The Truth About Numbnuts and Chubbs

by Cat Kelly

  But today there was no debate. Odd.

  "See you then." She hung up.

  Damn computer was slow, working on a half dead battery and no power cord. With a sigh she flipped open her briefcase and fumbled for a legal bad, a biro and a calculator. Back to basics.

  * * * *

  He strode through the doors, tucking his phone away inside his jacket. The restaurant was already filling up with the lunch crowd and it was barely half twelve. The air was thick with basil and garlic, a low murmur of contented diners music to his ears. Probably ought to be the beep of the cash register that brought a smile to his face. But right now it wasn't. He was starting to feel good about bringing pleasure to other people. It was weird. The satisfaction of seeing that little restaurant packed to the walls was like a shot of adrenaline directly into his veins.

  Then he saw Bryony in a corner booth, poring over the menu. At once he felt a sly punch deep in his gut—maybe it was more of a kick this time.

  Like the bubbles in a glass of champagne.

  What song was that from? Couldn't think.

  About to walk over to her, he stopped. No way would she welcome him at her table. He should know better by now.

  Go over, you fool, his grandmother whispered inside his head. You coward. What are you? A little girl?

  Nah. But he wasn't looking for a slapped face either.

  Chubbs would probably flay him alive with her tongue if she saw him right now.

  So he slipped by, hiding behind the coat stand and making a dash for the office behind the bar. Ben Petruska had climbed Everest, dived off a cliff in Acapulco, run with bulls in Pamplona, but for some reason Bryony Mulligan, all grown up, scared the pants off him.

  He skidded to a halt, like Bugs Bunny at the cliff edge, teetering forward at an impossible angle, ears folded back, toes clenched.

  Had he walked into the wrong back room?

  The bookshelves—formerly tilting hazardously—were now in neat order, binders labeled. The desk was cleaned off, but for a phone, a blotter and a stack of restaurant supply catalogs. Beside the fax machine there was a big box marked Receipts and another marked Invoices. A large staff roster, which had been rolled up behind the door, was now taped to the wall. Along with an invoice for her work that day.

  He took it down and looked at it. That's how much she made an hour? Hmmm. The miracle worker could make five times that working for him. Not that she ever would consider it.

  Permeating the oregano and meatballs there was a very slight touch of spicy perfume, still lingering. He sniffed, tasted it far back on his tongue as if it was wine. Nice. Fruity. Full-bodied. Like her.

  What the fuck was he scared of? She was a woman, wasn't she?

  * * * *

  "Try the rigatoni with eggplant. One of the chef's specials."

  She glanced up from the menu, expecting to see the waiter back again. Instead it was Ben, standing at the table, grinning stupidly. Damn. She was actually going to order that dish, but now she couldn't, or it would look as if she followed his advice. Only a man of his arrogance would approach her with that grin on his face after leaving her with five years of badly kept account books. Which she couldn't complain about, because they were supposed to be managed by the firm that had just hired her. She was still puzzling over how Don Philips ever got Mr. Leonato's tax forms in on time.

  "I suppose you thought that was funny this morning, when you chose not to tell me this was your place."

  "I was in a hurry, Miss Mulligan, and you were late for the appointment." He dropped casually into the seat opposite. "You fixed your shoe?"

  "I found some glue in the back of a drawer. It's a temporary fix to get me through the day. The shoes are ruined." Slapping the menu shut, she tossed it down and grabbed her wine glass. "Do you want to hear my recommendations for the business?"

  "Depends. Will they involve my head and one of the ovens?"

  Sarcastic ass. "First of all you need a computer back there. One with updated accounting software. Leonato's has evidently been operating by the skin of its teeth with processes from the dark ages. I'm surprised I didn't uncover an abacus and some cave paintings. What made you buy this restaurant anyway? It's not the usual acquisition is it?"

  He shrugged one shoulder against the burgundy pleather. "Some nights it was so packed I couldn't get a table. I didn't like that. I got annoyed."

  Unbelievable! And yet not, since it was him. She exhaled a curt laugh. "So you simply bought the place. Problem solved. What's it like to have so much power?" Fluttering her lashes, she feigned awe.

