A Winning Battle

by Carla Neggers

  A Winning Battle

  Carla Neggers

  Copyright © 1989, 2020 by Carla Neggers

  2nd Edition

  Published by Windmill Press

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  Chris Battle leaned as far back in his beat-up oak swivel chair as he could without tipping over and tried once more to remember where he’d put that woman’s name and telephone number. He had stuck his feet up on his desk—or what passed for a desk. It was just an old library table he’d gotten at an auction sale a few years ago, big enough to hold innumerable piles of papers, folders, magazines, newspapers, books, diskettes, letters he was supposed to answer but seldom did, bills he was supposed to pay on time but seldom did, his computer, which he hated, and his grandfather’s old manual typewriter, which he loved. One charitable friend had called his desk “cluttered.” But who the devil cared? He knew where everything was.

  Except for that blasted name and number.

  For the first time since late autumn, he had the alcove window in front of his desk open a crack. In midsummer the breeze that floated in would have felt cool. In mid-March it felt blissfully warm. Carried on it were the sounds of the traffic and pedestrians five stories below on busy Beacon Street. Bostonians loved the first taste of spring. Red buds had sprouted on the still leafless trees across the street in the Public Garden, an impressive remnant of Victorian Boston with its meandering walkways, wrought-iron fences, labeled trees, fountains, lagoons, monuments and flower beds.

  Chris paid dearly for his view of it. Even the last of the blackened snow of winter had melted, revealing expanses of muddy, brownish green, pounded-down grass on Boston Common and in the adjoining Public Garden. The gutters and sidewalks were gritty with the sand and salt needed so desperately just a few short weeks ago but now useless, dirty looking. But Chris hadn’t packed away his parka. There’d be another storm. There always was one more, just when one couldn’t stand the thought of snow.

  He hadn’t even an inkling of spring fever and ignored the temptations of the breeze and the view as he contemplated his ceiling. There was coffee splattered on the otherwise sparkling white plaster, from the time he’d gotten so irritated over a column he was working on that he’d just swept everything off his desk, except the computer and the typewriter—and only because one cost too much to replace, and the other was impossible to replace. Four coffee mugs had gone flying, two half-filled. He assumed one of these days he’d get around to painting over the stains. But not today.

  Today—right now—he had to remember where he’d jotted down that woman’s name and number. They’d both sounded so efficient, he recalled. A memorable name and a memorable number. Only, curse his soul, he couldn’t remember them.

  He squinted his dark gray eyes, thinking. One had to be methodical about this sort of thing. Now when had he first decided this woman was column material? Of course. The day before over lunch. His friend William, an advertising whiz, had told him there were such creatures as professional organizers. Apparently one had gotten hold of William’s mind and office, and neither one had been the same since. “Straightened everything out,” William had said, incomprehensibly pleased. ‘‘Now I don’t waste time looking for things.”

  Chris had contended, and still did, that wasted time was a precious gift not to be messed with by outsiders. He didn’t want his mind or his office messed with, either, certainly not by someone called a “professional organizer.” William hadn’t agreed. He maintained that knowing where things were and having an “individually designed organizational system”—Chris remembered those exact words—had eliminated frustration and increased his productivity.

  “Really, Chris,” he’d said, “doesn’t it drive you crazy when you can’t find something?”

  It did. It was driving him crazy right now. But if he eliminated frustration in his life, things wouldn’t bug him so much. If things didn’t bug him, he’d lose his edge. If he lost his edge, he’d lose his audience, and if it was one thing a nationally syndicated columnist needed, it was an audience. Chris liked being irritable. He needed to be irritable. He was known as Boston’s wittiest, nastiest columnist, and it was a reputation he intended to keep.

  Where in hell was that number?

  William hadn’t had one of the woman’s business cards. Chris recalled that much. But his friend had written his savior’s name and number in an efficient-looking notebook she’d helped him set up. “I couldn’t live without this thing,” William had admitted. Of course, that was exactly Chris’s point. He’d hate to think his survival depended on his keeping track of a notebook—not to mention remembering to use it.

  He crossed his ankles and felt another gust of warmish air. So William had given him the information over lunch. Chris must have jotted it down right there at the table. Where had they been? Newbury Street. One of those healthy, chichi places that served just about everything raw. William’s choice, since he’d paid. Chris had choked down a salad of unidentifiable vegetables—he’d hoped they were vegetables. Afterward he’d debated stirring up a round of boos and hisses by lighting a cigarette, just to be ornery. He hadn’t smoked for two years. William had quit as well, organized right out of his pack-a-day habit.

  “Matches!”

  Chris swung his feet onto the floor and shot out of his chair and over to the sport coat he’d flung on the back of his couch. He checked all the pockets but, except for a couple of movie ticket stubs, a handful of change and a circular some persistent soul had handed him on the street, came up empty-handed.

  No matches.

