Double Standards

by Judith McNaught

  "Your relative," Nick repeated with freezing sarcasm. "Your relative is trying to blackmail you."

  "Yes!" Lauren feverishly tried to explain. "Philip thought you were paying someone to spy on him, so he sent me here to find out who, and—"

  "Whitworth is the only one paying a spy," Nick jeered scathingly. "And the only spy is you!" He released her and tried to push her away, but Lauren clung to him.

  "Please listen to me," she begged wildly. "Don't do this to us!"

  Nick jerked her arms loose, and she crumpled to the floor, her shoulders racked with deep choking sobs. "I love you so much," she wept hysterically. "Why won't you listen to me? Why? I'm begging you to just listen to me."

  "Get up!" he snapped. "And button your blouse." He had already started toward the door. Her chest heaving with convulsive, silent sobs, Lauren straightened her clothing, braced a hand on the coffee table and slowly pushed herself to her feet.

  Nick wrenched the door open and the security guards stepped forward. "Get her out of here," he ordered icily.

  Lauren stared in paralyzed terror at the men coming purposefully toward her. They were taking her to jail. Her gaze flew to Nick, silently imploring him for the last time to listen, to believe, to stop this.

  With his hands in his pockets, he returned her gaze without flinching, his chiseled features a mask of stone, his eyes like chips of gray ice. Only the muscle jerking in his tightly clenched jaw betrayed the fact that he was feeling any emotion at all.

  The three armed guards surrounded her, and one of them took her by the elbow. Lauren yanked free, her blue eyes deep pools of pain. "Don't touch me." Without looking back, she walked with them out of his office and across the silent, deserted reception area.

  When the door closed behind her, Nick went over to the sofa. Sitting down with his forearms resting on his knees, he stared at the enlarged black-and-white photo of Lauren handing Whitworth the stolen copies of the bids.

  She was very photogenic, he thought with a stab of bittersweet pain. The day had been windy, and she had not bothered with a coat. The photograph had captured her delicate features in profile with the wind whipping her hair into glorious abandon.

  It was a picture of Lauren betraying him.

  A muscle moved convulsively in Nick's throat as he swallowed over the constriction there. The photograph should have been taken in color, he decided. Mere black and white couldn't capture her glowing skin, the gold highlights in her beautiful hair or the sparkle of her vivid turquoise eyes. He covered his face with his hands.

  The silent guards escorted Lauren across the marble lobby, which was crowded with late-departing employees. In the press of so many people, Lauren was spared the humiliation of curious onlookers. Everyone else was rushing home, absorbed with individual thoughts. Not that she particularly cared who witnessed her shame; at the moment, she cared about nothing.

  It was dark outside and raining, but Lauren hardly felt the icy sting of the rain pelting against her thin silk blouse. She looked disinterestedly for the police car that she expected to see waiting at the curb, but there was none. The guard on her left and the one behind her stepped back. The guard on her right also turned to leave, then he hesitated and said with curt compassion, "Do you have a coat, miss?"

  Lauren looked at him with pain-dazed eyes. "Yes," she said inanely. She did have a coat; it was with her purse in Jim's office.

  The guard glanced uncertainly at the curb, as if he expected someone to pull over and offer her a ride. "I'll get it for you," he said, and walked back into the building with his companions.

  Lauren stood on the sidewalk, rain glazing her hair and pelting her face like a million icy hypodermic needles. Apparently she wasn't going to be taken to jail, after all. She didn't know where to go, or how to get there without money or keys. In a kind of trance she turned and started to walk down Jefferson Avenue, just as a familiar figure strode swiftly out of the building toward her. For a moment hope flared and burned painfully bright. "Jim!" she called when he and Ericka were about to pass without seeing her.

  Jim turned sharply, and Lauren's stomach clenched at the bitter, accusing fury in the single scathing glance he passed over her. "I have nothing to say to you," he snapped.

  All hope died inside of Lauren and with its death came a blessed numbness. She turned on her heel, shoved her frozen hands into the pockets of her tweed skirt and started walking down the street. Six steps later, Jim's hand grasped her arm, turning her around. "Here," he said, his expression just as hostile as before. "Take my coat."

