She couldn’t take this another moment. She stood abruptly, and swiftly walked around Jason. Then she picked up speed and headed for the safety of the ladies room. It was definitely a retreat. She’d soak her neck and wrists in cold water until he went to his next program appearance. Or until she had regained some semblance of her usual poise.
Wasn’t this what she wanted? After all these months, he had made a move. She was a wreck. How was she going to tough out sitting next to him on the panel in a few minutes?
#
That went well. She ran away from him.
Jason looked after Linley’s disappearing figure. Linley disliked him. He’d been a jerk that night last year. It had started out as just another hookup, exciting for the moment, but meant to be meaningless in his life. Then, he didn’t know how, it had changed. After they’d finished, he’d wanted to stay close to her, to hold her. Something he hadn’t wanted to do since he’d been a naïve teenager. The mere idea had galvanized him to leap up and dress in a hurry.
Linley must have thought he was a pig. A gentleman softens the inevitable goodbye. He’d always tried to act like one, even with women he was bored with as soon as he’d gotten off. With Linley, his unexpected emotion had made him act like a boor. He’d seen it in her eyes when he’d finally looked at her again as he was about to leave.
He had seen that same expression in Linley’s eyes often in the three months since they’d been working together. An expression that judged him and found him wanting. It made him want to crash through her defenses, prove he was more than she took him for. One kiss would do it, he was convinced, but he resisted the urge to touch her at the studio and commit career suicide at the same moment. Daily, he fought to keep a poker face, to act in a calm, professional, and distant manner, especially when they were on the air. He had to keep it formal. Sometimes, he turned in the other direction so he didn’t have to look at her.
When would she forgive him? Why did he even want her to forgive him? He didn’t deal with women on those terms. He was careful to keep things cool and equal. With Linley, he felt as if he was on an uphill quest. Her aloof demeanor rolled him down to the bottom again and again.
She’d had her nose stuck up in the air ever since that night. He didn’t intend to sit next to her any longer, day in and day out, and take it. It was a struggle to keep his mind on his job when she was getting under his skin. She affected his concentration.
She didn’t put much of her terrific body on display. She was a lady. It was enough to see the delicate skin of her neck. A thin gold chain often rested gently on her flesh. Nothing flashy for her. At the oddest moments, he found himself wanting to reach over and pull her chain off. With his teeth. Then put his lips on that neck, that white, long neck, and kiss his way down into the secrets hidden by her conservatively buttoned blouse.
He cursed silently. This had to stop. He was going crazy from lust. He had to get her to bed again. This time, he’d spend the whole night. He’d luxuriate in Linley until he’d had his fill. Maybe, if the sex was as great as he remembered and anticipated, they’d even date for a while. Until he got tired of her. It had been years since any woman had held his interest for more than a month, if that. A month should do it.
First, he had to convince her to even speak to him outside the studio. She’d made it clear she wasn’t going to cross professional lines. How to lure her to take that step?
He walked to his office, automatically glancing at the calendar on his phone. There was his answer. A day away from the studio, that’s what he needed to crack Linley’s shell. A joint project for extra credit. It had worked in high school when he’d been hot for a girl in his class. All he had to do was come up with a project that played on Linley’s naked ambition. Then get her naked.
Chapter 5
Pam had spent a week shilly-shallying. There was no other way to describe her lack of action. She’d had such a great idea and then gone nowhere with it.
During her first, optimistic check on the Internet for micro loans, she’d discovered a serious hitch. The major company that did them in the U.S. was suspending all capital investments. With Wall Street and the American banking system in chaos, chances were that an iffy new loan program would not receive regulatory approval. Meanwhile, the Internet loan storefront had effectively been shut down.
She’d tried other sites, but there wasn’t any significant feedback about whether they were working. With the country in financial upheaval, everything was changing. Certainly her life was. And Magda’s.
How could she have messed up so badly? She was in over her head. She had no clue how to help Magda as she had offered. Peer-to-peer lending was all over the Internet and in theory it was no big deal, except that with no job, Magda wouldn’t have the regular income to repay a loan. Pam had been combing Internet sites, but she couldn’t figure out how to help a person with no income. Magda would need her unemployment compensation to pay her rent and put food on the table.
This was making a mountain out of a molehill. She had spent several days at the library reading about loans and grants. She had trolled the Internet for hours. Now she had to put her money where her mouth was. Come up with a plan that would work. She was afraid, afraid she couldn’t do it.
Finally, she bit the bullet and called her mother. As she explained the problem and all the side issues, she could hear herself get more frantic.
“Pamela, calm down,” Dorothy’s voice came through the line in her typical admonishing tone. “You are making this too complicated. Now, do you have any information about the tuition obligation? Do you know the total? When it’s due? What the interest rate is? If it’s a secured loan? A balloon loan? A government loan?”
Dorothy finally paused, and Pam answered in a low tone, “No. I don’t know any of it.”
