Worst Week Ever (A Long Road to Love) (9 page)

“Amazing
magicians and comics, as well.”

“I won’t tell Daniel
that, or he might change his mind. He hates comedy. I didn’t get your name.”

She stiffened,
prepared for the woman to turn on her. “I’m Carrie Hanson. Not of the Boston
Hansons. I’m just a normal person from New Jersey.”

The woman
chuckled and patted her hair before extending her beautifully manicured hand.
“I’m Irene Bernstein, a Jewish girl from Queens.”

Carrie shook her
hand. Instead of a limp shake, Irene had a firm, no nonsense grip.

“Not all the
rich are stuck in the past, just Gary and a few others. I ignore them…and
always find something not up to par in Gary’s restaurant.”

Carrie felt
compelled to correct one major misunderstanding. “Trent’s only my boss.”

Irene rolled
her eyes. “Honey, the man standing out there worrying himself sick is not
thinking like a boss. If Robert Conrad hadn’t been arrested last year for
entering this bathroom to continue a fight with his wife, I’m sure Trent would
be in here professing his undying love.”

A spring of
hope took root in her misery. “Do you know Trent well?”

“I know
everyone in society, all too well.”

“Do women in
society like him?” Carrie cringed as she waited for the answer. The answer
would be yes, and while Trent might go slumming for a moment, eventually he’d
go back to some lady of his own class.

“Trent’s
burned through all the available young woman in our circle. They think him the
biggest jerk alive.”

“Bigger than
Gary?”

“Afraid so.”
She smiled. “Seeing Trent so happy with you had to scare Gary to death. Pretty
soon he’ll be the last intolerable bachelor left standing, and honestly I don’t
see that ever changing.” She patted Carrie on the shoulder. “Don’t keep your
bad boy waiting.”

Carrie smiled.
“I truly enjoyed meeting you. I hope to see you again.”

The woman air
kissed both her cheeks. “I’ve no doubt we shall.”

Determined to fix
matters, Carrie hurried from the bathroom and crashed into Trent’s hard chest. He
wrapped his arms protectively around her. “Are you okay?”

She met his
gaze. “I’m fine. A nice woman helped me get proper perspective. Are we ready to
go?”

“We are. I’ve
offered Harmon and Andy a ride back to their hotel.”

She laughed
and smiled at Tall. “You’ll have plenty of leg room.”

When the limo
pulled in front of the hotel Tall leaned over and kissed Carrie’s cheek. “It’s
a pleasure to have met you. Perhaps we can meet up again before our show
closes.”

Trent cleared
his throat and Tall leaned back. “The two of you, of course.”

Trent smiled.
“We’re going to be really busy the next month or so, but do call me before you
leave town.”

Carrie wanted
to make sure they hadn’t interpreted Trent’s response as a dismissal. “Because
we definitely want to see you guys again. Just at a different restaurant.”

Tall gave her
a nod then looked at Trent. “I’ll check our schedule and give you a call.”

“Call me,
instead. I keep his schedule.” She rummaged through her purse and found her
business cards. She handed one to Tall and another to Tiny, so he wouldn’t feel
left out. To her shock, Tiny already possessed a card. He exchanged it for the
one in her hand.

Tall exited
the limo with amazing agility and grace given how his legs, arms, and long
torso had to squeeze through the door opening.

Tiny turned
Carrie’s face to his and kissed her on the lips. “I will remember you always.”
He pressed her hand to his heart. Then Tall pulled him from the car by his
belt. “Always!” he promised, stretching his arms toward her.

Sam closed the
door and returned to the driver’s seat a second later.

“Where to now,
sir?”

Carrie
replied. “To New Jersey. It’s late, I need my sleep.”

“Hold on,”
Trent demanded and turned to Carrie. “Sam will take you home. It’s late, so I’m
going to stay in my penthouse. I’ll see you at work tomorrow.”

While his
words seemed completely reasonable, they still hurt her to the core. “That
makes sense. I’ll see you tomorrow. I may be a little later than normal.”

“Why?” he
growled.

“Because it’s
already two in the morning and by the time I get home it will be four and I
need at least four hours of sleep before I wake up.”

He sighed
heavily and rubbed his head a very long time before answering. “Sam, take her
straight home, as fast as you can. Don’t talk to her on the drive. She needs to
lie down on the back seat and begin her sleep requirements. Then locate a
nearby hotel for yourself and have her at work by six.” He refocused on her.
“Wear something that won’t wrinkle too much if you sleep on the way in. I’ll
see you at six.”

Before she
could argue with his outrageous solution, he exited the limo and walked off.

“Jerk!” she
muttered and threw herself across the seat and closed her eyes. She felt the
car pull from the curb.

She woke five
minutes later to a dinging alarm. Not good when they should be driving on Rt.
80. The door nearest her head opened. She pushed herself up and stared at Sam’s
worried face.

“What’s
wrong?”

