Farris flipped his phone over to check the screen, and after he read his text before, he popped to his feet, his face a mask of worry and shock. “Excuse me a minute.” He stumbled in his haste to make it to the door. “I’ll be right back.”
After he shot out of the meeting room, shutting the door behind him, the remaining five members shared a look between them.
“Well, what do you think that was about?” Charlie was the first to ask. “That’s the first time he left the room to take a call.”
Farris had been surprisingly open about all his dealings concerning their new overseas venture. And strangely enough, his forthrightness and enthusiasm had been contagious. Most of Tom’s co-workers were jumping into this project with both feet. Tom was still holding himself back, but he had to admit, it really did seem like things was going to work out.
“Boss Boy better not be keeping anything from us,” Pat growled.
This was the first time Tom had heard anyone call the kid that in over a month. The label sort of startled him.
“Hey, I have an idea.” Standing up, Ben leaned toward the conference phone and picked it up.
As he began to dial a few numbers, Tasha gasped as if realizing what he was doing. “Don’t worry,” she assured the others. “He won’t be able to hear us. We’ll only be able to hear him.” But she still whispered and looked slightly pale as she glanced worriedly toward the door.
Braxton’s concerned voice filled the small phone speakers about as soon as Ben pushed the right button.
“What’s wrong? Are you okay?” He paused a moment and then responded, “I’m still at work. Why aren’t you? I thought you had to go in until nine tonight.” Then he let out a breath. “You got the job? Oh, my God. That’s amazing. I knew you would but...wow. Congratulations...What?
No
, I didn’t pull any strings. I swear...Hey! All I did was give him your name. You did the rest. This was all you, babe.”
Tom glanced at Ben, thinking he’d hang up now that he knew it was a personal call and had nothing to do with Farris Industries. But Hendricks, and everyone else in the room, looked even more intrigued.
“So, he really is dating someone exclusively then,” Tasha murmured.
“I think this means we need to celebrate big. What do you say? Want to hit Paris again?”
“See.” Tasha lifted her eyebrows, looking smug.
Through the phone, Braxton Farris chuckled. “Okay, okay, fine. If you want to be a buzzkill about it, then I guess we can just order in some Chinese takeout instead. I should be done here in an hour. Hour and a half tops.”
An hour and a half?
Tom groaned, wanting to weep. Around him, his co-workers looked just as disheartened.
“You mean you’re at my place...right now?” The kid sounded shock. “Well, go ahead and go inside... Crazy woman. That’s why I gave you a key, you know. To
use
it.”
“I guess that answers the question whether he’s into women or men, at least,” Charlie murmured, grinning.
Tom rolled his eyes. If he wanted to listen to a soap opera, he’d just stay home and watch TV all day.
“It’s not weird,” Braxton murmured, his voice lowering a notch to a husky tenor. “I kind of like knowing you’re in my house without me there. It’s sorta hot. You know you’re going to go through my underwear drawer.”
Around him, his co-workers chuckled, but Tom groaned. “Christ, turn that shit off,” he ordered.
“Oh, hell no,” Tasha argued. “I want to figure out who this girl is.”
“Okay, now is definitely not the time to tease,” Braxton growled into the speakers. “Because...I don’t want to return to my meeting with a woody.”
Tom made a face, thinking now Ben would certainly shut the intercom off so they could all be saved before their punk boss’s conversation turned x-rated. But no. If anything, the four around him leaned in closer to hear more.
The morons.
“No, don’t worry about it.” Farris was saying. “You’re never an interruption. Besides, I think the guys needed a break anyway. They’re all probably thanking you right now for the reprieve.”
“Yes, thank you,” Charlie leaned forward to address the phone. Tom snorted and wiped his face, almost ashamed that these idiots were some of his closest friends.
Braxton suddenly groaned. “Oh, hell, no. You did not just say that. Damn. Okay, you know, there’s nothing we can do here tonight that we can’t do in the morning. I’ll be home in fifteen minutes. Just...stay that frisky until I get there.”
Tom could almost hear the kid’s smile through the small speakers. He sounded so jubilant it reminded him of a long ago time when he’d been dating Maxine. The thrill of getting to see her again had always filled him, knowing that when he did see her, she’d let him do things her father would disapprove of.
