Bad Heiress Day by Allie Pleiter Read Free Book Online Page A

don’t want to be known as the patron saint of martyr beauty?”
    “That’s a good one,” Darcy replied, laughing. “I’ll put it on my business cards. But I’m sure we need to do this without anyone knowing who we are. And we need someone who can convince these women that this is on the level, and that it is important and worth taking the time. Someone from the hospice, like…Meredith. She’s the hospice center’s executive director. Oh, she’d be perfect. She’s got that sage-wise-woman quality about her that makes you listen to what she has to say.” Darcy wrote “Contact—Meredith?” beside the two. She looked up to find Kate staring at her. “What?”
    “Business cards. Dar, that’s the first joke I’ve heard you crack in nearly three months.”
    Darcy thought. “It is, isn’t it?”
    “And what’s with the ‘we’? Nobody left me a fortune to give away, you know,” Kate added, hesitantly.
    Darcy stopped short. She’d never even considered that she ought to ask Kate if she wanted to be involved. Perhaps that was a bad assumption. But she needed her. Badly. She looked at Kate intently. “You’re in on this, aren’t you? Kate, I can’t do this without you. You’ve got to be in on this.”
    Kate’s smile was as rich as the mousse. “You betcha. Wouldn’t miss it for the world.” She held out her hand. “Partners.”
    Darcy shook it, manicure to manicure. “Maybe co-conspirators is more accurate. But that sounds too…I don’t know…too criminal.” Darcy pondered. “What’d Robin Hood call his buddies?”
    Kate narrowed her eyes, thinking. “The Merry Men, wasn’t it?”
    “Ick. We need something better than that.”
    “Bandits of Beauty?”
    “Ugh. Even worse.”
    “Drive-by Pamperers.”
    Darcy laughed. “That sounds like we’re chucking diapers out of a minivan window. Definitely not.”
    “I’m stumped.”
    “Me, too.”
    Kate folded her hands under her chin. “Well, how do you feel? What word would you give to what’s happened to you today?”
    Darcy considered the question for a long moment. She finally said, “Healed. Put back together. Restored.”
    “Restored. I like the sound of that. That fits.”
    Without another word, Darcy put her pen to the top of the page and wrote, “The Restoration Project.”
    Kate nodded in agreement. “So it is written, so may it be done.”
    Darcy raised an eyebrow. “Where in the world did that come from?”
    “ Prince of Egypt. Jessica watches it constantly. She loves the funny camel faces.”
    Darcy held out the paper. “‘So it is written.’ Massage, partner dear?”
     
    Perhaps it would have been wiser to wait until she had it worked out better before telling Jack. Dinner had been great fun. Jack’s ogling of the “new and improved Darcy” was a terrific high. Jack took in her hair and nails and generally saucier new demeanor with manly fascination. She couldn’t even remember the last time she’d surprised Jack, much less with the kind of surprise that made him look like he’d give anything to have the kids somewhere else for a few hours.
    All of which went out the window when she mentioned she’d had the beginnings of an idea of what to do about the money. Darcy hadn’t realized, until just that moment, that Jack had never even considered going along with her dad’s instructions. Granted, she still felt a long way fromsure about her father’s request, but she hadn’t moved it completely from the realm of possibility—the way Jack obviously had.
    What started out as a whopping pile of money was quickly turning itself into a whopping load of conflict. Oh, great. Just what we need. When she told him about The Restoration Project, Jack stared at her as though she’d mentioned it might be a nice idea to sell the children into slavery. He was still holding the glass of Cherry Coke halfway to his mouth, frozen in astonishment.
    “You’re serious,” he said, almost under his breath.
    “Well, I don’t know