Life Is A Beach / A Real-thing Fling

by Pamela Browning

  Paulette glanced up at her from beneath raised brows. “Hell, yes, it hurt, but not until I tried to pull it off the flagpole and left a significant amount of skin behind. Afterward I thought I shouldn’t have been so dumb.” Paulette was smiling, sort of.

  “I’m sorry, Paulette. For that and the other things.” Like the catfood sandwich they’d traded to her for lunch. And the time before their school’s fall placement tests when they’d told the naive Paulette that smoking a cigarette would make her smarter, and Paulette had been caught puffing away in the basement by her horrified parents. Paulette hadn’t ratted on them, though. She’d taken the punishment, which as Azure recalled involved raking leaves for days and days, maybe even weeks.

  “Well, all is forgiven,” Paulette said. “I might as well confess, though, that I’ve run a dating match on you. I’d like to set up a date for you with a certain client. Client Number 1851, to be exact.”

  Azure stood up. “No dates, Paulette. Charming Paco saw to it that I won’t want to kiss any more frogs for a long time. Anyway, I’m leaving tomorrow.”

  “Oh, not so fast.” Paulette scrabbled among the papers on her desk and produced a phone message. “This is from someone named Harry. He wants you to call him right away.”

  “Harry Wixler is my boss,” Azure said, wondering why he would be calling her here. Then she recalled that she’d switched off her cell phone at the beach so she wouldn’t be disturbed. Her time away from Wixler Consultants was supposed to be vacation time.

  “Harry said he wants you to stay in Miami Beach for a while. I’ll be away at a seminar on small business practices in Orlando for most of this week, but you’re welcome to keep bunking here if you like.”

  Azure didn’t like, but she thought she’d better find out what was going on, so she retreated to a lounge chair on the balcony and dialed Harry’s office number on her phone. Out on the small triangle of rippling blue ocean that she could see from where she sat, she watched a large freighter ply its way north, trailing a creamy white wake. A scattering of pleasure boats caught her eye closer in, and she had the reluctant thought that there could be worse places to linger on the orders of her boss.

  “Got a little problem, A.J.,” Harry Wixler told her when he answered. “A prospective client is vacationing in Miami Beach on his yacht, and I want you to wait there until he calls. He requires major sucking up to if we’re to acquire his account.”

  Azure rolled her eyes. “I hate sucking up.”

  “The man needs a business plan, and you’re the one to do it.”

  “What kind of business plan?”

  “He sold his dotcom company for millions before dotcoms went bust, he’s weary of traveling around on his yacht, and he’s eager to begin a new venture, franchising his new idea. It’s called Grassy Creek. He didn’t tell me everything, but it’s something to do with grass. In fact—”

  “Grass? What kind of grass?” she asked sharply.

  “Not that kind,” Harry said with a deep chuckle. “You young whippersnappers always jump to conclusions.”

  “I am not,” Azure said tartly, “a young whippersnapper. I am a thirty-year-old woman—”

  “That’s young. When you’re my age, anyway. And you’re one of the best consultants on board, especially with franchise start-ups. This client plans to franchise a bunch of health food stores specializing in wheat grass, if you can believe it. I’ve given him your phone number, so stay put until he calls. And rent yourself a set of wheels so you can pick him up and take him to dinner. Got that?”

  “Got it,” Azure said wearily.

  “Good. Report back to me after you talk with him.”

  “Hey, Harry,” Azure said before he could get away. “What’s this guy’s name?”

  “Santori,” Harry said. “Goodbye, A.J. Don’t get sunburned.”

  “Wait a minute, Harry! Are you talking about Leonardo Santori?” She’d read plenty about the man, who when still a college student had established an online mail-order music company and sold it for gazillions a few years ago.

  “Right. He’s the Dot.Musix fellow, a real brainy guy and a hell of an entrepreneur. He’s kind of reclusive, always stayed out of the public eye. I don’t need to tell you that it would mean a healthier bottom line for our struggling company if we snagged his business.”

  “Why don’t I call him?”

