Her Last Best Fling

by Candace Havens

  He shrugged. “Who said anything about a relationship? We’re sharing a meal. We won’t call it a date. We’ll call it a mutual companion outing. Besides, you’d be doing me a favor. All the gray hairs keep throwing their daughters at me. You can be my shield.”

  That made her laugh. “I’m pretty sure you can defend yourself just fine, Lieutenant Michaels. You don’t need me.”

  He smiled. “But we had dinner last night. Why can’t we do it again?”

  “Last night it was about work. And frankly, I don’t think it’s a good idea to leave Harley alone while she’s getting used to her new surroundings. I plan on taking her to the office with me so she doesn’t feel abandoned.”

  Rubbing his chin, Blake eyed the dog. “If I can solve the problem with Harley, will you go to dinner with me?”

  She bit her lip. He really loved when she did that.

  “I’m not sure how many times I can say this isn’t a good idea.”

  “Fine. I agree. It’s not a good idea, but I’m having trouble focusing because I keep wondering what it would be like to kiss you. To hold your hand in mine.”

  “And spending time with me is going to solve that dilemma?”

  “Maybe we’ll get lucky and you’ll bore me to tears. Or I’ll be allergic to your perfume. You might like a movie I despise. I’m kind of a movie snob.” That last bit was true. In college, he’d refused to date any woman who hadn’t seen his two favorite films, To Kill a Mockingbird and North by Northwest, they were now followed closely by Zero Dark Thirty.

  Movies were his favorite escape, and he took them seriously.

  Shoving her curls behind her ears she stared at him.

  “So, I’d really be doing you a favor by sharing a meal at this mutual companion outing? We’ll get bored with each other and then we can move on, right?”

  “Exactly,” he told her, but he didn’t believe it for a minute. She was bright, funny and beautiful. A triple threat as far as he was concerned. Blake didn’t want to think about the future. For now he just wanted the clever journalist with the curvy hips any way she’d take him.

  5

  AMANDA PELEGRINE, the receptionist at Tranquil Waters News, put down her nail file and eyed Macy warily. For once, Harley was on her best behavior and strode in as if she owned the place. Macy was certain it had nothing to do with the giant box of dog treats and sack of brand-new toys she had in her hand.

  Amanda, who was not Macy’s biggest fan, sneered. “I’m allergic to dogs.”

  Good. Maybe you’ll quit.

  She’d wanted to fire the useless female since the day she took over the paper. But her uncle’s will stated she had to wait three months before making any staffing changes.

  He’d left her with an angry receptionist, who looked like something from the circus with her fuzzy raspberry sweater, two-inch-long green nails and fascinator that looked like a dead bird on a perch.

  Having lived in big cities, Macy was used to all kinds of fashions, but she’d never seen someone like Amanda.

  In addition to the snarky witch, she had one reporter, Darla, who was amazing, but eight month’s pregnant with her second child.

  The only columnist was Hugo, who was eighty, possibly ninety. Old enough that he couldn’t remember what year he was born. He couldn’t hear or see, but the man could write. He used an old manual typewriter, which meant someone else had to scan his stories into a computer.

  Twice a week Macy stopped by to pick up his columns. She always had to make sure she scheduled an extra hour for each visit because Hugo was just as good at telling a story as he was at writing one.

  He’d seen so much, and she enjoyed listening to him talk about the good old days.

  “Well, Amanda, she’ll be coming here with me every day. I’m happy to give you a severance package, otherwise, I suggest you invest in some antihistamines.”

  “Maybe I’ll just talk to my friend the lawyer about working conditions.” Her heavily colored eyebrow rose into her bangs. She wore so much makeup it was impossible to tell her age.

  If Macy had to wager a guess, it would be somewhere around twenty-seven, but that was debatable.

  She hadn’t meant to sound rude, but she’d grown weary of the woman’s constant negativity. “You do that.” She only had to wait one more week before giving her the heave-ho.

  “No reason to get testy. By the way, you have some messages.” She stuck out her hand with a pile of pink notes.

  “It’s only nine in the morning.”

  The woman shrugged. “Some might be from the last couple of days. I cleaned off my desk when I was looking for my good nail file and I found them.”

  Stuffing the messages in her pocket, Macy’s mouth formed a thin line. “In my office in fifteen minutes,” she said through gritted teeth.

  “But I have a—”

  “Amanda, my office in fifteen,” she said harshly as she entered her office. She slammed the door.

  Harley whined.

  “Sorry, old girl, but she is too much.” Rolling out a furry mat that had gel on the underside, she put it behind her desk. Then she added a stuffed toy along with one of the chewies she’d bought at the discount store just outside of town.

  Lucky for her, Great Danes were notoriously lazy. Once the dog was comfortable, she’d probably sleep most of the day.

  Macy’s phone rang. “Call from Boston,” Amanda said snidely. “Same guy.”

  “Tell him I’m in a meeting.”

  She hung up before the receptionist could question her decision.

  She had no interest in talking to her ex. The man had tried to apologize countless times. But she’d caught him red-handed, meaning in bed with his intern. Not one to give into hysterics, she’d turned on her heel, picked up her laptop and walked out with only the clothes on her back.

