Waiting For You (2 page)

Chapter 1

Sacramento California, present day

“You have two minutes to come rescue me before I scream.”

What in the…
Nicholas Marshal tightened his grip on the cell phone, bringing it closer to his ear. He moved away from the window overlooking Capitol Street—one of the busiest thoroughfares—as the street was clogged with traffic, making it difficult for him to hear the caller. In the distance, thunder boomed as if trying to compete with the honks and roars of car engines from outside. The ominous weather soured his mood almost as much as the crazy woman on the phone.

He scowled. Who could possibly be calling him on the first day of his new law practice and say something like that? Perhaps it was a prank.

“I think you have the wrong number,” he snapped.

“Nick, I mean it. I need your help.
Now!”

It only took him a second before he recognized the voice. “Vanessa? Is that you?”

“Of course it is! Who else would be calling you in a panic this early in the morning?”

What she said was true, but he still wondered why
she
was up at eight o’clock in the morning to begin with. Thankfully, the call wasn’t a reporter from one of the tabloid magazines that’d been hounding him for the past six months. After refusing an interview for so long, he hoped they had given up on him.

“What are you up to now, Vanessa?”

Another grumble came from the other end. “Nick, I don’t think we have time for small talk right now. Although, I’m glad you recognized my voice, how did you know it was me?”

“Because I’ve only been back in town one week, and you’re the only woman I know with the canine senses to track me down so quickly.”

She released a horrific gasp. “Are you calling me a dog?”

He held back a laugh. Vanessa was anything but a dog; in fact, she’d always been a perfect 10…at least in the physical sense. However, her personality was a different matter. “No. It just means you can track me down no matter where I go.”

Nick grabbed the chilled bottle of water off his desk and took a long drink. He wasn’t kidding, either. He and Vanessa had dated over five years ago, but they remained friends, and she always knew where he was and what he was doing.

“So, Vanessa, what do you need?” He sat behind his desk and leaned his elbows on the oak top.

“I’m in the elevator down the hall from your office, and I’m stuck.”

He nearly choked on his water. “Stuck? How did you accomplish that?”

“Well, if you’ll stop yakking for a minute and come to the elevator, you’ll see.”

Chuckling, Nick set down the bottle of water, pushed away from his desk, and hurried out of his office. “All right, I’m coming.” He ended the call and slid his cell phone into the pocket of his suit jacket.

Finding out Vanessa was in town explained why things were already going wrong. This past week disaster after disaster happened in the old building, worrying him that he might not reach his goal in opening his doors the day he had advertised to be open for business. If it wasn’t the air conditioner breaking down, it was the water leak in the bathroom that threatened to ruin the new carpet inside his office.

Now another disaster was here…Vanessa Westland. Her arrival only meant mayhem. He didn’t expect clients to be lined up at the door on the first day he opened his doors to the public—not yet—but he definitely had a bad feeling about his ex-girlfriend scaring off any clients if they did happen to arrive, seeking his services.

As Nick strode down the hallway, his shoes clipped on the hardwood floor the building owner had newly-installed a month ago. Other offices along the way had not been rented yet, and the lack of people in the hallway made his footsteps echo.

When he neared the elevator, Vanessa’s grumbling alerted him of her presence. She stood between the opened doors, bracing each one with a hand, as she wiggled her spiked heel, which was caught on the doors’ tracks. Holding back a laugh, he shook his head.

She raised her gaze and looked at him.
“My hero.”
She batted her long, fake eyelashes at him and pouted her heavily glossed lips. The swimsuit model knew how to make men weak in the knees. Thankfully, Nick was immune to her charm now. It had been an adventure dating her, but it didn’t take him long to realize how selfish she was.

“I’m so glad you’re here. I can’t get my heel out of the wedge.”

He arched an eyebrow. “You can’t bend over and take it out?”

“Of course not.”
She rolled her eyes. “If I let go of the doors, they close on me and it hurts.” Proving her theory, she let her hands drop away from the doors and they started to close.

He reached out, stopping one.
“Point taken.
You can resume your position.”

Nodding, she braced her hands back on the doors.

“Do you know,” he knelt in front of her and reached for her ankle, “if you wouldn’t wear such spiky high heels all the time, this wouldn’t happen?”

She giggled. “Oh, Nicky, you know I only want to look good for you.”

He carefully loosened the heel from the doors’ tracks so her shoe wouldn’t break.

She smiled. “I think you enjoy rescuing damsels in distress.”

Silently, he agreed with her. Perhaps that was his biggest weakness. If he could only stay away from damsels in distress, his life would turn out better. It seemed lately that his life had taken on a catastrophic pattern, like one car wreck after another.

When he stood, Vanessa wrapped her arms around his neck and gave him a kiss on the lips. Nick pulled away, knowing all too well what she
really
wanted. The last thing he needed was his ex-girlfriend plaguing him while he rebuilt his reputation and finished scraping the tattered pieces of his life back together. Especially now, establishing himself as a top-notch lawyer took priority over everything. Allowing Vanessa into his life again would no doubt put a swift and painful death to his career.

Flashbacks of his previous humiliation plastered across the front page of the tabloids passed through his mind.
Scandal rocks Hollywood. Renowned Hollywood attorney, Nicholas Marshal, fired from the case of the century because of his illicit affair with client.
Never again would he go down that road.

“You really are a hero, Nicky,” she purred; the sound seductive.

Nick withdrew and shook his head. “I didn’t do that much,
Nessa
. Any man would have helped you.”

“Do you see any other man around?” Vanessa laughed and hooked her arm around his elbow. “So, are you going to show me your new office, now?”

“Sure.” He led the way, back down one hall before turning down another.