  “Like I said, he’s a very private person. He lives on a yacht, it would be best if he could talk to you at his convenience, not yours, and you’re not to bother him.” With that, Harry was gone.

  At least Harry wanted her to rent a car. That would give her the freedom to get around on her own without having to depend on Paulette.

  Who was at this moment standing at the sliding glass door and more or less smirking at her over a glass of papaya juice. “Now will you go out on a date with my client?”

  “Your client, Harry’s client, the world’s exploding with clients,” Azure muttered, getting up and leaning over the balcony railing. A huge bougainvillea vine trailed up a wall trellis, its branches overhanging the balcony, and Azure brushed them aside for a better view.

  “I only tried to match you up with him because you seemed kind of down this morning.”

  “I was nowhere nearly as depressed as I am at this very moment,” Azure said darkly. She heaved a sigh. “I’d better call and reserve a rental car. Phone book?”

  “On the kitchen counter.”

  Paulette trailed her into the kitchen and noisily scavenged in the freezer for more ice while Azure made arrangements for a car to be delivered to her at the Blue Moon.

  “Problems, problems,” Azure said after she hung up. “The rental car company can’t deliver the car until tomorrow afternoon, and who knows when I’ll hear from the mysterious Mr. Santori? What am I going to do here for the next few days? The rest of the family left early this morning, I don’t know anyone except you and Uncle Nate, who keeps wanting me to join in a pinochle game with him and his cronies, and—”

  “You can help me at Rent-a-Yenta,” Paulette said hopefully. “I’ll be leaving late tomorrow for the seminar I told you about, and I’m incredibly overworked because I’m signing up clients right and left.”

  “So set one of them up with this guy you keep pushing at me.”

  “I might have to. If you’re not interested, there’s always Mandi.” Mandi lived upstairs, and Azure had met her before the wedding. Mandi had been wearing a black halter top with a short white see-through skirt, showing off her new diamond nose stud to anyone who would pay attention.

  “Better Mandi Eye Candy than me.”

  “Like I said, I need help in the office. I’m way behind because of Karma’s wedding.”

  “No way,” said Azure. But then she thought of Paulette standing forlornly with her tongue frozen to that metal flagpole all those years ago while she and Karma, Isis and Mary Beth laughed their heads off. Guilt was a great motivator.

  “On second thought,” Azure said unwillingly, “maybe I could do some filing for you in the morning.”

  On third thought, she wished she hadn’t offered. But Paulette did look pleased, you had to say that for her. And what could it hurt?

  2

  LEE SANTORI POISED ON THE bow of his 141-foot yacht, Samoa, soaking up the early-morning sunshine. The temperature at seven in the morning was a simmering 82 degrees, typical for summer in South Florida. Across the bay rose the city of Miami, its glass towers golden with the reflection of the rising sun. Behind him was Fisher Island, home base for many wealthy people, including more than a handful of bona fide celebrities. Beyond that lay the wide Atlantic Ocean, which Lee had crossed on the Samoa only two weeks ago on his way back to the U.S. from Portugal, where he had spent the winter.

  He was glad to be back on this side of the Atlantic where he could elude the woman who had followed him around Europe uninvited, turning up everywhere he did for months. She had claimed to be a princess in exile, victim of some Balkan upheaval or
other, though Lee had doubted the truth of the story. Anyway, he was free of her now, and all he could think about was the woman who had captured his interest at the wedding. Azure, her name was. Azure: the shade of the bay at sunset, the brilliance of the sky at noon, the color of his favorite crayon when he was a kid.

  Lee breathed deeply before plunging from the yacht in a swift dive that took him beneath the cool sparkling waters of Biscayne Bay, and as he surfaced he felt encompassed in a bubble of blue, azure blue. Which only reminded him again that things had gone wrong, terribly wrong, between him and the one woman in the world who interested him at the moment.

  The mellow muted sound of the ship’s bell rang out over the water as he surfaced.

  “Breakfast,” Fleck called from above, where he was hanging over the railing and watching.

