The dog had been to war and back. He’d survived. His skills on the battlefield, which the president had extolled, rang in Jake’s ears. They were so impressive, Jake could feel his eyes fill up again when he compared his own life to the shepherd’s. Man, he was so far down on the rungs of the ladder, he didn’t even count. No way could he even come close to comparing himself to Sergeant Gizmo Samson Sweet.
Jake tried to remember the last time he’d actually cried, shedding real tears. Maybe when he was ten years old. Not that he hadn’t wanted to cry many, many times, but his father’s words always echoed in his brain. “Big boys don’t cry.”
“Bullshit!” Jake bellowed to the silence that surrounded him. He repeated it again, “Bullshit!”
The only thing as far as he could tell that he had in common with Gizmo was they were both famous. He through football and the shepherd through war. The shepherd had earned it. All he’d done was run around a football field. No comparison at all. None. The thought rocked him.
And at that moment in time, Jake Masters took control of his life. He straightened up in the chair and headed for the bathroom, where he struggled to get out of his clothes and into the shower. On his own, with no help. Thank God for his upper-body strength. No one was more surprised than Jake himself when he managed it all on his own, even dressing with no help. He was exhausted, but at the same time, he was exhilarated. He rested for a few minutes before he headed back to the chair and out to the elevator.
Sustenance.
Jake poked around the refrigerator and found some cheese, a tomato, a cucumber, something that looked like sprouts of some sort, lettuce, and some sliced pumpernickel bread in a baggie. He spotted a sweet potato at the back of the vegetable bin and popped it into the microwave oven. He knew, because Moose told him, that sweet potatoes were good for something. Cholesterol, he thought, but wasn’t sure. It looked like he wasn’t going to starve after all.
Early in the morning if Moose wasn’t back, and Jake knew he wouldn’t be, he’d call the market and order some groceries. He remembered Moose telling him that the market had a whole section of cooked food, rotisserie chickens, meat loaf, fried chicken, stir-fry, and just about any other food you could mention. He could always go online to one of the food networks and look up recipes if he didn’t like the cooked food, although Moose said it was almost as good as his own. How hard could it be to cook something? This was all assuming Miz Nazi herself and her killer dog didn’t work him to the bone or to the point he was too tired to cook.
Jake Masters stared off into space.
He needed a plan.
A plan that would work.
For him.
And put Miss Nazi Storm Trooper in her place.
Jake chomped down on his sandwich, and while it wasn’t as good as one made by Moose, it was still good. He ate the sweet potato, skin and all, and felt like he’d done something good for his health. Health. He needed to take his pills and his vitamins. The only problem was the pill bottles were lined up on the windowsill over the sink and he couldn’t reach them.
Jake wheeled himself into the laundry room and returned with a broom. He used the long handle to swipe all the pill bottles into the sink. He reached down and lined them up on the counter. He looked at them, wondering why he was taking so many pills, because he could no longer remember what they were for. Moose had always just handed them to him with a glass of water, said, “Take these,” and he took them.
Well, Moose wasn’t here now, was he? With one swipe of his arm, Jake sent the pills, bottles and all, into the sink. Screw it!
Things were different now. Now he was in charge. As much as he hated to admit it, it was a great feeling. He left the mess and headed for his family room, where he turned on the gas-driven fireplace, hit the remote for the eighty-four-inch TV on the wall, tuned it to ESPN, then put it on mute. He scored a long-neck Budweiser from the bar fridge and settled down to read, again, everything Gracie Sweet had given him to read. He would ace her damn quiz if it was the last thing he ever did.
Chapter Ten
Gracie felt all woolly headed as she sat in Jake’s driveway. She wished she was anywhere but here. Gizmo, in the seat next to her, was whining, so it was a good bet he wasn’t any happier than she was at the moment. She thought about Beth’s late-night phone call, and everything she’d told her about Moose. She had felt depressed after the phone call and tossed and turned all night. She had dark circles under her eyes and felt jittery. She was out of her element, and she knew it. She turned to the dog, and said, “I wish I had never let Beth talk me into any of this. I wish, I wish, I wish. And now I’m stuck. Just the thought of spending all day in that room with Jake is making me crazy.” Gizmo continued to whine.
“Look outside, Giz. Is this a perfect day or what? Any other time, we could have gone out to one of those farms and picked pumpkins and the fall apples for Thanksgiving dinner. Blue skies, just the right temperature, the sun is out. And here we are. Tell you what, we’ll go out for lunch. Actually, we don’t have a choice, with Moose gone now. It’s either bag it, which we didn’t do, or go out. We’ll need a break by lunchtime, I’m thinking.”
Giz barked. Time to move. Gracie punched in the code that would open the massive iron gates. Was Jake Masters keeping people out or keeping himself in? Like it mattered at this point in time.
Gracie drove around to the back of the house and parked. She found the key to the kitchen door with no problem. She let herself in and looked around at the messy kitchen. It had been neat and tidy when she’d left yesterday. She eyed the coffeepot and started poking around for the coffee container. That’s when she noticed all the prescription bottles in the sink. Her eyebrows shot upward. Jake Masters was a tall guy, six-three or -four. Sitting in the wheelchair, he should have been able to reach into the sink if the bottles toppled over by accident. Why hadn’t he done that? Or had he tossed them in the sink deliberately? Well, that wasn’t her problem.
