Before I Melt Away

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Before I Melt Away Page 12

by Isabel Sharpe


  And that would mostly likely be that.

  “I’m actually calling for a reason beyond the fact that I am constantly overcome with lust thinking about you.”

  “Oh?” Her smile found fresh life. She added the fennel seeds to the pot, lowered the heat and gave the vegetables another stir, inhaling the licorice aroma dreamily.

  Concentrate on your work, Annabel. She risked flying off into gooland when he talked like that.

  “A friend of yours is coming to town.”

  “Santa Claus?”

  “Guess again.”

  She scowled. A friend of hers? Who did Quinn know that she was friends with? Someone from junior high? Oh, she hoped not. More ghosts from the past she did not need right now. “I give up. Who?”

  “Adolph Fox.”

  “Adolph Fox?” She stepped back from the stove, wooden spoon raised like a flag. “Adolph Fox?”

  He chuckled. “No, Adolph Fox.”

  “Oh, that’s fabulous!” She covered the pot and brought the mortar and pestle to her sink, dunked them in the bowl of soapy water at the ready for her mise en place. “What is he going to do here?”

  “A promotional tour.”

  She frowned. See what happened when she didn’t keep up with the paper? “Appearing where?”

  “He’s promoting a new line of low-carb frozen pizzas and is appearing at Holidayfest activities downtown in conjunction with a certain enormous local brewery launching a new low-carb winter ale.”

  “Diet beer and pizza, how Christmassy.”

  “Since when do you concern yourself with how Christmassy something is?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Ho, ho, ho.”

  “So…”

  “Ye-e-es?”

  “On to more important things.”

  “Such as?”

  “What time I can see you tonight.”

  “Oh, Quinn.” She sighed and pulled a potato out of the plastic bag on the counter for peeling. “I can’t tonight. I’ve got soup to make for Linda’s party, then I have an After Hours event at five at Maggiano’s, then back home to make stuffing and cake and I should get a start on the hors d’oeuvres and I really need to get a decent night’s sleep for once.”

  “Okay. I’ll be over at seven-fifteen.”

  “Quinn.”

  “To help.” His voice became warmer. She closed her eyes to enjoy it and nearly peeled her thumb. “I’m a decent cook, I can give you a hand with the menial stuff—be your slave in the kitchen.”

  She put the peeled potato down and crossed to stir the vegetables on the stove again. It had never occurred to her he could help. Her relationships with men in recent years had been strictly confined to bars, restaurants and bedrooms. If he came over, she’d be letting him into her life in a much more intimate way than by letting him into her—

  Ahem. On the other hand, he could do things like wash lettuce and chop parsley, make the watercress dip, help out with a ton of the prep work. It would make a huge difference to her level of stress and the amount of sleep she’d be able to get tonight.

  And she’d have company. And that company would be Quinn.

  He started whistling the theme from Jeopardy and she smiled. He knew exactly the battle that was going on in her, damn him.

  “Stop that.”

  “Just providing my own hold music.”

  She laughed. “Okay, okay, you can come.”

  “Mmm, I plan to.”

  “Come over. Quinn, this is going to be business, not pleasure.”

  He sighed. “Annabel, if I manage to introduce one concept in your skull by the time I leave…”

  She rolled her eyes, ignoring the kick in her stomach at the word “leave.” “That would be…?”

  “That you can actually have both at the same time. Business and pleasure. And in this case…”

  Silence. She craned her head forward expectantly. “Mmm?”

  “I want you to have both as often as possible. With me.”

  ANNABEL WALKED into the high-ceilinged bar at Maggiano’s Restaurant and made her way to the upstairs room where the MMAC event was being held. Five o’clock, the party was just starting, and already quite a few suited men and women were ordering drinks and launching themselves down the road toward tipsy networking. Annabel made her way to the bar and requested seltzer with lime; she held her alcohol well, but this evening she was too tired and pressured for booze. And in a business setting, when she was trying to make an impression, she didn’t want that impression to consist of slurred babble and too-loud laughter.

