Dreams of Perfection (Dreams Come True) Page 6

  “Josh? Martin? There’s one left.” Chris gestured to the pool table where the women had just noticed their audience.

  “No way, man. I’m getting married in a couple of months.” Martin picked up a handful of pretzels. “I’m not getting anywhere near that.”

  “Josh?”

  “Nope. Count me out.”

  “Fine. More for us.” Mark picked up his beer and gestured to Chris to follow.

  Josh watched the two men walk over to the table and introduce themselves. He’d never really gotten the hang of picking up women. When he dated, which wasn’t often, it was usually the friend-of-a-friend kind of thing. The idea of making small talk with a complete stranger just didn’t appeal to him.

  “Damn.”

  Martin’s muttered curse drew Josh’s attention.

  “The A’s lost to the Tigers.”

  Martin’s beloved A’s were having a tough start to the season. Josh chose not to rub in the fact that the Yankees had won. Again.

  “Hey, Martin. How did you and Cindy meet?” Josh tossed back a handful of the complimentary peanuts.

  “Her sister works at the firm. You know, Vicki in Securities Litigation. Anyway, Cindy met Vicki at the office one day for lunch, and I ran into them in the elevator. Next thing I knew we were dating.” Martin shrugged.

  “How did you know, you know, that she was ‘The One?’” Josh made air quotes with his fingers.

  Martin grew thoughtful a moment. “I guess when I realized she makes me want to be a better person.” He wore an expression of complete conviction.

  Josh could only nod in response to such a simple, yet profound statement. What happens, he mused, when the one individual who makes you want to be a better person doesn’t realize it?

  “Speaking of the love of my life, I’d better go. She and her mother spent the afternoon at the florist, so she’ll have lots to share when I get home.” Martin gulped the remainder of his beer and grabbed his gym bag. “See ya.”

  Josh noticed that Martin didn’t seem to mind that the evening discussion would revolve around flowers. He signaled the waitress for another beer. It must be love.

  “Hi.”

  Josh looked up, startled to see one of the girls from the pool table, the one with the light brown hair, standing next to him.

  “Hi.”

  “I came over to ask you and your friend if you’d like to join us.”

  Her accent had a soft drawl to it. Definitely not a New Yorker. “Yeah, he went home to his fiancée.”

  “Oh. How about you? Do you have a fiancée to go home to?”

  “Um, no.”

  “Wife?”

  “No. No wife either.”

  She sat down in the empty chair next to him.

  “I’m Paige.” She extended her hand to Josh.

  “I’m Josh,” he replied as he took her hand. It fit nicely in his grasp.

  “We’re visiting from Alabama.” She indicated her two friends who were currently engaged in a boisterous conversation with Chris and Mark.

  Josh enjoyed the mellow sound of her molasses-sweet drawl. “Really? I thought you were from New Jersey.”

  Paige smiled and shrugged. “It’s pretty obvious, I guess.”

  “So what brings you to the Big Apple?”

  “Ashley there”—pointing to the redhead—“is attending Columbia in the fall. Getting her Ph.D. in theoretical physics.”

  Josh’s brows shot up.

  Paige laughed. “I know, right? Beauty and brains.”

  Clearly, Chris didn’t know what he was in for. “How about you? Are you in school?”

  “I’m in the Ph.D. program at Alabama. Art history.”

  Another surprise. “So I’m guessing you’ve been to a few of New York’s art museums.”

  Paige gasped. “You have art museums here?”

  Josh laughed. Small talk was growing on him. “Surprising, I know. It’s our best-kept secret.”

  “While Ashley’s been apartment hunting, I’ve been prowling the museums. Being a New Yorker, you probably get bored with all that.”

  No one had ever called him a New Yorker before. He kind of liked it. “Actually, I’m from the Mid-West, and I’m ashamed to say, I’ve only been to the Met once.”

  “I’ve been three times since Thursday.” She shrugged in embarrassment.

  “Oh, hey, can I get you a drink?”

