by Davis Bunn
“Did I not say?” Inyakie asked the room. “This was a very Basque plan.”
Kirra cried, “But they destroyed our valley!”
It was Jacques who replied, “It will grow again. We will see to that.”
Inyakie took her hand in his. “What Taylor said is correct. The only way we can be certain you are safe is if your sister believes the threat to her company has been erased.”
“But—”
He gentled her with his tone. “You trust my father, yes?”
“Of course.”
“You heard what he said. Nothing of any great importance grows in that valley. But what would the attackers know of this? The attackers heard we went up to gather the special herbs, the ones that can be picked only at this time each year. They hear this and they find us and they destroy the source. The only source. And now they are gone.” He stroked her cheek. “So why do you cry?”
Madame Dupin bustled over. “And why must all men be so blind?” She swept Kirra out of her son’s arms. “What do you know, you great brute with your talk of plans and sources and I don’t know what.”
“But, Mama—”
“Did you not hear what she said? Are you deaf as well as blind?” Madame Dupin enveloped Kirra in a huge embrace. “Our valley, she said. She weeps because she hurts for our land. Can you not see this lady is becoming Basque?”
chapter 24
TAYLOR ARRIVED AT HIS OFFICE IN ANNAPOLIS hours before anyone else. He watched the techies filter in and accepted their uncertain hellos. They might never know the reason, but they were sensitive to the corporate winds. They knew his fate was sealed. He glanced into Allison’s work station, missing her, yet glad she was removed from the tumult.
He did not wait for Gowers to come downstairs. At the stroke of nine, Taylor entered the chairman’s outer office. The company chief did not keep him waiting long. “I want an explanation and I want it now!”
Taylor countered with, “Has the merger with Revell gone through?”
“I’m the one asking questions here!”
“Just tell me this one thing. Please.”
The CEO glowered over the length of his cluttered desk. “No thanks to you.”
Taylor felt the knot of tension he had carried back with him from France begin to ease. “I want something in return.”
“You want . . . your job is on the line here!”
“Wrong. I’m already canned.”
There was a flicker deep in the CEO’s gaze, enough for Taylor to know he had guessed correctly. Gowers lied, “That’s yet to be decided.”
“Amanda Revell and I have a bad history. I told you that in the chopper out to her boat.”
“That’s no excuse for running off without a moment’s notice!”
“You’re not concerned about my absence. You want to know why she ordered me away, and what effect it has on your own future.”
The chairman thoroughly disliked having his subordinate taking the upper hand. But there was nothing he could do about it, and they both knew it. “Well?”
“I told you, I’ll explain it all, but only if you agree to do this one thing.”
“What?”
“Yes or no.”
“Yes, all right!”
Taylor did not bother to sit down. He ran through the bare bones, Kirra’s disappearance and the lie of a message asking him to come.
“Did you find her?”
“Yes. She’s fallen in love with a Basque healer.”
“A what?”
“It doesn’t matter. She’s safe, she’s in France, and she’s not coming home.”
Gowers did not take it well. “Amanda Revell jeopardized the merger just to locate her wayward sister?”
“She is used to having her own way.”
“So why . . .” Gowers realized the question was out of line. But too late.
“Why does she still insist you fire me? I told you before. We’ve got a lot of history.”
Gowers lumbered to his feet. Taylor avoided the perfunctory handshake by walking back to the entrance. From that safe distance he said, “Call Amanda. Tell her she owes me. And that I have it all on tape.”
“Wait just one—”
“Can’t,” Taylor said, already out the door. “I’ve got a plane to catch.”
WHEN TAYLOR HALTED BEFORE HIS MOTHER’S HOUSE, HE found Ada Folley weeding the front flower bed. She raised up in stages, stripped off the gloves, and gave him a fierce hug. “How you been?”
“I’m fine.”
She released him far enough to inspect his face. “You look it.”
“I am. Really.”
“Go in and greet your momma. Then come back out here and tell me how is my little girl.”
The screen door slapped shut. “I’m here.”
Taylor bounded up the front steps. “I’m so sorry, Ma.”
“You already told me that on the phone.” She brushed aside the apology with a lifetime’s practice. “You said it was over.”
“That’s right, Ma.”
“But you lost your job.”
“It’s okay. Really. I’m thinking of starting a little business on my own.” He looked back at Ada. “With Kirra.”
“You two back together now?”
“Not now,” Taylor replied. “Not ever.”
Ada climbed the steps for a closer inspection. “You all right with that?”
“Yes, Miss Ada. I am.”
She squinted over his words. “Something’s sure different here.”
Taylor took a long breath. “I’ve started listening, Miss Ada.”
“Have you, now.”
“And praying.”
She propped her hands on her hips. “Well, it’s way past high time, I can sure tell you that.”
“Yes, ma’am. It is.”
She smiled for the first time since all this had commenced. “And all God’s children said, Amen!”
THIS TIME, HE WAS THE REVELL HELICOPTER’S ONLY passenger.