“I may have
gotten your address wrong.”

She looked out
the window and smiled at her small Cape Cod home. “Nope, this is it.” She
climbed out and breathed in the fragrance of her unruly English garden. Her
neighbors must have watered it during her absence. She had expected to come
home to a sun-torched yard of death.

The travel
case she’d lost in Customs waited for her on the porch. Sam carried it inside
and searched her house for intruders. She followed him about, certain she had
no burglars since she had nothing to burgle.

Upon
determining her home free of two-footed vermin, he smiled. “Nice place.
Furniture looks comfortable.”

She yawned.
“Thank you. I think all furniture should be comfortable. That’s its core job.”
Her yawn caused Sam to yawn, as well. “Where are you going to stay?”

“Not sure,
yet.”

“You could
stay here if you want. I have three extra beds.”

He looked all
set to refuse then stopped. “Let me check in with Master Trent and see if
that’s acceptable.” She yawned again as she watched Sam hurry from her house.
She had no idea why Trent thought his house staff terrible. She could attest to
a superb cook, a driver who went above and beyond his duties, and recalling
Trent’s beautiful home both inside and out, the gardener and housekeeper must
be top notch, as well. The butler saved a family heirloom, so he seemed on the
job too.

She sat down
on her comfortable couch, waiting for Sam to get permission to stay at her
house from Daddy Trent. The couch did its job a bit too well. She curled into a
ball and fell asleep.

* * * *

Trent still
walked the streets an hour later. He didn’t know if their first ‘date’ had been
a promising beginning or a complete disaster. Normally, he could tell the
difference. But a roller coaster had fewer ups and downs than this night.

He probably
should have gone with her to New Jersey, but she’d given Tall her card and
asked the guy to call her. That really pissed him off. If he’d stayed in the
car, he feared their evening would end in a fight, which he didn’t want. So he
abandoned ship.

Besides, he
had no shot of her inviting him in, even if he made the long trek out into the
wilderness of New Jersey. In addition, if by some miracle she invited him inside,
having sex with Carrie on their first date would seriously impair his wait-until-he-had-new-employees-before-getting-involved
plan.

When his phone
rang, he answered it without even looking to see who called. “You better not be
in an accident.”

“No, sir. We
arrived safely at Miss Carrie’s house.”

“Good job.” He
planned to end the call when Sam spoke again.

“The place has
an unoccupied abandoned look to it, so I checked all the rooms to ensure no
vagrants had moved in during Miss Carrie’s absence.”

Trent’s heart
jumped. He’d never considered that possibility. “And?”

“No vagrants. But,
I still worry about Miss Carrie staying here alone in its current state. Thus,
when she offered me a bed for the night, instead of refusing at once, I told
her I needed to check with you.”

“And she
bought that?” Ever since Trent had sent his driver to the Defensive Driving
Academy where he became the best driver the school had ever tested, the man had
an inflated sense of self-worth. Sam never asked permission to do anything
anymore. He just did whatever he pleased, knowing Trent wouldn't fire him and
even if he did, someone else would hire him in a second.

“She appeared
to.”

Clearly,
Carrie couldn’t read people as well as he’d thought.

“In her
defense, sir, I have been an exemplary employee today.”

“That’s true.
Any reason for such aberrant behavior?”

“I wished to
make a good impression, so later when you rant and rave about your out-of-control
driver she will think you mad.”

Trent thought
his driver disturbingly Machiavellian. “Well, no matter. I appreciated your
obedience today. I thought you did an excellent job.”

“I always do
an excellent job.”

“True, but
today, or should I say yesterday, given we’ve crossed to a new day, you did an
excellent job without attitude, and I really appreciated it.”

He had
evidently stunned his driver into complete silence. He would have thought the
man had hung up, except he could hear crickets in the background.

“Where exactly
are you?”

“Standing in
Miss Carrie’s front yard, which is four foot high in thick flowering weeds.”

Ah, that
explained the crickets. However, it didn’t explain why Carrie failed to have a
service to care for her lawn. No wonder Sam didn’t want to leave her alone in
an apparently abandoned house.

“Does she have
a place for you to stay?”

“There is a
bed and bathroom in the basement. It is acceptable to me, if it is acceptable
to you.”

“Then stay.
I’m surprised you bothered to call me and ask permission.”

“This concerns
Miss Carrie. I make it a policy never to get between a man and his woman.”

His chest
suddenly hurt. “She’s not my woman, and please do not say that within her
hearing. She’ll run for the hills. She’s my employee and nothing more.”

“Then shall I
stay?”

All his
internal frustration over his feelings for Carrie burst forth in a flare of
temper. “I already answered you. Yes! Stay in the basement. Only don’t sleep so
soundly you fail to hear vagrants breaking in.”

He raked his
hand through his hair and tried to calm. People—a considerable number of
well-dressed people wandered the streets at three in the morning—stared at him
in alarm.

