When the opposition is too delicious to ignore!

Running slam-dunk into Vic Golinski at her college reunion leaves Mimi Lodge with a lot of questions. Back in the day, they were Grantham University’s star athletes and polar opposites. If she said left, he said right. If he said hot, she said cold. All of that opposition had an unexpected consequence: a heated attraction….

So will she and Vic still clash like the fiercely competitive jocks they once were? Life might have softened their beliefs, but clearly that incredible chemistry is still there. As the reunion unfolds every meeting is a study in grown-up lust—and restraint—as they decide where these exhilarating feelings are taking them.

“There’s something between you and me.”

Vic smiled. “Although I’ve always thought we were completely wrong for each other.”

“Maybe we’re actually attuned to each other in ways unimaginable?” Mimi suggested.

“Oh, I can imagine all right,” he said teasingly. They continued to shift and sway as they stood there in the moonlight. Their faces close, so close to contact, but not quite.

Mimi felt giddy, felt herself tremble. “You know what they say? Opposites attract.” She grabbed his finger when he pointed it at her. She felt possessive.

He looked at her hand on his. “Why’d you do that?”

Because she wanted him. “Because you shouldn’t point at people,” she answered instead.

“You’re teaching me manners now?” He angled his head one more time and brought his lips near hers.

She angled her head the other way, but kept their mouths only an inch apart. “So, is this where you assert your manliness and kiss me?”

“Bossy, too.” He put his hands on her waist. Drew her hips to his.

And that was the type of assertion she wanted from him.

Dear Reader,

When I was in college, I was a jock—not the first thing most romance writers tell you.

I was a member of the varsity women’s crew at Yale University, and in my junior year was elected captain. But I also served as an undergraduate representative on the university’s Title IX committee. This group of faculty, administrators and students evaluated the effects and compliance actions regarding the federal measure to ensure equal opportunity for men and women competing in intercollegiate athletics.

The head of the committee was the athletic director at that time. He was intensely loyal to Yale, and his family had a long relationship with the university. He also understood the emotional, social and historic aspects of sports, in addition to the physical benefits. Yet above all else, he valued the importance of doing the right thing.

Luckily for me, he took me under his wing, and I learned a lot about patience, kindness and the joy of life despite hardships—of which he had suffered more than a few. And because of him, I made regular pilgrimages back to my alma mater for the annual Yale-Harvard crew race on the Connecticut River. I returned for more than the race, though. I returned because I learned the importance of keeping in contact with true friends.

And, now in retrospect, I realize he was the genesis for this School Ties miniseries.

Warmest regards,

Tracy Kelleher

PS—As always, I love hearing from my readers. Reach me through my website, www.tracykelleher.com

The Company You Keep

Tracy Kelleher

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Tracy sold her first story to a children’s magazine when she was ten years old. Writing was clearly in her blood, though fiction was put on hold while she received degrees from Yale and Cornell, traveled the world, worked in advertising, became a staff reporter and later a magazine editor. She also managed to raise a family. Is it any surprise she escapes to the world of fiction?

Books by Tracy Kelleher

HARLEQUIN SUPERROMANCE

1613—FALLING FOR THE TEACHER

1678—FAMILY BE MINE

1721—INVITATION TO ITALIAN

1762—ON COMMON GROUND*

1774—A RARE FIND*

*School Ties

Other titles by this author are available in ebook format.

Don’t miss any of our special offers. Write to us at the following address for information on our newest releases.

Harlequin Reader Service

U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269

Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3

I’d like to thank Audrey Zak for providing insight into training methods for the sport of water polo.

This book is dedicated in loving memory of Delaney Kiphuth, a smart and gentle man.

You left us all much too soon.

Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Six

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Epilogue

Excerpt

PROLOGUE

Grantham University

Twelve years ago

“WHAT ROCK HAVE YOU BEEN living under for the past twenty-two years?” Mimi Lodge wailed. She shook her fist, the wide sleeve of her black-and-orange-pinstripe class jacket slipping down her arm.

Grantham University, an Ivy League college in Grantham, New Jersey, had been educating future world leaders for centuries in a pristine setting of academic Gothic architecture, ornamental shrubbery and a strong sense of entitlement. And every year its senior class picked a new jacket to wear for Reunions weekend before graduation. At five-foot-nine, with wide strapping shoulders from years spent competing in water polo—and the long, sleek torso from being in top physical condition—she was one of the few who could carry off such a garment with aplomb.

Of course, maybe it was just her forthright attitude that substituted for shoulder pads. She continued to fume. “In case you didn’t know it, this is the twenty-first century. Men and women are equal. Women have had the right to vote for almost one hundred years. You know the twentieth amendment?”

Vic Golinski, the object of her tirade, slowly peeled off his blue blazer. Vic was also graduating from Grantham, but he was wearing more sedate attire—or at least, had been wearing—until Mimi had upended a water pitcher all over him in a particularly heated moment. They were participating in what was supposed to be an open panel discussion.

Reunions organizers often featured panels with faculty members, administration officials and occasionally students to discuss topics of interest to returning alumni. Theirs had been anything but routine. With the subject being The Impact of Title IX on Participation in College Varsity Sports, the session had drawn a large crowd. Title IX was an amendment to the Civil Rights Act that prohibited discrimination based on sex in regards to school sports. And while the university abided by the law, there were any number of Grantham alumni from the once all-male bastion who felt it was undermining long established men’s teams.

And it appeared to Mimi, these former students—meaning, old, stuck-in-the-mud type guys—were not alone. Vic Golinski might be all of twenty-two, but as captain of the football team, he appeared to be firmly stuck in the mud. How else to explain his statement, “I believe the university’s football program must inevitably suffer due to siphoning off dollars to create so-called parity programs in minor sports. What’s going to happen next? The call for creation of a women’s football team when girls programs don’t even exist in high schools around the country? That would be the height of absurdity, all in the name of so-called equality.”

Whoa there. Minor sports? (Meaning hers, no doubt.) Height of absurdity? So-called equality? Talk about reaching a tipping point. Mimi had seen red. Her hand had migrated to the water jug. And upended it—all over her classmate.

“Giving women the right to vote was the nineteenth amendment,” Vic corrected, his voice low as if he was trying to keep his temper in check.

Mimi stood there, barely keeping still, while Vic yanked his arm out of the sleeve of his soaking blazer…when…when she momentarily forgot her anger. Instead, she realized that when water comes in contact with a man’s dress shirt, it turns the material virtually translucent. Translucent and amazingly pliable, she couldn’t help noticing, as the thin cotton molded to Vic’s biceps and triceps, in addition to his well-contoured pectoral muscles.

She stopped in midstride, took a deep breath and willed herself to replay what he’d just said. “Details,” she scoffed in rebuttal. Vic Golinski wet might be better than any firemen’s pinup calendar, but that didn’t excuse his reactionary sentiments.

He loosened the knot of his orange tie and undid the top two buttons of his blue dress shirt. A few dark curls from his wet chest hair peeked out through the opening. “The devil is in the details,” he responded.

Mimi gulped and turned away. She exited the building and marched away from Baldwin Gymnasium where the panel had been held. She walked a short distance along the path, before she cut between two of Grantham’s Social Clubs, the university’s version of coed fraternities. Ahead lay the Alexander Hamilton School of International Studies, an elite branch of the university. She had wanted to ditch Vic, but he kept up stride for stride, shoulder to shoulder—forcing her to keep acknowledging his presence.

“You deserved that soaking—and more,” she muttered, her eyes focused on the uneven sidewalk. “What you said is just so infuriating…such a personal affront to me as captain of the water polo team, one of your so-called ‘minor sports.’” She raised her hands and gestured with her fingers to form quotation marks. “You have no idea what you are talking about.” Without bothering to look she jaywalked across Edinburgh Avenue, oblivious to the fact that she’d also crossed against the light.

Her statement was met by silence. Surprised, Mimi looked over her shoulder—and realized that Vic Golinski was waiting for the light to change and the “Walk” signal to flash. Mimi shook her head. “What’s the matter with you?” she scolded him. “There’s not a soul, let alone a car, in sight. Don’t you believe in taking the initiative?”

The light changed, and Vic stepped off the curb. “That’s no reason to disregard the rules,” he said patiently.

Mimi waited with hands on hips.

He stepped up next to her, towering over her despite her above-average height. “You may have gained some satisfaction in pouring water all over me, but this is my only dress shirt—and I need it for graduation in a few days.”

“I’ll get it dry cleaned for you.” She raised her chin.

He lowered his. “That’s your solution for everything, isn’t it? Throw money at it?”

Mimi didn’t back down. “Well, I hope you’re not expecting me to break out the ironing board.”

Vic narrowed his eyes. “Spoken like someone who was born with a silver spoon in her mouth. I bet you don’t even know how to iron.”

He was right, dammit. Mimi whipped around and marched on. On the right was the courtyard for Allie Hammie, as the Alexander Hamilton School was affectionately known. The whole area was paved in white marble, the same stone that clad the exterior of the school with its attenuated columns and narrow arcade. A row of magnolias ran along the far side, and in the center of the courtyard was an ornamental pool out of which rose an abstract metal sculpture. Water jets splashed its rusty surfaces and droplets bounced off and rained down to the water below.

Mimi stopped by the fountain and held up her arms in exasperation before letting them fall to her sides. “Okay, I’m sorry.” Her palms thwacked against her black trousers. “In hindsight, the powers-that-be never should have put us on that panel. Maybe they thought we would provide a student perspective besides the usual drivel from the administration flunky and the coaches. But you are clearly a throwback to some Neanderthal age.”

“Just because I don’t believe that there needs to be a comparable women’s team for every men’s athletic team, doesn’t make me a caveman. And I’m sorry if it offends you, but guys who are friends of mine on the wrestling team—who work their butts off—are pissed, rightfully pissed in my estimation, that their sport is being thrown on the trash heap because there’s no comparable women’s sport. Following that logic, what’s going to happen to the football program?”

“There’s nothing wrong with being a club sport.” That wasn’t quite true, as Mimi knew. Club sports received only small budgets, didn’t have paid coaches and didn’t travel.

“Then why don’t you petition for Women’s Water Polo team to be a club sport instead of varsity?”

“No way! That wouldn’t be fair because the men’s team has varsity status. You want that to become a club sport, too?”

“Of course not.” Vic ran his hand through the top of his brown wavy hair. He seemed entirely unaware that it stuck up like a lopsided Mohawk.

For someone intent on maintaining the status quo on and off the field, he looked remarkably off-kilter. Mimi had an intense desire to fluff up his hair even more, loosen him up and see what lay beneath his stuffed shirt exterior. Actually, she knew exactly what lay beneath his shirt—lots of well-developed muscles.

Vic seemed completely oblivious to Mimi’s inner ruminations. “Listen, all I’m saying is, before you—or anybody else for that matter—goes jumping into things, they need to weigh the pros and cons, evaluate a program over time, consider making adjustments when necessary. I’m not saying things can’t—or shouldn’t—change just that why rock the boat too much? Why not take it nice and easy?” He furrowed his brow. “Doesn’t that make sense?”

Raising one eyebrow, Mimi gave him a jaundiced view. “Are you always so cautious? Don’t you ever believe in taking risks? Are you always so slow to make up your mind about something?” It was a taunt, and she meant it.

“What are you talking about? Risk? I’ve been drafted into the NFL. A career in pro football is all about risk.”

Mimi waved off his question. “That’s all about seizing an opportunity. Because I bet even though you’re going to give the pros a chance, you have an airtight backup plan—maybe some trainee position at a bank or an acceptance to business school.”

Vic rubbed the sole of his black leather loafer on the sidewalk.

“Ah-hah!” Mimi shouted triumphantly. “I was right, wasn’t I?”

He shrugged. “Maybe. But some of us can’t simply plan on being world-renowned international correspondents.”

Mimi had voiced her post-graduation plans when she’d introduced herself at the start of the panel, minus the world-renowned part.

