“Thanks,” she replied, encouraged by Jim’s praise. “I’d like to think we’ll attract motivated students.”
Scott nodded. “But I doubt Leonard will be happy about that. I was talking with Marc Dunbar the other day and he said the old man is bent on building the journalism department so they’ll have more majors than we do.”
“Let him try. Amanda’s got a figure the male students will like. That’s a bonus for us, don’t you think?” Jim sat back in his chair, then glanced at her before looking over at Scott. “Sorry, Amanda. Not very PC, am I? Hope you’re not offended.”
She shrugged. “No harm done.”
“Jimbo, we’re supposed to be thinking in terms of academics, like how Amanda here has already charmed JJ into working with her.” Scott raised his glass in her direction. “You asked for pointers at our faculty meeting, something we’d expect from a newbie. I’m not so sure about Winslow. He probably needs more help than you do, but he didn’t ask. And I wasn’t impressed with him—too casually dressed, not very forthcoming with what he’s doing, that sort of thing.”
Scott turned back to her, his gaze dropping to her left hand for a fraction of a second, as if checking for a ring.
“Tell us more about yourself, Amanda. You were pretty quiet in the meeting. Didn’t Beatrice say you have a daughter? But you’re not married, right?” Scott asked.
Amanda creased her brow, then opened her mouth to speak.
“Come on,” Scott interrupted. “Don’t look at me like that. I’m happily married—just like Jim here. I was just thinking of some of the other faculty—the single ones.”
“Anyone in particular come to mind?” She recovered enough to give him a brief smile.
“For sure not Winslow. Talk about a cold fish with a big ego. He’s not married—that I know for sure.”
The three of them continued to chat while finishing their coffee. Amanda returned to her office. Carlton had insisted on taking nearly all of the bookshelf space. She debated asking the secretary if the bookshelf in the conference room was available for her books. The oversized desk—“bigenough for two,” Beatrice, the department secretary, had said when it was moved into the office—took up nearly all the free space, leaving little room for the extra chair she expected students to use during office hours, or maybe herselfif Carl occupied the larger chair. He had already centered his monster desktop computer facing the larger chair. An equally bulky printer sat closer to the window out of which she could see part of the mountain range in the distance. She sighed. If he was going to use the office daily—in order to finish his dissertation—it was going to be a long year.But this was not the time to ask for special favors, not at the beginning of the term. I’ll just have to see how we can work things out.
She collected her papers, nodded in Carl’s direction when he glanced briefly at her, and headed out the door of the department, rubbing the head of the Shakespeare sculpture as she left, a sculpture the chairman had acquired on a long-ago European trip. It held a place of honor at the entrance to the department. Everyone rubbed Will’s head for good luck, according to Beatrice. Let’s hope I don’t need it.
Chapter 2
Marcus sat on the porch swing, enjoying the cool evening breeze as the moon rose above the tree line. He reached for his phone to call the new faculty members who had not yet returned his questionnaire. Only two of them, both in the English department. No one answered when he called Carl Winslow’s place. A message would have to do.
Now for the other one. Amanda Gardner. The woman wore her dark hair in a chic pixie cut. At the dean’s house he had spotted her immediately in a colorful vest over a white blouse with puffy sleeves, and a short skirt that showed off her trim legs. She seemed shy. Her gaze had slid away from his facewhen she’d asked for more time to study the questions before returning his sheet. Her dark hair framed a high-cheekboned, slim face. A silver chain half-hidden by the cut of her blouse had winked in the lamplight.
Beautiful, he mused. What kind of brains are behind that beauty? Greg Hillier wasn’t one to be swayed by appearances.Marcus thought back to the most recent general faculty meeting when the Australian-born chair of the English department had harangued others about the importance of the “qualities that mattered.” I’ll bet this is her first post-grad position.
She didn’t seem at all like the full-figured music professor, also new, whose affectations in pronouncing her name had prompted smiles from the others. Eugenie Freeman reminded him of Felicity, the way she had come on to him, not waiting for him to make the first move. Felicity’s actions had implied she was ready to settle down, something he very much wanted—a wife and family, his own home. Instead, Felicity had broken his heart.