Linda Lael Miller Bundle

by Linda Lael Miller

The thought made Mitch feel weary. He was having a hard enough time working up enough enthusiasm to write about Rosamond, but he supposed that was because of Shay. No matter how delicately the project was handled, she would, to some degree, be hurt by it. “We’re talking about a specific subject here, I assume.”

  Ivan nodded, licking a dab of cream from one pudgy finger. “You’ve heard of Alan Roget, haven’t you? That serial murderer the FBI picked up in Oklahoma a few months back?”

  Mitch remembered. The man had been arraigned on some thirty-two counts of homicide. “Sweet guy,” he reflected.

  “Roget may be a pyscho, but he’s a fan of yours. If anybody writes his story, he wants it to be you.”

  “They don’t need his permission to do a book,” Mitch pointed out, and he remembered saying a similar thing to Shay.

  “No,” Ivan agreed readily, calmly. “The difference is that he’s willing to talk to you, tell you the whole disgusting saga from his point of view. Another writer could do the job, of course, but they’d be operating on guesswork.”

  “What about my anonymity? How could we trust this maniac to respect that?”

  “He wouldn’t have to know your real name. That can be handled, Mitch, in the same way we’ve handled it in the past. What do you say?” A master of timing, Ivan waited a moment and then laid the sizable check Mitch and Shay would share on the coffee table between them.

  “I need time to think, Ivan. For one thing, I’m not sure I even want to hear all the rot this space-case probably plans to spill.”

  “Going soft, Prescott?”

  “Maybe.”

  Ivan gave a delicate sigh and stood up. “Well, I’ve got a cab waiting. Got to get back to the airport, you know.”

  Mitch only shook his head. He was half Ivan’s age, but even in his jungle-crawling, Klan-breaking days, he hadn’t lived at the pace that Ivan did.

  “You’ll call?” Ivan asked, tugging at the jacket of his Brooks Brothers’ suit to straighten it.

  “I’ll call.” Mitch sighed the words.

  Shay raised one eyebrow when Ivy informed her that the bank was calling. She couldn’t be overdrawn, could she? She’d just deposited the bonus check Marvin had signed before he left, making payment for the four commercials.

  “Ms. Kendall?”

  Shay drew a deep breath and set aside the stack of paperwork, also left behind by Marvin, that she’d been wading through. “Yes?”

  “My name is Robert Parker and I’m calling in reference to your account.”

  Shay tensed and then willed herself to relax. She had balanced her checkbook only a few days before, and her figures had tallied with the bank’s. “Yes?”

  “It seems that a sizable amount of money has been deposited and, well, we were just wondering if a mistake had been made. This sum is well beyond what the Federal Reserve will insure in any single account, you know.”

  “I don’t understand,” Shay said, resting her forehead in the palm of one hand. “Surely a four thousand dollar bonus check—”

  “Four thousand dollars?” The bank officer laughed nervously. “My, my, this deposit is many times that amount. I was certain that there had to be some error.”

  Shay was a little stung that the banker could be so incredulous, even though she was incredulous herself. Maybe she’d never had more than eight hundred dollars in her account at any one time, but she wasn’t a deadbeat and if she’d been overdrawn a time or two, why, that had been accidental. “Wait just a moment, Mr. Parker, wasn’t it? Where did this deposit come from?”

  “The check itself was drawn on the account of a Mr. Mitch Prescott.”

  It was a moment before Shay remembered the book she and Mitch were supposed to be writing together; her mind hadn’t exactly been on the professional aspects of their relationship. “Then the money is mine,” she said, as much to herself as to Mr. Parker. “Would you mind telling me the exact amount?”

  The sum Mr. Parker replied with made the pit of Shay’s stomach leap and sent her head into a dizzying spin. Mitch had told her that her share would be a “lot” of money, but never in Shay’s wildest dreams had she expected so much.

  “We’ll have to verify this, of course,” Parker said stiffly, seeming to find Shay’s good fortune suspect in some way.

  “Of course,” Shay answered. And then she hung up the receiver, folded her arms on the desktop and lowered her head to them.

