“Hmm?” Bernice asked absentmindedly. “Oh yes, definitely a three-car garage.” She looked at Barbara. “And a pool and solarium. Spare nothing, since it’s that bastard’s money I’m spending.”
Barbara cleared her throat. “Certainly.”
“And all high-end appliances,” Noah said. “Viking range, built-in Sub-Zero refrigerator and wine cooler. I’m sure we’ll be able to find you just what you want.”
Bernice smiled. “I like this guy. Where have you been hiding him, Barbara?”
Barbara laughed. “Noah is a gem. I’m sure he’ll look out for you.”
“No question,” he said. “I’m looking forward to working with you, Bernice. Any friend of Barbara’s is a friend of mine. Now if you ladies will excuse me for a minute. I need to call a client about something.” He stood in his khakis and navy sports jacket and smiled at them as he removed his cell phone from his jacket pocket. He leaned down and whispered to Barbara: “I won’t be long. I need to check on another client, OK?”
Barbara nodded.
“You be sure to hurry back, baby,” Bernice cooed.
Barbara rolled her eyes to the ceiling as Noah walked toward the entrance. Bernice removed her compact from her purse and touched up her cocoa-brown nose.
“Are you sure about the swimming pool?” Barbara asked as she flipped through her notes. “Some people don’t want the trouble of maintaining one.”
“Who the hell said I would be maintaining it? I’ll hire someone and send the fucking bill to Bernard.”
“Of course,” Barbara said, glancing down at her notes. “So pool, solarium . . .”
“Tell me something, Barbara.”
She looked up at Bernice.
“Are you screwing him?”
Barbara frowned, not understanding. Then her eyes grew wide as it dawned on her that Bernice was talking about Noah. She nearly dropped her Montblanc fountain pen. “Goodness no, Bernice. He’s a coworker. And I’m a married woman.”
“Heh! I don’t think that would stop me. That chocolate hunk is too fine. I love locks on a young man. And I think he has the hots for me, too.”
Barbara blinked. “Bernice, please.”
“You saw the way he looked at me, didn’t you?”
Barbara was tempted to slap some sense into the silly woman. “Noah is like that with everyone. He’s very charming and he knows how to make you feel special. That’s why he’s such a good agent. He’s a schoolteacher and only sells real estate in the evenings and on weekends during the school year, yet he’s still one of our top agents. If he worked at it full-time he would be unbeatable.”
“Listen to you, girl, gushing about him.”
Barbara felt her cheeks go hot with embarrassment. “I’m only . . .”
Bernice held her hand up to silence Barbara. “You don’t have to explain to me, sister. He’s so cute, I don’t blame you. Don’t worry, he’s young enough to handle the both of us.”
Barbara bit her bottom lip. The things one had to put up with to keep a client. “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about, Bernice. There’s nothing going on between us. I would never do something like that to Bradford.”
“How very honorable of you, Barbara. I have to admit that Bradford is quite the catch. He must be near sixty but he’s still looking good. And rich and successful to boot. I bet you have to beat the women off him. Bernard is like that or at least he thinks he is.”
Now Bernice had gone too far. Barbara had limits when it came to discussing her personal relationship with Bradford, especially with nosy women she barely knew.
Mercifully, Noah reappeared, and again Bernice practically forgot that Barbara was even sitting there as she flirted shamelessly with him. Bernice turned her legs from under the table, faced him, and hiked up her skirt. At the rate she was going, Barbara half expected her to give him a lap dance at any moment.
Noah just smiled and acted like nothing was out of the ordinary. Why the hell didn’t he tell her to back off? Barbara wondered as she cleared her throat. “Can we get back to discussing the features you want in the house?”
Bernice waved her hand irritably. “Oh, Barbara, I’m sure you understand what I want. Nothing all that different from what you and Bradford have, just smaller since it’s only me. I’m really all talked out about houses now.” She smiled at Noah. “I want to relax and enjoy the company.”