  The week before she’d found him cheating, she’d received a visit from her uncle’s attorney. At first, she thought she would sell her inheritance and use the proceeds for an amazing honeymoon.

  But after what had happened, she decided it was a sign to move in a new direction. She’d been a high-profile, far-flung reporter for a long time. She had the awards and reputation to prove it.

  So instead of planning a honeymoon, she gave two weeks’ notice at the Boston paper and told HR she was taking two of the six weeks of vacation owed to her. She waited until she knew her ex was in a meeting, and went to the condo and packed up everything she owned.

  A gypsy, always on the road, she didn’t have much other than her clothes, shoes and a few pieces of art she’d picked up during her travels.

  She then bought a car and drove to New York to visit Cherie. After a couple of days of being analyzed by her best bud, she knew her choice to move to Texas was a great one.

  As soon as she saw her uncle’s house, it felt like home, a feeling she hadn’t experienced in years. It had surprised her how easy it’d been to walk away from the life she’d thought she wanted and the man she was supposed to marry. That was when she’d known—the obvious reason aside—he wasn’t Mr. Right, after all.

  Still, she had no desire to speak to him.

  A knock on the door interrupted her revisiting the past.

  “Come in.”

  Harley raised her head to see who entered and then lay back down. Amanda stood in the doorway.

  “Have a seat.” Macy pointed to the chair.

  Eyeing her warily, she sat.

  “As you know, the three months are almost up. I wanted to give you notice now so that you have time to find another job.” Macy picked up a folder. “This is the severance package my uncle had in his files. I will honor it, even though—” She’d been about to say, “you don’t deserve it.” She shoved the folder across the desk.

  “You’re firing
me?” Amanda’s face crumbled. Huge black mascara tears dripped down her cheeks. “I knew it. Why don’t you like me?”

  Seriously?

  “You’ve been hostile to me ever since I arrived. The missing messages today are just one in a long line of problems with you being inept at your job.”

  A good manager would have found a way to cushion the blow, but Macy was at the end of her patience with the woman.

  “It is nothing personal. It’s business. I need to employ people who are efficient and can carry extra duties when necessary. I can barely get you to answer the phone, and that’s your only job. I’ve had to do all the admin, customer service and deal with circulation. That’s on top of writing, editing and publishing the paper.”

  The woman sniffled.

  Closing her eyes, Macy gathered her thoughts.

  “I—thought you were going to get bored fast and hire someone to take over, so I didn’t think it was worth getting to know you or impress you,” Amanda said finally. “And you never asked me to do those things. You told me to answer the phone, so I did. I noticed the second week you were here that the accounts receivables were a mess, so I’ve been doing those. It takes me a little longer than it took Todd, but he’d been doing it for years. And I sort of had to teach myself those first few weeks. You never even said thank-you.”

  Her eyes popped open. “What?”

  “That I was doing so much of the accounting. I’m pretty sure I’ve done it right, but you might want to have an accountant look over the books. My mom was able to help me with some of it, but once the treatments started, well. You should probably have the figures double-checked.”

  Macy groaned inwardly. She’d assumed her uncle used a firm to monitor the accounts receivable or payable. There was still so much she had to learn.

  The first order of business was to find a good accountant to go over those books.

  “We all thought you’d sell the paper, or quit and fold it up. So I didn’t see any sense in putting forward any extra effort other than the day-to-day stuff until you figured out what you wanted to do.

  “And you were so serious and businessy when you arrived. You didn’t treat us any differently than the file cabinets, the gray ones you didn’t like. I asked those first few days if I could help you with something, but you looked at me like I was a crazy person.

  “I know I don’t dress as fancy as you do. But clothes are how I express myself. And I’ve been studying so hard. I hid the books when you walked by because I was afraid you’d get mad if you saw me. I wanted to talk to you about it. I was hoping, since you were a woman, that maybe you’d give me a chance. But you make me so nervous, I don’t know if I’m doing anything right and I sure don’t want to ask for a favor.”

  Staring down at the files on her desk, Macy thought back. She’d been off on her own for so long that she was used to doing everything herself. When she was on assignment, it was expected.

  And she’d been sullen and angry when she first got to Tranquil Waters. Had she taken it out on the staff? Did she have the scary face, her game face, on as Cherie called it, when she was walking around town? The same face she had when traveling, so that no one bugged her? No wonder folks thought she was some mean, Yankee shrew.

  “That doesn’t explain your hostility, Amanda, and what do you mean you’ve been studying hard? I’ve seldom seen you without a nail file in your hand.”

  “You know how you don’t know how to act so you act like the other person even though you don’t know why someone hates you.... I guess that’s what happened. When a person is mean to me, I just do the same back. I’m kind of flaky. I’ll give you that.

  “You’re some important war correspondent, I figured being professional maybe meant being mean. I saw that old movie The Devil Wears Prada. That editor was horrible.”

  Was the woman really taking her cues from a film?

  “Yes, but that was fiction. I don’t expect you to fall all over yourself, but I do insist on common courtesy.” She held up the messages. “And this—this is bad.”

