Best Laid Plans. Brenda Jackson

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СКАЧАТЬ the huge bouquet. He would never hear the last of it. Especially, if they got wind of the story behind them. He pushed the intercom button.

      “Yes, Mr. Madaris?”

      “Marlene, please step into my office and bring the rolling cart with you.”

      “Yes, sir.”

      Moments later his administrative assistant opened his office door and rolled the metal cart in as he’d instructed. “Take these flowers and have them delivered to one of the hospitals in the area.” He refused to give them to Mama Laverne like Miss Chapman had suggested. His great-grandmother deserved a harsh scolding and not any flowers.

      “All right.”

      After Marlene left his office, Nolan Googled Ivy Chapman. The photo on her website looked just as conservative as the real thing. Her hair was in that bun thing again and those same earrings were in her ears.

      She owned a cybersecurity business, Cyber-Tech Securities. And it was described as “a unique technology company, specializing in moving the twenty-first century into the twenty-second.” She stated her occupation as a cybersecurity analyst. In other words, she was a legal hacker.

      He had to admit she and her business were impressive. Cyber-Tech Securities was linked with some of the best in the business, including Intel and Texas Instruments. But what he’d found most impressive was that she’d begun her career with the government, working for the Department of Homeland Security.

      He noted a wealth of community work and charity affiliations. She’d even established a college scholarship foundation named after her grandfather who, like her grandmother, had been a well-known educator in the city. Her foundation awarded numerous scholarships each year.

      She was twenty-six, with a degree in technology engineering from MIT. Very remarkable, indeed. They had attended the same university. However, their paths would not have crossed due to the eight-year difference in their ages.

      She’d only been in business for two years, but she’d been able to snag several lucrative contracts.

      Nolan pushed back from the computer, impressed. More than impressed. She wasn’t a plain Jane as he’d originally thought, but a techie. There was a difference, and someone like him who owned an electronics company and had been enamored with technology all his life understood the difference. To reach the level of success that Miss Chapman had and in such a short period of time meant she’d worked hard and pushed to the side anything she’d considered nonessential or frivolous.

      Growing up, his life had been centered around computers, so his choice of a profession wasn’t a surprise to anyone, especially not to his family. As a kid, he’d have rather spend time indoors messing around with computers than outdoors playing with other kids. He’d been the proverbial geek, with glasses and all. He hadn’t minded since he’d been happy and everyone had pretty much left him alone, except when he and his cousins had gone to Mama Laverne’s house, where she taught them to cook, or to Granduncle Jake’s Whispering Pines, where he’d bonded with Corbin, Reese and Lee and, more important, discovered how important it was to have a social life.

      He wondered if Ivy Chapman had a social life. Drawing in a deep breath, he figured that her social life or lack of one wasn’t his concern. But the issue of his great-grandmother meddling in his affairs was. He glanced across the room to the wall where a huge portrait of said meddler hung.

      Felicia Laverne Madaris was the matriarch of the family. Having borne seven sons, his grandfather Nolan being one of them, Mama Laverne had taken over the running of their ranch with her sons after her husband, Milton, died. All her sons were still alive except for Robert, who had been killed in the Vietnam War.

      Mama Laverne had insisted that each of her grands and great-grands hang this particular portrait of her in their places of business and in plain view. She sat looking regal, dressed in her Sunday best with a huge dressy hat on her head, and she appeared to be looking directly at the viewer with those shrewd eyes and all-knowing smile. It was known by every member in the family that she liked giving orders, and she expected them to be carried out. Regardless. Well, he had news for her. He had no intention of allowing her to butt into his affairs. Namely, his romantic life or lack of one.

      Nolan reached for his phone and then decided telecommunications with Mama Laverne wouldn’t do. He needed to see his great-grandmother in person and look her in the eyes to make sure she had a clear understanding of where he stood and what he would not tolerate.

      He stood and headed for the door. He would have it out with Mama Laverne once and for all.

      * * *

      “WHAT DO YOU mean Nolan Madaris isn’t the person who was sending you those flowers?”

      Ivy glanced across the desk at her best friend, Tessa Hargrove. She had left Nolan Madaris’s office and come straight here, to Tessa’s property management office. She and Tessa had been best friends since high school, and although they’d gone to different colleges, their close friendship had remained intact.

      Their friendship surprised some people. While in school, Ivy had few friends and was considered a geek because of her deep love of science, math and computer technology. Unless they needed her tutoring services, she was ignored by her classmates...until Tessa transferred to the school in their junior year.

      Tessa had been ignored as well but for a different reason. Because of Tessa’s beauty, the other girls saw her as a threat and treated her as such. So, Tessa and Ivy, as different as night and day, had become the best of friends.

      “It was so embarrassing,” Ivy said, covering her face with her hands. “I practically stormed into his office, carrying that huge vase of flowers and told him not to send me any more. Only to discover he wasn’t the one sending them. His great-grandmother was.”

      A confused expression appeared on Tessa’s face. “His great-grandmother? I don’t understand. Why?”

      “As part of a matchmaking scheme. But what has me so angry is that my own grandmother was in on it.”

      “Ms. Helen?”

      “Yes.”

      “How?”

      “By practically doing the same. While Nolan’s great-grandmother was sending me flowers, my own grandmother was sending Nolan notes from me.”

      “Ms. Helen actually did that?” Tessa asked in a voice that clearly said she was having a hard time believing such a thing.

      “Yes, Nana actually did that.”

      “What did the notes say?”

      Ivy took a sip of coffee. “The same thing the card on the flowers said. That I would love for us to meet and the note was signed with my phone number.”

      “Yet he didn’t call.”

      “Nor did I call him. I don’t know why his great-grandmother and Nana think we make any sense as a couple. Maybe I shouldn’t have, but I told him that because of his reputation around town as a womanizer, there’s no way I’d want to be linked with him.”

      Tessa’s eyes widened. “You actually told him that?”

      “Yes. But then he probably thought something similar about me not being his type, СКАЧАТЬ