Hers By Request

by Karen Ann Dell

  “Darling, don’t ever try to be devious. You’re about as transparent as a pane of glass.” He kissed the tip of her nose. “Believe me, Chris and I have had many talks about my nightmares and, as I said before, it hasn’t helped.”

  Amanda pushed the sheet-covered furniture against one wall in the living room. The party was barely two weeks away and props and supplies were piling up. She lugged the cardboard boxes filled with tablecloths and toppers in from her car and stacked them against one wall. They’d need ironing. Folding chairs were lined up on the other side of the room and boxes of ‘slipcovers’ for them had already arrived. They’d have to be unpacked and checked for wrinkles. There’d be a lot of ironing in her future.

  She checked the two bedrooms. Each had a double bed, a chest of drawers, and a single chair. They would do nicely as changing rooms on the night of the big event. The bartenders and wait staff would all be in the uniforms she dictated. Only the three parking valets would be allowed to wear their own clothes. They had all sworn to own dark slacks and white polo shirts. She and Zoe would be working right up until the guests were due to arrive and would have to change into their own dress clothes at the last minute.

  Mrs. Wyndham wanted them on site during the entire event to deal with unexpected emergencies, but she wanted them to ‘blend in’ with the guests and be as inconspicuous as possible. That meant formal attire for both of them. Zoe had been complaining about it for weeks. They’d decided on black in case they should need them again for another affair and made a trip to Annapolis to scout the consignment shops. Luckily they managed to get two suitable second-hand gowns at reasonable prices.

  This little house on the Wyndham’s property was working out perfectly as a staging area. Amanda opened both front and back doors in the hope that she could get rid of the musty, closed-up odor with a little cross-ventilation. The windows hadn’t been opened in so long they appeared to be swollen shut. Maybe she could ask Jeff to see if he could work on that.

  Once she harangued him for his participation in Dev’s remodeling scheme—then thanked him for his help—he’d been offering his services for any odd job the party required. Zoe suspected there would be IOUs he intended to collect when all was said and done, and complained every time Amanda put another ‘Jeff job’ on their to do list. Jeff had borrowed Mr. Pennypacker’s pick-up and he and Zoe were bringing the painted urns and ivy garlands over here after the gallery closed.

  Amanda was silently congratulating herself on how well the plans were moving along when an imperious Mrs. Wyndham strolled through the open front door.

  “I see you’re making good use of my property,” she said, taking in the supplies stacked in boxes.

  “Mrs. Wyndham, how nice to see you. I didn’t know you’d be back in town this week.” Amanda smiled and started to walk over when she realized the matron’s expression was not a happy one.

  “Yes, I can see you didn’t expect me.”

  Amanda’s eyebrows shot up in surprise.

  The social maven of Blue Point Cove was dressed to the nines as usual. She glanced askance at the covered sofa as if to decide whether her Donna Karan pantsuit would suffer permanent damage by coming into contact with it. Apparently unwilling to risk it, she walked slowly through the living room toward the kitchen, murmuring to herself, “Such a long time since I’ve been in here. It seems much smaller than I remembered—” She broke off and turned back to Amanda.

  “Everything is coming along nicely for the party, Mrs. Wyndham. As you could see when you came in, we’ve had the area in front of this house cleared and leveled. The mulch will arrive next week so it will be ready for us to park cars here.” She smiled brightly to compensate for the unease she felt building in the pit of her stomach.

  “I attended an engagement party in Annapolis last week,” Mrs. Wyndham began, totally ignoring Amanda’s remarks. “The Michaelson’s daughter is marrying some lawyer fresh from Harvard.” She waved her hand, dismissing the details as unimportant. “She had a singer there. Someone from New York City. I’ve never heard of him but the guests were very impressed.” She fixed Amanda with a stare. “I want you to find a singer for my party.”

  Amanda’s stomach did a triple flip and nosedived to her feet. “Mrs. Wyndham, we never discussed having entertainment other than the band, and it’s kind of late to arrange for that now.”

  “I don’t want to hear excuses, Ms. Adams. You touted yourselves as event planners and I gave you a chance. Now I expect you to be a professional and able to deal with unexpected. Find me a singer. It doesn’t have to be Michael Bublé, just someone who knows the songs the band will be playing.”

  “Ma’am, this is terribly short notice. I doubt if I can find anyone with that kind of talent that isn’t already booked at this late date.”

  “Well, you’d better find someone. Otherwise I may have to call that other planner. See if she can be up to speed on short notice.” Mrs. Wyndham emphasized the final two words with a heavy dose of sarcasm. “Remember, my dear, in this business, like any other, the customer is always right.” She gave one last look around the room, shivered slightly, then headed out the front door. “I expect to hear from you by day after tomorrow, Ms. Adams. Please don’t disappoint me.”

