“Right,” she had said, only she didn't feel right at all, not at all.
While Robin was sipping Chianti, Jake was concentrating on what the instructor was saying about load balances. Engineering II was not his favorite class to begin with, but it was a hell of a lot harder with Cole on the brain. When he had confronted Cole at his Mom's, the kid had sat slumped down on the couch, his spindly legs spread wide apart, glaring. “You're going to school, Cole,” Jake said. “If I have to take you myself every single day, I will.”
“When are you gonna stop acting like you're my father? You ain't my father! You don't have no say over me!” Cole instantly shot back.
“Like hell I don't have any say over you. I may not be your father, but I am your uncle, and like I told you, I'm all you've got.”
“Everyone's always telling me what I don't got,” he complained.
“Maybe what I need to do is have a visit with your school to see if something else is going on that causes you to skip class and not learn proper English,” Jake snapped.
Cole's brown eyes grew wide at that. “I don't want you to go to school!” he cried.
“All the more reason to go then,” Jake said. “If you won't go to school like you're supposed to, then I'll go down there and find out what's up.”
“I don't have to take this shit!” Cole shouted and vaulted off the couch, bounding up the stairs two at a time.
“You watch your mouth!” Mom shouted up after him. They heard the slam of his door, then Mom shook her head
at Jake. “I might as well be raising Ross all over again.”
Jake left before she could start her litany of complaints.
He was late for class, sneaking into the last seat. “T hank s for deciding to join us this evening, Mr. Manning,” the grad student instructor drawled. Jake frowned as the rest of the class turned around to have a look. Smirking, the instructor resumed his lecture, and Jake tried to concentrate. But by the end of the class, having lost most of what the instructor had said, he waited impatiently for last week's assignments to be handed out. When the instructor at last came to Jake, he shook his head, handed him a paper that had a bright red D scrawled across the top. “You're going to have to apply yourself, Mr. Manning, if you want to pass this course. There are names of students who will tutor for a fee in the library. I suggest you call one.”
Jake pushed down the desire to deck the pompous smartass, and went to find Lindy.
She had picked a table in the corner of the cafe, had spread her papers wide so no one would join her. Her face lit up when Jake approached. “I finished the assignment for Planning III,” she said happily, “so I'm all yours. I figured you didn't have much time to do the assignment, but I think between the two of us we can work through it tonight.”
He couldn't help but wince inwardly at her smile. Lindy was the kind of girl that could make a man very happy, such a nice girl that he thought he really ought to have his head examined. But the surprising and alarming truth was, he found an overbearing, stuck-up prima donna more interesting than the June Cleaver scene. He sighed, dropped his backpack, and folded his arms on top of the table. “Lindy, we really have to talk,” he said and watched the smile fade like a light from her attractive face.
Evan drove her home, barely managed a good night. Robin let herself in through the kitchen, paused there to toss her doggy bag of ravioli into the fridge (she was not the type to leave food behind when her cupboard was Sahara-desert bare), then walked through a house as empty as the inside of her.
She didn't like this feeling of emptiness. She didn't like hurting Evan, or the fact that she couldn't seem to form decent relationships. It always felt like there was some hard and high wall she was struggling to climb, but to what? God, who knew? She was too tired to think about it, thought it funny that a day of accomplishing absolutely nothing could exhaust her so. The moment her head hit the pillow, she fell into a deep sleep, interrupted only by one of those pesky dreams in which she was drowning.
When she awoke the next morning, she felt very strange, as if someone else had stopped by to inhabit her skin. The antsy feeling was so unlike her and so uncomfortable that she hurried out to the dining room to work, anxious to do something, anything, to make the feeling go away. She was
still in her Curious George pj's, engrossed in her research of bubble wrap when Jake let himself in the back door, carrying three pink flamingos and an Igloo lunch box.
“Morning,” he said stoically, put the flamingos down, and walked to the foyer. Robin gathered her robe more tightly around her, took a sip of very blah coffee, and attempted to focus on the information on her screen. But then Jake climbed up the ladder, reached high over head, and began to pry old trim from the top of the paned glass windows that graced the top of the eighteen-foot entry.
