Part 24 (1/2)
”Thank you. But you deserve some of the credit. Your coaching has been a great help.”
”That's my job,” she said. ”Eileen said you have no other meetings this afternoon.”
”None. I didn't know how long this would take.”
She returned the slides to the manila folder, then circled her hands around the neck of the overhead projector. ”Then how about lunch?”
”Good idea.”
”Great. What do you say to San Francisco? I've got to run a few errands, and you can drop me off at home later in the afternoon since I don't have my car. It's being serviced.”
He hesitated, then shrugged. ”Why not. I think I deserve the rest of the day off. And I haven't been to the city for lunch in a long time.” He had forgotten that she lived in San Francisco.
Lunch, then a ride home.
They gathered his materials and in a few minutes were on the highway and heading for the city.
He felt relaxed in the car with her. With absurd clarity it occurred to him that while they had worked together almost constantly for several months, everything they had discussed pertained to business. How could he have been so focused on his work and not gotten to know her better? Now, he decided, was as good a time as any.
”How are you adjusting? This being your first full-time job and everything?”
”Excellent. Of course, working with you has made it all worth it.”
He had hired her fresh out of school, graduating with a communications degree from Villanova. The previous summer she had been an intern, working in the public relations department as an apprentice speech writer. On two occasions she had a.s.sisted Matthew in preparing his speeches. The impression she had left him with was so positive that he had had his secretary contact Laurence as she neared graduation, to ask if she would be interested in working for him as his personal press a.s.sistant.
Although she was inexperienced, she really had helped him.
Enormously. Not only where his public image was concerned, as when she had smoothly handled the press for him after Peter Jones's departure, but also with his self-image, the hours they spent together in coaching sessions, counseling him on his manner and style, reinforcing his self-confidence. He felt as though some transformation was about to happen between them, some new level of communication.
”...right there,” she said, pointing to the high hills and valley a half-mile in the distance, to the east.
He had been daydreaming. ”I'm sorry?” he said.
”My horse. That's where I keep my horse.”
”At Woodside Ranch?”
”Yes.”
”That's where my wife keeps hers, too.” He remembered Greta for the first time since leaving the house that morning.
”They have a new trainer who recently came to the States to start a new polo club. He's fabulous.”
”Maybe that's Greta's trainer.”
”It is,” Laurence said, then, quickly: ”I mean, he knows her, mentions her horse. He said Mighty Boy is the most beautiful horse he's ever seen.”
”He's something, all right,” Matthew said, changing lanes.
”I'm happy to be riding again. I've missed it so. In school I rarely got home to see my parents in Los Angeles. My father sponsors polo players, did I already mention that? I'm sorry, I'm rambling.”
”Not at all. I want to know more.”