock the reports were edited to perfection and emailed to several people at Headquarters. Noel grabbed his attaché and waited for Amelia so they could walk out and lock up together. He watched her drive away and sat for a few minutes enjoying the mind numbing noise of the car idling. The clear night sky should have comforted him but the near black and cloudless sky made the stars shine brightly, which made him wish he was in a field or on a rooftop someplace pointing out constellations with Shellie. But he wouldn’t get to share tonight’s perfect sky and he probably wouldn’t get to share any stars or smiles for quite some time.

  He shifted the car into drive and made his way home on autopilot.

  ##

  Noel quietly entered the dark house. She hadn’t even left the porch light on for him, an early sign of just how angry she was. He slid off his shoes and lined them up neatly along the wall and tossed his bag on the sofa. The house smelled of food so she cooked dinner but he wondered if she had saved any for him. He passed up Amelia’s offer for dinner, hoping that he would be home in time for at least a cold dinner with Shellie.

  A quick peek into the kitchen told him that she didn’t make enough for him, or if she had it was tossed out in a moment of anger. Since she was likely already asleep he went first to change into something more comfortable, a thought that never would have occurred to him in New York. He loved his high-priced, dry clean only, perfectly assembled look. At least he used to love it. Now it just felt confining and he counted down the hours until he could change into jeans of all things or even lounge pants. There were so many things about his old life that he no longer enjoyed and his stuffy wardrobe was at the top of that list. He kicked off his version of business casual in favor of grey cotton pants and a cotton eggplant V-neck shirt and padded to the kitchen in search of food.

  He knew she kept fresh fruit and vegetables around so he hoped to make a quick salad before putting in an hour of reading before bed. Inside the fridge a plate covered in plastic brought a quick smile to Noel’s face. On that plate he saw the lamb with an orange and balsamic glaze, asparagus and mashed potatoes with roasted garlic that he’d planned to make for her tonight. If he wasn’t already convinced that there was something special about Shellie he would have been by this gesture. She was obviously angry with him, and she should be, but despite that she’d carefully wrapped up his dinner and put it in the fridge. Any woman who could be this considerate in the face of blinding fury was a woman he wanted in his life.

  After heating up the food and pouring himself what was left of a bottle of pinot meunier that was chilling in the fridge, Noel sat at the table worrying about how he would make this up to Shellie. He knew forgiveness would not come easy this time but he was prepared to do whatever it took to get hers. He didn’t deserve it, of course he didn’t, but Shellie reminded him how important it was to enjoy life as well as succeed in it. He knew she was awake in her bedroom, he could hear the faint strumming of a guitar and the beginning chords of a song he recognized as Beast of Burden. He rather liked that song and knowing the lyrics well, felt a pang of guilt thinking about how Shellie must be feeling on the other side of the door. He felt like the lowest form of life right now and he knew sleep wouldn’t come if he didn’t make it right tonight.

  Rinsing his plate and refreshing his glass, Noel slowly crept down the dark hall and stopped in front of the first door on the right. He knocked and waited for what seemed like an eternity for her to open the door. He knew it had been seconds but the anticipation was killing him. He placed his ear on the door listening for any sounds and he still heard the low strum of a guitar and the familiar voice of Jagger, likely soothing her weary soul. He knocked again, willing her to answer. “Shellie I’m sorry. Can you please open the door so we can talk?”

  She didn’t answer but he wouldn’t be deterred.

  He tried the doorknob, hoping that in her anger she had forgotten to lock him out. She hadn’t. He knocked once more. “Come on Shellie, I’m really sorry. Just come out and yell at me so I can explain. Please!”

  A few moments went by and he thought she was putting on pajamas to confront him but the door never opened. The music got imperceptibly louder and he knew that she was more hurt and angrier than he had anticipated. He didn’t know much about women but he knew that her silence meant so much more than any hurtful words she could’ve spewed during a lover’s quarrel. Lover, what a joke, he thought sardonically. T
hey had barely done any loving in their time together. In fact if he was honest, they had fought more than they had loved during their brief relationship.

