by Holly Jacobs
"Morgan, we never meant—" Thomas began.
She held up her hand. "I know. And even when I was so hurt, I think I knew that by telling me, you were saving me from more pain later on. I'm not saying I think we can have what we once had, but I do think the three of us can find something new. And maybe we could start by Sunday brunches, Gina?"
Gina's face practically disappeared beneath her smile. "I'd like that. I'd like that a lot."
"Great."
"Would you like to come in?" Thomas asked.
Morgan shook her head. "Not today, but you could ask me again sometime, okay?" She started toward the porch stairs. "I'll see you next Sunday, Gina."
"Sunday," her old friend said.
Morgan tried to decide what it was she was feeling as she walked down the sidewalk, tugging on Gilligan's lead. She felt. . .light. Lighter than she'd felt in years.
"Come on, Gilligan, let's go home."
CHAPTER ELEVEN
E.J., you know that old saying about when it rains it pours? It's definitely true. I'm feeling more than a little soggy. . . .
MORGAN HADN'T LISTENED TO the answering machine all weekend. She'd been too wrapped up on Saturday with the reception, her crashing friends and then her impromptu dinner with Conner.
Then there had been her aborted brunch this morning and her reconciliation with her friends. . .with her past.
She'd spent the afternoon going all zennish as she tried to sort out her feelings. She finally decided she felt good. Really good.
Optimistic about. . .well, everything.
And as if to prove her newfound optimistic attitude was the right one, fate sent her a sign.
She'd been so busy putting her past to rest that she'd forgotten to fret about the future, so it was Sunday night before she saw the answering machine blinking. Even then, it wasn't her anxious checking that caused her to look. It was merely that she was turning off the living room lights, getting ready to go to bed, when she noticed the light was blinking a merry beat next to the number four.
Blink.
Blink.
Blink.
Blink.
Four messages.
She was suddenly wide-awake.
Message number one. "Hi, Morgan, it's me."
She didn't need more than that to know "me" was E.J. Finally.
"Still down here. It'll be a couple more weeks until I get back. I don't know when I'll be near a phone again, but I'll call when I can. I know how you worry, so this is just to say I'm fine."
"Message number two," said the metallic voice.
"Hello. This is Ellie Marx calling for Morgan Miller. I have your résumé in front of me, and Turner, Inc. is very interested in an interview. Please call me at your earliest possible convenience at. . ."
Morgan grabbed a notepad and took down the number.
"Message number three."
"Ms. Miller, this is Jerry Johns, at Cameron and Peters here in San Diego. We'd like to fly you out as soon as possible for an interview. . . ."
She scribbled down more information.
"Message number four."
"Morgan. . .it's me. I miss—"
Marvin. She hit Delete before his message ended. Marvin was well and truly past tense, even if he didn't seem to get it.
She concentrated on the other messages. E.J. was fine and she had job possibilities.
Two, to be exact.
Not that she was counting or anything.
Heck yeah, she was counting. Two responses to her queries.
One of the cats—she wasn't sure if it was Lovey or Thurston—came out from behind the couch and curled around her leg.
She froze, not wanting to scare it back into the shadows.
Gilligan had no such compunction. As if sensing its presence, he barked from somewhere in the house, and the cat disappeared again.
"Do you want to go out?" she called.
Gilligan continued barking.
Here she was, talking to a dog.
Was that worse—in a questionable-sanity sort of way—than talking to herself?
Morgan sat on the porch steps while Gilligan sniffed every blade of grass in the small front yard.
It was two in the morning, and the street was quiet, which felt strangely disconcerting, considering her mind was anything but.
Job offers and Y chromosomes.
She couldn't do anything about the job calls until morning.
That left men. Conner, Mark and even her almost forgotten ex.
Men.
They were the bane of her existence.
No, that wasn't true. Too many men to think about all at once, that was what was hard.
She'd been off the market so long she wasn't sure what to do with such a bountiful batch.
Marvin. Well, that was easy. He was in San Diego and she was here. No proximity, no worries. Although, if one of these job offers panned out, they'd be close again. Morgan would just have to see to it that Marvin understood they were over. Whether she was in San Diego or Pittsburgh, it was done.
Mark and Conner, however, were here, and—
Just then a car pulled up next door and her mother got out.
No. Her mother slithered out, then leaned back into the car and said something to the driver before getting out all the way.
The car pulled away as her mother started to walk up the flower-lined sidewalk to her front door.
"Late night, Mom?"
Her mother gave a yelp. "Morgan Elisabeth Miller, what on earth are you doing out here at this hour?"
"I just noticed I had messages, and there was good news. I was too jazzed to sleep. Besides, Gilligan wanted to come out. The better question is, where were you until 2:00 a.m.?"
Her mother didn't say a word. She didn't need to. Morgan could see she wasn't going to like the answer.
"Mom?"
"I was out."
"I can see that. With. . .?"
"Friends."
"Which friends? Where? You're being awfully vague, and that concerns me."
"Morgan Elisabeth Miller, I certainly don't have to answer to you as to my whereabouts. I'm the mother. You're the daughter. You never seem to remember that. Even as a little girl."