  "The old man was ready to retire anyway and looking for a buyer. I gave him a good deal. He's happy."

  "Right. One of your deals."

  "What's that supposed to mean, Chubbs?"

  "It means, Numbnuts, that your deals are only good for you." She remembered, to her surprise, almost every word in that interview she'd read. "When asked for his definition of a good deal, Petruska laughed and said, Any deal that's good for me."

  He looked at her, puzzled.

  "Time magazine," she explained, smug. "An article on the city's top ten, over-achieving, thirty-something assholes."

  "I'm surprised you bothered to read it."

  She sipped her wine. "I was in the dentist's waiting room. I'd run out of everything else to read. It was between you or the instructions for a building evacuation in the event of fire. And I'd read those the last time I was there."

  Ben winced and shook his dark head. "Ouch." He changed the subject. "How long have you been back in the city?"

  "Almost two months," she answered crisply. It wasn't as if they were likely to run into each other and they didn't have connecting friends, but she was surprised he didn't know through Helena, who was married to his cousin Carl. "I was in France." She couldn't help it—wanted him to know there was something exotic and brave about her. She wasn't that dull, chubby, thirteen year-old bridesmaid hiding cannolis in her napkin. Not anymore.

  Oh, why tell him she'd been abroad as if it was something special? He probably traveled overseas every month on business deals. Why the hell did she care what he thought of her anyway? She didn't need his approval.

  He leaned toward her, resting his forearms on the table. "You ought to work for me."

  She squinted. "Why?"

  "I need a new personal assistant. Someone smart, efficient, likes to travel. Someone with a good bullshit detector. Who won't keep trying to sleep with me."

  She laughed, but it came out more as a snort. "Is that a common problem for you?"

  "Why don't you think about it? I can more than match your current hourly salary."

  "I'm a CPA. Not a doormat." That was, no doubt, what he wanted—some poor soul to run around and do his dirty work, all those trivial things he didn't have time for in his busy day. "Why would you want me working for you, anyway, Numbnuts?"

  "So I can boss you around, Chubbs."

  "Right."

  His slow grin made her pulse speed up. "Get my whip out."

  "Right."

  Evidently, he was kidding about the job. For just a moment she'd thought he was serious. When she reached for the wine to pour herself another glass, he beat her to it. "I expect any assistant of mine to be on call at a moment's notice, ready to leave with me as soon as I need them. Someone who knows me, can anticipate what I want, before I even know it. Someone unflappable in a crisis, who doesn't take my occasional bouts of bad temper personally."

  She rolled her eyes. "Jesus, Mary and Joseph, where do I fill out the application form? Sounds like a dream job."

  "Very funny, Mulligan."

  Swinging her leg under the table she accidentally knocked her knee against his. The contact sent a jolt through her body, as well as the table. Wine spilled.

  "You can't sit there," she muttered, dabbing hurriedly at the puddle with her napkin. "I'm waiting for someone."

  He scratched his ear. "A date?" It was a damn shame that he should have hands like those, she th
ought peevishly. Why couldn't they be on a nice man? They were large, expressive hands with long fingers and he used them a lot when he talked. The thick, silver band of his wrist watch winked at her as he gestured, drawing attention to one of his best features. Regrettably.

  People said he'd punched faces with those hands. Taken out the opposition. He fought dirty, they claimed.

  Whomever handled his publicity these days had made an effort to turn his image around, make him appear less like the gutter fighter who built his empire with questionable methods. He was trying for a more legitimate image—the golden poster boy for the American dream. And it had been quite a successful campaign. But she wasn't fooled by the expensive suits, handmade shoes and charity work. He was still the tough-nosed, wise-cracking, arrogant boy from Brighton Beach who—as he once boasted to her— knew twenty ways to cheat her out of a buck and her panties.

  Bry often found her mind wandering when she looked at his masterful hands, thinking what he might do with them. The latest fantasy involved cream pastries.

  She gulped down the remaining wine in her glass. At this rate she'd be drunk before Helena arrived. Probably a good thing.

