Infatuation. Alison Kent

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СКАЧАТЬ the night every time he drafted them into hooking up.

      That was exactly what she didn’t want happening. “You know what? Don’t worry about it. I’ll check with Amy, and if she doesn’t have any ideas, I’ll call one of the guys in my book. An emergency is an emergency, right?”

      “Wait a minute.” Natalie pushed away from the countertop. “Correct me if I’m wrong, girlfriend, but aren’t we overlooking the obvious here? The stash of names and numbers in that boot in the lounge?”

      “Yes, but after last night?” Milla shuddered just thinking about a repeat of that particularly bad experience. “Besides, the tradition is that we get together as a group during Monday’s lunch if we’re going to dip into the kitty.”

      “Sure, when you’re not strapped for time,” Natalie said, arms crossed, hip cocked, brow lifted in that listen-up look she delivered so well. “I may not belong to your club, but I can’t see anyone objecting to you making a Thursday booty call seeing as how you’re in this bind. Right now, you need to worry about Joan and the advertisers. You get through this Friday, Amy and I will put our heads together and figure out your future.”

      “I wish you would. I’m obviously having no luck getting anywhere with men on my own.” Milla chuckled to herself. “At least not anywhere beyond the best restaurants and clubs in the city.”

      “Oh, blah, blah, blah, cry me a river already,” Natalie said, taking hold of Milla’s upper arm and herding her toward the restroom’s lounge and the glass boot full of business cards and untapped possibilities. “Pick yourself a good one and hope he’s free tomorrow night so those of us with work to do can get back to it.”

      Milla stuck out her tongue as she settled on the sofa and set her purse on the table next to the vase. She pulled her cell phone from the pouch inside, deciding it would be a waste of time not to call from here, and then she picked a card.

      “What does it say?” Natalie asked as Milla silently scanned the note scribbled on the back.

      “‘Great eyes? Check. Incredible smile? Check. Body to make a girl melt inside? Check, check, check. Potential for high-yield capital gains? No, but he’s hell on wheels in bed. And really, isn’t that all that matters?’”

      “See?” Natalie said. “There you go. Who better than a hot body to scope out a hot spot?”

      That part Milla couldn’t argue with. And since she’d pretty much given up expecting dating to be meaningful or more than the occasional good time, a guy’s potential for high-yield capital gains had dropped off her radar.

      It was, however, when she turned over the card and read the name embossed on the front that truth became stranger than fiction. The white rectangle fluttered to the carpet. Natalie bent and picked it up while Milla stared at her fingers that had grown useless and cold.

      “‘Bergen Motors,’” Natalie read. “‘Serving the Bay Area for FortyYears. Rennie Bergen, Sales.’” She tapped her finger along the edge of the card, then stopped as suddenly as she’d started. “You don’t think—”

      “No. I don’t think. I know.” Rennie Bergen had been her boyfriend Derek’s college roommate during his freshman year, and as much a part of Milla’s life during that one and the three that had followed as had been research papers and labs.

      He’d also been her indiscretion. Her one and only.

      Over and over and over again.

      “Didn’t you say he disappeared after graduation?”

      So much had happened after graduation, she didn’t even know where to begin. “He left the city, yeah. He said he wouldn’t be back until he’d made his first million.”

      “Unless he’s selling Lamborghinis, it doesn’t look like he met his goal.” Natalie started to drop the card back into the glass boot.

      Milla snatched it away. Her girlfriend had no way of knowing the full extent of what had gone on with Rennie Bergen. No one knew. Things left unsettled when he vanished without a word. Things for which Milla had never forgiven herself. Things over which she still carried guilt.

      Not that she wore those feelings on her sleeve, or brought them out like voodoo dolls to stick with pins. They were just there, the same way as were the feelings from her past for any of her friends. Only not the same.

      Because more than anyone else in her life, she had hurt Rennie Bergen, and she’d never had a chance to make amends.

      Well, now she did, and she had to seize the opportunity that had been dropped into her lap. If she continued to leave the past unsettled, she would never forgive herself. She could only hope that after all this time Rennie would be able to forgive her.

      “Don’t tell me you’re going to call him,” Natalie said as Milla got to her feet.

      She picked up her purse, tucked her phone down inside, dug for her car keys and sunglasses—and she did it all without giving herself time to examine the emotions that were driving her. She was afraid if she looked at them too closely, she’d stop.

      “No. I’m going to see him. Tell Joan I’ll be back when I’m back,” she said, leaving the restroom, heading for the elevator, and praying she wasn’t making the second biggest mistake of her life.

      

      “YO, REN. JIN’S ON THE phone. He says the frame’s got a nickel-sized rust hole on the cross panel support. He wants to know if he should haggle the Captain on the price since it ain’t so pristine as he said.”

      Son of a barking dog. Rennie Bergen planted the rubber of his heels on the garage’s slick concrete floor and rolled the creeper out from beneath the panel van that had once been an ice cream truck. The water pump was pissing like a baby kangaroo. Story of his life.

      He got to his feet and looked for Hector who was halfway across the hangar-size building and heading Rennie’s way with the phone. If he didn’t find a workable frame and soon…aw, hell, who was he kidding?

      It wasn’t the frame that was the problem. It was the entire concept. Turning a VW bus into a submersible had seemed like such a good idea when he’d been six beers under the table and scrambling for new show ideas.

      He grabbed the phone from Hector’s hand and yelled at Jin. “You tell the Captain thanks, but no thanks. And if he keeps hitting me with this crap, he can forget seeing another dime of my business, I don’t care how long he’s known my father.”

      His voice still echoing, Rennie disconnected before Jin could respond, tossed the phone back to Hector, and headed for the huge stainless-steel sink on the wall outside the office and the john. From the exterior, the garage looked like nothing, a big metal building like any other warehouse or shop. Except it wasn’t.

      The garage was home to the cable TV phenomenon “Hell on Wheels.” The show had made Rennie Bergen a star with a cult following few car buffs could claim. That was because few, if any, managed what he and his crew accomplished, turning passenger vehicles into mechanical wonders such as low-rider school buses and rolling techno clubs.

      The best part of his success was that he wasn’t a household name. He could still walk down an average city street and never turn a head. He stood a better chance of being recognized in blue-collar neighborhoods СКАЧАТЬ