The Blind Date

by Alice Ward

  All those little glass bottles and drinkware and silverware wound up being weirdly heavy. I hadn’t thought of that during my shopping spree, but when I pulled the strap of the bag up, it dug into my shoulder. I had to limp my way the three blocks to the subway and then dragged it to the hospital, where my mother’s offices were.

  When I got off the elevator, there were only a few lights on the floor, one belonging to my mother’s office. I called to her before I went in, and when I entered, she looked up at me confused, almost as if I’d never called her.

  She pulled off her reading glasses. “Oh, you’re here.”

  I didn’t know why, but I heard the disappointment in her voice.

  I put the picnic kit on her desk with an excited flourish. “Hi.”

  She pursed her lips. “That’s all very lovely, honey, but could you move that?” She pointed at the papers on her blotter. “My desk is for work, and as you can see, I have a lot of it.”

  “Sorry. Sorry,” I said quickly, grabbing it and moving it to the floor. “I got lots of goodies. Take a break.”

  I pulled out the crusty loaf of bread, expecting an ooh or an aah. Okay, not really expecting that, but I wanted some appreciation or at least the acknowledgment that I’d spent the money and time.

  She frowned.

  More nervous now, I pulled out the roasted peppers and tomatoes and cheese, careful not to heap them on her desk where she was working. She looked at everything, still not saying a word.

  I cleared my throat. “I brought plates and silverware too.”

  I smiled. So that meant, time to put your stuff away for ten minutes so that we could share a civil meal together. But she didn’t. She lifted a file and continued to look at it.

  “Don’t you want to eat?”

  She dropped the top of the file and sighed like I was putting her out. “Fine.”

  She stood up and cleared a small table in the corner of the room. I laid everything out there, and she sat down, watching me. “I thought you didn’t eat cheese.”

  “Yes, I know. But it’s for you.”

  “I’m not much for mozzarella.”

  She begrudgingly took a slice of bread, a few peppers, and a sprig of grapes. When she’d selected her food, she sat down and tented her fingers under her chin. “All right. Tell me.”

  I’d been trying to spread the peppers on the bread. “Tell you what?”

  “You don’t often surprise me with lunch like this. You have to be up to something.”

  I sighed. Of course I didn’t surprise her, because whenever I tried to do anything with her, she was always too busy. She was the doctor who was so married to her work that her patients loved and respected her beyond all measure. I clearly remembered my seventh birthday party when she walked out on cake because she’d gotten an emergency call. My father always just let her. I remembered growing up thinking she loved her patients more than she loved me.

  “I just wish we would spend more time together,” I said, which was true. “And I thought you might want to know that I presented at the open forum last week.”

  She raised an elegant eyebrow. “Did you now?” I’d have loved a pat on the back or even a half-hearted good for you. I didn’t get it. “And what were the results?”

  “I think the audience was receptive to my message, overall,” I said. Even though Mr. Zachary Vaughn made me eat one of his devil cakes. “Ella Greer, who directed it, really seemed to think it made a difference.”

  “Hmm,” she said.

  “And so I’m happy with it, overall. And now I’m going to be presenting to one of the school lunch suppliers to see if there’s any way we can get them to modify some of their recipes and replace ingredients with more healthful ones.”

  “Oh. Which one?”

  “Vaughn Industries. Their headquarters is right here in down—”

  “I know them. They have a factory in White Plains too. They make those awful snack cakes that taste like pure sugar.”

  “Yes. Right.”

  “That’s an uphill battle. That company has been doing things their own way, forever. I doubt God himself could get them to change their recipes.”

  I lifted my chin. “Well, I won’t know until I try.”

  She took a dainty bite of her bread, but then her eyes trailed back to her files. “I suppose. Seems like a waste of time to me.”

  The conversation lagged after that. I could tell my mother had other things on her mind. “You’ve been taking those pills?”

  I nodded, deflecting since I’d only taken those pills straight to the garbage. “How was Hamilton?”

  “Fine.” She lifted a shoulder. “Your father seemed to enjoy it.”

  That’s right. Clearly, my mother doesn’t enjoy anything. Especially lunch with her own daughter.

  I sighed. When my mother wasn’t in the mood for conversation, it was easier to pry teeth from her head. I’d have had a more lively conversation with a wall. And it was clear from the way she downed her food that she wasn’t feeling lunch. I knew there were only moments before she ushered me out.

  Since I couldn’t count on the subject to come up in conversation, I needed to cut to the chase of why I’d come.

  “But you’re right. I…” I took a deep breath. “I met someone.”

  For once, that piqued her interest. She snapped her eyes to mine. “You did? And who is he?”

  “His name is Zachary. But I don’t know. I went out with him, and he was everything I wanted in a date. But then I found out something, and where normally it would’ve been a deal breaker, with him, I can’t seem to say no. He can be an arrogant jerk sometimes, and then…”

  I stopped. I wasn’t used to pouring out my man troubles. I sounded like I was all of twelve. My mother must have thought so too because she’d begun tugging on her collar and gazing at one of her patient charts across the room.

  “And also, I’m pregnant,” I added. “I don’t think it’s human.”