The hair on the back of Gizmo’s neck moved. She heard the whirring of the wheelchair; then, out of the corner of her eye, she spotted her nemesis.
“How’d you get in here?” Jake barked.
“With a key.” Gracie held up the key to make her point. “I didn’t break in, if that’s your next question. Moose gave me the code to the gate, and here I am.” She eyed the dripping coffee and had her cup ready the moment she heard the last plop of sound. She’d only made two cups, just enough to fill the oversized coffee mug she’d brought from home, a gift from Alex. The script on the side of the cup had at one time read You are the love of my life. The letters were faded and worn off now, but she couldn’t bear to part with the mug. She added the last of the cream, then tossed the bottle into the trash container under the sink.
“Let’s go, Giz, we have a long day ahead of us.”
From his position in the doorway, Jake couldn’t see the counter past the center island and had no way of knowing the coffeepot was empty. “I take mine light with two sugars.”
Gracie made a production of looking around to see who Jake was talking to. “I don’t see anyone else here in the kitchen, so I assume you were speaking to me, right? Well, I’m not your maid. Let’s get that straight right now. You want coffee, make it yourself. Make it quick because we have a lot of ground to cover. By the way, did you sleep in your clothes? You look awful. You also need to shave. Just because we’re working from home doesn’t mean you should look the way you do. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to get ready for this workday.”
Jake had no other recourse except to move his chair in reverse so Gracie and Gizmo could get through the door.
Jake looked around at the mess he’d left the night before. He winced. If Moose saw the mess he’d created, he’d pitch an unholy fit. Well, Moose wasn’t here. Coffee. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d made coffee. Come to think of it, maybe he’d never made coffee. How hard could it be? He looked around, wondering where the container was. He finally found it. He was hoppi
ng mad now. Why couldn’t she have made enough for him, too? This was his house and his coffee. “I’m not your maid,” he said, mimicking Gracie’s words. He tried to spoon the coffee grounds into the wire basket but missed by half an inch. Coffee grounds flew everywhere. A string of obscenities filled the air.
He was back to mimicking Gracie Sweet again. “Did you sleep in your clothes?” Well, yeah, he had, but so what? “You also need to shave.” Like I don’t know that. Damn Nazi.
Jake eyed the coffeemaker again. He really wanted a cup of coffee. He didn’t come alive until his second cup. He sucked in his breath as he wheeled himself over to the sink to fill the pot with water up to the two-cup line. That’s when he saw all the pill bottles in the sink. “Shit!” He decided his best bet was to ignore the pill bottles just the way he was ignoring the mess he’d made. This time he made sure the coffee grounds made their way into the wire basket. One scoop for each cup, plus one for the pot. He wondered how he knew that. Probably Moose had said it at some point, and for whatever reason, he now remembered. He heaved a huge sigh of relief when he turned the on button into position and watched it turn bright red.
Two things hit him at once. He needed to clean up his language. He’d never been one to curse and swear, but lately that seemed to be all he did. He decided a few hells and damns along the way didn’t count. The second thing he needed to do was to find a housekeeper. Stat. Somewhere in one of the drawers, Moose kept a list of the tradespeople he dealt with. From time to time, he’d used a domestic service to help with the heavy cleaning. It took Jake close to ten minutes, but he finally found the book. He rifled through the pages until he found the page he wanted. In the blink of an eye, he punched in the number, announced himself, and stated his needs. He listened, and said okay from time to time. Finally, he said, “And have her stop at the Emporium for food. There is nothing here. I have an account there. No, she will not be living in, but I want her here at six every morning. She can leave at five as long as she prepares dinner before she goes. I understand the salary scale. Fax me whatever it is you need me to sign.” Jake rattled off his fax number, then gave the lady he was talking to the code to the gate. “I’ll leave the kitchen door open. The door chimes, so I’ll know when she gets here. One last thing. I’m handicapped and am in a wheelchair. If that makes a difference, tell me now.” The voice on the other end of the phone said that was no problem.
Jake leaned back in his chair, feeling like he’d just scaled a mountain. Not only had he made coffee, but he’d hired a housekeeper. Yahhh, Jake Masters.
Jake had just settled his special coffee cup into the special holder on his chair when he looked up to see Gizmo in the doorway staring at him. He forgot how ticked off he was that Gracie used the last of the cream for her coffee and left none for him. To his credit, he didn’t cuss, but his stomach muscles tied themselves in a knot.
Eyeing the dog, Jake spoke softly to the big animal. “I’m not having a very good morning, Sergeant. As you can see,” he said, waving his arms about. “You look really smart, so I’m assuming you know I’m not in top form here. The truth is, I don’t know if I’ll ever be in top form again. Something tells me you’ve seen it all, and I’m a pretty poor example of mankind. It’s getting away from me, as much as I hate to admit it. The thing is, Sergeant, I have no one to blame but myself. I’ve been blaming everyone else to make myself feel better. It doesn’t work. Okay, enough, right? Lead on, Sergeant, and I will follow you.”
