Heart's Refuge
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Cheryl Harper
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17
Chapter One
WILL BARNES STRAIGHTENED the pad of paper so the bottom was perfectly aligned with the edge of his desk. Next, he hit Play on his voice mail. For more than a decade, every morning had started the same way—voice mail, email, crisis management. Whether he was in a Dallas high-rise or his quaint new office in downtown Holly Heights, his clients, the ones who’d stuck with him, had come to expect quick answers.
People liked to know what was happening with their money.
And dependability mattered. Especially now that Will had left the practice he’d helped build to step out on his own. Proving he was the same guy who’d protected his clients’ futures—minus the slick city office—was critical.
Only his daughter, Chloe, could convince him to walk away from what he’d built, the partnership he’d been chasing, for the unknown.
Since she was currently clearing every one of his shelves and restacking the books to her liking, he wasn’t sure he was off to a great start. Entertaining a twelve-year-old girl for a whole summer would tax his creativity.
Neither of them was certain he could do it.
When the last message started, Will realized his day was about to take a sharp downturn.
“Will, I’m sorry to do this to you, but I won’t be in to work today.” His secretary, Ann, cleared her throat. “Actually, I won’t be in again. Ever. Life is too short to spend it filling out forms. Six weeks is enough to convince me of that.” Even the click when she hung up sounded agitated. That didn’t surprise him. By the end of almost every day, Ann herself had been pretty agitated.
“Great.” Will carefully pushed the button to end the call and tried to ignore the headache building right between his eyes. “Another assistant bites the dust.”
Without someone to answer the phone and follow his procedures, the whole balancing act had just gotten more difficult. If he’d been juggling watermelons before, now he had a chain saw in the mix.
“No more Ann? Now who will feed me?” Chloe shoved his binders in the bottom shelf, her pink stripe of hair—the one that still gave him indigestion—flashing.
Remember it clips in. It’s only temporary.
“You can feed us both. Brenda’s down at the diner. Go see if she’s got any work you can do, and bring back lunch when you get hungry.” Will shifted to pull out his wallet. “Here’s a couple of extra dollars. Put my initials at the top of the old Galaga machine.”
Chloe snatched the bills out of his hands, folded them with a crisp crease in the center and slipped them in her back pocket. “If you’d get me a tablet, I could sit quietly.” Chloe shook her head slowly. “Might save you money in the long run.”
The upward curve of her lips reminded him so much of her mother, but Olivia would have been dumbfounded at the idea of wasting her time on an old video game.
In April, she’d listened to him rant for a full five minutes about the hair before she explained it wasn’t permanent. Then she’d flipped the script, saying that if he’d pick up his daughter or come for her soccer games or school awards ceremony, they could discuss Chloe’s fashion phases and things like pierced ears.
Which his daughter also had. Today she was accessorizing with gold stars.
At the rate she was changing, tomorrow she’d be driving, the next day she’d go off to college and by the end of the week he’d be a grandfather.
And he might not know her at all.
Olivia had moved his daughter to Austin, but he was the one who’d let work take over his life.
One conversation. He’d changed his whole life after one conversation.
Quit his job. Sold his house in a nice Dallas subdivision. Hired movers.
Taking the risk of going into business for himself had been a big, scary step, but he’d done it.
For Chloe.
His daughter perched on his mahogany desk, one sneakered foot thumping against the drawers.
Will gave her the most ferocious frown he could.
Then he grabbed her, pulled her close and tickled her until she couldn’t breathe. When her beautiful giggles finally died down, he said, “Yeah, smarty-pants, a tablet might save money except you keep dropping them. Shattered screens don’t keep you occupied for long.”
Chloe was wiping her nose and panting, but he was happy to see the bored stare replaced by something else.
“Trust me, Dad. I won’t drop it again.” She put one hand over her sequined tank top to make this solemn vow.
“Go help Brenda and we’ll see. I’m calling to tell her you’re on the way. Don’t talk to strangers on the sidewalk. Don’t dawdle on the sidewalk. Don’t leave the restaurant without calling me to tell me you’re coming back. Order me a hamburger. And don’t talk to strangers on the sidewalk.”
“Got it. Talk to every stranger I see, get in random cars and bring you tofu.” Chloe waved a hand as she disappeared.
He trailed behind her and peered out the window to make sure she made it the four doors down to the diner. If she caught him watching, she might actually bring him tofu.
If Sue Lynn’s Best Burgers had tofu.