  “All right,” she said distractedly, finishing up her meager piece of bread.

  “They say it has tentacles,” I murmured, raising an eyebrow at her.

  God, it’d taken me all morning and most of my spare money for the week to prepare the feast, and she’d eaten in a minute. “You know, I have a patient waiting for a call from me on the results of some important tests.”

  I stared at her. Seriously?

  She stood and started closing up the jars and piling everything back in the bag. “I’m sorry,” she said. “But I really can’t let this wait much longer.”

  I just sat there, watching her, as something ignited inside me. I crossed my arms. “Sure, why worry about your family when you have your patients?”

  She’d packed everything up and was now closing the zipper. I could almost already feel the imprint of her shoe on my ass, shoving me out the door. “Oh, stop, Juliana. I don’t have time for this.”

  “Exactly,” I muttered, pushing away from the table. “You never had time for me.”

  She wasn’t even looking at me. “Don’t be silly, Juliana. I have important matters to attend to, and I really don’t need this right now.”

  “You don’t need this right now? You never had time for this, ever. What this is, for your information, is called being a parent,” I snapped.

  I didn’t know what had gotten into me. I’d always just taken the rejection. I’d sat back, defenseless, all my life, just as I’d done with Colton, with the kids who made fun of me in school, with everyone.

  But maybe fighting against Zachary at the open forum had given me courage. Maybe I didn’t want to stay silent anymore.

  My mother opened her mouth to say more, but I held out a hand. “No. Don’t. I’ve wanted to tell you this for a long time. If I wanted to talk to a wall, I could’ve stayed home. I have four of them at my place and guess what? They don’t judge me.”

  I grabbed the picnic set off the table and stalked to the door.

  “And another thing,” I fumed, turning
around with an elaborate swing of my hair. “My skin might be dull, but there are still people who find me attractive. And smart. And…” emotion surged to my throat and I forced it down, “good enough to want me around.”

  I slammed the door open and lugged my still-full picnic kit down the hallway, stopping at the elevator, thinking she might come out and apologize.

  But she never did.

  When the doors to the elevator slid open, I stepped inside, and eyes fastened on my mother’s office door, watched as the doors closed on me.

  The anger only grew as I stalked down to the subway. What a worthless, unavailable, cold-hearted witch she was! I mean, not even to care when I told her about the forum! That was a big part of my life. And I was stupid for thinking my having a maybe-boyfriend might actually convince her I was her daughter and make her proud to be related to me.

  No. Obviously, nothing would do that.

  When I got home, I fired up my laptop and sat down at it. Through the series of terse texts, Zach and I’d arranged that I’d give a short demonstration and presentation to the R&D department on Monday. I had some ideas, which mostly involved providing statistics I’d given during my open forum, then as an added push, baking the recipes off the cards I’d developed for my clients to show them how tasty good-for-you desserts could be. I’d already contacted a healthy-eating restaurant in Queens who was going to help me with the catering.

  So I had most of the cylinders ready to fire. I just needed to push that button and kill it.

  And I was also going to wear my deadliest outfit and make Zach as completely insane as he’d made me.

  I knew Leah would approve of that.

  Once I’d finished the presentation, I went to my closet. I took out my power suit — the suit I’d only worn once, for the interview at Healthy Steps, since it was a little too formal for everyday wear. Black pencil skirt and blazer, it said I meant business, but I put a feminine, sexy lace camisole underneath. Yes.

  Then I reached to the top of my closet for my black Coach purse. As I pushed stuff around, trying to find it, an avalanche of purses and boxes that I’d stored up there started to slide at me. I tried to make a barrier, but they just kept coming, sliding at me and falling to the bottom of my closet in a heap.

  Shit.

  As I picked everything up, I grabbed onto my small date purse, and the tiny clasp on it opened.

  Out poured a treasure trove of hundred-dollar bills, fanning out onto the floor.

  I stared at the money. Hundred-dollar bills. Like, a hundred of them. Thousands of dollars. Holy… where had that come from?

  Staring at my purse, I remembered the last time I used it. It wasn’t like my “date purse” had been on many dates. Actually, it had only been on one.

  With the only person who could possibly afford to pad my purse with hundred-dollar bills. Zachary Vaughn.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Zachary

  Gavin and I had this thing in college. Whenever one of us looked like we were getting too much play from a girl, like it might have been straying into serious territory, we sounded the alarm. We called it Code Red. At that point, we would help each other do whatever we could to backtrack out of it. Usually, it involved sending in other women or lying to the Code Red to get them to leave. Whatever we could do, we did.

  By Sunday, there was no doubt about it.

  I was in a Code Red situation with Juliana.

  Not that I’d seen her much in the past week. In fact, the less I saw of her, the more I wanted to see her, and the farther into dangerous territory I tread.

  But as I rode in the limo to JFK International, I knew this would ordinarily be the point where I’d send up the SOS signal to Gavin.

  But the thought of being with other women, or lying to Juliana?

  I didn’t want to.

  I just wanted to see her again. Be inside her again.

  Tomorrow. I’d see her at the board meeting with our R&D team. We’d arranged this big thing in the downstairs event room. Actually, Juliana had done all the arranging without much help from me. I had no idea what we were in for.