  “I’d like that.”

  Josh signaled the waitress again, and Paige ordered a beer.

  “Looks like a little competition is in the works.” Josh gestured with his beer toward the pool table. “Want to go cheer on your friends?”

  “Sure.”

  After the introductions were made, Josh and Paige watched as Mark and Chris paired off against her friends, Sheila and Ashley. Bets were placed, and Mark racked the balls.

  Paige leaned over and whispered to Josh, “You should probably warn your friends that Sheila was state champion in intramural billiards at Alabama, and Ashley is no slouch either. Her father once played professionally.”

  This just got more interesting all the time. Josh couldn’t remember the last time he’d enjoyed an evening at the pub so much. “Nah. Why take all the fun out of it?”

  The two women morphed into great white pool sharks, winning first at eight ball and then at straight pool. But the men didn’t seem to mind the fact that they’d been hustled. Several games and a hundred bucks later, Mark and Chris were ready to cry ‘uncle.’

  Mark walked over to Chris, slapped him on the back, and loudly proclaimed, “I think I’m in love.”

  “Best fifty bucks I ever lost.” They clinked beer bottles in a toast. “You ladies up for buying the losers a steak dinner?” Chris asked.

  “Yeah, come on, ladies. We’re flat broke now,” Mark cajoled, looking convincingly pitiful.

  Ashley and Sheila laughed and glanced at each other, then at Paige. “Sure. Why not.”

  The guys moved their gym bags to a bigger table, while the ladies went to the powder room.

  Chris leaned over, rubbing his hands with relish. “This is our lucky night.”

  Chapter 11

  “Okay, spill it. Give me all the juicy details.” Laura sipped from some mint-green martini concoction the bartender had dreamed up. Her ever-present smartphone sat on the bar so she didn’t miss that all-important call, text, or email.

  Their favorite midtown bar really packed them in even on a Monday night. The place fairly crawled with eligible young professionals looking to hook up. Darcy observed the sharks with a jaundiced eye as they circled Laura, calling to mind Jimmy Buffett’s song, “Fins.”

  But who could blame them? Laura’s long blond hair, tall svelte figure, and flirtatious personality drew attention wherever she went. They’d learn soon enough they had a barracuda in their sights.

  “You’re glowing.” Laura leaned in, eyes narrow and assessing. “Did you get laid?”

  “The mouth on you!” Darcy glanced around to see if Laura’s vulgar comment had drawn the attention of the other patrons crowded at the bar. Fortunately, the noise in the place could cover a sonic boom. “No, I didn’t sleep with him,” Darcy replied rather primly. “He’s a gentleman.”

  “This from someone who writes some of the steamiest love scenes just shy of X-rated.” Laura rolled her eyes.

  “What I write and what I do are two different things.”

  “Well, something must have happened to make you glow like that.”

  “Oh, Laura! I had the most wonderful evening.” All misty-eyed, Darcy proceeded to regale her with every little detail, including the flowers, and, of course, the kiss.

  “But . . .?” Laura nudged.

  “But what?” Dar
cy asked, all innocence as she flagged down the bartender for another chardonnay.

  “I noticed you lost some of your enthusiasm when you got to the part about the kiss.”

  “Well, the kiss was perfectly lovely, but not . . . Perfect.”

  “You and your Perfect Kiss. There’s no such thing, you know.” Laura took another sip of her drink. “Don’t get me wrong. There are some guys that can really knock your Louboutins off, but most of them just fumble around like they’re licking a sloppy ice-cream cone.” She glanced at the bartender. “Too much tongue.”

  Darcy looked over at the tattoo-adorned bartender then back at Laura. “You and . . .? You’re incorrigible!”

  “He’s from Ireland, and I have a soft spot for that lovely lilting brogue.” Laura shrugged her shoulders. “Maybe next time you kiss Dr. Gorgeous you should give it some, you know, welly.”