  She was rich.

  The more Mitch thought about the Alan Roget project, the more it appealed to him. It would be a study in human ugliness, that book, but for once in his life he had something to counterbalance that. He had Shay.

  Eager now to get the Rosamond Dallas book behind him, he unpacked his computer equipment and the attending paraphernalia and brought the machine on-line. Working from his notes and the tapes containing Shay’s observations about her mother, he began composing a comprehensive outline of the material he had on hand.

  He was interrupted, at intervals, by the telephone. Mrs. Carraway tried to field his calls, but there were several that could not be avoided, one from a pedantic bank clerk questioning the deposit he’d made to Shay’s account after Ivan had left, one from his daughter, Kelly, who wanted to tell him that she could visit over Christmas vacation, and one from Lucetta White. Lucetta had heard, through the grapevine, that he’d landed a “plum” of an assignment and asked for details. Mitch had talked for fifteen minutes and told Ms. White exactly nothing.

  He was sitting back in his desk chair, his hands cupped behind his head, when the telephone rang again. To spare Mrs. Carraway the problem, he answered it himself with a crisp “Hello?”

  “Hello,” Shay replied, and the single word resounded with bewilderment. “About that money…”

  Mitch waited for her to go on, but she didn’t, so he replied, “Your share, as agreed. Is anything wrong?”

  “Wrong? Well, no, of course not. A-are we working tonight?”

  “I’m working. From now on, your part will be an occasional consultation. Of course, I’ll need you to read over the material, too, as I write it.”

  “Oh,” she said, and she sounded disappointed. Perhaps even a little hurt.

  “Shay, what’s the matter?”

  She sighed. “I feel a little—a little superfluous, I guess. And overpaid for it in the bargain.”

  Mitch laughed. “You could never be superfluous, my love. Listen, if you want a more active part in writing the book, you can have it.”

  He could almost see her shaking her beautiful, leonine head. “No, no. I have things of my own to do, now that I’m a woman of means.”

  Mitch arched an eyebrow, not sure he liked the sound of that. “Like what?”

  “Oh, getting solid financial advice, talking to the tax people, starting my catering service. Things of that nature.”

  Mitch hadn’t known that Shay had aspirations to go into business for herself and he was a little peeved that she’d failed to confide something so important. He scowled down at his watch and saw that it was nearly five o’clock. “I won’t keep you, then,” he said stiffly, and even as he spoke the words he wondered what it was that made him want to put space between himself and this woman when he needed her so much.

  There was a brief silence, and then Shay answered, “No. Well, thank you.” She hung up and Mitch sat glaring at the receiver in his hand.

  No. Well, thank you, he mimicked in his mind. She had what she wanted now, the money; apparently their lovemaking and the special rapport they’d formed weren’t important anymore. Mitch hung up with a bang that was no less satisfying for Shay’s not hearing it.

  As Shay wandered up and down the aisles of the public library that evening, choosing books on the operation of small businesses, she was awash in a numbing sort of despair. All of her dreams were suddenly coming true, or, at least, most of them, and she should have been happy. She hugged the stack of self-help books close to her chest. Why wasn’t she happy?

  She knew the ans
wer, of course and was only torturing herself with the question. She had thought she meant something to Mitch Prescott and found out differently. She had provided the research material he needed for his book and he’d paid her and, as far as he was concerned, the transaction was complete. There would be a few “consultations,” and he wanted her input as the book progressed, but he’d made it clear enough that she wasn’t to expect anything more.

  Shay drove home slowly, heated a can of soup for her supper and immersed herself in the books she had checked out at the library, making notes in a spiral notebook as she read. It wasn’t as though she needed Mitch Prescott to be happy, she told herself during frequent breaks in her concentration. She had Hank, she had her job, and she had the money and the determination to make her life what she’d always dreamed it could be.

  Well, almost what she’d dreamed it could be.

