I move his hands off me, feeling slightly embarrassed. I’ve never been jealous over a man before, but I do tend to be with him. Wherever we go, he’s like a magnet for female attention. He’s never been disrespectful to me or encouraged it, but it gets annoying, really annoying.
“She isn’t here to see me. She’s here to see you,” he retorts, stepping toward me again, and I arch my brow in surprise.
“Me?”
“Yes, you, and if it has anything to do with shopping, I figured I’ll save time by having her come back later,” he teases.
I don’t shop that much to have personal shoppers tracking me down. I try to think who would come here to see me.
“Go finish getting ready, and you can meet me downstairs,” he says, and a moment later, he’s out the door.
I head back to my dressing room, adjust my dress, and run my hand through my hair. I grab my flat iron, but there’s a nagging feeling in the pit of my stomach—the kind you get when you feel like you’ve left something behind. I set my flat iron back down and grab my purse and jacket. I rush down the stairs, almost breaking my ankle in these pumps, and head out the door. I push the elevator button multiple times, and it seems like an eternity before it opens.
I push the main floor button and wait for the doors to close. As it starts its mile-long drop, I take a deep breath. I don’t know why I’m nervous, but something isn’t sitting right with me. When the doors open, I try to exit quickly without running. I walk past the desk when Lamar, one of the concierges, greets me. I want to be rude and wave and walk past, but I always stop to say hello. In the distance, I see Cal speaking to a woman. Her back is to me, showcasing a mane of long red hair hanging down her back. She seems to be shifting from side to side.
“Lauren, your dress is fab,” Lamar says quietly so the other tenants don’t hear him.
“Thank you. Lamar, did you call upstairs for me?” My attention is on Cal and the woman.
“Yes. Mr. Scott answered and said he’d be down instead,” he replies, his attention turning to my shoes.
“Did she say who she was?” I ask, a little impatient that his attention is on my outfit instead of the matter at hand.
“She said she was reluctant to do so,” he says, arching a brow.
Mine matches it in understanding. I reach into my purse and hope that I have some money in it. I’m happy to find a twenty-dollar bill already folded, so I bite my lip and rest the money on the counter, covering it with my hand.
“Anything else?” I ask, looking Lamar square in the eye.
He looks around before taking it and leaning closer across the desk. “She seemed to be a bit on edge when Mr. Scott appeared instead of you, and they went outside. She didn’t look too pleased to see him though.”
“What did she look like?” I ask mechanically, unable to keep the words from escaping.
Lamar’s eyes light up as if I asked a question that made his day. “Well, she doesn’t seem like she’s from around here,” he says with a frown.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, you know how everyone dresses around here? She didn’t look homeless or anything, but she seemed out of place. More like she got lost on her way to the suburbs and wandered in.” He chuckles.
“How old do you think she is?” I ask curiously.
“She was an older woman. Maybe early fifties.” Then he pauses. “But there was something about her that seemed familiar, like I’ve seen been her before, but maybe not.” He shakes his head, dismissing the thought, and returns his attention to the computer as the manager approaches the desk.
“Is everything okay, Ms. Brooks?” Ms. Riley asks me with a wide smile.
“Yes, everything is fine,” I say before leaving the desk and hurrying toward the door.
By the time I reach it and step out, the redheaded woman is walking down the street and Cal is walking back toward me.
“What was that about? Who was she?” I ask Cal, buttoning my jacket.
“Nothing,” he says, opening the door for me to go back inside.
I hesitate a moment, and the woman turns back and looks toward us. She’s far in the distance, but her expression is sullen.
“Are you coming?” Cal asks impatiently.
In the second I look at him and back at the mysterious redheaded woman, she’s disappears into the sea of people.
“Nothing?” I say pointedly.
“I took care of it. She didn’t want anything important.” He sits on one of the plush chocolate-brown chairs in the lobby. I assume he’s waiting for our car to be brought around.
“Well, what happened? What did she want with me?” I ask, sitting beside him.
“She really wasn’t making any sense. She seemed hopped up on something. I told her to leave.” He sighs, pulling out his cell phone.
“Well, maybe you should have let me talk to her,” I say, nudging him so he can give me his full attention.
“I didn’t want some crazy woman to upset you about nonsense before our dinner tonight,” he says simply.
“Why would she upset me? How did she know me and that I’d be here? I don’t understand.”
“Look, she wasn’t making any sense. She probably pulled your name off an article about some event we’ve been to with Dexter. You have to be careful about just anyone trying to see you. When you’re associated with the Crestfields, people see dollar signs and will sell you any sob story thinking you can write them a check. Most people have some type of agenda, and I’m sure she did, but she won’t be back. You can’t just trust anybody now, okay?” he says, grasping my hand at the last part of his speech.
I nod and try to accept that explanation. It makes sense, but that nagging feeling doesn’t go away, and the woman’s face doesn’t disappear from my thoughts easily.
June 7th 2011
June 7th, 2011
I walk into the office, and the first thing I see is a woman trying to hold her baby and read a magazine at the same time. She smiles at me, and I try my best to return it before approaching the receptionist’s desk.
“Hello. Welcome to Dr. Green’s office. How can I help you?” she says with a wide smile.
“I need a pregnancy exam.”
The young woman seems caught off guard by my candor and takes a few seconds to recover. She smiles. “We can do that. I’ll need your name and for you to fill out this form, then I can schedule you an appointment,” she says, handing me a packet of papers.
“No, you don’t understand. I need one now,” I tell her quickly.
Her eyebrow rises. “I’m sorry, but you’ll have to make an appointment.”
“This—this is an emergency,” I tell her quickly.
“An emergency?”
I’m not going to be able to maintain my composure. I plaster on a big smile and lean closer to her. “My husband walked out on me last week, and I have no fucking idea where he is. I took a pregnancy test this morning, and you guessed it! Positive! So I need a doctor in there to tell me that the test was wrong and that I don’t have another thing to add to my list of things to worry about. I don’t have any cash with me, but I have these credit cards and a checkbook. I’ll pay anything.” I take out my wallet and put it on the desk.