“Call your friend and find out, dear, and while you’re at it, ask if she has any other source of income available to make repayments—even tiny ones—on a loan.”
Hearing nothing in reply, Dorothy continued, “Pamela, did you hear me?”
“Yes,” she sighed. “I can’t. I can’t do it, Mom. I’ll mess it up and embarrass her. And myself.”
“Have you contacted any lending sites to find out what their rates and repayment plans are?”
“Yes, but…”
Her mother made a sound of disgust. “What’s your problem?”
“I don’t know, Mom,” she wailed. “I had this great idea, and now the easy options have vanished. And I can’t follow through. I feel blocked. I know Magda is depending on me. She’s looking to me with a lot of hope because I spoke thoughtlessly.”
“Why don’t you just give her the money?” her mother asked, impatience in her voice.
“I don’t have it. The value of my 401k has dropped drastically in the last week because of the ongoing financial crisis. Oh, maybe I could borrow it against the house, but I suspect getting a loan when I am unemployed wouldn’t be very easy. The mess on Wall Street has sent every financial institution into a panic. Banks are freezing credit. Even my credit cards suddenly have tiny cash limits.”
“I’ve been following the news. Do you have enough for yourself?”
“I’m okay, but I can’t spare the many thousands Magda needs. Plus, that would change my relationship with her. Wreck it.”
“What do you think raising false hopes will do?”
“I know, I know.” She swallowed the bile in her throat to confess, “I’m mad at myself. I’m all talk and no action.”
“We can fix that, dear,” her mother said. A new briskness had entered her voice. “Pack some clothes and come out to my house and we will brainstorm how to help your friend obtain some money.”
Relief flooded Pam. Her mother could fix it all. Dorothy knew what to do. What would she do without her mother?
#
Dorothy hung up the phone. How had she come to raise a girl with so little gumption? Her other children were capable types who had managed complex careers and lar
ge families, but Pamela still needed direction and reassurance. Good lord, the child was nearly sixty. It was time she got her act together.
Although she was a dear, affectionate girl, Dorothy reminded herself. She must be fair. Pamela was also the warmest of her children. Now that Alexander had retired to North Carolina, Pamela was the child who lived the closest.
Alexander had lived in Queens County for many years. Then he announced that he was done with northern winters, and he and his wife were heading south to retire.
She was getting distracted. She could have organized Pamela’s silly little charitable project easily in the past. She did not have the energy anymore. She wasn’t quite willing to admit that, though. Anyway, it was high time Pamela learned to stand on her own two feet. Good thing the child was coming for a visit. Together, they would figure out what to do.
#
As Pam drove the Long Island Expressway toward her mother’s house on the south shore, she still was angry at herself for her impulsiveness. First, she had gotten the big idea that helping Magda was going to give new purpose to her own life. Then she’d stupidly told Magda too much too soon, raising hopes she might not be able to fulfill. To make matters worse, she’d dragged her feet for a whole week, trying not to complete the very task she herself had initiated. Why was she such a wimp? What was she afraid of?
Why was she clutching? There must be many ways to obtain money for a good cause. Her mother certainly never gave up after a mere initial setback. Dorothy always had ideas. Unlike Pam. Here she was, running to her mother for help, and at her age.
Glenvale Village, way out on Long Island, was a pleasant place to visit, and her mother’s house on the beach was more than charming, yet Pam dreaded how their talk would go. Dorothy Duncan’s plans usually worked, but they often involved some very showy, media-noisy tactics. Tactics that made Pam cringe. Dorothy had the knack, the secret to making publicity work for her. Pam didn’t. It was a miracle she hadn’t been a wreck when she appeared on national television last week.
The reward had been a precious extra hour with her daughter. Not much, but more than Linley had allowed her all year. Linley was punctilious about visits for Thanksgiving and Christmas, and that was it. Sometimes, the only other time Pam saw her in a year was when the entire family was visiting Dorothy at the beach. It was not enough.
She might as well stop rehashing her reasons to be miserable, and enjoy the scenery and the good weather. She’d been making this drive now for nearly forty years, and in that time, her mother’s country retreat had turned into a suburb, even though it was far out on the island. The roads had gotten better, at least, and the signs. The simple country village her mother had retired to was now part of an exclusive enclave whose homes had increased exponentially in value and priced the middle class out. How ironic that her mother, for whom the rich were a natural enemy, now lived as one of them.
Her father had left her mother comfortably off. Dorothy had always managed her own affairs and had never mentioned any money issues. Of course, Dorothy lived a simple life. Her only real expense in the past had been her activism. Now she had retired from that at last. Pam’s brother, Alexander, had been influential in getting their mother to call it quits once traveling to protest sites became burdensome.
During Dorothy’s last years on the activist circuit, she had worked the angle of shaming her opponents by being a newsworthy elderly lady whom they in their greed or intransigence had arrested. It made for excellent TV and sound bites, too. She had milked it for all it was worth, even carefully choosing her hairstyle and wardrobe to get the maximum effect out of the indignity to which she had been subjected. Pam admired her mother’s shrewdness, though she often felt immature and foolish around her.