  Lauren carefully pulled her arm from his grasp. "Don't touch me," she said calmly. "I don't ever want to be touched."

  Alarm flickered in his gaze before he extinguished it. "Take my coat," he repeated tersely, already starting to remove it. "You'll freeze to death."

  Lauren found nothing unpleasant about the prospect of freezing to death. Ignoring his outstretched coat, she lifted her gaze to his. "Do you believe what Nick believes?"

  "Every single word," he averred.

  With her hair plastered to her head and the rain driving into her upturned face, Lauren said with great dignity, "In that case, I don't want your coat." She started to turn, then stopped. "But you can give Nick a message for me when he finally discovers the truth." Her teeth chattered as she said, "T-tell him not to ever come near me again. T-tell him to stay away from me!"

  Without thinking about where she was going, Lauren automatically walked the eight blocks to the only people who would take her in without being paid. She went to Tony's restaurant.

  With frozen knuckles she rapped on the back entrance. The door opened and Tony was staring at her, his black tuxedo a discordant contrast to the noise and steam of the kitchen behind him. "Laurie?" he said. "Laurie! Dio mio! Dominic, Joe," he shouted, "come quick!"

  Lauren awoke in a warm comfortable bed and opened her eyes to a charmingly quaint but unfamiliar room. Her head was pounding ferociously as she struggled to her elbows and looked around. She was in the house above the restaurant, and Joe's young wife had put her to bed after a hot bath and a warm meal. She had not died of exposure, she realized. How disappointing—how anticlimactic, she decided morbidly. Her body ached as if she'd been beaten.

  She wondered when Nick would discover that she'd changed the figures on the bids. If any of the four contracts were awarded to Sinco, Nick would surely wonder how that could have happened. He would wonder why Whitworth hadn't bid less than Sinco had, and he might compare the copies of the bids Lauren had given Philip with the originals.

  Then again, there was also the possibility that other companies besides Sinco and Whitworth would be awarded the contracts, in which case Nick would always believe she'd betrayed him.

  Lauren threw back the heavy quilts and climbed slowly out of bed. She felt too sick to care what happened.

  She felt even worse a few minutes later, when she walked into the family kitchen and heard Tony on the telephone. His sons were all seated at the table. "Mary," Tony was saying, his face furrowed into stern lines, "this is Tony. Let me talk to Nick."

  Lauren's heart thumped, but it was too late to stop him because he was already launching into a nonstop monologue. "Nick, this is Tony," he said. "You better come over here. Something happened to Laurie. She came here last night almost frozen. She had no coat, no purse, no nothing. She wouldn't say what was wrong. She wouldn't let any of us touch her except for—What?" His face turned angry. "Don't you use that tone of voice with me, Nick! I—" He was perfectly still for a moment, listening to whatever Nick was saying, then he took the receiver away from his ear and looked at it as if it had just grown teeth. "Nick hung up on me," he told his sons.

  His amazed gaze encountered Lauren standing uncertainly in the doorway. "Nick said you stole information from him, that you're his stepfather's mistress," he told her. "He said he never wants to hear your name, and if I try to speak to him about you again, he will have his bank foreclose on the loan they made for improvements t
o my restaurant. Nick said that to me—he talked to me like that!" he repeated disbelievingly.

  Lauren started forward, her face pale with remorse. "Tony, you don't know what's happened. You don't understand."

  "I understand the way he spoke to me," Tony said, his jaw clenched. Ignoring her, he turned back to the phone and dialed with furious intent. "Mary," he said into the phone, "you put Nick back on the line right now." He paused while Mary apparently asked him a question. "Yes," he replied, "you bet your life it's about Lauren. What? Yes, she's here."

  Tony handed the phone to Lauren, his expression so angry and hurt that she felt ill. "Nick won't talk to me," Tony said, "but Mary wants to talk to you."

  With a mixture of hope and fear, Lauren said, "Hello, Mary?"

  Mary's voice was like an icicle. "Lauren, you have done enough damage to those of us here who were foolish enough to trust you. If you have any decency at all, you'll keep Tony out of this. Nick is not making idle threats—he meant what he said to Tony. Is that clear?"