The chopper landed upon a circular bed of green by the Bethesda Hunt Club, the most exclusive in the nation’s capital. A gray-suited corporate gopher held his jacket in place with one hand and his toupee with the other. “Mr. Knox?”
“Yes.”
“Ms. Revell is waiting for you.” He settled Taylor into the golf cart’s passenger seat and headed out.
Amanda’s foursome were gathered on the third tee. The other three players were all male. Naturally she played first. She hammered the ball down the fairway, then said, “You guys play on. I’ll catch up with you.”
The corporate gopher did not wait to be told to back away. She used a rag from her rear pocket to wipe the club. “I ought to use this on your head.”
“Your guys already tried that. They failed.”
“Threats don’t work with me, boyo.”
“It wasn’t a threat. And you know it. Otherwise we wouldn’t be meeting.”
Amanda wore wraparound shades that glinted copper and hard in the sunlight. She slipped behind the wheel. When they pulled down the fairway, she said, “So talk.”
“You sent me to find your sister. I found her. You promised me a share of the buyout. I’m here to collect.”
“I don’t recall—”
“I know about the Geneco Labs pain remedy you’re bringing to market. I know about Kirra’s research. I have it all down on paper and tape, wrapped with a lovely legal ribbon.”
“You can’t prove a thing.”
“I don’t need to. I have your request to send me off. I have the reasons. All I’d need to do is put this in the hands of a halfdecent PR firm, and the mess would go prime time. I can see the 48 Hours special now.”
Amanda halted where they were screened by an island of tall firs. “I could shoot you myself right here, and my trained seals would swear I was defending myself.”
“My little taped insurance policy says you’ll think again.” He pulled a CD jewel box from his inside pocket. “The local French cops did
n’t take kindly to your heavies shooting at me from the cliffside—”
“That is libelous slander!”
“—And trying again in the hospital.”
“You don’t have a shred of evidence!”
“They tracked me using two traveling surfers. I have their testimony. The cops bugged your men’s hotel in Biarritz—”
“Stop trying to tie me to something I know nothing about!”
“Your goons called your cell phone, Amanda. The secret one.” Taylor waved the case so the sunlight danced off the CD’s mirror surface. “The same number you gave me.”
Amanda winced as the light struck her face. “Get that thing away from me.”
“This is your copy. Compliments of the house.”
“Put it away.” She slipped off the kidskin glove and began tapping her diamond ring upon the steering wheel. “I underestimated you, sport.”
“Bad move. Very bad.”
“So I see.” She formed a fist. “All right. Here’s how it’s going to play. You’ll get your cut in the form of a single cash payment.”
“Three million dollars.”
She actually laughed. “You’re insane.”
“That’s my price.”
“Half a mil. And you’ll count yourself lucky.”
Taylor slid from the carriage. “Pity your new product launch is going to be so badly tainted.”
Her fury was such that her features turned splotchy. “Get back in here.”
“What for? We’re not even talking the same language.”
“Get in.”
“Three million, Amanda. That’s what you promised me back on the boat, remember? Or I walk and you suffer the consequences.”
She stared out over the empty fairway. “All right. Done.”
“I want it in writing. Now.”
“I’m not telling you again, Taylor. Sit down.”
They drove back to the waiting aide in hostile silence. As soon as she halted, Taylor stood and backed from the cart. He had no interest in remaining close to Amanda Revell for an instant longer than necessary.
She demanded pen and paper from her staffer. She said as she wrote, “This instructs my attorneys to pay you three million dollars for services rendered.”
“Have your man witness it.”
“Do as he says.”
She accepted the paper back from her aide, read it once, then rose from the cart. She stalked to where he stood. “You’re never to show your face around here again. Is that clear?”
“Perfectly.”
She handed him the paper. “It’s cheap at the price. Daddy’s disowned Kirra. I get it all. Or perhaps you already heard that from her.”
He carefully inspected the document. “Haven’t you heard? She’s marrying the Frenchman.”
“At least she showed a trace of good sense in that move.”
Carefully Taylor folded the paper and stowed it in his pocket.
“Daddy was right. That might make you rich, but scum you were and scum you’ll remain.” Amanda stomped back to the golf cart, slid into the seat, and ordered her aide, “I’m definitely done here. Drive me to the others.”
The staffer looked uncertainly toward where Taylor stood. Amanda shrilled, “Forget him. Get in here and drive!”
Taylor stood where he was, surrounded by pines and birdsong, and watched her disappear down the slope.
epilogue
Six months later
HE HAD NEVER DREAMED THAT PARIS COULD BE this expensive.
Taylor kept telling himself that it didn’t matter, he could afford it. But the money seemed to blister his hands as it slipped away.
Allison could not help but notice his concern. She chose to wait until they had put Clarissa down for the night to tell him, “We don’t have to stay here.”
“Yes we do.”
“Taylor—”
“I promised you a honeymoon. I live up to my promises.”
