Crossroad To Love (Fab Five Series) (4 page)

Unlike Angie, Marianne had chosen her family over her
career. She had gone back into nursing recently. Katy wondered how that was
working out for her. Marianne had not worked for quite a few years. And she
certainly did not need the income. Jon was doing quite well as a surgeon.
I
hope
I get to see Jon while I’m in Texas. They make such a good couple
.

The plane landed on schedule in St. Louis, bringing her back
to the present. Katy hurried through the airport, eager for Lizzie and Angie to
arrive.
This is going to be a
reunion to remember
. Little did she
know just how true that statement was.

Marianne stepped into the luxurious suite at the Prava.
Everything was perfect, the hotel had followed her instruction to the letter.
This was going to be one big week-long slumber party with her best friends,
just like the old days. She was so glad Lizzie had thought of it. She made sure
there were soft drinks in the fridge, wine, coffee, and snacks. She had ordered
a box of expensive chocolates and had fresh-cut flowers sitting in a ceramic
floral vase on the gleaming cherry desk. They had all been chocoholics in the
old days.
The girls are going to love this place
. Preparing for their
arrival had given her something to do to get her mind off her troubles. She
could not wait to see the ‘Fab Four’ again. She was determined to have a good
time this week, and face her problems next week, when a decision would finally
have to be made.

She had to decide whether to confront Jon, wait for him to
confront her, or to pretend nothing was wrong and hope the affair ended soon.
He had been so attentive that morning. His kiss had started out quite
passionately, in fact. If she had not pulled away, it might have gone further.
Has
he ended it with the other woman
?
He had told Mari not to worry
about him and Jordan. He was planning a guy’s night out with Jordan. He was
acting like everything was normal in their household, like nothing was going
on. Jon was acting like the perfect husband that everyone thought him to be.
Could she actually get her hopes up that it was a mere fling and that Jon had
come to his senses? Or could he be that good an actor, and was waiting until
after her week with her friends to lower the boom and tell her he was leaving
her for the young lab tech? Marianne was more confused than ever. She cracked
open a bottle of her favorite red wine from the bottles she had stocked the
liquor cabinet with, poured it into one of the crystal glasses she found, and
sat down on the comfortable burnt orange sofa to enjoy it while she waited for
Ang, Liz, and Kate to arrive.
I might as well start the party early
, she
thought to herself.
It will relax me before they all get here
.

I wonder what they will want to do first
. Lizzie had
brainstormed the idea of the trip but since they had decided on Dallas,
Marianne had volunteered to take care of the entertainment arrangements.
There
is always
shopping at the Galleria. They would love that. The symphony
isn’t too far from here,
either.
She would just play it by ear and
see if they were more interested in gallivanting around town or staying in and
visiting most of the time. She poured another glass of wine and sank back
against the oversized pillows on the couch. The girls should be arriving within
the hour.

Meanwhile, in St. Louis, Angie stepped off the plane, walked
to the main area of the airport and looked around to see which direction she
needed to go to meet Lizzie and Katy when her cell rang. She did not recognize
the number, but touched the screen and said, “Hello, this is Angela.”

“My, my, aren’t we formal this morning?” It was Michael!
“Take a girl to dinner at a romantic restaurant and she goes from Angie to
Angela overnight. Bad for the male ego, Angie, darling.”

“Sorry, Michael, I didn’t recognize the number, thought it
might be business.” 

Apology accepted. I take it you made your flight on time.”

“Yes, I just landed in St. Louis to meet Lizzie and Katy. We
are flying on to Dallas together from here and I need to meet them soon. We
wanted to have lunch before our flight leaves. So to what do I owe the honor of
this call?” Her heart was racing.

“Well, business, in a way. I forgot to get the name of the
hotel you’ll be staying at in Dallas in case I need to get a hold of you about
the project while you are gone.”

“Can’t you just call my cell?”

“Well, Miss Prim and Proper, yes, I can call your cell
obviously. But I like to have a second number just in case.”

