I didn’t know if I wanted to answer that question. Why would I even entertain thoughts of that nature regarding my boss, when a much more rational alternative in the form of Jonah Freeman had just presented itself? My sister Ellen had once told me I always wanted what I couldn’t have, and although at the time I’d heaped scorn on her big-sister philosophizing, maybe she’d been right. Maybe I was trying to talk myself into being attracted to Van Rijn just because he seemed so unattainable. He certainly hadn’t said or done anything to make me think he regarded me as anything except his executive assistant. Pretty much all innuendo had been manufactured in my own mind. Or had it?
I didn’t know. Right then I didn’t know anything except that I was tired and wanted to go home. I had the rest of the weekend to get all this sorted out and determine the best way to face Van Rijn on Monday morning. Very likely he hadn’t meant to do anything except bring me to an event where I could meet some of his clients. All very professional and above board. It was just my silly brain, trying to see things that didn’t exist. Like the look of dislike on Van Rijn’s face when he spotted me with Jonah. It could have been nothing. Or maybe he just didn’t like Jonah because he thought he was spoiled. It certainly didn’t have to mean Van Rijn was jealous because he’d seen me talking to another man. That was just stupid.
Wasn’t it?
Six
“I do not believe you,” Leslie declared. “Do you know how hard it is to find a nice Jewish boy in this town? And you scoop one up, just like that?”
“I didn’t say he was Jewish.”
“With a name like Jonah Freeman?” Her eyes narrowed. “What was his father’s name again?”
“Howard Freeman.”
“Holy shit.” Leslie took a bracing pull at her grande macchiato. “Do you have any idea who he is?”
“A movie producer, right?”
“Yeah, a movie producer…the way Donald Trump is just a real estate developer. Ever heard of a little film franchise called Lone Justice?”
Of course I had. Billings wasn’t exactly Outer Mongolia; the Lone Justice movies had been big hits in my hometown, maybe in part because of their crowd-pleasing brand of frontier-spirit vigilantism. I’d only seen the first one, mostly because I wasn’t a huge fan of the sort of film that traded meaningful dialogue for a high body count. But even I knew the movies had pulled in truly obscene amounts at the box office. “Yeah, I’ve heard of it,” I said cautiously.
“Over two billion in worldwide box office,” Leslie said. “That’s billion with a ‘b.’ A big producer gets a cut of the profits in addition to his upfront fee, so I’m guessing Howard Freeman probably pulled in at least a hundred million for those movies—not counting all the other ones he’s produced over the years.”
Holy crap. No wonder the guy didn’t bat an eye over dropping a quarter-million on a piece of furniture. That was just chump change to someone like Howard Freeman. Frankly, I wasn’t even sure I could comprehend such staggering amounts of money. I also reflected that I’d probably spent more time thinking about money—my woeful lack of it, the large amounts it took to get by in L.A., and whether I’d ever earn enough to have anything except a hand-to-mouth existence—during my last six months here than I had my entire life. Of course, I’d never lived on my own before. While I always had jobs, starting with my junior year of high school and going on from there, I’d stayed at home all through college, saving my pennies. Even then I’d known I wouldn’t stay in Billings, although the plan to come to Los Angeles didn’t crystallize until about six months after I graduated. But still, it just didn’t seem as if people back in Montana had obsessed over finance quite the same way they did out here in L.A.
Although I was feeling a little shaky now that I knew exactly who Howard Freeman was, I managed to reply, “Well, I don’t care who Jonah’s father might be. I just know that Jonah was a nice guy. He seemed relieved to find somebody normal to talk to.”
“I’ll bet. Guys like that are always drawn to the scent of fresh meat.”
I felt a stab of irritation. Guys like that? How would she know? She hadn’t met Jonah. She didn’t know him. Not that I could claim any great insights, either, but at least I’d spent a little time around him.
“Whatever,” I said, and gave a weary little shrug. Even though I’d gotten to bed by midnight, I still felt inexplicably tired, and my cappuccino wasn’t doing much to wake me up. “He probably won’t even call.”
