by Kara Isaac
Eleven
Call her a nerd, but no one could deny there were few things more beautiful than an updated Microsoft Project Gantt chart. And not just any old Gantt chart, but one that showed everything tracking on schedule. Some things even tracking ahead.
Paige allowed herself to revel in the glory of her beautiful project plan for a few seconds. Not even the page sitting behind it, an electronic bloodbath tracking the budget, could dent her good mood.
After a month, she still missed Emily’s good-humored company, but it was nice to have her own space, to be able to do things her own way.
Leaning back in her chair, she pushed back from her desk and cast her gaze up to the window to check on the weather. She wanted to get to the mall during lunch and pick up some picture frames so she could personalize her office. Blue sky and wispy clouds greeted her. So far winter in June felt remarkably similar to a Chicago summer.
A knock sounded on her office door, and Maggie stuck her head in. “Heya. You’ve got a delivery.”
“Great. That should be the stickers we ordered to go on the gift bags. Can you just tell the delivery guy to put the boxes in the photocopy room?”
A wide smile slid across Maggie’s face. “It’s not stickers.”
“Oh?” She couldn’t think of anything else due to arrive today.
Maggie gestured to her. “C’mon. You need to sign for it personally. It’s in reception.”
This was getting weirder and weirder. Paige pushed back her chair and stood, tugging her skirt down. If nothing else, it provided a good excuse to stretch her legs. “Okay, coming.”
Two of the admin girls crossed her path, their usual casual nods turned to broad smiles when they saw her. What was going on?
As she neared the front desk, Chloe, the receptionist, looked up and gave her an equally large grin.
“There’s a delivery for me?”
“Sure is.” Chloe was still grinning as she nodded to the waiting area, obscured from Paige’s view. She paused, legs almost unwilling to take her around the corner. Everyone was way too excited. Something was up.
Peering around the corner, she was met by a blur of color. Pinks, oranges, yellows, purples, all combined in the world’s largest bouquet of flowers held by a set of burly arms.
“Looks like someone has an admirer.” Chloe’s words broke through her haze.
“What?” Paige’s fingers curled around the wall corner for support. An admirer? That was ridiculous. She spent her entire day surrounded by women, and the only guy she’d felt a flicker of anything for had proven himself to be an arrogant jerk.
She hadn’t seen Josh since the cupcake debacle. The band had been on the road some of the time, which suited her fine. It was inconvenient enough that the whole altercation kept intruding on her thoughts at the most inconvenient moments. She’d never wanted to slap someone so badly in her whole life as when he insinuated she was a drunk but then when he’d pulled out that grin . . . well, that had sent her pulse rocketing for a whole different reason.
She shook her head, forcing him from her mind. “Are you sure they’re for me?” She directed her question to Chloe, saving the delivery guy from having to check. The bouquet was so large, it obscured his entire head.
Chloe flicked her ponytail over her shoulder. “Assuming you’re still Paige McAllister, yes.”
She turned toward the deliveryman. Why hadn’t someone warned her to bring her wallet? She didn’t have money on her to give him a tip.
“Thanks.” She took the blooms from the guy’s arms.
The face of a blonde, freckled teenager popped out from behind them. “Don’t thank me, thank the guy who dropped a bomb on these things. I just need you to sign here.” He poked a small device at her.
“Hold on a sec.” She placed the bouquet on the coffee table, took the stylus he held out and scrawled her initials across the screen.
“Awesome. Have a nice day.”
Turning her attention back to the behemoth, the delivery guy’s words rolled over her. Thank the guy who dropped a bomb on these.
“So? Who are they from?” Chloe poked her head up like a tortoise from behind her desk.
Paige wrangled with the staples for a second, trying not to tear the wrapping as she pulled the envelope free and pulled out a plain white card.
Congratulations on two months on your big adventure. Missing you. Nate.
A smile tipped up her lips. She missed him too, more than she’d imagined she would. Missed his stability, his sincerity, his friendship. They still talked most weeks.
The flowers drew her eyes downward as she hefted them into her arms and sucked in the floral fragrance. She didn’t even want to guess how much they had cost.
“What did you do? A night raid on the botanic gardens?” Josh’s voice drifted from behind her and she flinched, the rectangular card slipping from her fingers as she turned. He cast a scathing glance over the bouquet. “Maybe next time he might like to sponsor a starving African village as a demonstration of affection.”
She pierced him with a glare, trapping the card under the tip of her shoe. “Maybe you should take some of that attitude and—” She cut herself off before she could say something that would be the highlight of her day but definitely career limiting.
He tilted his head. “And?”
“Go talk to Jesus about it.”
His mouth wobbled as he fought to contain the laughter that she could see in his eyes. “I appreciate your concern for my spiritual welfare, Miss McAllister.” With that, he brushed past her and strode away.
Patronizing sod. Oh, well, it could always be worse. At least she didn’t work for him.
“You just rest up, okay? We’ll manage.” Josh dropped his mother’s desk phone back into its cradle, then stood and stretched his back.
