A fool can no more see his own folly than he can see his ears.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
“I FEEL LIKE a fool,” Kate said into the phone. “Lesley, I don’t know why I let that man make me so flustered. Do you think I made a mistake by agreeing to go with him?”
Lesley hummed. “Only if you wind up in bed with him again.”
Kate guffawed and, suddenly restless, got up from her couch and walked across the red looped rug in her living room, digging her toes into the thick yarn. “Well, that’s not going to happen.”
“Then I don’t see the problem. You said the only part of your job that makes you uncomfortable is not knowing the outside sales business—here’s your chance to learn from the best. Eric McDaniels may be a ladies’ man and a practical joker, but he could sell condoms to a nun.”
Kate laughed, then sobered. “Les, you ought to see the way the other reps look up to him—like he’s some kind of god.” Suddenly the responsibility that John Handley had assigned to her seemed overwhelming. If sales dropped, every department in the company would suffer. “For me to be an effective leader, it’s important that I have Eric as an ally.”
“Then you’d better go,” Lesley said. “Look, whatever you want to say about Eric, he’s not an idiot—he’s not going to jeopardize his career by making a pass at his boss.”
Kate’s shoulders fell in relief…and something else that felt vaguely like disappointment. “You’re right. I’m overreacting. Sorry to be such a downer. How was dinner?”
“We missed you.”
Kate dragged a pedicured toe across the rug. “Was Neil there?”
“Yup.”
“I’ve been thinking…”
“I’m listening.”
“Maybe when I get back, I’ll join the three of you for dinner some night.”
“Good,” Lesley said lightly, as if she were afraid if she sounded too enthusiastic, Kate might renege. “When do you leave on the sales trip?”
“Wednesday.”
“And when will you return?”
“Next Wednesday, the thirty-first.”
“Maybe we can get together the weekend after you return. I’m taking a couple of days off to go camping with the boys, so I won’t see you before you leave. Will you be able to stay in touch?”
“I’m taking my laptop, so I’ll be checking my e-mail. And I’ll have my cell phone, although I don’t know what kind of service coverage we’ll have for some of the trip.”
“Check in and let me know how things are going. I’ll look in on your place every couple of days.”
“Thanks, Les. You’re such a good friend.”
“Yes, I am. Try to enjoy yourself, okay?”
“I will,” Kate said, although both of them knew the improbability of that happening. “Talk to you soon.” Kate disconnected the call and walked to the kitchen to grab a bottle of water from the refrigerator—dinner had been shrimp-fried rice at her desk, and the soy sauce had left her with a thirst. She carried the water to her home office and winced at the stack of reading material she’d brought home. None of it seemed appealing. Instead she walked over to a cabinet and opened the doors to reveal her private indulgence—her collection of Bernadette dolls, with all the accessories she’d been able to gather for the 60s pint-sized fashionista.
Less popular and more petite than her counterpart Barbie, Bernadette had enjoyed only a short run on the toy shelf and had not evolved into bendable limbs and styleable hair. She remained frozen in her original state of rigid arms and legs, with a short auburn-colored bouffant and painted-on freckles across her tiny nose. Kate had seen her first Bernadette doll at a flea market when she was ten, and had been mesmerized by the similarity between the doll’s coloring and her own. She had emptied her change purse to buy that first doll, dressed in dingy yellow clam-diggers and a blue-and-white striped sweater. The shoes that had gone with the outfit (white criss-cross sandals, she later discovered) were long gone, but astonishingly, a tiny mesh bag full of even tinier sand dollars was intact, its handle looped around the doll’s arm. Bernadette had launched Kate’s imagination. The insight she’d had into how attached children could become to toys had benefited her immensely in her job with Handley.
The glass display case held over thirty of the red-haired Bernadette dolls in varying stages of condition, in a half-dozen different outfits. Bernadette’s closet hadn’t been as deep as Barbie’s. Kate smiled—she always thought of Bernadette as the poor relative, the late bloomer, the loner. Instead of a sports car, Bernadette had a bicycle, instead of friends, Bernadette had a bag of books, instead of a boyfriend, Bernadette had a little plastic cat.