He had his doubts but no time to check. Revising the employment ad yet again had reordered his to-do list. In Dallas, any time a job opening was advertised, he’d had plenty of experienced candidates to choose from. Recent finance graduates were willing to work long hours in order to move up the ladder.
But very few candidates wanted to drive from Austin to Holly Heights every day.
Ann’s previous experience had been running a hotel front desk. He’d thought that would mean discretion, good time management and an ability to follow procedure. Finance and investments and the paperwork that came with it must have been a boring change.
Will opened the employment ad he kept on his desktop. “Maybe ‘financial administrative assistant’ isn’t the right title.” The leather executive chair that fit the expensive atmosphere of his office was silent as he twisted back and forth and flipped through the possibilities. “Assistant financial planner. Junior finance agent. Salesperson with a flair for investments. Person who can use a checklist and answer the telephone.”
He didn’t understand the difficulty. He yanked the three-inch three-ring binder off the shelf and dumped it on his desk with a thud. “Everything is in here. All I need is someone who will follow these directions step-by-step.” He flipped the pages and read, “How to answer the phone, what to do with the mail, when to take lunch and breaks...”
Reworking the employment ad would be a waste of time, so he emailed the Holly Heights classified editor and the newspaper in Austin to run the ad as soon as possible. This could be the time he found a UT Austin finance graduate who’d always dreamed of a small-town life instead of a hefty paycheck.
When the phone rang, he waited for someone else to answer it and realized it was going to be a long week.
“Barnes Financial. This is Will.”
“The man himself. What happened to the assistant who answered the first time I called?” Rebecca asked. Will could hear the smile in her voice. That’s the kind of person Rebecca Lincoln was. Her sunny personality made bad days better. “And are you already hard at work finding good places to send my money?”
“Not yet. I start by finding ways to make you money. It’s kind of my thing.” Will waited for her to laugh. When she did, he relaxed in his seat. “I’ve got some good leads, too, so whenever you have a minute, I could present them to you and Jen and Stephanie.” Was it cowardly to ask Rebecca to arrange things with his stepsister? Possibly.
“Jen’s insistence that I’ll be robbed blind without your help is insulting,” Rebecca muttered. “I’ve managed to keep the lights on all by myself for some time.”
“Sure, but now you’re going to be a juicier target.” Will grimaced. Juicier wasn’t a word he should use in conversation with a client.
“I guess.” Rebecca sighed. “And even if I want to give it all away, I would like to make sure the money has an impact.”
Will didn’t understand Rebecca’s urge to donate that much money, but he could still help Holly Heights’s lottery winners make good decisions. “If we use some of your winnings to make more money, that means more help to spread around.” As well as a solid payday for him.
“You and Jen, you’re stuck in the same loop. But I agree. All of us together, we’re going to make Holly Heights better and change the world. This is about more than finding places with the best financial returns. You’re sure you know what I want?”
He wasn’t sure he agreed with her, but the client was always right at Barnes Financial.
Unless he couldn’t stomach how wrong they were.
“How about I present you with some options? I know you’ve already earmarked funds for the hospital’s mentoring program, and I’ve made donations in your name to the short list of causes you gave me when we started. Now we can talk investments and other programs closer to home. You let me know what works with your schedule, and I’ll have a few things to show all three of you.”
“Sounds good. Stephanie passed along the check I wrote to HealthyAmericas, but we might want to send another donation. Daniel’s identified five students to sponsor through the university in Lima, so he’ll need funds for tuition. Please add them to your list,” Rebecca said.
“Okay.” Will jotted a reminder to study the financials of the medical charity Rebecca’s brother, Daniel, worked with in South America. Researching not-for-profits was going to be a new direction, but the process should be similar.
Not that it mattered. Rebecca’s brother and her best friend, Stephanie, were doing good things in Peru. Stephanie’s blog was a record of how money and dedicated, passionate people could make amazing progress that would impact generations.
It would take some serious mismanagement to turn Rebecca and Stephanie away from HealthyAmericas. His gut said it wasn’t a problem.
“We’ll have a dinner party to send the lovebirds back to Lima. I’ll give them the check before they go.” Rebecca sighed happily. “By then, my new kitchen will be finished. And you’re coming.” The long pause indicated she was waiting for his answer.
“I wouldn’t miss it.” Almost everyone he knew in Holly Heights was a part of Rebecca’s crowd, but there might be a few networking opportunities.
“You need to call your sister,” Rebecca said. “She’s making some big decisions. It would be nice if she had some advice.”
He’d tried that once. She’d ordered him to go shove his head in the lake. Loudly.
They’d always mixed like orange juice and toothpaste.
