The Sweetest Thing

by Barbara Freethy

  The Tribune? The Parish family paper? They wouldn't have reviewed a book about their daughter's death, which meant the novel couldn't be about Emily. Natalie forced herself to breathe.

  "I read today that it's going to be a movie, too," Karen continued. "I can see why. I just started it yesterday, and I'm hooked. I can't wait to see what happens."

  "What's it about?" Natalie asked, then wished she hadn't. She didn't want to know what it was about. She didn't want to know anything more about it. But it was too late to take back her question.

  "It's about a murder in a sorority house. A girl named Ellie falls to her death from the second-story roof the night of the initiation."

  Natalie's stomach twisted into a painful knot. Ellie, not Emily, but the names were close.

  "None of her friends or family knows what happened. At least that's what they say. I'm not sure how it's going to end, but I think one of those girls killed her."

  Natalie turned away, her heart racing as the words ran through her head.

  One of those girls killed her.

  And she was one of those girls.

  * * *

  Cole Parish strode through the newsroom of the San Francisco Tribune early Friday evening, nodding to reporters and research assistants who would work into the night, making calls, tracking the wires, and scanning the Internet in search of the latest-breaking stories to fill the pages of the Saturday and Sunday editions. The energy in the newsroom never failed to get Cole's blood pumping, and he needed that energy now, having spent most of the afternoon in a meeting with the bean counters. As executive editor of the paper, it was his job to make sure the paper stayed profitable, a trying proposition in the current climate of instant electronic news.

  Studying the profit and loss statement was his least favorite part of the job. He was a news man at heart, not a business man, but duty to family had landed him behind the big desk in the corner office instead of out on the front lines where he'd always wanted to be. Well, that ship had sailed years ago. No point in crying about it now.

  His secretary looked up at his approach. Monica, an older woman with dark hair and shrewd brown eyes, was a longtime employee. She'd worked for his grandfather, his father, and his uncle, and she probably knew as much about running the paper as Cole did. "Any messages?" he asked.

  "Your father called earlier to confirm that you'll be having dinner with the family on Wednesday evening when they get back from their trip."

  Cole nodded. His parents, along with his aunt and uncle, had spent the past month touring Europe, and he suspected that his father and uncle, who served as chairman of the board and president respectively, were eager to catch up on what was going on with the paper.

  "I told him everything was running smoothly," Monica said. "You also had a message from your cousin Cindy, who ..." Monica frowned as she stared down at the message slip in her hand. "I didn't quite understand what she was talking about, but it was something about a book review in last Sunday's paper. She said she'd call back. She seemed quite upset. She muttered something about family loyalty."

  "When she calls back, take a message. I've told her before that I leave the choices of books up to our book editor, and I don't want to get into another discussion about it. What else?"

  "You have a visitor waiting in your office. She insisted," Monica added with a disapproving glint in her eyes. "When are you going to find a nice girl to settle down with?"

  "Gisela is a very nice girl."

  "She's very something. Nice isn't the word I'd use."

  Nice wasn't the word he'd use, either, Cole thought as he entered his office. Hot, stunning, and sexy came to mind. Actually, his mind failed to function when Gisela brushed her well-endowed breasts against his chest and gave him a long, wet kiss.

  "I missed you, baby. Where have you been?" she asked in a little-girl voice that immediately dampened his enthusiasm. Why did women think that kind of talk was sexy?

  "I've been in meetings all day," he replied, stepping away from her.

  "You know what they say about all work and no play. It makes a man very boring." She gave him a flirtatious smile. She really was pretty, he thought, ash blond hair, dark brown eyes, curves in all the right places. He just wished they had more in common outside of the bedroom. Not that he wanted a long-term relationship. He'd given up on that idea years ago.

  "Ask me what I did today," she continued.

  "What did you do today?"

  "I went to a spa in the Napa Valley with Margarita. It was incredible. We had facials and mud baths, and they wrapped our bodies in seaweed ..."