  Amanda heard the smooth purr of the BMW as it left the driveway, then collapsed onto the sheeted sofa, a little dust on her jeans the least of her worries.

  Holy cow. She’d never be able to find a singer in time. Heck, she couldn’t find one if she had a month. Mrs. Wyndham was being completely unreasonable.

  Besides she couldn’t just cancel A to Z Event Planning and go with another company at the last minute.

  Could she?

  With a sinking feeling, Amanda realized she’d not put a cancellation clause into their contract. She’d never even considered the possibility. An amateur’s mistake. One that could end their business before it even got started. Visions of unpaid student loan bills danced before her eyes. She pictured a FOR SALE sign on the door of Silvercreek Gallery. Oh God. When she told her partner about this, she’d lose it. Zoe had depended on her for all the business details.

  And I’ve dropped the ball completely.

  CHAPTER 19

  Rosemary buzzed the intercom. “Captain Majewski is here, Dev.”

  Dev cursed under his breath. “Send him on back, Rosemary.”

  He saved the file he had been working on and stood up. As Chris appeared at the doorway, Dev came around his desk and went to meet him. He’d been expecting this visit.

  “How about some coffee?” he suggested as he pointed to the employee lounge.

  “Sounds good. I don’t suppose there are any of Rosemary’s muffins back there, too?”

  “You’d better ease up on the muffins, Freud. They’re starting to accumulate above your belt. Pretty soon you’ll have your very own muffin-top.”

  Dev went to the counter and poured two cups. He set one in front of Chris and waited for the interrogation.

  Never one to do the anticipated, Chris sat back and stirred sugar into the dark liquid, happy to let Dev take the conversational lead.

  “I gather you’re here to see how well Lance is making out,” Dev began.

  Let’s pretend that’s the only reason you’re here. Maybe the world will end and we won’t have to get around to my problems. “I’ll tell you right up front that I didn’t hire him as an announcer.”

  “Job placement is your bailiwick, Marconi. I just send ‘em over in the hopes they’ll fit in somewhere.” Chris took a cautious sip of the hot coffee. “You know I like to see how all of my former patients are making out.” He shot Dev a look that clearly indicated he wasn’t getting out of the cross-hairs that easily. “You seemed to be working harder than anyone else here and since Lance needed night work I thought he might give you some relief.”

  �
��Yeah, I thought of that possibility myself, but much as I wish I could split my shift with someone, Lance wouldn’t work there. He’s still too worried about flashbacks to be on the air—especially at night with no backup.”

  “So? What’s your plan, then?”

  “How do you know I have a plan?”

  “You always have a plan, Marconi. It’s one of the things that intrigues me about you. You seem to know exactly what should happen for everyone else.” He leaned across the table to get a napkin. “But you won’t plan your own life further than a week down the road.”

  “Let’s just confine our conversation to Lance,” Dev said, but he knew it was only a matter of time before he was the duck in the shooting gallery.

  “Fine. Tell me about your plan for Lance.”

  Dev saw the faint smile lurking at the corners of Chris’s mouth and chose to ignore it.

  “I think he’ll make a fine engineer. I had Mike run him through the basics. Now he’s reading some engineering handbooks and shadowing one of the other guys at night. The control booth is a much safer place for him until he’s more comfortable with us. If he wants to try for a first-class radio license, I’ll see what I can do to make it happen.”

  “Do you think he’ll go for that?”

  “He’d be a fool not to. He’s a smart guy, Chris. He’d be a college graduate if he hadn’t had to drop out to support his parents. He could make a decent living at this. Move on to a bigger city if he wanted to, once he gets a little experience under his belt.”

  “Don’t expect too much too soon, Marconi. I’m not sure he’ll ever want to go to a big city, let alone live in one. As long as you’re willing to give him time, I think he’ll work out well right here.”

  Chris got up, went to the refrigerator, then picked up the round metal tin on the top. “Mind if I have one of these?” he asked before he even opened the tin.

  “It’s your call.” Dev smirked, staring pointedly at the other man’s waistline.

  “I don’t weigh a pound more than I did ten years ago,” Chris retorted. He opened the tin.

  “True, but some of your chest muscles have moved south and disguised themselves as a paunch.”

  Dev wanted to get a rise out of Chris, who was determined to remain as fit as he had been in boot camp. There was no evidence to support Dev’s taunt. Chris’s physique was the envy of Hank and Neal, both of whom had indeed allowed their pecs to migrate toe-ward.

  “The hell you say.” But Chris sucked in his gut and put the lid back on the tin without taking a muffin. He refilled his mug and offered to do the same for Dev, who refused, so he sat back down and stirred two packets of sugar into his.

  “So, what else is new?” Chris asked casually, continuing to stir his coffee. “I see you’ve lost the glove.”

  Here we go.

  “Not completely. Just around friends, and here, where everyone’s used to me.”

