by Cass Sellars
She hit a speed dial number and waited.
“Baker and Haithcock, may I help you?” A young female voice answered the company line.
“Jess Ivan for Dan Baker.” She didn’t examine her actions too carefully. She would decide later if they were wrong. They weren’t wrong. They were financially and managerially prudent. If Skylar Addison was unstable, she had to know. The advisory board would expect her to act in the best interest of her father’s business. There had always been some doubt about her ability to take up the reins when her father passed, and this was no time to prove them right. Granted, Skylar hadn’t given her any reason to doubt her abilities or capability, and if they hadn’t been in that dark, damp basement she’d have no reason to doubt her now.
She heard the annoying hold tones cease. “Jess. Pleasant surprise. I’ve been meaning to call you about the Pam Landry thing. We really dropped the ball on that background we did. Let’s just say we’ve made some changes.” The words rushed out as Dan Baker was blatantly hoping he didn’t lose the lucrative account over an incompetent background investigator.
“Thanks. It happens. The problem is solved now.” Jess hadn’t called to discuss the incident.
“Glad to hear it. We will obviously be issuing you a credit.” Dan sounded relieved.
“How about a favor?” Jess said, staring through her window. She leaned into her high-backed chair and wedged the toe of a shoe against the windowsill.
“Anything you want, Jess. Just name it.” Dan was a bit too eager, and the pandering annoyed her.
“We have a new employee you did a check on last month or so. I just wondered if you could go a little deeper, maybe back a little further.”
“For you? Sure. It’ll take a few days depending on the normal factors. It would be on the house.”
“I’m not worried about the money, Dan, I just want to check on something.”
“Suspicious?” Baker sounded concerned.
“Um, no. Nothing like that. I just want to be extra careful after the Pam thing. She was less than honest, and everyone knows that we’re on notice now. I just want to be sure that we have all the facts.” Jess couldn’t help but think that she wasn’t the picture of integrity herself at the moment.
“Understood. Name?”
Jess took a deep breath. “Skylar Addison.”
She disconnected after she’d given him the details of what she was interested in and felt uneasy. She wanted to be sure Skylar was okay, she told herself. She couldn’t be too careful with her business. As far as she was concerned it was due diligence. She had to know more about the woman who trembled in her arms and inexplicably made her heart beat just a bit too fast.
She watched Skylar leave her office with one of her ever-present colored files. She must have realized after a few steps that she was barefoot because she ran back to her desk to slip her shoes on. Jess laughed and felt mildly guilty at her growing voyeuristic habit. For whatever reason, Jess thought Skylar was fascinating. And confounding. And bewildering. And a mystery.
Skylar knocked and pushed open the door to Jess’s office. Jess sat straighter in her chair and grabbed a stack of paperwork she hadn’t been working on, as if Skylar might detect what she had really been up to.
“Got a sec?” Her voice was strong.
Jess thought perhaps she had managed to erase the remnants of her emotional morning by diving into work. She looked steady and focused. She immediately felt guilty for potentially overreacting.
“I run an empire here, Ms. Addison. I have to concentrate on my global interests.” Jess held the serious expression until she watched Skylar join the joke.
“Would these global interests involve your third cup of coffee and black jelly beans?” Skylar pointed an accusing finger at the bowl of licorice beans swimming in a shallow candy dish directly in front of Jess. Skylar’s relaxed smile was a balm over Jess’s concern.
“Why yes, they would. Both imported from countries I really like. Want some?” She held out the bowl and watched as Skylar popped two between her lips.
“I don’t trust people who don’t like black jelly beans.” Jess spoke around the candy as it clicked against her teeth.
“That sounds like a very reliable life imperative, boss. I can see how you’re so successful.” Skylar stifled a giggle and nicked another from the bowl.
“You can learn from me, Skylar…watch and learn.” By the end of the dramatic sentence Jess could barely form the words through her fit of laughter. It wasn’t that funny, but the release felt good.
