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  Even his parents, with master’s degrees and thirty years of teaching experience, struggled to make ends meet. He never wanted that. In fact, he intended to make their lives easier as soon as he was in a stronger position at the firm.

  Janie listened closely, writing an occasional note, honing in on him with her gaze, working him over with her intuition. God, he wanted this finished. He ran his finger under his collar.

  “What about outside interests? What are your passions?”

  Hell. He couldn’t say work again. “I used to play baseball for a parks and rec league. I rode with a bicycle club. Also, photography. I won some prizes.”

  “But that’s not recent?”

  “I’m on a partner track.”

  “Sure,” she said, but she pursed her lips in mild disapproval.

  “I went skiing two weeks ago,” he blurted, though it was for the firm and he’d mostly schmoozed with clients or worked in his room. He’d only managed one ski run.

  “What leisure activities will you share with the woman in your life?”

  “I thought we’d eat out, go to movies, plays, all that.” That sounded lame. “Maybe hike?”

  “Relationships take time, Cole,” she said gently. “If you’re not in a good place with your career…”

  “I’m prepared to budget the time.” Benjamin, Langford and Tuttleman could spare a few of the sixty hours a week he gave them so that he could advance the greater good—their mutual future.

  “Dates are not billable hours.”

  “I realize that.” Not billable, but an investment in his career, all the same. A settled life with an appropriate wife would edge him into the partner slot over his competitors—two notorious womanizers. Which was why he was subjecting himself to a critique from this steel-eyed fairy.

  That and the empty echo in his life.

  “And I’m shifting my priorities. In fact, I’ll be taking care of my neighbor’s dog for a few weeks. I see it as practice in accommodating another being into my life.”

  “That’s something,” she said. He felt her rooting for him, like a dear friend or a sister, and that touched him.

  “I’ll make it work, Jane. I promise.”

  “Tell me what you hope for in a relationship.”

  “A partner. Someone to share my life.” He pictured Sunday mornings in bed reading interesting tidbits to each other from the New York Times before he headed to the office to put in a few hours.

  She’d be okay with him leaving, of course, since she’d have her own plans. He’d bring home takeout or she’d cook. He would cook, too, when time allowed. The best marriages were egalitarian.

  Janie asked more questions. Did he want children—he did. What were his goals beyond making partner—to grow with the firm, to make his mark, perhaps open his own firm, make a good life for his family. Finally she closed the folder and regarded him critically.

  Now what? He felt like he’d been through therapy.

  “Did you bring something to change into for your Close-Up?”

  He looked down at his gray suit, red tie and starched white shirt. “Why?”

  “You’re a tad formal. We want to emphasize the whole you.”

  He just looked at her.

  “Yes, I know. That is the whole you.” She sighed. “At least take off your jacket and tie and roll up your sleeves.” She gentled the command with a weary smile.

  He stood and shrugged out of his jacket, then dug at the knot of his tie. “How long will this take?”

  “Not long, but, as I said earlier—”

  “I know, I know. I’ll make the time.”

  “Let’s go, then.” She led the way and he followed, rolling his sleeves as he went, to a small room with a video camera on a tripod pointed at a stool.

  She motioned for him to sit, then drew down a photographic backdrop of a forest, the trees grainy and blurred from too much enlargement. He sat, managing a smile, despite how goofy he knew he looked in his dress clothes—like an SUV ad of Mr. Corporate escaping civilization into the woods.

  She looked at him through the viewfinder. “Lean a little forward, Cole…that’s it. Give me a relaxed smile…more…too much…okay, that’ll do.”

  He adjusted himself on her command, tension mounting.

  “Now, imagine the camera is the love of your life.”

  Great. He tried to feel warmly toward the device, but he was too literal-minded and it was cold glass surrounded by black metal.

  “You have five minutes before fate separates you,” she continued cheerily. “Tell her what she must know about you.”

  “No pressure there.” He tried to laugh, but it turned into a rasp over his dry throat. He patted his pants pocket for his notes, then remembered he’d left them in his jacket. “My speech is in the other room.”