  Lauren swallowed the lump of desolation in her throat. "Perfectly clear."

  "Good. Then I suggest you stay where you are for the next hour. Our corporate attorney will deliver your possessions, to you and explain your legal situation. We were going to notify you through Philip Whitworth, but this will be vastly preferable. Goodbye, Lauren."

  Lauren sank into a chair at the table, too ashamed to look at the men who would now be watching her with the same bitter condemnation that Jim and Mary had shown her.

  Tony's hand clamped reassuringly on her shoulder, and Lauren drew a long, unsteady breath. "I'll leave as soon as the attorney arrives with my purse." She dragged her gaze upward. Instead of despising her, the boys and Tony were looking at her with helpless sympathy.

  After everything that had happened to her, Lauren felt better able to cope with animosity than kindness, and their compassion wrenched her heart, weakening the dam that was holding back her emotions. "Don't ask me to explain," she whispered. "If I did you wouldn't believe me."

  "We would believe you," Dominic said with blushing fierceness. "I was standing behind the screen where the coffeepots are kept, and I heard every word that… that pig said to you at lunch, but I did not know his name. Papa recognized him and he came to stand with me, because he wondered why you would be eating with someone Nick hates."

  Lauren's composure slipped another notch toward tears, but she blinked them back and said with a tremulous smile, "The service must have been terrible that day, with both of you standing guard over me." She hadn't cried in years until she'd met Nick. After last night there would be no more tears. Ever. She had wept at his feet, begging him to listen to her. Just thinking of it made her cringe with mortification and fury.

  "I tried to call Nick after you left that day," Tony said, "to tell him that Whitworth was threatening you and that you were in trouble, but Nick was in Italy. I told Mary to have him call me as soon as he came back, but I did not ever believe you would really give Nick's stepfather the information."

  Lauren heard the reproof in Tony's voice at that, and she lifted her shoulders in a weary shrug. "I didn't give him what he wanted. Nick only thinks I did."

  Half an hour later Tony and Dominic escorted her downstairs to the restaurant, which wasn't open for business yet, and stood protectively behind her chair. Lauren instantly recognized Mike Walsh as the man who had been with Nick the night she'd literally fallen at their feet. He introduced the man who was with him as Jack Collins, the head of Global's security division in Detroit. Then both men sat down across from her.

  "Your purse," Mike said, handing it to her. "Would you like to check the contents?"

  Lauren kept her face carefully expressionless. "No."

  "Very well," he said curtly. "I'll come directly to the point. Miss Danner, Global Industries has sufficient evidence against you to charge you with theft, conspiring to defraud and several other serious crimes. At this time, the corporation is not going to insist on your arrest. However, if you are ever again seen on the premises of Global Industries, or any of its subsidiaries, the corporation can and will press charges against you for the crimes I just mentioned. A warrant for your arrest has already been prepared. If you are seen on our premises, the warrant will be signed, and you will be arrested. If you are in another state, we will insist on extradition."

  He opened a large manila envelope and withdrew several sheets of paper. "This is a letter stating the terms I have just set out." He handed her a copy of the letter, along with an official-looking legal document. "This—" he indicated the document "—is an injunction, signed by the court, which now makes it illegal for you to set so much as one foot on Global property. Do you understand?"

  "Perfectly," Lauren said, lifting her chin in silent rebellion.

  "Do you have any questions?"

  "Yes, I have two of them." Lauren rose, then turned to press a fond kiss to Tony's cheek and another to Dominic's smooth one. She knew she would break down under the strain of an emotional goodbye; she was saying farewell to her two friends now, when it was easier. She turned back to the attorney and asked, "Where is my car?"

  The attorney inclined his head toward the door of the restaurant. "Mr. Collins here drove it over. It's parked right outside. What is the other question?"

  Lauren ignored the attorney and asked Jack Collins, "Are you the one who discovered all this 'proof' against me?"

  Despite his pallor, Jack Collins's eyes were inquisitive and sharp. "A man who works for me conducted the investigation while I was in the hospital. Why do you ask, Miss Danner?" he inquired, watching her closely.