  He swore, rubbing his chin. He hadn’t shaved yet today, although it was midafternoon, but some of his women friends told him a two-day growth of beard looked sexy. He wasn’t a tall man, and his lean, fit body was a result of no elevator in his building and a loathing of cabs, buses and subways rather than any organized exercise plan. His hair was dark, not just tousled looking but actually tousled, and with his straight mouth and sharp features he often looked more irritated than he was. In his profession he considered that an asset. And it hadn’t hurt him any with women, either.

  Now that he’d given the matter more thought, he could distinctly remember, jotting down the name and number of William’s organizer on the inside flap of one of the restaurant’s fancy books of matches. And he’d stuffed the matches in his pocket. Dammit, he remembered doing it!

  Of course.

  Rain. It was March in Boston, and if today was sunny and warm, yesterday had been drizzly and cold.

  Whistling victoriously, Chris ambled down to the bathroom, where he’d hung his floppy oilcloth raincoat to drip-dry. He fished among the numerous pockets and came up with an elegant book of matches. The name of the restaurant was embossed in a neat script on the outside, and on the inside in his unmistakable scrawl was the name Page B. Harrington and her Boston telephone number.

  An orderly and intrepid woman was this Page Harrington, no doubt. With a name like that, what else could she be? Why not organize people for a living?

  It sounded crazy to him. What a scam.

  He opened the
book of matches and set it next to his telephone. This was going to be fun. He couldn’t hold back a wolfish grin as he dialed Ms. Page B.’s number.

  If all went well, she’d irritate the hell out of him.

  * * *

  At precisely 4:15, as planned, Page Harrington returned to her office in her modern condominium in the Four Seasons Hotel on the Tremont Street side of the Public Garden, parallel to Beacon Street. She had walked along Charles Street from the subway station and resisted the temptation to linger in front of shop windows brimming with pots of spring flowers. The daffodils she found the most enticing, and she’d felt her purposeful gait slacken as she’d spotted their lively yellow blossoms among the tulips and hyacinths in a flower shop. But even as perennials went, daffodils were impractical. She’d no sooner set them on her dining room table than they’d wilt. They were money— and time—wasted.

  As it was, all her looking around and dreaming had meant she’d had to hustle through the Garden to make her condo by 4:15. There was just something about that first gust of warm spring air, and whatever it was— spring fever, a certain restlessness of spirit—Page was no more impervious to it than the rest of Boston.

  She just wasn’t one to give in to dangerous impulses.

  She hung up her coat in the hall closet, slipped off her boots and padded in her stocking feet across the warm, neutral carpet. She was a trim woman of average height, and her proportions allowed her to fit into designer clothes without having to resort to expensive alterations. Her short reddish brown hair did exactly what she wanted it to, with virtually no fuss, because she had regular appointments to have it cut at one of the top salons on Newbury Street. Her eyes were a vibrant turquoise, although severely myopic, but she wore contact lenses. Her mouth was full and generous, which helped her not to look quite so appalled when she had to face a particularly disorganized client. She considered her eyes and her mouth her best features and applied cosmetics, using a light hand, to draw attention to them.

  Her office maximized use of all available space and was done in pale neutrals, with accents of orchid—serious, but not too serious. Expertly arranged for streamlined efficiency, her desk faced a wall to minimize the glare of sunlight on her computer screen. The window was reserved for a small, attractive but seldom used sitting area. Most of the time she went to her clients.

  It was nice to come home to order.

  As she dropped into her expensive leather chair, she reached for the button on her answering machine to play back her messages. But she stopped midway. There it was again. Something didn’t feel quite right, and she couldn’t pinpoint what it was. She felt…uncertain. With no windows open she couldn’t blame the warm air. The view? She wasn’t looking at the view, although it was a magnificent one of the Garden and Beacon Hill. The sunlight, then. It had to be that. The past few days had been so gloomy. She had to be overreacting to the pleasant weather.

  She went over and drew her shades, then sat back at her desk. That was better. She had work to do and couldn’t be bothered with odd, indescribable feelings. But as she reached for her answering machine, there it was again. This time she scoffed and got on with her job.

  She always checked her messages immediately upon returning to her office. That way she could make calls before five, if necessary, and not have to wait until morning. She hated waiting, hated to keep her callers waiting.

  While she was out, she’d had seven calls. Six left their names, numbers, times called and brief messages, as she’d requested in her taped answer.

  One did nothing of the kind.

  Frowning, Page rewound the tape and listened once more to the deep, bored voice. “Chris Battle here. Call me when you get a chance— Nah, the hell with it. I’ll catch you later.”

  Normally she would simply have erased such a message and not wasted time trying to figure out what it could be about. But something about the voice tapped into her inexplicable restlessness. And something about the name was familiar. Chris Battle. Did she know him? Nothing specific came to mind, but she acknowledged a series of negative vibrations as she played the message back one more time. Had she had a run-in with a Chris Battle at some point?