Great. He’d been back in the city less than forty-eight hours and his tour planner had come down with glandular fever. She’d be off work for at least two months. Right when they were already having trouble nailing down the details of their next New Zealand and US tours.
He shook out his arms. Why had he decided to make the call from his mother’s office? If he’d turned around and gone back to his office to make it when he remembered, he would’ve missed seeing the arrival of the American’s ridiculous floral tribute.
Go talk to Jesus about it. Ha. Jesus definitely hadn’t been the first destination she’d had in mind.
He looked at his watch. Ten past twelve. He checked the schedule on his mum’s desk. Yes, there he was. Midday, lunch with Josh.
He craved something greasy and meaty before he tackled his latest staffing problem. No doubt his mum would want to go somewhere that served organic rabbit food. Speaking of, her familiar blonde head teetered into the office, a precarious stack of books perched under her chin.
“What are those for?” Josh walked around the desk, ready to grab the books before they crashed.
“I’m good.” His mother dropped the books on the side table under the window. “We’re doing the women’s Bible study on mercy next term. I need to start prepping some of the material.” She turned toward him, tilting her head. “What’s wrong? Some of the gear get damaged in transit?”
“Marcy has glandular fever.”
She stared at him blankly.
“Our tour planner.”
“Marcy, Marcy.” His mother tapped a finger to her lips. “Petite brown-haired girl?”
Considering Marcy was at least forty-five, “girl” was stretching it a little.
“She was only part-time, right? Like two or three days a week?” His mother turned back to her pile, placing the top half of the stack on the table.
What did he look like, payroll? All he knew was she got the job done. “I think she did a total of two days but usually as four half-days while the kids were in school.”
His mother smiled the kind of smile that made him suspicious. “Excellent. In that case I have the perfect solution. Someone was just telling me thi
s morning they have some capacity.”
“Who?”
His words hit his mother’s back. She was already heading back out the door.
He groaned. The last time he needed assistance, his mother had saddled him with a single mother who “needed some support to get back into the workforce.” The woman hadn’t worked since the nineties and had spent most of her time eyeing him up in the way Potiphar’s wife must have looked at Joseph. He couldn’t get back on the road fast enough.
He blew a breath out between clenched teeth. He loved his mother, but he didn’t have time to train up one of her little projects. He needed someone who could hit the ground running.
His mother marched back into the room with a pleased expression as the American followed her. She looked the opposite, all pinched brows and pursed lips.
Oh no. She was not going near his tour. Or his team.
He opened his mouth to say that in the last ten seconds a solution had magically appeared and he didn’t in fact need any help. None at all.
“Paige will do it,” his mother announced. “She can give you up to two days a week.”
He shoved his hands into his pockets. “Surely the A—Paige is busy with Grace.” Surely they’d both rather bang their respective heads into a brick wall for sixteen hours a week than be forced to work together.
“Actually, she’s so brilliant that we’re two weeks ahead on all the big milestones. Which makes her exactly what you need.” His mother stepped toward him, her expression daring him to argue.
“Do you know anything about organizing a tour?” He turned toward the American. He could stare her down.
She shook her head, leaned against the doorway, looking polished in her white shirt, wide belt, and fitted gray skirt. “Nope. But I’m a professional logistics planner and event manager. How hard can it be?”
How hard could it be? Was she serious? “For a start there will be twelve concerts in eight cities over four weeks in two countries. You have over thirty band members, some will be on one tour, some on both. You have to deal with flights, transport, hotels, and freighting instruments. Musicians with charming little quirks like only sleeping on even-numbered floors and losing their mind if their seat number has an F in it. Would you like me to go on?”
She crossed her arms and stared at him. “Do I need to arrange to have every trash can, every letterbox, every pothole within a one mile radius cleared for bombs?”
“Uh . . . no.”
“Do I need to have sixteen contingency plans for a terrorist attack, ranging across magnitudes, types, and level of lockdown required?”
“Um, no.”
“Do I need to know the details of every hospital within a fifty-mile radius, their specialties, services, and how many casualties they can take?”
He shook his head. “No.”
“Will I need to have everyone who so much as breathes near the logistics of the event screened by the CIA, FBI, and NSA?”
Okay, she had to be making that up.
She took his silence as surrender. “Then I’m sure me and your little tour will be just fine.”
His mother patted him on the shoulder and grinned. “And that, my son, is what we old people refer to as getting schooled.”
He didn’t see what was so funny.
“Now you two go work out the details.” She flicked her hands at them.
Luckily, he already had plans. “We’ll have to do it later.” As in never, because he was going to spend the afternoon finding another solution no matter what it took. “We’re supposed to be having lunch.”
She glanced at her schedule. “So we are. Even better. I’ve got a Bible study to plan, so you can take Paige out. Work things out over food.”
He’d been sewn up tighter than the game ball at the Bledisloe Cup.
He plastered a smile on his face for his mother’s benefit. “Great, shall we?”
From the American’s expression, she’d prefer a lobotomy. That made two of them.
He gestured her out of the room ahead of him, then turned. “Bye, Mum.”
She looked up, a twinkle in her eye. “Bye, honey. Have fun.”
