Got Your Number

it much. If it happens, it happens."
    "Oh, now see—that's a myth. Nothing 'just happens.' You have to help things along."
    "To what end?"
    "Well...to happily-ever-after, of course."
    "You were jilted at the altar yesterday, and you still believe in happily-ever-after?"
    "Well, sure. What else is there?"
    "How about 'contentedly-ever-after'?"
    "Can you be content without a man?"
    Roxann nodded. "I am content without a man." Eighty-four percent true.
    Angora sighed. "Then you're a stronger woman than I am. I couldn't stand it, working with scared women all the time, moving around, changing jobs, having no money, being alone." Another sigh. "You're so brave."
    She frowned. "Thanks."
    "I mean it. It takes guts to chuck your education and go out on a limb for people you don't know and might never see again."
    She frowned harder.
    "To sacrifice your own happiness so that—"
    "Okay, Angora. You're making me blush."
    She sighed again, with more drama. "I thought by now I would have done something with my life, and now I'm starting over."
    "Have you been working for the museum all these years?"
    "Yes, and it's dreadful. They treat me like I'm an idiot."
    "So why do you work there?"
    "Well, Ms. Valedictorian, after graduation, I didn't have as many options as you did. Not much I could do with a degree in art history—even Daddy couldn't find a place for me in the hotel business—so the museum job seemed promising. By the time I realized it was a dead end, I had met Trenton and wanted to be near him and his family." Her laugh was hollow. "I guess I am an idiot. I was never smart, like you. Of course you know that."
    Except a high IQ did not a smart person make. If she was so smart, for instance, why had she brought Angora with her on the lam? Right now the woman was sitting there waiting for a nugget of brilliant advice.
    "You can't make someone love you," Roxann said slowly. "You're only responsible for your own feelings and actions." She'd counseled hundreds of women with those same lines.
    Angora lifted her head. "You know, you're absolutely right."
    Encouraged, she continued. "Isn't there some small part of you that's relieved you didn't marry Trenton?"
    "No, I was really looking forward to marrying a rich man and living hundreds of miles from my parents."
    So much for magic words.
    "I'm not like you, Roxann. I want it all—a husband, a home, kids. I can't be happy helping other people live their lives."
    It was a good thing that Angora withdrew a foot-long emery board from her purse and began sawing on her nails, because Roxann was speechless over the backhanded compliment. Everything Angora had said was true—she did chuck her education, work with scared women, move around, change jobs, live frugally, and was, for the most part, alone. And she did help other people live their lives. So why did a lifestyle that had once seemed noble and romantic sound downright bleak when someone else described it?
    And worse, Angora truly believed that her cousin had sacrificed a man, a home, and a family so that she could devote her life to others. But in truth, she was starting to feel resentful of her thankless job, and of the string of needy women who stood between her and her own happily-ever-after.
    Roxann went cold remembering the eerie message on her computer screen. She was a fake, going through the motions of benevolence with an empty heart. She was counting on the gratitude of the forlorn women she aided to fill the void in her gypsy life, which wasn't fair, or even reasonable.
    "Are you okay?" Angora asked. "You look a little green."
    "Still a little hung over," she lied.
    "Would you like for me to drive?"
    It had taken Angora eight attempts to get her driver's license. "No, I'm fine. Why don't you take a nap?" Now that the confrontation with Dee was over, Angora was limp, and yawning between every sentence. Plus Roxann wanted to be alone with her own thoughts—not a good sign ten miles down the highway on a proposed two-week road trip.
    "No...I want to stay awake," Angora said, but her voice was groggy. She put her purse behind her head and leaned back. Her eyelids fluttered. "So you don't fall asleep...at the—"
    The nose job took over and the snoring set in. Roxann shook her head and wondered again what she'd gotten herself into. And at the worst possible time. She adjusted the rearview mirror, alert for a tail, but few cars were on the neighborhood roads of Baton Rouge at this hour. Besides, even if Frank Cape