“See you soon,” Braxton murmured. There was a pause as if he’d hung up. Ben leaned over to take the phone off the intercom but just before he pushed the button, their boss more quietly added, “I love you.”
Tom couldn’t help it; he glanced up to see the startled expressions on his co-workers’ faces, wondering if they were thinking what he was thinking: Braxton had been too chicken to confess his feelings
before
his little girlfriend had hung up. Then it struck him; great, his friends had sucked him into the soap opera of Braxton Farris too.
“Is he still talking to her or has he hung up already?” Tasha whispered.
“I want to marry you,” Braxton went on, “and grow old with you so that when we die, we can hold hands and go together like that couple on that movie you love.”
“
The Notebook
,” Tom murmured, blinking rapidly. When his co-workers glanced at him strangely, he shrugged. “What? It’s Lenna’s favorite movie.”
“Shut the phone off,” Charlie hissed suddenly. And Ben complied a split second before Braxton breezed back into the meeting room.
“Okay,” he announced, his blue eyes glittering with life and excitement as he rubbed his hands together. “I’m sure you all have homes you’d like to go to. Let’s wrap up and get out of here for tonight.”
* * * *
Lenna made a surprise visit to her parents’ house in the suburbs. She burst through their front door, almost ripping the hinges off in her haste.
“Mom! Dad!” she yelled, exploding through the foyer and heading straight toward the living room.
Her father was struggling out of his lazy boy when she bounded into the room. Maxine hurried in from the kitchen with a dish towel in hand.
“What in the world is going on?” her mom demanded to know, looking bewildered.
“I got a job!” Lenna screamed. She was so happy, she swept Maxine off the floor when she hugged her and spun her in a circle.
“You...” Maxine’s eyes turned as round as saucers. “Oh, Lenna,” she murmured in delight. “That’s wonderful.” She returned her daughter’s hug fiercely. “When? Where?”
Setting her mom back on her feet, Lenna described her new position at ProTech. She turned expectantly toward her father. He stood and listened to what she’d be doing. When she was finished talking, he gave her such a blank stare she couldn’t tell what thoughts swam through his head.
Finally, a grin spread across his face. “That’s my girl,” he announced, proudly.
As he pulled her into a bone-crushing hug, Lenna’s pulse accelerated. Since she’d appeased her father by getting a job he could be proud of, maybe she could tell him about Braxton soon without him blowing his top. Grinning, she crossed her fingers behind her back and made her decision.
Definitely soon. As soon as she figured out a way to make sure he wouldn’t retaliate against Braxton, she would tell him.
Wearing navy blue slippers and a matching terry cloth robe, Tom stood by his bed, grumbling his nightly mantra under his breath as he tossed a load of throw pillows onto the floor.
“Why in God’s name do we need so many damn pillows we don’t even use? No man should have to—”
“I think she’s seeing someone,” his wife announced unexpectedly as she appeared in the doorway that led into their connecting bathroom, her nightgown backlit by the bright bathroom vanity lights.
Tom frowned. “Woman, what in the world are you talking about?
Who’s
seeing someone?” He aimed a pillow to land exactly on top of another he’d already pitched to the carpet. His face contorted with displeasure when he missed.
“I think
Lenna’s
seeing someone.”
Halting his pillow party, Tom turned to blink at Maxine while she smoothed lotion onto her face, dabbing gently under her eyes.
“Lenna?” he repeated. He had to shake his head to clear the befuddled idea from it. His wife thought
Lenna
was seeing someone? No way. “Where in God’s name did that idea come from?”
“I don’t know.” Maxine shrugged and turned back, disappearing into the bathroom. “It’s just a feeling.”
“Max.” He sighed, his shoulders deflating because he wasn’t sure which subject she’d bring up next. First she’d been asking him about Braxton Farris. Then she’d moved on to his daughter dating?
What a shift from one awful topic to the next. Next thing he’d know, his wife would be depressing him even more by asking how much his retirement investments had gone down this year.
“She’s not dating anyone,” he muttered. “She’d tell us if she was.”
“Maybe,” Maxine voice came back, sounding cryptic.