“Just take care
of her and bring her back to me in the morning. I’ll send several of the
gardeners out in the morning to fix her grounds.”

“It’s a
postage stamp, sir. One gardener should suffice.”

He hung up on
his driver, remembering why he didn’t like the fellow. Damn know-it-all!
Perhaps he should have Carrie give Sam lessons on how to be likable.

He entered his
penthouse lobby. The sleepy security guard popped to his feet and smiled. “Good
morning, Mr. Lancaster. Allow me to call the elevator.”

When the metal
doors opened, the guard held one side, lest it try to close while Trent stepped
inside. The man reached in, slipped his key into the box and pushed the button
for the penthouse. When the guards used their key, the elevator went directly
to the floor requested, ignoring all floors between. He then smiled at Trent.
“Have a good morning, sir.”

Checking his
nametag, Trent smiled. “Thank you, Ray.”

The man
brightened up as if he’d received a hundred dollars. Why would a ‘thank you’
make him so happy?
Carrie strongly believed appreciation of one’s prior
work improved the quality of future work. Personally, he’d never seen any proof
of that, but the only person at work who ever warranted thanks was Carrie and
she improved even when she received no thanks and several threats of dismissal.

Carrie.

Tonight showed
why he had to fix his business before he started anything with her. She hadn’t
been among one of ‘his people’ for more than a minute before she escaped to the
bathroom. Honestly, he had no idea what Gary said to set her off.

Her reaction
troubled him immensely. He’d heard horror stories about how vicious the women
of his circle could be to the lower class beauties who married their way up.
What if they skewered poor Carrie alive?

The elevator
opened to a small lobby before the entrance to his penthouse. Mars, his
amazingly efficient penthouse butler, stood at the side of the open door, ready
to take his suit jacket as he entered. Without question, Mars was the best
butler Trent had ever met. Fortunately for him, his young age of thirty-five
and lack of a British accent meant most of society wouldn’t hire him.

After going
through three old English butlers in a year, the service told Trent he could
take Mars or find another service. Since he’d already been tossed from the
other services, he agreed to try out the fellow. While too young to be a proper
butler, Mars had studied at an English butlering school, so he knew his job. In
Trent’s opinion, the fellow’s years as an army captain set him above other
butlers. His black laser eyes scared the staff into perfect soldiers. In less
than a month Mars had the penthouse running better than his Long Island Estate.

Still, given Trent
hadn’t called and warned of his intention to stay here tonight, he’d no clue why
Mars waited at the door to receive his jacket at three in the morning.

Curious, he
asked.

Mars’
expression remained blank, but he blinked several times before answering. “A
buzzer goes off in my room when the penthouse button is pressed on the
elevator.”

“So you
dressed and groomed yourself in three minutes?”

“Yes, sir.”

“In the
future, if I come in after mid-night, just stay in bed and let me fend for
myself.”

For a moment,
a faint smile flickered on the man’s face. “Thank you for the offer, sir, but I
prefer to be dressed and ready for duty.” He then studied Trent with his
penetrating gaze. “Are you feeling well, sir? You appear a bit flushed. Shall I
call a doctor?”

“No. I’m fine.
I’ve been walking around town trying to work some things out.”

“Ah,” he
stated as if he knew what things. “Can I offer you coffee or something to drink
to assist in your endeavors?”

“No, I’m going
to go to sleep. I need to be at work by six.”

“In three
hours, sir?” His expression remained as flat as his question.

Trent realized
his plan made no sense. “Better make it nine. Will you call Sam and let him
know I won’t be into work until nine?”

“If you wish,
but would it not be more efficient if I called you a limo to carry you the two
blocks to work instead of asking Sam to come in from Long Island. The traffic
is—”

Trent held up
his hand.

“Sorry sir, I
will call Sam immediately.”

Carrie’s
lecture about ‘providing sufficient information so his orders made sense’ came
back to him. “Sam isn’t in Long Island. I had him drive Carrie home and stay
there so he can drive her in this morning. I told him to be at work by six, but
I’m changing it to nine.”

“Thank you,
sir. I will see to it immediately.”

Trent had no
idea if Mars felt better understanding his logic, but
he
did, since the
man hadn’t gone off shaking his head this time.

That his staff
thought him a blundering idiot, annoyed him to no end. He’d graduated from
Harvard, for god’s sake! This problem lay at his father’s feet. The man had
insisted a Lancaster never explained himself.

He retired to
his master suite, which was immaculate as ever.

Did Carrie have
a maid at least? She’d never mentioned one. Yet, if she didn’t, how did her
house get cleaned? He’d send a maid with the gardener tomorrow.

Otherwise, she
might ask for a week off to repair her environment that had fallen apart during
her time in Taiwan. God knew, his office fell apart in her absence. When she
proudly told him about the system she’d created to stop the supplies from
ending up at flea markets, he didn’t have the heart to tell her that in her
absence, supply cost had quadrupled.