Well, further notice was on the way! If she had second thoughts later, no way he was letting her back out of it. By the time he slid behind the wheel, he was also thinking he’d agreed too soon. If she’d offered fifteen hundred, she would’ve gone higher. It didn’t have enough zeroes in it, of course, but it was a start.
“Plus expenses,” he said. “Gas, oil, lease, mileage—”
“That seems a little redundant.”
“You want me or not?”
She smiled wickedly. “Well, if you put it that way.”
She’s hitting on me!
There was only one thing he could think of to protect himself, because while his brain knew what she’d done, how devious she was, his body—and maybe even his heart—was in danger of writing it off. Fortunately, his brain was back in control.
“Make a pass at me, lady, and you ride in the back.”
“Hm, I hadn’t counted on that,” Elizabeth said. She was looking in on Lilly’s progress from her higher vantage point, her robe swirling around her legs as she paced in tight, agitated turns and waited for John.
This had to go better if she was going to save Lilly and get what she, herself, wanted—more freedom to help others in the future. John was a by-the-book kind of guy, and much too strict, in her opinion. People were weak and needed a gentle, guiding hand.
Three million dollars hanging between Lilly and Jake— boy, what a test. She’d worked with John when he’d sent others back, but Lilly was the first one to reap the benefits of Elizabeth’s persuasive talents. Lilly could turn over a new leaf and get right into heaven upon her return; she just needed a little guidance.
“Be sure it’s only a little,” John said when he arrived.
The two of them gazed down at Lilly, who was drooling over Jake’s pan of fudge and trying to get him to share, and Jake, who was chomping at the bit to confront Lilly about his money.
“It won’t be long before he tells her,” Elizabeth said, “and then she’s going to feel obligated to pay him back.”
“One would hope so.”
“But according to the rules, she can’t give her money to friends. Well, we just need to bend them a little bit, that’s all there is to it.”
“No.”
“But Lilly’s a good person at heart. She’ll see to it that the rest of the money—”
“Elizabeth, Elizabeth,” John said, shaking his head. “Haven’t you noticed people’s tendency to slide by? Give them an inch, and all that? No, I guess you haven’t been doing this long enough. I’m sorry, but without rules to follow, Lilly would simply reimburse Jake, dash off a few thousand checks to charities, produce a child, and think she’s home free.”
“But you don’t know—”
“I do know that there are many good reasons we have apprenticeships at this job, and so will you, in time.”
“But we’re angels. We’re forgiving. We’re understanding. Or we should be.”
“Ah, Elizabeth. I see Lilly isn’t the only one who must have faith. People have to help themselves. They have to struggle”—his arms spread and rose theatrically—”defy all odds, surmount all obstacles.”
Elizabeth, who’d stopped pacing long enough to watch, yawned at the display.
“A test must equal the gift of going back,” John said, “and it’s no different in Lilly’s case. We cannot make exceptions.”
Elizabeth gnawed the inside of her cheek. How was Lilly supposed to resist the claims of a strapping big hunk like Jake? How was she going to spend every day with him, giving money away left and right, then hold out over the life insurance money she’d inherited in his stead? As a man, he was irresistible enough to be persuasive. Scratch that, as a man, he was downright, drop-dead irresistible.
“He won’t do anything illegal, will he?”
“You mean like forging a check? Well, one thing I’ve learned from watching people—”
“Yes?”
“You just never know.”
“He could get close to her and steal all her money, thinking he can use it to start his business again. Then she wouldn’t be able to follow the rules. Then what?”
“I hope she’s wearing comfortable shoes.”
“But, John, she hates lines. Making Lilly stand in line is like making an artist live in the dark.”
“Fortunately for her, Jake’s always had her best interests at heart.”
Elizabeth breathed a sigh of relief, knowing that was true. Jake had left town to keep his feelings for Lilly hidden, so no one would think she’d encouraged him in any way.
“Although… he is pretty mad at her,” John mused. “Who knows what he might do? Money is a great temptation.”