  For the rest of that week, Shay concentrated on her job at Reese Motors, grateful that she would have a little time before she had to do another commercial. She talked to Hank frequently by telephone and visited Rosamond every afternoon. From the convalescent home she invariably went to the public library, exchanging the books she’d scanned the night before for new ones. She told herself that she was preparing for her own entry into the world of private enterprise and she was learning a great deal, but the main reason for her marathon study fests was Mitch Prescott. Being absorbed in business theories kept her from thinking about him.

  By Saturday morning, she was haggard. Ivy, showing up on her doorstep bright and early, was quick to point that out.

  Shay yawned, feeling rumpled and dissolute in her old chenille bathrobe. “How do you expect me to look at nine o’clock on a Saturday morning? Don’t you ever sleep in?”

  The weather was nice and Ivy looked disgustingly vibrant in her old blue jeans and summery cotton blouse. “Sleep in?” she chimed. “And let the world pass me by?”

  “The world wouldn’t dare pass you by,” Shay responded dryly, staggering toward the kitchen, homing in on the coffeepot which, blessedly, operated on a small timer set the night before. “Where’s Todd?”

  Ivy settled herself in a chair at Shay’s table, shoving aside the current stack of business books with a slight frown. “He’s working. Ambition is his curse, you know.” She stopped for a breath. “I’m going to this great auction today. Want to come along?”

  Shay poured coffee for herself and Ivy and stumbled over to the table to collapse into a chair. “Why would I want to go to an auction?”

  “To buy something, silly. This is an estate sale, and they’re holding it in a barn.”

  “I’m not in the market for harnesses and milk stools,” Shay muttered, beginning to come alive as caffeine surged through her veins.

  “The newspaper ad says they have a lot of great stuff, Shay. Antiques.”

  “Milk stools.”

  “You’re impossible. I bought my brass bed at a sale like this, and for a song, too.”

  “They probably just wanted you to stop singing.”

  “Very funny. Come on, Shay, come with me. For the drive. For the fresh air. Good Lord, you look terrible.”

  Shay knew she couldn’t face another day of studying. Maybe it would be fun to poke through a lot of junk in some old barn and then treat Ivy to lunch. “You haven’t asked me why I look terrible, Ivy. For you, that’s a drastic oversight.”

  Ivy sat up very straight and smiled. “I haven’t asked because I already know. You and Mitch are on the outs.”

  “You’re pleased about that?”

  “I know it’s temporary. Now, are you going to the sale with me or not?”

  “I’m going. Just let me finish my coffee.”

  “No.” Ivy shook her head. “They sell coffee at the sale. They sell it in little stands along the road. They sell it everywhere. Take your shower and let’s go!”

  Muttering, Shay abandoned her coffee and made her way to the bathroom.

  The carousel horse stood, its once-bright paint chipped and faded, in the middle of the barn where the auction would be held, as though waiting for Shay.

  She drew in her breath and moved toward it, her eyes wide. It couldn’t be Clydesdale!

  Shay crouched to look at the horse’s right rear hoof. Sure enough, splotches of Rosamond’s favorite fire-engine red fingernail polish still clung to the wood. The marks had been made one glum and rainy afternoon in the long-ago, by Shay herself.

  Another woman came to look at the horse. “Wouldn’t that make a marvelous planter, Harold?” she was saying. “We could strip off the paint and then varnish it….”

  Shay put down an urge to slap the woman away and glanced back over one shoulder at Ivy, who was inspecting a sterling-silver butter dish, one of hundreds of items set out on portable display tables.

  The carousel horse, like the playhouse, had been a gift from Riley, before his divorce from Rosamond, and Shay had cherished it. The piece was valuable, and, after shipping Shay off to a summer camp, Rosamond had sold it on a whim.

  The anger came back to Shay—or maybe it had never left. In any case, it was all she could do not to fling one arm over the neck of that battered, beloved old horse and cling to it, fending off all prospective buyers with her purse.

  “That’s nice,” Ivy said suddenly from beside Shay, her eyes moving over the hand-carved and painted relic. “Are you going to bid on it?”

  The woman and Harold were still standing nearby, pondering their plans to make a planter of Shay’s horse. “I might,” she said through tight lips, shrugging to give her words an air of indifference and nonchalance.