“That’s fine with me, Barbara,” Noah said gently. “I’ve got a pretty good idea what she likes. And as I show her a few houses and get her likes and dislikes, I’ll have an even better idea.”
“You got the right approach, baby. Now, tell me, Noah, how do you like to spend your free time?”
Barbara settled back and took a sip of her latte. She glanced around discreetly. The way Bernice was acting was embarrassing. She had seen hookers show more restraint.
Barbara almost felt sorry for Noah. He would have to put up with this outrageous behavior for weeks if not months while Bernice shopped for a house. If a male client had flirted with Barbara like that she would have walked out on him by now. But not Noah. That was probably why he sold so many more houses than she did. He could put up with this kind of nonsense from clients. Maybe he even enjoyed it.
After coffee the three of them stood outside the restaurant in a heavy downpour, Bernice under one umbrella and Barbara under another, as Noah stood at the curb in an all-weather coat and hailed a taxi for Bernice. He walked her to the cab and held the door open as she climbed in, then he rushed back to the sidewalk and stood under the umbrella with Barbara. His coat was dripping wet as he took the umbrella handle and held the umbrella over both of them.
“That was quite an experience,” he said, shoving one hand into the pocket of his khakis.
Barbara shook her head. “I had no idea she was like that. But you handled her perfectly.”
He shrugged it off. “Don’t worry about it, ma’am. I’ve dealt with her type before. It goes with the territory.”
He called her “ma’am,” but he flirted with Bernice, she thought wryly. For some reason she felt really old at that moment. She adjusted her Hermès scarf around her neck. “I hope you’re wrong about that. I couldn’t handle a male client if he acted that way.”
“You’d better prepare yourself, Barbara. You meet all types in this business. Sometimes you have to let it wash off your back if you want to make the deal, then move on to the next one.”
Barbara looked at him doubtfully. “I couldn’t put up with behavior like that.”
“Even to sell a million-dollar house?”
“Not even to sell a five-million-dollar house.”
“You’re not as hard up as I am,” he said, only half jokingly. “Still, sometimes I think you should lighten up a bit. What do you do for fun? You know, parties, games? Something besides getting manicures and pedicures.” He smiled down at her teasingly.
“Very funny.”
“I’m just kidding, trying to get you to loosen up. But I’m going to have to give up for now. It’s nasty out here, and we need to get out of this rain. Where are you parked?”
“A few blocks that way,” she said, pointing north.
“I’ll walk you to your car.”
“Thanks,” Barbara said as they headed in that direction. “You can walk me to my car and then take the umbrella. I’ll get it from you next week when I go into the office.”
“You’re not going back into the office until next week?” he asked as he casually draped his free arm around her and rested his hand on her shoulder. The move surprised Barbara. But she supposed it made sense to walk together this way, to keep from bumping each other as they shared the umbrella.
She shook her head. “I have a meeting tomorrow with the literary committee that I’m on and some other things to take care of on Friday.” Like shopping for the party on Saturday at the new mansion in Silver Lake, she thought. She already had a stunning new Bill Blass silk chiffon gown, but it needed accessories. Probably b
etter not to mention that to Noah.
He nodded. “Busy society woman.”
Barbara rarely thought of herself that way but she understood why it looked like that to Noah.
“Now that I think about it, that idea of yours won’t work because you have to walk from your car to your house. You’ll get wet if I keep the umbrella.”
“We have a garage.”
“Right,” he said, smacking his head. “Dumb city dude. What do I know?”
She smiled. At times it felt like she and Noah were worlds apart. Then she remembered that they were worlds apart—different ages, different lifestyles. They had an agreeable working relationship and their differences were sometimes easy to forget.
“You look very pretty when your mind wanders off like that.”
Barbara blinked and glanced away. She hoped that it was dark enough that he couldn’t see that she was blushing. Noah had never said anything like that to her before, and she wondered if being around Bernice had something to do with it. He had obviously loosened up.
