Mind Over Matter

be outmaneuvered. With a laugh, A.J. rose. Clarissa would love that one, she mused.
    Walking around her desk, she let herself sink into the deep, wide-armed chair her mother had given her. The chair, unlike the heavy, clean-lined desk, was extravagant and impractical. Who else would have had a chair made in cornflower-blue leather because it matched her daughter’s eyes?
    A.J. realigned her thoughts and picked up the DeBasse contract. It was in the center of a desk that was meticulously in order. There were no photographs, no flowers, no cute paperweights. Everything on or in her desk had a purpose, and the purpose was business.
    She had time to give the contract one more thorough going-over before her appointment with David Brady. Before she met with him, she would understand every phrase, every clause and every alternative. She was just making a note on the final clause, when her buzzer rang. Still writing, A.J. cradled the phone at her ear.
    “Yes, Diane.”
    “Mr. Brady’s here, A.J.”
    “Okay. Any fresh coffee?”
    “We have sludge at the moment. I can make some.”
    “Only if I buzz you. Bring him back, Diane.”
    She turned her notepad back to the first page, then rose as the door opened. “Mr. Brady.” A.J. extended her hand, but stayed behind her desk. It was, she’d learned, important to establish certain positions of power right from the start. Besides, the time it took him to cross the office gave her an opportunity to study and judge. He looked more like someone she might have for a client than a producer. Yes, she was certain she could have sold that hard, masculine look and rangy walk. The laconic, hard-boiled detective on a weekly series; the solitary, nomadic cowboy in a feature film. Pity.
    David had his own chance for study. He hadn’t expected her to be so young. She was attractive in that streamlined, no-nonsense sort of way he could respect professionally and ignore personally. Her body seemed almost too slim in the sharply tailored suit that was rescued from dullness by a fire-engine-red blouse. Her pale blond hair was cut in a deceptively casual style that shagged around the ears, then angled back to sweep her collar. It suited the honey-toned skin that had been kissed by the sun—or a sunlamp. Her face was oval, her mouth just short of being too wide. Her eyes were a rich blue, accentuated by clever smudges of shadow and framed now with oversize glasses. Their hands met, held and released as hands in business do dozens of times every day.
    “Please sit down, Mr. Brady. Would you like some coffee?”
    “No, thank you.” He took a chair and waited until she settled behind the desk. He noticed that she folded her hands over the contract. No rings, no bracelets, he mused. Just a slender, black-banded watch. “It seems we have a number of mutual acquaintances, Ms. Fields. Odd that we haven’t met before.”
    “Yes, isn’t it?” She gave him a small, noncommittal smile. “But, then, as an agent, I prefer staying in the background. You met Clarissa DeBasse.”
    “Yes, I did.” So they’d play stroll around the bush for a while, he decided, and settled back. “She’s charming. I have to admit, I’d expected someone, let’s say, more eccentric.”
    This time A.J.’s smile was both spontaneous and generous. If David had been thinking about her on a personal level, his opinion would have changed. “Clarissa is never quite what one expects. Your project sounds interesting, Mr. Brady, but the details I have are sketchy. I’d like you to tell me just what it is you plan to produce.”
    “A documentary on psychic phenomena, or psi, as I’m told it’s called in studies, touching on clairvoyance, parapsychology, ESP, palmistry, telepathy and spiritualism.”
    “Séances and haunted houses, Mr. Brady?”
    He caught the faint disapproval in her tone and wondered about it. “For someone with a psychic for a client, you sound remarkably cynical.”
    “My client doesn’t talk to departed souls or read tea leaves.” A.J. sat back in the chair in a way she knew registered confidence and position. “Miss DeBasse has proved herself many times over to be an extraordinarily sensitive woman. She’s never claimed to have supernatural powers.”
    “Supernormal.”
    She drew in a quiet breath. “You’ve done your homework. Yes, ‘supernormal’ is the correct term. Clarissa doesn’t believe in overstatements.”
    “Which is one of the reasons I want Clarissa DeBasse for my