Surprise Package (2 page)

      
He was right about their size difference, Gilly saw. She wore flat-heeled boots, and he towered over her. She would definitely need “power” heels to measure up to this guy. Her bemused train of thought came to an end when she realized that she stood with her gloved hand still held firmly in his grasp, staring up into his face as he reached with his free hand to straighten his glasses.

      
I must be gawking like a banked carp!
She closed her mouth and broke contact, then stooped to pick up her tote—just as he scooped it up to hand it to her. Quickly catching herself, Gilly straightened up—just in time for her head to connect with his jaw. The heavy woolen cap she wore softened the blow, but she could hear his teeth click together. He touched his tongue experimentally against the bleeding edge of his lip.

      
Great! Maybe I could render him unconscious and drag him back to my apartment to have my way with him!
“I'm so sorry. Does it hurt? What am I saying—of course it hurts. You're bleeding! Here, let me...” She began to root frantically in her tote, searching for a handkerchief. All she managed to come up with were a couple of dog-eared grocery coupons and a lipstick-smeared tissue.

      
Jeff dug a handkerchief out of his back pocket and daubed his lip, grinning once again at her flustered agitation. “You know, we might be able to form a really funny circus act, except no one would insure us.” Before she could begin apologizing again, he said, “I'm Jeff Brandt. We may have, er, gotten off on the wrong foot, but that's no reason we can't start over.”

      
“I'm Gilly—Gillian Newsom. My friends call me Gilly.” Idiot. She was babbling again.

      
“Then I hope I can call you Gilly. The least I can do is buy you something hot to warm you up after that toboggan ride down the steps. There's a little coffee shop down the next block. I'll even carry your tote. It looks pretty heavy.”

      
“That's very sweet, but I have to do some library research for a book I'm editing.” The minute the words tumbled out, Gilly could've kicked herself. How often did she get an opportunity like this dropped into her lap—or, rather, her lap sort of dropped into it.

      
“But I could—”

      
“I could—”

      
They both spoke at once. When she stopped, he started again. “What I meant was that I'd be happy to wait while you do your research. Actually, I was just taking a break. I have at least two more hours to put in myself, reading back issues of the
Times
for a sentencing class.”

      
“You're a law student?” She did some quick math in her head. The most he could be was twenty-four, maybe twenty-five. By comparison, her twenty-eight seemed positively ancient.

      
“Yes. I finally managed to finish a B.A. and get into the NYU law program after four years in the Navy. I'm afraid you're looking at one of those long-on-the-vine Gen-Xers who couldn't decide what he wanted to be when he grew up...until he was pushing thirty,” Jeff said ruefully. “On the plus side, though, if I graduate in the top ten percent of my class, Bradford, Trent and Lange have an opening in criminal law. Very, very snotty outfit, but it would be quite a coup if they made me an offer.”
Not that I'd accept it, but damn, it would—will—be sweet.

      
He wasn't too young for her! Gilly brightened. But his next question caught her off guard.

      
“You said you were editing a book? Do you work in publishing, then?”

      
“Yes.” She paused then. This was always the hard part for her, explaining that she edited historical romances. Most people took romance editors about as seriously as they did romance writers, which was to say, not at all. She had heard more than her share of condescending remarks.
Just what kind of research are you doing? Wouldn't it be better to conduct it someplace a teensy bit less public than the library? Say, like your bedroom?

      
“I have a cousin who works in marketing for Houghton Mifflin. Where do you work?” Jeff asked.

      
“FS&G. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, that is.” The words tumbled out before she could stop them. To make matters worse, she found herself adding, “I edit history and literary fiction. Right now, I have to do some research on the Spanish-American War for a book I'm working on.” Well, that much was true.

      
“History, huh? My undergrad work was in American Studies. I even did a senior thesis on Roosevelt's Rough Riders. We have something in common, Gilly.”

      
“Uh, yes, I guess we do.”

