The Things We Do For Love

He lifted an eyebrow.

Her cheeks took on color as he watched.

“Your advice to that girl was so good. It’s the kind of thing a lot of women need to hear.”

“Thanks,” said Graham. This was unprecedented. And a little strange.

“And I wanted to do you a—or ask you for—”

She stumbled around incoherently.

Graham said, “What do you want?”

“I wanted to offer to set you up with Cameron.”

“Your cousin,” he clarified.

“Yes. She’s really nice and she directs the women’s resource center, which I’m sure you know. She’s had some counseling training, and I thought the two of you might get along.”

Graham scratched his head. This was all so strange. “You think I can’t get a date?” he asked.

“No.” She actually stamped her foot. A small stamp of frustration, but a stamp nonetheless. “I just thought you’d like each other. I thought you could go to Jonathan’s party together.”

Things were getting more and more weird. “Did she put you up to this?”

“Of course not. Cameron’s not like that. She doesn’t need male attention. She gets plenty of that without help. But she does think you’re nice, and I thought the two of you might hit it off.”

He squinted. “Cameron…What’s her last name?”

“McAllister. Our mothers are sisters. Cameron is really great. I know you’d like her.”

Strangely, Mary Anne seemed every bit as desperate in her quest to unite him and her cousin as she was to earn Hale’s approval. Graham decided to forgo the “whys.” Did he want to go out with Cameron McAllister?

He was selective in choosing dates. He sometimes had trouble getting rid of women after he’d taken them out a few times. One or two had even taken to dropping by the radio station, finding excuses to walk past his house—which wasn’t even in town but out in Middleburg, near Mary Anne’s grandmother’s house. It made him uneasy. He was a public figure. Like it or not, his voice and his radio show, his appearances on television and more, had made him a public figure.

“I really don’t know her, Mary Anne,” he said. Then, added impulsively, “I have an idea. Why don’t I take you to Jonathan’s party?”

Mary Anne appeared to be considering some serious dilemma in her mind. He could hear the wheels turning and wished he could read her thoughts.

“I—I’d rather you took Cameron,” she said.

“And I’d rather take you. Besides—” he lowered his voice, unable to resist “—think of the effect it will have on Hale, seeing us together. For all you know, he might decide you are more of a prize than little Angie.” Graham didn’t believe this. Hale had no interest in Mary Anne Drew, except as a source of food for his massive ego. Graham simply had to tease Mary Anne, whose face grew distinctly red at his words.

She expected him to rise to the bait and spit back at him.

Instead, she said, “Oh, I just don’t know,” in a way that suggested global warming or world peace might hang on the answer to her inner conflict. She said, again almost desperately, “I’m trying to do something nice for you!”

“So go out with me.”

“I don’t like you!” she replied. “Cameron does. Why don’t you go out with her?”

Her behavior was incomprehensible. Graham pushed aside the little sting of that “I don’t like you!” He said, “Well, you tried. But to be perfectly honest, it reminds me of the Christmas when I wanted a red ten-speed Bianchi bike and found a five-speed Schwinn under the tree.”

She made a startled little noise that might have been the word Oh, and looked crestfallen.

He said, “I’ll tell you what. You bring Cameron to the party, and we’ll see what happens. I’ve never really talked with her. All I know is she broke Carl Moosegow’s wrist.”

“He grabbed her in a bar!” Mary Anne exclaimed. “And not on the arm, either. She’s studied martial arts. It was a case of ‘no mind,’ like Bruce Lee used to talk about. She just reacted as she’d been trained to do.”

“I’ll be careful where my hands stray,” said Graham, who had counseled female clients on maintaining boundaries—and dealing with men who did not observe them. “By the way, are you trained in martial arts?”

Without a word, she spun away, grabbed her purse and left the office.

Graham grinned as he watched her go…and exchanged a look with the Killer Rabbit of Caerbannog, who grinned right back.

HE HADN’T LET HER do something nice for him, and Mary Anne was unsure whether “It’s the thought that counts” applied to good deeds required to activate love potions. A simple solution would have been to agree to go to the party with him, but Mary Anne didn’t like him, so how could that have been doing him a good deed? She couldn’t have gone with him, though. Because of Cameron. Cameron liked him, and Mary Anne didn’t want to hurt Cameron.

Objecting to the idea of putting more effort into the love potion project, yet unwilling to simply abandon it, she took a gift certificate for Pizza Hut pizza that she’d won at the high school’s kickoff carnival and slipped it into Graham’s In tray. After that, the only thing to do was mildly discourage Cameron’s interest in Graham, play down any possibility that Graham actually liked Mary Anne herself and prepare to slip Jonathan Hale a love potion.

“DO I LOOK OKAY?” she asked Cameron on the night of the engagement party. “Do these jeans make my butt look big?”

“You have an excellent butt,” Cameron replied matter-of-factly. Blessed with a figure that Mary Anne, for one, believed was the answer to every man’s fantasies, Cameron had absolutely no interest in discussing Mary Anne’s figure flaws. “And your clothes are cool. You look like a model.”

Low-rise flare jeans, baby T-shirt and her favorite hat. She also wore her favorite moss-green wrap sweater coat.

In her handbag was the precious vial she’d bought from Clare Cureux.

Tonight was the night.

Taking her turn in front of the mirror, Cameron babbled, “Jonathan asked Paul to play for the party but I told Paul he couldn’t, because if he’s there I have to pretend we’re together.”

It was a situation Mary Anne still couldn’t get her head around, but all she said was, “And so he turned down the gig?”

“Oh, sure. That’s not usually part of our agreement, but he knows how badly I want to go out with Graham.” After a moment, she said, “Besides, he knew he could get a different gig tonight. He just told Jonathan he was booked, and then he got a gig—so he was.” She changed the subject. “Do I look okay?”

Mary Anne scrutinized her cousin. Cameron was dressed up, for her. She wore a low-backed brown dress and clunky platform shoes. She looked sexy and great and had probably spent a total of six dollars on the ensemble. “You’re an eleven,” Mary Anne told her, blowing her a kiss. “He’s lucky you’re coming, but you’ll get to see for yourself what he’s really like.”

Cameron gave a mischievous grin that showed her chipped front tooth, an anomaly in her otherwise perfect bite. “Graham Corbett, here I come!”

Mary Anne decided that if Graham tried to flirt with her tonight instead of her cousin, she would pour a drink on him.

THE PARTY TOOK PLACE in the Embassy Ballroom, which occupied the entire floor above the radio station in the Embassy Building. Mary Anne had learned that the landlord was letting the engaged couple use it as a gift to Jonathan Hale, a tribute for his work for WLGN.

Before they headed upstairs, Mary Anne said, “Want to use the ladies’ room?”

“Sure.”

Mary Anne opened the radio station’s glass door. The recording booth was occupied by two indie kids prerecording a music program. She gave them a wave as she and Cameron headed past the rows of desks and computers to the restrooms.