They walked the rest of the way in silence. When they reached Barbara’s Benz, they stopped and faced each other. She smiled. He was such a cute young man, and for a fleeting moment she wished that she was ten years younger—and single.
“There you go again,” he said.
“What?”
“That faraway look you get when your mind wanders.”
She glanced down. “Oh, that.” She laughed nervously and looked back up at him. “Well, um, thank you for walking me to my car. I’ll see you next—”
Suddenly his lips were on hers. She was surprised at how warm and soft they felt, and she was too stunned to move. Noah was kissing her in the moonlight on a crowded street in Washington, D.C., and she was letting him. Had they both lost their minds?
She jerked her head back and shoved him away. “What are you doing, Noah?”
He smiled awkwardly. “Huh. Good question.”
“I can’t believe you did that.” She wanted to smack his hand like she would a naughty schoolboy.
He shook his head as if to clear it. “I don’t know what came over me. It’s just that for a minute there in the rain and under the moonlight you looked so . . .” He shook his head again. “I don’t know. It seemed like the thing to do. Stupid, huh?”
“That’s an understatement.”
“I’m really sorry, Barbara. Look, can we pretend this never happened? I don’t want to ruin our working relationship.”
She thought for a moment. What he had done was shocking and completely out of line. But he really looked embarrassed, and she didn’t want their relationship harmed either. She needed him. “Fine. Just see that it doesn’t happen again.”
He nodded and handed the umbrella back to her. Then he pulled a Redskins cap out of his coat pocket and slipped it over his head.
“You sure you won’t take the umbrella?” she asked.
“I’ll be fine,” he said abruptly.
She hated to part with Noah under such strained terms, but there wasn’t a lot she could do about that. He obviously felt bad. He should feel bad. “OK. So, I’ll see you at the office next week.”
“It’ll probably be a few weeks, since I start vacation next week.”
“Oh. Going anyplace special?” she asked.
“Jamaica to visit some relatives.”
“I didn’t realize you had relatives in Jamaica.”
“My father is from there. He moved back after my folks divorced.”
She nodded as he lifted the wet collar to his jacket, gave her a weak smile and jogged up the sidewalk. Barbara’s heart thumped harder with every step he took away from her, and she watched until he rounded a corner and disappeared. What the hell had just happened? That was so unlike Noah.
Then she realized she was standing in a hard rain. She found her car keys and hastily unlocked and opened her car door. She pressed the button to close the umbrella but it was stuck. She pressed again and again, still no luck. “Dammit,” she muttered. “Stupid umbrella.” She was getting soaked, and her hair would be a mess.
She dropped her bag on the driver’s seat and squeezed the button on the umbrella with both hands. Still, it wouldn’t close. She stomped her foot and shook the umbrella, as if that would help. She tried once more to get the button to work and when it didn’t, she threw the umbrella on the sidewalk and hopped into the car.
She slammed the door, sat and stared at the rain as it pounded the pavement. Suddenly she found herself giggling. She covered her mouth. What a night. It had been ages since an attractive man had flirted with her, including her own husband. She had forgotten how giddy it made a woman feel.
She also felt a bit guilty. Not that Noah had kissed her but that she had liked it so much.
She shook her head to clear it. She had no reason to feel guilty. She put a stop to it before things got out of hand. Although why she would feel the slightest amount of guilt when she was married to Bradford Bentley was beyond her. He certainly had no reluctance about doing a lot more than kissing other women. Joan, Vickie, Sabrina, Jolene. And those were just the recent ones she knew about. They ranged from sluts to society women, old to young, married to single and everything in between. Sometimes there were long periods where he seemed to be faithful, and then boom. Another bimbo came along.
Early in their marriage, when Barbara realized that Bradford was never going to quit the womanizing, she made the bottle her companion. Good old Mr. Belvedere had kept her company for many lonely nights until finally she understood that all the booze was making her hurt more.
She didn’t want to leave Bradford. He was the father of her two lovely daughters and a pillar in their community. She enjoyed her lifestyle with him. A part of her still loved him.