  Cole sat down at his desk as Gisela rambled on about her visit to the spa with a fellow lingerie model. He turned on the panel of television monitors that lined the opposite wall and skimmed through the tag lines on each news channel, catching up on the latest happenings in the world. Breaking news in war zones had taken on a new dimension in recent years with reporters embedded in battalions and marching into battle along with the soldiers. It was a dangerous but exciting time to be a foreign correspondent.

  "Did you hear what I said?" Gisela asked impatiently.

  "Sorry?" he asked, still distracted as he saw a breaking-news tag flash on the CNN screen. He couldn't quite read the words, but the raging winds and swirling waves suggested a hurricane heading toward the North Carolina coast.

  "Cole, this is ridiculous. You're not listening to me." Gisela slapped the top of his desk with her hand, a small ineffectual tap that would not have dared to chip her red nail polish, but the fact that she'd hit anything at all with those newly painted fingers told him she was truly irritated -- which was par for the course. Gisela was a drama queen.

  Every minor annoyance in her life turned into a major problem.

  "What was the matter this time -- not enough caviar in the body wrap?" he asked.

  "The problem is you."

  Cole sighed. He'd heard that one before -- not just once, either. The comment was usually followed by, You don't spend enough time with me or I don't feel like we really know each other. To which he often felt like replying, Do we need to know each other? Can't we just have a good time together, a few laughs, a lot of sex, and leave it at that? Not that he would ever actually say that. He knew better than to wave a red flag in front of a bull or an irritated woman.

  Before Gisela could explain exactly why she was upset, there was a knock at his office door, and Josh Somerville entered the room. Josh had a typical California beach boy look: a wiry, lean physique perfect for riding a surfboard, skateboard or any other kind of board, sandy blond hair that was never combed, freckles that got worse in the summer, and a wide grin on his perpetually cheerful face. Thank God for Josh. His radar was still working. Growing up next door to each other, Cole and Josh and Josh's twin brother, Dylan, had developed a system with girls. If one was in trouble, one of the others always came to the rescue.

  "Josh, you're right on time." Cole sent his friend a pointed glance.

  Josh darted a quick look at Gisela's stormy face. "I see that I am. Hi, Gertie, how are you?"

  Cole inwardly groaned. Gisela, once known as Gertrude Hamilstein, had changed her name to Gisela years ago, but Josh, a sports reporter for the Trib, had come across the info and couldn't resist goading her with her real name.

  "We're having a private conversation, if you don't mind," Gisela said.

  "I don't mind. Go right ahead." Josh sat down in the chair in front of Cole's desk and stretched out his legs. "What are we talking about?"

  "Love," she said.

  "My favorite topic."

  "I said love, not sex. You wouldn't know the difference."

  "Most men don't," Josh said with a laugh. "Don't you agree, Cole?"

  "Dammit," Cole said, distracted once again by the scene on one of the television monitors. "They just hit the embassy in Jordan." He picked up his phone and punched in the extension for the editor of the foreign affairs desk, his younger cousin Randy. Fortunately, Randy was still
at his desk. "Is Hal in Jordan?"

  "He's on his way home," Randy answered. "His wife is about to go into labor."

  "Who else do we have over there?"

  "Anita is in Lebanon. I'm already on it."

  "Good." Cole hung up the phone to find Gisela shaking her head in disgust. "What?"

  "You're addicted," Gisela replied. "The news is a drug to you, and you can't get enough."

  "The news is my business, and this is a newspaper. We're supposed to report what's going on in the world."

  "How about what's going on in your own life? Aren't you interested in that?"

  "What are you talking about?"

  Josh cleared his throat. "I don't think you two need me for this. I'll come back later."

  "Oh, you can stay," Gisela said with a frustrated shake of her head. "I'm done. I'm leaving."

  "Okay. I'll see you later tonight," Cole said, as Gisela picked up her designer purse.

  She shook her head, an expression of amazement on her face. "I don't think so. Did you hear nothing of what I just said?"

  "Uh ..." he said warily. What on earth had she been talking about?