  "I said," the man across the table repeated firmly, "is it a date?"

  Why did he want to know? And what right did he have to ask? "Jealous?" she replied with another snort. Not very ladylike, Bryony, she heard her mother's voice.

  He paused, eyes narrowed. "Maybe I am," he replied thoughtfully.

  A shocked chuckle caught in her throat. She wished it was a date, just to show him. "Going to send a gypsy violinist to serenade us?"

  "Not at lunch, no." He checked his cufflinks. "So who is he?"

  She groaned. He'd find out sooner or later anyway. Sadly, she couldn't keep an air of mystery even if she wanted to. "It's Helena."

  A little smile curved his thin lips and he blinked those deep, emerald green eyes. "Ah. Cousin Hel. How is she?"

  That, she mused, remained to be seen. "Don't you speak to Carl these days?"

  He drummed his fingers on the table, his darting gaze swiftly taking in the other diners. "Not...Not often. Been busy." She got the sense he was hiding something. "Aha! Here comes the waiter."

  * * * *

  So she hadn't heard the latest from her cousin. Yet. She'd no doubt find out over lunch. Better get out of the line of fire, away from the fallout. He'd already spent two hours last night with Carl who, for some reason, chose to spill intimate details about his marriage during the course of venting over beer and burgers. Ben was never comfortable knowing about other people's private lives and certainly never wanted to know about his cousin's sex life, but in those two hours he'd been given a blow-by-blow account. No pun intended. The thought of Helena in a naughty nurse outfit, offering to give Carl an enema, had almost brought the burger back up. Apparently it did the same for Carl who was completely rattled by his wife's sudden desire to explore new frontiers in sex.

  "I don't get it," he'd moaned to Ben between chugs on a Dos Equis bottle. "I thought she was perfectly happy for sixteen years. You know, missionary position every Saturday without fail, a little outdoor from behind in the summer. Occasionally a crotchless, lace teddy or some edible undies, if it's my birthday. Nothing too out-there. Now, suddenly she wants to experiment. I've got Horny Housewife Helena on my hands. I blame the books she's been reading."

  What, exactly, he expected Ben to say or do, was beyond him, so he'd just lent a listening ear, nodding as required, trying not to laugh.

  Helena would kill Carl if she knew half the things he'd unloaded last night.

  Certainly made him look at prim and prissy Helena in a new light.

  That was the trouble with women, he mused; marry them and they changed, the mask came off.

  He watched Bry explaining to the waiter that she'd hold-off on her order until her cousin arrived. She'd cut her hair since he last saw her, he realized. It used to be long and wavy, but now it was a sleek, auburn, shoulder-length bob. Is that what was so different about her? He couldn't pinpoint it.

  She wore a chic, navy wrap dress and those high, scarlet heels. Odd choices for an accountant. Gave her a sexy edge. If he saw her in the street he'd definitely turn his head to watch her pass. She used to be self-conscious, fidgety. Today she sat before him with an air of confidence, her polished, pale pink fingernails occasionally drawn through her hair to tuck it behind one ear. She wore a ring, he noted. Not an engagement ring, however.

  Suddenly she looked over his head and smiled. It was the easy sort of smile she never spared for him, and when she raised a hand to wave, he knew Horny Housewife Helena had arrived.

  "Well, I'll leave you to your cauldron," he muttered, sliding out of the booth. "Nice to see you, Chubbs."

  "Likewise, Numbnuts," she replied, studying the menu again.

  "Give some thought to my offer."

  "Offer?" She looked up and in that second she was thirteen again, innocent, startled and confused that he'd just asked her to dance.

  "The job offer," he reminded her patiently, leaning down with his palms flat on the table. It seemed she'd already dismissed his suggestion as nonsense. "Obviously Rostrop and Philips are giving you all the shitty jobs. A woman with your talent is wasted there. You know they'll hold you back."

  Her lips twitched and Ben realized he was focused on them a little too intently. Red lipstick made her mouth full and lush, very enticing. No more virgin uncertainty there, he mused. The reminiscence had been brief and now awkward, pugnacious Bryony Mulligan transformed back into this tantalizing, feisty woman again. "Why don't you write up a full description of what my duties would be, Petruska?"

