Free Twelve Nights by Carole Remy Page A

I need the money.”
    An awful possibility occurred to Aggie. “You’re not hooked
on drugs, are you?”
    “No.” Angela stated flatly. “I’ve never touched anything.
Not that they aren’t around. That’s not why I want the money. I just want to
make a new start.”
    “You can do that without $120,000.”
    “Can you see me in some poky apartment drudging every day at
some stupid job?”
    “Is that how you see my life?” Aggie asked, surprised and
hurt.
    “No, stupid. You have a house and a good job. You were smart
and got a degree in library science. I was the stupid creative one. Now I’m not
fit to do anything real. I thought maybe I’d go back to school, become a lawyer
or something.”
    Aggie couldn’t argue. Angela had always been smart in a
careless way. Aggie had gotten the better marks, but Angela’s B’s had come
easily. If she had the determination to go back to school, Aggie was sure she
would be successful. She made one last try to dissuade her from what she saw as
unnecessary self-degradation.
    “Come to Cincinnati and live with me while you go to
school.”
    “I can’t be that dependent.”
    “Then get a college loan.”
    “I can’t be that poor. Starving graduate student doesn’t
appeal to me much more than prostitute.”
    Aggie knew her sister well enough to agree. She couldn’t
think of any more arguments, so she capitulated.
    “All right. I’ll do the interview.”
    Angela grabbed her sister in a breath-stealing hug.
    “I love you!” she screamed. “I’d love you anyway, even if
you said no, but …”
    “Stop crying,” Aggie admonished her sister for the second
time that evening. “You’re not making sense again.”
    “I don’t care,” Angela sobbed. “This has to work, Boo. It
just has to work.”
    “I’ll do my best, Angela,” Aggie cautioned as her sister sat
up and dried her eyes. “But he’s probably interviewing lots of people. Wait a
minute.”
    Aggie stared at her sister.
    “You said the lawyer rejected your letter. Why do you need
me to go for an interview with him?”
    “I never told you the rest of the story. Danny said to come
to Vancouver anyway, and he’d figure out a way to get me in to the interview. I
picked up a note from him at the Vancouver Hotel…”
    “Ah,” Aggie interjected.
    “Right,” Angela agreed. “We were supposed to stay there. He
rented the Queen Anne suite for us. Sounds posh, doesn’t it?”
    “Why aren’t we…” Aggie paused as she figured out her
sister’s reasoning. “We can’t be seen together. He can’t know there are two of
us. No wonder you’ve been so nervous the last two days.”
    Angela nodded. “I have the room key, so he doesn’t know
we’re somewhere else. Anyway, the note said to meet him at ten o’clock tomorrow
morning in the lobby of the hotel. We don’t have much time.”
    Aggie felt her heartbeat quicken. Anticipation of the coming
encounter made her feel more alive than she had in years. Since her sister
moved away, she realized. Angela could do that, make the colors of life more
vibrant, the days more fun. Aggie had almost forgotten the surge of adrenaline
that foamed in her sister’s wake. She thought back to the personal ad. The man
might have written it directly to her. Mingled with pure adventure was the
tingle of sexual anticipation. If her sister hadn’t needed the money so badly…
She suppressed the subversive thought. What about Andrew? Screw Andrew, she
realized with a guilty shiver. One way or another, she was going to at least
see the man who had placed the ad. She turned to her sister with a smile.
    “Let’s get started.”
     

Chapter
9
    “What criteria did you use to select these women?” Jimmy’s
voice boomed over the speakerphone.
    “Exactly what you said in the ad, Jimmy,” Richard replied.
    Jimmy heard no apology in his lawyer’s voice, but only a
resigned weariness. Jimmy mentally accused and then quickly acquitted him of
deliberately choosing unappealing