Leslie lifted her shoulders. “You never know.”
Right then my cell phone rang. I jumped, and Leslie and I both looked at each other and burst out laughing. I dug the phone out of my purse and gave a quick glance at the readout to see if I recognized the incoming call. Of course I didn’t. All I could see was that it was a 323 number. My heart started to beat a little faster, although I tried to tell myself that of course Jonah wouldn’t be so over-eager as to be calling me at ten-thirty the morning after we’d just met the night before.
I flipped open the phone. “Hello?”
“Katherine.”
Van Rijn. Curiously enough, my heart didn’t stop pounding. “Oh, good morning, Mr. Van Rijn.”
Across the table, Leslie waggled her eyebrows at me. In response, I frowned at her, hoping she’d get the message and keep her mouth shut. The last thing I needed was some ill-timed remark on her part about my hot boss or something.
Van Rijn said, “I’m sorry to trouble you on the weekend, but I’ve had some urgent business come up which calls me out of town for a few days. I realized that I hadn’t yet given you a key to the office, and of course you will need to keep things running in my absence. Would it be possible for you to come by my house to get the keys? I regret that I don’t have time to meet you anywhere else—my flight leaves in a few hours.”
I knew couldn’t refuse; it might be a Saturday, but apparently I was still on-call. Still, as “additional duties” went, this one was pretty mild. “Of course, Mr. Van Rijn. Can you give me the address?” As the words left my mouth, I realized I didn’t have anything to write with. I made a flailing gesture at Leslie, and with a knowing grin on her face she slid her napkin toward me, then pulled a pen that advertised the plumbing company she worked for from her own purse.
He named an address on Parva Street. “Not too far from the Observatory,” he said. “Take Commonwealth from Los Feliz.”
I scrawled the address on the napkin Leslie had provided. “No problem. I’m up by the Galleria, so I should be able to get there in about fifteen minutes.”
“Excellent. I’ll see you then.” He hung up.
Well, that was that. I closed my phone and set it down on the table top.
Leslie was watching me with an amused expression on her face. “So is he going to show you his etchings now?”
“Very funny. He’s going out of town and needs me to come by and get the keys to the office from him.”
“Not bad. I almost believe it myself.”
Most of the time Leslie’s incessant teasing didn’t bother me. The last six-plus months had taught me that was how she approached most relationships. After meeting her brothers, I could see why. They didn’t take anything too seriously.
At the moment, however, the constant ribbing had lost a bit of its charm. I remarked, “You know, I’m pretty sure that if he planned to use some cheap moves on me, he would have done it last night when he had me all alone in the parking lot at work. Driving up to his house in broad daylight makes me a little conspicuous.”
“If you say so.”
By that she most likely meant I’d won the argument (or at least made my opinion clear enough that further discussion on the subject would be highly unwelcome), but she wasn’t about to admit it. Fair enough. I’d never been a big fan of arguing a point into the ground. However, judging by the endless bickering Leslie and her two brothers exchanged, I’d gotten the impression that was just how they’d all been raised.
“Sorry to ditch you, but I need to get going,” I went
on. “I’ll drop you back at the apartment on my way over to Mr. Van Rijn’s place.” We’d gone out to Starbucks in the Mercedes, naturally. After that we’d had some vague plans for lunch and maybe a movie, but those activities were going to have to be postponed for a bit.
“All right,” she replied, and scooped up the brown leather monstrosity she called a purse. A sudden glint appeared in her eyes. “Can I drive?”
“Hell, no,” I said. Actually, Leslie was a very good driver, but while I trusted her abilities, I couldn’t say the same for the other people on the road. The last thing I needed was to explain any accident that might happen with Leslie behind the wheel instead of me.
Her wide mouth formed itself into a pout, but I guess she knew there was no point in arguing. Instead, she pushed back her chair and got up from the table, and I followed suit, heading out to the parking lot and my car.
Luckily I only had to go about five minutes out of my way to drop Leslie off at our apartment complex. She waved goodbye and called out, “Have fun! Hope you packed some condoms!”