Her mother used her full name when she was trying to pretend to be outraged. The fact that she'd used it twice in the course of this short conversation made Morgan's mom-radar beep out of control.
Morgan, on the other hand, found using her mother's first name to be the most efficient way to get answers. "Annabelle."
"It was Paul. I met him at a wake yesterday. He called today and we went out."
Morgan immediately felt guilty for being suspicious. "Oh, Mom, I'm sorry."
"So am I," she muttered, not sounding overwrought with grief.
"Who passed away?"
"Uh. Well, about that," her mother said, her voice a little louder than was wise at 2:00 a.m. in a residential neighborhood.
"Shh," Morgan warned.
"Fine," Annabelle said a bit more softly. "So I crashed a wake last night. It's not like I meant to. I thought it was some sort of celebration. A birthday, maybe. I mean, who has a wake in the banquet room in a bar on a Saturday night?" Before Morgan could say anything, her mother added quickly, "And I promised no more reception crashing. Wakes weren't included in the promise. And it certainly seemed to me there would be men my age at a wake."
Morgan couldn't think of anything to say to that, so she simply settled for, "Mother."
"Don't worry. You don't have to ask me to promise not to crash wakes. I do it of my own free will. I've decided they're not the way to go. Everyone tends to be depressed."
"You went out with a widower?"
"Give me some credit. Paul wasn't the widower, just a distant cousin." Her mother snorted. "A widower? Why, I'd definitely be the rebound relationship then, and we all know that never ends well. As it was, Paul was not exactly what I'd call chipper. Now, if you're finished with the inquisition, I'm going in." She turned and walk
ed across the lawn to her own front door. "Good night."
"Good night," Morgan echoed softly. She noticed the dog was standing patiently in front of her. "Let's go to bed, Gilligan."
Morgan realized she wouldn't be tossing and turning the rest of the night, worrying about men.
She would be worrying about her mother.
She wasn't sure which was worse.
CHAPTER TWELVE
E.J., I'm going out with my Remington Steele man tonight. He's taking me to one of the fanciest restaurants in Pittsburgh. I should be more excited. Maybe I'm just so excited about the job leads that they've overshadowed everything else? That must be it, because Mark is exactly the type of man I've been looking for. . . .
MONDAY NIGHT, MORGAN FOUND herself seated in Falines across from Mark. They had a window table. The view of the city was astounding.
She kept reminding herself that this dinner was supposed to be business, pure and simple. But Mark seemed to be determined to make it something else. . . something more.
Morgan wasn't sure she wanted more with him. Pursuing more than business with Mark wasn't exactly unethical, but she wouldn't want the fact that he was gorgeous, that he was the type of man she'd always been attracted to, that if Elon Musk and Pierce Brosnan had a child he would be B. Mark Jameson, to sway her recommendation to her mother.
She knew without asking that Annabelle would say go for it. The problem was, Morgan wasn't sure what it was, and even worse, what she wanted it to be.
They chatted through the appetizer. Well, not quite chatted. They were playing a verbal tug-of-war. He wanted date-type conversation, while she tried to keep things businesslike until she could decide just what she wanted.
"Did you look at the figures I sent?" she'd ask.
He'd just nod and say, "Isn't it a beautiful night?"
She'd counter with questions about his opinion of her growth projections. He'd comment on the city lights spread out below them.
By the time their entrées arrived, she was feeling a bit desperate. She didn't want to discuss the weather, the city lights or the new exhibit at the Carnegie Museum.
"I want—" she began, but he cut her off before she could add, to talk about OCDR.
"What is it you want, Morgan?" Mark took a bite of his pasta dish, turning the simple act into a sensual experience. The fork rose to his mouth as if in slow motion, and his lips closed around the bite languidly. As he leisurely removed the fork and began to enjoy the taste, his eyelids fell lower, his expression one of well-sated pleasure.
Morgan's mouth went dry and her mind went numb as she watched him.
"Morgan?" he finally asked, after he'd finished the bite. "What is it you want?"
Ah, the question. She pulled herself together. It was one she'd asked herself a lot recently. She felt no closer to an answer for Mark than she did for herself. "If I were a beauty pageant contestant, my answer would be world peace, but I don't think you meant the question quite that broadly. So I'd have to say, I'd really like to talk about your thoughts on the figures I've collected for you. I'd like to know what you would do with the business, if my mother decided to sell to you. What are your plans?"
"No, a beauty pageant answer wasn't what I had in mind, and although I do want to discuss those figures and my plans, I'm more interested in what you're searching for professionally. What are you looking for in a new job?"
Morgan realized that there was simply no hurrying Mark along. So she thought a moment about his question as she finished her bite of salmon. It was good, but she knew she wasn't displaying the kind of pleasure Mark had.
She swallowed, then answered, "Something like what I'm doing now at the OCDR. A challenge. Something new. Feeling like I'm making a difference. I don't think I'd realized how much that was lacking at my old job."
