Finding Home (21 page)

That, of course, was all it took to send her brain shooting back like a laser beam to the image she was trying hard to avoid.

Why should she care what Natalie was doing or who she was with? It made no sense.
She’s not mine, I’m not hers, I don’t want
to be hers, she doesn’t want to be mine, and those are all good
things because we’re too different to ever be together anyway
.

She is so utterly
not
my type, it isn’t even funny.

To help her argument, she began to tick off all the reasons they shouldn’t be together, even though neither of them wanted to so it didn’t matter anyway.

“She works in a coffee shop.” She said it aloud. With disdain.

And then felt terrible that she’d done so. After all, there was the bookkeeping. Natalie was going to take classes. She was a math teacher. She had a college education.

So what if she works in a coffee shop? What if that makes
her happy?

“She’s a kid, for Christ’s sake.”

She’s not a kid. She’s thirty-one. Maybe she seems like a kid
to you because you’re old for your age.

“I am not.”

Getting annoyed with the arguments and simultaneously trying to Þ gure out exactly whom she was arguing with and whether or not she could be considered certiÞ able, she spat,

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“She stole my dog, damn it.” Bentley cocked his head like he understood. And disagreed.

She
rescued
your dog. There’s a difference.

“This is fucking ridiculous.” Snatching a Diet Pepsi out of the fridge, she returned to the living room, Bentley following her and keeping a close eye on her. Thumbing the Play button, she tried to concentrate on the Þ lm, but in the back of her mind, two Þ gures continued to roll and tumble in the conÞ nes of a sleeping bag, their friendly giggles turning to groans of passion.

Sarah turned up the volume on the TV.

v

A torrential downpour hit on Tuesday, large blasts of water banging loudly against Sarah’s ofÞ ce windows as if somebody was hurling them. The sky was nearly black and angry thunder rumbled through the clouds, shaking the building like an earthquake.

The loud crashing outside her windows didn’t distract Sarah in the least. She worked diligently, head bent over her desk like a high schooler taking a test, assessing the Þ gures on the paper before her. The voice that interrupted her, however, made her jump.

“How was your weekend?”

Sarah looked up as Patti Schmidt fell into one of the chairs in front of the desk and grinned. Patti’s face was open and the question genuine, but Sarah wasn’t in any kind of shape to deal with small talk. She’d slept horribly the night before and the inside of her head felt every bit as dark and ominous as the sky outside. She was in no mood and tried hard to make that point with her eyes.

Patti surprised her by Þ nally seeming to sense her serious state of mind. Rather than dive into details about her weekend or try to pry those about Sarah’s out of her, she simply held out a Þ le

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folder and asked in an uncertain voice, “Can you take a look at this sheet for last month? I’m not sure I did it right.”

“Sure.” Sarah took the forms and scanned them as Patti nervously Þ ddled with a button on her sweater. She didn’t really want Patti hanging out in her ofÞ ce today, but Þ gured it wouldn’t take her long to Þ nish up and give her approval. The admin had actually done a good job and Sarah told her so as she read.

At that moment, the phone rang.

Oh, good,
Sarah thought, expecting Patti to go out to her desk and answer it.

Patti furrowed her brows, apparently concentrating on a spot she’d discovered on her sweater, and didn’t look up.

The phone rang again.

Knowing better than to scold the poor girl at that moment because in her current mood she’d come down on her like a hailstorm, Sarah instead snatched up the handset. “Sarah Buchanan,” she barked.

“Sarah?” The voice on the other end of the phone was uncertain. “Um, hi, it’s Natalie.”

At the recognition of Natalie’s voice, every muscle in Sarah’s body relaxed, as if an enormous sigh of relief was released from her lungs. “Hi,” she said softly.

“Everything okay?” Natalie asked. “You sound stressed.”

“No more so than usual.” Sarah threw a look in Patti’s direction. Patti was working feverishly on her sweater, picking at the spot with her Þ ngernail. Sarah spun her chair so her back was to her. “You home?”

“Yup. I just wanted to let you know that and…to ask if I could see Bentley. I missed him.”

