She wished them both a good trip to Venice, Portofino, and Paris, and a few minutes later Marie-Louise and Jeff drove off in an ancient Peugeot that Marie-Louise said she had brought from France. She said as they got into it that she didn't trust American cars. “Or anything else!” Jeff added, and they all laughed.

“She's a piece of work, isn't she?” Sarah commented to Marjorie, as they walked back to their cars.

“She's hard to work with, but she's good at what she does. She has great taste and a lot of style. She treats him like dirt, and he seems to love it. That's always the way, isn't it? The bitches always get the great guys.” Sarah laughed at the comment. She hated to admit it, but it seemed to be true a lot of the time. “He's a hunk, isn't he?” Marjorie said admiringly, and Sarah smiled.

“I don't know if I'd call him that.” Phil was a hunk, in her eyes. Jeff wasn't. But he seemed like a nice man. “But he's a very nice guy, and he seems to know his stuff.” He obviously had a passion for old houses, and loved his work.

“They both do. They complement each other. Sweet and sour. It seems to work. At home and in the office. Although I think they've had their ups and downs. Every now and then she gets fed up, and goes back to France. She left him for a year once, while he was working on a big project I referred to him. But she always comes back, and he takes her back when she does. I guess he's crazy about her, and she knows she's got a good thing. He's solid as a rock. It's too bad they never got married. He'd be great with kids, though she doesn't look like the motherly type to me.”

“Maybe they will someday,” Sarah said, thinking of Phil. Their weekend was due to begin in a few hours. This part of the week was her reward for all the hard work she did at her law firm.

“Who knows what makes people's relationships work,” Marjorie said philosophically, and then wished Sarah luck with Stanley's heirs on Monday.

“I'll let you know what they decide, after the meeting.” They were obviously going to sell the house—the only question was in what condition, restored or not, and to what extent. Sarah would have loved to oversee the project, but she knew there was almost no chance of that. They weren't likely to want to spend a million dollars to restore Stanley's house, or even half that, and then wait six months or a year to sell it. She was sure that on Monday she'd be telling Marjorie to put it on the market as is.

Sarah said good-bye to her, and drove home, to get ready for Phil. She changed her sheets and made the bed, and then collapsed onto the couch with a stack of work she had brought home from the office. It was seven o'clock when her phone rang. It was Phil, calling from the gym. He sounded awful.

“Is something wrong?” she asked. He sounded sick.

“Yeah. We settled the case today. I can't tell you how pissed off I am. We got buried by opposing counsel. My fucking client got caught with his pants down a few times too often. There was no other choice.”

“I'm sorry, sweetheart.” She knew how he hated to give up. It must have been a really rotten case for him to do that. Usually, he battled to the bitter end. “What time are you coming over?” She was looking forward to seeing him. It had been an interesting week for her, particularly dealing with Stanley's house. She still hadn't had time to tell him much about it. He'd been too absorbed in his depositions. They had hardly spoken to each other all week. And whenever they did, he was too busy to talk.

“I'm not coming over tonight,” he said bluntly, and Sarah was shocked. He very rarely canceled a weekend night completely, except if he was sick.

“You're not?” She had been excited about seeing him, as she always was.

“I'm not. I'm in a shit mood, and I don't want to see anyone. I'll feel better tomorrow.” She was instantly disappointed when he said it, and wished he'd make the effort to come over anyway. It might cheer him up.

“Why don't you just come here after the gym and chill out? We can order takeout, and I'll give you a massage.” She sounded hopeful, and tried to be convincing.

“No, thanks. I'll call you tomorrow. I'm going to stay here for a few hours. I may play some squash, and get my aggression out. I'd be lousy company tonight.”

He sounded like it, but she was upset not to see him anyway. She had seen him in black moods before, and he wasn't fun to be around. But it would have been nicer having him there, even in a rotten mood, than not seeing him at all. Relationships weren't just about seeing each other on good days. She expected to share bad days with him, too. But he was adamant about staying at his own place that night. She tried to talk him into it, but he cut her off. “Just forget it, Sarah. I'll call you in the morning. Have a good night.” He had hardly ever done that in four years. But when Phil was upset, the whole world stopped, and he wanted to get off.