“We don’t just take off for parts unknown on the chance that we might run into some newsworthy event or use old family connections to get interviews with generals or presidents,” he continued. “Some of us need to think about things like paying back college loans and getting jobs that provide health insurance.”

“Oh, please, this is not about health insurance. Because, for your information, I’m not going into this as some rich girl hobby. For four years, after practice, I’ve slogged away at the Daily Granthamite, writing every kind of story under the sun.” She referred to the student newspaper that came out five days a week. “I’m not using my contacts. I’m cleaning out my bank account and getting a one-way ticket to Lebanon, and from there I’ll hunt down stories—stories about the real victims of this world.”

“And what if you don’t succeed? Then what?” he asked, his face getting closer to hers.

“Oh, I won’t fail. And I won’t give up,” she said with conviction. “Because to me, it’s worth whatever I have to do to expose the reality behind oppression, racism and especially wars. Wars aren’t just about soldiers. It affects the lives of everyday civilians—families, women and children. And if I run out of money because I can’t get someone to pick up my work, then I’ll simply keep writing until they do. I’m willing to take that chance because sometimes you just can’t take things slowly—moving only after you’ve weighed the pluses and minuses.”

Vic opened his eyes wide. “You’re crazy, you know that?”

Mimi laughed. “I may be crazy, but no one will be able to look back on what I’ve done twenty years from now and say, ‘Well, she might have made a good war correspondent—even a great one—but she spent too much time worrying about health insurance premiums.’” Then she stuck her finger out toward him. “And what will they be able to say about you? ‘When he was cut from training camp, he didn’t bother trying to get picked up by another team. He weighed the pros and cons and became an accountant instead.’”

Mimi glared at Vic, expecting him to argue, to say she didn’t know what she was talking about. But he was deathly quiet, menacingly silent. She back-pedaled a few feet, and stumbled against the low wall surrounding the reflecting pool. Spray from the fountain spattered over her head, beading on her ponytail and shoulders.

She saw him narrow his eyes and stare at her without blinking. Had she gone too far? she wondered. “Listen, maybe I shouldn’t have carried on like that, you know.” She tried to sound nonchalant.

He fisted his hands and took a step toward her.

Mimi stuck her tongue against the inside of her cheek. “You know, me and my big mouth. Sometimes I can’t stop myself—like pouring the water over your head.” She looked over her shoulder, then back at him. “So tell me,” she said brazenly, her chin high. “Should I feel worried here. Because, you know, I realize that aggression is an inherent element of your sport, especially for a linebacker. You’re a linebacker, right?” Mimi guessed, having never been to a football game in her four years at Grantham—a heresy, she knew, but it had been another way to avoid her father who never missed a home game.

“Right tackle,” he corrected, looming a little larger still.

She gulped. “I’m sure there’s a big difference. But the important point I’m trying to make is that off the field, physical violence never solved anything.”

“Maybe where you come from. But in my old neighborhood, it sure came into play.” He tossed his jacket to the ground and took another step, moving his massive body deep into her personal space. “Why is it, that as infuriating, as irritating, as arrogant as you are—you also sometimes make sense? I just hate that.”

Mimi frowned. She didn’t know whether to feel complimented or wary. “Are you admitting that I’m right?”

Vic moved until there wasn’t a millimeter of space between them.

She could feel his chest rise and fall, feel the heat generating from his skin and the cold wetness of his shirt. Immediately her nipples responded to the contrast, tightening into sensitive beads.

“The only thing I’m admitting is that there are times when you get under my skin,” Vic went on. “You don’t know me at all, yet you understand me in ways that even I sometimes don’t. How do you do that?”

“Innate brilliance? Extraordinary insight?”

He stared at her, turning his head this way and that, as if trying to analyze every curve of her face. “No, you’re smart, but I’m pretty sure I’m smarter. No offense.”

“I’m not so sure about that.” Actually, she was pretty sure, but she wasn’t going to admit it. She was no dope. She may have been a legacy admission—her family had been Grantham graduates and generous donors for generations—but she had been at the top of her class at prep school and had aced the college entrance exams. True, her grades in college weren’t exactly great, but then she had chosen to spend her time on sports, the newspaper and her social life.

Whereas Vic Golinski, despite devoting countless hours to football and the Big Brother program—she had listened to his introduction, as well—was graduating Phi Beta Kappa. In their junior year he had won the prize for the highest cumulative GPA for a student in the social sciences. Even if the guy spent every night in the library, he had to be extra smart to beat out all the other smart people at Grantham.

He pointed his finger at her, then at himself. “No, I think it’s because there’s something between you and me—something despite the fact that we are polar opposites.”

“Maybe we’re actually attuned to each other in ways unimaginable?”

“Oh, I can imagine all right,” he said teasingly. They continued to shift and sway, their faces so close to contact, but not quite.

Mimi felt giddy, felt herself tremble. “You know what they say? Opposites attract.” She grabbed his finger when he pointed it at her. She felt possessive.

He looked at her hand on his. “Why’d you do that?”

Because she wanted him. “Because you shouldn’t point at people,” she answered instead.

“You’re teaching me manners now?” He angled his head one more time and brought his lips near hers.

She angled her head the other way, but kept their mouths close. “So, is this where you assert your manliness and kiss me?”

He put his hands on her waist. Drew her hips to his.

She was sure she could feel evidence of his arousal. She put her hands on his shoulders and went up on her toes. She held her breath, closed her eyes. Felt his hands squeeze her waist, felt him lift her effortlessly off the ground. Felt him hesitate then…

Then toss her into the water.

Splash!

Mimi landed on her bottom in the shallow pool. She opened her eyes and coughed to clear her airway. Water streaked down her face and soaked her clothes. She flailed, reaching out on either side to gain her balance. She tried to push herself up, wobbled and fell back on her rump again. Water weighed down her clothes, soaked her shoes. Overhead, the fountain showered her hair and face. “Argh,” she growled.

Vic was doubled over—laughing uproariously. “How come if we’re so attuned to each other, you didn’t see that coming, huh?” he asked, grabbing his side.

He was right. She was sure he’d had something else in mind. But…but…whatever. She was madder at herself. And the jerk didn’t know when to stop laughing. “So, you thought you’d get even, didn’t you? Have a little go at me?”

“You call that little?” He wiped his hand across his mouth, trying to stop the laughter. There were even tears leaking from the corners of his eyes. “Maybe. Or maybe I just wanted to see what can happen to someone who insists on flying without a safety net.”

She struggled to stand, the two feet of water making her clumsy. She whisked her wet ponytail back from her cheek and straightened her shoulders. “You think you’re so clever to…”

She paused. And then she knew what she was going to do. Nobody made a fool out of Mimi Lodge—especially when she was sure she hadn’t been mistaken about his arousal.

First, she wriggled out of her jacket. Then she kicked off one black flat. The other got dragged down with water, so she bent over, slipped it off and tossed it over her shoulder. Next she grabbed the hem of her black sleeveless shell and began peeling the wet material over her head.

“Whoa! What do you think you’re doing?” He called out.

She freed her head from the top and threw the shirt over her shoulder. She saw him holding out an arm as if to stop her. “What does it look like I’m doing? I’m stripping down naked,” she announced emphatically. “Now who didn’t see that coming? So what are you going to do now, eh? You going to pretend you didn’t have other things in mind? Oh, I know—you’re too chicken to act. Or maybe you’d like to weigh the pros and cons?” she taunted him.

He looked around. “Hey, you can’t do that. Someone might come by.”

“I’ll take that chance, especially since everybody and his little brother is down at the Reunions lunch eating and drinking to their heart’s content.” She undid the waistband of her pants and lowered the zipper. Then she stepped out of the legs, lifting one foot as she hopped in the water, and then the next.

She threw the trousers at him.

He caught them before they thwacked him in the face. “What about the cops?”

“What about the cops?” She stood there naked except for the wisps of nylon and silk that comprised her demi-cup bra and bikini underpants. The slippery, nude-colored underwear was wet and, she knew, just as transparent as his shirt. She reached behind for the clasp on her bra.

His jaw dropped open. “You could, you could be arrested.” He gulped visibly.

She unhooked her bra and let it slide to the water below. The jets from the fountain hit the undersides of her small breasts. The chilly water made her nipples pucker tightly. She slipped one thumb in the side of her underpants. “You think I won’t do it?”

“No, that’s the problem. I think you just might.”

“So you’re attuned to me after all.” This time Mimi threw back her head and laughed. Then she looked him straight in the eye, put her other thumb in the other side of her panties and did a little wiggle. “So what do you intend to do about it, Mr. Look-But-Don’t-Leap?”

She wiggled some more as she worked the elastic waistband down her thighs.

“Well, I’m certainly done looking.” He came in after her.

“My, my, you didn’t even take off your shoes. Now that’s impulsive.” She held open her arms.

He slogged through the water to reach her.

And that’s when the police sirens came wailing down the street.

CHAPTER ONE

A LOUD WAIL INTERRUPTED Mimi’s whimpering. The mechanical, incessant noise went on…and on. Mimi pressed her forehead down. She wanted to cover her ears, and even though logically she knew that movement was impossible, she reflexively went to raise her arms.

She expected to feel the binding restraints and the shooting pain. Miraculously, there was none. Just the incessant ringing and ringing…

Then the noise stopped.

Mimi rolled over and opened her eyes. And realized she was lying on her own queen-size bed in her own apartment on the Upper East Side in Manhattan and not…not captive in that hellhole in Chechnya—blindfolded, beaten, alternating between bouts of despondency and glimmers of hope.

She turned her head on the downy pillow and gazed out the window toward the light—something she’d been deprived of for months, something that was now so precious. It didn’t disappoint.

It was one of those rare winter mornings in Manhattan when the gray clouds of January had decided to take a holiday. The sun streamed in through the glass like some visionary painting.

It should have warmed her. It didn’t.

Mimi still hadn’t gained any weight back after she’d been kidnapped while on assignment in Chechnya, a forced confinement that had lasted almost six months. Two months had passed since her television news network had secured her release, but she still suffered an almost bone-numbing coldness.

She wriggled deeper under the white duvet cover. The feel of the expensive Egyptian cotton material reassured her without fully erasing the nightmare.

Mimi had never been introspective for a variety of reasons. She freely admitted the obvious one that she simply never had the luxury of time to stop and think. The other reasons she kept private, even from her best friend from college, Lilah Evans. But since…since the kidnapping—there, she’d said it—she was beginning to appreciate just how bizarre time and memory were.

For instance, off the top of her head, she had virtually no idea what she’d done all day yesterday. Yet the exact events of the day she was abducted remained crystalline clear. Not surprising, really, since every night when she sought comfort in sleep, she instead kept reliving that day over and over, each detail more vivid, each smell more penetrating, each sound more ominous, the pain…

She forced herself to focus on the cream-colored walls of her room. They were bare except for a few framed photos of colleagues and friends. Several showed her family: her mother blowing out candles on a birthday cake; her half-brother, Press, who’d graduated from Grantham University last year and was now in Australia; and her little half-sister, Brigid, a bundle of energy who was eight going on sixteen. There were none of her father. The photos showed people laughing, happy. She was in a few, too—laughing, happy. She sniffed, trying to recall the feeling. She couldn’t. That was the thing about memory. It was selective, even when you didn’t want it to be.

Mimi shifted back to the bank of metal-framed windows that looked out from her twelfth-floor apartment on East Seventieth, off Lexington. After years of renting various places around the City, she’d finally bought the condo when the real estate market hit a low a few years ago. And for the Upper East Side, it had been a bargain, all because her building was one of those white brick high rises built with good intentions but a total disregard of aesthetic appeal. Ugly didn’t come close, and no self-respecting equities analyst or art gallery owner wanted to be caught dead in something so gauche. One day, though, she figured, white brick would be the new Art Deco, and she’d be laughing all the way to the bank.