  “Spontaneous is better, Cole.”

  “Spontaneous?” Sweat dribbled down his temples. This was way more nerve-racking than he’d expected.

  “Just relax, be yourself, and speak from the heart. Go!”

  Oookay. “Yes. Well. I’m Cole. I’m an attorney—business law, specializing in mergers and acquisitions. Benjamin, Langford and Tuttleman, or ‘BLT, hold the mayo,’ we like to say.” He laughed—which came out in a snort—and felt like an idiot. His cell phone chimed from his breast pocket. He lifted a hand. “One sec.”

  Janie shot him a look, but when he heard Rob Tuttleman’s voice, he was glad he’d taken the call. Tuttleman wanted to meet with Cole and Trevor McKay, one of his competitors for partner, about an important case that had fallen through the cracks. A crucial break for Cole. “Terrific…looking forward to it,” he said into the phone. “We can meet as soon as I get back in about…” He glanced at his watch, then at Jane, who looked stern. Dates aren’t billable hours. “I’ll buzz you when I get back.”

  He hung up, determined to hurry this along. “Sorry. Where was I?”

  “Holding the mayo. Let’s talk about you as a person, not a lawyer. Go.”

  “Let’s see. I’m dependable…loyal…faithful. Hell, I sound like a St. Bernard. What else? I’m looking for a woman who wants to join her life with mine.” That sounded hopelessly drippy.

  The clink of jewelry signaled the arrival of the receptionist—Gail was her name, he thought—and he was relieved by the interruption.

  “Sorry, but I have Harold Rheingold from Inside Phoenix on the line, Janie. It’s about the article.”

  “Oh. I should take this.” She looked apologetically at him.

  “I can do the Close-Up,” Gail said, bustling to the camera, her large bosom jostling for air behind a tight purple blazer.

  Jane looked uncertainly at him.

  “We’ll be fine,” he said, figuring the woman couldn’t possibly have Jane Fall’s intensity, sense of mission or intuition. He’d get Gail to cut it short.

  Once Jane was gone, Gail pushed a pencil into her piled-up red hair and looked at him over half-glasses trimmed in rhinestones. “You’re one lucky man to have Janie Falls on the case. She found my husband for me, you know.”

  “You were a client?”

  “Nope. I was interviewing for the receptionist job and Wayne, the light of my life, was installing phones. Before he could say ‘Can you hear me now?’ Janie had matched us. And Wayne is the song in my heart, let me tell you. She’ll find you yours.”

  “I hope so.” He did. He craved a bond with one special person. Yeah, getting married would help his career, but what he really wanted was someone to grow old with. Someone to stand side by side with, facing life’s challenges, enjoying its triumphs. A soul mate, corny as that sounded, though he’d never say that out loud to anyone.

  Gail bent to study him through the viewfinder, making him feel like a bug under a microscope.

  “I think I should explain what I’m looking for in a mate,” he said to hurry her along. If they knew what he wanted, the women could self-select. He didn’t want to disappoint anyone.

  Gail tapped a finger t
o her lip. “Not sure that’s compelling, but we can always edit it out. Okay…action!”

  Action? They were in Hollywood now? “I’m hoping for someone comfortable enough in her career that she can be flexible about mine. There are social events and charity projects related to the firm, so she should enjoy that. She should also be an independent thinker, a self-starter and a team player.”

  “Hon, do you want her to marry you or work for you?”

  “Oh. Sounded like a job description?” On the other hand, too many couples got caught up in chemistry and learned later their lives didn’t mesh.

  “You’re not putting in an order at the Wife Factory. Try selling her on you.”

  “So I should explain that I’m—”

  “Not the ‘self-starter, team player’ bit. Give me something tender and sensitive.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Even independent, self-starting team players want roses and poetry. I’ll walk you through it, don’t worry.”

  Gail swung into action, directing every aspect of his performance, from his body angle, facial expression and vocal quality to the words he used. She yelled “cut” and “action” until he had a headache, before finally declaring it a “wrap,” and offering to show him the “rough cut.”

