Change of Life. Leigh Riker

“It’s what Stephen King calls a ‘toy truck’ project. Just for me right now.”

      “Johnny, it will be a movie. Tell me. When it gets released, the whole world will see it. How private can that be?”

      He looked even more uncomfortable.

      “Yeah. I know. But that’ll be Christmas a year from now at the earliest. I figure I’ll be too busy changing diapers to notice the public reaction. Or the reviews. I don’t want to talk about it. Wait until wide release.”

      When Johnny picked up the jewelry box, obviously as a diversion, Nora held her breath. Embarrassed in turn, she fussed with her napkin, waiting for him to at last remove the wrapping paper from the gift. Would he like it?

      “I may have overstepped my bounds with Starr,” she admitted, returning to their earlier conversation about her own career to distract herself. “We had a run-in recently, and I may have made an impulsive remark or two about that potential client I mentioned, Geneva Whitehouse.”

      “Earl Whitehouse’s wife?”

      Nora felt a twinge of unease. “Yes. Do you know him?”

      “Only by reputation. He’s a pretty big developer in this area. He built a few of the houses in my compound at Seaview. Didn’t you do some work for him a while back?”

      “Briefly,” Nora said, not wanting to discuss Earl Whitehouse, who, despite his stellar standing in the community, was not one of her favorite people. “We were talking about Starr. She and I seem to bring out the worst in each other. Now I wonder if at our monthly business luncheon this week she decided to retaliate for what I’d said.” Had Starr’s pointed reaction to Nora’s hot flash been exactly that? Payback?

      Johnny gauged her expression. “Then why not cut her some slack? You might even come to like her.”

      Nora doubted that was possible, but she didn’t say so. And maybe he was right. She and Starr had struggled with each other long enough, and it was up to Nora—always the ready helper—to take the first step. Then she saw that Johnny had removed the paper, lifted the top of the box and pulled out the gift.

      “Uh, Nora.” He choked up, and she saw him swallow. “This is for me?”

      “It won’t suit anyone else, angel.”

      He slipped the eighteen-karat gold signet ring on his finger. And stared at it. The fine script flowed across its surface, caught the light streaming through the restaurant windows and shone on the one simple word. Five letters that Nora had hoped might mean the world to him.

      Johnny’s voice was thick. “Sometimes you break me up.” Then his gaze met hers, and his smile beamed. “Thank you. You sure know how to get a guy.”

      The gold ring’s inscription read simply: Daddy.

      Riding on a wave of euphoria long after her brunch with Johnny, Nora decided to take his advice to see Starr that afternoon before Nora met with Geneva Whitehouse. With luck, they, too, might reach some kind of rapprochement.

      First, Nora swung by Nine Lives, Inc., where she found a pile of mail waiting on her desk. Her longtime client, Leonard Hackett, one of her most lucrative accounts, was also in her office. Typically, he didn’t look well.

      Most of the mail was routine, with the exception of an invitation to a charity dinner in Fort Walton Beach for the Heart Association, and ordinarily she didn’t mind Leonard’s unannounced visits. But why was he here?

      Nora tried to listen but, bent upon her meetings with Starr and then Geneva, her mind refused to take in the details. In her experience, it was always better to empathize with Leonard’s latest bout of severe hypochondria than to try talking him out of his newest ailment. All she needed to do was make soothing noises.

      “I tell you, I’m not long for this world. It will be almost a relief.” Leonard slumped in a chair across from her. “I’ve been ill for years.”

      “Clearly, it’s taken a toll.” His neurosis had definitely shredded her nerves and, suppressing a sigh, Nora lifted her gaze from the charity invitation to give him her best look of sympathy.

      “I see you’re letting your hair grow,” she said, hoping to distract him.

      Leonard ran a hand over the top of his head where a barely visible fuzz had sprouted. She’d never cared for his—so Leonard had believed—trendy baldness. Now, his gleaming skull struck her as preferable to the gray-brown stubble that took its place.

      “I won’t need to maintain my looks,” he murmured. “I only dropped by—with the utmost effort, I might add—to say goodbye.”

      Nora’s heart lurched. “Leonard, don’t be ridiculous.”

      Needing to discharge her nervous energy, she jumped up from her desk to pour a glass of water from the silver carafe on the sideboard. She held the Waterford tumbler out to Leonard.

      “Here. Drink. I have whiskey, if you’d prefer.”

      “Not good for my liver. My function is marginal, you know.”

      Nora did sigh then. Leonard frequently tried her patience to the breaking point. Others might laugh at him, but she kept trying in her usual way to—what, save him from himself?

      Dutifully, obviously stalling, he took a few sips of water, then set the glass aside. On her cherry end table. Without a coaster. Nora whipped one in the shape of a seashell from the drawer and smacked it down.

      “Please, Leonard. No rings.”

      He stretched his legs out, then crossed them at his bony ankles. If he had ever been the playboy he imagined himself to be, Nora hadn’t seen it. To her, he was more like Greta Garbo in drag, playing Camille.

      Still, everyone had his illusions, and she maintained a certain fondness for Leonard. He could irritate her to distraction, but he had gobs of inherited money which he didn’t mind spending on the houses, condos and co-ops he’d purchased with astonishing regularity over the years.

      It was a neurotic cycle, Nora suspected. Leonard became “ill,” he managed to survive the deadly disease, then bought himself a new place to live like a fresh lease on life. She had to admit the very notion of his leaving this earth now, after years of threats to do just that, would make her weep.

      On second thought, she couldn’t continue to agree with him.

      She tried to cheer him up. “Your color’s good today,” she pointed out. “That navy polo shirt makes your eyes look even more, um, blue.” Actually, they were almost colorless, but Nora wouldn’t be unkind—one reason, she supposed, why Leonard kept showing up without an appointment. He must know he could count on Nora for support. “If I don’t miss my guess, whatever illness you contracted during your weekend in the Caymans must be encountering all those little antibodies by now. I’d say that by tomorrow—”

      Leonard shifted. “I’ve talked to Starr Mulligan.”

      Uh-oh. Here we go. This was the real reason for Leonard’s latest impromptu visit. The rest had been a cover-up.

      Nora’s voice chilled to the temperature of the water in the silver carafe crammed with ice on the sideboard. “I see.” He had, as usual, engaged her sympathy for his current illness, taken advantage of her kindness. Now he would tell her the truth. Nora didn’t want to hear it.

      “Starr?” she said, already rethinking her earlier intention to make amends.

      “I wasn’t expecting her when she turned up at my condo yesterday afternoon. I was napping, trying to preserve my strength, and not properly dressed to entertain.”

      “Starr brings her own show with her.”

      “Yes, well.” Leonard cleared his throat. “I think you should know she plans to underbid you on the design for my new house.”

      “You bought another house? So this medical crisis—”