In the back of his mind he wondered how she’d found him. Confusion filled his head, threatening to suffocate him if he didn’t discover answers soon. “So, how did you know I was here? And how did you know my new phone number? It’s a private number.”

She stroked his arm as she continued to hang on him. “You forget, darling Nicky, my father owns Capitol One Associates, this very building where you chose to set up your office…and he owns pretty much the whole block along with it.”

Nick suppressed a grimace. How could he have forgotten such a vital piece of information? “You’re right.”

Back when Nick was dating Vanessa, her father had approved of them as a couple. Nick was relieved to know the businessman held no harsh feelings for him now that he and Vanessa weren’t dating. Of course, Nick now wondered if the only reason he obtained an office here in this building was because of Vanessa.

“Oh, Nicky.
I have a crazy idea.” She clutched his arm tighter. “Why don’t you hang up the “CLOSED” sign, and we can hit the town and spend time together, just like we used to do.”

Releasing his breath slowly, Nick tried to calm the irritation slowly rising inside of him. “Vanessa, it’s my first day on the job. I can’t close up.”

“I don’t see any customers yet.”

“Not yet, but they’ll come. I’ve been advertising this for a few weeks. It would be very irresponsible of me to close the doors on the very day I’m open.”

She turned the full force of her practiced pout on him. “What’s happened to you, Nicky? You used to be so spontaneous and fun.”

“Life’s cruel lessons have changed me.”

She leaned her head on his arm. “Yeah, I read about what happened when you represented Leslie Blake, the Hollywood producer’s wife, in their divorce.” She shook her head. “I don’t think there was a single person in the United States that hasn’t heard about that scandal.”

Nick shrugged off her arm and stuffed his hands into his pockets.
Thanks for reminding me.
Vanessa certainly knew how to rub vinegar in his open wound. “Don’t believe everything you read in the tabloids.”

“How can I not?
Especially when I know you, Nicky.
I just can’t believe you got caught with Leslie Blake.”

His irritation grew by leaps and he clenched his jaw to keep from saying anything he might regret later.

“Oh, look…here’s your office.” She touched the frosted glass and ran her fingers across his name printed in bold black letters on the door’s window. She glanced over her shoulder at him, grinning. “I’m so proud of you for starting your own firm. A lot of men would have crumbled if they went through what you had.”

A slight ache pounded behind his eyes. How he hated stress…and her words were not comforting in the least. “Then I must be a lot stronger than they are.”

She turned the doorknob and walked ahead of him into his office. He followed behind, and the moment he stepped in, she spun and grasped the lapels of his suit coat and shoved him against the wall, pressing herself next to him. Using her black stilettos, she kicked the door closed. She wrapped her fingers around his tie and gazed into her eyes, seductively. “Nicky, do you know how much I’ve missed you?”

She leaned up to plant a kiss on his lips, but he refused to accept it. “Stop it, Vanessa. I’ve got to get to work.”

A deep frown marred her face.
“Dinner tonight, then?”

“Can’t.
I’m busy.”

“No, you’re not.” She scowled. “You’re trying to avoid me.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Do I need to remind you that my father owns this building?”

He tilted his head as he narrowed his gaze on her. “Vanessa,
dear
, that almost sounds like a threat, and I don’t surrender to them.”

“I’m not threatening you. But whether you know this or not, I was the one who made it possible for you to get an office in my father’s building.”

“What are you talking about?” His hopes sunk. He didn’t need to hear what she had to say. He already knew why.

“My father was going to refuse your lease application because of your public fall from grace. He wasn’t sure he wanted someone with a scandalous reputation renting from him, but I convinced him to give you a second chance.”

Nick bunched his hands into fists and tried to hold in his frustration. Why couldn’t people forget the past? Now he felt obligated to take Vanessa out on a date. He probably owed her dinner, but nothing more. “Okay, we’ll go out, but not tonight. How about tomorrow night? I’ll pick you up at seven o’clock.”

She lifted on tiptoes to kiss him again, but he turned his face so her lips grazed his cheek. She pulled back and glared.

“I hope you’re in a better mood tomorrow night,” she snapped before walking out the door and slamming it behind her. The sound of her high heels pounding on the hardwood floor of the hall echoed loudly.

Nick exhaled a relieved sigh, then closed his eyes and rubbed his forehead. Leave it to Vanessa to make the dead aware of her departure. Thankfully, he didn’t have close neighbors in the building.

“Excuse me if I’m intruding.”

Another feminine voice broke his concentration, and he swung around. A woman rose from the brown leather chair in front of his desk. Confused, Nick glanced from the woman to the closed office door and back again.
When did she get here?
His face heated from embarrassment. She must have been in the office waiting for him when he’d arrived with Vanessa. But why hadn’t he noticed her until now?

Not believing his eyes, he blinked and ran his gaze over the strange woman again. She definitely didn’t look like a model from a style magazine, like Vanessa did. Instead this woman looked as if she had stepped off the set of a motion picture from the early 1900s—or a historic magazine.

His visitor smoothed a hand down the side of her ankle-length dark brown skirt decorated with entirely too much lace. Her silk blouse was the darkest purple he’d ever seen, and the color brought out her amazing cobalt eyes. Her clothes contoured her body nicely yet were modest, especially in this day and age. Her dark brunette hair was swept up beneath a flat purple hat decorated with an outlandish matching bow-shaped flower in front. White-laced gloves encased her slender hands, adding to the olden-day glamor style. Even her proper posture spoke of an old-time society dame. Yet her smooth, youthful face told him she wasn’t old at all—probably somewhere in her mid-twenties.
And her eyes…
He’d never seen such intriguing blue eyes before.