Chapter One

 

 

Holly Legere glanced at her cell phone to check the time and swore. She’d have claimed the damn thing was running fast except that even she had trouble arguing with satellites. San Francisco made her crazy anyway. She hated driving in this city and most of all she hated trying to park.

Already she was running a few minutes late for her meeting with the famous architect Prescott Chance which was adding to the stress that was her constant companion. It wasn’t that she enjoyed being late, but her boss, the media mogul Alistair Rupert, always gave her more to do than any human could be expected to accomplish in a twenty-four hour day, and he threw fits when he didn’t get everything he wanted, when he wanted and exactly how he wanted it. Alistair had told her to see the architect and get him to design Alistair and his scary wife a house after the architect had refused the commission.

She wasn’t thrilled with her current assignment. How was she supposed to get Prescott Chance, one of the most famous and most in-demand architects in the world, to change his mind and build a house for her boss?

Secretly, she was happy someone had said no to Rupert. But her boss had not become a bazillionaire by taking no for an answer. He also hadn’t become a bazillionaire by treating employees well, respecting union agreements or showing any regard at all for the environment. But, she reminded herself as she came off the Golden Gate and slowed infinitesimally for some poor tourist who didn’t know you couldn’t stop at the toll booths, beggars can’t be choosers.

Her degrees in communications followed by an MBA left her well suited to work in media or publishing, two declining industries that were shedding a lot more people than they were hiring.

She’d ended up as a gofer for the wealthy industrialist and was happy to have any kind of a job that let her pay her student loans and the rent. She could even eat if she gave up such extravagances as cheese and wine.

Sometimes she thought heaven was one big wine and cheese party.

She found the offices of PGC Architects and drove around the block. Of course there was no parking. The minutes ticked past as she tried a leafy side street and ended up having to back out again as a big semi was laying right across the road like a fallen tree. Seriously flustered now—she drove round the block again and—thank the good Lord, a car pulled out of the tiny lane beside the PGC office. She stopped so fast that her briefcase flew off the passenger seat and onto the floor, spilling paper everywhere. Crap. She wedged her car into the tiny spot, shoved the paper back into the briefcase and took a much-needed moment to breathe. A quick glance in the rearview showed that her corkscrew curls were beyond help. A swipe of lip gloss was the best she could do for her appearance. And, she reminded herself, a positive attitude.

She got out of the car, locked it behind her and headed into PGC, refusing to rush. She was the client, she reminded herself.

Walking into PGC was an amazing experience. She hadn’t even noticed the noise and bustle of the streets outside, not until the door closed softly behind her and she was struck by the silence. She felt as though she were entering a church.

She walked up to a sleek reception desk, black and curved, where an equally sleek young woman in a blond chignon and chunky black glasses regarded her with raised brows.

“Hi,” she said. Then lowered her voice. “Holly Legere. I’m here to see Prescott Chance.”

She could not imagine a working office could be so quiet. Then, she looked around and saw a stairway rising up and on the other side of the stairway a large office area behind glass. Inside, there was the bustle she’d expected to find, rows of desks, people hunched over computers, talking in groups, someone working on the model of what looked to be an apartment building. Maybe an office tower. She bet if she walked through the double doors she’d enter a fairly noisy environment. But out here? It was as silent as a cathedral.

The woman flicked a glance at a screen. “I’m so sorry. You’ve missed your appointment.”

People did not blow off her boss like that. And she couldn’t let them do it to her. This gig was important. Vital to her budding career. “I didn’t miss it. I’m a little late. Traffic was murder.”

“I understand, really I do. Mr. Chance left a message for you.” And she handed over a handwritten note. Holly blinked. She could not remember the last time she’d received a note with, like, ink on paper. It was as quaint as getting a letter in the mail.

The note said, “I never change my mind.”

Holly read the note a second time and glanced up to the receptionist. “Who does he think he is? God?”

“I like to think of him more as a superhero. Mysterious, but powerful.”

She leaned closer, sensing an ally. “I could get fired over this.”

The woman looked sympathetic but unhelpful. “I’m really sorry,” she said. The words, next time be on time floated out there, louder for remaining unspoken.

Holly left the hallowed space and hit the street feeling hot, irritable and mad at herself. It was a beautiful September day, sunny and fogless, but that didn’t lift her mood. Why hadn’t she allowed more time to get here? But she always tried to shoehorn too many things into too few hours, and sometimes the hours didn’t stretch the way she wished they would. If she had a superpower, that’s what hers would be. She’d balloon hours when she needed more time and also shrink them when she was stuck with extra time so she could bank the extra minutes.