The loud wail of the cell phone started up again.

She rubbed her eyes and turned to find her BlackBerry on the nightstand. Its slim black case jiggled across the glass surface. Mimi peered closely, not at the phone number displayed on the screen but at the table, checking for dust. It was spotless. The cleaning lady she’d hired since returning home came in twice a week. She was considering having her come in three times, but even she admitted that was absurd. This obsession she’d developed to maintain spotless control would pass. Still…

The phone rang on.

Mimi sighed and finally reached over. “Yes?” she said without much interest.

“Is that any way to answer the telephone, Mary Louise?” It was her father, Conrad Lodge III. Only he would use her given names instead of her nickname. “I suppose I should thank the heavens that you even picked up—as opposed to my many emails that you’ve ignored completely.” His upper class, lockjaw manner of speaking sounded even more pronounced over the phone.

Mimi inhaled. “I didn’t answer your emails because I haven’t had time to open them.” It was a lie, but then her family was good at lying. She hadn’t actually bothered about the messages at all.

She shifted her position under the covers and stared at the wall with the photos again, zeroing in on the black-and-white shot of her mother wearing a silly party hat and holding forth a birthday cake adorned with lit candles. It had been Mimi’s ninth birthday. She’d been in third grade at Grantham Country Day School.

Mimi recalled that birthday vividly. More than anything she had wanted to get her ears pierced. Her father had refused. “Who do you think you are? An immigrant child?” he’d asked scornfully. Her mother, only recently a naturalized citizen, had bowed her head and looked away.

As she lay in bed now, Mimi felt the hole in one of her earlobes. Conrad had won the battle that birthday, but as soon as she’d left home for boarding school Mimi had made a beeline for the nearest Piercing Pagoda. Maybe one of these days she’d actually get around to wearing earrings again.

From the other end of the telephone line her father cleared his throat. “I’m delighted you’re keeping so busy during your time off from work.”

Cutting sarcasm had always been one of his strengths, Mimi thought.

“Therefore, rather than wait for you to find the time, I decided to call you instead.”

“Before you begin the lecture, I know I should come down to see the family,” Mimi cut in, anticipating his demands. Grantham, New Jersey, Mimi’s family’s hometown, was an hour’s train ride south of New York City. It was the epitome of a picture-postcard college town—Gothic university buildings and historic colonial houses. Its quaint main street—named Main Street, no less—boasted high-end jewelry shops, stock brokerages and coffee shops that catered to black-clad intellectuals and young moms with yoga mats tucked in the back of expensive jogging strollers.

“So, I promise to visit soon,” she continued, only half meaning it.

“That would be most welcome,” her father replied. “But actually, I am inquiring about something else. I’m on the organizing committee for Reunions this year. Quite an honor, really.” Reunions at Grantham were a giant excuse for alumni from all the previous graduating classes to gather for a long weekend at their old stomping grounds, reminisce about the good old days and make fools of themselves by wearing silly class outfits and drinking excessive amounts of alcohol.

“Reunions? But they’re not until June. If it’s about giving Noreen plenty of notice that I’ll be staying at the house, you don’t have to worry.” Noreen was her father’s third wife. Mimi’s natural predilection was to despise her stepmothers, but even she had to admit Noreen was pretty decent.

“I’m sure Noreen will appreciate hearing from you, but I repeat, that’s not why I called. Really, Mary Louise. If you’d let me get a word in edgewise, you’d realize that fact.”

Chastised but not humbled, Mimi bit her tongue.

A self-satisfied silence permeated the line. “I wanted to speak to you in regards to my position on the Reunions committee. I’m in charge of organizing the panel discussions.”

Despite his chastisement, Mimi couldn’t help but jump in with a comment. “I thought I made it clear to you and everyone else that I don’t want to talk about what happened in Chechnya.” She hated the fact that her voice trembled.

“Yes, you made that loud and clear when you took an extended leave from the network—though I still believe you should talk to the psychiatrist that Noreen found for you, the specialist in matters…in matters related to your particular circumstance.” Conrad cleared his throat uneasily. “What I had in mind was more directly relevant to the Grantham student experience. Intercollegiate athletics, to be precise.”

“What are you talking about? I haven’t participated in any competitive sports since my senior year.” Mimi was baffled.

“Which was the year you served on a panel at Reunions addressing Title IX and its impact on Grantham’s varsity teams. As I recall, your comments were particularly offensive to certain male members of the audience when you advocated the demotion of the wrestling team to a club sport,” Conrad noted.

“That’s because there was no female equivalent,” Mimi pointed out, the arguments still fresh in her mind. That whole memory trick again. “Anyway, I recall that the university administration agreed with me.”

“And I have no doubt you’d be more than willing to defend the same position what…ten or so years after the fact?”

“Twelve, as I’m sure you know perfectly well.” Her father might be an arrogant twit, but as a founding partner and long-standing chairman of a successful private equity firm, one thing Conrad Lodge III knew—and remembered—was numbers, any and all numbers. Except for the date of my birthday, she qualified silently.

But instead of enjoying her self-righteous sulk, Mimi suddenly experienced one of those lightbulb moments. “Wait a minute. You didn’t call to merely reminisce about one of my more dramatic episodes, did you?”

“Since when have I been inclined to reminisce about you?”

At least he was honest. This time, she amended.

“No, I was thinking about reconvening the same panel of administrators, coaches and students from before. A do-over confab, you might say.”

Mimi pinched the skin at her throat. “Well, I suppose the topic might be of general interest—might. As you’re no doubt aware, there’s been a number of recent headlines about colleges manipulating their athletic reporting to fulfill their Title IX obligations. But even if you buy into that premise, from the practical perspective, half the people who were on that panel must be dead.”

“There you go again—jumping to conclusions. As it turns out, only one person has passed away—the former athletic director.

“I remember him,” Mimi grumbled. The moron had refused equal locker room space to the women’s water polo team until their demonstration senior year. She smiled, remembering the photo in the New York Times of her leading her teammates into his office to use it as their changing room. Boy, did they get permission to share the men’s locker rooms adjacent to the pool, but fast.

“But the rest are still active at Grantham or other universities,” Conrad went on. “I even tracked down one of the coaches who’s currently with a professional basketball team in Italy.”

“And you honestly think you can get him and everyone else to come back for a rerun?”

“I already have. Everyone but you and one other person have been confirmed. Not many people say no to me.” He stated it as a simple matter of fact. “Besides, they’re doing it for Grantham.”

“And I’m such a loyal alum—not,” Mimi said. “But who knows, one of these days I might actually donate some money.”

“And give generously. All Lodges are loyal alums.” Her father’s words had a certain déjà vu ring to them.

She’d been ten, and it was right after her parents’ divorce. “All Lodge men go to Grantham,” she remembered him telling her. They’d been on a sailboat in Seal Harbor, Maine. Mimi had had two options—stay in a sweltering apartment in Easton, a far less socially acceptable town just north of Grantham where her mother had moved, or two, enjoy coastal Maine’s balmy breezes and wild blueberries—not to mention an unlimited family tab at the Bar Harbor Club in between tennis lessons. She’d chosen Maine.

Two weeks later, her mother had chosen an overdose of sleeping pills.

Her father cleared his throat, bringing her back to the present. “So do I have your agreement?” he asked.

Mimi recalled her first experience on the panel. “You know, I’m not sure I’m your safest bet. Not only did I tee off some people in the audience, I didn’t exactly see eye to eye with some other members of the panel.”

“One in particular, I believe—the captain of the football team. How could I forget the way you dumped a pitcher of water over his head.” Conrad chuckled.

Actually, Mimi’s mind had raced ahead to her stripping off her clothes in the Allie Hammie fountain.

“If memory serves me correctly, he rose above your antics with great equanimity. A true Grantham man.”

She remembered something else rising. She smiled—at that and the picture of the cops arriving at the fountain. Equanimity had been in short supply. “You know, Father, I’m not all that convinced that a replay would provide the results you’re looking for.”

And that’s when Mimi experienced a second lightbulb moment. Two in one conversation! Which could only mean… “Wait a minute. Don’t tell me you’re trying to create some drama?” She hated the fact that her father had so easily manipulated her—for his own purposes, no less.

“These alumni panels can sometimes be rather dry, much too intellectual. Do we really need to be lectured on our overdependence on oil or the future of the space program? Far more entertaining to watch sparks fly, don’t you agree?”

Vic Golinski. Mimi hadn’t thought about him since graduation. What she did remember was they were more than polar opposites. They were matter and antimatter. Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner. Get them together, and it was total combustion—as that one time had proved.

Not that he’d even remember her, she immediately dismissed. It wasn’t like they’d ever hung around together in college. And hadn’t he gone on to some pro football career? He probably had groupies at his beck and call.

“So what do you think?” her father prompted her.

Mimi wasn’t ready to commit. “Did you say one other person hasn’t gotten back?”

“That’s right.”

Mimi heard a shuffling of papers.

“Yes, it’s the other undergraduate member of the panel…that former football captain…named…let’s see…yes, here it is. Golinski. Witek Golinski. Quite a mouthful.” He chuckled in a condescending way.

What a narrow-minded snob, Mimi thought with irritation. “Vic. He went by Vic,” she corrected him. And impulsively, to thwart his smugness, Mimi blurted out, “Okay. I’ll do it.”

“I knew I could count on you.” Again, that conceit.

You want drama? I’ll give you drama, Mimi thought. She could be just as manipulative as her father—for her own ends. “Yes, I’ll participate on the panel—on one condition, no, two actually. First, I’ll do it, but only if Vic Golinski does, too.”

“I’ll call him as soon as I hang up,” her father answered. “And the second proviso?”

“I want you to notify the fire department.”

“The fire department? I don’t understand?”

Mimi smiled for the first time in months. “Forget sparks. I predict a fire of major proportions.”

CHAPTER TWO

“HERE’S YOUR ORDER, THEN—Ubatuba.” Vic Golinski pointed to two enormous slabs of polished granite. They were stacked vertically in a wooden pallet in the brightly lit warehouse the size of a giant airplane hangar. Several 747s could have fit in the space with no problem. Rows and rows of identical pallets held enormous rectangles of different stone, all finished on one flat surface, rough and scored on the reverse. The high-tech space was filled with the mechanical whirring and beeping of a crane maneuvering a slab of pink-flecked granite to a flatbed truck stationed by the open garage doorway.

“Ubatuba is our largest seller and a fairly uniform stone,” Vic explained. His voice was calm, solicitous, betraying none of the awareness that myriad tasks awaited him with a timeline of “yesterday.”

He waved the young couple next to him to come closer. “Have a good look here. See how the flecks are regular and there’s no discernible veining? That’s typical of Ubatuba granite—not a lot of variation from one shipment to the next.” He ran his hand up and down the polished side of the stone. “Still, I’m delighted you came in to check out your order. I always tell customers that it’s best to come to the warehouse to see what they are getting, rather than take the salesman’s word back at the store. It’s your money and your kitchen, after all, and you want what’s best.”

The woman, her hand resting protectively on her rounded baby bump, stood with her mouth open. “It’s beautiful,” she said in awe, reaching out to touch the polished black surface for herself.

Her husband leaned in to get a better look before stepping back to take in the inventory that surrounded him. “Wow. It’s like a museum in here,” he exclaimed. “I had no idea there were so many types of granite.”

“Not just granite. We’ve got all kinds of natural stone—marble, limestone, travertine, onyx, slate—”

“Vic. Vic Golinski.” A loud announcement carried over the speaker system. “You’re wanted on line one.”

Vic looked apologetically at the couple. His football days were long past, but his large shoulders and massive build tended to dwarf those who stood next to him. “I’m sorry, but it seems I’m needed elsewhere. I tell you what. I’ve got your order information here—” he held up the clipboard “—but feel free to go ahead and take a look around. If you see something else you like, we can always change it. And when you’ve made your decision, just check back at the reception desk. That way we can finalize all the delivery arrangements.”

