Linda Lael - Mixed Messages

Allison returned Carly’s smile, pleased. “Someone will bring you this week’s batch of mail. You’ll find all the experts you need listed in the Rolodex. Oh, and between letters you might help out with clerical work and such. Welcome aboard.” With that, she stepped out, closing the office door behind her.

Carly set the box down on her desk with a clunk and sank into her chair. “Clerical work?” she echoed, tossing a glance at the computer system perched at her elbow. “Good grief. Did I come all the way to Oregon just to be a glorified secretary?”

As if in answer, the telephone on her desk buzzed.

“Carly Barnett,” she said into the receiver, after pushing four different buttons in order to get the right line.

“Just seeing if it works,” replied a bright female voice. “I’m Emmeline Rogers, and I’m sort of your secretary.”

Carly felt a little better, until she remembered that she was probably going to spend as much time doing office work as writing. Maybe more. “Hi,” she said shyly.

“Want some coffee or something?”

Carly definitely felt better. “Thanks. That would be great.”

Moments later, Emmeline appeared with coffee. She was small, with plain brown hair, green eyes and a ready smile. “I brought pink sugar, in case you wanted it.”

Carly thanked the woman again and stirred half a packet of sweetener into the hot, strong coffee. “There are supposed to be some letters floating around here somewhere. Do you know where they are?”

Emmeline nodded and then glanced at her watch. Maybe she was one of those people who took an early lunch, Carly thought. “I’ll bring them in.”

“Great,” Carly answered. “Thanks.”

Emmeline slipped out and returned five minutes later with a mailbag the size of Santa’s sack. In fact, Carly was reminded of the courtroom scene in Miracle On 34th Street when the secretary spilled letters all over her desk.

By the time Emmeline had emptied the bag, Carly couldn’t even see over the pile. She would have to unearth her computer and telephone before she could start working.

“I couldn’t think of a way to break it to you gently,” Emmeline said.

Carly took a steadying sip of her coffee and muttered, “Allison said I’d be helping out with clerical work during slack times.”

Emmeline smiled. “Allison thinks she has a sense of humor. The rest of us know better.”

Carly chuckled and shoved the fingers of her left hand through her hair. Until two weeks ago, when she’d made the final decision to break off with Reggie and come to Oregon, she’d worn it long. The new cut, reaching just a couple of inches below her earlobes, had been a statement of sorts; she was starting over fresh.

Emmeline left her with a little shrug and a sympathetic smile. “Buzz me if you need anything.”

Carly was beginning to sort the letters into stacks. “If there’s another avalanche,” she responded, “send in a search party.”

Her telephone and computer had both reappeared by the time a brisk knock sounded at her office door. Mark poked his head around it before she had time to call out a “Come in” or even wonder why Emmeline hadn’t buzzed to announce a visitor.

“Hi,” he said, assessing the mountain of letters with barely concealed amusement. He was probably off to interview the governor or some astronaut.

Carly gave him a dour look. “Hi,” she responded.

He stepped into the tiny office and closed the door. “Your secretary’s on a break,” he said. He was wearing jeans, a plaid flannel shirt and a tan corduroy jacket.

“What I need is a moat stocked with crocodiles,” Carly retorted with a saucy smile. She wasn’t sure how she felt about this man—he produced an odd tangle of reactions that weren’t easy to unravel and define. The impact of his presence was almost overwhelming—he seemed to fill the room, leaving no space for her—and Carly was both intrigued and frightened.

She was at once attracted to him, and defensive about her lack of experience as a journalist.

Mark drew up the only extra chair, turned it around backward and sat astraddle of it, resting his arms across the back. “What are they going to call this column now? ‘Dear Miss Congeniality’?”

“I wasn’t Miss Congeniality,” Carly pointed out, arching her eyebrows and deliberately widening her eyes.

“Little wonder,” he replied philosophically.

Carly leaned forward in her chair and did her best to glower. “Was there something you wanted?”

“Yes. I’d like you to go to dinner with me tonight.”

Carly was putting rubber bands around batches of letters and stacking them on her credenza. A little thrill pirouetted up her spine and then did a triple flip to the pit of her stomach. Even though every instinct she possessed demanded that she refuse, she found herself nodding. “I’d enjoy that.”

“We could take in a movie afterward, if you want.”

Carly looked at the abundance of letters awaiting her attention. “That would be stretching it. Maybe some other time.”

Idly Mark picked up one of the letters and opened it. His handsome brow furrowed as he read. “This one’s from a teenage girl,” he said, extending the missive to Carly. “What are you going to tell her?”

Carly took the page of lined notebook paper and scanned it. The young lady who’d written it was still in high school, and she was being pressured by the boy she dated to “go all the way.” She wanted to know how she could refuse without losing her boyfriend.

“I think she should stand her ground,” Carly said. “If the boy really cares about her, he’ll understand why she wants to wait.”

Mark nodded thoughtfully. “Of course, nobody expects you to reply to every letter,” he mused.

Carly sensed disapproval in his tone, though it was well masked. “What’s wrong with my answer?” she demanded.

“It’s a little simplistic, that’s all.” His guileless brown eyes revealed no recriminations.

Without understanding why, Carly was on the defensive. “I suppose you could come up with something better?”

He sighed. “No, just more extensive. I would tell her to talk to a counselor at school, or a clergyman, or maybe a doctor. Things are complex as hell out there, Carly. Kids have a lot more to worry about than making cheerleader or getting on the football team.”

Carly sat back in her hair and folded her arms. “Could it be, Mr. Holbrook,” she began evenly, “that you think I’m shallow just because I was Miss United States?”

He grinned. “Would I have asked you out to dinner if I thought you were shallow?”

“Probably.”

Mark shrugged and spread his hands. “I’m sure you mean well,” he conceded generously. “You’re just inexperienced, that’s all.”

She took up a packet of envelopes and switched on her computer. The printer beside it hummed efficiently at the flip of another switch. “I won’t ever have any experience,” she responded, “if you hang around my office for the rest of your life, picking my qualifications apart.”

He stood up. “I assume you have a degree in psychology?”

“You know better.”

Mark was at the door now, his hand on the knob. “True. I looked you up in the Reader’s Digest book of Beauty Queens. You majored in—”

“Journalism,” Carly interrupted.

Although his expression was chagrined, his eyes twinkled as he offered her a quick salute. “See you at dinner,” he said, and then he was gone.

Thoroughly unsettled, Carly turned her attention back to the letters she was expected to deal with.

Resolutely she opened an envelope, took out the folded page and began to read.

By lunchtime, Carly’s head was spinning. She was certainly no Pollyanna, but she’d never dreamed there were so many people out there leading lives of quiet desperation.