  "I told you already."

  "A vague overview. I need details." One beautifully shaped eyebrow arched gracefully, sensuously. "I can't consider leaving a steady job for some half-assed idea you plucked out of the air. So write it down." There went the lip twitch again and her black lashes swept downward as she turned her attention back to the menu. "Unless you're weren't serious."

  He'd never heard a soft voice crack a whip before.

  Suddenly Helena was upon them, bitching already about having come so far across town in midday traffic. As if midday traffic was worse than any other time of day. Helena was a whiner. Curiously, so he'd found, people who whined the most often had the least to complain about. "Hi, Helena." He tried desperately to keep a straight face, but kept picturing her bony frame in thigh highs and a nurse's outfit. He always thought that when a woman's knees were the widest part of her body she ought to consider eating a slice of cheesecake once in a while.

  She shot him a cold glance. "What the hell are you doing here?"

  Bry spoke up before he could answer. "He owns the place."

  Helena flung herself into the seat he'd just vacated, shrugging off her coat, muttering about men always being where they weren't wanted, but never around when they were. Ben knew she didn't like him, of course. She thought he was a womanizer, according to his cousin Carl, and made no secret of her disapproval regarding the various dates he'd brought to her parties over the years.

  "Enjoy the coven...er... lunch, ladies." He made a hasty exit.

  Chapter Three

  She hovered in the doorway, suffering the quakes of last minute doubt. In a weak moment she'd agreed to go to this gallery opening Helena had organized tonight, but she wasn't really at home with this sort of crowd. Modern art confused her. She always got the sense of watching a naked Emperor march by while everyone else cooed over his new suit of clothes. Bry liked classical art, portraits and landscapes that weren't interrupted by flying cubes or bicycle tracks, or random items she could have picked out of her own garbage. In Helena's opinion, that made her "pedestrian".

  "Just don't tell anyone what you really think," had been her advice to Bry as they left Helena's car and walked toward the polished glass front of the gallery.

  That seemed to be Helena's mantra, she mused. Just pretend everything's "darling".

  So now
, here she was, trying to look cool and sophisticated, watching her cousin greet people with the double-cheek air kiss. Helena was fully-recharged this evening, bright and sparkling as a fake crystal chandelier, much improved on the dour, crumpled, teary-eyed woman she'd been seven hours ago at lunch, when pouring out her troubles.

  "I know he's having an affair," she'd exclaimed over the Chianti and garlic bread. "He's been chatting with an old girlfriend on Facebook."

  "How do you know?"

  "I have his password. I checked. It's all there."

  "What is?"

  "Chats. She's always asking about his work. Sucking up. Whether he remembers this and that." Helena had shaken her slender shoulders as if she had a chill. "Talking about her vacation and her new car."

  "Is that all?"

  When Helena responded with a deep scowl, Bry thought maybe she was missing something. But no. "Isn't that enough?"

  She recovered hastily. "So, what does he say?"

  "He tells her about problems at work," Helena exhaled dramatically. "Things he never bothers to share with me. And he reminisces about taking her to the prom. I mean, it's sickening." With one hand to her forehead Helena slumped over her untouched pumpkin ravioli.

  Later she conceded that her husband's former flame lived all the way across the country in California and was married with four kids. Bry casually suggested that these "chats" seemed relatively harmless, but Helena, in usual drama-queen fashion, had burst into tears. "I can't believe you'd take his side. Oh my god, no one cares about me. No one."

  Then she was guilted into going with Helena to the gallery opening—an event, apparently, that Carl had refused to attend.

  "He claims he has to work late, but he's probably chatting with his online hussy and can't tear himself away." Helena mopped up her tears with a paper napkin. "I've tried everything I can think of to keep his interest in the bedroom. I don't know what else he wants, Bry."

  When Helena was in one of her dark moods there was little to do except wait for the storm cloud to pass, but she'd always been there for Bry—more of an older sister than a cousin—so it felt as if she ought to prove her allegiance by trotting along to the gallery. Couldn't let Helena walk into her own party alone.