Oh, for Christ’s sake— Not bothering to reply, I pushed the button to roll up the passenger-side window, which Leslie had left open. Then I headed over to the freeway and took the quick hop down to Los Feliz and made my way up the hill. Even at that time of the morning the streets around me were packed with cars. Maybe it wasn’t rush hour, but there were still plenty of people on their way to the Observatory or going to Griffith Park for picnics or hiking and whatever else they could do to fill up the day. At least it had cooled down enough that I’d actually been able to put on a blouse with short sleeves instead of my usual weekend tank top, although the weather was still too hot for my taste. Fall seemed a long ways off.
From Los Feliz I turned onto Commonwealth and followed it to Parva as Van Rijn had instructed. The street wound up through the hills in such convolutions that I hoped I’d be able to find my way back. I crawled along, trying to read the numbers on the houses, which wasn’t always easy. A lot of them had lush landscaping and trees around them for privacy, and half the time I couldn’t make out a number at all.
I actually overshot Van Rijn’s property, mostly because he’d neglected to tell me that I wasn’t looking for a house, but a gated driveway. After I’d made a U-turn and backtracked, I found the gate and pulled up to it. As I approached, it swung inward. Sort of creepy, but I supposed he must have a security camera watching the gate, even though I couldn’t see it.
The driveway sloped upward and seemed to go on for an impossibly long time; I wondered just how big the property really was. Finally the drive opened up into a circular paved area that fronted the house and terminated in a large-five car garage. The house itself was Mediterranean in design, but in a mellow, old-Hollywood way, not like the row after row of faux Spanish-style tract homes I’d seen in L.A.’s suburbs.
I stopped the car more or less in front of the entrance to the house. A few seconds after I’d gotten out, the front door opened, and Van Rijn smiled at me from just inside. “You made good time.”
“The lights liked me today.”
He didn’t reply, but nodded and stepped aside so I could enter the house. While it wasn’t quite as massively impressive as Howard Freeman’s home, I found myself liking it much more. Of course there were antiques, in an eclectic mix of styles that somehow worked better together than they probably had any right to. In rooms to either side of the foyer in which we stood, filmy curtains surrounding French doors moved gently in the light morning breeze.
“The keys,” Van Rijn said, going to a spindly-legged table against the wall beneath a sweeping staircase. He handed me a ring from which dangled an assortment of keys, and then a folded piece of paper. As he did so, his fingers brushed against mine for a fraction of a second. Something about even that fleeting touch was enough to send a thrill through me, and I had to force myself to attend to his next words. “Also, the codes to the alarm system. You have thirty seconds after entering the building to enter the code, or the alarm will sound. The phone number to the security company is there as well, in case you’re unable to disarm the alarm in time and need to inform them there was no actual break-in.”
Still feeling a little off-balance from my reaction to his touch, I somehow managed to reply, “Of course.” Once I recovered myself, however, it occurred to me that Van Rijn was putting a lot of faith in someone who’d only worked for him a few days. Then again, I was pretty sure Pyramid Imports was insured up to the hilt. Even the little I’d seen of my boss had told me he wasn’t the type to take the risk of having substandard coverage for his business. I cleared my throat and inquired, “How long are you going to be out of town?”
“I hope to be back by Thursday. I go first to Amsterdam, then Brussels. I may have to stop in New York on my return trip, but that has not yet been settled. If I do, then I may not return to Los Angeles until a week from today.”
A whole week? I fought the sinking feeling in my stomach and tried to tell myself it was just trepidation at the thought of being left to run Pyramid Imports on my own for a week. Then again, my limited experience had shown me that the business was pretty low-maintenance—on my end, at least. As for not seeing Van Rijn for such a lengthy stretch of time…well, plenty of time to worry about that later. Seven days, to be precise.
“No problem,” I said. “You can count on me.”
That sharp blue gaze rested on my face for a moment, and he nodded. “I am sure of that.” A barely noticeable glance at the razor-thin watch on his wrist. “The car will be here soon to pick me up. My cell phone number is on the reverse side of the paper with the alarm code information. If there is an emergency, don’t hesitate to call.”