He shook hands and nodded goodbye before heading to the door. As he moved along the cement floor, he winced. His lower back was reminding him of last night’s pick-up game of basketball at Baldwin Gym, the basketball arena at Grantham University. It had been a mistake to play given his knees, but he hadn’t been able to resist.

He pushed open a heavy door and entered the front office space. To the left, behind a decorative wall of marble stone with a cascading fountain, were the showrooms. Mosaic patterns, multi-patterned stone floors and walls displayed a seemingly endless variety of inventory. To the right, on the other side of the long reception desk, was a warren of cubicles and some larger offices along the front wall of the building.

Two women, both talking into headsets, were stationed to greet customers. One, Abby—a middle-aged woman with raven-black hair that Clairol needed to retool—looked up when Vic passed by. As she provided directions over the phone for the warehouse’s location on Route One in central New Jersey, she raised her penciled eyebrows and made a circular motion by the side of her head, indicating that the person on the other end of the line was loco. Abby didn’t believe in subtlety when dramatization was so much more satisfying. True to form, she snapped her fingers and pointed with her manicured acrylic nails—snowflakes adorned each tip—in the direction of his office. Pronto, she mouthed emphatically.

Vic nodded but only marginally picked up his pace. He’d long ago learned that whenever anyone wanted him, somehow it was ostensibly always a crisis. That seemed to be the best job description for his position. In his opinion, there simply weren’t that many crises in the world, let alone at Golinski Stone International. And if it were a real crisis—a cave-in at a mineshaft or flames engulfing an apartment building—the chances that a washed-up football player who was now a natural stone distributor was the man for the job were slim to none.

So with his usual display of understated calm he headed for his office prepared to deal with whomever was having an anxiety attack.

No doubt it would be his brother, Joe—or maybe his father. Though Pop rarely showed at the office these days. Ever since his sister, Basia, had started divorce proceedings against “The Lousy Scumbag” and moved in with Vic’s parents, his mother and father had been drafted for babysitting duty for Basia’s three-year-old Tommy. That way, Basia could juggle waitressing at a diner in Grantham with going back to finish up her degree in accounting. Vic was convinced though that the real reason their parents—more specifically, their mother—had jumped at the idea was because she wanted to keep an eagle eye on her only grandson.

Anyway, his kid sister had had to abandon college when she’d gotten married and had a baby, which was a real shame in Vic’s opinion. Not that he didn’t think his nephew was aces. It’s just that of all Golinski siblings, Vic had always thought Basia was the one most deserving of an Ivy League education. She was scary bright, and he’d never understood why she refused to take advanced placement courses in high school.

“I want to be in classes with my friends,” she’d say with a yawn. “Don’t bug me. I’m not you.”

“No, you’re smarter than me,” he’d reply. Fat lot of good it did him. Only thing she didn’t fight him about was the violin lessons. He even paid for them to make sure she kept at it. Instead, it was his mother who hadn’t seen the point.

“The violin? How’s that going to put food on the table or help her find a husband?” his mother had repeated whenever anyone was in earshot.

“Mom, she’s got a gift. Leave her alone,” he’d responded.

His mother had just shaken her head. “I could understand if it was an instrument that she could play in the band at high school football games.”

Vic would let the matter drop.

When Basia had graduated high school, Vic had taken comfort that she’d enrolled at Rutgers, the state university in New Brunswick. Then she promptly dropped out when she got pregnant, and then got married. Vic had had the decency not to point out to his mother that, see, Basia found a husband anyway—for all the good it did her.

But before Vic could get to his office, his brother accosted him outside his own, one door down from Vic’s. “Vic, some guy from a private equity firm in Manhattan has been trying to get you for the past half hour. He said it was urgent,” Jozef or “Joe” announced, practically treading up the back of Vic’s brown Rockport shoes.

Vic didn’t respond and instead headed through the open glass door to his own modest office. The wall facing the hallway was also glass, but blinds provided partial privacy. He maneuvered past a coat stand with his blue blazer and North Face jacket and headed around to his plain wooden desk. Then he squatted down in the back corner to greet the one member of his family who never failed to live up to expectations. “Hey, beautiful girl, Roxie. How ya doin’? How’s the ear feel, huh?”

Two of the saddest brown eyes in the world looked up at him. A thick white bandage stuck out from one ear. A large white cone circumscribed her head, and in silent protest Roxie lifted her head and banged the hard plastic against his knee. But even that seemed to require too much energy, and she ended up dropping her head to her pillow.

Vic patted the long flank of the eight-year-old white golden retriever. “You’re a good dog, Roxie, and I promise you I’ll get that collar off your neck as soon as the vet gives his okay.”

“Geez, you’re more attached to that dog than any human being,” Joe complained.

Vic looked over his shoulder. “That’s because she’s a better listener and certainly more loyal than just about anybody out there.” He turned back to the dog. “Aren’t ya, sweetheart.”

Joe rolled his eyes. “Please, you’re making me ill. Just because you were taken to the cleaners by Shauna in the divorce is no reason to go all gaga over a dumb dog.”

“My ex was welcome to anything she could get her hands on—anything except you, Roxie, right?” He scratched behind the dog’s good ear. “That’s why you’ve got to look after yourself.”

Joe circled the desk to get closer to his big brother. Roxie immediately inched away on her belly. “Geez, you’d think after all these years she’d be used to me.”

Vic went on petting the dog. “She can’t help it. She had a hard life as a puppy, kicking around all those shelters. You’ve got to give her some slack.”

“So what did the vet say?” Joe asked, making an effort to show some concern.

Vic rested his hand on Roxie’s flank. “He said that the kind of tumor she had is ninety percent cancerous and spreads through the bloodstream. That’s why he also took a large part of her ear in case it had already gone beyond the lump. But we won’t know for sure until he gets the results of the biopsy in a couple of days.”

“Well, until then, you could get Mom to pray for her. Light a candle, do the whole bit. You never know.”

“Mom has her ways of dealing with problems, and I’ve got mine. I keep my nose to the grindstone and just do my job. Whatever happens with Roxie, happens. In the meantime, I’ve got the family to think about—and the hundreds of employees who depend on this company running smoothly.”

“And don’t think we’re not all eternally grateful. It certainly saves me from having to be the responsible son.” Joe commandeered Vic’s desk chair and swiveled it around to face his brother. Then he crossed his legs, the tassels on his Gucci loafers jiggling as he lazily rocked his foot.

Vic gave Roxie a final pat and stood. The dog wearily thumped her tail on the ground. “Do you mind?” Vic indicated his chair.

“Be my guest.” Joe rose and crossed the gray carpeting to the small leather sofa opposite the desk. He plopped down at one end and rapped his knuckles on the wooden arm. “But tell me, oh, wise and great brother, if you’re so responsible, why haven’t you answered your phone for the past half hour?”

Vic settled into his desk chair, slipped off his shoes and let his feet rest atop the carpet. “In answer to your question, I was showing a couple a slab of Ubatuba for their kitchen countertops.”

“One slab? Of Ubatuba? What are they doing? Upgrading their galley kitchen in some track house in Levittown? Excuse me, but what are you—the CEO of the company—doing showing small-time customers their order?” Joe glanced dismissively around the office. “You know, I think it’s about time you upgraded your décor, starting with the carpeting. What is it? Indoor-outdoor from some box store?”

“I like the carpeting.” Indeed, Vic would never tell his family, but at times he really could do without padding around barefoot on cold marble floors. “And Roxie likes it, too.”

“That dog of yours sheds all over this stuff.”

Vic was unfazed. “If it bothers you so much, there’s a vacuum cleaner in the janitor’s closet.”

Joe held up his hands. “No, thanks. Besides, Pop banned me from manual labor around the place after that incident with the forklift.”

How could Vic forget? Forty thousand dollars worth of travertine down the drain. Joe wasn’t much better when it came to driving that ridiculous Porsche 911 of his. At least whenever he wrapped that around a pole it was his insurance, not the company’s.

Vic bit back a sigh. Why was he always the responsible sibling? True, as the oldest, he bore the burden of carrying on the family business and keeping his brother and sister out of harm’s way. But deep down, he was afraid that he was just born old.

He continued in his usual mature, patient fashion. “No one else appeared to be free, and I don’t like customers standing around waiting. As I’ve said before, a CEO wears many hats and pitches in wherever needed, even on the floor dealing with first-time customers. And two, more importantly for this company, that couple placed their order through Home Warehouse, whose contract with us—as you undoubtedly know since you’re senior vice president in charge of sales—is up for renegotiation in the spring. And, seeing as they’re the largest home improvement company in America, we need to continue to be their sole supplier of natural stone. So, if we satisfy their customers with top service, word will get back—trust me—and that will place us in a much better bargaining position.”

Joe rolled his eyes. “Thanks for the lecture, Mr. Miyagi, my personal sensei.”

“Anytime. My ‘Wax On, Wax Off’ lecture is scheduled for tomorrow.” Vic rested his elbows on his blotter. “Now, who’s so anxious to talk to me—” he shuffled through the pink paper slips “—that he keeps calling…what…three…no, four times?”

“The head honcho at Pilgrim Investors. I checked around, and they’ve got their own building on Park Avenue, besides offices in London, Tokyo and Shanghai. Rumor has it that they’re planning a new office in Australia—the economy’s booming there what with their large supply of raw materials going directly to China. They’re players, big time—trust me.” He shot back Vic’s own words.

Vic could do without players. But business was business. “So, if there’s a possibility of new construction, why didn’t they contact you?”

Joe shook his head. “I tried pointing that out to him over the phone, but got nowhere. He’s one of those blue-blood types who only talks to the top dog. If it gets down to the nitty-gritty, then his lackeys will step in and deal with me.”

Vic rubbed his bottom lip thoughtfully. “All right, let’s see what the big man has to say. Little does he know I was born in Trenton and grew up in a row house.”

“Ah, but you’re still the one with the Grantham degree,” Joe needled him.

“See, if only you had stuck with football,” Vic replied, and he could have said, “studied a bit harder,” but he didn’t. Why rub it in? Instead, Vic picked up one of the message slips and started to punch in the number.

Suddenly, Abby stuck her head in the open door. “Hey, boss, thought I’d let you know. That young couple you helped in the warehouse?” She worked the chewing gum in her mouth. Abby was a smoker, and since there was no smoking in the building, she was a constant gum chewer in between cigarette breaks in the parking lot. “Well, they ended up going with the Verde Typhoon granite from our Platinum Collection, and are now thinking about the Yellow Bamboo stone for the vanity top in the master bath. I told them no problem—we’d hold a slab, and they could just call in the dimensions. If we don’t hear back in a day or two, I’ll follow up.”

Pleased, Vic nodded. “Good work, Abby. We just quadrupled the price of the sale. You could teach my younger brother here a thing or two.”

Abby eyed Joe and laughed knowingly. “That’s not what I heard. Word is he’s the one who likes to play teacher.”

Joe tugged at a starched cuff of his white dress shirt. His onyx cufflink winked. “Hey, anytime you want to be a pupil I’d be delighted.”

Abby threw back her head and erupted in a gagging smoker’s cough. “Please, not only am I old enough to be your mother, I have three sons of my own. No one can spot bull faster than a mother of sons.” Long divorced, Abby had grown up in the same Polish neighborhood of Trenton as Vic’s parents, and it had been his father’s idea that she work for the company.

“You two can go at it all day if you want, but some of us have work to do.” Vic picked up his phone and started to dial again.

Abby saluted and scampered off.

For a fiftysomething mom she still looked pretty good in a tight black skirt, Vic thought. He leaned on his elbow and waited, listening to the phone connection.

“Mr. Lodge’s office,” a male voice answered at the other end.

Vic shifted the phone to the right hand so he could write with his left on a legal pad. “This is Vic Golinski from GSI, Golinski Stone International. I’m returning—” he looked at the slip again since names were not his strength “—Mr. Lodge’s calls.”