“I will call her. I promise.” But not today. Tomorrow, definitely.
“I’m going to hold you to that. Aunt Jen would like to know your Chloe.” She hung up and he wondered if this would be the way he and Jen communicated now that he was in town. Rebecca would get tired of being the middleman sooner or later.
And Chloe and Jen and Brenda—his stepmother—together were the reason he was taking this risk in the first place.
But his plate was pretty full at the moment.
First, he needed some leads on organizations Rebecca would love. Jen and Stephanie were mainly along for the ride.
“Who could I call to find out about local organizations? Somebody at the chamber of commerce?” He scrolled through his list of business contacts, saw the name of his leasing agent and decided that was a good place to start. Real estate agents should have plenty of inside information on all the businesses in town.
Before he could dial the number, he heard the front door open, thanks to the chime he’d had installed after his first secretary left him in the lurch. The how-to binder had been much smaller then. He’d learned a lot from that three-week stretch.
Had Chloe even tried to follow his orders?
He put the phone down and rolled the chair back, ready to either lecture his daughter on safety or explain to his visitor that he wasn’t seeing clients that morning, but he’d be happy to make an appointment, when he heard a dog bark.
Inside his office. There was a dog inside his office.
He hurried around his desk and paused in the doorway to the reception area. His ears hadn’t deceived him. There, standing on the rug he’d bought because it matched the room’s tone of somber wealth, was...a dog. Big. Brown. Hairy. And happy, if the lolling tongue could be construed as an emotional display. The dog barked again and the woman—who had absolutely no hope of stopping it if the creature decided to make a break for it—shushed him. “Bub, be quiet. Use your inside manners.”
“Or better yet, take whatever manners you do or don’t have right back outside and away from the very expensive furnishings.” As soon as Will spoke, the woman and the dog both turned to stare at him. And both of them made it pretty clear what they thought of his directive.
The dog sat. The woman propped one hand on her hip. Will waited.
“Bub is well-trained, an obedience school graduate.” She ran a hand over the dog’s head, and Will was pretty sure he saw the dog wink.
Of course the dog didn’t wink. They didn’t teach winking in obedience school.
Did they?
Will shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. This is a place of business, so unless he’s a service animal, please take him out.”
“You were chased by a dog as a child, weren’t you?” the woman asked. Then Will realized who was invading his office with a canine in tow as if she had every right to do so. Sarah Hillman, homecoming queen and queen of mean to every outcast at Holly Heights High. He should’ve known—his junior year he’d developed a sixth sense to warn him when she was in the vicinity. Obviously, if he didn’t use his Hillman radar for more than a decade, he lost it.
“I’m not accepting any new clients at this point,” he said. Not even if she was the daughter of the richest man in town and he could use the business. Will walked a wide circle around the dog, who hadn’t moved a single inch, and held the door open for them. “And I’m too busy to make small talk.”
Sarah put her hand on the dog’s head and looked down at him for a minute. Will was pretty sure he was going to win this encounter. It was a weird feeling. At seventeen, he’d been happy to escape her notice. Now he wanted her to look right at him while she digested that bit of information.
Then she straightened her shoulders, smoothed the skirt of her red dress and shifted in the sky-high heels that made her legs look as if they belonged on the silver screen. The brands weren’t important. If Sarah Hillman was wearing it, it was expensive. And now that Will wasn’t afraid of social suicide, he could see the way her face changed when she was about to hit him with the full force of her personality.
Her red lips curved up and she tilted her chin. He watched her lick her lips and run a red nail around the curved neck of her dress. “Come on, Will, won’t you even give me a chance to tell you how much I need your help?”
For a split second, he imagined he knew what the snake charmer felt when he stared into the beady eyes of a cobra. Except her eyes were a beautiful, warm brown. That probably made her twice as dangerous. Then he realized the unfamiliar feeling warming him from the inside was pleasure that she’d remembered his real name.
He shook his head and looked out the door. The dog stood up and peeked around the door frame as if to check on whatever Will was watching and then sat back down.
“Don’t you remember me? We went to high school together.” She reached over to tug on his sleeve. “You have time for an old friend, surely.”
Instead of jerking his arm away, Will snorted. That wasn’t the most elegant or dignified answer, but it was honest. And it surprised her. Another win.
“Sarah Hillman. I remember. What surprises me is that you can recall my real name. Beanpole Barnes would roll more naturally off your tongue.” She laughed as if it was the funniest thing in the world and unbelievably Will wanted to laugh along with her. In high school, the nickname had been an embarrassing insult, but no one would think to use it now.