  The woman scrunched her face. “I considered throwing them in the trash so you wouldn’t find out. It took everything I had to give them to you. When you came in yesterday, you were in such a hurry that I didn’t get a chance to pass them on. I stuck them under the phone so I’d remember, but Mrs. Dawes, the cleaner, must have moved them.”

  Macy gave her an incredulous look.

  “I know, I know. But I mean it. I’ve been studying journalism at an online college. I have to do it like that because my mom is sick and I have to be home to watch my brothers at night when my dad’s at work. So in the mornings, I’m tired and can barely keep my eyes open. The nail file thing is a kind of way to trick myself. I hate the sound, but it keeps me awake.

  “I promise I’ll try to be better. I’ll do whatever you ask, just give me two more weeks.”

  Amanda folded her hands in her lap. The tears continued to roll down her face, and each one churned Macy’s stomach a little more.

  She felt sick. If the story was true, and her instincts said that it was, Macy had indeed been horrible with a capital H.

  Journalism 101 was to find out the real story. Everyone had one, and most of the time they were fascinating.

  “May I ask what’s wrong with your mom? And you should know, as an employee, you do not have to tell me.”

  “Breast cancer. It’s her third time with it. My grandma and aunts all died of it. But she’s doing better. This last round of chemo and radiation has taken its toll, but the docs say her counts are good. Dad drives her to Houston once a week for treatment.

  “She just doesn’t have any energy. I’m the oldest of four, and all under sixteen. So I help out around the house and try to give them money when I can, since Mom can’t work right now.”

  Shame on you, Macy Reynolds. Shame on you.

  Dear God, she’d almost fired the poor woman and had the entire family out on the street.

  The journalist in her told her to stop right there, that she was being too soft. If Amanda worked at one of the top one hundred papers, she’d be out. Everyone had to do the job of five or six people these days. When Macy started out as a reporter, she’d had to turn in only three columns a week. Her last job in Boston, she’d had to do a minimum of eight, and help with copyediting and online coverage.

  But the Tranquil Waters News was not a top one hundred paper. She was certain it wasn’t even ranked, though for a small paper, they had a good circulation.

  “I see. That is unfortunate.” Her words sounded cold, even to her. But she’d never been great at the touchy-feely stuff. Except when it came to Harley, that dog turned her into a pile of emotional mush.

  “So, you’ve been studying journalism. What year are you?” She forced a smile.

  “I’m a junior. I was all set to go to Texas State, but then Mom got sick again, so I enrolled online.”

  Rummaging through the old desk, Macy found her personnel file. She was only twenty years old.

  Holy hell. That explained so much.

  But they had to set some ground rules.

  “Are you really allergic to dogs?”

  The girl glanced at Harley. “No, but I’m scared to death of them. One tried to bite me once when I was a kid and I’ve never been able to get close to a dog since. I’m sorry, but that’s the truth.”

  Macy nodded. “This one won’t hurt you. She is the friendliest dog. Aren’t you, Harley.”

  The dog lifted her head and cocked it sideways. A low grunt of what sounded like her agreement followed.

  Amanda laughed.

  “She’ll hang out with me most days,” Macy explained. “So it might be good if you two tried to be friends. I won’t force it, but if you’re going to make friends with a dog, this is the one to start with. I promise.”
r />   “I’ll try.”

  “Okay. Well, if you’re staying, we’ll need some changes. Ones that you and I will decide on together.”

  “I’ll do whatever you want, no problem.” Amanda held up her hand as if she were swearing an oath in court.

  “Good. To begin with, you’d better give me the lowdown on my other employees.”

  Macy listened carefully to each backstory. Amanda knew it all, which showed she had a propensity for getting the truth out of folks. Not a bad trait for a budding journalist.

  “I’ll come up with a code of conduct and expectations for you to sign off on. And we’ll consider the next two weeks as a probation period,” Macy said. “If that goes well, we’ll extend it.

  “As for your wardrobe, I don’t want you to feel like you can’t express yourself, but I do want to offer you suggestions on proper attire for the office.”

  Amanda made a weird face. “I don’t have any old lady clothes or sexy librarian stuff like you wear,” she said. “But I could maybe tone it down a little.”

  “How about we compromise with one bright color a day? And maybe jeans that don’t show more than they should?”

  “Fine by me. Would you like me to get you a coffee?”

  Hmm. That sounded good. “Tell you what, you like those lattes from the café. Why don’t you get one and I’ll take a black coffee. Here’s some cash. And then, please find out when everyone can come in for a staff meeting. We need to chat.”

  “That’s going to be a bit tough on Hugo, but I can give him a ride from the nursing home if that’s okay with him.”

  “We’ll figure it out. I’d also like to talk to the printer, and before you leave today, I need access to those books. I’ll hire an accountant this afternoon.”

  “Got it, Boss!” She hopped up. “Coffee, and then I’ll make the calls. Thank you!”

  Macy smiled. “You’re welcome.”

  Amanda turned back when she reached the door. “Uh, there’s one other thing.”

  Macy’s eyebrow rose, but she didn’t say anything.