Truth or Dare (2 page)

Now the desk was neat and uncluttered.  The paperwork had been moved to the top of the low, lateral file ca
binets along the back wall,
the overflowing wastebasket had been emptied
, the empty coffee cups were gone, and unless he missed his guess, that was a fresh pot of coffee
he smelled
.

He
followed the coffee aroma
through the room and stepped into his own inner office.  The only changes here were the missing dirty cups and two neat stacks of papers in the center of his desk.  The rest of the piles were, thankfully, just as he'd left them.

The two new stacks were as much a puzzle as the neat appearance of his nonexistent secretary's office.  One pile was a stack of pink "while
–
you
–
were
–
out" messages.  The oth
er appeared to be letters, printed
on his own company stationery.

Someone had definitely been busy.  But who? 

A tinkling of glass and the sound of running water
, and the ever-enticing aroma of fresh coffee,
led him to the small kitchen off the back of his office.

There stood his fantasy secretary at his sink, obviously engrossed in cleaning up the dirty glasses and week
–
old coffee dregs on the countertop.  The woman who normally cleaned up at night had been sick for days.  Jared hadn't realized what a mess the place was in, but he certainly didn't expect his secretary
—
much less an applicant
—
to do this sort of work.  "What are you doing?" 

At the sound of his voice Rachel's heart gave a little flip.  She nearly dropped the cup she was rinsing.  "Oh!  You startled me."  She closed her eyes briefly to regain her composure.  "I didn't hear you come in."  She placed the cup in the sink and dried her hands on a dish towel.  "I just thought I'd make myself useful while I waited.  I hope you don't mind," she added, a bit uncertain of his reaction.

When he'd left the room earlier, his charcoal suit and burgundy tie had been neat and crisp.  Now his jacket was gone, his shirt was wrinkled and dirty, and his tie hung loosely from his fingers.  "I made fresh coffee.  You'll pardon me if I say you look like you could use some."

Jared chuckled ruefully and ran a hand through his thick wavy hair.  "I sure could."

She poured him a cup.

He took it and thanked her.  "Pour yourself one and come back to the office."

Rachel declined the coffee.  The shape her stomach was in, coffee was the last thing she needed.  She preceded him out of the kitchen, wondering what he'd say about everything she'd done.  Wonder
ing if he would
hire her.

He leaned back in his chair with a sigh, then sipped the coffee.  "Someone's been busy.  What's all this?" he asked, indicating the stacks of letters and messages on his desk.

"I hope you don't think it too presumptuous of me," Rachel said, "but the phone kept ringing, and no one seemed to be around.  I just took a few messages, that's all."  She made a conscious effort to keep from fidgeting.  What she'd actually done in his absence was take over his office, but she hoped he wouldn't see it that way.

He eyed her carefully.  "And these letters?"

"I'm sorry if I overstepped, but it just looked like an awful lot needed to be done.  I didn't mind helping out.  And please don't feel obligated to hire me because of this."  She nearly choked on the words.  Obligated was exactly how she wanted him to feel.  Obligated enough to hire her.

"You don't want the job?"

She swallowed a knot of panic.  "Of course I want the job."

He studied her a moment longer, then reached for his phone
—
which had miraculously stopped ringing as soon as he'd come back to the office
—
and punched in a three
–
digit number.

"Mark, this is Jared.  Put a Ms. Rachel Fredrick on the payroll as of an hour ago.  You can have her fill out the necessary paperwork Monday.  She's going to be too busy today.  Thanks."

Rachel nearly wilted with relief.  "Thank you, Mr. Morgan. Jared.  You won't regret it."

"I'm sure I won't, Rachel.  I just hope you don't.  You've got your work cut out for you."

*  *  *  *

"Ooo, Mother, what happened to your hair?  Yuk."

"Caroline, is that any way for a twelve
–
year
–
old to talk to her mother?" Rachel asked with a raised eyebrow and a quirk on her lips.  "Yuk, indeed.  This happens to be a wig."

"But . . . why?  You look so . . . so . . . like a . . ."

"I think what Caro is trying to say," Mike offered, "is that you look like a bag lady.  Please tell us you didn't go on your job interview looking like that."

"I most certainly did," Rachel replied calmly as she looked up at her seventeen
–
year
–
old son.  He was several inches taller than she.  He had his father's height, but not his looks, thank God.  She wouldn't have been able to bear it if either of her children even remotely resembled Hank.  A coldness poured through her at the mere thought of her ex
–
husband.

"What did you do that for?" Mike demanded.  "And those clothes!"

"I did it so I wouldn't look like me.  And I got the job.  So there."

"Well, you oughtta be able to keep this job."  Caroline giggled behind her hand.  "It's for sure nobody's gonna recognize you when you look like that."

"That, my darling children, is the entire idea."

"Where are you working?  What kind of place is it?" Mike wanted to know.

"I'll tell you all about it, but first, let me get out of this costume."

Mike and Caroline both laughed at her strange appearance as Rachel went down the hall toward her bedroom.

"Love the wig, Mom," Mike called after her. 

Caroline's squeal of laughter accompanied his words.  "The glasses are my favorite."

Rachel closed the door to her room and kicked off the tacky flat shoes.  She rushed to rid herself of the layers of clothing as quickly as possible.  How long would it take her to get used to wearing clothes so loose they threatened to fall off every time she moved?

Except for the bra.  It had the opposite problem in that she'd purposely bought it two sizes too small, to flatten her chest.  It wasn't all that uncomfortable after the first hour or so, but getting it off was certainly a relief.