  He didn’t know why things with Shellie were so difficult but he wasn’t prepared to give up just yet. Noel wasn’t a stranger to difficult women. Most of the women in his life would be classified as difficult, high maintenance, high strung or simply too aggressive. But Shellie wasn’t difficult, she was complicated. There were many different layers to this woman and he was dying to peel back everyone until he knew all there was to know about Shellie. And he planned to learn everything about her past and be there for what he was sure would be an unforgettable future.

  Whatever he needed to do to earn her trust and love, he would do.

  ##

  After making dinner and clearing the dishes, Shellie retired to her room for the rest of the night. Feeling inspired by her anti-KitchenMart fliers, she spent most of the night trying to mock up a few pamphlets for her own business to help it expand. She figured that pamphlets would allow her to reach out to businesses as far away has Chicago so she created a few different layouts and she would ask Alexis for her opinion tomorrow over lunch. With the music low and lulling her into a false sense of calm, she decided that it was time embellished her website. After all, the internet was the future and just because most of Mustang Prairie still relied on word of mouth and paper menus to do business, her website was a cheaper method of advertising. If she was going to live the lonely life of a spinster she may as well have a successful career to blame. By the time Noel finally showed up she already created two business pamphlets, updated her website and answered emails from a few potential clients. At least the night wasn’t a total waste, she thought looking down at the dress she still wore.

  She ripped the dress down her body and kicked it into the nearby hamper in favor of a comfortable cotton nightgown. Sitting cross-legged on her bed with the blue light of her laptop lighting up her face, she stiffened when she heard Noel’s heavy footsteps stop outside her door. She wasn’t ready to see him or talk to him. Her wounds were too fresh and honestly, it was too late to explain. Her entire body relaxed when she heard the footsteps start again and she breathed again when she heard the soft click of his bedroom door.

  Switching to her Rolling Stones playlist, she was nearly finished writing her speeches for the town hall meeting as well as University outreach. The lyrics had always spoken to her. They weren’t the most poetic in the band’s repertoire but the desire to be more, to be better, hell to be richer for someone else, spoke to her. Especially now. She would not, could not cry right now. Not over this and not over Noel. It had been a long time since she shed tears over a man and back then she promised that she would not waste precious liquid on a man ever again. They simply weren’t worth it.

  More than anything Shellie was furious with herself for wanting to cry, for being so hurt and shocked by tonight’s turn of events. Unable to focus on either of her speeches, she shut the laptop and worked out her thoughts in a room as black and as cold as she felt inside. Her eyes began to well up and she bit her lip hard to stop the tears before they fell. Why am I crying, she wondered to herself. It was no secret that Noel was career driven, he had told her all about his plans for the future. It was all related to his career trajectory, not family and certainly not falling in love. She knew that he would always put his career first, especially here in Mustang Prairie. His career was the reason he was here in Mustang Prairie. She knew that and she knew he would say that if she mustered up the courage to confront him. She knew all of this and had slowly begun to accept it since the nature and longevity of their relationship or whatever it was, had yet to be defined. What she didn’t realize though was that she meant so little to him that she wasn’t worth fifteen seconds or a damned text message to say dinner was off.

  Her eyelids were finally getting heavy and she could feel the sleep begin to envelop her. He won’t have to worry about sparing me any time from now on, she promised herself pulling the covers up to her chin. I’ll give him all the space he wants. From this moment forward we are roommates and nothing more. Not friends, not lovers, not friends with benefits. Nothing! She knew it would be difficult for a while and wished they could skip right to the part where it wouldn’t be weird and tense between them.

  The way her heart hung low and heavy, Shellie knew her feelings for Noel were not just real but they were more than merely lust or infatuation. As much as she didn’t want to, she loved him. She loved his self-assured lazy grin, his intense green eyes and she even loved his determination to follow his dreams. Noel was kind and generous and funny but, she thought bitterly, he was also career-obsessed, inconsiderate and not at all interested in her outside the bedroom.

  It was settled then. She would give them both space. She would give Noel his space to be himself and she would give herself time and space so that she could love him less with each passing day.