But she didn’t want to stoop to Bradford’s level either. Just because he cheated, didn’t mean she should.
She started the car. She had done the right thing by putting a stop to that kiss. Noah was young, attractive, exciting, and for those reasons alone she had to keep him at a distance.
She was glad it would be a couple of weeks before she saw him again. She hoped that by that time, what had happened tonight would have faded in both of their memories, and their relationship could go back to the way it had been before the kiss.
JOLENE OPENED HER eyes and stared at the ceiling of her bedroom. It was a ten-foot-high ceiling, as were all the other rooms in her 6,000-square-foot dream house. She had scrimped and saved to build the house, going against Patrick’s wishes. He thought their first 4,000-square-foot house in Silver Lake had been big enough. Her determination to build her dream house had nearly wrecked their marriage.
But it hadn’t. Patrick didn’t even leave when he discovered that she was screwing the architect building the house. It wasn’t until he discovered her affair with Bradford Bentley last summer that Patrick decided he’d had enough. Bradford was his boss and a neighbor. That was too much, even for passive Patrick. So he had quit his job and left his wife.
She sat up in bed and sighed so loudly it was nearly a sob. She hated this fucking house. It seemed that all her problems had begun when she’d moved in here. And now it was being dwarfed by a monstrous mansion going up right across the street. Her damn house looked like a hut standing next to that thing. And no one had any idea who was building it. The Osbournes could be moving in across the street from her for all she knew.
Her Bose clock radio blared, piercing the silent air, and she moaned and touched her forehead. She had a splitting headache. She reached over and smacked the button to shut the radio alarm off, and that was when she noticed the empty bottle of Veuve Clicquot champagne and the crystal flute on the nightstand. Now she remembered that last night after Patrick had left she had brought a bottle up to her room and partied by herself. No wonder her fucking head hurt.
She forced herself to sit up. As much as she dreaded going in to work, she had an important business meeting at eleven o’clock. It was at times like this t
hat she despised all the rich ladies in Silver Lake like Barbara Bentley who didn’t have to work because their husbands made insane amounts of money. And here she had to work like a damn slave for the government to make ends meet. Never mind that she was a GS-15 with a staff at her command, it was still work.
She slipped into her Stuart Weitzman animal-print mules and pulled a robe around her black lace teddy. The mules were last year’s style and long overdue for updating. The sexy lingerie was a sad joke since no one was around to see her in it and no one had been for months. These days she felt about as sexy as a withering old maid.
She walked down the hallway and glanced in Juliette’s room as she passed by. Her daughter had been up and out by seven-thirty as usual that Thursday morning to catch the bus to school. Her bedroom looked like a tornado had touched down in the middle of it, with all the outfits she had decided not to wear strewn about and her bed hastily made up. Jolene had learned to do without a lot of new things so she could pay the mortgage and all her other bills, but she tried as much as possible to make sure Juliette had all the clothes and accessories that any teenage girl would want.
Normally she would have rushed in to tidy up after Juliette but she was not in the mood this morning. She needed a quick hit of coffee and a shower. Then she was going to drag herself in to the office.
She opened the front door and walked down the driveway to pick up the morning’s Washington Post. Two huge moving vans were parked across the street in front of the new house, but still no sign of the neighbors and only two days left before the big party.
She picked up the paper and glanced at the front page of the Metro section. One of the headlines was about the police lieutenant who had been found dead in his garage from a bullet wound and the wife who had been arrested and charged with his murder. Jolene scanned the article quickly. The house where the body had been found was only a few miles from Silver Lake, and Jolene couldn’t believe something like that had happened so nearby.
It seemed that the man’s wife had admitted that she had hired a hit man to kill her husband for 1 million dollars in life insurance money. The wife was a former stripper turned real estate agent, and her police officer husband made only $75,000 a year. The couple had recently declared bankruptcy and their half-million-dollar house was in foreclosure. The wife had agreed to pay the hit man $200,000 once the trigger was pulled and she had collected on the insurance policy.
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