“But that wouldn’t be fair!”
“Hey, life’s not fair. Besides, Jake has life lessons to learn, too.”
“He’s mastered patience.”
“So far.” John shrugged. “Maybe it’s been too easy. So he lost a little insurance money. Big deal.”
“Ah, so Lilly’s there to try his patience. Well, it’s a good thing for her sake that I took out a little insurance of my own.”
John’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”
“You’ll see. Maybe I’m working with you for a totally different reason than you think. Maybe I need to learn to fight for what I believe in.”
“Lord, woman, what have you done?”
At home that evening, Lilly took stock. She wanted to talk to Elizabeth—in fact, she did talk to her, quite a bit, but no reply was forthcoming.
She wasn’t sure if she should continue.
“I mean, come on,” she said heavenward. No way she could give away eighteen million dollars. “I must have been in shock. You’re not really real. I never really talked to you. You’re a figment of my imagination. Aren’t you?”
She could prove it. She’d call the bank first thing and put a stop on the check.
“Ye-ow.”
Damn, but that hurt.
“Okay, so you’re real,” she muttered, shaking her arm out. When the phone rang, she hoped it was a new avenue of communication with Elizabeth. Boy, how she’d like to give her a piece of her mind!
But it was only her weekly, after-dark, heavy breather. Shortly after Brady’s death, the nuisance calls had begun with silence on the other end of the line, which frightened her at first. Changing her number hadn’t worked. She couldn’t screen every call, because she wasn’t always in the same room with the answering machine or caller ID. About the time she got used to the silent harassment, it escalated to heavy breathing. Blowing a shrill whistle into the receiver hadn’t worked, though she’d spent one night laughing and hugging herself at the thought of the scumbag writhing on the floor in pain.
She spent hours in her glass-roofed atrium. Tending the exotic trees and plants and feeding the koi usually relaxed her, but tonight, thinking back over her day with Jake turned out to be an exercise in frustration. She wasn’t quite certain what to make of him. Sometimes friendly and polite, sometimes a chip on his shoulder. Moody? Or contemplative?
It didn’t matter which, really. She had to complete a mission, as it were. A few weeks to get pregnant, at most. With her irregular cycle, no telling when the key dates were.
She’d confessed she hadn’t any prospects, and then bam, Jake had shown up. No doubt about it; had to be him. And he wasn’t just a tool, a sperm donor. That would be impersonal and unfair. She felt they had a real connection. Sure, it wasn’t much yet. It needed to grow and be nurtured. She needed to get to the bottom of why he was driving a taxi and seemed to have abandoned any profession his degrees had prepared him for. As long as she got pregnant soon, they’d have a lifetime for all that and more. Hadn’t Elizabeth said to have faith?
At ten o’clock, Lilly started packing up odds and ends that she didn’t want sitting around when she marketed the house, which, as part of her net worth, had to be liquidated. Everything of any monetary value had to be converted to cash. If she gave it all away too soo
n, she’d be destitute. She needed a legal arrangement that would allow her to sell the house but stay on until whatever else she was supposed to take on faith happened. That would take a unique buyer.
“Elizabeth, if you can hear me, I need some one-on-one time. You know, down here? Face-to-face?”
Unfortunately, she couldn’t shut her mind down while filling bags for the next Salvation Army pick up.
Why was Jake in her every thought? What had he done to make her hormones sit up and take notice, other than exchanging a few words and—oh yeah—touching her arm? That might do it. The fact that she hadn’t had sex in the whole last year of her marriage probably had a lot to do with it, too.
He couldn’t be serious about her not making passes! If he was the right one, he’d just have to get over that and get down to at least one night of the heated passion and endless lovemaking she knew she’d get with him. Too bad getting pregnant might take, oh, thirty or so such nights.
To hell—excuse me, God, I’ll try to do better—with John. He could close his eyes or his ears or not read whatever page of her life story that’d be on.
She called Betsy. “Abstinence sucks.”