  Lauren picked up her purse from the table. "Because whoever did it was not very good at his job."

  She pulled her gaze from Jack Collins and managed a brief teary smile at Tony and Dominic. "Goodbye," she said softly. "And thank you."

  She walked out of the restaurant and never looked back.

  Both of the men from Global Industries watched her leave. "Stunning young woman, isn't she?" the attorney said.

  "Beautiful," Jack Collins agreed, his brows knitted thoughtfully together.

  "But treacherous and deceitful as they come."

  Jack Collins's frown deepened. "I wonder if she is. I kept watching her eyes. She looked angry and she looked hurt. She didn't look guilty."

  Mike Walsh heaved himself impatiently out of his chair. "She's guilty. If you don't think so, go look at the file your assistant put together on her."

  "I think I will," Jack said.

  "You do that!" Tony said angrily, shamelessly eavesdropping. "Then you come talk to me, and I'll tell you the truth. Whitworth made her do it!"

  20

  « ^ »

  Nick leaned back in his chair, watching while Jack Collins, Mary, Jim and Tony filed into his office. He had agreed to this meeting about Lauren only because Jack had insisted that it was vitally necessary for the corporation's sake, in case she should decide to sue them.

  Sue them for what, Nick thought bitterly. He wished to God he were somewhere else right now. Anywhere else. They were going to talk about her, and he was going to have to listen. She had been gone for a month, and he still hadn't been able to tear her out of his mind.

  He kept expecting to look up and see her walking into his office, her shorthand notebook and pen in hand, ready to write down his instructions.

  Last week he had been deeply engrossed in the corporation's new financial statement, and suddenly a woman in the reception room had laughed. It had sounded like Lauren's soft, musical laugh, and he had leaped out of his chair, telling himself that he intended to drag her into his office and warn her for the last time to stay away. But when he strode into the reception area and saw that it was some other woman, his heart had sunk.

  He needed a rest, he told himself—some relaxation and the right sort of diversion. He had been pushing himself too hard, trying to drive her out of his thoughts by working until he was mentally and physically exhausted. All t
hat was going to change now. In a few hours he was leaving for Chicago to attend the international trade committee meeting— the meeting he had walked out on to go rushing after Lauren, and which had now been rescheduled so that the committee could conclude the business they'd been unable to resolve without his vote. On Sunday, three days from now, when the meeting adjourned, Vicky was joining him in Chicago, and they were flying to Switzerland for three weeks. Three consecutive weeks of skiing during the day and making love at night should solve all his problems very nicely. Spending Christmas in Switzerland again, as he had three years ago, was also a vastly appealing idea.

  Whom had he spent it with three years ago? He tried to remember.

  "Nick," Jack Collins said, "may I begin?"

  "Yes," he said shortly, turning his head toward the windows. How long would it take before he could blot out the memory of Lauren weeping at his feet? "Please don't do this to us," she had sobbed. "I love you so much."

  He rolled his gold pen idly between his fingertips, aware that Tony was watching him angrily, just waiting for the slightest opportunity to plead Lauren's defense.

  Her defense, Nick thought sarcastically. What defense? Because Lauren was Italian, Tony was automatically biased in her favor. Because she was so heartbreakingly beautiful, Tony was blind to her treacherous nature. He couldn't blame Tony, because he himself had been just as blind, just as stupid. Lauren had captivated him, fascinated and enchanted him. From the very first, he had been enthralled by her, rendered senseless by his uncontrollable, fiery desire for her…

  "I realize," Jack Collins was saying, "that Lauren Danner is a very unpleasant topic to all of you, but the five of us in this room have all known each other for many years, and there's no reason we can't speak openly among ourselves, is there?"

  When no one replied, Jack sighed with frustration. "Well, she's a damned difficult subject for me to discuss too. The investigation on her was technically my responsibility, and I'm going to tell you now that it was done very poorly. The young man who handled the security check while I was in the hospital was inexperienced and overeager, and that's putting it politely. If I hadn't been back in the hospital twice since then, I'd have looked into this before.