Jennifer Greene - The Billionaire’s Handler

“Of course,” she said.

“Like a family illness or anything like that. Mr. Cochran was only trying to give you a break from demands on you for that short stretch.”

“Of course,” she said.

“I took the liberty of having your fridge stocked with just a few things. Fresh milk, fresh eggs. Bread. Not much. But so you wouldn’t have to immediately run to the store.” He hefted the two suitcases from the trunk-she’d gone with nothing; and come home with cases that were chock-full. “I’ll return your key. And I have a list of phone numbers here. Mr. Cochran. Myself. The list of contacts he discussed with you before. So if you need anything-anything at all-”

“Henry, Maguire fixed me. Completely. I won’t need anything from anyone. I promise.”

Finally, he set down the suitcases, then stood at the front door like an awkward geek who didn’t know how to stay or go. She said, “If you stand there a minute more, I’ll throw my arms around your neck to thank you for all you’ve done for me.”

That did it. He took an immediate step back, eyes wide with alarm, and reached for the door. He said, “I think you’re the best thing that ever happened to him, Carolina.” And then left, hiking back to the rental car at a speed designed to outwit robbers, bill collectors…or women who might hug him without restraint.

Then she was alone, for the first time in quite a while.

She wandered through the four rooms, feeling like a cat trying to find the right spot to settle. The apartment had been cleaned stem to stern. The sinks shined. The pink towels in the bathroom were hung straight. The book she’d been reading was still face-down on her nightstand-but dusted-and her gold-leaf lamp, a treasure inherited from her grandmother, gleamed when she flicked on the light.

She’d decorated every inch of the place-some from Ikea, some from yard sales, some from family attics, pulling together colors and textures she liked. When everyone first heard about the inheritance, they’d all urged her to move to a nicer place.

She could. But the reason the apartment no longer felt like home had nothing do with furnishings or style or any other details like that. It was about feeling the absence of Maguire.

She would have to get used to it, she told herself. As crazy as it sounded, he was where her home was. Her heart. But that, of course, was foolish thinking.

A sudden sound jarred her thoughts-the phone. Her phone, her landline.

Two weeks ago, she’d caved at that torturous sound. Now she gulped and strode toward the phone. She’d left a life dangling.

She wasn’t ducking and running from anything that mattered to her, ever again.

Maguire was on a video cam when Henry yelled out a hello. Henry’d been gone for three days. Maguire had been chasing his own heels the whole time, working nonstop. The video cam was essentially a business call between an Austrian, Japanese and British counterpart-it was no mean feat to find a time and time zone where they could all comfortably talk together. Their common project was still in the engineering stage, but they’d all invested several million. It was time to separate the men from the boys, so to speak. The lady from Austria very definitely was tough, but the discussion was tricky and complicated. Everybody might have their feet in the same water, but they each had sharply different ideas about how to swim to the other side.

Henry showed up in the office doorway, saw what was happening, waved a greeting and disappeared-undoubtedly to raid the kitchen, Maguire assumed.

He couldn’t cut the video meeting short. It had taken hell times ten to put it together to begin with. The project mattered. It was one of his babies right now, in spite of the precarious economy.

But he was as distracted as a porcupine with an itch. He finally got all the business accomplished and severed the call. Two in the morning was a tough time to negotiate. He jogged toward the living room, hoping to hell Henry wasn’t already asleep.

He wasn’t. Looking, as always, impeccable in unwrinkled sweater and slacks, he had the television on in the kitchen, some war flick, a tidy sandwich in one hand and a beer stein in the other.

“All hell’s broken loose since you were gone,” Maguire said, and started the fill him in. Henry was due some R &R. Maguire had fires burning in Atlanta, Chicago, a sort-out with Jay in the middle, a stupid speech he’d somehow signed up for in D.C. Wednesday night. He was behind, of course, from having disappeared for the last two weeks.

“I need you home-”

“Which home, sir?”

“I’m going to base out of the Chicago condo for the next while. I need you to call, get things opened up, food, all that-”

“Yes, sir.”

“Would you mind contacting Billingham for me. He’ll be expecting a call, and I know I won’t get to it. Folder’s on the desk-”

“Yes, sir.”

“If he still has a question, contact me.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did we get a new security set up for the Elkon system?” Maguire poked around in the fridge, saw beer, milk, finally pushed aside debris, found some fresh OJ.

“No. You put that on hold until next month.”

“Well, let’s push it up again. It’s been on my mind. There’s too much to protect to let that slide. Scare up the bids again, would you?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Now, on Carolina. Let the weekend go, but check on her Monday.”

“No, sir.”

Maguire closed the fridge, turned around. “Beg your pardon?”

“I said no, sir. I’m not spying on Carolina.”

Maguire frowned. A headache had been playing slice-and-dice in his temples for three days. He was used to pressure. Used to having an impossibly heavy schedule. Used to finding discipline and endurance when there couldn’t be any left.

He just wasn’t used to pain having this fist-grip on his heart.

“I wasn’t asking you to spy on her, Henry. I was asking you to check in.”

Mild as milquetoast, Henry said again, “No.” And turned off the tube.

“You work for me, remember? I give the instructions. You say yes, and then follow through better than I would myself. That’s your job. And you’re great at it.”

“Yes, sir. Although you can outwork anyone I ever met.”

“Which is the point. I’m extremely busy. And it’s not as if I were asking you to do anything. I just need to know that Carolina’s all right.”

Henry stood up from the couch, dusted two crumbs from his trousers, took the sandwich plate to the kitchen and neatly slid it in the dishwasher. “I understand your concern, Mr. Cochran. That Carolina, she just isn’t of the me-me-me generation. I don’t doubt she can look after herself. I just think she could easily fall into her old ways.”

Maguire picked up that beat as if it had been on his mind. “Giving in to everybody. Riding herself ragged for everyone else. The calls will have restarted by now. Her family and friends and all will realize she’s back home. It’ll start up again. I think she’s stronger. I think she has good ideas on what to do. Stuff she can do. But I need to be sure.”

“Then call her yourself, sir.”

“I beg your pardon?”

Henry didn’t seem to hear. He aimed for the stairs, as if intending to crash for the night. “I keep remembering how she was when you first brought her here. Not hearing. Jumping at every shadow. I just think it’d be easy for her to get over her head again. I’m not all that positive you can teach a kitten to be tough.”

“Which is precisely why I want you to follow up and make sure she’s all right.”

“Well, I would, Mr. Cochran, because I’m not looking to get fired. I love my job. I can’t even imagine a job as good as this one. But she’s not my business, sir. She’s yours. If you don’t mind my saying, I almost didn’t recognize you when I walked in here. You obviously haven’t slept or showered or apparently eaten since I left. You look like hell, sir, and that’s putting it as politely as I can. I fully recognize that you’ve never appreciated advice-”