Ms. Money Bags

Chapter 3

Chapter 3

“It's been positively dreary without you here,” Faye announced. Her red silk shirt shimmered in the candlelight, the color a spot on match to her perfectly applied lipstick.

“Really?” Presley didn’t believe a word of it. Faye was one of her oldest friends. Besties since childhood, attended the same college, and knew each other’s deepest secrets. Presley had never known Faye to live a dreary existence, but she was prone to drama.

“Grace's filming schedule was delayed so she hasn't been here. Ronnie is still in New York, probably working herself to the bone. I didn't have anybody to play with,” Faye whined into her martini.

They were enjoying an early dinner at a sleek yet comfortable restaurant in Aspen. Faye kept a house in Aspen and when she was there she spent most of her time skiing, going to various spas, or socializing. Although Faye’s version of skiing was more about sipping hot toddies in the lodge near a fireplace and flirting with the occasional snowboarder than actually flying down the slopes. She came from money, a lot of money, and had never worked a day in her life. She did spend a lot of time loudly resenting her friend’s desire to do so. Still, Presley knew that Faye was mostly teasing. Underneath her beautiful, well maintained, and costly exterior was a basically nice person with a good sense of humor.

“What about Ruby? Hasn't she been up here planning her big fundraiser?” Presley asked, sipping her own drink, a cosmopolitan.

Ruby ran nonprofits. She was the do-gooder of their group of friends, and her pocketbook reflected that fact. All of them had spent every summer together as kids at a luxury camp for girls near Aspen. They were five total: Presley, her little sister, Veronica who they called Ronnie, Faye, Grace, and Ruby. Their friendship had endured through decades.

Faye let out a sigh. “She's been so wrapped up with the details of her party she hasn't had time to do anything with me. I'll be glad when it’s all over this weekend.”

They ordered dinner and another cocktail as Presley regaled her friend with her recent difficulties at Mack Industries. Faye tried to stay focused on Presley’s complaints surrounding the business side of things, but she kept returning to her favorite, and Presley’s least favorite, part of the whole subject, Hobie.

“I haven’t seen him around anywhere for years,” Faye said. “What does he look like now?”

Presley rolled her eyes. “He looks like a degenerate architect. Even his name sounds like a surfer dude who’s spent too much time baking in the sun.”

Faye’s well defined eyebrows lifted with interest and she cooed, “That sounds delicious.”

“He’s not delicious. He’s ridiculous.”

Just how ridiculous was not something Presley wanted to relive over dinner. She wanted to forget about her recent entanglement with him, which had begun with her awkward fall and ended with her looking like a macabre clown trying to conduct a powerful business meeting. Forgetting the second time they had encountered each other at her offices in New York a few days later was preferable, too.

He had shown up in his standard issue brown sport coat and jeans. Presley wondered if he owned any other clothing, but checked herself before she asked him out loud. He had brought Barcom’s CFO, a wild haired elderly woman named Mary Collins who kept asking for water and had a thick cough. The two of them had monopolized Presley’s morning and then, right when they had been getting to a place where she thought they could wrap all of this up and hand everything over to her team so she wouldn’t have to think about it on her trip to Aspen, Hobie’s cell phone buzzed with a text. And he stopped everything to read it.

Presley had been astounded at the blatant disrespect for her time, let alone her team’s time. After looking at his phone, Hobie’s admittedly ruggedly handsome face turned ashen and he had excused himself–excused himself! Stunned by his rudeness, Presley and her team had forged ahead with the phlegmy Mary, but hadn’t been able to come to terms. The memory of it still made Presley angry. She took another sip of her cosmopolitan to quell the feeling.

Faye was halfway through her second martini and looking openly relaxed. “I always thought Hobie was handsome.”

“No, you’re thinking of his brother, Danny.”

“Am I?”

Presley nodded confidently. “You must be.”

Faye looked off into the middle distance and pondered that assertion. Then she shook her head coyly and turned her grey eyes back to Presley. “No, I remember both of them. Hobie was always aloof, you know, secretive and morose in a tall, lean, delicious kind of way.”

Presley pursed her lips in mild disgust. “I don’t remember that at all.”

“Of course, Danny was gorgeous as well. It’s too bad what’s happened to him.”

Presley’s eyebrows pinched together, uncertain to what Faye was referring. “What are you talking about?”

Faye’s expression changed into pity, obviously sorry for Danny, but also sorry for Presley for not knowing about it. She leaned in closer so others around them wouldn’t hear and, in a stage whisper caused by her martinis, she said, “He’s got cancer. In his brain I think.” Taken aback by this news, Presley made a sympathetic sound. She had not heard. Faye continued, “Poor thing. He has a family, you know. A wife and two kids. And he’s been running Barcom since the day he graduated from college, practically. His father wasn’t able to keep up the pace so Danny took over.”