“Hold on,” Betsy whispered, which meant there was an overnight guest in her bed. She picked up in another room, chuckling. “So it’s finally gotten to you, huh? I knew it would eventually.”
“Don’t sound so smug, missy. You were the one begging for a vibrator this morning.”
“Not anymore.”
“Yeah? Who is he?”
“That cute paramedic from this morning, and wow, does he know a thing or two. But back to you. You want me to fix you up with one of his friends?”
“Can you just tell me how to make a pass at a man who’s told me not to?”
“Why bother? Unless it’s a doctor. Ooh, I’ll bet there was a cute one at the hospital.”
“No, not a doctor.”
“Well, who else? Andrew?”
“Oh c’mon, he’s my brother-in-law.”
“Was. I’ve seen those exquisite bouquets he sends you.”
“He’s being nice.”
“Yeah, a hundred bucks a week’s pretty nice. I read the last card. ‘To my favorite Lilly of all. Love, Andrew.’ “
“He doesn’t mean it like that.”
Betsy gasped audibly. “Oh, wait a minute! You don’t mean the store clerk?”
“His name’s Jake, and you should’ve remembered him from the wedding. He was Brady’s best man.”
“Well,” she said, drawing the single word out very suggestively. “And you want to seduce him?”
“In a word, yes.”
“Way to go, girl. Invite him to dinner.”
“My chef quit, remember? I do takeout now.”
“Gotta do better than that. I know, have a caterer deliver something yummy, and then disappear. Let’s see, you’ll need candlelight, soft music, sheer blouse, perfume on the pulse points. What’s his favorite hobby?”
He designed computerized home control systems, but Lilly didn’t know if that counted as recreation. “Selling sex toys?”
“Hm, I was going to say whatever his hobby is, leave a book on it lying around, as if you’re interested, too? But I doubt that counts unless he designs them.”
“Oh yuck.” Lilly had a less-than-pretty mental picture of someone bent over his workbench, fashioning the next-generation vibrator.
“Hey, somebody has to do it.”
“Let’s say it’s not him.”
“Okay. So next time you see him, find out his hobby. If you don’t know anything about it, act interested. If you know something—Hey, wait a minute, didn’t you ever seduce your husband?”
Lilly sighed. “I don’t think I was very good at it.”
Brady’d had a little trouble in that department, and the more Lilly tried to help him through it, the more distance he’d put between them. He wasn’t the kind of man who asked for help. He certainly wasn’t about to accept any, either. Eventually he’d changed bedrooms.
“Did you wear red?”
“I don’t know. Sometimes.”
“Can’t go wrong with red. It sends a subliminal message.”
“I thought it was a power color.”
“Mm-hm, makes ‘em feel more manly, if you know what I mean.”
“I don’t know, Betsy. Maybe it was me.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I’ll take you shopping, and we’ll buy lots of sexy red stuff.”
“Yeah, let’s not,” she said with a short laugh. “I can’t stand to get blown up again.”
After the phone call, she sorted boxes, one for her mother-in-law, one for Jake, if he wanted it, seven for a charity, and one she wasn’t quite sure what to do with. She left a message for Andrew that she had a box of his brother’s things he might want to go through.
The phone rang at eleven, undoubtedly Betsy with more good advice to impart. Hopefully not along the lines of crotchless panties.
“Lilly?”
Ah, now there was the voice of the man she might consider wearing them for.
“Oh. Jake, hi.” If only he were after her instead of throwing out ride-in-the-back ultimatums.
“Good, it doesn’t sound as if I woke you.”
“I wish. But I’ve been on this cleaning frenzy.” Don’t babble. “What’s up?”
“We forgot to set a time.”
“No we didn’t. Eight o’clock tomorrow morning.”
“Huh. Oh yeah, now I remember.”
Maybe this was his subtle way of hitting on her. Smiling to herself, she sank down on the carpet and leaned against the bed, getting comfortable, feeling cozy. “You’re checking up on me, aren’t you?”
“It’s the least I can do. You know, for Brady.”