  She cast an eye around the attractive room—gas fireplace on one side providing warmth and atmosphere, hot and cold hors d’oeuvres on another, providing sustenance and a speed bump to alcohol absorption for those driving home. She sipped her seltzer and made careful note of the better-dressed women in attendance. Sad to say, even now that wives were putting in equal time at the office, the decisions about cooking for the family each week generally still rested solely on their shoulders.

  So she wanted to approach females first, preferably those wearing wedding rings. A family of mom, dad and kids meant the value of the contract went up. The more the merrier. After that, she could branch out to men without rings, since busy bachelors often wanted a home-cooked meal as well.

  A likely looking brunette stood alone near the fireplace, mid-thirties, hot-pink suit, rock the size of Gibraltar. She looked confident, in control, someone Annabel would like to know.

  She walked up to her and smiled, stuck out her hand. “Annabel Brightman.”

  The woman blinked. “No kidding, really?”

  Annabel blinked back. “Uh, do I know you?”

  “No, but—”

  “I do.”

  Annabel turned at the sound of the familiar voice. Oh no. Ex-lover Bob. Whose calls she’d dodged for so long.

  “Hey, what a surprise.” She shook his hand, trying very hard to make herself sound pleasantly happy to see him, and wasn’t sure she succeeded. The last thing she wanted to do was have to fend him off all evening.

  “Why, it’s Annabel-who-doesn’t-return-calls.” He rolled his blue eyes and grinned.

  Annabel gestured stupidly. “Oh, well I was—”

  “Busy, I know.” He slid his arm around the attractive pink-suited brunette. “This is Karen Adleman.”

  “Karen, nice to meet you.” Holy cheezits, Bob had a new woman—a fiancée if the ring was anything to go by. That was a quick courtship. But hallelujah! Annabel was off the hook.

  Except why was he still calling her?

  “Karen is starting her own Web-design company and is offering design work at a reduced rate, to get the buzz going around town.” Bob looked at Karen adoringly, then back at Annabel. “So I remembered you complaining that you wanted to upgrade your site, and I thought you’d be a perfect candidate.”

  The lightbulb flashed on in Annabel’s brain, and what it illuminated wasn’t pretty. “Is that why you’ve been calling?”

  “Yes.” He shook his head as if she was beyond all hope. “I couldn’t get past the big freeze-off to tell you.”

  Annabel felt herself flushing and attempted an apologetic smile at Karen. “I…that is…”

  “It’s okay. The main thing is that we’ve hooked up here, so if you’re agreeable, I can show you some of my work so far.” Karen extracted a card from her purse and passed it over. “Here are the Internet addresses.”

  “Okay. Good. Great. Bob’s right, I’ve been wanting to redo my site, lure in more traffic.” Annabel pulled herself together, cheeks still burning. Oh, nice. Bob had been trying to help both her and his beloved here, and Annabel assumed for no particular reason that he wanted back in her pants. Worse, she’d been a total bitch.

  Well. Hadn’t she come off sweet as a lemon in that encounter.

  She forced herself to keep chatting to show no hard feelings and smooth things over, but she couldn’t help keeping only one eye on Bob and Karen, the other working the room again
. Which prey to pounce on next?

  A few likely women were sprinkled around the room. When she felt she could exit gracefully, she excused herself and spent the next hour pitching her services—starting with the requisite small talk, then getting around to the point of the evening as far as she was concerned. Damn shame she couldn’t just march up to someone and state her business, see if there was a need and if not, move on. Waste of her time to bother chatting someone up only to find she or he had no interest.

  By six-thirty, she was without success and beginning to get antsy, anxious about what still needed to be done tonight, and wanting to go home. But the point of these two hours was to drum up new business, so drum she would.

  She grimly marched up to yet another executive-looking woman and started in again. Hi, I’m Annabel, what do you do? Oh that’s nice, I have a personal chef business, did you know that when you factor in the time you save shopping and cooking and cleaning up, my services don’t end up being that expensive, bla-bla-bla-bla-bla.

