A Time to Mend Read Online Free

her opinion.
    “Nail my carcass?”
    “That’s what I said.” She nodded. “Did she?”
    “Almost.”
    “Good for her.”
    Neva had gone with him the previous day to visit the office in Sacramento. She overheard his conversation with Claire when he explained the company jet needed repairs and he wouldn’t be home on time. She understood his wife’s disappointment.
    Phil cleared his throat. “Max, you look like something a dog would be proud to drag inside and lay at his owner’s feet. Care to elaborate?”
    Max studied the two employees who also happened to be his closest friends.
    Neva had been his director of operations since he created the position, less than two years after opening the doors of Beaumont Staffing. At that time he and Claire were almost bonkers trying to run things themselves. His niche was networking with clients; Claire’s was play-ing her violin with the symphony. Nobody was managing the office until Neva stepped in. Hardly out of her teens, she’d been bilingual, extroverted, and eager to work for a pittance.
    Phil was tall and blond with Nordic features. He’d joined the team a dozen years ago, when technology sprouted wings, and Max realized he was Gulliver, tied fast to the ground with other concerns. Phil led Beaumont Staffing into the twenty-first century and now, as director of technology, oversaw the selling and servicing of software. He was also one heck of a tennis partner.
    They weren’t just being polite. They wanted to know what was going on with him and Claire.
    Max gave them the highlights. He omitted Claire’s derogatory jibe about the stale commercial—after all, they were an integral part of the agency—and ended with that nonsense about not being there when he got home.
    Neva and Phil exchanged a glance and then resumed staring at him.
    “What?” He shrugged. “We’re having a spat.”
    Neither of them replied. He stared them down.
    At last Neva said, “Yeah, right. Max, for your information, you left ‘spat’ behind about the time you went off to separate bedrooms.”
    Phil added, “Most definitely by the time she announced the ultimatum about not being there when you got back.”
    Max shook his head. “She won’t literally leave, no matter how serious the spat is. Walking out has never been an option for us. Period.”
    But a memory snagged his attention. No, not so much a memory as an impression. A gut-wrenching impression of his body being ripped apart.
    Walking out had been an option . . . once.
    But that was—what? Thirty-one, thirty-two years ago. And there had been a reason then. Claire had done the unthinkable—
    He vaulted over that thought and landed in another place.
    He was back at the beginning, and he remembered it as if it were yesterday. He’d been in college, studying in the library. October. Ten o’clock at night. His last year. A stranger walked past his table. Their eyes met. He smiled. She smiled. Her name was Claire Lambert.
    Hokey as it sounded, he’d been smitten. Totally, head-over-heels, dizzily so.
    He still was. Always had been.
    What had happened? Claire wouldn’t . . .
    Max glanced at Neva. Her brows raised a fraction of an inch. She knew their history. Not the details, but she’d been there when things happened, close enough to catch the drift that walking out had at one point been a very real option.
    She uncrossed her legs. “So maybe turning fifty-three is throwing her for a loop. It happens.” She shrugged. “One of life’s mysteries. You’ll work it out over the weekend.”
    Phil tapped a pen on his knee. “I don’t know, bud. You’d better get the earrings to go with that diamond necklace.”
    Max smiled. “I called the jeweler first thing.”
    Phil chuckled. Neva lowered her gaze to the notebook on her lap.
    They knew he’d chosen a special necklace for Claire’s birthday gift and debated about including the earrings. The price of the necklace alone wasn’t exactly understated. Its style was, though.