Christmas Diamonds (3 page)

“Did you move the papers I had on the table?” he asked, knowing she sometimes went a little too far with her cleaning.

“I put them on your desk,” Jackie said.

“Guess I should’ve checked there first.” He scratched his chin. “I’ve hired Paula Devine to redecorate the great room. I’d like you to help her with anything she needs.”

“Sure, I can do that.”

“Thanks.” Chase remembered there was something else he’d meant to tell her. “Also, I’d like that box of my late wife’s clothes in the closet upstairs put in the storage room.” He planned to soon donate them to charity, deciding it was time they were put to good use.

Paula couldn’t believe her nearly rotten luck. Of all the men she could have spoken her mind to at the coffee shop, it had to be the very man she sought to hire her. One who happened to be quite well-to-do, judging by his abode and bloodline, and needed some work done to bring at least one room in his house up to snuff. Never mind the fact that in the looks department he could hold his own with the best-looking men on the planet: tall, definitely fit, with broad features and neatly trimmed facial hair that brought out his brown skin tone.

Thank goodness he didn’t take my remarks too personally, or I would’ve really dug a hole for myself
.

Her grandmother had always told Paula that she was a bit too frank for her own good at times.

And whom did I inherit that from?

Since the age of five, Paula had been raised by her grandmother and, in the process, had acquired Isabelle Devine’s in
dependent spirit and willingness to assert herself. Sometimes it got her into trouble, but more often than not, Paula was secure in being a strong woman who wouldn’t be walked over or taken advantage of.

Paula supposed that the same spirit had been passed on to her mother, as well, who had left home as a teenager, making her way to several states before ending up in Atlanta. It was there that she’d gotten pregnant at twenty-one with Paula, raising her alone as a single mother. When times became too tough, Paula was sent to live with her grandmother. She became the only real mother Paula had ever known. Her contact with her birth mother had been infrequent.

She was proud to have her grandmother’s spunk and would not apologize for it. On the contrary, Paula felt that being herself was the only way she could live. She only hoped that one day she would meet a man who could respect that without it being an affront to his manhood.

Paula drove home, happy that she had landed the job with Chase McCord. With an enormous great room, it would be a wonderful challenge to redecorate. The fact that Chase was allowing her to put her vision into it with little interference was an interior decorator’s dream. She was intrigued by the man who was clearly more than just a handsome face with weak pickup lines that turned out to be not even that.

She wondered if he had dated anyone since his wife died. Or had the romance inside him died with her as if it had nowhere else to go? Paula knew something about that. She’d certainly had her fill of unworthy men who knew how to kill a romance. She had a feeling that someone like Chase McCord might be entirely different.

Paula arrived at the Prairie-style chalet where she lived with her grandmother. Built in the 1930s, it had been remodeled several times yet still retained its architectural charm and coziness. Paula loved the fact that her home was on a peaceful dead-end street, nestled amongst Douglas fir trees.

She went inside and immediately smelled collard greens. Since Paula’s stomach was growling, she was eager to find out what else was for dinner. An excellent cook in her own right, Paula’s grandmother had taught her well. Unfortunately, with her busy work schedule and often long hours, Paula rarely had time to cook anymore. That wasn’t to say she couldn’t find the time if preparing a feast for the right man.

Passing the sunken living room and formal dining room, Paula walked into the country-style kitchen. It had an eclectic feel, borrowing on the Colonial America and Old English Country styles. She saw her grandmother standing over the sink, peeling sweet potatoes for a pie while humming a song.

Isabelle Devine was seventy-one years old, but looked much younger. She was tall and lean with stylishly short, curled, silver hair and butterscotch skin. Isabelle had retired from the public school system five years ago after more than thirty years of teaching. Born in South Africa, she was classified under apartheid as “colored,” reflecting her mixed-race sub-Saharan ancestry. Isabelle had been seventeen when her father brought his family to the United States to join him while he pursued his graduate studies in entomology at a university in the state of Washington.

It was there that Isabelle met Paula’s grandfather, Earl Devine, a railway worker. They married a year later and had only been wed for six months when tragedy struck. Earl was killed in a railroad accident, leaving Isabelle a nineteen-year-old widow pregnant with Paula’s mother, Jean.