  The woman’s elegant features froze under her up-swept blond do. Annabel sighed. Okay. Fine. Don’t need me. Don’t want me. Whatever. She felt like taking the woman’s shoulders and shaking her and yelling, “I do really good work and I can make your life easier, what is your problem?”

  The buzz in the room grew suddenly louder, and people seemed to be milling more excitedly. The elegant woman looked around, clearly longing to escape Annabel’s evil neediness, then her frozen features melted into a stunning smile over Annabel’s right shoulder.

  “Hello.”

  The deep voice flowed over her, and oh, she knew who that was. And more to the point, why Ms. Ice Maiden in front of her had suddenly morphed into Lulu the Love Goddess.

  “Hi, Quinn.” She kept her voice cool and professional while her insides struck up a yee-haw hoedown. “This is—”

  She gestured desperately at the blonde, completely unable to remember her name. Of course she’d only met about ten thousand people tonight…help!

  “Jeanette Wakefield.” The voice dripped honey all over Quinn while her glance at Annabel contained artificial sweetener.

  “Oh, yes.” He shook her hand warmly. “We met at the Art Museum fund-raiser. How’s Boris doing?”

  Jeannette positively sparkled. “Much better. The vet said it most likely wasn’t diabetes, possibly just an allergy.”

  “Good news. And by the way…” He reached into his inner jacket pocket. “I found that article on the Cook Islands I told you about and printed it out. I’ve been carrying it around on the off chance I’d bump into you again.”

  “Oh, thank you.” She took it from him, beaming. “This will be a huge help. Bruce and I are still weighing our vacation options, but I’m so glad to know about this place.”

  “You’re welcome. Tell Bruce I also included an article about online cigar stores for him.”

  Jeanette seemed to find this hilarious. Annabel stood and smiled politely, feeling utterly superfluous.

  “Excuse me, Mr. Garrett?” Dark-suited man, about fifty, short, in ill-fitting suit. No wedding ring. Possible candidate.

  “Call me Quinn, please, Tom. How are you? How did things go last week with Johnson Controls?”

  “Very well.” He beamed, clearly thrilled to be included in the group of Those Quinn Smiled Upon. “They asked me to do up a proposal.”

  “Excellent.” Quinn put his arm to the small of Annabel’s stiff back and brought her forward. “I’d like to introduce you to a friend. Tom Denato, this is Annabel Brightman.”

  “Nice to meet you.” Tom Denato shook her hand. “What’s your line of work?”

  Aha! “I have a personal chef business, Chefs Tonight.”

  “I see.” He took a sip of his drink, throwing a glance at Quinn as if he’d much rather be talking to him. “And what does a personal chef do?”

  “All your weekday cooking and grocery shopping. I show up at your house one day a week, prepare the following week’s meals according to menus you choose and portion them in packages for your freezer. I even clean up after myself.”

  “Well. I had no idea such a service existed.” He glanced at Quinn again.

  “It’s very convenient. Are you interested? I have a card I can give you. I also do dinner parties and have some special holiday events you can host. I do all the work—you just provide the booze, show up and enjoy the party.”

  He began looking a little tense and took a step back. “I don’t think I need anything like that.”

  She sighed behind her polite smile. “Okay.”

  Enough rejection. She wanted to go home. With Quinn. Cook up a storm and get back on top of what she needed to accomplish.

  Another man broke into the circle and said hello to Quinn, who remembered where they met, every member of the guy’s family, where he’d been on vacation the previous year…

  Someone else entered the circle and brought Quinn a drink.

  Another person brought him a plate of hors d’oeuvres.

  He listened, commented, laughed. Everyone seemed to fascinate him, everyone’s career, family situation, hobby. No one seemed to notice he shared nothing of himself.

  Must be nice to be so on top of the world that you could spend time chatting and didn’t have to go chasing after people. She was pretty sure that, over the next half hour, one by one the entire room came up to see him. Everyone loved him and he seemed to love them all right back.