Gizmo tilted his head to the side and stared at Jake and the chair. He advanced into the room and stopped directly in front of the chair and looked up at Jake. He let out a soft woof, then a second woof. Then he held out his paw for Jake to shake. Jake grinned. “You get it, don’t you? Well, damn. Okay, let’s go show that Na—your boss I’m not the lazy laggard and whiny puke she thinks I am.”
Giz backed up and walked alongside the wheelchair. He stepped aside to let Jake power through, then took up his position again. Gracie looked up and immediately knew something was different, but she couldn’t figure out what it was. She hated it when she couldn’t figure something out. Time.
Gracie wasted no time. She swiveled her chair around and maneuvered it to the center of the room so she could see and hear Jake better. “You ready?”
“As I’ll ever be, but first let me suggest something to you. How about if I just tell you my thoughts after reading through everything you gave me? That might save us some time. Then, if I missed something, you can call me on it. Does that work for you, Miz Sweet?”
“Actually, it does, Mr. Masters. Go for it!”
Jake took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. He tried to center himself the way his therapist had taught him. “I went into this knowing absolutely nothing, and I do mean nothing, about the dating game or the matchmaking business. To be honest, I’m not even sure I knew there was such a thing. I am referring to back in the day when my sister started up this operation. In today’s world, I see commercials all the time on TV for matchmaking. I have to say when I do see a commercial for a dating service, I switch the channel because, for some reason, it offends me.
“When Beth, my sister, started up her business it was at the beginning, and to me it was like the Wild West, a new frontier. There were no rules, no regulations. Dog eat dog, you kill what you eat, and all for the dollar. The fly-by-night companies sprang up everywhere, most overnight. People flocked to them, thinking the grass was greener on the other side of the fence. People, especially the younger ones, dumped their current partners hoping to find the perfect mate, who just might be rich and love them into eternity. How’m I doing so far?” Gracie nodded for him to continue.
“And then the crazies started coming out of the woodwork, and things weren’t kind of so wonderful anymore. Applicants were lying right and left, sending pictures of other people who looked better than they did. The meet-and-greets turned into horror shows, and the clients started demanding their money back. They do not do background checks on the Internet, so anyone could and did sign up.
“The services started to scuttle and scurry, not wanting to lose the gold mine that allowed them to make money hand over fist while sitting at home in their ratty bathrobes. The million-dollar matchmaking service eventually turned into a billion-dollar-a-year business. The owners of the companies started to tighten up on the Web sites, and started charging a fifty-dollar monthly fee. Then they initiated tiers, silver, gold, platinum, with the platinum costing five thousand dollars. These were called VIPs, and they had access to the Web site and local in-person functions. That costs extra, usually seventy-five a month for the silver tier for a once-a-month event, usually something at a restaurant, or maybe an art gallery. Something different every month. It’s a hundred-dollar-a-month fee for the gold tier. Gold entitles the applicant access to the Web site and special video matchup. The set-up cost here is five hundred and costs a hundred dollars a month.
“I found that the silver and gold tiers are not as stringent as the platinum. Platinum tries to weed out the losers; they do in-depth interviews, and each applicant is guaranteed five dates. All for five thousand dollars. If you don’t meet your match after five dates, you have to start all over again and plunk down another five grand.” Jake stopped and looked straight at Gracie. “It’s a hell of a way to make money. Should I continue?” Gracie nodded.
“I can give you some statistics. There are 54,250,000 single people in the United States.
“The total number of people in the United States who have tried online dating is 41,259,000.
“Annual revenue from the online-dating industry is $1,249,000,000.
“Average amount of money spent by dating-site customers per year is $239.
“Only 10 percent of the customers leave after the first three months.
“Percent of male online users is 52.4.
“Percent of female online users is 47.6.
“Should I continue?”
Gracie realized Jake had indeed read the material s
he’d given him and also committed it to memory. “Let me ask you a few questions. I’m sure you read the write-ups on the other online services that I included. Tell me what, at this point in time, sets your sister’s service apart from the others.”
Jake didn’t miss a beat. “She had the good sense to scale back after the wild-frontier days. She went smaller and more secure. She made her bag of money first crack out of the gate. Then she made that money work for her. I have to say I admire what she’s done. In a million years, I wouldn’t have thought she was capable of running a company, much less something like this, and sustaining it. I see hands-on all the way. I’m impressed, for whatever that’s worth.
“I’m also impressed that Perfect Match has three satellite offices, in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles. The managers appear to be top notch. I just don’t know where I’m supposed to fit in to all of this.
“In case you haven’t figured it out, I made the decision to have the surgery I have put off for too long. I go in for my first workup Friday, the day after Thanksgiving. I expect the surgery will take place the following day but no later than Tuesday. Just so you know, I won’t be coming back here for a while because I’ll be going straight to rehab. I’m not trying to shirk my duty here or weasel out on my sister. It is what it is. Anything I can do on my laptop at the center, I’ll be happy to do. Probably not until week two, just so you know.”
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