Just Like Heaven Read Free Page A

morning was actually deteriorating. She wouldn’t have believed it possible.
    “So how did things go in London with Liam? Any sparks?” Her mother was nothing if not resilient.
    “We had tea together my first day. That was it.”
    “Sharon said he would be perfect for you. She’ll be so disappointed.”
    “Next time why doesn’t Sharon fix you up with the Liams and Nigels of this world. I keep telling you I’m not looking for a man and I mean it.”
    “You might not be looking but you wouldn’t turn down a good one if he popped up.”
    “I’m not sure there are any good ones,” she said, “at least none that I’d be interested in.”
    “That’s not normal, honey. You sound like you’ve given up.”
    “Mom, this is old news. I’m perfectly happy being on my own, even if that seems to bug the living daylights out of everyone else in the world except me. Can’t we just leave it at that?”
    “Sara Whittaker’s son is back in town. He’s been working in Tokyo the last few years, a graphic artist. I think you two might hit it off.”
    “Mom, I have another call. We’ll have to pick this up later.”
    “You don’t have to use the call-waiting excuse with me, sweetie. I know when you’ve had enough.”
    Kate had to laugh. “It’s a real call this time,” she said as her irritability lifted. “I’ll call you tonight. I promise.”
    Paul Grantham, old friend and confidant, was next in the queue.
    “Took you long enough, French.”
    “Thank God it’s you,” she said, adjusting the headset. “This thing hasn’t stopped ringing since I got off the plane.”
    “So how was the big buying trip? Is there anything left on the other side of the pond?”
    “Not much,” she admitted. “I may have struck gold.” She told him about the stack of Revolutionary War-era letters she’d found in a tiny shop near Lincolnshire written to a colonel’s wife in New Jersey.
    “When will you know if you found the mother lode?”
    A truck, horn blaring, appeared out of nowhere in her blind spot. “Oh, damn! Sorry!” She veered back into her lane, heart pounding wildly. “What were you saying?”
    “Are you okay?” he asked. “You sound a little out of breath.”
    “I’m not out of breath. It must be the connection.” That and her surging adrenaline.
    She held on while Paul answered an assistant’s question.
    “Sorry,” he said. “Crazy morning. We’re still on for the Hospital Gala this week, aren’t we?”
    “I take it Lisa’s no longer on the scene.”
    “Lisa is looking for somebody who’s willing to go the distance,” he said, “and we both know I’m saving myself for you.”
    It was an old joke between them, but lately she had the feeling there was more behind her old friend’s words than either one of them cared to acknowledge.
    Paul was a partner in a prestigious Manhattan law firm, another one of the Coburn High School Class of 1982 who made good. He had been in her life for as long as she could remember, part of their crowd from kindergarten through high school. He had hung out with them at Rutgers, where Kate had struggled unsuccessfully to combine marriage, motherhood, and college, and he had stayed a good friend even after their respective marriages fell to the divorce statistics. They had tried dating once early on but the absurdity of dressing up and staring at each other over candlelight and a bottle of Tattinger had pushed them both into helpless laughter, which was pretty much where they had stayed.
    Or so she had thought until recently.
    “Oh my God,” she said through clenched teeth. “I almost rear-ended a cop.”
    “You sure you’re okay?” he asked. “Maybe you should take the day off and catch up on your sleep.”
    “That’s something you say to your aging aunt,” she snapped. “I’m not ready for the nursing home yet, Paul.”
    “Tell you what,” he said. “How about if we’re not both hooked up by the time we hit retirement, we pool our Social