  He didn’t have time. He was hopelessly late for the meeting with Tuttleman and McKay. Besides, he couldn’t bear seeing what she’d gotten him to say. He’d blurted the Sunday-morning-and-the-Times fantasy and confessed his deepest hopes. What sensible woman wanted a sweaty, desperate lawyer blathering on about melding two lives into one?

  He’d need a redo. With Jane, this time, not Gail Ford Coppola, who kept saying, “Go deeper, no, deeper, give me the inner Cole.” He hoped to hell his computerized personality inventory netted him Potentials, because all the inner Cole would earn him was therapy.

  2

  “OF COURSE I’ll come out for the retreat,” Kylie said to Garrett McGrath, her future boss, swerving to miss a minivan. “And the account meetings are no problem.” Her heart pounded high and tight from the near-accident and the stress of easing the impact of her delayed start date in L.A. Plus, if she didn’t get the artwork on her front seat to the printer in ten minutes, her client’s grand opening would be ruined.

  “Just think of me as a satellite office for these few extra weeks,” she said, wishing Garrett had waited just an hour to return her call. Who knows what other promises she’d make in her frantic effort to survive the drive and make him happy? She’d already promised two trips to L.A. and an entire weekend for the firm retreat.

  “That sounds workable,” Garrett said in the melodic drawl that had been the voice of America’s cushiest toilet paper in the eighties. She’d mollified him, thank God, but how would she manage all he’d asked, along with closing out her own clients and rescuing Janie?

  “We need your fresh voice in the room, Kylie.”

  Hearing those glorious words from the genius of Simon, McGrath and Bellows, she knew she’d do it if it killed her. She honked at a woman applying mascara at a green light, then barreled after her on the yellow.

  She’d come to Garrett’s attention by winning a national ad award for her campaign for an effective handgun-locking device. He’d searched her out and offered her the chance of a lifetime.

  Saying yes had meant closing down her two-year-old agency, but the honor had been too great to reject. The professional validation was enormous and she hoped to learn tricks to compensate for her weaknesses. Besides, she told herself, with the prestige of a few years at S-Mickey-B, as the firm was affectionately known in the marketing world, she’d draw clients like flies when she reopened her practice later on. The month-to-month financial struggle had been more daunting than she’d expected. She wasn’t that sure of herself.

  “Just clear your conflict fast,” Garrett said, “so we can have you all to ourselves.” His words made her heart swell with pride and squeeze with pressure. Her already-knotted stomach turned inside out with all she had to do.

  At least she’d made progress promoting Personal Touch over the past week, including scoring a profile at a trendy rag with the right demographic, but neither she nor Janie had yet gotten the suit-happy client on the phone. Soon she’d have to look at hiring an attorney. Big bucks they didn’t have, dammit.

  She shifted her gaze from the traffic to her dashboard clock. Seven minutes before Sun Print closed and her client, Dagwood Donuts, was out of luck.

  “I’d like your thoughts on a campaign for Home Town Suites,” Garrett continued at the leisurely pace of someone not braving murderous traffic with a cell phone pressed to her ear and a client’s future on her passenger seat. “Maybe you can sketch some ideas when you have time.”

  Time? Time? She had no time. A Crystal Water truck screeched to a stop in front of her. “Damn!” She slammed on her brakes.

  “Excuse me? Is that a problem?” Garrett said.

  “I was swearing at traffic, not you, Mr. McGrath.” A collision with the mountain of water before her seemed welcome at the moment. It was October, but the desert heat hung on like desperate fingertips on a ledge. Her suit was lightweight, but dark blue—chosen to reinforce her authority—and it was baking her alive.

  She let Garrett rattle on about branding and niche marketing, while she wove through traffic like James Bond, praying any passing police would be too awed by her technique to ticket her. Wrapping up the conversation at last, leaving Garrett content and her overloaded, she scored a neighborhood shortcut and roared into a Sun Print parking spot just in time. She grabbed the artwork CD and raced inside.

