Susan Mallery Page 0,3
recently sold her house and has moved in with me until the wedding,” he said, his voice carefully neutral. “Should you take the job, she would like you to stay here, as well, for the time you’re working together.” He glanced at her. “Just to be clear, my mother sometimes keeps odd hours.”
“Many clients do,” she assured him, thinking of the business executive who had wanted to work on his Chinese etiquette between four and six in the morning.
“She’s not—” he began, then pressed his lips together. “My mother is—” He shook his head. “You’ll have to see for yourself.”
He started across the lawn toward the garden. Margot followed him along the stone path that was just as worn as the open hallway had been. They passed between two flowering trees onto a huge patio created with paving stones. Stone benches lined the perimeter while hundreds of pots of various sizes overflowed with exotic flowering plants.
The scent was divine—sweet without being cloying. If she had to pick a single word, she would have chosen alive as the fragrance. She found herself longing to sit on one of the stone benches and turn her face to the sun. Farther on, she spotted a table and chairs and desperately wished for a slow-paced dinner at sunset.
“This is the most incredible garden I’ve ever seen,” she admitted, unable to hold in the comment. “It’s magnificent.”
“I can’t take credit.” He gave her a slight smile. “But it is very nice.”
Nice? Iced tea was nice. This was stupendous!
She reminded herself that she was here for an interview and reluctantly let go of her garden lust. As they moved toward the table and chairs, Margot saw a woman seated in a small, hidden alcove, reading a magazine. The woman glanced up when she noticed them and waved a greeting.
Margot rarely worked with celebrities. Her area of expertise was the corporate arena. If you had a quick trip down to Argentina, for example, she was the one who could give you a crash course on things like greetings—while the first greeting with a client or customer involved a handshake, in subsequent meetings, the greeting was likely to be a kiss on the cheek, even if the business meeting was between two men. She could advise that good posture was important and that dinner rarely started before nine. She found comfort in rules and knowing the right thing to do in any situation.
Each employee in her company had a profile that was made available to prospective clients. Coming to an understanding of who worked best with whom was a mutual decision. Movie stars and those in the music business rarely picked Margot and she was fine with that. She’d been on a couple of jobs with directors looking to be more successful in obtaining financing in China, but that was different. Which probably explained why she was unprepared to meet Bianca Wray in person.
Oh, she’d seen pictures of the actress and had watched three of her movies the previous weekend. She was familiar with the sound of her voice and the way she moved, but none of that had equipped her for the reality of seeing her up close.
Bianca was far more delicate in person. Slim, but also small boned. There was a glow to her bare skin, a grace to her movements. Her deep blue eyes were wide and her light brown hair was wavy, and just past her shoulders.
Taken individually, the features were nice enough but unremarkable. Yet there was something about the way they were put together. Something...breathtaking. Margot supposed that was the difference between the chosen and the ordinary. An undefinable quality that couldn’t be manufactured, only recognized and worshipped.
Her great-grandmother had talked about star power. She couldn’t say what it was, but she’d been able to recognize it when she saw it. Bianca had star power. When she smiled, Margot instantly felt like the most special person on earth. Even as she reacted viscerally, the intellectual side of her brain cataloged how Bianca stood, smiled and moved toward them. She was looking for clues to the problem, along with any information that would help her do her job to the best of her ability.
“Have you thought about what I said, Alec?” Bianca asked as she approached. She wore jeans and a loose T-shirt. Nothing out of the ordinary, yet both suited her perfectly. Her feet were bare, her toes painted with little American flags. “I’m sure they would enjoy it.”
Alec exhaled. “My mother