  I didn’t really care. Truth be told, Vaughn Industries was well aware that our snacks could be a little healthier. But all of our efforts in the past to bring healthy snacks to the marketplace had failed miserably. Starting with the massive tanking of low-fat GoodSnacks in the early nineties, and then the tanking of carb-free Guiltless Goods later, it had proven to us that no one turned to Vaughn for healthy snacks. We were okay with that.

  But I’d had to give Juliana her chance. If it meant she wouldn’t hate me, and I’d get to see her again, I’d give her the chance.

  My father was waiting at the curb as the limo pulled up, suitcase and custom golf clubs in tow. He slid inside next to me, smiling, and even though his green eyes were covered by sunglasses, I knew they were sparkling. My father usually had pale skin, but the constant Florida sunshine on him had done wonders — he was tanned and looked healthier than I’d ever seen him. “Hey, Dad. How was your flight?”

  “Not bad,” he said, yawning. “Not bad. How’ve you been?”

  My father had just started living year-round in Florida, and though he was retired now, he still made it up to the city at least monthly for business and to see my mother. He still hadn’t been able to completely relinquish the reins of the business to me, so he’d assumed the role of Director Emeritus, which meant that he still came up to and presided over our monthly board meetings.

  I nodded. “Fine. Hot down there?”

  He shrugged. “Oh, you know. You get used to it. Still better than here.”

  My father was not an old man. Even with his shitty ticker, he still had plenty of life left in him, so I could still see him staying active with the company for the next two decades. He had a full head of silver hair and still looked young, save for an open-heart surgery scar and a little pooch in the belly, despite the fact that he was responsible for… what had Juliana called them? A food worse than heroin? The bane of her existence?

  I found myself smiling as I thought of her. How passionate she’d been. How fucking sexy.

  My father began going over the agenda of our Monday meeting, and meanwhile, my thoughts stayed on Juliana. When I realized he was talking about lunch plans, I stopped him.

  “Actually, we have a special guest presenter for lunch,” I said. “Juliana Hurley is a nutritionist who has a plan to help us, you know, make our recipes a little healthier.”

  His normally jovial mood turned sour. “What? How did that come in? I don’t want to waste my time—”

  “Dad…” I held up a hand. “I know, I know. We’ve been through it before. But I still think we should give her a chance. She presented at that forum on school lunches last week and had a lot of people on her side. We want to at least give the appearance that we want to do healthy. Right?”

  He nodded, conceding. “But I’d rather we not waste the board’s time—”

  “It’ll be worth it.” My tone was blunt. “She’s really… something.”

  My father’s face broke out into a smile as he inspected me. “Something?” He crossed his arms and laughed. “Something as in, she has a nice set?”

  “Dad.” Something told me he’d been away from my mother too long. “No. I mean, she does, but—”

  “Come on, come on,” he said. It was a funny thing about my father. When he was with my mother, he was as strict as she was. But when he was apart from her for any period of time, he became more relaxed, and this fun, bachelor side of him came out. I could almost see him as the single, fun-loving guy like me. Now that he wasn’t running the company, it was even more pronounced. “Your mother told me about the stunt you pulled at the gala. An escort? Really?”

  I shrugged as he laughed, a long, hardy belly laugh that shook the pooch of a stomach under his polo.

  “Technically, she wasn’t one, but…” I stopped. Technically she’s the nutritionist who’s presenting to us on Monday. “Forge
t it. Long story.”

  He shook his head. “You should’ve known how well that’d go over with her. You sure do like to get her riled up, don’t you?”

  I looked out the window. It wasn’t that I liked it. It was just too easy. Anything I ever found interesting or exciting, my mother usually frowned upon. “Look. I’m just trying to live my life.”

  “By inviting a girl with a nice set into the boardroom, hoping it’ll get you laid,” he said with a small smile. “Nice. Nice work.”

  “That’s not it—”

  He held up his hands as if to say he wasn’t taking offense. “Hey. I’ve been there.”

  Okay, that was partly it. “I do think she has some valid points and even if we don’t make the changes she suggests, it’ll only help our image to listen to her.”

  He ran a suspicious eye over me as I reached over and poured myself a glass of scotch. Sure, it was only eleven on Sunday morning, but I needed it.

  “And if it gets you laid, all the better,” he added.

  I looked at him. He’d definitely loosened up since retiring. I couldn’t help but laugh. “Juliana isn’t… it really isn’t like that with her. She’s different,” I admitted. “She’s funny and awkward, but… so gorgeous. She has this drive, this ambition… but she can be uptight. Really uptight about things.”

  My father stared at me, a vaguely astonished look on his face. I’d never spoken to him about women before. “Well, in case you didn’t notice, I have a little experience in the realm of uptight women.”

  I chuckled. That was the understatement of the year.

  “Mom wasn’t always so uptight, was she? She did know how to have fun once?”

  My father nodded. “Well, some things she was always uptight about, but we had fun together. Sometimes I felt like I was the only person who saw that side of her. It made me feel a little special.”

  “Yeah? When did you fall in love?”