I wondered how much he could do to help if something catastrophic happened. After all, he was going to be five thousand miles away. But of course he’d have other contacts here in Los Angeles—lawyers, insurance agents, that sort of thing—if something did go dreadfully wrong while he was gone. “I’m sure everything will be fine,” I replied, after a hesitation I hoped he didn’t notice.
“Of that I have no doubt. But I’m sure you have other things to occupy your Saturday, so I’ll let you be on your way.”
Now that his business was done, of course Van Rijn wanted to be rid of me. So much for the whole “etchings” notion Leslie had so gleefully entertained. It was silly to persist in the idea that he had any sort of ulterior motives as far as I was concerned. I just wished I didn’t feel so disappointed at that realization.
“Have a good flight,” I said, and then blurted, “If you need someone to check on the house or anything—”
Was it just my imagination, or was there something indulgent in the way he smiled at me? “That’s a very generous offer, Katherine, but not necessary. My housekeeper will keep things in hand for me here in my absence.”
Of course. After all, a place like this couldn’t stay so model-home perfect on its own. Very likely Van Rijn had a whole staff besides the housekeeper to make sure everything was spotless at all times. I just wasn’t used to people who had household staff. The only time my mother had ever had “help” was the time when I was around six, and she’d broken her foot while helping my father clean out the garage. She’d managed to keep hobbling around enough to make dinner, but housework was beyond her for about two months.
Great. So once again I’d betrayed to Van Rijn what a total greenhorn I was.
“Oh, right,” I said. Then, since I figured I’d better get out of there before I made even more of a fool out of myself than I already had, I added, “Guess I’d better get going, then.”
He only nodded and guided me back to the door. I dug in my purse for my sunglasses and planted them on my nose once I was back outside. At least that way Van Rijn might not be able to read my expression, which I guessed was anything but placid. Why the hell did I keep feeling the sensation of his fingers brushing against mine?
“I’ll keep in touch,” he said, as I climbed into the driver’s
seat of the C-class.
I gave a brief nod and smiled, then closed the door. Almost at once I felt a little better; it was easier to concentrate after I was encased in that private sphere of air conditioning and leather seats. I turned the key in the ignition and maneuvered the car around in the drive so I was pointed back toward the street. I forced myself not to peer into the rearview mirror so I could catch one last glimpse of Van Rijn before the curve of the driveway hid him from view. That would have been altogether too pathetic.
Of course, it was still pretty pathetic that I couldn’t seem to concentrate on much of anything except those piercing blue eyes, or the way the tanned skin of his throat had shown against the open white collar of the shirt he was wearing. I realized this was the first time I’d seen him in anything except a suit and tie. Good thing he was so formal in his dress at work, or I would have run the risk of being permanently distracted by wondering if he was that tan all over.
Maybe it was good that he was going to be away so long. Maybe in that span of time I’d be able to figure out what to do about this inexplicable attraction I’d somehow developed for Van Rijn…a man who was probably the last person I should have ever considered having a relationship with.
I got back to my apartment about ten minutes later and was immediately struck by the contrast between its shabbiness and the quiet elegance of Van Rijn’s home. So I wasn’t exactly earning enough to buy a mansion even with my current salary, but maybe it was time for me to think about getting some new digs. After all, now I could afford a lot more than this cramped little studio.
Then again, running off and getting myself someplace more lavish maybe wasn’t the best idea. I didn’t know how long the gig at Pyramid Imports was going to last. Wouldn’t it be better to just sock money away for a while before I made any drastic decisions? I was actually pretty good at saving up; I’d paid cash for my poor abandoned Corolla, and I hadn’t asked my parents for a penny when I moved out to Southern California. That wad of hundred-dollar bills my uncle had slipped into my hand just before I left town was supposed to be our little secret. And thank God for that—everything in L.A. had cost twice as much as I had expected. I wouldn’t have lasted as long as I did without his help.
Fringe Benefits Page 8