“Meow.”
Kate looked down and smiled at her Siamese cat Lenka who sat on her gray haunches, politely waiting for attention. “Meow yourself,” Kate said, then closed the cabinet door and picked up the cat, stroking the spot behind her shoulder that she seemed to like best. Kate’s mind drifted back to the morning’s encounter with Eric and she replayed the scenes, reliving the mix of dread and thrill at seeing him again and sparring, this time on more equal footing. It was impossible to look at him and not remember the night they’d spent together in Vegas, and worse, she had known he was reliving those memories too. But to him, their one-night stand had been a conquest. To her…
She bent and released Lenka onto the smooth wood floor. To her, their lovemaking had been a sexual awakening—her first inkling of the connection a man and a woman could experience. In the wee hours of the morning, wrapped in Eric’s strong arms, listening to his deep breathing, it had been easy to fool herself into thinking she’d fallen in love with him, and that he might feel the same way about her. Surely he had felt it—that strange welling in the chest, a mixture of fear and excitement, the intense ache when their bodies joined, the feeling of languid isolation from the outside world.
But as she had lain there, her limbs entwined with his, panic had pooled in her stomach, then risen in her chest to crowd out all other emotion. One person’s earth-shattering experience was another person’s roll in the hay. She’d seen her mother turn a blind eye to her father’s stepping out off and on during their marriage, had seen her mother’s bubbly personality shrink a little more each time her father found a new “friend.” Hadn’t she vowed not to become involved with a ladies’ man? Hadn’t she felt a pang of pity for the women who flitted around Eric McDaniels like birds waiting for a crumb of his attention? Instead she had become one of the flock, and within a few days’ time, Eric wouldn’t remember her name.
She had thought back over their conversations on the trade-show floor and over cups of bad concession coffee and realized that he’d played her for a fool. He hadn’t been interested in getting to know her. It had all been foreplay for him, a means to an end. A sale. Like a pliable customer, she had bought his act—his flashing eyes and charming tongue and raucous sense of humor.
Kate remembered being overwhelmed with remorse, and had wondered if her behavior would affect the one thing in her life she felt confident about—her job. She had slipped from the bed inch by inch so as not to awaken Eric, and fled his room. The next morning at breakfast, Lesley had grilled her, but she had denied having any feelings for him, had dismissed the encounter as meaningless. And she had studiously avoided Eric the remainder of the trade show. As she recalled, he hadn’t seemed to mind, no doubt grateful to be spared the awkwardness of explaining that he wasn’t looking for a girlfriend.
To her credit, she thought she’d done a good job of pretending the one-night stand hadn’t affected her. She had returned to Birmingham, immersed herself in work, and found the distraction a balm to her psyche. In truth, it was during that time that she’d developed a habit for working late, taking projects no one else wanted, haunting other departments on weekends. How ironic that overcompensating in defense of her encounter with Eric had ultimately fixed her directly in his path again.
She walked over to her desk and picked up one of the books she’d bought on the way home: How to Make an Effective Sales Call. The only way she was going to be able to maintain the upper hand on Eric was if she knew at least half as much as he did.
Their road trip loomed before her, rife with potential predicaments. Lesley was right—Eric wouldn’t jeopardize his job by making an advance towards his boss. Besides, for all she knew, he could be happily cohabitating with someone, or even be engaged. No, she wasn’t nearly as worried about any ulterior motives that Eric might have as she was about her own vulnerability where he was concerned.
Because, she conceded, hugging the book to her chest and looking around her painfully neat office in her painfully neat apartment—she was, heaven help her, lonely. Nail-gnawingly, teary-eyed, tissue-drenchingly, chest-achingly lonely. She leaned her head back and sighed at the ceiling. She didn’t often stop moving long enough to acknowledge that ghost, but it lurked behind every late night at the office, every weeknight TV dinner, every Saturday-morning run in the park. She was ready for someone to come into her life, ready for love.
