California Christmas Dreams. J.M. Jeffries

the door and entered. “Just so you know, my secretary is standing right behind you as a witness to this meeting.”

      Annie jumped back and rebuttoned her blouse. “This isn’t over.”

      Phase three: the threat. “You don’t seem to understand what a conservatorship means. You have no control over your money because you can’t be trusted. That is no one else’s fault but yours.”

      “You’re fired,” she snapped.

      “And you can’t fire me, either,” he said with a half smile as she moved to phase four. Like so many others before her, she was completely predictable. “I’ve seen it all, sweetie. Your mother has your best interests at heart and you need to grow up and listen to her.”

      “If I’d listened to my mother, I would have gone to college and not been a star,” she snapped.

      “If you’d gone to college, you could have taken an accounting class and learned to manage your own money.”

      “You’re mean,” Annie said, the pout returning. “How do I know you’re not trying to rip me off and take a piece of the pie for yourself?”

      Phase five, he thought, was questioning his ability to keep her solvent. “Probably because I have a lot more money than you do and don’t need your piddly little 1.6 million.” Which she wouldn’t have if he hadn’t been hired by her family.

      “You’re just an accountant. You can’t have more money than me.” She lifted her chin defiantly as though he’d be intimidated.

      He resisted the urge to laugh. “I don’t buy ten-thousand-dollar belts.” Or fancy cars, or designer clothes. He’d bought his last Mercedes SUV used and lived in a small house in the Hills that he’d bought in a foreclosure sale. The only areas he’d splurged on had been his bedroom and the kitchen. Jake liked to cook and he wanted the best appliances he could afford. He also liked to sleep comfortably, so he did purchase a custom-made Swiss mattress that was so comfortable he fell asleep almost the moment his head touched the pillow.

      She stomped her foot. “I’m going to go see a lawyer.”

      Phase six: the final threat—seeing a lawyer. “Fine,” he replied. “See you later.”

      She marched out of the office, slamming the door so hard the photos on the walls bounced.

      “She’s going to be trouble,” Vicki said.

      “Like we haven’t had that before,” he said with a sigh. Most of his clients were trouble with a capital T. And Miss Gray was proving to be one of the bigger ones.

      “This is a heck of a way to make a living,” Vicki said, straightening one of the photos that had slipped askew from Annie’s door slam.

      “That’s why I love it.” And he did, despite the juvenile behavior of so many of his clients. He loved the challenge of putting them back on solid ground. Many of them appreciated his efforts, but a few, like Annie, chafed under his control.

      “Your sister called,” Vicki said. “I said you’d get back to her.”

      He picked up the phone as Vicki walked out, closing the door quietly behind her.

      He dialed his sister. Evelyn answered on the first ring as though she’d been standing right next to the phone.

      “It’s Daddy. He’s lost his mind.”

      Jake’s first thought was that his widowed father had run off with a twenty-year-old bimbo. Not that his father was easily led, but a pretty woman was a pretty woman, and he’d been a widower for a long time. “What’s going on?”

      “He’s decided he’s not selling the park and is going to renovate instead. He’s already been to the bank and gotten a loan.”

      Jake pinched the bridge of his nose. He and his father had talked about this. John Walters had inherited his family’s orange groves and had proceeded to turn them into an amusement park. With the downturn in the economy, the park had been suffering until Jake had finally convinced his father to sell to developers who’d been trying to get their hands on the property for nearly ten years.

      “Did you hear me, Jake?” Evelyn asked, her voice sharp.

      “I’m trying to pretend this is just a bad dream, but I heard you.”

      “He’s turning his nose up at thirty million dollars,” Evelyn huffed. “And he’s planning some huge Christmas extravaganza to reopen the park with and has hired some woman, a has-been child actress to do the decorations at an obscene salary. She’s going to bankrupt him. Probably trying to bankroll her comeback.”

      “That’s Dad’s decision,” Jake said calmly, though he agreed with his sister. Thirty million dollars was a lot of money to turn down to keep an aging amusement park open.

      “I beg your pardon?” Evelyn asked, almost angrily.

      “He doesn’t need the money,” Jake said. Jake’s father had been his first client. Originally his mother had handled the finances, but when she’d passed away, Jake had taken over even though he had only been sixteen. Jake had found he was good at handling money, and by the time he’d graduated high school he’d known exactly what he was going to do for a living.

      “That’s not the point,” Evelyn replied. “He’s sixty-seven years old and should be sailing off into the sunset with one of his, you know, one of his honeys. He should be enjoying life instead of being at the park from six in the morning until midnight. He works too hard. He should be enjoying his retirement.”

      “So you think Dad should sail off into the sunset with some gold digger?” The image amused Jake. While his father enjoyed the charms of the opposite sex, he wasn’t about to ask one on a cruise or be swayed to give her money.

      “As if you’d let anyone touch his money,” Evelyn scoffed.

      Jake said nothing as his thoughts raced. His father was of sound mind and body. And even though Jake had argued for the sale, he’d seen that his father was torn. On one hand, the amusement park was a family legacy, but on the other hand, it was a lot to take care of.

      “What are you going to do?” Evelyn asked.

      “Nothing.” He was disappointed in his father’s decision but not terribly surprised. His father was having a hard time letting go of his family’s heritage. Family meant a lot to John Walters.

      “But...”

      “Sis,” Jake interrupted, “the property belongs to him, and he’s of sound mind.”

      “We all agreed he would sell. He sat at the dinner table with us and listened to our arguments and agreed with everything we said. My God, if he’s going to keep that damn park, my son is going to want to work there again. He’s already talking about skipping college and working for his grandpa, ruining his entire future.”

      “He’ll change his mind.” He loved his sister. Evelyn had worked hard to get her doctorate in physics. She now taught at Cal State, San Bernardino and was on track to head the department.

      Evelyn ground her teeth in frustration. “Can’t we go to court and stop him somehow?”

      “Do you really want to try to have our father declared incompetent?”

      A strangled sob came to him through the phone. “No, I guess not. It’s not your kids he’s filling with ideas that life is an amusement park and a little orange marmalade on sourdough toast will solve everything.”

      Jake half smiled. His father had tried to sell him and Evelyn the same dream, but they hadn’t been converted.

      “I’ll talk to him,” Jake promised, and ended the call.

      He leaned back in his chair and looked out the window at the cloudless, blue Los Angeles sky. In the distance he could see the huge Hollywood Hills sign. One of the reasons he’d taken this spot was because