Guess he thought I was being just a little bit sarcastic
,
Angie thought to herself as she grinned.

“I don’t really have the number handy, but I can give you
the name of the hotel. It’s the Prava on the north side of Dallas.”

“Okay, got it. You have a good week now. And thanks for the
info.” With that, he hung up, leaving Angie to wonder what that call was really
about.

He certainly cut the conversation short after he had gotten
the information he wanted, short and sweet.
Oh, well, I don’t have time to
worry about that now
, she thought as she put her cell back in her bag and
looked around for the place she had planned to meet Lizzie and Katy. She got
her bearings and rushed to meet them. They were both already there when she
arrived.

After hugs all around, Katy said, “We were beginning to
worry about you. What delayed you?”

Should I tell them? Why not, it will be good for a laugh
.

“I had a phone call just as I was getting off the plane. It
was a business associate. His name is Michael Gray.”

Angie watched smugly as Katy and Lizzie looked at each other
in amazement.

After the initial shock, Lizzie was the first to find her
voice. “Are you telling us that you are working with a guy who just happens to
be named Michael Gray?”

“Or are you trying to tell us that you are now working with
our
Michael Gray?” added Katy, still trying to wrap her head around what her
friend had just said.

“Believe me, girls, no one was as shocked as I was yesterday
when
our
Michael Gray walked into my office as the architect who will be
handling my remodeling project at work. Unbeknownst to me, he recently moved to
the Quad City area from Des Moines and joined the architectural firm that I
hired to do the work on the expansion.” She stopped to savor the looks of
surprise on the two women’s faces and added for good measure, “And we had
dinner together last night.”

“Girl, you’ve got some heavy explaining to do over lunch,
which by the way, we need to get to if we are going to catch our flight to
Dallas. Marianne will kill us all if we are late after all the work she has
done to get ready for our descent on the Big D.” Lizzie hurried them along to a
restaurant near their gate.

“And she’ll hate it that we get to hear the ‘Michael and
Angie’ saga before she does,” added Katy with a good-natured giggle.

After they were comfortably seated in a corner booth at the
airport restaurant, Lizzie asked in anticipation, “Now spill it, girlfriend,
what is up with you and Michael Gray, after all these years?”

“Actually, nothing is going on, Liz. Quite simply, I
scheduled a meeting yesterday with my architect for the new expansion project at
the hotel. I was anxious to get through it since it was my last appointment of
the day.  Imagine my surprise when the architect walked in and it was Michael,
after all these years. I had no idea he had recently taken a job with the firm
I hired.” Angie watched her friends’ faces to see if she could read their
reactions.

“I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall at
that
meeting,” laughed Katy, as she thought her friend had just a bit of a dreamy
look on her face at the mere mention of Michael’s name. Could it be… after all
this time… that she still had feelings for her ex-husband?

“After I picked my jaw up off the floor, we had our meeting.
That was all there was to it,” Angie answered with the dreamy look on her face
again. Katy was sure of it now.

“All there was to it, huh?” Lizzie joined the conversation,
seriously doubting Angie’s last statement, given the look on her face.

The waitress came to take their order, so the conversation
had to be tabled for a few minutes. Katy, the petite one of the group, ordered
a blackened chicken salad and iced tea with lemon, Angie, a club sandwich and a
cup of coffee, and Lizzie, ever the junk food junkie, ordered a burger and
fries with a Coke.

“Well, I see some things never change, our eating habits are
still the same,” Angie giggled like a school girl, shifting the subject to
something other than her meeting with Michael. It was good to be with her old
friends again. They had so many wonderful memories together. Memories that
included her life with Michael, she gently reminded herself.

“Don’t change the subject, you’re not off the hook, yet, my
friend.  What was the part about you two having dinner together last night? You
can’t tell me it was just a business dinner,” nudged Lizzie, eager to hear
more.