It pained Paula that her mother had chosen to lead her life for the most part without reaching out to either her or Isabelle. Her grandmother and mother had not gotten along well, but Isabelle never stopped loving her only child to the point of selflessly rearing Paula as if she were her own.

Paula carried this weight on her shoulders, trying to compensate for her mother’s absence in both of their lives by making Isabelle proud and never giving her cause to reject the role she had played in making Paula’s life everything it was
today. She wanted her grandmother to enjoy the years she had left as much as possible, and since she was in relatively good health for a woman her age, Paula was pretty confident Isabelle wasn’t leaving any time soon, the good Lord willing.

“Hi, Isa,” Paula said, using the nickname for her grandmother that she’d used for as long as she could remember.

“Hello.” Isabelle stopped humming and offered a big smile. “I didn’t hear you come in.”

“That’s me, quiet as a mouse,” Paula said.

“You hungry?” Isabelle asked.

Paula moistened her lips. “Starving!”

Isabelle chuckled. “Well, I’ll take care of that.”

“Can I help?” Paula offered.

“No, just go freshen up. I won’t be more than a few minutes.”

“All right.” Paula kissed her cheek and went upstairs. She had always been spoiled by her grandmother and couldn’t imagine life without her.

Paula hoped that one day she would find the right man, someone who would enjoy spoiling her as much as she would enjoy being spoiled by him. The fact that she hadn’t met him up to this point didn’t mean he wasn’t out there somewhere. He could be right around the corner just waiting to run into her.

She stepped inside her bedroom that was well down the hall from her grandmother’s room, with two spare rooms in between to give them some needed privacy. In redesigning her personal space, Paula had done the walls in soft apricot, added plantation shutters to the windows and installed lush gray carpeting. Decorative accents complemented hand-carved mahogany furnishings. She sat for a moment on the antique bed, where silk taffeta hung above the headboard to form a crown canopy.

Paula suddenly found herself curious about Chase’s bedroom. In light of the rooms she’d seen at his home, she assumed his bedroom was spacious and immaculate. If things worked out right, maybe he would allow her to redecorate it, as well. Or would that be overstepping the boundaries of his late wife’s memory a bit too much in Chase’s mind?

After freshening up, Paula went downstairs for dinner. She sat at the dining-room table across from her grandmother.

“So how did the prospective client work out today?” Isabelle gave her a curious look.

Paula bit into a biscuit. “I got the job.”

“Wonderful.”

“I hope he agrees when I’m done,” Paula said sincerely.

Isabelle cocked a brow. “He?”

“Yes,
he
.” Paula chuckled, knowing her grandmother’s propensity to try to get her hitched to any single, good-looking, gainfully employed and available man.

“Remind me again what the job is,” Isabelle said.

“Redecorating his great room.”

Isabelle lifted her glass. “Oh, yes. Sounds like something right up your alley.”

“I think I’m up to the challenge.”

“And when have you ever not been?” Isabelle tossed out.

Paula smiled. “You give me way too much credit.”

“You’ve earned it,” Isabelle said sincerely. “How old is your client?”

“I’m guessing he’s in his midthirties,” Paula answered, which would put him a few years over her age of thirty-one.

“That’s perfect, if I say so myself.” Isabelle favored her with a scheming look. “So, is he single?”

“He’s a widower.” Paula couldn’t begin to imagine losing a significant other so young in life. How on earth did one manage to go on after that? She hoped she would never have to find out.

“Then he and I have something in common besides you,” Isabelle said.

“That’s true. You both lost your spouse at a young age.”

Isabelle closed her eyes for a moment. “You never really get over it, no matter how much time passes.”

Paula reached across the table and touched her grandmother’s hand. “I know.” She watched a shadow of sadness cross Isabelle’s face like a shadow. Paula had seen that look
many times before. She wished things had been different for Isa. In spite of being an attractive woman of color and seeing men off and on over the years, her grandmother had chosen not to remarry, believing that no one could ever take the place of her beloved husband, Earl.