      
“Then we'd better get right to work,” he said with another heart-stopping Colgate smile, taking her tote and gently leading her up the icy steps to the library doors.

Chapter Two

      
When they entered the reference room, Abbie Kunsler, the librarian, greeted Jeff by name. Obviously, he had used the facilities often over the course of his academic career. Gilly felt reassured. After all, this was New York, and she was by nature cautious. They both went to work on their separate projects, he scrolling through reams of old newspapers while she took careful notes from the antiquarian, non-circulating tome she had found to be an excellent resource to draw upon when correcting Gwendolyn's historical vagaries.

      
Within two hours she was finished. Jeff was still deeply engrossed at his computer terminal. Gilly walked over to Abbie's desk. The older woman smiled and adjusted her sharply delineated trifocals so she could make out Gilly's face. How to say this? Gilly cleared her throat nervously.

      
“Uh, Abbie, I was wondering...”

      
“About Jeffrey Brandt?” The reference librarian didn't exactly smirk, but there was a definite look of amused smugness on her angular, horsy face. “He's such a nice young man. Studious and polite. Been using our facilities ever since he was an undergraduate. I believe he lives somewhere down in the Village, not too far from NYU.” Abbie paused to see if Gilly needed more data.

      
The information she had given Gilly was reassuring. The rest of what Gilly wanted was a little stickier. “I was wondering, Abbie, if you would do me a favor—well, not so much
do
a favor as...er...well,
not
do something.” At Abbie's puzzled look, Gilly sighed and confessed quickly before she lost her nerve. “You know where I work, but I'd really appreciate it if you didn't mention that to Mr. Brandt. He's under the impression that I work for FS&G.”

      
“Oh?” One thinly penciled eyebrow rose above the trifocals.

      
Abbie wasn't going to help her out here. Gilly struggled on, knowing her face was getting as red as the wild rosebuds on Gwendolyn's milky sea of white velvet. “Well, I sort of gave him the wrong impression—not that I don't plan to correct it; but...well, I'd rather do it in my own time.”
Like by getting that job at FS&G
.

      
“I never gossip, Gillian,” Abbie replied primly.

      
Before Gilly could speculate whether or not that meant the librarian would keep quiet, Jeff came ambling over to them. “All done?”

      
“Yes. I have my notes complete.”

      
“Good. Do you want to get that coffee, maybe a sandwich?”

      
They thanked Abbie for her help and left the cavernous library. Once again braving the icy streets, they walked quickly to a nearby greasy spoon on Forty-Second Street.

      
The place was small and crowded. Here, too, everyone seemed to know Jeff. The waitress, a frowsy, mid-fortyish blonde, handed them laminated menus that looked only slightly newer than the Dead Sea Scrolls.

      
“The cheeseburgers are very good, but the chili dogs are my personal favorite,” Jeff said while the blonde scribbled his order.

      
“I've always had a weakness for cheeseburgers—with Swiss, if you have it?”

      
The waitress looked at her as if she'd asked for fois gras, then nodded curtly and wrote up the order, adding the two cups of black coffee they requested. Gilly was careful to place her tote with the Gleeson manuscript on the floor where Jeff couldn't see it. Gwendolyn's working title was
Cuban Ecstasy
.

      
“So, when will you take the bar exam?” she asked.

      
“My coursework should be wrapped up by the end of this year. I'm planning to take a few months to review everything, then go for it.”

      
“Got to make that ten-percent cut.” She nodded, sipping the steaming coffee the waitress had deposited on the chipped Formica table a moment earlier. “It must be very exciting to have a top-level law firm interested in you. I imagine your family is really proud.”

      
He looked down into his cup, then took a swallow before replying. “Yes. BT&L has always been my father's dream.”

      
Was there something in the tone of his voice, a faint hint of irony? Gilly couldn't be sure, but she was curious. No more involvement with mystery men who had relatives—like wives and children—about whom she knew nothing. “Do your parents live nearby?”