  With that thought, she finally drifted off to sleep.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Noel hadn’t seen or heard from Shellie in more than week. He hated that she was taking her anger—and hurt he acknowledged—this far but he was grateful that his last memory of her was kissing her as the morning sun kicked through her living room windows. When he woke up the morning after their thwarted dinner plans, much later than he usually rose, she was still in bed. He left for work an hour later than he normally did in hopes of getting a few moments with her, but still she didn’t emerge from her room. He wanted to knock but he couldn’t ignore the fact that she was intentionally avoiding him so he left. Unsure if he would be welcome to stay here another night.

  When he came home that night his key still fit in the door, which was a good sign, so he changed and quickly set about making dinner. He picked up ingredients for coq au vin, hoping Shellie wouldn’t be able to resist the wine soaked dish. When midnight rolled around he knew she wouldn’t be coming home. She didn’t tell him but his unreturned calls and text messages relayed as much.

  The pattern continued for the next three days. He woke early in hopes of catching her sneak in or out of the house and left for work late just in case she was hiding out in her room. He didn’t hear or see her at all, but knowing Mustang Prairie was one of the safest towns in the country—according to extensive KitchenMart research—he didn’t worry for her safety but he did worry. When Friday rolled around he was prepared for a lonely weekend in an empty house. Stopping at the Wine Depot for two bottles high priced scotch and the market for six meals for two, Noel settled in front of the television to sulk. Breakfast, lunch and dinner were all prepared for two people even though half sat uneaten, silently mocking him from an empty place setting.

  By Saturday night he was furious. It didn’t matter that he was wrong and should have called her. She should just come home to their home and yell at him or kick him out or something. Dammit. He felt bad for exiling her from her own home but it was a self-imposed exile, he reminded himself scornfully. When he awoke Sunday to grey skies he was sure she would be back with her hands on her hips and foot tapping endlessly to force him out of her home. He decided if she did that he would go and he would not ask for his deposit money back.

  As the hours passed however he was feeling less charitable and less certain that she hadn’t decided to abandon the house altogether. After two quick glasses of scotch he did what he should have done days ago. He phoned Alexis. She hated him and he knew it was unlikely she would give him any information but he had to try and he had to make sure that Shellie was alright.

  Alexis picked up the phone, neglecting a greeting for her caller. “She’s fine Noel, just a little pissed off as you might imagine.”

  He raked his hands through his messy overgrown locks in relief. “Is she there?” He had to know something, anything about her right now.

  “Not at the moment,” she trailed off, unwilling to give away more information than necessary. He hurt her best friend and she wasn’t going to make it easy for h
im.

  Noel waited silently, counting to keep his patience in check, but Alexis did not continue. He knew Shellie had been staying with her. They were best friends, where else would she stay? Through clenched teeth he asked, “Well where is she?”

  Alexis sighed heavily, her anger and frustration hung thick with every word she spoke. “Why couldn’t you have just called? For crying out loud, would it have taken that much time away from your precious work!”

  “Because I’m an idiot Alexis, ok? Is that what you want to hear?” He knew it was the wrong move even has he decided it. Work always came first for him and it had never been a problem. Until now. Until Shellie who made him realize it wasn’t all about his career trajectory. “I’m sorry, so sorry Alexis. How can I tell her how sorry if she won’t talk to me?” He didn’t blame her but a week without Shellie was a hard week to endure. It’s funny, he thought, I went thirty years without knowing her and now I can’t seem to live without her.

  Alexis’ angry voice cut through his thoughts. “How unimportant and insignificant would that make you feel?” Her anger burned hotter than it should, but Alexis felt some of the blame for encouraging her friend to pursue her feelings for Noel.

  He listened silently as she ranted at him. She was right, he knew, but it didn’t make his time without her best friend hurt any less.

  “Would ‘sorry’ be enough for you, Noel?”

  He shook his head even though Alexis couldn’t see him. No, sorry wouldn’t be enough for Noel either. He always expected more from people and yet here he was giving Shellie less than she deserved. Truthfully he hadn’t thought of the irony of the situation. Here he was asking her for a minute to hear his apology when he was unwilling to spare one for her that night. He was rotten and he felt it deep down through his bones and into his soul. He sighed, pouring himself another drink to come to terms with the man he had become. “Thank you Alexis. For telling me this. I needed to hear it. Will she be home soon?”