“If you’ll hold, I’ll see if Mr. Lodge is available.”

“No problem.” Vic began doodling a grid pattern on the legal pad. He covered the mouthpiece and spoke to Joe. “I’m on hold for the great man.”

Then he leaned back in his chair and winked at Roxie. She blinked, her thick white lashes fluttering, but her brow remained furrowed. Roxie was one of those dogs that seemed to carry the weight of the world on her shoulders. Just look at her cross-eyed and she was convinced she had cancer. Maybe this time she was right.

“Mr. Golinski.” A gravelly male voice drawled out Vic’s name. The aristocratic overbite extended the last syllable into almost two. “Conrad Lodge III here. You’re a hard man to track down, Mr. Golinski.”

“Vic, please, and I’m sorry for the delay. Things have been slightly hectic this morning, but now I’m all yours. What can I do for you, Mr. Lodge?”

No first-name familiarity was reciprocated, not that Vic had expected anything else. But then he had a thought. Conrad Lodge? “I don’t mean to be presumptuous, but your name is very familiar.”

“Perhaps because you’ve seen me mentioned in the Wall Street Journal or the Financial Times.”

“No, that’s not it.”

“Yes, I suppose for someone in your line of work—stone and all—that wouldn’t be your usual reading matter.”

Vic didn’t feel the need to convince him otherwise. What point was there in informing him that he had an MBA from Stanford and that GSI was now the leading distributor of natural stone in North America.

No, he wasn’t about to set the record straight because he knew all about people like Conrad Lodge III. They liked to look down at people in “the stone business”—good honest people like his father, who worked with their hands and believed that if you worked hard enough, anything was possible—especially for your children.

No, he wouldn’t give Conrad Lodge III the satisfaction of knowing he’d pissed him off. “I suppose you’re right. I don’t usually get beyond the sports pages—being an ex-jock and all,” Vic responded. He leaned back in his chair and rested his stocking feet on the lip of the trash can next to Roxie’s pillow.

The dog stirred and knocked the plastic cone around her head against the black container. Clearly, it annoyed her. If Vic knew that Roxie wouldn’t bother the bandaged ear, he’d take the thing off.

Conrad chortled as if he were actually sharing the joke. “Of course. Which is exactly why I called.”

“Not many people have any interest in my short-lived football career.” Vic wasn’t being modest, merely stating a fact. But he also knew that prospective customers, once they found out about his former sports career, liked to dish the dirt. Everyone was an expert or a fan, it seemed. Then after that ritual dance, they usually got down to business. “How can I help you?” He continued to draw on the pad, adding vertical lines to the grid pattern.

“You may recall that I’ve sent you several emails regarding Grantham University, in particular Reunions in June.”

Vic had a vague recollection of deleting some emails with a Grantham email address. He figured it was yet another solicitation for the alumni fund or the latest capital campaign. Not that he didn’t value his education and the opportunities it had opened up for him, but that didn’t mean he was about to fork over more than his two hundred dollars a year that he obligingly offered. Let the Conrad Lodge the Third’s of the world dip into their ample trust funds… . With a few quick jabs, he drew some arching lines, fanning outward.

Wait a minute… Conrad Lodge III?

Vic abruptly lifted his foot off the garbage can and planted both feet firmly on the floor. “Hold it. Now I remember why I know your name.” He lay the pen on the pad. “You wouldn’t happen to be Mimi Lodge’s father?”

“Why, yes, Mary Louise is my daughter.”

Vic looked down at his pad and frowned. He’d unconsciously drawn what looked unmistakably like the fountain in the courtyard of Allie Hammie. He ripped the paper from the pad and scrunched it up.

And that’s when he hung up—without another word.

CHAPTER THREE

“HEY!” JOE JUMPED to his feet. “What the hell just happened?”

Vic rubbed his forehead, then held up his hand. “Not to worry.” He hit redial.

Conrad picked up immediately.

“It seems we were cut off. My apologies.”

Conrad didn’t bother with any more preliminary chitchat. “You may know that my firm is considering opening another office in the Antipodes.”

Vic rolled his eyes at the pretentious language. “Yes, I believe my brother, Joe, to whom you talked briefly, mentioned something about it.” He nodded to Joe, who raised his chin.

“Yes, well…I know our design and construction team are in the process of sending out for bids.”

“That’s good to know. GSI has handled several projects in Australia and New Zealand, and we’ve had very positive reviews.”

“I’ll pass that information along. But that’s not entirely why I called.”

Why wasn’t Vic surprised? When did a CEO get involved with building projects besides signing off on the design and then cutting the ribbon at the end?

“As I explained in my emails, I’m on the organizing committee for Reunions coming up this June.”

“Congratulations, but I must confess I haven’t attended Reunions since my senior year when I served on a panel discussion,” Vic said. It was an experience he’d managed to put far, far away.

“Yes, that was a memorable occasion.”

“Your daughter, I believe, made it particularly memorable.” Vic tried to keep his tone even.

“Yes, Mimi is definitely opinionated, but I’ve never seen her so…shall we say…demonstrative?”

She may have been “demonstrative,” but somehow it had been Vic who had been hauled off to the police station. Mimi had merely waved goodbye wrapped in a towel provided by the cops. “I guess that’s what you could call it.” His tone wasn’t quite so even.

“Yes, well, the past is something we can’t change, even if we’d like to.”

That surprised Vic. Conrad didn’t strike him as someone who was particularly introspective, let alone regretful. He wondered if Mimi’s father was referring to something in particular.

He didn’t know much about the family except what he’d heard as an undergraduate. You couldn’t live in Grantham without realizing that the Lodges were very Very Important People. And as for Mimi, she’d run with a different crowd—the preppy jocks who knew all about lacrosse, and what brand of gin was best for martinis.

He knew she had become a hotshot war correspondent on the nightly news—her dream fulfilled, if he remembered correctly—who’d been kidnapped while on assignment in some ex-Soviet region and finally released. He wondered if the family had maneuvered that one the way they used to have the Grantham police in the palm of their hands. They obviously had connections everywhere. Whatever, he really didn’t care. If a family member of his had been kidnapped, he would have used every possible means to free them also.

“On the other hand,” Conrad went on, “perhaps what I am proposing is a way to redress past wrongs. You see, as it turns out, I am the chair of panel discussions for the Reunions in June.”

“Tell me you’re not proposing what I think you’re proposing?”

“I think the possibility to revisit problems of equality in college sports is as timely now as ever. And since all the panelists have agreed to participate again, it will be interesting to see if any of their perspectives have changed.”

“All the panelists?” Forget the others. Vic was only interested in one.

Lodge cleared his throat. “Yes, though, it is true that my daughter agreed to participate only if you served on the panel, as well.”

Vic tipped his chair back again. “She did? I’m surprised she even remembered me.”

“Interesting, she said the same thing about you.” Lodge didn’t elaborate. “In any case, I think the audience would be fascinated by your perspective as a former professional athlete. And no doubt more than a few of them will recall your courage all those years ago to take what might have been considered a refreshingly candid, though politically incorrect stance.”

“If I didn’t know better, I would say you’re itching for a replay. Is your daughter still so easily riled?”

“That remains to be seen. Even if there are no fireworks, the anticipation that something might happen would be worth the price of admission alone, don’t you think?”

Vic didn’t know what to think. He glanced down at Roxie, who sighed a dog sigh. He hadn’t wanted to wait until after the weekend, and the vet’s office closed early on Fridays, so he’d had no choice but to collect her first thing in the morning. Now, he just wanted to get her home and comfortable. And wait for the prognosis.

Yet the businessman in him also wouldn’t let go. Besides, the economy in Australia might be booming, but big commercial jobs in general were still few and far between. “At the same time you’d keep GSI in mind in regards to the construction of your Australian offices?” he asked.

“As two seasoned men of the world, I think we both understand the certain quid pro quo that is a part of doing business,” Conrad replied. “You have my word that we will view your company’s participation in a very favorable light.”

Mimi Lodge. Just the thought of her was like a craw in his side—an irritating feeling that just wouldn’t go away. Like nothing and no one else he’d ever come in contact with. What was it Machiavelli had said? Keep your friends close but your enemies closer?

Well, Mimi Lodge wasn’t so much an enemy as a troublemaker with a capital “T.” All the Lodges were, he reminded himself, even the man on the other end of the phone line.

But Mimi Lodge was also the only woman who had ever aroused his passions so fully, so surprisingly. She’d blindsided him, that’s what she’d done.

And now he wondered what would happen if they met again.

“So do I have your agreement, then?” Conrad prodded him. “It would mean a great deal to me.”

If Lodge were at all the type of person to be sincere, Vic would have assumed that the older man genuinely meant it. He watched as Roxie licked the top of a front paw, sure evidence that she was in pain. Nope, he couldn’t hang around the office any longer. “Just send me the details, and I’ll be there,” he said decisively.

They exchanged a few more cursory comments, Vic wrote down the information, and then the call ended. He swiveled around and faced Joe.

“So, did we get it?” Joe sprung from the couch.

Vic ripped off a sheet of paper and rose. He circled his desk and handed it to Joe. Then he stepped over to the coat rack and shrugged on his blazer. The action rekindled memories of the exact opposite where Mimi Lodge was concerned.

Joe frowned at the paper. “If I can navigate your handwriting, this is a contact at Pilgrim?”

Vic reached for the top button of his jacket, then decided to leave it open. Easier for driving. “It’s the person you can contact in regards to our bid for their new building.”

Joe whistled. “So how did you do it? I gather there’s a Grantham connection?”

“Yes, it seems that my agreement to serve on an alumni panel at Reunions this coming June sealed the deal—or at least the bid.” He reached for his winter jacket and turned back to his brother.

Joe looked incredulous. “Wait a minute. That hothead? The one who dumped water on you your senior year? Wasn’t her name Lodge, too?”

Vic pulled out Roxie’s lead from the pocket of his coat. “Mimi Lodge. His daughter. Conrad seemed particularly interested that we recreate our little tango.”

Joe shook his head. “I don’t get it. It sounds suspiciously like the old man is pimping for his daughter. Which is pretty creepy, even for someone like me.”

“I don’t think your sensibilities had anything to do with the offer, and I’m not convinced it really has anything to do with me, either.” Vic walked over to Roxie and kneeled down to hook the lead to her collar. Then he stood up and Roxie awkwardly followed suit. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say the motivating factor was guilt.” The question is whose? Vic silently ruminated.

CHAPTER FOUR

June, the Wednesday before Grantham University Reunions…

“YOU DIDN’T NEED TO PICK me up, you know. I could have taken the Link into town and then walked,” Mimi announced. The Link was the single-car commuter train that connected Grantham to the mainline at Grantham Junction. That’s where she was now—standing, on the southbound platform at Grantham Junction, having just disembarked from the express train from New York. It had been standing room only when she’d gotten on at Penn Station, and she’d only managed to secure a seat when she outmaneuvered a teenager with two Bergdorf Goodman bags and a Louis Vuitton purse. What was the world coming to anyway?

Her half-brother, Press, took her rolling suitcase from her without bothering to ask. “I’d already emailed you that I’d be back for Reunions, and the timing worked out. Besides, admit it—you would have given me grief if I hadn’t made the effort.” A year after graduating from Grantham, Press was living in Melbourne, Australia, where he was getting a master’s degree in paleontology. He’d traveled halfway around the world to work with a scientist who was on the forefront of 3-D imaging of bone specimens.

Mimi looked him over. He seemed the same—maybe skinnier and now sporting a fashionably scraggly beard that was a darker blond than his short curls. He wore jeans and a T-shirt—a Hoagie Palace T-shirt. The T-shirt had her thinking. “How about we stop off for some hoagies—my treat. Unless you have other plans, of course?”