Her smiles were coming more fully now, even when they were arguing. She had not smiled much at the beginning. Even after she had learned to trust him, to accept his word as his bond, to know he was determined to give her the best of everything at his disposal, still she bore her emotional wounds. Taylor had no objections, or if he did, he chose not to express them. After all, he was still in the process of learning his own lessons of letting go and moving on. She knew this too and granted him a whole heart load of latitude.
Still, when she smiled as she did now, with a heart full of love, with her gaze and all her face shining, he could cry with the joy of knowing there was a thing called hope after all.
She asked, “Do you really think I need a place this fancy?”
The words sounded feeble even before they were fully formed. “I want to give you something special.”
Their courtship had been a series of carefully measured steps, and unlike anything Taylor would have ever scripted for himself. Which, if truth be known, was one reason he was so certain it had been both right and divinely ordained. They had spent weeks finding a church together, for one thing. The three of them would talk all week about the last one visited and the next to come. They decided by joining a new couples’ class in a church where Clarissa discovered she loved to sing. Allison’s little girl carried her own set of scars. Taylor counted it as a star-flecked blessing to hear the little girl sing. For him.
They had a room under the eaves of the Hotel Intercontinental on the Rue de Rivoli. The room was long enough to be called a mini-suite. The balcony doors were open, and they were seated on the sofa, nestling together under a quilt they had dragged over from the bed. Clarissa was asleep on a trundle bed in a small adjoining room. Outside the balcony doors, Paris was slowly settling under a blanket of midnight snow. The Eiffel Tower flickered in and out of sight, framed by spotlights and snow, floating in the night.
Allison might have chuckled, or perhaps it was merely a sigh. She said something to herself.
“What?”
She nestled into his neck. “Nothing.”
“We can afford this.”
She kissed his face. “Are you telling me or yourself?”
“Don’t do that.”
“What, this?”
“I’m serious.”
“You’re always serious. You’re the only man who takes his wife to Paris on a honeymoon, then spends his time talking to lawyers.”
“I’ve got a lot to do before I see them.”
“Do you still leave tomorrow?”
“Last I heard.” He knew it was futile. But he needed to say it once more. “Come with me, Allison.”
Her only reply was to kiss his neck.
“Why not?”
“Because this is something you need to do on your own. And you know it.” She snuggled in closer. “But thank you for asking.”
The next morning they took their breakfast at the Café de l’Opéra, Clarissa’s favorite place in the whole world. She was four and a half and had definite opinions about everything. Two days earlier, Taylor had taken her to a store called Printemps by himself. He was still trying to forge a bond with this wideeyed bundle of energy.
Taylor and Allison had been married in the stone chapel of Iona. Brother Jonah had performed the ceremony. Ada Folley and Taylor’s mother had flown over for the wedding, the first time either of them had ever been out of the country. Clarissa had carried the flowers down the aisle behind her mother, a cherubic expression of satisfaction on her face.
Clarissa would sit in his lap now and let him read to her. He could sit by her bed and hear her prayers. But he would catch her sometimes, staring at him in a very cautious way, as though uncertain who he truly was, or whether he would stay. These looks hurt him more than he could say. So Taylor took her shopping and bought her a new plaid dress and a bright red coat and a matching beret and wool mittens and tights and red patent leather shoes. Clarissa loved the color red. She loved how the salesladies spoke to her as they would a woman their own age. She loved how Taylor l
et her make all the choices herself. When they had returned from the shop and Clarissa had modeled her new outfit for her mother, Allison had rushed into the bathroom and sobbed so hard Taylor could hear her through the locked door.
They had the same breakfast every morning. Clarissa had a big pot of hot chocolate and her very own croissant. She tore off bites and dipped them into her oversized cup, just like she had seen the French people do, very careful not to drip anything on her new red outfit. Taylor went inside to use the café phone and called Guethary. When he returned to the table, Allison caught one glimpse of his face and said, “It’s today?”
“They’ve booked me on the eleven o’clock express train.”
“You need to hurry, then.”
“Yes.” Allison had asked not to go to the train station with him. He had agreed. His valise and the briefcase with all the legal documents were stationed between his chair and Allison’s. He took his seat and reached for her hands. “I can’t call you while I’m down there.”
“We’ve been through all this.” She squeezed his hand with both of hers. “It’s going to be all right. Just miss me a little, all right?”
“Can I miss you a lot?”
Clarissa piped up from the table’s other side, “Will you miss me too, Daddy?”
Taylor stared at her. She was a diminutive image of her mother, the same huge eyes, the same hair somewhere between brown and blond, the same glowing skin. Only now she seemed to swim before his eyes. “What did you say?”
“I want you to miss me too.”
Allison released one hand so as to cover her mouth. Taylor said very deliberately, “The only person I will miss more than you in the whole wide world is your mother.”
“Where are you going?”
“To a village near some mountains south of here.”
“Is it snowing there too?”
“Do you know, I forgot to ask. But I imagine that it is.”
“How long will you be away?”
“I’m not certain. But I think three days.” He added to Allison, “If it’s any longer than that, I’ll find some way to call you.”
Clarissa observed her mother. “Mommy’s sad because you’re going away.”