  Lee swam with sure, powerful strokes to the yacht’s swim platform and hoisted himself up the ladder. He still couldn’t believe his good fortune at owning a yacht like this one, nor could he feel completely comfortable with the life of leisure he led after selling his company. Well, he was going to take care of that. He had plans, big ones. Not as big as his plans had been for Dot.Musix, but big nonetheless.

  His friend Slade’s childhood buddy Fleck, built as squat as a fireplug, grinned at him from under his mop of unkempt hair, frizzy and bleached almost white from the sun. “It looks like shrimp and cheese grits and scrambled eggs again for breakfast, pal.”

  Lee shook the water from his hair. It sprayed across the highly polished teak deck in a shimmer of fine droplets. He dried himself off with the towel handed to him by a silent steward. “I’ve ordered shrimp and grits to be served every morning, Fleck, as long as you’re in residence.”

  “You know how to treat a guest, that’s for sure.” Fleck slapped him on the back as they made their way to a round breakfast table set up in the open air near the stern railing. The table was covered with a pristine white cloth, set with china embossed with the name of the yacht, and embellished by a colorful bird-of-paradise centerpiece, one of a series of fresh flower arrangements ferried out to their anchorage every morning by a local florist engaged for that purpose. Beside Lee’s plate was propped yet another letter from his father, and he avoided looking at it. He hadn’t spoken to his father for some time, nor did he intend to.

  He turned his attention back to Fleck. “I was thinking,” Lee said slowly, “that you might want to come on board permanently.”

  “As part of your security detail?”

  “No, I’ve got the guys who man the boat for that if I need them, and I’m traveling incognito here in Miami. I want you to become my point man for my new venture.”

  Fleck appeared startled. “Yeah? You mean this new health food chain you told me about?”

  “That’s what I mean, all right.” Lee drained his glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice and dug into the scrambled eggs, which were invariably cooked exactly the way he liked them—soft, but not runny.

  “Hey, dude, what makes you want to take a chance on a reprobate surfer like me?”

  “My old roommate Slade Braddock, for one thing. He assures me that you’re through goofing off. He also told me what a fantastic job you did managing that resort over on the west coast until it went bankrupt.”

  Fleck’s face clouded for a moment. “I got unsettled by that whole sad situation, and after the place went belly-up, I thought to myself, ‘Hey, why not take up surfing again like when I was a kid?’ That’s why I set out to hang ten at every worthwhile beach in the world, and I made it to almost all of them before the accident.”

  Slade had told Lee all about Fleck’s motorcycle accident, which had laid the guy up for a month and consumed most of his savings. Fleck’s present poverty was why Lee had offered the hospitality of the Samoa for as long as Fleck needed it so that he could attend Slade’s wedding. They’d gotten to know each other, he and Fleck, and Lee was impressed by Fleck’s insight and by his down-to-earth business sense, which the veneer of his casual lifestyle and careless speech did not entirely hide.

  “Are you ready to settle down?” Lee asked bluntly.

  “Yep, I sure am.”

  “I’m planning to open my first Grassy Creek outlet right here in Miami. I want you to be in on this from the get-go, Fleck.”

  Fleck looked surprised. “Kewl,” he said. “You got all your ducks in a row yet?”

  “I’m staying on in Miami Beach so I can meet with an executive of a seed company, who will be flying in from South America for a business presentation on Wednesday. I’ve also rented a storefront in a strip mall on the west side of Miami, and the workmen are remodeling to my specs. Maybe we could go take a look one of these days.”

  “Any time, good buddy. And you are a good buddy. I mean it.”

  It always embarrassed Lee to be thanked effusively, and he wasn’t about to give Fleck that opportunity. “Think nothing of it,” he said, pushing his chair back.

  “You going somewhere?”

  “I’ve got to go onshore and check on the construction crew, but first I want to talk to Paulette from Rent-a-Yenta. She messed me up big time with Azure O’Connor.”

  “Azure O’Connor? Karma’s uptight sister?”

  “Maybe she’s not so uptight. The last place I saw her was at a nude beach.”

  Fleck appeared nonplussed. “You don’t say! And were there noteworthy girl parts under that business suit she wore to her sister’s wedding?”

  “I wasn’t in a position to know.”