Someone bumped Mimi from the back. She tensed. Damn. She’d been doing better these past two months. She willed herself to breathe out slowly and recognize the bump as just a commuter in a rush. Much as she didn’t go in for the touchy-feely stuff, seeing the psychologist recommended by Noreen had helped. Treatment for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder had greatly improved over the years. For Mimi, the sessions had helped her identify frightening memories and replace them with more manageable thoughts. That still didn’t mean she was “cured.”

Again, she felt pressure on her upper arm, and while she steeled herself, at least she didn’t flinch. She glanced to see what it was and saw it was Press touching the sleeve of her leather jacket.

“Sorry, I guess I’m jumpy. Must be the excitement of returning to the old stomping grounds,” she joked lamely. She peered into her brother’s eyes to see if he’d discerned something more, but his gray-blue eyes looked more bloodshot than anything, and his face didn’t show a reaction one way or the other. But then Press had always been good at appearing unemotional under the best of circumstances—or the worst. That was his way of coping, she realized. Hers was to rant and rave and run away.

“So food?” she asked again. Today she wasn’t planning on running—at least, not yet.

“I’m always up for Hoagie Palace. Besides I need to stop in to say hi to Angie and Sal. If they knew I was in town and hadn’t seen them, I’d be in a lot of trouble.” Angie and Sal were the owners of the popular Grantham establishment and had probably been more involved with raising Press than his own parents had been.

He pointed out his car in the parking lot, and they marched down the platform to the stairs. Instead of bouncing her suitcase down the cement risers, he simply picked it up by the handle and carried it down.

“So, how are things in Australia?”

Press fished the car keys out of his pocket and beeped open the doors to the aging BMW. “Good, I guess. I mean, the work is great and my advisor is, too. Now that we’ve got the bugs worked out of the new 3-D equipment—it cost a bomb, I’ll tell you—the measurements I’m getting on the specimens are amazing. Which is a good thing, because I just heard that my proposal for a talk at the big paleontology meeting in September was accepted.”

“That’s fantastic. But what about outside of work? Don’t you like Australia?” Mimi had gone scuba diving in the Barrier Reef after successfully completing a story. And she’d downed more than a few beers with a crew from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation in the Rocks section of Sydney. Beyond that, the vast Red Continent was a mystery to her—one of those places she was always telling herself that she needed to explore. The thing was, she never seemed to have time for a vacation.

Press hoisted her suitcase into the trunk and came around to open the passenger door. “No, Australia’s great. Just more different than I anticipated. I don’t know why. Maybe because we speak the same language—or kind of the same language—I expected things to function the same way as in the U.S. My mistake.” He held open the door.

Mimi hesitated. You’re thinking of being pushed into the car in Grozny, but this is your brother and Grantham, she reminded herself. She willed herself to get in and fasten her seat belt. But she kept a death grip on the door handle. Then she forced herself to talk. “It’s not easy, I know, to uproot yourself and live in another country. Everyone thinks it’s so glamorous and exciting, but sometimes it’s just plain lonely. I remember my mother complaining about it.” She looked out the window as they negotiated the traffic out of the crowded parking lot.

“You know, that may be the first time you’ve ever mentioned your mother to me.” Press tapped his thumbs impatiently on the steering wheel.

“I guess that’s true. It just kind of came up.” Mimi looked out the window. The maple and ash trees were thick with leaves. Every time she came back to this part of central New Jersey, she was struck by how green it was, especially in June. “So do you have any roommates?” She turned back, changing the subject.

Press inched the car forward. “Nah, I decided to live alone after years of having roommates at boarding school and college.”

“Maybe that’s one reason why you’re lonely? That can’t be good if you’re trying to fit in.”

“Who said I was lonely? Anyway, you live alone.”

“That’s no recommendation.” Mimi bit her tongue. She hadn’t seen her brother since his graduation last year, and she didn’t want to fight. “So what brings you back to our fair shores now? Don’t think I’m buying your explanation about the siren call of Reunions. You were always as blasé as I was about the whole rah-rah thing.”

He breathed in noisily.

Mimi recognized New Jersey allergies.

“I don’t know,” Press said nonchalantly. “It’s been a year. I figured it was time to take a break. See some people.”

“People?”

“Sure, there’s Matt Brown. We met a ways back when we both worked at Apple Farm Country Club. You remember him, right? He graduated from Yale this year and is home in Grantham for a while.”

Mimi nodded. “I remember him—the kid who interned for Lilah with her organization in Congo. What’s he up to?” Lilah Evans was her old roommate.

“I’m not totally sure. From his Facebook page it looks like he’s going into the Peace Corps, then grad school. I thought I’d get more details, just hang out, you know?”

“Anyone else you just hanging out with?” Matt Brown was a decent enough kid, but Mimi thought there had to be a bigger draw to travel this far.

Press turned on the car radio. Katy Perry music suddenly blasted at megawatt force. “Crap. Someone’s been fooling around with the stations while I was away. I told Noreen she should drive the car to keep the battery from going flat, but she must have let Brigid play with the dials.” Brigid was their eight-year-old half-sister. “I mean, you don’t see me going into her room and mixing up her Barbies.”

Mimi smiled at his frowning face. She remembered the spats she had with him when she’d come home from boarding school and found he had swiped some of her Beanie Babies. Not that as a teenager she still played with them. It was just the principle of the thing.

He continued to fiddle with the buttons, neatly avoiding any further conversation. That was okay with Mimi. They rounded the steep curve by the gardening store, crossed the canal and entered Grantham proper, passing some modest clapboard houses from the early nineteenth century, then the university golf course on the left and some office buildings on the right. They even made the light behind the university theater where Press deftly avoided a throng of students crossing against the light. They must have stuck around after exams to work at Reunions. The hours might be long, but the money was good and the beer was free.

No matter how long she was away, Mimi was always struck by how Grantham never seemed to change. Oh, the sign at the convenience store on the corner might be painted a different color and one stock brokerage firm might be replaced by another, but basically Grantham remained the same picturesque enclave with Colonial roots that was everyone’s ideal of a bucolic college town. Everyone’s but Mimi’s, that is.

She had always found the reverence for history and tradition stifling. Her quest growing up had been to fly away as far and as often as possible. But now two things were certain: Grantham was quiet, and it was safe. Right now, that was about as good as it got for her.

Press hung a right on Main Street and maneuvered around the cars turning left and those double-parked on the right. It was a slalom course for high-end European cars and the occasional Toyota. After they made the light at Adams Road, with the movie theater on the left and the university library on the right, Press pushed past the Catholic church and the flower stores before turning right into the parking lot opposite Hoagie Palace. They headed for the mecca of good, cheap greasy food that never, ever disappointed. It might be a weekday evening, but the line of customers was backed out the door.

Still, it moved quickly, and Mimi and Press were soon in the door, ready to lean over the high glass counter and give their orders to one of the cooks wearing the ubiquitous Hoagie Palace T-shirt.

“I’ve got this,” Mimi reminded her brother as they inched toward the cash register after placing their orders.

“I’m going to get an Arnold Palmer, as well.” Press elbowed his way to the cooler of soft drinks and bottled water on the side wall.

“Press, caro.” The woman behind the cash register lifted the counter and came to the other side. She embraced him and kissed him on the cheek. “Trying to sneak by without giving me a proper hello?”

“Just testing your reflexes, Angie,” Press teased. Mimi was amazed to see that her brother—normally so reserved—returned the hug without hesitation.

“Carlos, take over the register, okay?” she called out. “Sal will be upset that he missed you. He’s just gone to the barbershop. I was complaining that he was starting to look shaggy.” Then she held Press at arm’s length, her gold bracelets jangling, and eyed him up and down. “Speaking of shaggy, I like the beard. It’s very sophisticated.” She rubbed it lovingly. “So when did you come in?”

“About two hours ago,” Press answered. “And I had to go pick up my sister Mimi. You remember her?” He nodded back to Mimi in the line.

Angie gave a hello nod. Mimi waved.

“Tell Sal not to worry. I promise I’ll stop by the house tonight.”

“Only if you’re not too tired. I know you, Press. You never get enough sleep,” she clucked over him.

“You only just got in?” Mimi tried to get his attention, but Press took no notice.

Angie held Press’s face in her hands. “I can’t tell you how upset I was to find out that Australia doesn’t allow any food—even in containers—to be shipped to the country. I worried that you would lose weight. And you did.”

Mimi shook her head. There was no point in trying to get his attention. He’d just gotten in after what? A twenty-hour trip? No wonder the kid looked exhausted.

The line moved along and she reached the cash register. “An Arnold Palmer to drink, and a chicken cheese steak hoagie and a meatball hoagie with two sides of fries,” she announced. Then she stretched her neck over the countertop and addressed the chef working on her hoagie. “And could you put some extra hot sauce on the meatball?” A meatball hoagie with sauce was straight out of her college days.

“For once we agree on something,” a male voice to her right declared.

Mimi turned. Blinked once. And didn’t blink again.

“That’s right.” Vic Golinski saluted her with one finger to his brow. “Only, this time, I’m the one with the container of water.” He showed her the large bottle he was carrying and unscrewed the top. “An open container of water.”

He raised his arm.

CHAPTER FIVE

VIC TOOK A LARGE GULP, lowered the bottle and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Vic. Vic Golinski, in case you didn’t remember.”

Mimi raised her head, then raised it more. “Of course. You’re hard to miss.” She’d forgotten just how big, how imposing he was. Maybe he was a little fuller around the jaw line and not quite so pneumatically blown up in the shoulder area, but she was pretty sure he could still bench press everyone behind the counter, and maybe the counter, as well. She stared at his chest—the top button of his blue Oxford shirt undone, the striped tie loosened and casually tossed over his shoulder—and wondered what else he could press… .

“That’s fourteen ninety-nine,” Carlos announced. “Fourteen ninety-nine,” he repeated.

Mimi shook her head and held up her hand. “Sorry, that’ll be me.” Flustered, she reached for her shoulder bag—and didn’t feel it. She patted along her hip. Nothing. She looked down. “Oh, cripes.” She peered over her shoulder, seeking out her brother. “Press, hey, Press,” she called out.

He glanced over his shoulder at the sound of his name.

“Listen, it looks like I left my purse in the car.” She pointed outside. “I can run back and get it if you give me your keys. Or can you cover it, and I’ll pay you back?”

Press pushed toward her, shaking his head wearily. “I don’t have any cash, but I suppose I could use my debit card.”

“That’s all right, Press,” Angie said reassuringly as she reached his side. She motioned for Carlos to vacate his post at the register. “I know you’re good for it. You can pay me some other time.” She waited as her assistant raised the flap in the counter for her to come across.

“Please, allow me.” Vic pulled out two twenties. “Just add it to my bill. A meatball hoagie with hot sauce, side of fries and—” he raised his eyebrows at Mimi “—and one bottle of water—large and extremely wet.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I’ll just run back to the car. It’s only across the street,” Mimi insisted. She waved away his hand.

He squeezed closer to the cash register. “She’d give you the shirt off her back—and trust me, I’ve seen her do it. But it’s probably faster if I take care of this.” He kept his arm outstretched with the bills.

Mimi nudged him away with her elbow. “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She turned to Angie. “I’ll be right back, I promise.”

“Will someone make up their mind?” Press asked behind them.

Mimi and Vic turned their heads, she clockwise, he counterclockwise. Mimi raised her eyes. Vic lowered his. His nose almost grazed her forehead.

The cash register drawer opened with a loud ding.

Mimi and Vic turned back, she—lowering her head slightly, he—pulling back ever so much.

Angie reached out for Vic’s twenties and deposited the correct change in his hand at the same time. “Okay, big boy, let’s keep the line moving. We’ll call you when your orders are ready,” she said smartly, all five foot two of her substantial body imposing itself. One did not argue with Angie.

Needless to say, Mimi and Vic shuffled to the side and hovered as inconspicuously as possible against the side wall. Mimi pretended to look at the snapshots of patrons wearing Hoagie Palace T-shirts in places like Machu Picchu and the Parthenon in Greece. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Vic pocket his wallet and fold his arms across his chest.