Skylar couldn’t help but join her. She thought Jess had the most amazing smile, which she could barely see through tears of laughter that spilled from her eyes.
“Wow, I needed that. I needed a good laugh. Thank you.” Jess ran a tissue under each lash. “No one else will understand why we’re both giggling idiots at the moment.”
“You started it—thank you.” Skylar swept the back of her hand under her eyes to blot the moisture.
“Sit, have more jelly beans. Regale me with your latest money-saving scheme.”
“I can’t yet. But I’m working on it. I had a couple of questions, though.”
“Shoot.” Jess leaned back and braced a loafer against the corner of her desk drawer now.
Skylar noted that the posture seemed to indicate when Jess was relaxed. She was grateful that the morning was behind them and hopefully quickly forgotten. She certainly wouldn’t be bringing it up again. Skylar imagined if they hadn’t met at work they might have been great friends. She refused to speculate on any other possibilities.
“Do you know what we buy from Continental Supply Warehouse?” Skylar thrust a nondescript billing statement at Jess.
“What do they sell?”
“Depending on which of the half a million hits on Google you believe is this Continental Supply Warehouse,” Skylar waved a plain white invoice at her, “it could be anything. There isn’t anything distinguishing on the invoices. Plain computer-generated pro forma junk. You wonder why companies don’t think every single thing they do is a reflection of their brand. Especially in a web-based business.”
Skylar’s eyes narrowed as she paced the floor and looked back for some indication that Jess would be able to shed light on the expenses. “Ever heard of them?” She looked back at Jess.
“Mmm, could be, but nothing immediately comes to mind. I usually do approvals over the weekends, but I’ll be honest, I’m usually checking on unexpected job costs or high-dollar expenditures. But the names don’t ring a bell. I guess I’m not as in the loop as I should be, huh?”
“You could hardly run the company if you personally signed every check for binder clips and staplers. I just thought I would try you first. Accounting entered some invoices that weren’t tied to a GL, so I’m figuring they should have been part of a project.”
“Okay, what are you thinking?” Jess studied the invoice again.
“That we should have done a better job of picking accounting software, but that’s a lot of water under a pretty old bridge.”
“Any others like that?” She pointed a short, manicured nail at the document.
“A few. Um…Aviator Surveys?” Skylar consulted her notes and skimmed a finger down the list she had just finished writing.
“Ah, well that could easily be some due diligence on properties we were marketing or inspections on a purchase. They still should be tied to a project, like you said.”
“I’m thinking that your overhead isn’t as bad as you thought. I’m thinking that we recorded a killing on a few projects and the office budget paid for it.”
“Makes a lot of sense, although I would have remembered a killing. Maybe we thought we did really well on a project and we just did okay.”
“Very possible. Your tax accountant might like that from a write-off standpoint, but it would be nice to know the real story.”
“I think at this point in our business, it’s imperative. Businesses typically fail when they start re
sting on the way it has always been done instead of the way it should be. I’m not going to bury my father’s company while he watches from the other side.”
“We aren’t even close to that and you know it. You’re just trying to scare me into more overtime.” Skylar looked at her sideways and smiled.
“I gave you jelly beans, didn’t I? Better than a raise, in my opinion.” She held the bowl toward Skylar, who took three more.
“I wouldn’t go that far, but I’ll admit it’s a nice perk.” She leaned on Jess’s desk. “Would you mind if I ordered some back files from the remote storage people?”
“Of course not. What are you looking for?” Jess seemed to study her, and she stepped back from the intensity of her energy.
“Nothing really, I just want to try to trace typical project expenses, not only to manage them better in the future but to see where some of the straggler invoices actually belong. Maybe we’ve paid them before. I’m thinking five years should do it.”
“You’re talking thirty or forty boxes, Skylar. We weren’t that generous with your office space.” Jess glanced down toward the small office at the end of the room.