Angie took a sip of the coffee the waitress had delivered,
added creamer, and as she slowly stirred the mixture, she continued, “Well,
there is not much to tell, really.  He called after I had just finished packing
and suggested we have dinner together. I drove my own car and met him at a
little restaurant down the street from the condo. We had dinner, I found out he
is still single and I went home. End of story.”

“End of story, my ass,” Lizzie commented wryly.

“More like beginning of story, if you ask me,” Katy remarked
smugly.

“Oh, come on, I had no choice, I have to work with the guy.”
Angie was on the defensive now.

“Did you invite him back to your place for a drink after
dinner?” asked Lizzie mischievously as she took a sip of her Coke.

“No, I most certainly did not.” Angie was beginning to wish
she had never told them about Michael. But she did value their opinions,
especially Katy’s.

The waitress brought their food and as they enjoyed their
first lunch together in quite some time, each was lost in her own thoughts for
a few moments.

Wouldn’t it be great, if after all this time, the Grays
got back together?
Katy thought to herself. She knew from many
conversations with Angie over the years that she had never really gotten over
Michael, the love of her life. Apparently that still held true from the way she
spoke of him now. Katy also was aware of how hurt Michael had been by the
divorce and that he had always kept a place in his heart for his ex-wife. He
had shared his feelings with Katy after she had lost Bill, during one of the
many heart-to-heart conversations the two of them had shared at that horrible
time in her life.

The girls finished their lunch in relative silence, and
prepared to board the plane for Dallas. Excited to get to their destination and
to see their dear friend, Marianne, they dropped the subject of Michael Gray
for time being, much to Angie’s relief.

The flight to Dallas was uneventful and when the plane
landed at DFW airport, the girls gathered their luggage, picked up the rental
car as planned, and drove to the hotel. Angie drove, Lizzie sat in the front
with the directions and Katy sat in the backseat, watching happily as her two
friends joked together in the front seat. Soon, they arrived at the Prava,
handed the valet the keys to the rental, and made their way to the suite. When
they entered, they were greeted by a very cheerful Marianne who held up her
glass of wine as she toasted her three best friends.

“I see you’ve started the party without us,” Angie chuckled,
slightly taken aback at the glass of wine in Marianne’s hand. It was so unlike
her to drink alone.

“Come here, you guys, I’ve been waiting patiently for hours
for you to get here,” replied Marianne with a forced laugh.

With that, the three friends rushed to her. After much
hugging, kissing, and crying, finally reunited again, the four friends sat
down, each with a glass of wine in their hand now, ready to catch up on each
other’s news.

“So, who wants to go first?” Marianne ventured.

The three looked at each other and giggled like schoolgirls.
Lizzie and Katy both looked pointedly at Angie, who turned beet red.

“You already know something, don’t you?” asked Marianne, her
curiosity building.

“Tell her, Angie, you know you are not going to get away
with not telling,” Katy coaxed her gently.

“Alright, already, I can see I’m going to have to tell my
story first or you two will burst.” She looked at Marianne and continued,
“Well, Mari, I got the biggest surprise of my life yesterday. I had scheduled a
meeting with an architectural firm to work on a new project for the hotel. It’s
an expansion project.” She paused, took a sip of wine, and continued, “I
pitched the idea a few months ago and it was wholeheartedly approved. I am
basically in charge of the whole project, which is a major undertaking. I’ve
been working long hours on it,” she explained, “which is why I am so looking
forward to this week with you guys. I really needed a break before the bulk of
the work begins.” She was taking her time telling the story, savoring every word.

“On with the good part, Ang,” Lizzie said impatiently.

“I’m getting to that. All in good time, my friend, all in
good time,” Angie replied. “Anyway, when the architect walked in the door, it
was none other than the still-gorgeous Michael Gray. There he was, a blast from
the past after all these years, and still as hot as ever. He waltzed right in
and sat down. Now are you happy? I’ve said it.” Angie waited for Marianne’s
reaction, while her other two friends burst into yet another fit of giggles.