“I thought you’d go with Barn-door Barnes from that time you spent most of lunch with your zip...”
“Why are you still here?” Will asked. This walk down memory lane had already gone on for too long.
“We were kids. That’s what kids do.” She walked her fingers up his sleeve. “You’re no beanpole now. Time’s been good to you, Will Barnes.”
“Yeah, my sister’s doing pretty well, too. Maybe you remember her? Red hair? Lots of freckles? Cried more than once when you pointed them out?” He crossed his arms over his chest and the office was silent except for the chime of the door closing. “Raggedy Jen. Was that because of the red hair or her secondhand clothes, too?”
Sarah blinked and the calculations taking place in her brain showed in narrowed eyes and tightened lips. Then she ducked her head, folded her hands in front of her and said, “That was all in fun. You’ve got ten minutes. For me?” She stuck out her lower lip as she looked up at him.
“No.” The dog drooped to rest his chin on Will’s polished loafers. Two pairs of puppy dog eyes were nearly impossible to withstand. The second no was harder to get out, but he managed. Then he stepped around the dog. “Please leave.”
Will walked back into his office and closed the door firmly. He didn’t have to worry about Sarah Hillman running off with his carefully chosen knickknacks. He’d been trying to give the impression of good taste and old money. She had the old money.
He pressed his ear against the door to listen for the chime that would signal her defeat and retreat. Instead, he could hear angry muttering. He wanted to crack open the door to see her disappointment in living color but didn’t want to restart the conversation.
And he had work to do. Will had to admit, Sarah Hillman could probably help with that... Holly Heights was filled with signs saying Sponsored by Hillman Luxury Autos. Little League teams, the local stadium, the Fourth of July fireworks displays and every Christmas parade had been funded by Bobby Hillman. She’d be able to come up with a list of contacts.
But Will would go door-to-door through every street in the downtown area begging for recommendations before he asked for her help.
With a firm nod, he moved back around his desk and reached for his phone. Before he could dial the numbers, Sarah Hillman shoved open his door and followed her dog into his office.
His clean, orderly office now had a dog in it. And a beautiful brunette who was no longer begging in an attractive, manipulative sort of way. Now she was determined.
“Listen, I’m sure keeping track of Daddy’s money is exhausting, but I will not help you. Head over to Austin. There are lots of choices for portfolio management and you can add in lunch and a shopping trip. I’m sure there have to be spas somewhere.”
Instead of carefully considering the right face to try, Sarah marched over and planted her hand in the middle of his shiny desk.
“Don’t be that guy, Will. You have a chance to be the bigger person. Come on. Don’t you want to feel superior to me?” Nothing about her said she was faking or flirting or manipulating.
“If I wanted to feel superior, I wouldn’t have to try hard, Sarah.” Instead of the satisfaction he’d expected to feel at finally winning a verbal sparring match with her, he was almost instantly sorry for what he’d said, even if it was a pretty good last word.
“Well. You have done some growing up, haven’t you? Learned how to throw a punch.” She eased back. “Make sure you don’t go too far, kicking a girl when she’s down. Might make you a bully.”
He snorted. Again. He’d need to get a better handle on reactions like that.
“I’m sure you’re amazed that something isn’t going your way, but let’s call it my gift to humanity. You can take your dog and go. And I’ll get back to work.” He pointed at the computer. “You know what these are for, right?”
She pushed her shoulders back and propped a hand on her hip, using her curves and crazy-long legs to her advantage. It almost worked.
“Don’t bother. I can see through the manipulation now. That’s the gift of your high school education.”
Instead of turning away to stare at his computer screen as he wanted to, he watched her hands tighten into fists. “Fine. I heard about the lottery win and whoever is answering Rebecca’s phone refuses to let me talk to her. On the last call, they told me to come to you with any requests, so here I am. Could you please give me ten minutes to make a case for an appointment with Rebecca?”
“So, what? You want Rebecca to float you a loan until Daddy’s allowance arrives?” He swept a glance from the top of her shiny hair to the ridiculous shoes. “Doesn’t look like you need handouts.”
His inner nice guy was telling him he had ten minutes. That was the easiest way to get her out of his hair, pretend to listen.
Sarah ran her hand over Bub’s head. “No, but these guys do. Ten minutes, Will.”
Bub stretched forward to rest his chin on Will’s formerly spotless desk and sighed. Sarah had given up on manipulation to go for honesty, but Bub’s skill was impressive.
Will knew he was making a mistake, but sometimes mistakes were inevitable. “The clock is ticking. Make your case.”