“It’s okay. I asked Yolanda if I could use the old IT room for secure storage, and she thought I could.” Skylar’s eyes traced the fabric of Jess’s crisp white shirt and took in the contrast of her dark skin. She idly wished she could touch her cheek and then forced her brain back to the conversation.
“You should keep your phone with you, you might get lost in old paper.”
Skylar twisted her hair around her fingers, ultimately dropping the fat strand along her right shoulder when she realized Jess was watching. “Please request a search party if you haven’t seen me in a few days.”
“Deal.” Jess dropped her foot back to the floor. “Ready for Saturday? I’m looking forward to a little non-business time with everyone.”
“Of course. Hope you can keep up,” Skylar said cockily.
“Ooh. Would that be a challenge?”
Skylar hoped their meeting full of business and banter would reinforce that this morning’s meltdown was a distant memory and didn’t indicate she was some flake. It still weighed on her.
“I’m just saying that the bottoms of my shoes are bright orange in case you need to see how far I am in front of you.” Skylar grinned.
“Really. We’ll see. I like a little healthy competition, so bring your A game.” Jess winked.
Skylar walked toward the door and looked over her shoulder. “You too.”
Skylar glanced up and saw Jess watching her cross the floor. She threw a casual wave that Jess returned. Skylar forced her eyes away and wondered if anyone else saw the not-so-covert exchange that felt strangely intimate.
Chapter Eight
Skylar accepted the number bib from Yolanda and pinned it to her slightly dingy jersey. She pinned Kyle’s to the fluorescent yellow one that still smelled like the store where he’d bought it the day before.
“This is all for show. I won’t make it ten minutes, but I’ll pay you to tell everyone I overtook you a couple of times.” Kyle looked nervously at the competition he obviously wanted no part of.
“Deal,” she said around a safety pin clenched in her teeth.
Jess stood on alternating legs doing quadricep stretches. She greeted her employees and their spouses or friends as the group assembled into what would be their starting position. Skylar forced her nose to her knees as Kyle imitated her, making it only half as far.
He peered under his arm at her. “How long do we do this?”
“Until you feel a warm stretch.”
“Don’t leave openings for me like that, woman. It actually hurts to avoid making crude comments.”
“I’ll be much more careful in the future.” She laughed.
Skylar pulled to her left side and stretched an arm over her head. As she pulled toward the other side, she caught Whitney Fields dressed in designer jeans and short fabric heels winding through the bodies. Skylar felt an odd mix of envy and unreasonable jealousy as the petite blonde in a pink Ivan Associates T-shirt delivered an audible kiss over Jess’s cheek.
Whitney looked over to Skylar and Kyle. “Hi, guys. Good luck today.”
“Thanks. No running for you?” Skylar admired her curvy, toned figure with envy.
“Nope. I’m just Jess’s head cheerleader today.” Her fingers were locked firmly over Jess’s forearm.
Jess chuckled. “I believe she told me that unless 5k was the name of a spa or a massage salon, she would pass.” Jess looked directly at Skylar as she spoke over Whitney’s platinum hair.
Skylar watched a thin vein bulge in Jess’s arm as she casually draped a hand over Whitney’s shoulder. Skylar wondered if it was her imagination or if Jess was as uncomfortable as she looked. Skylar followed her eyes as Jess brightened when a dark-haired police officer pushed her way through the crowd in full uniform.
“Dino!” She accepted a brief hug from her. “You know Kyle, right?”
“Last race. This time last year, in fact.” She looked playfully at the obviously unenthusiastic Kyle. “It looks like you didn’t manage to find an excuse to bow out this year, either.” She smiled and accepted a glancing hug from him.
“No. Jess says I have to find a boyfriend who can run in my place before I can refuse. I’ve never wanted to be in a relationship so much in my life.” He rolled his eyes and put his hand over his heart.
Jess caught Skylar’s elbow. “Skylar Addison, meet Samantha Paladino. Skylar just started with IA.”
“It’s a pleasure, Officer Paladino.” Skylar shook her hand.