Press sidled over and popped his can of Palmer iced tea. He eyed Vic skeptically. “Hey, do I know you?”

Vic uncrossed his arms. “Vic. Vic Golinski. I was a classmate of Mimi’s at the university.” He held out his hand to shake Press’s.

Mimi glanced over. “Oh, sorry. Vic, this is my half-brother, Press Lodge. He’s a Grantham grad, too,” Mimi said. Press might be almost as tall as Vic, but Vic had about sixty more pounds of muscle on him.

“Hi, there.” Press went through the handshake motions, then scratched his head. “Wait a minute. You used to play pro football, right?”

“Briefly.”

“I remember seeing you play at the Meadowlands.”

Mimi looked at Press. “You went to a game? With Dad?”

“No, of course not with Dad. It was a birthday party or something, and someone else’s parents took me.” He narrowed his eyes and considered Vic. “Yeah, I’m sure of it. It was a game against the Giants. There was this head-butting incident. And you were involved in it. Am I right?”

He shrugged. “That’s so long ago, it’s ancient history.”

“No, no.” Mimi shook her head. “Even I recall something about it. I mean, I was in Kuwait at the time, and the Armed Forces Radio was going bananas over this flagrant foul.” She looked at Vic. “I remember it being totally out of the blue. And it sounded absolutely malicious. Were you badly hurt?”

“Oh, darling sister of mine—” Press chimed in, sounding pretty pleased with himself “—before you offer any after-the-fact consoling, I do believe your buddy here was doing the butting, not the player on the receiving end.”

She opened her mouth. “Oh.”

“Oh, is right,” Press said with enthusiasm. “What a hit! And what a fine. If I remember correctly, it was a League-leading record at that time.” He seemed very ebullient, practically bouncing on the white soles of his beat-up boat shoes.

“Not one of my finer hours. How about we just drop it?” Vic said, his voice eerily soft.

Press closed his mouth and opened his eyes wide. “Sure, no problem.”

“A chicken cheesesteak, meatball with hot sauce, Arnold Palmer, another meatball with hot sauce and water,” Carlos shouted out.

“I’ll meet you guys outside with the orders,” Press offered. He clearly knew a way out when he saw one and lunged back to the counter.

“Shall we?” Vic offered, holding his hand out for her to lead the way.

She nodded, and she could sense the crowd part not so much for her as for the large set of shoulders sheltering her to one side.

They stepped out of the door. Mimi stretched out a tight-lipped smile. Vic made a similar face. She looked down where the sidewalk was heaving from the encroachment of a large tree root.

“So do you come back often?” “You live around here?” they asked at the same time.

“You first.” She nodded.

“No, you.” He held out his hand.

She smiled nervously. “No, I don’t get back much. But when I do it’s always great to get a hoagie first thing back. Kind of like Grantham’s version of madeleines, don’t you think?” She sounded pretentious, even to her ears, but here among the throng of people on the street she wasn’t relaxed. Not fearful, as she would have expected, but nervous—giddy nervous. Which was…well…unexpected.

Vic frowned.

“You know, Proust? How he smelled madeleines—the little French butter cookies—which evoked all the memories of his past?” She stared up at Vic. Why the hell was she talking about some nineteenth-century author, who truthfully, she’d never read more than a few pages of, when what she really wanted to ask him was, “So you do remember me? In a really bad way? Or maybe just a bad way?” Or maybe not at all.

Press forced himself through the doorway, leading with two large bags. “Here you go.” He peered in the bags and handed one to Vic. “Yours, I believe.” Then he slipped out a waxed paper covered hoagie for Mimi and a paper pouch of fries. “If you want ketchup for the French fries, I can muscle my way back in. Sorry, I forgot, but I’m happy to…” He cocked his head over his shoulder.

“No, I’m fine,” Vic said.

“Me, too. I don’t want anything to get in the way of the mounds of salt.”

Press stuffed the bag with his food under his arm. “Listen, you guys, I just got this text about meeting some friends. They’re free shortly. So, I don’t want to cut your personal reunion short, but I’d like to get a move on if possible.” He motioned with his car keys to where they’d parked across the street.

Mimi stood there, hugging her hoagie to her side. “I’ll need to get my wallet out to pay Vic.”

“No, don’t bother. It’ll be my treat,” Vic offered. “Anyway, I don’t want to hold you up,” he said to Press.

“Don’t worry about me, Press. I’ll find my own way home,” Mimi blurted out. “Whenever you get a chance, just leave my suitcase and stuff in the foyer. It’s not like there’s anything I need right away.”

“If you’re sure?” Press asked.

Mimi wasn’t sure of anything—especially where Vic Golinski was concerned. Why had she told her brother to take off without her? More to the point, why wasn’t she quite ready to say goodbye to Vic? Was it guilt for what she’d done the last time they’d crossed paths? Or maybe her hormones were sputtering to the fore after a long, bleak period? Or maybe she just needed to set the record straight before their next public showdown. Yes…that was it. She just needed to set the record straight—not that she intended to back down from her principles, but just to let him know that she wasn’t looking for a fight.

“Okay, then,” Press said breezily, seemingly unaware for the mental gymnastics Mimi was going through. “And nice meeting you,” he said as a farewell to Vic before stepping off the curb, his head already half-buried in a bag of fries. A Land Rover made a quick stop, missing him by a few inches. But Press munched away.

“Were we ever that oblivious?” Mimi asked in relief.

“I thought you people were born that way,” Vic replied.

“What?” Mimi turned back to him.

“Oblivious to others. Using words like foyer.”

“Foyer?” She was completely lost now.

“Yeah, you told your brother to leave your suitcase in the foyer of the house. Who uses words like that? Who even has a house with a foyer?”

“What’s wrong with foyer? You want me to say entryway instead?” She shook her head. “Listen, I didn’t stick around to argue. I wanted to make sure that since we’re going to be sitting on that panel again that we should bury the hatchet.” She set her jaw.

“You think I need to bury the hatchet? I could point out that you were the one who spilled the water.”

“Which you just did. And I could point out that you were the one with the flagrant head-butting violation.”

“That was different. That was a onetime occasion,” he argued.

“And you think I just go around dousing people with water whenever it strikes my fancy?” She stared at him.

Vic seemed about to speak, then looked away. After a moment, he turned back. “Shall we agree to try to be civil? Or at least put up the front of being civil?”

Mimi peered around and saw that several people were slanting them nervous looks. She stood up straighter. “I don’t see why not. Besides, it’s not as if we really know each other to get all riled up anyway. And I’m sure that since I last saw you you’ve changed and…developed in many ways. I mean, you look…” Her voice trailed off. Yes, she had already noticed just how physically developed he’d become.

“Older?” he suggested.

“Settled,” she said instead.

“You make that sound like a criticism.”

Mimi shook her head. “On the contrary, over the years I’ve grown to appreciate stability. It’s like something isn’t missing in your life.”

He studied her face. “You think you know me?”

She touched the top of her hoagie bag. The burst of energy she had felt when first seeing him was slowly seeping away. And she could almost feel her eyes darting back and forth, studying the people passing by on the sidewalk or going in and out of Hoagie Palace.

Stop it! she reprimanded herself. This is bloody Grantham, after all! The biggest criminal threats were bored teenagers shoplifting from the drug store.

She squared her shoulders and fixed a smile on her face. “Let’s start again. So, are you living nearby or did you just come in early for Reunions?” The Reunions festivities didn’t begin until Friday evening, so there were a few days to go.

He studied her some more, then visibly eased off. “I live in town now. Actually, my whole family does. In a small town house development behind the shopping center.”

Mimi nodded. “I think I know the one you mean. Brick? Kind of a Georgetown re-dux? Very exclusive. I bet you even have an aesthetically minded owners association.”

“So you heard about the no clothesline rule, then?”

“You’re joking?”

“Could I make something like that up?” he asked. A smile twitched the corner of his mouth.

“No, I guess not.” She chuckled then gazed into his face. “So you think we’ll be able to be civil to each other?” She cocked her head.

“Only with immense amounts of restraint.” He shifted his bag of food to the other arm and cradled it like a football.

How fitting, thought Mimi. She was actually starting to relax again. Weird, the one person in Grantham who had vexed her the most now seemed capable of putting her best at ease. “If you want, we could eat our hoagies together?” She held up her paper bag.

“I was going to take it home.” He hesitated. “Of course, you’re welcome to come.”

Why did she feel he was just being polite? And anyway, even though he had bought food for only himself, who was to say he wasn’t meeting someone? For some reason, the prospect of having to make polite conversation with Vic Golinski’s current squeeze was more than she could bear at the moment.

So, instead, she glanced down at her oversize wristwatch—not the sturdy Rolex from her mother, that one was gone forever—and started to back away down the sidewalk. “Thanks for the offer, but on second thought, I should probably head home.” She held up her wrist and tapped the crystal of her black Swatch. “My family’s probably wondering what’s happened to me.” Like that was really going to happen, Mimi thought. Whatever, it was as good an excuse as any.

“So, I’ll be off, then.” She pointed vaguely toward the center of town. Her family’s house was located on the west side about a half-mile past the commercial stretch, in the Old Money residential section. Even the rhododendrons on that side of town could boast aristocratic lineages.

“I can give you a lift if you’re in a hurry.”

She shook her head. “Not to worry, I’m fine. Besides, I wouldn’t want to take you out of your way.” The ride in from the train station with Press had not totally been knuckle biting, but it had probably been enough to tax her stamina for one day. “It’s not personal. I prefer to walk.” Now that was the truth.

“Don’t worry. I don’t take it personally.”

From the scowl on his face, she wasn’t so sure.

“On the other hand, I’m parked in a spot down a ways—right in the direction you’re headed. If you don’t mind, I’ll just tag along that far. That way you’ll get the chance to meet my girl. She’s waiting in the car.” He seemed very chipper all of a sudden. “She’s the hot sauce fanatic actually.”

Was it too late to run?

CHAPTER SIX

CONRAD LODGE SAT in his usual leather armchair in the study of the Lodge mansion on Singleton Road, the thoroughfare that led into the “right” side of town. One-hundred-year-old sycamores shaded the sidewalks. Tall brick and stone walls and wrought-iron fences with security boxes guarded the magisterial homes, including the residence of New Jersey’s governor.

“So how does she look?” Conrad asked. He cupped a cut-crystal tumbler with the finest single malt whisky, resting on a coaster featuring the Grantham University crest. In his other hand, he held a newly lit cigar. A red circle of flame shone around the gray ash center.

“How does she look?” Press repeated wearily. How about how do I look? This was the first he had laid eyes on his father since coming back to Grantham. His flight had gotten in around three in the afternoon. And by the time he had caught the train down and gotten a taxi home, it was after five. After five—but still several hours before Conrad’s train was due in from Manhattan.

He had no sooner gotten home than he’d received a message from his father’s assistant to pick up Mimi at Grantham Junction station.

So, there Press stood, zonked out from jetlag and the crazy fourteen-hour time difference between the U.S. and Australia, enduring a cross-examination from his father. Did the old man think to ask how his flight was? If his planes had been crowded? On time? Let alone how his work was going in Melbourne?

Of course not.

His father had never asked him about anything that Press cared about. Business and Grantham—that’s all he could talk about. “Why don’t you go out for football at Grantham, the way I did?” his father had instead asked critically. “Why don’t you talk to my friend at such-and-such investment firm about a summer internship? Do something real with your life.”

All his life, Press figured he’d been a failure to his father’s way of thinking. No, it was worse than that. It was more like his father didn’t think of him at all.

Though Press had never gotten the impression that Dear Old Dad cared one whit for Mimi, either. Still, it had been on his father’s marching orders that Press had returned for Reunions and to come and visit his sister. Truth be told, he would have returned anyway, but he wasn’t about to admit that to his father. One, because Press didn’t like to give him any satisfaction that they might be thinking along the same lines. God forbid! And two, this way his father had paid for the flight. Considering the cost of living in Australia, not to mention the sky-high price of the airfare, Press would have had to forego food in order to pay for the trip.