  Darcy almost spewed her mouthful of wine all over the bar in her laughter. “I think you’ve been dating—what’s his name?—Ewan, too long.” Ewan was Laura’s latest romance. A hunky model from Glasgow.

  “I’ve been dying to use that phrase. Don’t you just love it? I’ve got to work it into an ad campaign somehow.”

  The tattooed bartender brought over another green cocktail, giving Laura a wink as he set it down.

  Lifting the drink to her blood-red lips, she asked, “Have you figured out where Dr. Gorgeous came from?”

  Darcy sighed. “No, and I don’t care.”

  “Maybe you should just ask him.”

  “Right. How about this: ‘So, Blake, did a fairy godmother send you in answer to my prayers?’”

  “Okay. I see your point. But aren’t you the least bit curious?”

  “Of course I am.” Taking another sip of her wine, she played with her cocktail napkin. “But maybe I’m afraid of the answer—that he’s not real.” Or that he’d see she wasn’t worth dating.

  “He looked and felt pretty damn real to me.” Laura took a moment to send a flirtatious smile to the guy who’d just walked up to order a drink. He smiled back, but the minute Laura saw the wedding ring, she gave him a dirty look and turned her back. She might be a modern-day Doña Juana, but she drew the line at married men. Even she had some morals.

  “So when do you see him again?”

  Darcy frowned. “I don’t know. He’s in South America performing surgery on a little boy.” Her eyes became wistful. “He’s so generous with his skills.”

  “I’m thinking if he’s so generous with his, um, skills, you’d have been laid by now. Just saying.”

  “Jeez, Laura. Is that all you ever think about? Anyway, he’s supposed to be home next week and said he’d call.”

  “Well then”—Laura raised her glass—“here’s to a successful operation, a quick return, and . . . getting laid.”

  Checking his emails first thing in the morning, Josh noticed one from a ‘pdobson’ with a University of Alabama address. Guessing it was from Paige, he clicked it open.

  Hi Josh,

  I just wanted to tell you again how much I enjoyed meeting you. The museums weren’t the only highlight of my trip to New York.

  Anyway, if you ever find yourself in Tuscaloosa, give me a call.

  Best, Paige

  He’d really enjoyed meeting Paige, as well. After a steak dinner on Ashley and Sheila, he and Paige had strolled through the Financial District down to Battery Park and along the East River. They’d talked of art and law and life in general.

  The evening ended with him walking her to her hotel and kissing her goodnight. And while it had been a very satisfactory first kiss, as first kisses went, with her living in Alabama and focused on her doctoral studies, there was no point in pursuing anything. She and her friends were headed home the next day anyway. But he did learn one thing from the encounter: Darcy Butler wasn’t the only woman in the world.

  He took a moment to reply to Paige’s email expressing the same sentiment about meeting her and wishing her luck on her studies. He thought about giving her his phone number in case she ever came back to New York to visit her friend, and then decided against it. He wasn’t interested in the occasional date.

  He was already way ahead of last month’s hours, and with the completed brief filed with the court that morning, Josh picked up one of the pro bono cases the Women’s Legal Fund had assigned to him. One of the things Josh liked about Butler, Lukeman, and Michaels, was that it encouraged its attorneys to give back either by handling pro bono cases, or volunteering in their communities, and gladly gave them the time to do it.

  Most of his cases were heartbreakers, but this one affected him more than most. Kelly Winters, the widow of an Iraq War veteran fighting to save her home from foreclosure. She had a son, about twelve, who’d clearly taken the death of his father especially hard. During the initial consultation, he’d never uttered a word. Just sat quietly, doodling in a notebook he’d pulled from his backpack.

  Kelly had told him that shortly after she and Dan had married, they’d purchased a battered row-house in a Harlem neighborhood undergoing regentrification. They’d gotten it for a song, considering the price of real estate in New York. But they’d borrowed money over and above the purchase price to renovate the property.