Paula wondered if Chase felt the same way about his late wife. Had he deemed her irreplaceable, no matter who else might enter his life? Or maybe he had moved on but simply was looking to find the right woman to occupy his time.

“Is he handsome?” Isabelle wiped her mouth with a napkin.

“Yes, very,” Paula admitted, blushing at the thought.

“Does he have any children?”

The question had crossed Paula’s mind, too. “Not that I know of.” She had seen no signs to that effect at his house. “But he does have a housekeeper, if that counts for anything.”

“Not as offspring,” Isabelle said with a chuckle. “But it does indicate a desire to keep the house clean, and that’s a good sign since there’s apparently no one to help in that regard.”

“I was thinking the same thing,” Paula told her honestly. “I’ve also met his father.”

“Oh?”

“Yes, Sylvester McCord. You remember I worked on his recreation room.”

Isabelle’s eyes widened. “You mean the gentleman in the diamond business?”

Paula nodded. “That’s the one.”

“What about his son?” Isabelle asked inquisitively.

“What about him?”

“What’s his profession?”

“He works with his father,” Paula responded. She could tell by the look in Isa’s eyes where this was going.

Isabelle tilted her head. “Hmm…So maybe this is someone you should get to know personally.”

Paula looked at her thoughtfully. “I’m not sure either of us wants to go there, especially after I sort of put him off when we met earlier today by chance.”

“I doubt he’ll hold that against you,” Isabelle said. “If he did, he wouldn’t have hired you.”

“Point taken.” Paula tasted her diet drink. “Still, ours is a professional relationship, and I don’t want to mess that up.”

Isabelle narrowed her eyes. “You mean like with your last beau?”

She colored. “Kind of.”

The thought left a sour taste in Paula’s mouth. Things between her and Sheldon Burke had started off with a bang and much promise, but in the end it was obvious that he wasn’t the right man for her. She saw no reason to go down that road again too soon, even if Chase seemed like every woman’s dream from what little she knew and had seen of him.

“Don’t let one bad apple taint the entire tree,” Isabelle said, leaning forward. “Maybe it was a sign when he hired you.”

Paula knew her grandmother was big on signs and karma and all that, dating back to her youth in Johannesburg. But she didn’t share this belief, preferring to think that destiny was something you controlled rather than the other way around.

Still, she went along with it up to a point. “I guess I can accept that, just like any job I get might be in the cards, or should I say stars?”

Isabelle smiled. “There could be much more here for you than a job. The man seems to have the right foundation. If he has any common sense, he’ll realize you’re one good catch.”

“You would say that,” Paula said, expecting nothing less from the woman who always saw the best in her.

“I know what I’m talking about,” Isabelle said candidly. “Besides, it’s just as easy to marry a wealthy, handsome, lonely man as it is one who is poor and not so attractive.”

Paula’s eyes widened. “Who says he’s lonely?”

“Who says he’s not?” Isabelle retorted. “There’s only one way to find out.”

Paula chuckled. “What am I going to do with you?”

“I’m not the one you need to worry about, sweetheart.” Isabelle held up her hand, sporting a diamond wedding ring. “I
already have my ring. Earl saw to that before he ran into harm’s way, leaving me something very special to remember him by.”

Paula marveled at the ring with tiny diamonds that still sparkled. She’d heard the story a thousand times about how her grandfather worked the railways tirelessly like so many others of his day and died doing what he needed for his family. But not before he’d expressed his deep love for Isa by giving her a diamond engagement ring for Christmas, following it up with the wedding ring the next summer.

Paula never tired of the wonderful tale. Indeed, it had been her wish since childhood to find that type of all-consuming, powerful love from a man who would give her a diamond ring at Christmas—or any other time of year—setting the stage for a lifetime of marital bliss. She wasn’t sure it would ever happen, even if her grandmother seemed to believe it was only a matter of time. Finding a man she wanted to spend the rest of her life with had proven elusive thus far for Paula.

She certainly wasn’t ready to say that Chase McCord could turn out to be her Prince Charming. And since he’d already found true love once, he probably wasn’t looking to get married again, particularly not to someone who had already let him know she wasn’t interested in him romantically. But things had changed since their initial meeting, hadn’t they?