There was nothing she could do about it. She sat on the couch for a long time, staring into space. She thought of the architect she'd met that day, and his difficult French partner. She remembered Marjorie saying that Marie-Louise had left Jeff several times and gone back to Paris, but she always came back. So did Phil. She knew she'd see him in the morning, or sometime on Saturday, whenever he felt up to calling her. But it was small consolation on a lonely Friday night. He didn't even call her when he got home. She stayed up till midnight, working, hoping she'd hear from him. She didn't. Whenever Phil was upset about something, there was no room for anyone else in his life. The world revolved around Phil. At least he thought it did. And for the moment, he was right.





Chapter 7


Sarah didn't hear from Phil until four o'clock on Saturday. He called her on her cell phone while she did errands, and said he was still in a bad mood, but prom ised to take her out to dinner to make up for it. He showed up at six in a sports coat and sweater, and had made reservations at a new restaurant she'd been hearing about for weeks. It turned out to be a really lovely evening, and made up for the time together they'd missed. He even stayed later than usual on Sunday, and it was early evening when he finally left her house. He always made it up to her when he let her down in some way, which made it hard to stay angry at him. It was why she had never walked away, so far. He reeled her in, and out.

She had told him about her visit to Stanley's house, over dinner at the new restaurant, but it was obvious he wasn't interested in it. He said it sounded like an old dump to him. He couldn't imagine anyone wanting to do all that work. He changed the subject before she could tell him about the meeting with the architects. It just wasn't his thing. He was more interested in talking about a new case he was handling. It was another sexual harassment case, but this one was a lot cleaner than the one he'd had to settle that week. It was actually fascinating legally, and Sarah discussed it with him at great length on Sunday afternoon. They watched a video at her apartment, and made love before he left. The weekend had been short but sweet. Phil had an incredible knack for salvaging things, calming her down, and keeping her in it, just as he had for four years. It was an art.

She was in good spirits when she went to work on Monday, and excited about meeting Stanley's heirs. Five had been unable to leave their jobs and lives in other cities. Twelve were coming, and the two cousins in New York were too old and ill. She had asked her secretary to set up the conference room for them, with coffee and Danish pastries. She knew that what was coming to them was going to be a big surprise for them. A few of them were already waiting in the hallway when she reached her office. She set down her briefcase and went out to meet them. The first one she saw was the bank president from St. Louis. He was a distinguished-looking man in his early sixties. He had already told her he was widowed, and had four grown children, and she had gathered in the conversation that one of them had special needs. Perhaps, although he had money, the bequest from Stanley would be of some use to him.

It was nearly ten o'clock when the last of the heirs finally drifted in. There were eight men and four women. Several of them knew each other, far better than they knew Stanley, who had only been a name to some of them. Others had never even heard of him and knew nothing of his existence. Two of the women and three of the men were siblings. They lived all over the country, from Florida to New York to Chicago to St. Louis to Texas. The man from Texas was wearing a cowboy hat and boots that looked well broken in. He was the foreman of a ranch he had worked on for thirty years, lived in a trailer, and had six kids. His wife had died the previous spring. The cousins were enjoying talking to each other, as Sarah made her way through the group. She was going to offer to show them Stanley's house that afternoon. If nothing else, she thought they should see it before they decided what to do with it, or how they wanted to dispose of it. She had explored the options for them, and had them carefully outlined on a single sheet, with the appraisal from Marjorie, which was more of a guesstimate, since nothing even remotely comparable to it had been sold for years, or existed anymore, and the condition it was in affected the price they could ask for it. There was no accurate way to assess what it would bring. Sarah wanted to attend to the reading of the will first.

The bank president from St. Louis, Tom Harrison, sat next to her at the conference table. She almost felt as though he should be calling the meeting to order. He was wearing a dark blue suit, white shirt, conservative navy tie, and had impeccably cut white hair. And as Sarah looked at him, she couldn't help thinking of her mother. He was the perfect age, and a cut above anyone her mother had gone out with in years. They would make a handsome couple, Sarah thought with a smile, as she looked around the table at the heirs. All four women were seated next to each other to her right, Tom Harrison was on her left, and the rest of them fanned around the table. The cowboy, Jake Waterman, had taken the foot of the table. He was having a feast on the Danish, and was on his third cup of coffee.