Tom frowned. “Now, what’s that supposed to mean? What do you know?”
“I don’t know anything, Tom. It’s just a mother’s intuition, okay?”
“Honestly, dear,” he called back on a snort. “I don’t know where you get your ideas. Lenna is not dating anyone without telling us about it. We’d
know
.”
Unless…maybe her one date with Spencer’s youngest boy, Tyler, had gone better than she’d let on. Maybe she was going to surprise them with an engagement announcement. To be honest, he wouldn’t mind her being settled and secure with a Farris…just not the damn, infuriating Farris he currently worked for.
“Did you see her tonight?” Maxine asked. “She glowed. She absolutely glowed.”
“Yeah.” He rolled his eyes, even though his mind whirled. “Because she’d just gotten a real job.” If he were his youngest daughter, he’d add
Duh
right there, but he managed to hold himself back.
“I don’t think so,” Maxine said. “She’s been acting differently for over a month now. She hasn’t been coming to Sunday suppers as much, and her reasons for not being able to make it have always been so vague. Then there’s that gleam in her eyes lately. I can’t explain it. Something’s going on with her, Tom, something besides a career.”
Maxine finally strolled fully into the room, dressed in a long nightgown. She paused and frowned at the half-cleared bed where Tom had stopped messing with the pillows and was standing there frozen with shock on his face. With her own impatient sigh, she took up his job, ridding the bed of the excess cushions.
“I think she’s in love,” she finally said, tossing the last accessory into an armchair.
Tom shook his head. “Well, I think your motherly instincts are all out of whack. She’s just happy about her new job.” He refrained from bringing up the dreaded M word. But menopause had been starting to plague his wife lately. That’s probably what this was all about.
“Maybe,” was Maxine’s demure reply as she folded back the covers. “Maybe not.”
Tom rubbed his bottom lip between his fingers. Well, damn. She seemed so sure of herself. It made him think of that nineteen-year-old Farris kid again.
Lenna Farris?
Hmm. Didn’t sound so bad.
But he despised the idea of Maxine knowing more about Lenna than he did. Their oldest had always been a daddy’s girl, and he preferred to keep it that way. If Maxine had tapped into something about Lenna he hadn’t, he’d be...well, she was wrong. That’s all there was to it.
He could be cruel and remind her he’d always been closer to Lenna than she had. He knew more about their firstborn. But Maxine looked quite lovely in her silky, brown nightgown.
He appreciated the way the material kept sliding over her body and teasing him with glimpses of soft curves. Upsetting her was the last thing he wanted to accomplish.
Reassuring himself he knew Lenna better, he agreeably murmured, “Maybe,” as he followed Maxine onto the mattress and between the sheets, not giving the Lenna-in-love idea another thought.
He flipped off his night light and reached for his wife.
* * * *
The Sunday before Lenna started her first day at ProTech, Braxton leaned against the opened door to her apartment as he watched her call her family and tell them she couldn’t make it to supper...again. Instead, the two of them went to a fancy restaurant and decided to celebrate her new job.
When they returned to her apartment afterward, they spent most of the evening sitting cross-legged on her bed, discussing the people she’d be working with the next day. Braxton fed her more information about her future co-workers than she could possibly remember. She merely watched him, nodding, as he grew animated, talking about his old position.
A small frown puckered her brow. “I still don’t see why you left,” she finally said.
Braxton paused and glanced away. “Because... my dad asked me to,” he tried to explain without explaining.
Lenna opened her mouth. He saw a “but” coming, so he quickly added, “Now, Donna Jorgensen is a real airhead. If you ask her to do something for you, don’t expect it to get done right. You’ll know her by her long, curly, red hair.”
He went on, detailing every ProTech employee he remembered, not providing Lenna the opportunity to ask him again why he’d left. He didn’t want to think about the reason he’d deserted his dream job in order to fill his father’s shoes at Farris.
To distract her, Braxton kissed her until they were both breathless.
She tugged his shirt up over his head to press her mouth frantically to his chest. “You should be ashamed, you know,” she panted while she batted his hand away from his zipper and lowered it herself.
Thinking she’d caught on to his diversionary tactic, he lifted his face, eyes wide and mouth already open to spit out an apology.