He’d turn into an organic, wheat-free vegan before that happened.
He waited until the two of them were out of the office, out of earshot, then leaned down beside her, the apple-y scent of her hair distracting him. Focus, Tyler! “Just so you know, you may have fooled my mother, but you won’t have it so easy with me.”
She stopped mid-stride and pinned him with a scathing glare. “Darlin’, my last boss was a lazy, incompetent alcoholic who only had a business because of her rich daddy’s connections. So unless you have the mafia in one back pocket and Al-Qaeda in the other, I could organize this tour with one arm tied behind my back and both eyes shut.”
Food court for lunch it was. At least when they both lost it, there would be limited damage they could do to each other with plastic forks.
Twelve
The car ride to the mall had had all the warmth of North Dakota in January, and it stank of gym socks and sweat.
Paige had tried to back out not once, but six times, on the silent walk to the car park. The only terse words Josh had uttered were that the boss said they were going to lunch, and so that was exactly what they were doing.
She hadn’t even had time to put Nate’s bouquet in a vase before Janine had come flying in and hustled her to her office, throwing around something about Paige being the perfect solution. So right now, gorgeous flowers lay dying on her desk so she could have lunch with her boss’s stupid son.
At least he’d brought her to a mall. The food court resembled all the others she’d visited—overcrowded with the lunchtime rush, reeking of grease, with infants wailing and generic mall music pumping so loudly it would be almost impossible to hold a conversation.
“What can I get you?” Josh reached into his pocket.
“I’m capable of getting my own food.”
He shrugged, his blue T-shirt stretching across his broad shoulders. “Suit yourself. I’ll meet you back here in ten.”
He disappeared into the crowd, and she turned to survey her options. A burger. That’s what she would get. If she had to have lunch with him, she was at least going to have something good. The biggest stack of meat and cheese she could find fit the bill.
She weaved her way through the crowd, bypassing the Golden Arches for a sandwich joint with a flashing burger icon.
The line moved quickly, and within minutes, she stood in front of a boy who looked like he should be in school, not serving fast food for minimum wage.
“What can I get you?”
She scanned the menu above his head. “I’d like the Double Stacker please, fries, and a bottle of Diet Coke.”
He paused, eyed her up and down. “Are you sure? It’s pretty big.”
She flashed him a smile. “Perfect.”
He gave her another doubtful look, but tapped her order into the register. “That’ll be fifteen-sixty.”
She barely managed to keep her face under control. Fifteen-sixty for a burger and fries? It had better be impressive.
Digging into her purse, she pulled out her wallet and flipped it open.
Her heart dropped as she stared into its gaping depths. Oh, no. No notes.
Australian coins were her nemesis. The notes were easy, being color-coded and all. Purple for five, blue for ten, orange for twenty. But the change was annoying. One dollar and two dollar coins. Coins! No quarters. Things with weird shapes. And even though she was great with numbers, for some reason she lost the ability to remember which was which when someone was standing there, waiting for her to pay them.
She unzipped her change compartment, and emptied the contents onto her hand. Gold and silver mingled together in her palm.
She stared at them. She could do this. The gold coins were ones and twos. The big silver weird shaped ones were like half dollars.
“Do you want some help?” Josh materialized beside her hol
ding a kebab.
If she said no, he’d just stand there watching her flounder around like she hadn’t passed first grade math. So she swallowed her pride. “That would be great. Thanks.”
As she extended her hand toward him, the sleeve of her blouse rode up her wrist, exposing the puckered start of her scar.
“Bet that hurt.” Josh nodded toward her arm as he made quick work of plucking an assortment of coins from her palm and handing them over.
“Yup. Compound fracture. Needed screws, surgery, the works.” Over the years, Paige had learned that trying to hide the scar once it had been seen or dodge questions about it made people more interested. Providing a little bit of detail was usually enough to satiate their curiosity and give her the chance to divert the conversation.
Josh opened his mouth but she cut him off before he could ask any more questions. “So which ones are the ones and which are twos? I can never remember.” She threw on her ditzy blonde voice for good measure. She’d rather have him think she was stupid than have him ask questions that would force her to either lie, or tell the truth and become an object of pity.
“The two-dollar coins are smaller.” Josh handed a last couple of coins over and the counter guy gave her the ticket for her order, and a bottle of Diet Coke.
Pocketing her ticket, Paige tipped the remainder of the pile back into her purse with a cascade of clinks as they stepped back from the counter and joined the people waiting for their orders.
“Thanks for that.” Her words were terse and her fingers gripped the neck of the bottle in a stranglehold. She checked that the cuff was back in place. Hopefully with Josh it would be a case out of sight, out of mind. It had been a long time since someone seeing it had left her feeling so vulnerable and exposed.
“No worries. What did you order?”
“A burger.”
She could feel him eyeing her. So maybe her skirt had been a little tight when she put it on this morning. Kat cooked better than Nigella Lawson, and she didn’t have the funds to buy a whole new wardrobe. And that was before even considering the downright depressing Australian sizing system that had deemed her to be in the double digits for the first time in her life.