The tenderness in Natalie’s voice made Sarah smile. “Of course you can. You know where to Þ nd him. As a matter of fact, I think I’m going to end up here late tonight. Why don’t you just take him and I’ll get him later in the week? Okay?”

“You work too much.” Her smile was apparent in her tone, but there was still an etching of worry.

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“I know. How was camping?” Sarah didn’t want to talk about herself. She wanted to hear more of Natalie’s calming voice.

“Not bad. We had fun. It got a little chillier than I like, but what can you do?”

“Snuggle up in your sleeping bag, I guess,” Sarah offered as a solution, not necessarily liking it.

Natalie chuckled. “That’s what I did.”

“It could have been worse. You could be camping in this right now.” She gestured toward her darkened windows with her eyes, as if Natalie could see to what she was referring. As if on cue, a rumble of thunder rattled the window panes.

“Oh, no,” Natalie said with a laugh. “I draw the line at camping in a monsoon.”

“Smart girl.” The sound of Sarah’s second line ringing distracted her for a moment.

“I’ll let you go,” Natalie said, obviously hearing it in the background. “Call me when you’re ready to make the doggie exchange.”

“I will. Be careful driving in this stuff, okay?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Bye, Natalie.” Sarah hung up the phone.

“Who’s Natalie?” The innocence of Patti’s question took her by surprise.

“A friend.”

“Oh.” Patti nodded, the twinkle in her eyes saying she thought differently. “She’s called here before for you. She seems really nice.”

“She is.”

Before Patti could comment further, the phone rang again.

At the same time, Regina Danvers appeared in the doorway of her ofÞ ce.

Lowering her voice to a whisper, Sarah jerked her head in the direction of Patti’s desk and told her, “You need to go answer that.”

“Oh!” Patti stood, an expression of shock on her face as if she

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just realized her duties at that very moment. “Oh, my God. I’m so sorry.” Sarah half expected her to slap herself on the forehead.

“I’m sorry, Sarah. I’m on it. I’m so on it.” She sidled through the doorway, unable to meet Regina’s eyes, and practically ß ew to her own desk. When the ringing of the phone had stopped, Regina shut the ofÞ ce door behind her and took the seat Patti had vacated.

“I swear to God, if her uncle wasn’t the founder of this damn company, I’d throw her out on her ass so fast it would make her head spin.”

Sarah gave a small smile, but felt oddly protective of Patti.

“Nah, she’s okay. She’s a good kid and she tries hard. She did a great job on last month’s reports.” Sarah waved the folder she still had in the air as proof. “She’s got potential.”

“You just have to mine it.”

Chuckling, Sarah agreed. “Exactly.”

“I hope you have a damn good pickaxe, then.”

“As a matter of fact, I do.” Sarah made a mental note to set up some time off hours with Patti to start pushing her a bit harder.

She didn’t want Regina going over her head, thinking she was doing Sarah a favor by reassigning Patti. The woman had grown on her and Sarah wanted to keep her around.

Regina studied her as if trying to Þ gure out a puzzle. “In the meantime, I have something that just may take your mind off that subject for a while.”

Sarah narrowed her eyes at Regina’s cryptic tone. “Is that so?”

“Curious?”

“Thoroughly.”

“I thought you might be.” She crossed her legs and folded her hands over her knee. “We need a manager who knows what she’s doing to head up the New Zealand branch.”

Sarah tilted her head, not fully comprehending.

“On a permanent basis,” Regina clariÞ ed. “I’ve been authorized to offer the position to you Þ rst.”

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“The position,” Sarah said dumbly.

“Managing director of the New Zealand branch.”

“In New Zealand.”

“Yes, that’s how it would work.” Regina’s smile said she was amused.

“Permanently.”

“Yes.”

“Wow.”

Regina waited while Sarah processed the information.

“That’s a huge move.”

“It is. There would be a signiÞ cant bump in salary. And obviously, the company would cover your moving expenses to Auckland, help get you set up over there, all that good stuff.”

“Wow,” Sarah said again, not sure she was registering things completely.