  Twenty minutes later, she exited, mission accomplished. Shaky with relief, she smiled at the dropping sun and slid behind the wheel, noticing she’d gotten ink on her fingers from admiring some freshly printed flyers—you had to compliment the pressmen. They were where the ink met the paper in her biz.

  Glancing in the mirror, she saw her blouse collar had black fingerprints, too. Ruined. Along with the pricey panty hose she’d snagged along the way. Collateral damage was inevitable when you worked as hard as she did.

  She was on the street headed home when her cell emitted the music she’d assigned Janie’s calls. Unwilling to risk another accident, she zipped into the closest parking lot to call her back. Fleetingly, she noticed the marquee above her head: Totally Nude. All You Can Eat Businessman’s Buffet. She’d parked at a strip club. Yuck. Middle-aged salesmen ogling boob jobs while they inhaled ambrosia salad and bean dip. Strip clubs seemed so desperate.

  Of course, sexual frustration made her do strange things, too—pant over Cosmo’s naked chefs issue, devour erotic romance novels and think wicked thoughts about cucumbers. Masturbation was a pale second to the joys of a warm and willing man. Where was one when she needed him?

  “I need your help ASAP,” Janie said when she answered, her voice thin with tension.

  “Take a slow breath, Janie Marie.”

  “I’m okay,” she said, but she sounded like someone had wrapped a rubber band around her vocal cords.

  “Breathe, Janie. Consider it a personal favor.”

  “Oh, for pity’s sake.” She huffed in a couple of irritated breaths. “There. Are you happy?”

  “Yes, I am. Now what’s up?”

  “I need you to fill in on a date.” Over the past few weeks, as problems mounted, Kylie had stood in for missing matches a number of times. There’d been a mistake on the Web site which had married couples appearing as available and Gail had double-booked a few people. Kylie’s job was to be polite and genial and noncommittal and keep the client around until the right match could be made.

  “What happened this time?”

  “Gail got overly enthusiastic. Turns out the client’s match is in London right now.”

  “I love Gail, but she’s not much of a receptionist. She’s never at her desk, for one thing.”

  “She’s my entire sales force. Everywhere she goes she pitches Personal Touch.”

 
“When the money turns around, hire a real receptionist, okay? Let Gail do what she’s good at full-time.”

  “Will you do the date?”

  “Just tell the guy there’s been a mistake.”

  “He’s a lawyer. Unhappy lawyers file lawsuits. This is his first date with us and he’s barely squeezing in the time. I’m afraid he’ll bail. You’re so good at smoothing. The woman in London is his perfect match.”

  Someone honked at her from behind. She looked in her rearview to see the guy motioning her forward. What the…? Then she spotted the low Jack-In-The-Box sign beside his car and realized she wasn’t parked in the strip club lot. She was blocking the fast-food drive-thru lane next door.

  “Just a sec,” she said to Janie, then rolled forward to order a mint-chocolate-chip milkshake. Might as well get something out of the mistake, right? “Tell me about this guy,” she said on a sigh.

  “Thank you, thank you, Kylie! His name’s Cole Sullivan and he’s smart and serious and handsome. You’ll love him.”

  “I’m going to apologize to him, not marry him, Janie,” she said, reaching to take the milkshake from the clerk.

  “You have twenty minutes to get there.”

  “Twenty minutes? It’s tonight. Now?” In her alarm, she squeezed the cup and icy green sludge slid down her jacket and plopped onto her navy blue lap. “Shit, shit, shit.”

  “Don’t swear at me. I won’t ask you again. Jeez.”

  “I’m not swearing at you, Janie. I’m swearing at the mound of ice cream in my lap.”

  “The what?”

  “Never mind.” She dabbed at the mess with a wad of napkins and planned out her best route through rush-hour traffic. The things she did for love. Someone else’s love, that is.

  DEBORAH RAMSDALE was twenty minutes late, Cole realized, glancing at his watch. Not a good sign on a first date. She was an attorney—international law—so she knew the value of a minute. He couldn’t help wondering if she’d seen his desperate video and changed her mind altogether.