Feelings of insecurity were not what kept Linley away from her own mother. More like a belief in her own superiority to Pam.
Chapter 6
Linley’s shaken retreat from Jason yesterday still played on her interior monitor, mocking her. She had totally lost her cool. Running away from him had probably encouraged him. Which was confusing. She was a sharp observer, especially of men she’d been to bed with. She knew damn well he’d backed away from the something more that could have developed between them that night last year. Why was he trying to rekindle it now?
On her side, being apart had done nothing to change the strong chemical attraction. Months of sitting next to him every weekday for an hour had intensified her desire. She wanted him. Lack of interest wasn’t her problem.
She refused to play games with her career. She had no intention of risking her burgeoning television presence for a mere hookup. Or even for a fling. Something about Jason told her he was the fling type. If they had worked for competing networks or even on different television shows, she wouldn’t have any compunction in having it on with him. He was handsome, well-mannered, and smart. Hot in bed. He had a brilliant future. She was drawn to the complete package.
One session in bed wasn’t much. Call it an introduction. Since they’d started working together, she had learned how his mind worked when addressing a financial or political issue. She couldn’t infer from that how he felt about her, or any number of personal issues. Too many women leaped to unfounded conclusions about men, especially the ones who took after her mother’s excessively passive, sentimental femininity. They assumed emotion that wasn’t present. Linley was too smart to fool herself that way. Maybe Jason had some feelings for her. Maybe not.
Every day, when the show was over, she waved a pleasant farewell to the others and left the studio quickly, stopping only at her cubicle to pick up her personal possessions. She was careful to do her networking early in the day, not at night when men were more likely to get drunk or proposition her. The downside of being an attractive blonde. The studio in the evening was no place to linger. At this hour, she wanted to relax. Since her last appearance for the day was done, and the stock market was closed for the day, she could wind down a bit before heading home. She went up the street to her favorite coffee shop and found her usual quiet corner in the back. She checked her phone for the latest news, but then her thoughts drifted to Jason.
What would she do when he made another move? After last week’s scare, she needed some armor. For all his talk of it just being dinner, she wasn’t naïve. Blondes got hit on all the time. She usually knew when a man wanted her. Both Ralph and Ernie had shown signs of interest when she first was hired. Then she’d made her position clear, and they were content to settle for a comradely professional relationship.
Why now, after several months of playing it cool, was Jason actively pursuing her? She would not be surprised if he drew encouragement from her recent show of weakness. He could be very persistent. She’d seen it on the air when he’d worked on getting answers from stubborn guests. She felt a new vibe from him now. It excited her.
She was in control of her sexuality. Her body wasn’t going to betray her if he touched her. She wouldn’t melt in his arms. Anything that happened between them would be her decision, not his. She wouldn’t let him crowd her into a corner.
Did she even have time for a relationship? She was super busy, not only researching her role on the show but looking for ways to maximize her career momentum. The Today Show was the big win, but she also had a couple of radio talk shows to do, and a cable guest appearance. Her excuse for not inviting her mother to these was that the poor dear was in shock. Now that Pam had told her story once on a major network show, all Linley had to do was refer to it. Anyone interested in her mother could watch it on YouTube or elsewhere. Meanwhile, she would push herself as the person deserving a hearing, even if it was secondhand sympathy. She would use the opportunity to show off her expertise in personal finance. To give some desperately needed, sound financial advice. Maybe someday she could topple Suze Orman from her perch. It wasn’t easy to get attention with all the competition, but Linley was in it to win it.
She had to be careful not to overplay her ambition. She hadn’t hir
ed a publicist yet. For now, it was up to her. She already had a slice of the Today Show video linked on her website, which linked automatically to social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter. It was on YouTube, of course. That was last week, and now she needed new content.
Seeking fame and fortune via the net could be very complicated and time-consuming. It made her television ambitions seem quite doable by comparison. How ironic. No pressure here.
#
Her mother called. “Linley, hi, it’s Mom.”
“I know. All cell phones have caller ID.” Duh.
“Oh. Of course. You’re right. Anyway, I didn’t want you to worry in case you called the house. I’m going to Long Island and staying with Grandma for a few days.”
“Is she okay?” Grandma Dorothy was her favorite relative. What a fireball she had been when she was younger. Linley was proud to be related to her and sometimes even boasted to people about her activist grandma. A shame Dorothy had gotten too old to continue her campaigning. She was way out on the Island so Linley hardly ever saw her now that her mother wasn’t dragging her there for the summers or for family events. Thanksgiving at Uncle Alex’s house wasn’t quite the same, and anyway, he had moved out of state.
“She’s fine, dear. I needed to consult her about something, and she invited me out. Since it’s nearly a hundred miles from our house, I’m staying here for a bit.”
Okay. You said that already. Don’t you have anything else to do but bug me? You know I don’t care.
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