“Look, Sarah.” Regina sat forward on the chair and leaned her forearms on the edge of Sarah’s desk. “Certainly nobody expects you to make a snap decision. This will take a lot of thinking on your part. And you’re not in any jeopardy if you turn it down. I know you have family here and this isn’t something you’d jump into without consulting them. It’s just that you did such a terriÞ c job while you were over there in the spring, and you seemed to really enjoy the area during your stay. It’s only fair that you have Þ rst dibs on the position.” She sat back and added, “It would be one hell of a promotion, that’s for sure.”

Sarah could only nod slowly, feeling as if her brain was having trouble absorbing the information Regina had just given her.

Seeming to understand, Regina changed subjects. “So, what do you think of the campaign for a new marketing Þ rm? Any favorites?”

Sarah’s eyes snapped to Regina’s, guilt ß ooding her as she wondered if her supervisor had any idea of her unethical dalliances. “Oh. Huh. I can’t say I’ve given it a lot of thought.

I’m sorry. I’ve been so busy.” She made a feeble sweep of her

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desk with an arm and hoped she sounded less like she was full of shit than she thought she did.

“I liked the blond woman—Kennedy, was it? She seemed to know her stuff.”

“Yeah, she was deÞ nitely good,” Sarah agreed, thinking shamefully,
I am going straight to hell.

Regina stood, announcing her departure. “Take some time, think about what I said, and let me know where you stand, all right?”

“Okay. Thanks.”

At the doorway, she turned back and touched the back of her own neck with her Þ ngers. “I like the new hair. It suits you.” With a wink, she was gone.

Sarah tucked some of her “new hair” behind her ear in a self-conscious motion and tried to return her focus to the pages of numbers spread out on her desk, but her thoughts were still stuck in the previous conversation.

Managing director of the Auckland, New Zealand branch.

Permanently.

The thought wasn’t altogether unpleasant.

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CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Indian summer.

That’s what they always called this kind of weather when Natalie was small. At this time of year, it really should have been starting to cool down, show signs of the impending autumn and winter. But Saturday afternoon was gorgeous—low sixties; brilliant blue skies with puffy, cotton ball–like clouds ß oating aimlessly through them; bright sunshine that was warming, but not uncomfortably so; the smell of freshly mowed grass combined with newly fallen leaves to create the very distinct scent of September in upstate New York. Natalie loved everything about it, and she inhaled deeply as she strolled through the park with Bentley.

When she approached their usual clearing, her steps faltered slightly and an uncontrollable smile spread across her face. There, about twenty-Þ ve yards away, a blanket was spread out on the warm grass in the sun. Sarah was kneeling on it as she emptied a large picnic basket. Natalie tried not to stare at the pleasing shape of her behind cradled in soft-looking denim. It always amazed her to see the difference between Sarah the business executive and Sarah the casual woman. She wondered if Sarah herself was aware of the dichotomy. During the workday, she was so precise and tidy, so put-together with everything as neat as a pin. Today, in addition to the perfectly Þ tting jeans, she wore a simple, white

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button-up shirt and left it untucked. She looked relaxed and comfortable and—Natalie had to admit it—damn sexy. Andrea was right on the money with her description of Sarah as “hot.”

Bentley pulled at his leash, having also spotted Sarah, jerking Natalie back from her staring. She unclipped him and let him go, and he ran straight to the blanket, his butt wiggling like crazy.

Sarah made a sound of surprise when he slipped under her arm and then hugged him as she looked up and grinned at Natalie’s approach.

“Hi there,” she said happily, her eyes crinkling in the corners.

“Hi yourself.” Natalie was surprised and a little confused by how happy she was to see Sarah, the woman whom, barely three months ago, she’d feared and distrusted. “What’s all this?”

She gestured to the blanket, which now held several small plastic bowls, a tray with two sandwiches, and a bag of tortilla chips. Still inside the wicker picnic basket, a bottle of wine peeked out.

Sarah kissed the top of Bentley’s head and scratched behind his ears as he continued to shed love all over her, along with a lot of fur. “It’s such a beautiful day. I thought a picnic was in order.

I hope you don’t mind.”