  By the time the bidding finally began, Shay was in a state of anxiety, though she managed to appear calm. When Clydesdale—Garrett and Shay had considered a multitude of names for the horse before coming up with that one—came on the docket, she waited until the auctioneer had gotten a number of bids before entering one of her own.

  Harold and the missus drove the price well beyond what Riley had paid for the piece originally, and it had been expensive then, but Shay didn’t care. When the competition fell away and hers was the highest bid, she had to choke back a shout of triumph.

  “What are you going to do with that, Shay?” Ivy whispered, sounding honestly puzzled.

  It was a reasonable question. While Hank would consider the horse an interesting addition to their hodge-podge decorating scheme, he would not see it as a spinner of magic. “I’ll explain later,” Shay whispered back.

  Ivy shrugged and jumped into the bidding for the silver butter dish. Later, after Shay had written a check and arranged for the horse to be delivered, she posed her original question.

  Settled into the passenger seat of Ivy’s car, Shay shrugged self-consciously. “He was mine, once. One of my mother’s husbands gave him to me when I was a little girl. I’d just had my tonsils out, and Riley wanted to spoil me.”

  “Oh,” said Ivy, in a fondly sentimental tone. “That’s sweet.”

  They stopped for a late lunch and Shay was ravenous, but she was also anxious to get home. The horse would be delivered around six o’clock that evening, and she wanted to have sandpaper and fresh paints ready.

  In fact, she did. She had newspapers spread out on her living room floor, too, and the deliverymen made jokes about that as they set the beloved old toy on the paper and unwrapped the blankets that had protected it.

  Shay smiled wanly at their attempt at humor and had to restrain herself from shooing them out so that she could begin the restoration project. Once they’d been given their tip, they left.

  Gently, Shay applied a special paint-stripping compound to the horse, removing as much of the scratched and faded finish as she could. Then she sanded. And sanded. And sanded.

  It was therapy, she said to herself. She would restore Clydesdale to his former glory and when she opened her catering service, he would stand in the office, where customers could admire him. Maybe he would even become her personal insignia, his image emblazoned on h
er letterhead….

  Letterhead. Shay smiled and shook her head. Before there could be letterhead, there had to be a business, didn’t there?

  As she knelt beside the carousel horse, sanding away what remained of the silver paint on one hoof, Shay felt real trepidation. It wouldn’t be easy to hand in her resignation; while she could go no further in her job at Reese Motors, it was a secure position and it paid decently. The work might be trying sometimes, but it was never dull, and Marvin and Jeannie had been so kind to her.

  On the other hand, Shay had money now, and a chance to follow her dreams. How many people got an opportunity like this? she asked herself. How many?

  Shay sanded more vigorously, so intent on her task and her quandary that, when the doorbell rang, she was startled. Rubbing her hands down the front of an old cotton work shirt that Eliott had left behind, she got to her feet and hurried to answer the persistent ringing.

  Mitch Prescott was standing on the worn doormat, looking both exasperated and contrite. He was wearing a white T-shirt and jeans, his hands wedged into his hip pockets.

  Shay’s heart slid over one beat and then steadied. She was painfully conscious of her rumpled hair and solvent-scented clothes. “Yes?” she said with remarkable calm.

  “Dammit, Shay,” he grumbled. “Let me in.”

  Shay stepped back and Mitch opened the screen door and came inside the now-cluttered living room. His dark eyes touched on the carousel horse, now stripped nearly to bare wood, but he made no comment.

  Remembering his coolness on the telephone, Shay was determined to keep a hold on her composure, such as it was. She wasn’t about to let Mitch know how his disinterest had hurt her. “May I help you?” she asked stiffly.

  He looked patently annoyed. “I came here to apologize,” he snapped. “Though I’m not exactly sure what it was that I did wrong.”

  Coolness be damned. Shay simmered, and her voice came out in a furious hiss. “You made love to me, Mitch Prescott. You laughed with me and you held me and you listened to my deepest secrets! Then, when you’d found out all you wanted to know about my mother, when you’d paid me for my trouble—”