Page 79 of Lucas & Melissa Falling in Love
She’s not smiling, at least not at me. But after giving me a curt nod, she shifts her gaze to Lucas and the note of pleasure registers on her face as unmistakable as a fire alarm. It‘s subtle, but I know how to read these things. It’s the kind of thing I look for.
Will I forever need to be vigilant about the reaction of other women to Lucas’s charms? I decide it’s a cross I can bear as long as he sleeps in my bed at night—or any other time of day.
“Melissa Cooper, I’m Barbara Bench. And you must be Lucas Fierro. Come in and follow me to my office.” She speaks with efficiency and brings to mind a drill sergeant. I figure she’s in her early forties, which makes sense since she has to have been working for a while to build up her reputation. If I have to say, though no one’s holding a gun to my head, she is attractive. Her short blond hair is flawlessly cut to flatter her face and emphasize her square jaw, which reminds me of Farrah Fawcett. She’s no Farrah though. She lacks any kind of fun vibe, as if the job has robbed her of it and left her with nothing but a serious businesslike demeanor.
We walk about thirty feet down a carpeted corridor, following her compact figure. She’s average height. I’m taller but I can sense the ropy muscles under the snug suit. She could probably beat me at arm wrestling—if that was the game. But it’s not.
You’re not in a competition with this woman, Melissa. Get over yourself. Leave your competitive streak at the office.
Lucas has his hand on my back the whole way, but he doesn’t say anything, barely greeted Barbara. I want to ask him what he’s thinking, but Barbara opens the door in front of us and we walk into the proverbial big-ass corner office. The kind of office I’m aiming for. Now I admire the woman, though I should have in the first place.
“Have a seat. I’ll make this as quick and painless as possible. Lucas didn’t give me much information when he called, so I’m going to need everything you have. Anything you can tell me about your biological parents—names, locations, ethnicity, documents, everything and anything.”
We’re barely seated in the side-by-side chairs when she looks at me, expecting me to dive in. I’m game. Opening my bag, it takes me a millisecond to pull out an envelope. In it is the letter from my birth grandmother that had been given to me as part of her will, along with the money.The money which is now all gone.
“This is from my maternal grandmother. It’s a copy so you can keep it. I was given a large sum of money upon her death. It’s my understanding that my father came from a wealthy New York family and lived in Manhattan or the wealthy suburbs. His mistress was my mother. I know nothing about her.”
“Except that she was beautiful,” Barbara said.
I nod, adopting my gracious princess demeanor. Lucas squeezes my hand and I dart a look at him to see his dimple. Now I feel as at ease as I appear to be. We wait only a few seconds as she speed-reads the letter, then folds it and puts it in a folder on her otherwise empty desk.
“How much money did she leave you and how much do you still have?”
The directness shouldn’t have surprised me.
“Is this information necessary?” Lucas speaks on my behalf.
“It’s all right, Lucas. She wants to know if I’m after money.”
“Are you?”
“No,” I say. It’s true and it hits me that the idea of my birth father offering to give me money now repulses me. I shudder. Noticing that Lucas’s face went stony, I squeeze his hand back. He knows she’s doing her job, but he’s so protective of me. I think I like it. Right now, in this moment I do.
She nods. “I’m sorry to be blunt.” She’s looking at Lucas. “But it’s important for me to know these things one way or another before going into a situation. It affects the approach I take.
“I understand,” he says, but he doesn’t like it.
“Is this all you have?” she asks.
“Yes.”
“You don’t know the name of your grandmother? Where the money came from? How it was transferred to you? Who the lawyer was who contacted you or your parents? How old were you at the time you received this?”
“I was fourteen.” Now it’s my turn to go stony. “I’ll find out from my parents if they have that information. They handled it all at the time.” When I’d asked them in the past, when I was eighteen and came into the money, they’d insisted they had no information, no idea who my birth parents were, but now if I ask, I think they’ll give it to me. They must at least have a contact name, the name of a lawyer and a banker or financial person.
“Do you have enough to go on, to get started?” Lucas asked while my mind spun in a vicious circle about my parents and what they could know and why they might or might not tell me.
“Yes. We’re more likely to find your mother first. We’ll start by tracking down the hospital where you were born and talk to people.”
“Sounds like this could take some time,” Lucas says.
“Unless Melissa comes up with more information from her parents, yes, it could take months, if not longer. It sounds like a case where your father purposefully wanted to remain anonymous and may have gone to some trouble to hide his identity.”
I nod because what else can I say? That was always my working theory too. Based on the letter from my grandmother. Based on everything my father told me. My mother never talked about it. She let my father handle all the details.
Barbara looks at me, “What bank do you have the money in? I’ll need you to sign off on some documents so that I can contact your bank. Often times I can find where the money deposited came from.”
“Bank of New York City. The account is almost empty now.” I don’t know why I admitted this. She would have found out, but I preferred to be brutally honest about this. She says nothing as she slides some papers in front of me and hands me a pen. I scrawl my name.
