Falling Angel Read Online Free Page B

couldn’t stand to see you make the same mistakes I did. Anyway, I must go and get breakfast for Andrew. Love you.”
    Perversely, her mother’s dire warnings convinced Cara that she had overreacted the night before. She had to call Ben and apologize for running away, without a thank you or a goodbye. I will be polite and reserved, she told herself. I’ll tell him that I felt sick.
    The thought of hearing his warm voice over the line gave her a thrill of anticipation.
    She retrieved her coat from the hallway closet and searched the left pocket, and then the right, turning out a collection of old receipts, twisted pony-tail holders, candy wrappers and loose change.
    The business card Ben had given her was gone.

Chapter Three
    Cara felt through her coat pockets again to make sure there was no hole in the lining.
    Thinking back, she clearly remembered taking the card, reading it, and stuffing it into her pocket as she made her untimely departure from Ben’s apartment. Could it have flown out during her mad dash down Occidental Avenue? No. She remembered nervously sliding her fingers over its embossed surface as the taxi cab sped north to Madison Park, thinking about the fact that Ben had held that same card in his hand only moments before. Oh, well, it didn’t matter. She knew his name and it would be relatively easy to look him up. She’d call him after work.
     
    The bus dropped Cara off at the top of the hill that led down to the Vennemeyer’s sprawling compound on the shores of Mercer Island. Michael, Ingrid Vennemeyer’s personal assistant, was waiting in the Land Rover to take her down to the house. On the short drive Cara reflected on how much she enjoyed her new job, a welcome change from the tedious administrative positions she’d held since graduating from the University of Michigan.
    Cara’s mother Louise was the first friend Ingrid had made upon arriving in the United States from Sweden almost forty years earlier.
    She and Louise had quite a history together, sharing some of the most important milestones of each other’s lives. Ingrid was there when Louise first met Daniel, Cara’s father, and was maid of honor at their wedding. Louise was Ingrid’s matron of honor when she married her American sweetheart, Paul Vennemeyer, an engineer in the fledgling industry of home computing. Now, 34 years later, Paul was a vice-president at Emerald Systems, one of the top personal computer and software companies in the world, and Ingrid Gustavson-Vennemeyer had become one of the wealthiest women on the West Coast.
    Although Louise and Ingrid had lost touch over the years, when Cara announced her move to Seattle, Louise immediately thought to call her old friend. Ingrid, always generous to a fault, had hired Cara sight unseen.
    At first, Cara was wary of the situation, afraid that the job was primarily a means for her mother to keep tabs on her from a distance. But Ingrid’s unassuming manner soon put her at ease.
    “I don’t care what you do in your own time,” Ingrid told Cara on her first day at work. “My only suggestion to you is to have as much fun as you possibly can.” She winked at her and smiled, and Cara was astounded at how different she was from her own mother.
    With no children of her own, Ingrid, though a caring and compassionate person, showed no signs of maternal protectiveness. She rarely asked personal questions, and Cara was glad of it.
    She admired Ingrid, who despite her elevated circumstances had remained a level-headed, civic-minded Swede at heart. In addition to running Great Expectations, she was active on various fundraising committees and sat on the boards of the Seattle Art Museum, the Kruger-Kingston Infants’ Hospital and the Scandinavian Cultural Center.
    Thanks to her connections, innate sense of style, and complete willingness to go in and get her hands dirty when needed, she had pulled together some of the biggest weddings, auctions, and gala events in the greater Seattle