All thoughts of bubble wrap flew out of her head. Robin surreptitiously watched him over the rim of her coffee cup. As he strained to reach the trim, she could see the outline of his hips fitting snuggly in a pair of faded denim jeans, his broad muscular back beneath a very thin T-shirt, and the flash of that tattoo she was dying to see.
Okay. She had been around the world more than once, had dated more men than she could remember anymore, and rarely, rarely, had the physical presence of one man gotten under her skin like this. She was attracted to Jake Manning, big time. She continued to covertly watch him from behind the cover of her laptop, and miraculously, for the first time, she began to see past his butt to what he was actually doing. It fascinated her—he moved so smoothly as he worked, quickly and evenly, as if the dismantling of her home was the easiest thing in the world to do. She admired the way he didn't waste a moment, how everything was done with maximum efficiency.
She watched until it became apparent she was going to get nothing done again today if she kept it up, and retreated to her bedroom for a shower and a little regrouping. She dressed in a denim skirt and pale blue raw silk blouse, then slipped on some sandals, figuring since there weren't going to be any high-powered meetings on North Boulevard this afternoon, she might as well be comfortable.
When she returned to the dining room, Jake was gone again and her answering machine was blinking. She returned calls to Lucy and the account rep in the valley. She made calls to her attorney and her old college roommate, Cecilia
Simpson-Duarte, who was hosting a charity event. She even took a phone call from Lou Harvey's secretary, who called to confirm a meeting in Minot , North Dakota , the following week, which, even though it was only Minot , made Robin oddly ecstatic.
Now if only Eldagirt Wirt would call. From the looks of the LTI and Dun & Bradstreet reports, the Wirt Company was probably the best option of the two. With a groan, Robin picked up the phone, dialed the number to Wirt Supplies and Packing that she now knew by heart, and got the receptionist again. “Wirt. How may I direct your call?”
“Robin Lear calling for Eldagirt Wirt, please.”
The girl sighed wearily. “She's not in at the moment. May I leave a message?”
Okay, Eldagirt's work habits—as in never—were really beginning to annoy Robin. “Do you expect her in today?”
“Yes, I expect her in today” the girl shot back. “Girt is a very busy person, Miss Lear.”
“I am sure she is,” Robin hastily agreed, wondering just how busy a person who made bubble wrap could be. “But I've been trying to get hold of her for two days now.”
“One and a half. You've called her four times in twelve work hours.”
Well, hell, bite her head off, then. “Is there a convenient time to call?” Robin asked, trying to put the image from her mind of a woman named Eldagirt blowing up each individual bubble in the rolls of wrap she made.
“It would be better if she could call you this afternoon. She's in and out a lot with her son. Is there a number she can reach you?”
Oooh, her son. Now she got it—the woman was not committed to her job. “Why, yes, there is a number. It is the same number I have left four times now. Shall I repeat it?”
“No,” the girl said coldly. “I'll be sure and tell her you called.”
“I just bet you will,” Robin muttered as she hung up the phone. “And while you're at it, tell her to get a real name!” she added petulantly, heard a strange scraping sound, and jerked around. Jake was standing under the archway, hold-
ing a stack of drop cloths. “And may I just add for the record that I don't know how she runs that show if she's never there!” she added testily.
“Ah well, you know what it's like to be a busy executive,” Jake said as he strolled into the foyer and began to spread the drop cloths. “A long lunch, a round of golf with your client, then a meeting with the sales force to assure yourself that the business didn't get up and walk out the door while you were screwing around.”
Robin snorted at his warped perspective. “Please. When I actually have an office, I can hardly grab lunch most days because there is so much to do.” She did not add that most days, she was busy trying to set up deals that were doomed from the start.
“Yeah, well, I've worked in enough executive's houses to know it's not exactly nose to the grindstone all day, either.”
“Oh yeah?” she asked, following him into the entry.
“Like this heart doctor's garage apartment I did a few months ago. This guy's wife went to the gym every day at two. And every day at two-oh-five, he came home with his girlfriend. God's honest truth,” he added at Robin's dubious look. “And every day at three-fifteen, they scooted out of the drive just before the wife came home from the gym.”