Kate bit her lip. She should’ve taken Lesley up on the invitation to dinner with Neil Powers—even pretending that she had someone in her life over the next few days would be a welcome distraction for her vulnerable heart.
“THIS GAG has to be good,” Eric said to his pal Winston, then took a swig from a bottle of beer. “I mean really elaborate.”
“Something that will have people talking about you long after you’re gone?” Winston asked, mopping his forehead with a handkerchief.
Eric grinned. “Yeah. And something that will bring Kate Randall down from her high horse.”
“What did this woman ever do to you?”
Eric tipped his bottle for a drink and considered his buddy’s question. “Not enough.”
Winston’s eyebrows climbed over his glasses. “You two were involved?”
“Not exactly.”
“Ah. Well…is she involved with someone now?”
Eric laughed. “The woman is married to her job. There are rumors that she might be a lesbian.”
“Is she?”
“No.” He frowned. “I don’t think so.” Her response to his lovemaking all those years ago came back in a rush. A sweat broke on his upper lip, and he shook his head. “No, definitely not.” And he’d die before he’d admit it aloud, but he’d avoided the company holiday parties and summer picnics because he couldn’t stand the thought of seeing fiery Kate with a mannequin boyfriend…or husband. Until today he’d been able to fantasize that she’d harbored a small amount of regret for writing him off all those years ago. She’d been the first woman to make him want…more.
“Is she a looker?”
Eric nodded, then caught himself and shrugged. “If you like the ice-princess type.” A facade, because he knew the heat that simmered just beneath the surface.
“How about setting up a bucket of paint to fall on her?”
Eric shook his head. “I did that a couple of years ago to a sales guy in another division.”
“Mice in her briefcase?”
“Did that to lady in production.”
“Nail her office furniture to the ceiling?”
“Guy in customer service.”
“Set her up for a radio phone scam?”
“Stockbroker buddy of mine.” Eric lifted his index finger. “And that was funny, but his wife still won’t talk to me.” He sighed. “Besides, this has to be something more…cerebral.”
“Well,” Winston said, scratching his neck, “if she doesn’t have a boyfriend, how about sending her an anonymous love note over e-mail?”
Eric worked his mouth back and forth and nodded. “That’s good, but it needs something…” He snapped his fingers. “A secret admirer!”
“Yeah, string her along until—”
“April Fool’s Day!” Eric crowed. “I’ll be on my way out the door and no one will be able to touch me!” Then he frowned. “But how can we let everyone else in on the joke?”
Winston leaned forward. “We keep a log of the notes and her replies, and then on April Fool’s Day, we send the log to everyone at Handley!”
Eric’s conscience stirred. “I don’t know about that.”
“Okay, just the sales team then.”
Eric hesitated, and his own hesitation irritated him.
“I’ll make sure the notes are untraceable,” Winston cajoled, warming up to the idea. “If she’s as uptight as you say she is, she probably won’t respond anyway. But if she does respond and says something juicy—man, oh, man, you’ll be a legend.” Eric’s friend laughed, then wiped his forehead again.
Eric pulled on his bottle of beer, mulling the idea, trying to control that swell of anticipation that accompanied the planning of a good joke. “It’s a great idea, and the timing would be perfect.” He nodded. “I could give you our itinerary so you can send the notes while we’re on the road.”
“That’s good—she’ll never even suspect you.”
Eric worked his mouth back and forth again, trying to decipher the dull niggling in his chest. “Still…”
Winston snorted. “You’d do it if she were a man, wouldn’t you?”
“Hell, yes.”
“Then there’s your answer.”
Eric looked at his buddy and nodded. Kate had told him herself that she expected him to treat her the way he’d treat anyone else in her position. He grinned. “Okay, let’s see how the ice princess responds to having a secret admirer.”
He wasn’t any more interested in Kate’s reaction to a secret love interest than he would be if she were anybody else.
Really.