      
“Scarsdale,” he said dismissively. “I don't see them often. It's much more...convenient to stay close to school. I live in Manhattan, near NYU in the Village. Share a pad with another law student named Karl.”

      
“I know,” she blurted out, then blushed. “Er, Abbie mentioned it. Tell me about your family. Any brothers or sisters?”
Any wives or children?

      
“One sister. Older, married. Two kids and a husband who's a broker on the Street.”

      
His answers might have been a little on the laconic side, but it was quite apparent that he came from money. “Let me guess. Your dad's a lawyer, too?”

      
“Definitely yes, but retired now. He and my mother travel a lot. Right now, they're in Bermuda.”

      
“Sounds wonderful on a dreary Manhattan day like this. I'd love to travel if I had the time.”
And the money.

      
“It's greatly overrated. I saw a lot of the world during my tour of duty. Everyplace from Taiwan to Rio. The rich play, and the poor starve. Just like home.”

      
Gilly cocked her head and smiled. “Do I detect a strain of social activism here? It may be passé now, but I like it. Sort of fits you.”

      
He grinned. “How so?”

      
“Goes with the long hair and wire-rimmed glasses, not to mention the beat-up old Adidas and the necklace.” She eyed the tooled leather with elaborate beadwork hanging partially revealed at the open collar of his shirt. Swallowing, she looked away before the sight of the dark chest hair peeking out around the odd piece of jewelry had her any more flustered.
God, I'm acting like one of Gwendolyn's virgins!

      
“This?” He held up the small pouch, smiling. “It was a gift from a friend, David Strongswimmer, an Iroquois construction worker. His father is a shaman. He makes these to keep the wearers safe from harm.”

      
“If they work high iron, I can see the need,” Gilly said, shivering. “Personally, I get a nosebleed on the observation deck of the Empire State Building.”

      
Jeff was not too keen on heights either, and he had given up a really well-paying job with Dave and his dad because of it. But he didn't want to talk about his jobs any more than he did his family. Instead, he switched the conversation back to her. “Tell me about Gilly. You aren't a native New Yorker.”

      
“My Midwestern accent gives me away, doesn't it? I graduated from Oberlin six years ago and came to the Big Apple to set the publishing world on its ear.”

      
“Seems like you've done a pretty fair job so far,” he said, taking a huge bite out of his loaded chili dog.

      
They'd agreed jokingly on ordering onions ahead of time, since he loved them chopped on his hot dogs and she couldn't imagine a cheeseburger without a slice. It was a mutual passion, he'd said, laughing as they trudged through the slush to the coffee shop. Gilly took another bite of her burger, using her fingers to catch the stringy wisps of Swiss cheese before they stuck to her chin. “I want to be an editorial director someday.”

      
“You'll make it,” he replied, lifting his coffee mug in a toast to her.

      
When he asked her about her family, she debated. Then, remembering that his father was an attorney from Scarsdale, she reverted to the story that made life a little easier for her. The story she'd told everyone in New York. “My parents are dead now. I have a sister living out on the West Coast. I'm afraid we're not very close.” No lie about her and Liv, that was for sure. “I was born and raised in a little town in northwest Ohio—you know, picket fences, apple trees, and Fourth of July parades. Pretty dull stuff to a native New Yorker.”

      
“Oh, I don't know. There is a certain appeal to living a quiet, traditional life. And Scarsdale's not all it's cracked up to be.” His dark eyes studied her intently over the rim of his cup, noting the way her pale reddish-blond hair curled in spite of the heavy woolen hat she'd pulled off when they entered the warm coffee shop. Probably natural curl and color. It fit with her light green eyes and the faint sprinkle of freckles across the bridge of that adorable little dumpling of a nose. “Any current relationships?” he asked, surprising himself.

      
“N-no.” She cleared her throat. “I broke up with my fiancé six months ago.”