"I may have a solution. I brought you this." He pulled a number of folded papers from his inside jacket pocket. "I hope you'll give it consideration. I know it's not what you were planning, but I think it might prove to be beneficial."
She opened the file and saw a job description, followed by a numerical figure that made her wonder if she needed glasses.
"What's this?"
"My offer. I think you'll find that it meets your criteria. It would be something new, a challenge, and your taking the job would make a difference to me."
He reached across the table and rested his hand on hers. "I'd really like the opportunity to work with you."
"Why? You don't know me."
"I've done some checking. I hope you don't mind, but I called San Diego and talked to your boss—"
"Ex-boss," she interjected.
"Ex-boss. He had nothing but praise for you. And I've seen the presentation you made for OCDR. I like that you're looking into other options. Your mother assures me that was all your idea. And. . ." He paused, his fingers lightly stroking her hand.
Morgan realized she wanted nothing more than to yank her arm back.
Why?
Here was a man who was offering her everything she'd ever wanted on a business level, and he'd made it plain that he was offering the potential for more than that. B. Mark Jameson was her ideal man. A button-down planner who valued her worth. That should be irresistibly appealing to her. And yet she was resisting quite easily.
She realized he was still talking.
"Pardon?"
"I just said that I hope you'll consider my offer."
"I have two interviews in San Diego next week—"
"I'm not asking for anything concrete, I just want to be in the running. Why don't you come down to my office and I'll give you a tour? Maybe Saturday morning? It's quiet then, but you'll get an idea of what we're all about. I'll even treat you to breakfast after."
"We could talk about positions now," she suggested, hopefully sidestepping the running question.
He quirked his eyebrow—the left one—as he smiled.
She realized what she'd said and blushed, which made him laugh. "Let's table the position talk. Right now, I'm in a great restaurant with a beautiful woman. I'd like to concentrate on that."
"I think I might be dating someone else," she said, as bluntly and succinctly as she could.
"Pardon me if I seem like I'm prying, but you didn't sound very sure."
"Yes, I'm sure. I'm dating someone else."
"Are you engaged?" he countered, looking totally unconcerned as he twirled another bite of his pasta around his fork.
"No," she admitted.
"But you've talked about dating exclusively?"
She shook her head.
"So how long have you been dating this particular someone else?"
"Well, dating is such a specific sort of word. We haven't actually gone out on a real date, although he's cooking for me tomorrow night and we've kissed. . ."
Mark's fingers drummed the table as he studied her. Whatever he saw seemed to please him because he stopped drumming, smiled and said, "As a business man, what I'm hearing is that there have been negotiations, but no deal's been finalized."
"Well, no."
"So, we'll meet on Saturday and talk about both my job offer and the other kind of offer I'd like to make."
"Mark, I don't want to lead you on about either. I have interviews in San Diego next week and—"
"Let's leave off all business talk for the evening and just enjoy the sights and the company."
"But—"
"So, tell me about growing up with Annabelle as a mother. . . ."
It was as if he knew the one subject that could carry them through the rest of the meal with no problem.
Even as Morgan regaled him with tales of her mother's exploits, she studied him.
She'd never been actively pursued by anyone. . .not like this. It was sort of flattering. Mark was exactly the kind of man she'd always wanted.
She remembered what her mother had said at Uncle Auggie's wake: Sometimes what you think you want isn't what you want at all.
Morgan had been so sure
then. Sure of herself and of her career path. Sure of where she wanted her life to go.
Her promotion at work. Marvin. Her friends. Her life in San Diego.
Now?
She wasn't sure about anything. And mainly, she wasn't sure what she was going to do about it. About any of it.
Conner and Mark.
Job offers.
OCDR.
Morgan's party crashing mother and friends.
The only thing she was actually sure of was that for the first time, no amount of list making, no amount of planning, seemed to help her decide what to do next.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
E.J., I feel as if I'm in Gone With the Wind, running around hollering "I don't know anything about birthin' no babies" . . .or caring for them, for that matter.
MORGAN LOOKED AT THE PILE of clothing on her bed. She felt as if she were back in high school getting ready for a big date. And that was absurd, because not only was she well beyond high school, this wasn't a big date.
It was merely dinner with Conner. His brother was going to be there, for Pete's sake.
She looked at the pile of clothes again.
This was ridiculous.
She surveyed herself again in the mirror.
Her jeans—her good jeans—a tank top and a casual blazer. Heels. Low heels, but heels.
Did it say casual dinner with a man you sort of worked with, had fibbed to and kissed twice?
No.
She reached for a light summer dress and held it up.
Maybe this would be better.
She was interrupted by the doorbell.
Not just a polite ring, but a long string of incessant ones.
Morgan hurried out through the living room and into the small foyer. She opened the door and spotted Sunny holding a squirming baby.
"Sunny?"
"I planned on asking your mom, but she's not home. Could you watch Johnny? They just called and Mom's at St. Kathryn's Hospital. They think she had a heart attack, and I need to—"
Morgan stopped her. "Don't worry. We'll be fine, right, Johnny?" She held her arms out and found them filled with baby. A baby who didn't look at all convinced of his fineness in her questionable hands.