“Ugh, call me Sam, Dino, Sammy, or anything other than some official title.”
“Okay. Sammy, then.” She smiled before letting go of her hand.
Skylar resumed her stretches under the watchful eye of the new arrival. She couldn’t wait for Jess to tell her all about her friend. There was clearly a story behind the cocky officer who was staring at her.
Skylar was strangely left cold by the attention. She wondered if that would always be the case given her past and her desire to stay far away from cocky women who just wanted some sort of arm decoration.
She angled so that she wouldn’t accidently lock eyes with her and convey any interest unintentionally. She certainly wouldn’t want Jess to think she was interested. Although, since there wasn’t anything between them, Jess couldn’t care less, right? Skylar’s stomach twisted with a sense of loss when she considered all of the nuances of the nonsense in her mind.
Jess noticed Dino’s flirting and leaned over to speak quietly in her ear. “Not in a trillion years, Dino. She’s not available.”
“To anyone or just to me?” She grinned mischievously.
“Especially not to you.” Jess managed a smile, but she was staring at her seriously, glad they were momentarily out of Skylar’s earshot.
“Settle. I only have eyes for you.” Dino raised her palms in mock surrender.
“I didn’t believe that when you said it sixteen years ago.” Jess could hear the edge in her tone.
“Aw, but then I meant it.”
Jess rolled her eyes and shook off her irrational irritation.
When announcers began directing the runners to assemble, Whitney rose on her toes and spoke too loudly. “See you at the finish line, love.”
Jess bristled. She didn’t believe Whitney was aware of her misgivings, but it made her question, for probably the ninetieth time since they’d been dating, her motives and the future of their relationship. For the first time, however, she could clearly see Whitney’s motive in the public declaration and wondered if she felt the things she said or just liked being the girlfriend of a CEO.
Jess stepped next to Skylar and elbowed her. “The bottoms of my shoes are green, just so you know how to find me.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll just wait for you at the end.” Skylar offered an unexpected wink and plucked at the sleeve of Jess’s shirt as she leaned slightly ahea
d of her.
“You’re on, little girl.” Jess felt the thrill of the chase rise and bounced on her toes.
Skylar looked back in feigned horror at the slight.
The starter pistol cracked, and they moved slowly at first, waiting for the throngs of people to disperse by speed, pace, and group. Jess saw the thick braid bounce against Skylar’s back as she established a smooth gait next to hers. Only a few IA shirts remained in their line of sight. Kyle had made an attempt, but he whacked Jess’s arm at the first half kilometer, indicating he was out. He then waved at Skylar before falling in for a brisk walk with Yolanda.
“Looks like it’s just you and me.” Jess liked the feeling and mentally chastised herself.
“I’ll hang out for a while, just to pace you.” Skylar smiled, and Jess felt a cold gust of wind slide off the water and over her skin. Runners who had likely trained in the arid heat of the South Bay or the climate control of an indoor track made faces at the chill. Several more groups had faded by the second kilometer, and Jess continued to pace Skylar evenly. If Skylar was holding back, she didn’t let on. Jess enjoyed the silent tandem despite their earlier mock rivalry.
“Where did you park?” Jess asked, knowing she hadn’t seen Skylar’s car near her home.
“I didn’t, I rode over with Kyle from the office. I’m going to take BART back.” Skylar began to sound winded.
“I thought I heard you say that. Did you catch what those people were saying?”
“No, about what?”
“There was a bomb scare on the Oakland line. The whole system is on hold.”
“Lovely. Me and Lyft are going to be great friends.” Skylar shook her head.
“You’re coming to lunch at Joe’s, right?”
“I didn’t know anything about it.” Skylar looked quizzically at Jess.
“It’s tradition. Original Joe’s is a North Beach Italian restaurant, been there since the thirties. Fabulous food and drinks—all on me. You brought clothes, right?” She rushed out the words now, fighting for her own breath as they approached the last two blocks.
