A Fashionable Affair Read Free Page A

morning.
    “I’m sorry to hear that,” he said neutrally when she told him of Fred’s death.
    “The thing is, Michael, I feel as if I’ve killed him,” she confessed. “I should never have told him about the IRS.”
    “Patsy, be reasonable. He’d already had one mas sive attack. The other had probably been building all day.”
    “Do you think so?”
    “Of course. Accountants deal with the IRS all the time. He wasn’t upset about the IRS. He was having a heart attack.”
    Patsy’s brow smoothed out. She was never one to dwell on unpleasant or upsetting thoughts. “You’re probably right.”
    “Sure I am. Now, can you meet me at his office this afternoon?”
    “Yes. Fred has a daughter, and she’s taking care of the arrangements. What time can you be there?”
    “Three o’clock. What’s the address again?”
    She gave it to him, hung up the phone, and went to jog in Central Park.
    * * * *
    He was waiting in the lobby when she arrived. He was wearing a well-cut, pale-gray suit, and once again Patsy found herself gazing appraisingly at his shoulders. Michael had always been slender and compact, but even in high school he had been strong. She remembered he had once beaten up the captain of the football team for saying something disparaging about a thin, bespeckled, academically minded friend of his.
    His dark head turned and he saw her.
    “Have you been waiting long?” she asked as she approached him.
    “No, I just got here.” He put a hand on her elbow. “The elevator is over here.”
    Obediently she fell into step beside him. She was wearing medium-high heels with her chocolate- colored slacks and cream sweater, and he was still nearly an inch taller than she. “Did you drive in?” she asked.
    “No. I took the train.”
    “That was probably smart. It doesn’t pay to bring a car into Manhattan. I only have one because I can garage it in my apartment building.”
    “Was that your Volvo wagon I saw in the parking lot yesterday?”
    “Yes.”
    The elevator door opened and they started down the’ corridor. “A station wagon,” he said with amusement in his deep, pleasant voice. “Not at all the sort of car one would expect to see New York’s top photographic model driving.”
    “It’s built like a tank,” Patsy said. “New York’s top photographic model is more interested in protec tion than in style, thank you.”
    “Smart girl,” he said. “Here we are.” He fitted the key into the lock and they entered Fred’s office.
    An hour later Michael was sitting at Fred’s desk with a pile of folders in front of him. Patsy, who was finding the whole process extremely boring, was prowling around the office.
    “Sit down, Red,” Michael said absently. “You’re making me nervous.”
    Red. She had forgotten that. He was the only one she had ever allowed to call her by that name. She crossed the room and sat across the desk from him, her eyes on his preoccupied face. He had always had the most fabulous lashes, she remembered. She and Sally had been wild with jealousy when they were younger. “I mean, what good are they on a boy?” Sally used to say.
    “Patsy. Are you awake?” There was a distinct note of irritation in Michael’s voice, and she opened her brown eyes wide.
    “I’m sorry, I was daydreaming. What did you say?”
    “I asked you about this line of sportswear you’re endorsing. I’ve never heard of the company.”
    “Redman Fashions,” she answered readily. “I know they’re not Sears, but the clothes have really been very successful.”
    “I see that.” There was a thin deep line between his eyes. He was looking at the paper in front of him. “You made over a million from them last year.”
    She smiled. “You see.”
    He looked from the paper to her. “I’ve never seen them in the stores,” he said.
    “Neither have I, actually. But Fred said they were very popular in the smaller Midwest department stores.”
    “I see.” Michael’s voice was undramatic and