Drew hadn’t come out of his office. She could see him sitting in his chair again, but he’d swiveled it around so that he was facing the windows.
She told herself that she didn’t want to be a part of his charade, but she also couldn’t just walk out of the office as if nothing at all had happened. He’d been a good and fair—if sometimes challenging—boss to her. To everyone who worked in the San Diego office, for that matter.
Which was exactly the reason why they’d all been willing to give up even a portion of their holiday evening when he’d asked.
She sighed and dropped her purse next to the baseball bat on the chair he’d beat before going back into his office. She could see him reflected in the dark windows. “What are you going to do?”
He looked at the window as if it were a mirror, meeting her gaze there. “What are you going to do?” He turned in his chair until he was facing her again, and he set his own cell phone down on the center of his leather desk blotter. “Your mother lost her job again.”
She looked from his phone to his face. Horror warred with anger. “What’d you do? Call her?”
“I called Joe Winston. Remember, he’s the HR head over at Blake & Philips?”
Her mouth went dry. Blake & Philips was the law firm her mother had worked for … until a few months ago when she’d been fired. And the only reason that Drew knew that Gigi had worked there was because he was the one who’d told Deanna a year ago that his college buddy, Joe, was looking for legal secretaries and he knew that her mother—between jobs, again—had been worried about losing her house if she didn’t find work soon.
More like Deanna was worried about her mother losing her house, because she’d been the one trying to pay Gigi’s mortgage as well as her own rent.
“That was none of your business,” she said stiffly.
“We’re supposed to be golfing next week,” he went on. “He thinks I called to tell him our tee time.”
Embarrassment burned inside her. “And you just happened to mention my mother’s name?”
“I didn’t bring her up at all.”
“Right. How else would you know?”
His gaze was steady. “You’ve worked for me for a while, Dee. Just because you don’t go around airing your personal business as much as most of the people do around here, doesn’t mean I haven’t picked up some things. And your mother goes through jobs like I go through—”
“—women?” she inserted caustically.
“I was going to say shirts.” He sat back in his chair, his hand slowly turning his cell phone end over end. “Joe didn’t have to mention your mother. All I had to do was make an educated guess and watch your face.”
Which she could feel burning now. “Fine. Yes, my mother lost her job. Again. Story of our lives.” But only part of the story. “She’ll find another one.” She always did.
Another job. Another unattainable man to make a play for that always ended in a dramatic parting of employment when it didn’t work out. Another reason to go off the financial deep end and expect Deanna to “save” her.
“Your article is sent.” She pulled back her sleeve and looked at her watch. “And you’re supposed to be at the airport soon. Try not to grimace all through your father’s wedding tomorrow.” She turned on her heel. “It’ll ruin the family pictures.”
“I’ll give you the fifty grand.” His low voice followed her.
Her feet dragged in the carpet, coming to a stop. She didn’t look at him. “I shouldn’t have told you that.”
He was silent, but her nape prickled and she knew he’d left his desk and was walking up behind her. “You wouldn’t have if you weren’t upset about it.”
She closed her eyes for a moment. On one hand, it was unnerving to think that he knew her that well. On the other hand, was she really surprised? There was a reason why they worked well together and she was realistic enough to know that that wasn’t only because of her understanding of him. “I don’t want your money.”
“But do you need it?” He touched her arm, moving around until he was in front of her. “Hey.” He nudged her chin until she couldn’t avoid looking at him. His faint smile was crooked. And sympathetic. “I don’t want to get married. But I need to.”
She could feel a burning deep behind her eyes and because she couldn’t will it away, hoped to heaven that it would just stay where it was because she’d be darned if she’d cry in front of her boss. “Even if I … agreed … the money would just be a quick-fix for Gigi’s problem.”
“Which is what?”
She looked up at him and found her gaze trapped in his. “She has a shopping addiction.”
His brows twitched together. “What?”
At least he hadn’t laughed.
She sighed and moved the bat and her purse from the chair, sinking down onto it.
“A shopping addiction. And not the kind of thing people are often teasing women about, either. She doesn’t just like to go out shopping for shoes or … whatever.” She waved her hand. “When Gigi’s … between jobs—” which in Gigi-speak really meant between the men with whom she inevitably got unwisely involved “—she gets depressed. And when she gets depressed, she shops. Online or on the home shopping networks. It doesn’t matter which and it doesn’t matter what. She orders stuff that she neither needs nor can afford. And it doesn’t matter what I say or what I do, she won’t stop and she won’t get help.”
She pressed her palms together, staring at her bare fingers. “She’s behind on her mortgage again, she’s managed to open new credit cards that I didn’t even know she had and she figures that I ought to be able to solve it all for her.”
“Why you?”
“Because I’ve been paying things off for her since I got my first job when I was fifteen.” The year her father had left. The year that Gigi started blaming Deanna for her very existence. “As long as I continue bailing her out, she’s never going to get the help she needs.” Deanna had finally faced that truth because she had sought the counseling that her mother refused to believe she needed.
“At least you realize that.”
“Realizing it and being able to stick to it are two different things.” She swallowed the knot in her throat. “It’s not easy to say no to your own mother.”
“It’s not all that easy to say no to your father, either.” He crouched down in front of her, taking her hands in his. “We can help each other here, you know.”
His hands were warm and steady and nearly dwarfed hers. “It’s not a, uh, a good idea. Getting involved at the workplace never is.” She felt that threatening burn get even hotter. “That’s what my mother does, and it never leads to anything but disaster.” Certainly not the fairytale wedding Gigi kept hoping for.
“People have been marrying the boss for centuries. There doesn’t have to be anything wrong with that.”
“Right. When the two people are actually in love.” She realized her fingers had slid through his until they were twined together. She pulled her hands free and wrapped them over the arms of the chair. “And, like I said, throwing money on the situation doesn’t solve the ultimate problem.”
“Then we’ll get your mother into counseling. For as long as it takes. Even after our arrangement is ended.”
She pressed her fingers harder into the upholstery to keep them from trembling. “She’ll refuse. She always does.”
“We’ll make sure she doesn’t. We’ll find a way.”