A queer emptiness entered Presley’s stomach, replacing the annoyed anger at Hobie that had previously settled there. “I didn’t know,” was all she could think to say.

Faye patted her hand like she was precious, yet impossibly simple. “Of course you didn’t know. How could you know?” She waved her other hand in the air to signal to the waiter she desired a third martini. “That’s why Hobie’s back from Asia…or Africa, maybe. I’m not sure where he’s been.”

The waiter brought Faye her martini and another cosmopolitan for Presley. She waved it away. She was already going to have to spend extra time running tomorrow to burn off this night out. Faye didn’t have a problem eating and drinking to her heart’s content without it ever changing her lithe figure, but Presley’s genes were not that forgiving.

Her mind was clicking through all of this new information. Hobie hadn’t been in charge long, which might explain his complete lack of business decorum. And general decorum. Maybe she could use that to her advantage. Get the best terms for Mack Industries. Between Mary Collins as their CFO and a green Hobie in charge, it shouldn’t be a problem. Considering this new information, she was actually glad they hadn’t gotten everything determined in New York before she left.

Presley felt the familiar surge of excitement she always had when she figured out the power play in a business deal. She hadn’t sat at the knee of Mack Monroe for years watching him do business without learning anything. Not that she was glad Danny Brent had brain cancer, that was a terrible thing to be sure. But as far as what that meant for her dealings with Hobie, she saw light at the end of the tunnel. She wanted more information and who else knew more than anyone about everything? Why, her good friend, Faye, of course.

“Hobie’s been out of the country for a while?” she asked nonchalantly.

Faye grinned at her slyly. “I see your little brain working. What are you cooking up?”

“Nothing, I’m only curious.”

“Oh,” Faye swished her hand in the air as if shooing away all suspicions, “You’re only curious.” She giggled and tasted her new martini. Presley waited patiently. One thing she knew about Faye was that she would spill the beans on almost anything once she’d had a few martinis. Finally, she began, “I think he’s been in Asia most recently. But he spent a long time in Africa before that. He might have even gone to school there, you know, after he left Jessup.”

Jessup Academy was the prep school Presley and Faye had attended through graduation. Some memories of the Brent brothers were returning to Presley as Faye spoke.

“Why did he leave Jessup? Danny didn’t,” Presley asked.

Faye’s eyes widened with shock at how much her friend really didn’t keep track of other people’s lives. “Honestly, Presley, you don’t remember?”

“No, I don’t remember.”

“Their mother died,” Faye declared, shaking her head with dismay. “It was sad. You really don’t remember?”

Presley thought back to high school and all of its turmoil. There were boys and clothes and her own mother to deal with, let alone trying to get good grades in that hyper competitive school. As much as she had crushed on Danny Brent, his little brother had not been on her radar.

“I remember Danny graduating, because I remember his senior stunt,” she offered.

“Yes, but Danny was two years ahead of us. Hobie left before graduation.”

“Well, I remember that much,” Presley dismissed Faye’s concern over her lack of recollection. “I just didn’t remember why.”

Faye readjusted in her seat, leaning back and taking in the scenery of other well to do patrons at the restaurant. Dining out contributed significantly to the interactions of the upper class who lived in Aspen. Faye saw someone she knew enter and gave them a polite nod and smile before continuing, “Their mother got very sick and Hobie left school to be with her. I think she had cancer, too. That’s sad, isn’t it?”

“That is sad,” Presley agreed. She wasn’t completely cold hearted to such things.

“Oh, that’s right,” Faye said, more to herself than to Presley. “That’s what he’s been doing with his time. He runs some research project or nonprofit or something that has to do with the cancer his mother died from.” Faye’s eyes teared up at the thought of it, “How sweet. Isn’t that sweet?”

Presley wouldn’t go as far as to call Hobie Brent “sweet”. Still, it explained his general inability to impress her with his negotiating skills. And maybe it explained him being distracted. She was sorry that he’d lost his mother and sorry that Danny was sick, but ultimately none of that was anything she could solve or worry about. She could handle this whole deal better knowing that Hobie would rather be somewhere else doing something else. She would just take over and make it easy on him. And if Mack Industries came out ahead in the deal then so be it.

“I bet Ruby knows what the name of it is,” Faye was still rambling on.

“The name of what?”

“Hobie’s nonprofit research group.”

“Oh,” Presley picked up the menu. They hadn’t even ordered yet.

“She should be here by the time we get dessert,” Faye continued. “And Ronnie and Grace better be here by Wednesday, I’ve reserved the spa for us to rejuvenate and get gorgeous.”

Presley agreed. She looked forward to spending a spa day with her friends, but she already felt rejuvenated now that she knew what to do about Hobie Brent.