“Really.”
“Yeah, I owe him.”
Gee, thanks. “So, you want to check me out, Doctor? Ask me what year it is and who’s president?”
“Nah, you sound fine. Call me if you need somebody, okay?”
Now that sounded better. “Promise.”
“Good. See you at eight.”
Suddenly she didn’t feel like cleaning anymore. She leaned her head against the comforter and replayed their conversation, not for the words, but to hear Jake’s deep sexy rumble, to relish how nice it was to have a man care enough to call.
But she didn’t need nice. She needed horny. And potent. Very, very potent.
6
Lilly was up again at 6:00 A.M. She’d chosen red silk pajamas last night, hoping they’d give her concrete ideas for successfully seducing Jake. No such luck, but they’d felt unexpectedly decadent against her skin. Between Jake’s heated touch and the sumptuous silk, she recognized a pattern of at least one heightened sense.
She’d learned some valuable lessons in the five months since Brady’s death, and she reviewed them while she fed the koi and lovebirds and strolled through the atrium at a leisurely pace, checking everything from the tiniest primrose to the tallest tree.
Who knew beforehand what happened when their time was up, what they were supposed to have learned? She did.
Most people weren’t prepared. She would be next time.
They didn’t know what to expect. Again, she did.
Her mother-in-law had given her a framed copy of the Serenity prayer after Brady’s funeral, and she’d carried the words engraved on her consciousness for months now. Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.
Thanks to Elizabeth, she was practically wearing it on her arm, too.
So far Lilly had just about mastered the serene part. She couldn’t change Brady’s death; she’d moved beyond that. Now John and Elizabeth had thrown this whole go-back-but-you-have-a-deadline issue at her, which pretty much blew serenity out of the water.
As for the courage part, well, she could change how she lived. She would. It’d take a lot of courage to give away every blasted cent. Think
about it. What if she ended up on the street, dependent on the charity of others? How ironic. That could be her standing in line outside a food kitchen, eight-and-a-half-months pregnant and hungry.
It would also take a lot of courage to chase a man until he got her pregnant. How much time could she invest in Jake before cutting her losses if he wouldn’t cooperate? With only a few weeks, there really was no room for failure. The dashboard photos spoke in his favor, showing her that he’d had the rollicking, boisterous childhood she’d always dreamed of, the very same childhood she wanted for her kids—no way she wanted a man who wasn’t close to his family. If she had half a chance with him, she had to go for it.
Jake popped into mind again, full of life and vigor and not many clothes.
With a renewed burst of energy, Lilly searched for something in the kitchen to scrub. Eventually she stumbled upon the tub of miniature Snickers bars in the refrigerator, left over from Halloween. Stuffing one into her mouth, she closed her eyes and savored the sweetness.
God, chocolate had always been her favorite—and a chilled Snickers was hard enough to break teeth, that’s why she kept them that way, to slow her down—but since when did one taste this heavenly?
Oh yeah, since I got blown up. As soon as it was chew- able, she consumed it and stuffed in another.
The doorbell bonged promptly at eight o’clock.
Lilly’s hands flew to her hair, her face, her pajamas. She didn’t need a mirror to see what a mess she was. Lopsided hair. Eye makeup that hadn’t quite all come off the night before. Wrinkled pajamas, far too silky to disguise anything beneath them, which she thought might be a little too blatant to hit her target with so early in the morning. She hadn’t even brushed her teeth yet.
“I’ll unlock the door,” she said into the intercom. “But I’m not dressed, so count to ten before you come in.”
Once Jake stepped through the leaded-glass front door into the cavernous marble foyer, he could rest easy that Lilly hadn’t changed her mind about hiring him. While the salary she was paying was a pittance compared to what she owed him and what he needed to get his family out of debt, it was more than he’d clear picking up fares.
And it gave him an additional reason to be with Lilly, one he could rationalize as to how their togetherness was potentially beneficial and not detrimental to his objectives.
A Date on Cloud Nine Page 6
