Getting Married by Theresa Alan Read Free Book Online Page A

as the conversation ebbs. Then I think of something else we can talk about—my phone conversation with Mom. I tell him the story about the chair and he laughs.

    “I can’t wait to meet her. I can’t wait to meet all of your family,” he says.

    “I know. I can’t wait for them to meet you.”

    “Who should I meet first?”

    “It doesn’t matter.”

    “Why don’t we fly out to New York sometime in the next month and visit Sienna?”

    “This weekend is the barbeque for Jon, but any other weekend after that would work for me. I’ll call Sienna and see what would be good for her.”

    As Will drives us back to his place, I call Sienna on my cell phone and ask her if there would be a weekend when Will and I could come out sometime in the near future.

    “I perform every Saturday night for the next month,” she says.

    “Perfect. We want to see you perform. I want to show off how talented you are to Will.”

    “Let me talk to Mark. Hang on.” She puts the phone down for a minute and then gets back on. We decide we’ll come out three weekends from now.

    “Just call when you get your flight information,” she says.

    “Will do. Later, kiddo.”

    I click my cell phone off and smile. I’m excited about not having to live in two places from now on. I’m excited about being able to wake up to Will next to me every morning. I suppose that maybe I should be more nervous about this. After all, it’s a major life change, but it’s one I’ve been anticipating almost since we met. It seems silly to have to pay two mortgages and have to commute from one place to the other every day.

    I reach my hand out to hold Will’s and give it a warm squeeze.

Chapter 4

    O ne thing about working from home is that you get addicted to lounging around in sweats. However, I suspect that I’d appear somewhat unprofessional if I showed up to my meeting with the executives from WP in PJs and bunny slippers, so I wrestle my way into nylons, heels, and a sedate slate gray skirt and jacket.
    I’ve done some work for them before, primarily helping with new product launches. I worked for the company when Warren Woodruff was still running things. Warren had launched the business as a small-scale manufacturer of drugs like headache medicine and cough syrup. He built it into a major cutting-edge biopharmaceutical firm that was one of the top producers of prescription and over-the-counter drugs in the country. He’d done it by being a marketing powerhouse and by heavily investing in research and development, which enabled the scientists who worked for the company to make major discoveries and breakthroughs. Warren stepped down a year ago and handed over the reigns to his eldest son, Kyle, who had almost no management experience. Kyle’s appointment caused a major buzz among the in-the-know businesspeople in the Denver area.

    The receptionist guides me to the boardroom where I wait for twenty minutes for the four men I’m meeting with finally to show up.

    “Eva Lockhart? So good to meet you! I’m Kyle Woodruff.”

    Kyle is my age but he seems much younger. He’s thin and he apparently skipped over the part of puberty that was supposed to add bulk to his chest and shoulders. Doogie Howser comes to mind. He smiles at me and it takes me a second to figure out what is jarring about his smile. Then I realize that it’s a caricature of a smile. Everything about it is big. Big teeth, thin lips that stretch wide as rubber bands, large gaping open-mouthed big . I shake hands with him and he crushes my fingers with his grip. He doesn’t look like he’s capable of crushing my hand, but I guess that’s the point, he needs to prove he’s not the lightweight he looks like.

    “Glad to meet you! Glad you could stop by!” Kyle says.

    “It’s nice to meet you, too,” I say, shaking Kyle’s hand.

    He points to the three men flanking him around the business table. “Eva Lockhart, this is Michael Evans, the senior vice president