A Fashionable Affair

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Book: Read A Fashionable Affair for Free Online
Authors: Joan Wolf
Tags: Romance, Contemporary Romance
across from him again and watched him eat. When the weather report was over, he switched the radio off and looked at her.
    “The eggs are good, Red.”
    Patsy felt an absurd glow of pleasure at his words. Her lips curved a little and she took a bite of the toast she had made for herself. “Did you solve it?” she asked.
    “The math problem? Yeah. At three this morn ing.”
    Patsy finished her toast and, putting her elbows on the table, rested her chin on her hands and regarded him gravely. Her gaze didn’t appear to disturb him at all. He finished his coffee, wiped his mouth on a napkin, and said, “Come into my study and we’ll take a look at those taxes.”
    His study was off the kitchen in what would have been the dining room in a more conventional household. It was furnished with a huge desk, which was covered with a great number of tidily arranged papers, and several walls of bookshelves. Looking around, Michael realized there was no chair for Patsy and went out to the kitchen to get her one. He set it down in front of the desk and then went around to the chair behind it. He picked up a piece of paper and sat for a minute in silence, frowning thoughtfully.
    Patsy felt a twinge of alarm. “There isn’t anything wrong, is there.”
    He looked up. “On the face of things, no. The cash receipts books and the bank statements seem okay.”
    “Seem? What is this ‘seem’?”
    “Well, I haven’t done any checking yet.”
    “What kind of checking?”
    “Checking that the checks written down in the cash books were really issued to the company indi cated and in the amount stated, for one thing.”
    Patsy frowned. “But why on earth wouldn’t they be?”
    “They wouldn’t be if Zimmerman was ripping you off, sweetheart, and pocketing huge amounts of the cash he said he was buying you things like shopping-center shares with.”
    “What a rotten thing to say! Poor Fred isn’t even in his grave yet.”
    “I’m not saying he’s a crook, Patsy. For all I know, the guy is pure as the driven snow. But I won’t know for sure until I do some checking.”
    Patsy glared. “You have a nasty, suspicious mind.”
    “Mmm.” He looked preoccupied. There was a faint line between his well-marked black brows. “I’m an accountant. I’m always suspicious.”
    Patsy remembered what had happened to his father. “Well, go ahead and check,” she said in a gentler voice. “But the IRS wants to see me next week.”
    “I talked to Maginnis Thursday afternoon. He’s given you an extension.”
    “You never told me that!”
    The line between his brows smoothed out. “I just did,” he said. “Now, you tell me this ...”
    After ten minutes of relentlessly thorough ques tioning, Patsy was feeling a bit limp.
    “I hope the hell this Zimmerman is honest, sweet heart,” Michael said grimly, “because you are a sit ting duck.”
    Patsy bit her lip. “But, Michael, I paid Fred just so that I wouldn’t have to bother about things like contracts and investments and taxes and so forth.”
    “A sitting duck,” he repeated.
    “You know how wretched I always was in math.” She looked a little subdued and very beautiful as she sat there in her pleated linen pants and matching oatmeal linen jacket. Her skin was flawless in the merciless morning light.
    He smiled crookedly. “I know.” He put the papers he had been looking at back on their proper pile. “Well, all right, I’ll do some checking and let you know how things stand.”
    Once again he was dismissing her. Patsy found that she did not want to be dismissed. She looked out the window. “The weather is beautiful,” she remarked. “You have a perfect day for whatever it is you’re planning to do.”
    He raised an eyebrow. “How do you know I’m planning anything?”
    “You were glued to the weather forecast,” she pointed out.
    “I guess I was.” He moved his shoulders a little as if he felt a sudden cramp. “I just thought I’d go to the beach for the

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