  “Uh, what position were you in, exactly, Lee?” Fleck asked with a sly grin.

  “Let’s just say that I didn’t uncover any new territory, and this Paulette person has pretty much ensured that I probably won’t ever get the chance. Azure thinks I’m below the level of pond scum at the moment.”

  “Care to spill the story?”

  “I signed up with Paulette’s dating service, Rent-a-Yenta, on Slade’s advice. Ever since I sold my business, I’ve got women chasing me all over the globe. When women smell money, their whole manner changes. It’s awful.”

  Fleck guffawed. “Too-oo bad! I wish I had your problem. Anyway, how did you manage to sign up with Rent-a-Yenta without giving yourself away as a billionaire?”

  “I did what I do when I want to preserve my privacy. I used the name Lee Sanders.”

  “Kewl.” Fleck seemed impressed, though there was nothing to be impressed about. Using an alias wasn’t fun, but it was a necessity, especially since he’d rather be anonymous than have his movements curtailed by a security detail.

  Lee got serious, and fast. “Trouble is, Fleck, I don’t meet many women that I have something in common with, and trying to get them to be honest about who they are and what they’re about is impossible. I’m thirty-seven years old. I’m ready to settle down. A dating service? Well, why not?”

  Fleck shrugged. “Makes sense, I guess.”

  “So I spotted Paulette Parham at the wedding sitting next to this ice-maiden type who was punching entries into her PalmPilot right up to the minute Slade and Karma started to repeat their vows. I’m thinking, ‘You’re one coldhearted lady if you can’t take a few minutes to appreciate the wedding thing.’ And then she puts the PalmPilot away, and the bride and groom are saying ‘I do’ back and forth, and I’m watching this cool customer standing all stony-faced and aloof when suddenly I see a tear—one tear—trickle down her cheek. I thought, ‘The ice maiden melteth.”’

  “Yeah? So?” Fleck helped himself to a fresh-baked croissant.

  “So there’s a real human being under that gray suit. And she noticed me watching her. She looked straight at me, and I could have sworn that something clicked between us in that brief moment.” He didn’t know how to describe the compassion he’d felt for her, the sense of a tragedy in her life. Nor did he think he wanted to explain the deep-down urge he felt to comfort and nurture her. He was sure Fleck wouldn’t understand.

  As if to underscore that point, Fleck said briskly, “We
ll, cut to how you happened to be at the nude beach with her.”

  Lee forced the vision of Azure’s tearstained face to the nether regions of his consciousness. “I asked Paulette about her, and it turns out they’re cousins. Azure is Karma O’Connor’s sister. Paulette tried to get a conversation going between us at the wedding reception, but Azure left in a hurry. After that, I asked Paulette to set up a date between us for the next day, and she suggested that if I went to Haulover Beach, I might run into Azure in the morning—that is, if she could convince Azure to go. I went for it.”

  “Hmm, I would, too.”

  Lee decided not to explain his feelings of anticipation as he drove to the beach, or the vision he held in his mind of Azure’s heart-shaped face, her voluptuous figure. “I thought Azure was into nudity when I got there and saw signs posted that warned of nudity past a certain point on the beach. It was early in the morning, not too many people around, so I went for a long swim in the ocean thinking it over.”

  “What was to think about?” Fleck said with an expression of incredulity.

  “Whether I wanted to stick around. And whether she’d take her clothes off.”

  “And she didn’t?” Fleck appeared to be hanging on every word.

  “Nope. I tried to get her involved in a volleyball game, but that only made her angry.”

  “So she left?”

  “Ran up the beach lickety-split. Don’t ask me why, but she’s all I can think about.” He could have added that he’d noticed her looking after a crying child at the reception and taking the time to repair the shoe of an elderly lady. She might be standoffish where he was concerned, but he had seen evidence of a good heart, and this, in a world where selfishness often seemed to be the rule, appealed to him as much as her spectacular beauty.

  Fleck appeared to be mulling over what he had said. “Seems to me that if I were you, I’d avail myself of the awesome chicks who hang around the marina waiting for a glimpse of you, not chase after someone who wouldn’t give me the time of day.”