  No, she thought, almost crying out now that she had it, but other people had had run-ins with Chris Battle—lots of them. He wrote a biweekly column for the Boston Register that was syndicated nationally. He was known for a cutting wit and a nasty sense of humor. From what Page had heard around town, he’d been divorced a couple of times and was one of those sexy scoundrels women fell for and later regretted having done so. She, of course, had her life under too much control for such self-defeating nonsense.

  She read Chris Battle during her second cup of coffee and by seven-thirty had tossed him into the recycling pile.

  But what could he possibly want with her? Well, whatever it was, she couldn’t call him and ask since he hadn’t left his number. If he wanted her badly enough, he’d call back.

  A sudden shiver ran up her spine and caused her to straighten in her chair. Wanted her badly enough. A more matter-of-fact phrasing was in order! Yet her mind didn’t ordinarily run toward double entendres. Why now?

  “Quit dillydallying,” she told herself sharply, and got back to work.

  She finished at 6:30 and met friends for dinner at Faneuil Hall Marketplace, an area of shops and restaurants in restored waterfront market buildings. Just to spite herself, Page indulged in a pot of daffodils. They’d be dead in a matter of days, but the fifteen dollars would be well spent if they helped settle her down. But as she walked back to the hotel, she did things like look up at the stars and make a point of breathing in the fresh, incipient spring air and avoiding cracks in the sidewalk as she had as a child in games of step on a crack, break your mother’s back.

  Something definitely wasn’t quite right in her highly organized world.

  She watered her flowers and set them on a pottery plate in the middle of the contemporary off-white lacquer table in her dining room. They looked so beautiful. She sighed, feeling so full inside, and her eyes filled with tears. Her eyes. And over a pot of daffodils. Imagine, she thought.

  Within five minutes the phone rang. She got it in the kitchen.

  “You are organized, aren’t you? Picked up on the second ring.”

  She recognized Chris Battle’s voice instantly—not a good sign—and in the next instant decided not to tell him so. She wasn’t one to complicate things. “Who is this?” she asked coolly, in no mood for games.

  “Chris Battle. I called earlier.”

  “Yes, of course. What can I do for you?”

  ‘‘Organize me.”

  She didn’t like the way he said it. Not at all. Many of her clients considered themselves disorganized beyond hope. With some it was even a point of pride. Am I in the worst mess you’ve seen yet, Ms. Harrington? She’d heard such queries a thousand times. People enjoyed feeling they were a challenge.

  But this was different. There was a blatant note of challenge in his tone, to be sure, but also an undertone of something else—exactly what she couldn’t quite put her finger on. Cynicism, perhaps, but that seemed too strong even for him, she thought, too obvious.

  Amusement. That was it. Chris Battle wasn’t desperate, as some clients were when they reached the point of having to call a professional organizer. Nor was he on any campaign of self-improvement for solid business or personal reasons. Nothing in his tone suggested he considered what she did important or justifiable. Apparently he thought the whole idea of getting organized a hoot. Yet he’d called, hadn’t he?

  “I see,” she said, distant and businesslike. “If you give me your number, I’ll call you back during office hours and we can talk.”

  “You mean you don’t work all the time?”

  He didn’t seem to be putting a lot of effort into concealing his amusement, but Page tried not to take personal offense. From what she gathered, nothing was spared an attack from Chris Battle’s irreverent wit. He went after everyone and
everything, from the president of the United States to, in a recent column, yuppies who took their babies to parties that used to be reserved for adults.

  But Page had her own standards of professional conduct to maintain. Although she was tempted, telling him to go to blazes would only reduce her to his level. That, of course, was precisely what he was trying to make happen, although why mystified her.

  “No, as a matter of fact, I keep normal business hours,” she told him. “Evenings are reserved for my spontaneous time.”

  “You even have when to be spontaneous organized into your schedule?” He laughed, a rich, sexy laugh that went with his rich, sexy voice. “Lady, I can’t wait to see what happens when you get hold of my life. Call me anytime tomorrow. I may or may not be in.”

  “Do you have an answering machine?”

  “I used to. Threw it out.”

  Why wasn’t she surprised? Not at all sure she should, she took down his number. She had to be out of her mind. Spring fever. It had to be. Years of experience instructed her in no uncertain terms to tell Chris Battle to find himself another organizing consultant. She didn’t have to tell him a thing: didn’t have to tell him she didn’t like his tone, didn’t have to tell him she didn’t like people calling her up like this at night and making fun of her, didn’t have to tell him she did like his laugh—too much, in her opinion.

  After the daffodils she didn’t trust herself. But if the man wanted her to help him get organized, how could she rightly refuse?

  “Look,” he said as she was about to hang up, his number neatly printed on line two of her “calls to make” list for tomorrow. “Forget calling. I already know I want to hire you. Why don’t you just come by tomorrow, say around ten?”