  "Oh, my God," she said in exasperation. "You really don't listen. I'm breaking up with you. I never want to see you again. Is that clear? Or do you need a ton of bricks to hit you in the head?" To make her point, she picked up the heavy stapler on his desk and threw it at him on her way out the door.

  Cole ducked, but not fast enough. The stapler caught the side of his head and the next thing he saw was a burst of stars that went along with an explosion of pain in his forehead. He put his fingers to his face and they came away bloody. "What the hell?"

  He was barely aware of the flurry of activity that followed. Someone gave him a towel. Josh helped him into the elevator and down to the parking garage, where he put him in his car and drove to the nearest hospital. Apparently, the emergency department of St. Timothy's wasn't as impressed by the gash in his head as his coworkers had been, because they handed him an ice pack and told him to take a seat in a waiting room that was overflowing with a mix of people, many of whom didn't appear to be speaking English.

  "This could take hours," Cole muttered. "We should forget it."

  "We can't forget it. You probably need stitches." Josh sat down in the chair next to him. "You really know how to piss off a woman, I'll say that for you. How's your head?"

  "It hurts like hell." The throbbing pain made it difficult for him to speak.

  "Next time you break up with a woman, make sure there aren't any heavy objects lying around."

  "I didn't know we were breaking up."

  "Apparently that was the problem," Josh said with a grin.

  Cole moved his head, then groaned at the pain that shot through his temple. "Dammit. This is the last thing I needed today. I've got to get out of here. I have things to do."

  "What things? It's Friday night."

  "The news doesn't stop just because it's the weekend. In case you haven't noticed, the world has gone crazy in the last few months."

  Josh leaned forward. "In case you haven't noticed, your world is going crazy."

  "What does that mean?"

  "It means you should start paying attention to problems closer to home, like your girlfriend. You can probably get Gisela back if you call her tonight."

  "Why would I want to do that? She almost killed me."

  "If you'd moved faster, she wouldn't have hit you. You've gotten slow, Parish."

  "I have not gotten slow." Even though his job kept him at his desk for long hours at a time, he worked out every day. "Frankly, I think I've had enough of Gisela anyway. What is with that baby-girl voice she uses? It makes me want to rip my hair out."

  "Thank God she finally got to you. She's been driving me crazy for weeks. She was hot though."

  "Cole Parish?" a nurse asked, interrupting them. "Come with me."

  Cole got to his feet. "You can wait here, if you want," he said to Josh.

  "I'll stick with you. It's a zoo out here," Josh replied as a group of drag queens came into the waiting room.

  They followed the nurse down the hall and into a room with three beds, each separated by a thin curtain. An elderly man lay in one bed. The other was empty. "A doctor will be in shortly," the nurse said. She had barely left the room when they heard a commotion in the hallway.

  A flurry of people in scrubs dashed past the door, shouting out various medical terms as they pushed a gurney down the hall. Cole's reporter instincts kicked in despite the pain in his head. He craned his neck, trying to catch a glimpse of what was going on.

  "I'll check it out," Josh said.

  Cole frowned as his friend rushed out of the room, irritated that he was sidelined while someone else caught the action. He sat down on the bed, holding the ice pack to his head, and wished for a television set. If they were going to make people wait this long, at least they could offer an all-news channel to take their minds off their pain.

  Josh walked back into the room a few minutes later. "Gunshot victim," he said. "Convenience store robbery in the Mission district. The owner shot the robber, a seventeen-year-old kid."

  "Will he make it?"

  "They took him to surgery."

  "I should call Blake," Cole said, referring to the assistant editor who ran the city desk on Friday nights.

  "I'm sure he's already heard about it."

  "Where's my phone?"

  "Who knows? Relax, dude. You might have a concussion."

  "I don't have a concussion, and I don't want the Trib to miss the story. We have a lot of competition these days with blogs and online news outlets."

  "We can handle the competition." Josh sat down in the chair next to the bed. "Besides, you have a lot of people working for you. Let them do their jobs." Josh leaned back and toyed with a piece of tubing hanging from some sort of a machine. "What do you think this is?"