  “What made you change your mind?” Shrewd eyes examined Dev over the rim of his coffee cup.

  “Jeff started it. He’s a friend of Amanda and Zoe. He got me to take it off when he was helping me with some repairs at her house. Then Amanda didn’t seem to have a problem with it, so I leave it off most of the time now.”

  “How are things going with Amanda? I noticed she wasn’t here today.”

  “Pretty well.”

  Really well, if you considered the fact that he could count on one hand the number of days he hadn’t slept at her place over the past five weeks.

  Or the fact that he could accurately locate, with his eyes closed, the scar on her left knee she got at age eight when she knelt on a piece of broken glass.

  Or that he could kiss the little mole just below her navel and know she’d squirm with delight.

  The only thing that wasn’t going really well was his reluctance to continue lying about who he really was.

  “Pretty well? Does that mean you’ve told her about being Danny’s friend—or that you haven’t?”

  “Haven’t.”

  He bristled at Chris’s disappointed expression. “Listen, I’m not telling her until after this big party she’s handling. She won’t take the news well and we have to work together that night, so I don’t want to throw a monkey wrench into the works.”

  “So you’re sleeping with her under false pretenses?”

  Dev’s mug clattered to the table as he choked on his last mouthful of coffee.

  “See, that’s the thing. We psych docs are supposed to be observant.” Chris tilted his chair back on two legs. “Did you really think I wouldn’t notice any difference in you?

  Yeah, he had. He’d tried to act normal, especially around the station where it seemed the other guys were acting strangely enough around him as it was. Thought he was doing a pretty good job, too.

  “Well, I—”

  “You haven’t rubbed your left elbow once since I’ve been here. You actually made a joke about me getting fat. A joke, Dev. When was the last time you made a joke?”

  Last night in bed with Amanda he’d joked about Spook, her black cat, being his good luck charm. Now he crossed his arms and clamped his mouth shut, too stubborn to admit Chris had him nailed.

  “I bet it was with Amanda. I bet when anyone says her name, your eyes light up like traffic signals. Just like they did a moment ago when I asked about her.”

  “Okay, okay, Freud, you got me.”

  Damned shrinks think they know everything.

  Dev stood and began to pace. “I know I shouldn’t sleep with her. Believe me, she was the one who instigated our affair, if you could call it that. I mean, I kissed her one time and we both kind of lost control. But I managed to back off before things went too far.” As in, I ran like a scared rabbit. “The next day Amanda wanted to talk about it and I expected at least a verbal slap in the face. Instead she explained that she wasn’t going to fall in love again—but she didn’t plan on being celibate forever either. She was okay with the physical attraction as long as I realized it wasn’t going any further than that. She calls it as ‘friends with benefits’.”

  He raked his hand through his hair and dropped back into the chair. “But I fell for her, Chris. And now that I love her it’s killing me to lie to her every day, but I have to wait till this party is over before I drop this on her.”

  “When is this big event?”

  “Saturday, May ninth.”

  Less than two weeks away. Ten days before his world imploded and left his heart broken and bleeding amid the ruins.

  “So, after this party, you’re going to tell her all about you and Danny?”

  Dev nodded.

  “And are you going to mention that you’re in love with her too?”

  “Hell, no. I won’t get the chance anyway. Once she knows I’m the reason Danny’s dead, she’ll drop me like the festering leper I am and run so fast in the other direction there’ll probably be a sonic boom. Besides, we’re supposed to be just friends getting together to relieve a little sexual tension. She made me promise not to fall in love with her. Telling her I love her will only be one more thing I’ve been lying to her about these past few months.”

  Chris sat silently sipping his coffee for a few minutes. “Lying tends to cause more problems than it fixes. The longer you wait, the harder it will get. Amanda might surprise you. What will you do if she doesn’t run screaming into the sunset?” He got up and took his mug over to the sink and rinsed it.

  “She’ll run,” Dev said, his certainty evident in the slump of his shoulders. “She may be civil and even try to be understanding, but in the end, she’ll go. And I won’t blame her.”

  Chris nodded, not agreeing with Dev’s opinion, but acknowledging it. “Keep me in the loop about Lance and let me know if he has any problems you can’t handle.” He wal
ked to the door.

  “Yeah, I’ll do that,” Dev said.

  “You might want to talk to Danny’s mother soon too. It may take some of the pressure off. Give you a bit of practice accepting all the blame and hate you expect to have dumped on you.” Chris shrugged. “You’re so sure you know how everyone will react, but what if you’re wrong? Apparently Amanda isn’t repelled by the sight of your damaged arm. If she’s willing to ignore a physical defect in favor of having an intimate relationship with you, there must be something in you she finds worthwhile.” He slipped around the doorway and whistled as he walked down the hall.

  Dev sat until he heard Chris say goodbye to Rosemary. You’re wrong this time, Freud. And I’ll prove it to you on May the tenth.