Read Nothing But Trouble Online

Authors: Bettye Griffin

Nothing But Trouble (21 page)

“I'm glad you're taking your work seriously, but I'm getting tired of this, Norell. You're not second to
my
work. I don't like being second to yours.”
“It's a one-time incident. Look at the wonderful weekend we just had.”
Finally he turned to her. “I know you're trying. I think you might be putting too much on yourself. Why don't you girls hire more help?”
“We have. We hired two people the other week. But now we have to let someone go. It's hard to find qualified people, Vic.” Vic, like so many other people, didn't really grasp what medical transcription was all about. He felt that anyone who knew the keyboard could sit down and transcribe a cataract extraction or a heart bypass.
“You must not be trying hard enough.”
“We run an ad continuously on the Internet. The response has been wonderful, but when we test people they can't spell or they use the wrong words. We can't have people like that working for us, Vic. Our service would go out of business in a heartbeat if our quality was that poor.”
He silently turned back to the television, and after a few moments she went back up to her office with leaden steps, her heart feeling as heavy as her feet.
Chapter 27
D
ana's forehead wrinkled. Why did she always imagine she heard a ringing phone whenever she vacuumed? Sometimes she stopped to shut off the vacuum as many as two or three times to investigate. She told herself she had merely imagined the sound and continued moving the vacuum back and forth. But the sensation persisted, and she finally shut off the motor just in time to hear the tail end of a ring.
She jumped onto the bed and reached for the receiver on the nightstand. “Hello.”
“Hello, Dana. Irene Albacete.”
Dana's shoulders grew rigid.
She knows.
“Hi, Irene,” she said, forcing herself to sound natural. “What's up?”
“Vanessa is down in Miami with her grandparents, and she thinks she might have left her jeans skirt at your house. She really wants to wear it while she's there. I know Brittany is away too, but I was hoping that maybe you'd seen it.”
Dana's body immediately relaxed. “Yes, I sure did. It was in the wash, and I knew it wasn't Britt's. It's all ironed and folded.”
“Oh, good. I hoped she hadn't lost it. I was about to run some errands. Would I be able to come by and pick it up? I promised I'd mail it to her.”
“Yes. I'll be here.”
“Here it is, all ready to wear,” Dana said to Irene twenty minutes later as she handed her a plastic supermarket bag containing Vanessa's skirt. They stood just inside Dana's front door.
“Thanks so much, Dana.” Irene smiled. “I guess you miss Brittany as much as I miss Vanessa.”
“I really do. Have you been enjoying your summer?”
“Oh, yes. Vanessa and I went up to New Jersey to visit with family. I got one of the special deals where you drive a rental car up and leave it there. It only cost fifteen dollars a day to rent a Ford Taurus. I could have gotten away with ten bucks if I wanted to rent something smaller. We used the car while we were there, and then we dropped it off and took the train back.
“They're trying to move their fleet back up North for the fall. By the holidays they'll be offering the same deal for one-way drop-offs in Florida and other warmer climates. Usually you can't get those rates this late in the year, so I consider myself lucky.” Irene smiled and patted the skirt. “Thanks a lot, Dana. I'll get this off to Vanessa right away.”
“You're very welcome. I'm glad I could help.” Dana hadn't seen Irene since before Brittany had left for Nassau. She seemed so friendly and warm.
An impulse hit Dana like a bolt of lightning, and she acted on it before thinking it through. “Irene, do you have a minute? There's something I'd like to talk about with you.”
Irene nodded and followed Dana into the living room, where they took seats. “Do you have another special date?” Irene asked with a smile.
“Uh, no. It's something else. I've been wanting to talk to you for a couple of weeks now,” Dana began.
“Really? What about?” Irene sounded more curious than anything else.
“Well ... I'm not sure where to begin. It's about Gil.”
“Oh?”
Irene's tone had become a tad chilly, and Dana considered that she might have made a mistake in thinking she could share the confidence of her relationship with Gil. But she couldn't back out now. “You know he helped me with my business loan,” she said.
“Yes, I knew about that.”
“We worked very closely together, and he put in a recommendation for me. I think Gil wants us to succeed as much as we do ourselves.” Dana knew she was chattering, but now she dreaded completing what she'd started.
“Dana, what did you want to talk to me about?”
Naturally Irene would ask her to get to the point. The woman had things to do. “Well, like I said, we've worked together closely, and one thing kind of led—Irene, would you be terribly upset if we went out?”
“You mean if you and Gil started
dating
?” Irene asked incredulously.
“Something like that.” No way would she let on that they already had.
Irene stood up. “Dana, I find it odd that out of all the men in Jacksonville, you can't find anyone to date other than my husband.” She turned and left, closing the front door behind herself with more force than required.
Dana had stood, too, and she went to the window and watched, stunned, as Irene rushed to her car at the curb and drove away. It all happened so fast, she hadn't even had time to point out that Gil was Irene's
ex
-husband.
Dana fervently wished she could take back the whole conversation. What had seemed like a good idea in the beginning now seemed like a terrible error in judgment. Gil would be furious. She dreaded telling him.
She puttered around for a few minutes, wanting to put off the inevitable as long as possible. When she had summoned her courage she finally picked up the telephone and dialed him at home.
He answered on the first ring with a terse, “Hello.” When she identified herself he responded with an equally abrupt, “I'm on the other line. I'll have to call you back.”
Dana hung up, dazed. Was he upset with her, or was she merely being overly sensitive?
She jumped when the phone rang two or three minutes later. She immediately picked it up and uttered an anxious-sounding greeting.
“Dana, what were you thinking?” Gil asked incredulously without preamble.
“Irene called you already?” So she hadn't imagined his annoyed tone.
“From her cell phone. Reamed me out. This wasn't how I wanted to handle this, Dana. You know I haven't even told Vanessa yet. Now Irene will probably beat me to it.”
“I'm terribly sorry, Gil. It was an impulse, a bad one. But in my defense, let me point out that Irene would have found out eventually anyway.”
“Yes, she would have. And she wouldn't have been happy no matter who I got involved with. I can live with that. It's Vanessa I wanted to protect. I wanted to get her first, honest gut reaction to us, not one that's first been poisoned by Irene's venom. But now that won't be possible.”
Dana didn't know what to say. She knew she'd blown it. “What happens now?” she asked.
“I guess we'll have to wait and see. I'll be talking to Vanessa every day while she's at my parents', and I'll see her when she comes back. I don't think Irene will tell her until she returns. Maybe I can meet her plane and head Irene off.”
Dana hoped so, too. For Gil's sake, and for Brittany's as well.
 