  "I have no idea. Where is the damn doctor anyway? I could have bled to death by now."

  "'Death by Stapler,'" Josh said with a laugh. "There's a headline for you. Or how about 'Psycho Supermodel Snaps'?"

  Cole groaned. "Not funny."

  "It is kind of funny."

  Josh was right. His personal life was now officially a joke. Gisela's parting shot had definitely gotten his attention. Maybe he did need to focus on something or someone besides the news. But not Gisela. That was over. He'd known it for a while. He'd just been too busy to end it. Now that she'd done it, he felt more relieved than anything else.

  Cole looked up as a woman entered the room.

  "Good evening, Mr. --" She stopped abruptly, looking up from the chart with wide, shockingly familiar eyes. "Cole?"

  Natalie?

  His heart thudded against his chest. It couldn't be Natalie. Not now, not after all these years. Not here, not in his city.

  She moved farther into the room, slow, small steps, as if she wasn't quite sure she wanted to come closer. Her hair, a beautiful dark red, was pulled back in a clip, showing off the perfect oval of her face. Her eyes were a brilliant blue, her lips as soft and full as he remembered, but it was the tiny freckle at the corner of her mouth that made him suck in his breath. He'd kissed that freckle. He'd kissed that mouth. God! Natalie Bishop. The only woman he'd ever ... No, he couldn't think it, much less say it.

  It should have been easy to see her. It had been ten years, but it seemed like ten minutes.

  She was older now, a woman -- not a girl. There were tiny lines by her eyes and around her mouth. She'd filled out, grown up, and she'd come back. He wasn't ready to see her again. She didn't look ready to see him, either.

  Cole suddenly became aware of the white coat she was wearing, the stethoscope around her neck, the chart in her hands. She was a doctor. She was his doctor!

  "Well, isn't this quite the reunion?" Josh murmured, breaking the silence between them. "Remember me?"

  Natalie looked at Josh blankly for a second; then recognition kicked in. "Of course. You're Jos
h, Dylan's twin brother and Cole's next-door neighbor."

  "Good memory."

  Natalie turned her attention back to Cole. "Did you come to see me about the book? Is it really about Emily?" Her gaze moved to his head. "Oh, you're hurt. You have a laceration. That's why you're here. Of course that's why you're here," she added with a shake of her head. "What am I thinking?"

  "What book? What are you talking about?"

  Her mouth opened, then closed. "Nothing. Are you in pain?"

  "I've had better days. Are you really a doctor?"

  "Yes, I am. What happened?" She held his chart in front of her like a protective shield.

  "I got hit by a flying object," he said, preferring not to go into the details.

  "His girlfriend threw a stapler at his head," Josh interjected helpfully. "She was trying to get his attention."

  "Did it work?" Natalie asked briskly, her demeanor changing at the mention of a girlfriend. Or maybe she was just coming to grips with the fact that they were in the same room. Whatever the reason, she now had on her game face.

  "I'm definitely switching to paper clips," Cole replied.

  She stared at him for a long moment. He wondered what she was seeing, what she was thinking. Not that he cared. Why would he care what she thought of him? He knew what he thought of her. And it wasn't good.

  "You may need stitches," she said.

  He wondered how she knew that when she hadn't looked at the wound. In fact, she'd stopped a good three feet away and couldn't seem to make herself come any closer. "How long have you worked here?"

  "A few years."

  "A few years?" he echoed. She'd been in San Francisco a few years, working at a hospital a couple of blocks from the newspaper?

  "St. Timothy's is an excellent hospital. They offered me a terrific opportunity, better than I could find anywhere else. That's why I came to San Francisco," she said in a defensive rush. "It had nothing to do with you. I'm going to get some sutures. I'll be back."

  Josh let out a low whistle as Natalie left the room. "I didn't see that one coming."

  "I didn't either," Cole murmured. It must be his night for getting blindsided by women.

  "She looks good."

  "I didn't notice."