So he just rubbed his bloodshot eyes and mumbled, “She looks like you’d expect.” Press might not be a “real Lodge man,” but he had learned over the years that mouthing off provided only temporary satisfaction at best.

“Speak up, Prescott,” Conrad ordered.

Press looked up. “She’s kind of jumpy, but otherwise not too bad.”

Conrad rested his cigar in a green Venetian glass ashtray. “No outbursts of anger?”

Press shrugged. “No more than usual. Mimi’s never been exactly nonconfrontational.”

“She didn’t mention difficulties sleeping, eating, show difficulties concentrating, did she?”

“If I had known that my job involved making clinical observations, I would have taken notes.”

“There’s no need for insolence. You don’t seem to grasp the severity of the traumatic situation your sister’s been through.”

“I know she had it pretty rough. I’m not totally insensitive, you know.” He dug his hands in his jeans pockets. He felt his phone, a reminder that he was already late to meet Amara and Matt.

Anyway, like he’d ever admit to his father how he’d scoured the internet during his half-sister’s captivity. He’d even joined chat groups with Eastern European members with the hopes of obtaining some inside information that didn’t make it to the regular news media. That involvement, though, had scared him more than anything.

Just before his graduation last year, Mimi had told him that she was setting up an interview with some Chechen rebel. He’d known it was important to her—even more important than the other stories she’d covered. This one had been personal. Family. Her mother’s family.

Then he had waited—for her to return from her interview. Only, she hadn’t. He’d been worried sick for her. But he’d also felt sorry for himself. He knew it was selfish, but he couldn’t help it. Because he realized—if he lost Mimi, he’d lose the only touchstone he had to a real sense of family.

Now, standing in his father’s dark paneled study, he caught his father gazing off into space. If he didn’t know better he’d say the man appeared consumed by his own demons. Though the more likely explanation was indigestion or alcoholic haze.

Whichever, he wasn’t about to stick around. “So, if there’s nothing else? I came home to grab a shower before I meet up with some friends.” Press fisted his hands.

Conrad took a healthy swallow from his drink and returned his gaze to his son. “God forbid we get in the way of your social life. So, if I may be so bold as to ask—where is your sister?”

“We stopped off at Hoagie Palace because Mimi wanted to, and she ran into someone she knew from college who lives in town.”

“Not Lilah Evans? Noreen told me this morning that she and Lilah were involved in some kind of Board meeting today for Sisters for Sisters, their nonprofit organization, and then a dinner afterward. That’s why I have made arrangements to eat at the Grantham Club this evening.” He hesitated. “Though perhaps Noreen got her dates confused, in which case I wonder where she might be.” He nervously turned his cigar in the glass tray, knocking off the burnt ash.

If Press didn’t know better, he’d think his father sounded worried. “I don’t know anything about meetings or dinners. And it wasn’t Lilah. It was some guy.”

“Some guy?” His father drew out the second word. “Does this guy have a name?”

“Vic. Vic Golinski—the ex-football player.”

His father arched one brow and smiled. He savored a sip of whiskey and followed it with a few puffs of his cigar. The smoke curled upward from the tip.

Then, after a long moment, he glanced dismissively at his son. “You may leave then to do whatever it is you’re so hot on doing.” He made it sound dirty.

Press’s lip curled. Just being in the same room as his father made him feel dirty. He didn’t waste any time crossing the carpet to the door. He reached for the brass door handle, then stopped and glanced back over his shoulder. “Oh, sir.” He couldn’t resist.

His father looked up.

“Don’t bother to thank me for coming.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

“SHE’S NORMALLY VERY SHY with people she doesn’t know. So don’t take offence if she tries to hide,” Vic explained protectively. They crossed the street at the Indian restaurant that always seemed to be under new management. He pointed. “I’m just parked ahead in front of the dry cleaners. Her name’s Roxie, by the way.”

“You sure it’s okay for me to meet her, then?” Mimi asked. She was looking at him like he was crazy.

Well, maybe he was. First off, he could have pretended not to recognize her in The Palace. But, no. Then he could have butted in line and paid his bill and hightailed it out of there. But, no, again. Then he could have easily waved goodbye and sauntered back into the rest of his life, with only a minor blip on the radar screen when they both served on the Reunions panel.

But, no.

Because he couldn’t. All for reasons too complicated and yet too simple to explain. He was still ticked off. He was curious. He wanted to see if she’d remembered the guy she’d humiliated in front of hundreds of people, not to mention his father at the police station. He wanted to see if she would squirm. Act remorseful. Penitent. He was running out of adjectives.

Hell, he’d just wanted to see her.

Not that he’d had any problem recognizing her instantly, and not from seeing her on TV. As far as he knew, she hadn’t been on air in months, maybe longer. No, despite the span of more than ten years, and that she now wore her hair much shorter than in college, he’d known her immediately. It wasn’t as much as her voice, or her stance or even her face, it was something about the way the air seemed charged around her.

She was like some skittish colt. With the same long, lean body that he remembered so well. Which he could recall with infinitesimal detail from the one time her body had been plastered up against him. With the same proud set to her shoulders and arching posture—a testament to good breeding as much as good genes. Still skinny, though—too little meat on her bones to be vibrantly healthy like some well-tuned athlete—the way she had been in college. And too jumpy, like she always had an eye out for someone to pounce on her when she wasn’t looking. So she looked.

And kept looking—surreptitiously—as they headed into town and past his car. He had thought he’d wanted to see her squirm with remorse, not…not anxiety. Oh, she tried to cover it up, acting as if she were simply curious about her surroundings. But come off it, how exciting was a closed bicycle shop, a religious bookstore and a phone company repair office?

He should have let her leave with her brother, or since she seemed set on walking, pretended his car was parked in the other direction. But that seemed pretty wimpy, even to his reluctant self.

Anyway, he’d been the one to insist she meet Roxie. And that one was a lot harder to explain. Oh, well. He’d make the best of it, and then move on.

“She’s a bit conscious of her ear, too,” he warned her.

“Her ear?” Mimi patted hers as if to mimic the question.

“That’s right. She had surgery during the winter to remove a tumor that luckily proved to be benign.”

“You both must have been so relieved.” She pushed the French fries in the top of the bag with her hoagie and rearranged it more comfortably under her arm.

“The doctor said that plastic surgery was an option, but I thought why put her through any more pain and suffering just for cosmetic reasons. Don’t you agree?” Why was he even bringing this all up? As if Mimi Lodge’s opinion on how Roxie looked mattered one way or another.

“As long as it isn’t disfiguring, I see no reason to bother. The world is overly obsessed with superficial beauty in my opinion.”

She actually sounded reasonable. And if the fine vertical line between her eyebrows was any indication, she practiced what she preached. Not that he thought the wrinkle was ugly. Far from it. It made her look more thoughtful than the know-it-all he’d remembered.

Then he spied his car up ahead. “That’s me. The gray Volvo station wagon.” He saw Roxie sit up at the sound of his voice. From the looks of it, she’d been snoozing in the trunk. She quickly hopped over to the backseat and squeezed her head through the opening in the lowered window. Her tail fanned enthusiastically back and forth.

“Why didn’t you tell me Roxie was a dog? I was all prepared for…I’m not sure what I was prepared for. I haven’t quite gotten my head around you.” Mimi picked up her pace and leaned down to the window.

“I wouldn’t just bend over the window like that.” Vic rushed up to her side. “It’s not like Roxie’d bite or anything, but she’s not entirely comfortable with new people…”

Too late.

Mimi already held her hand to the window, palm-side up, and was letting the dog get a good sniff. “Not bad, huh? Eau de Hoagie Palace. Tell you what. I’ll give you a small taste, but just this once.” She undid the paper around the hoagie and tore off an end.

Roxie lunged for the roll and gobbled it down. Then she sniffed around Mimi’s hands and began licking her fingertips. Then Roxie put her front paws up on the armrest on the door and forced herself farther out the window. Her tongue came in contact with Mimi’s nose.

Vic was stunned.

Mimi started laughing and threw back her head. This time Roxie’s kisses landed on her chin. Mimi squinted, still laughing. “I don’t know why you say she’s shy. She’s incredibly affectionate, aren’t you, girl?”

Mimi pulled her face away and gave Roxie a good rub around the back of her ears. Then she let her fingertips slowly travel the smooth length of her floppy ears, massaging them gently.

Roxie, to Vic’s surprise, didn’t budge, didn’t pull away from contact, convinced that she was about to die. Instead, she closed her eyes, her white-blond eyelashes fluttering, and purred. Yes, the same dog who was usually afraid of her own shadow was purring.

“Don’t even consider plastic surgery. Your ear looks very distinguished. It gives you character,” Mimi addressed the dog directly. “Right, Roxie?”

The dog licked her lips contentedly and rested her head in Mimi’s hand.

If Vic didn’t know better he’d say she’d fallen asleep.

Mimi turned to him, smiling. “I think your fears were unfounded, don’t you?”

He opened his mouth. Nothing came out.

She didn’t bother for a reply. “What kind of a name is Roxie? Wait, don’t tell me.” She stopped him.

He wasn’t about to say anything.

“Short for Roxanna—Alexander the Great’s wife. The History Channel. It’s a guy thing.” She seemed very pleased with herself.

“Actually, it’s Edmond Rostand’s Roxane. His play Cyrano de Bergerac?”

Mimi frowned. “The beautiful woman who recognizes the love of the ugly but gifted poet Cyrano instead of the handsome other dude—I can’t remember his name.”

“Christian,” Vic supplied.

“Right, Christian. Of course you’d remember the details. As I recall, you were good with the facts.” Mimi shifted her bag of food again and went back to scratching Roxie’s wrinkled brow. “You know, Vic Golinski, from that story, people might get the impression that you are a romantic.”

He blushed. Dammit, blushing? “It’s more a case that I was feeling sorry for myself. I’d just been cut from my team and my future in football looked over. I needed someone or something to love me. And there’s nothing less complicated than a dog’s affection.”

“Affection’s never uncomplicated,” Mimi responded absentmindedly.

The dog leaned her head to one side, indicating she wanted more scratching in a particular place.

Mimi obliged, and Vic noticed that she’d cocked her head in the same way as the dog. She’d even closed her eyes, her own deep black-brown lashes resting on her high cheekbones. For the first time, she didn’t look brittle, like she’d crack if you touched her in just the wrong way. She looked…looked happy, secure. Loved. Pure and simple. Uncomplicated.

And then it hit Vic—why he’d insisted on Mimi meeting his dog. Unconsciously, he’d wanted to see Roxie’s reaction. To validate his own emotions.

Only, it hadn’t worked out the way he had planned at all.

Or had it? Because now more than ever, he wanted Mimi Lodge bad.

CHAPTER EIGHT

“HEY, PRESS, IT’S SO GOOD to see you.” Amara Rheinhardt jumped up from the steps in front of her dorm and rushed to envelop him in her arms. “I can’t believe how long it’s been since I’ve seen you. I’ve had a great Freshman year—except for organic chemistry. Not all of us were meant to be science gurus like some people I could mention. Anyway, chalk it up as a painful learning experience and definitely cross off med school as one of my career options.”

“I didn’t know it was one?”

She shook her head, her chin rubbing back and forth against his shoulder. “Well, maybe. But this course in Roman poets I took? What can I say? Ovid is my personal god—I don’t care what they say about Horace. I’m already determined to work on him for my J.P.” She referred to her Junior Paper, which was still a long ways off.

Press grinned at her bubbly enthusiasm.

“And working for Penelope—like you said, unbelievable. I mean, even though she was gone on sabbatical a lot the first semester, she still taught me so much about manuscripts and how to put together exhibits.”

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