 
Dana and Gil left for Savannah right after work on Friday. Dana dozed off somewhere after Brunswick, Georgia. When she opened her eyes they were thirty miles outside Savannah.
“I'm so embarrassed,” she said, her palm cupping her chin and jaw. “I didn't mean to go to sleep like that. It's just that I've been up late the last couple of nights trying to stay on top of my work so I won't come home to a huge backlog.”
He reached across the console and patted her hand. “It's all right, Dana. I know how hard you work and how last minute this all was, and I'm grateful that you were able to get away.” Then he squeezed her hand. “And if I had a choice between you being tired now or tired later, I'd rather you be tired now.”
Her breath caught in her throat, and a twirly sensation made its way to her stomach. In just a few hours she would be intimate with Gil for the first time. She'd been so eager before, but now she began to feel nervous. What if Cécile had been right and the same thing happened with Gil as had with Sean? Would Gil lose interest in her after they slept together? Would he go after some woman in her twenties with a better body, like Sean had?
When they arrived in the city, Gil checked them into the hotel. Instead of going up to their room, they left their luggage at the front desk, parked in the hotel garage, and set off on foot for a look at the historic district.
Dana was glad she hadn't had to look at their hotel room too soon. Her nerves had become as limp as cooked pasta as she considered that perhaps she'd made a mistake.
Spending time with Gil out in the open—simply walking down the street, with no huge bed in the background—turned out to be just what she needed to relax. Dana quickly became engrossed in her surroundings. She had never been to Savannah before. She liked the pulse of the city, all the people walking around, the street performers, the music drifting out of the bars. It reminded her of New Orleans, but with different architecture. “I see why you like it here,” she remarked. “It's very different from Jacksonville, much more lively.”
“Jacksonville is a great town, but it doesn't have a real personality. It's kind of bland. I like the beach atmosphere and enjoy living there, but I'm ready to purchase property, and I can't afford to buy out there.”
“So you'll be heading further inland, huh?”
“Yeah, probably one of those new town houses they're putting up all over town. I've always liked the convenience of having a pool and a fitness center available for my use, and not having to mow my own lawn. That's why I bought a town house years ago, the one where Vanessa lives now.”
How considerate of him not to mention Irene, she thought. “I know what you mean,” she said. “My pool requires a lot of work. Usually I let Brittany do it, but since she's been away it's fallen on me. I do keep an exercise bike and a glider in my garage. It used to look like a gym in there, before I sold ... before I sold the biggest piece of equipment.” She hadn't thought of the weights that ultimately killed Kenny in a long time, and those thoughts had no place during a romantic weekend with Gil.
He reached for her hand. “We've been walking for a long time. How about going back to the hotel and getting some dinner?”
“Are you sure you wouldn't rather eat at one of the places we've passed?”
“For lunch tomorrow. The package I bought includes breakfast and dinner at the hotel. The food there is excellent, by the way.”
Dana's spirits sank. “So you've stayed there before.”
With Irene.
“Many times. But that has nothing to do with you and me.” He squeezed her hand. “Dana, I guess this is as good a time as any to talk about this. Our room has a separate sitting area with a couch and some very comfortable chairs. I don't want to pressure you into doing something you're not ready for.”
She smiled. “Somehow my picture of a romantic weekend in Savannah didn't include you sleeping on the couch.”
He stopped walking and looked her in the eye. “Are you sure, Dana?”
“I'm sure.”
It was nearly seven o'clock when they returned to the hotel. By then Dana felt completely at ease, and the sight of the king-size bed in their room filled her with anticipation, not dread. In addition to the sitting room, their quarters also had a tiny patio barely large enough for two chairs and a small table. They could sit outside and watch the street scene below. Gil certainly hadn't skimped on this weekend. She would do all she could to make it memorable.
They took turns showering and changing in the privacy of the bedroom, then went down for dinner. Dana thoroughly enjoyed her veal piccata. The atmosphere of the restaurant set a romantic mood, with dim overhead lighting, candlelight, flowers, and soft music.
Gil lifted his wineglass. “Here's to good food, good drink, and the other pleasures of life,” he toasted.
Dana knew he was offering her one last out. All she had to do was amend his toast. Instead she touched her glass to his. “Here's to new beginnings,” she said. She sipped her wine, her eyes boldly meeting his and the corners of her mouth slightly upturned. Suddenly it didn't matter who Gil had been there with before. This time it was just the two of them.
 
 
Gil unlocked the door to their room. “That was a great meal,” he said, rubbing his belly. “What do you say we sit and chill for a while, let it digest?”

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