But the clothes concealed her figure, and that's what she wanted.

With the offending garments in a heap at her feet, she reached to pull the pins from her scalp.  The black wig landed like a dead thing on her dresser.  She shook out her hair until it hung down her back in curls that fell halfway to her waist.

"Ah."  It felt so good to be out of the disguise.  But the wig and ill
–
fitting clothes had served her well.  She had the job, and she intended to keep it.  So she'd just better get used to the idea of wearing those awful clothes and that hideous wig.

When she rejoined her children, Mike said, "Now you look like the mother we know and love."

Rachel had to admit she certainly felt more like herself in her snug fitting jeans and loose T
–
shirt.  "The bag lady is no more . . . until Monday morning.  Now, tell me how your day went.  How are you two making out at your new schools?"

Mike complained about being forced to read
A Tale of Two Cities
.  Rachel laughed at the face he made, and promised to buy him two new Louis L'Amours if he got a good grade on his book report.

"I had a great day," Caroline said.  "I signed up for a girl's softball team."

"That's wonderful," Rachel said with enthusiasm.  She knew Caroline had worried she might not get to play this year.  "Tell us about it."

"I don't know much, really.  Except that my new friend, Debbie, you remember hearing about her.  Well, her dad's the coach, and she says they've already started practice, but that they need a good short stop.  And that's me!  It's some sort of inner
–
city league and they play nearly all summer.  And you don't have to worry about how to get me to the games.  If Mike can't take me, Debbie says there's always a bunch of carpools going on with the parents."

"Sounds like you're settling in at school pretty fast," Rachel observed.

"Well," Caroline said.  "I miss all my old friends, but I'm making new ones."

"I'm glad,
sweetie
.  You both know I hated to uproot you, especially in the middle of a school year, but I didn't have much choice.  Now that I've got a job, things'll be fine, you'll see."

Mike laughed and shook his head.  "You mean, now that the bag lady has a job."

"Watch it, kid."  Rachel raised a fist in mock anger and shook it beneath her son's nose.  "It's bad enough having strangers laugh out the corners of their mouths when I walk by.  I don't have to take it from you two." 

"Yeah, but Mother," Caroline began.  "Isn't what you're doing, you know, changing your looks that way, isn't that kinda like . . . lying . . . sorta?"

Rachel sighed at her daughter's trouble look.  "Yes, honey, it is lying, I suppose.  And I don't like doing it.  But I've tried being myself at jobs before, and it never worked out.  Lying is never a good thing to do, but in this case it was my only choice if I wanted to get a job and keep it.  That doesn't make it right, but that's what I've done."

"You've always told us liars get punished," Mike said gravely, a twinkle in his eye.

"Oh, don't worry.  I'll be punished.  Those clothes and that wig are so uncomfortable I don't know how long I'm going to be able to stand them.  And if I don't go blind from wearing those awful, green glasses, it'll be a miracle."

*  *  *  *

Monday morning Rachel had Mike drop her off at work a half hour early.  They had decided he would use the car during the day to get to school and to take Caroline to her softball practices, since Rachel really had no need to leave the office until time to go home.  But she didn't want her new boss to see Mike just yet.

Jared Morgan had not asked about her marital status or if she had children, and she hadn't volunteered the information.  She also hadn't told Mike and Caroline about that.  They had enough problems of their own without being made to feel their mother was hiding their existence.

The first thing Rachel noticed when she got to her office was the audio cassette lying in the middle of her desk.  The note taped to it was addressed to her.  Jared would be late coming in this morning.  The tape contained correspondence he'd dictated over the weekend, and could she please get as much of it taken care of this morning as possible, because when he gets in, he'll have other things for her to do.

Rachel made her way through the tape, typing the correspondence into the computer, printing out the letters, making notes on her calendar, and taking phone messages.

She had just refilled her coffee cup for the third time when the phone rang
—
again.  When she told the female caller that Jared wouldn't be in until later, the woman said, "That boy.  I swear, sometimes I think he forgets he even has a mother at all."

"You're his mother?" Rachel asked politely, trying not to sound like a busybody.

"I am, for all the good it does me.  Who am I speaking with?"

"I'm Rachel Fredrick, your son's new secretary."

"New secretary?  Hallelujah!  How long have you been working for him?"

"Actually, this is my first full day."

"And he ran off and left you there alone, did he?  Well, I sympathize with you, Rachel.  If he can forget he has a mother for weeks on end, I can just imagine how he treats his secre
tary.  But you hang in there.  If you're any good at your job, then he sure needs you.  And if you weren't any good, he wouldn't have hired you in the first place."

"I guess you're right about that.  He certainly seems to know what he's doing," Rachel said.

The two women chatted for a few more minutes.  When Rachel hung up, she leaned back in her chair and smiled to herself.  She'd never made a friend over the telephone before, but she had the most pleasant feeling that was what had just happened.  She closed her eyes briefly and let her smile widen.

She was startled back to the here and now by Jared Morgan's deep voice from a few feet away.

"Does that smile on your face mean that call was
not
a viewer complaining about the amount of bare skin on Saturday night's late show?"  He was leaning against the door to the hall, looking as crisp and neat as he had when she'd first seen him last Friday morning.

There was one more thing Rachel hadn't told her children about this new job.  She hadn't told them that Jared Morgan, her new boss, was probably the best looking man she'd ever seen.  Maybe his individual features weren't exactly perfect
—
then again, maybe they were
—
but they certainly went together well.