She got into her car and immediately pulled out her cell. Alistair Rupert wasn’t going to be happy.

“He agreed, yes?” were Rupert’s first crisp words.

“Actually, no. He said no.”

There was a silence and she pulled the phone away from her ear in case he started shouting at her. Instead, he said, “Holly, I hired you because you are a resourceful girl.” Girl? Really? “I trust you can get him to change his mind.”

“He said he never changes his mind.” And she had that in writing.

“Let me put it to you simply. My wife wants a Prescott Chance home. The happiness of my marriage is hanging on this. Your job depends on getting Prescott Chance to agree to design my house. Do not come back until he’s agreed.”

“And if he doesn’t?”

“Then don’t come back at all.”

She wanted to tell him where he could stick his job, but the weight of her student loans got in the way. One day, she swore to herself, she’d be independently wealthy so she could tell people like Rupert to shove it.

The click in her ear told her the conversation was over.

A hopeful motorist saw her sitting in her car and slowed but she waved them on.

Pros and cons. She thought Rupert was a twit. But he was a powerful one and she’d taken the job as a personal assistant hoping to prove herself enough to get a real job in his empire. His businesses were huge and she knew there were plum jobs with her name on them if she could get him to promote her before he fired her. She blew out a breath that made a curl dance on her forehead. Rupert was the kind of man who was your best friend one day and shoving a knife in your ribs the next. But it was a job. And she needed that job.

And he was right. She was resourceful.

She got out of her car and did some sleuthing. There were three cars parked right behind PGC. She had to assume that one of the spots was reserved for the great Prescott Chance himself.

The car in the center was a Tesla. Well, that was easy. Everything she knew about Prescott Chance, that he was rich, forward-thinking, green and loved elegant design pointed to him being the owner of that sleek, black car.

Now all she had to do was the one thing she was worst at.

She had to wait.

She pulled out her tablet computer and called up her research file on Prescott Chance. There must be something she could do to get him to change his mind.

She pulled up a profile article on the architect and enlarged the photo. In it, Prescott Chance sat cross-legged, his hands resting on the earth. He might be posing for a photo but it looked as though he’d forgotten the photographer was even there. He had the look of a Zen master or a mystic, albeit a gorgeous one. He had black hair, a long, elegant face and eyes that seemed to gaze into a different world. He apparently sat for hours before he ever began designing. Unlike her, he was never in a rush. The article quoted him saying, “I believe an architect needs to take time to absorb the organic wholeness of a site. I have to walk the area, breathe the air, watch the light as the sun rises and as it changes throughout the day. I need to understand the indigenous trees and shrubs, the weather patterns. I need to know and respect the earth.”

Poser.

“Until I understand a site the way a man might try to understand the many moods of a beloved woman, I don’t even touch a pencil or paper.”

Oh, as if.

Even as she scoffed, she had to admit to loving the man’s work. His buildings, whether public or private, were unique. Not dramatic or showy, but they fit with their surroundings.

According to the journalist, Prescott Chance did not own a cell phone because he never, ever wanted to be distracted when he was working. He owned no device that beeped or squeaked or rang. If someone at the office needed him badly enough they could track him down. And if he was working in the office with his door closed, one of his associates said, “God help the fool who knocked on that door.”

He refused more commissions than he accepted, never promised a specific completion date, and was famous for refusing to cater to his clients’ whims.

“It’s like hiring Rain Man to design your house,” an A List celebrity had once complained.

Instead of leaving him broke, his whims and crotchets had helped make him famous and very rich. He was one of the most sought after architects in the world because he might be difficult but he was also a brilliant visionary. His final quote in the article was, “If one of my designs calls attention to itself then I have failed. A good design blends into its surroundings and exists in harmony with the land.”

And if he turned down a project nothing would entice him to change his mind. Throw money at him, he yawned. One enterprising earl, desperate to get Prescott to rebuild a crumbling castle, had even promised to wrangle him a knighthood. Prescott had been supremely uninterested in the title. “The castle doesn’t speak to me,” he said.

“What does speak to you?” the journalist had asked, and Holly could have kissed the man for asking the question she so needed answered.

She read the next part of the article eagerly: “Chance pauses, taking his time to think and finally, he says, “Challenge.”

“What kind of challenge?”

“Chance has a way of considering a question as though it’s a Zen koan. Finally, he answers, “I know it when I see it.”

And wasn’t that helpful. Well, she wasn’t a quitter and that I never change my mind note had her doubly determined. He was messing with the wrong girl. He wanted a challenge?

Oh, she was going to give Prescott Chance a challenge, all right.