  At seven o’clock, an enormous scattering of beeping watches announced the event’s end and a general exodus began. A few lingered. Quinn had a few plants in someone’s garden he hadn’t discussed yet, so he was talking—or rather listening—to a dull-eyed, middle-aged woman as if she were the most fascinating creature he’d ever encountered.

  Annabel had no idea how he did it. She would have run screaming from the room ages ago. By now, though, he was probably used to it. It must come with the territory.

  “Such a nice man.” A female voice spoke behind her. “You feel like there’s no one else in the entire world when he’s talking to you. No wonder he did so well for himself.”

  “Exactly, Doris.” Another female voice answered. “You don’t get the feeling it’s all about the money for him.”

  Annabel rolled her eyes as they passed. Of course it wasn’t about the money for him. He had practically all the money in the world. That was hardly the point anymore. He could sit back, relax and enjoy it. Though why he’d consider coming here part of that enjoyment, she hadn’t a clue.

  She downed the last of her seltzer, wishing she had something much stronger. But the time ahead of her tonight that she needed to spend around knives and open flame made drinking alcohol unwise, to put it mildly. She didn’t need her concentration messed with.

  As if being with Quinn wouldn’t do an even more effective job.

  He came toward her, through the last lingering members staying for one more drink or planning to eat at the restaurant.

  “Ready to go?”

  She nodded, feeling tired and spent and a little cranky. Actually she’d been ready to go about ten minutes after she got there. And striking out with everyone she’d spoken to hadn’t helped her outlook.

  “Nice people.” He escorted her out of the meeting room, putting his arm to her back to let her precede him through some tables in the restaurant.

  “Yes.”

  They went back downstairs through the bar and Quinn followed her out the revolving door into the chilly parking lot outside Mayfair Mall. “What’s wrong?”

  “Noth—” She caught herself and took a breath of the wintry air. “I wasn’t in the mood for that today.”

  “Any particular reason?”

  “It just seemed like…well, maybe people weren’t in the mood for me.”

  “I am, if that helps.”

  She laughed. “Thanks. It does.”

  “Where’s your car?”

  She pointed and Quinn walked with her down the long row of cars crusty with road grim
e and salt, many with snow still clinging to their roofs.

  “The way you talked to Tom…” He glanced at her and she tried desperately to remember which one Tom was.

  “Tom?”

  “Fiftyish, graying hair, single, works for a multimedia company, had a presentation last week to—”

  “Yes, okay, I remember.” She stopped him before he could go on to recite shoe size and underwear preference. “What way I talked to him?”

  “Is that how you present your business to people?”

  Annabel bristled. Doubtless he was trying to be helpful, but she wasn’t in the mood for that kind of helpful right now. “What about it.”

  He wrapped his arm around her shoulders, stopped walking, pulled her in close and bent his head so that she could have kissed him with almost no effort if she were so inclined. And once she caught the barest hint of his scent, she began to be. Shamelessly inclined.

  “If you show more interest in the person you’re talking to than in yourself, they will show more interest in you.” He leaned in as if to kiss her, then drew his tongue in a squiggly line across her lips and made her—she couldn’t believe it given her advanced case of the grouchies—giggle. “That’s today’s lesson.”

  “Thank you, teacher.” The words came out hard and ungrateful and she closed her eyes. “I didn’t mean to sound bitchy. I’m sorry. You’re probably right.”

  “I’m always right.”

  Her eyes shot open and found his teasing ones, which melted her indignation immediately. He moved his hands under the opening of her coat, brought her body flush against his and kissed her, his mouth soft and warm against her wind-chilled lips. “So does this mean we get to play teacher tonight?”

  She pretended to give that a deep mull-over. “Would I have to be the naughty schoolgirl?”

  “Hmm. That has possibilities.” He smiled, but his eyes stayed dark and serious. “People want you to be fascinated by them. Everyone needs that, and it’s not hard to act that way. Then, mercenary as it sounds, you can get what you want out of them more easily.”

 

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