  Dan, a high school music teacher, lost his job four years ago due to budget cuts, and was out of work for almost five months when he enlisted in the Army. At least he’d be bringing in a paycheck to support his family.

  Josh flipped through his copious notes. Kelly, an accounting major in college, kept the books for the butcher shop that had been in her family since her great-grandparents immigrated to New York from Ireland. Working for the family business allowed her the flexibility to be with her son after he got home from school.

  She also kept the books for a couple of other small family-owned businesses in the neighborhood. Mickey and Doris’ flower shop, and Sal’s Bakery. This she did in the evenings after dinner, either while her son did his homework or after he went to bed.

  Dan had served two tours of duty, was injured in the second tour, but after he’d recovered, they sent him back for a third tour. He didn’t make it back from that one. Died in a helicopter crash last year.

  The phone rang. Josh glanced over at the number and, preferring to stay focused on the case, let it go to voicemail.

  As if serving two tours of duty in a war zone wasn’t enough, he and Kelly had been fighting a war of their own with their mortgage lender over the foreclosure of their home. Thankfully, their lender was so backlogged on foreclosures, it had bought them more time.

  But their lender had also repeatedly lost their refinancing paperwork, and every time they sent new forms there were new requirements. No one could ever give them a straight answer.

  Well, he’d find the answers if he had to break down a few doors to get them. Opening the file, he began pouring over the paperwork Kelly had brought him, determined to keep her and her son in the home she and her late husband had bought and lovingly restored with their own two hands.

  Chapter 12

  Darcy’s house phone rang once, momentarily distracting her, before Millie got it. Whoever it was, Millie would take care of it.

  “Where was I?” she muttered. “Oh yeah, Dominic had pulled Larissa into his arms and—”

  “Excuse me, Darcy, telephone.”

  Darcy never snapped at Millie, but her nerves were so frayed from lack of sleep, lack of communication with Blake, and the manuscript that just didn’t seem to be working, that she turned to Millie with an exasperated, “What!”

  Millie narrowed her eyes at Darcy’s uncharacteristic reaction, but pulled it together and held her hand over the phone, “It’s Blake.”

  Darcy’s heart fluttered in her chest. “I’m sorry, Millie.”

  Millie simply sniffed in a
nnoyance.

  Reaching for the phone, Darcy took a deep, calming breath that she exhaled in a breathy, “Hi.” Covering the mouthpiece, she mouthed another apology to Millie before she left the room.

  “Darcy! You have no idea how good your voice sounds. How are you?”

  “Great.” Now that he’d called.

  “Did you get the flowers I sent?”

  Darcy looked around at the growing collection of vases filled with everything from calla lilies to exotic orchids.

  “Yes. Blake, you really didn’t need to send flowers every day you’ve been gone.”

  “Yes I did. I couldn’t let you forget me, now could I?”

  Right. She’d be more likely to forget her own name. “Are you back?”

  “Yes, and I’d love to see you tonight if you have the time.”

  Hmm, let me check my calendar. Yep, all clear. “I’d love that.”

  Two hours later, Josh sat back in his chair, stretched, then scrubbed his fingers through his hair. He thought he could swing a settlement with the bank and keep Kelly’s home. It would put all his negotiation and mediation skills to the test, but right now, he’d lay odds on a victory.

  His assistant, Miranda, knocked before sticking her head in the door. “This report just came for you by courier. Figured it must be important.” She handed him a large manila envelope with his name on it and the people locator service’s return address.

  “Thanks.”

  Anxious for the results that would reveal Blake as a fraud, but reluctant to tell Darcy the cold truth he knew the documents held, he drew the typewritten report and its exhibits from the envelope.

  Skimming the pages, Josh couldn’t believe it. Everything checked out; from Blake’s prep-school education to his Harvard degrees; from his residency at Johns Hopkins to his fellowship at University of California, San Diego. And that scar, it was real, too. They had the medical records from Peru to prove it.

  How can that be? Everything that Darcy wrote about the fictional Blake Garrett was true for the real Blake Garrett.