Moving On

Chapter 5 - Part 1

Kate stepped into her office, keeping her head low as she hastened past Evelyn's room.

"Miss Mitchell, a client—"

Her index finger flew to her lips, trying to shush her employee.

"Why didn't you pick up your phone?" Evelyn asked, her voice deadly serious.

Sighing softly at her failed attempt to sneak past Evelyn's office, Kate turned around and lengthened her steps toward her own office while her hand dug into the bag. "Sorry, I didn't hear it. I thought I'd be in and out of the house in a few minutes so I left my phone in the bag, and I left my bag in the car. As you can see, I'm still alive and well."

Evelyn closed her eyes and took in a deep breath through her nose.

Not good.

"I'm kidding, and I'm sorry." Kate took out her phone and sent a quick text to Tyler. "Let's get to work," she suggested before Evelyn could continue her lecture on the 101 reasons why she shouldn't be staying with Tyler at the mansion.

Before she could put her things down and settle into her chair, her phone buzzed. The notification flashed across the screen; a text message from Tyler.

"Did he just text you?" Evelyn asked, incredulous. "I thought you said he was awful."

Kate glowered at Evelyn. "I didn't say he was awful. I said he wasn't a bundle of joy." Kate repeated what she'd said that morning as she read the text.

Everything all right? Hope I didn't get you into trouble with your friend.

Evelyn snatched the phone from her hand and turned away.

"Eve!" Kate tried to grab her phone back, but Evelyn was too fast for her. Evelyn used her back as a shield and stretched her hands forward, making sure that the phone was out of Kate's reach.

With lightning speed, Evelyn's fingers worked across the QWERTY keyboard.

"Are we in elementary school?" Kate grumbled as she stretched over Evelyn's shoulder.

She was so focused on getting her phone back that she hadn't realized all their staff was staring at them through the glass.

When she finally noticed the stares, she pressed the switch on the remote to fog up the glass.

"Give me back my phone."

The moment Evelyn returned Kate's phone, Debussy's Clair de Lune broke the momentary truce. She quickly turned and picked up the phone before Evelyn could snatch it from her. "Hey."

"Kate?"

"Yeah." She shot a warning glare over to Evelyn.

"Are you all right?"

Uncertain about what Evelyn had sent out in the text, she decided to come clean rather than pretend to know what was going on. "Sorry, Eve sent out the last text. I have no idea what she sent, but you can just ignore her."

"Marianne's cooking. Why don't you ask Evelyn over for dinner?"

"Dinner?" Kate cast an uncertain glance in Evelyn's direction.

"Then she can take a look around at where you're staying."

"But the eight p.m. rule about guests ..."

"We can have an early dinner. I'm sure Marianne can get it ready by ... six?"

She doubted a dinner at the mansion would shut Evelyn up, but she did have to stay there for a year. If there was a chance that Evelyn would back off, she'd take it. "All right. We'll be back by six. I'll tell her to play nice, but please don't expect it."

"Not a problem. See you at six."

Kate could sense Evelyn's eyes on her throughout her phone conversation with Tyler.

Once she hung up the call, Evelyn asked, "Where are we going?"

"To the mansion, for dinner with Tyler and Marianne," Kate said as she tapped into the message application to read the text that Evelyn had sent.

Yes, she is. She shouldn't be staying with someone she doesn't know. If you harm her in any way, I swear I'll hunt you down and bury you somewhere in the creepy woods.

Kate's fingers splayed across her eyes and forehead. "Eve, thanks for being concerned about my well-being, but really? Do you have to add in the part about burying him?"

Evelyn rolled her eyes. "It's a threat; that's what a threat looks like."

Kate sat and leaned back against her chair. "Can we begin our work now?"

She rushed through the proposal she had been preparing for the new bed and breakfast she was working on, a bed and breakfast aimed at attracting city dwellers like her to the country.

In order to make sure that the city dwellers not get a rude shock, or feel as though they were still in the city, she'd worked to put in country elements without over-cluttering it.

Evelyn had already managed to find a few pieces of the furniture she wanted.

Kate simply had to make the final decision on which items would make it to the actual installment. Though she had hundreds of photos of that place, she needed to take a trip down before making the final decision.

She had to get a feel of the place for herself and look at the changes that the renovations had made.

It would save tons of trouble as compared to getting the pieces of furniture and planning a room, only to realize that the new floorings or the colors of the walls didn't match.

She scanned through her calendar, trying to find a date when she could make the trip down and perhaps stay over for the weekend. Just before she set the date down in her calendar, she remembered the conditions of the will.

She would have to ask Tyler along.

He had been much friendlier that morning, and they seemed to be on better terms. Hopefully, he wouldn't mind taking a weekend off.

She would ask him later after dinner, after Evelyn had gone home.

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