“I don't believe you. Where was this, anyway?”
“River Oaks.”
“River Oaks?” she asked excitedly. “I grew up there!”
“I thought you said you grew up in Dallas .”
“I said that's where we started out. Then we moved to River Oaks. So who was it?”
“Marvin Hanes.”
With a shriek, Robin slapped a hand over her mouth. “Dr. Marvin Hanes? The Marvin Hanes? Dad used to play tennis with him! Oh my God] What is it with men?”
“With those men, it's a power thing,” Jake said nonchalantly, bending down to examine several cans.
“What do you mean, a power thing?” she insisted. "He's a dog!''
"Same difference. You know how dogs will… you
know… hump another dog to show who's in charge? Some guys are like that. The more women, the more powerful they feel."
Robin collapsed against the brick wall, her arms folded across her middle. “It's just so… disgusting. Why can't men be faithful?”
“Wait, wait,” Jake said on a laugh. “Don't lump us all in with the sorry lot of dogs! There are men who can be faithful.”
Oh yeah, right, like Dad. “Name one,” she challenged him.
“Me,” he said in all earnestness.
Robin blinked; he steadily returned her gaze, and funny, she desperately wanted to believe if there was any man on the face of this earth who would honor one woman, it was Jake Manning. “Don't flatter yourself,” she said caustically. “If a better deal came along, you'd dump your girlfriend in a heartbeat.”
The color seemed to drain from his face so quickly that her heart skipped a beat. “See?” she demanded sternly to hide her disquiet. “You know it's true!”
“I take it you mean Lindy. The difference is, I never committed to her. What's a better deal, anyway?”
Robin snorted. “Better! Better looking. More money.”
“So you think it all boils down to money?” he asked disdainfully. “That's more of an indictment against women, if you ask me. They look for money, power—”
“Oh, and men don't look for those things? It's just the truth, Jake. There are certain inalienable facts about life, and one of them is money talks.”
“That's really cold.”
“It's not cold,” Robin said dispassionately, “it's just the way of the world.” But Jake was now looking at her as if he pitied her somehow, and Robin felt suddenly and strangely lost. She wished she'd never started this conversation. She wished she'd never mentioned Lindy. She could feel herself flushing.
Jake looked away, squatted down by the cans again, picked one, and withdrew a screwdriver from his hip pocket
to flip open the lid. “So you know what I think about this Eldagirt Wirt?” he asked, artfully changing the subject as he grabbed a paint stick and began to stir. “I don't think she exists.”
“Ha!” Robin laughed. “Well, maybe if I'm lucky, Wirt Supplies and Packing doesn't exist, either. Maybe this is just some huge joke my dad is playing on me.”
“If it is, it's a good one, because it sure has you going,” Jake said, and then wondered aloud what Eldagirt must look like, insisting she was a little old lady with a cowskin handbag. Robin disagreed. “A bulldozer,” she said. “Army boots, flap jacket. She has to be, with a name like that.”
They were laughing, talking like old friends as he began to strip away old paint and dirt from the brick in the entry. They talked about last night's Astros game.—See your boy Moz last night? He gave up three runs in the eighth.—You can't blame the loss on him! Those fielders had huge holes in their gloves! They argued about the relative value of tofu in society.—Tofu is made by people who want your money, that's all there is to it.—Oh yeah? Why don't you just open up your veins and pump in some 40-weight? Robin explained how bubble wrap was made by pressing two sheets together then inserting the bubbles, and was bowled over to find out he already knew.—How did you know?—I'm just real smart.—Why, yes, and modest, too!
Jake seemed to like her company—Robin hoped he liked hers at as least as much as she liked his. It was comfortable between them, shooting the breeze like this, and for a moment or two, Robin could believe she had known Jake all her life. But then again, she was aware that she had never known anyone like Jake.
Jake showed her what he was doing, ushering her in front of him, telling her to look at the brick as he painted the cleaner over it. Framed by his body, Robin watched, but she was much more aware of his body so close to hers, the very titillating sensation that their bodies fit like hand and glove.