“On it,” Brooke said, taking the dog and hurrying off.
“Mr. King, I am so, so sorry.” To make do until Brooke returned, Kate grabbed a handful of tissues and blotted the floor. “I don’t know why she did that. She’s been potty-trained for so long, but lately, it seems she’s forgotten everything. I will clean that up right away.” She was babbling but couldn’t stop.
“It’s all right. It wasn’t that much pee,” he said. “It surprised me more than anything.”
Brooke returned with a roll of paper towels and left again. Adam moved to the other chair and sat again as Kate approached him.
“Let me just quickly take care of this.” As she bent to wipe off his shoes, there was an unmistakable sound of material ripping. They both froze, and the silence dragged on for several seconds. She took a few last hasty swipes at his shoes and then stood slowly, eyes wide in disbelief. Could this get any worse? His eyes also widened, and a smile pulled at his lips. She sensed that he wanted to laugh but was waiting to see what she would do.
Determined to keep the meeting on track, she slid out of her suit jacket and wrapped it around her waist. Then she casually inched backward, returning to her desk and sitting primly, crossing her legs and smoothing her hair. She adjusted the pens in their holder and made sure the binders were at perfect angles—one directly in front of her and one directly in front of him.
“Sorry again about that. Where were we? Oh, yes, I was asking if you’d thought about a 1031 exchange? It would help avoid most of the taxes if we did it right.”
He was chivalrous enough to let her get away with ignoring the fact that she’d just ruined a perfectly good skirt, and her ass was feeling a draft. He followed her lead and acted as if nothing had happened. Thank God.
“I have thought of that. The logistics seem tough with so many properties though,” he said.
“That’s true. But what about putting the properties into bundles and selling them as groups rather than one by one? Or even all the properties together as one big portfolio?”
“Wouldn’t that limit potential buyers?”
“It would definitely limit your buyer pool, yes, but the exchange timelines are stringent, and you wouldn’t want to miss out on that waiting for a lot of separate sales to be finalized. It’s something to think about anyway.”
“Do you also work with commercial properties? I’m considering that as an option too.”
“Oh, and don’t tell me. Let me guess.” She looked to the ceiling and tossed her pencil in the air. “You have a property in mind, andall it needsis for the city to rezone it. And do Ihappen to knowanyone at city hall who could help?”
Her father was the mayor of New Bern, and if she had a nickel for every man who’d dated her just to get something from him, well, she’d have about fifteen cents. Still, she was tired of being used for her connections.
“Um, I have no idea what you’re talking about. I don’t have any specific property in mind, so I don’t need anything rezoned. I was simply asking if you work in commercial properties.” If she was reading him right, he was hanging between confused and irritated at her outburst.
“I’m sorry. So sorry. My father is the mayor, and I get a lot of people trying to get to him through me. It gets old,” she finished lamely. “Please, forget I said anything. Shall we go through the presentation I prepared?” She inched the binder sitting on the desk in front of him a little closer.
He picked it up and flipped through it. “Why’s the font so big?”
“Must have been a clerical error or something,” she muttered, looking away. He saw through her lie immediately.
“Oh my gosh. You thought I was going to be old, didn’t you?” He finally did laugh, long and loud.
His laugh was infectious, and she couldn’t help but smile. “Well, you do have a ton of homes. I figured you’d been acquiring them for years. And if you had been old, it would have been helpful, right?”
He nodded once. “Look, why don’t I take this with me and read it later? I’ll call you once I make a decision.” Standing, he left her no choice but to follow suit.
She adjusted the jacket tied around her waist and motioned with her hand that he precede her out the door, just in case not everything was covered. He gave her a knowing smile and exited first.
Standing next to Brooke in the lobby, Kate watched as he got into his car and threw the binder onto the passenger seat without a second glance.
“That. Did not go well,” Kate deadpanned as he squealed his tires, trying to get out of there fast.
“What happened?”
“Oh. You mean after Luna peed on him? Well, I bent to wipe off his shoe and ripped my skirt right up the back. Then I insulted him by suggesting he was using me to get to my father and finished it off by assuming he was old and blind.”
Brooke moaned.
“Damn it,” Kate said. “We needed that gig. That would have put us on the map, you know?”
“Maybe there’s still hope. What’d he say about the presentation?”