Back home, she read through her presentation for the teleconference one more time before she headed off to bed. It was a mid-morning meeting, so she set her alarm and settled in for what would be little more than a catnap. At least, that was her plan.
It was the sun streaming through her window that woke her. That was the first indication something was wrong. Since she’d begun work at Pneuma Inc., Dee had always caught the sunrise over the freeway just before she exited for the Pneuma Building. Somewhere in the back of her brain, a beep, beep, beep got louder and louder. It took a second to register that it was her alarm. She rolled over to turn it off, and her stomach turned to ice. It was almost eight o’clock! The alarm had been going off for nearly three hours. How could she not have heard it? She jumped from the bed, jamming her toe on the nightstand as she reached for her BlackBerry and punched in Ellis’s number. There was no answer. She punched in a quick message, which didn’t go. Then she remembered IT had had the network down all night for maintenance. Looked like they were still finishing up. She cranked the shower and stripped. The meeting was at nine. If she hurried, she just might make it.
And she probably would have had it not been for construction on I-5. Ellis still wasn’t answering his phone, and neither Lynn nor Sandra seemed to be at their desks. Dee left messages at the switchboard, but could do nothing else except sit and curse the traffic. She stumbled into the executive suites at 10:03, just as Tally Barnes stepped out of Ellis’s office.
Tally was the last person Dee wanted to see, but it was too late to duck behind anything. She was caught like a rabbit in the headlights.
Tally offered her a smile that was all sweetness and light. ‘Thank God! Dee, you’re here at last. I was worried sick that something awful had happened to you. Ellis had Lynn call me in when you didn’t show up. Naturally, I dropped everything and came in to pinch-hit for you. Are you all right?’
Dee nodded, forcing herself to remain calm. ‘Is Ellis in?’
‘Of course.’ Tally laid a solicitous hand on Dee’s arm. ‘I’m sorry, Dee, but he’s not in a very good mood. I mean, I’m sure whatever happened, you have an excuse, and, well, Ellis is a reasonable man. Good luck. I’m sure it’ll be OK.’ She squeezed Dee’s arm, then hurried past in a wave of some spicy perfume, her heels click-clicking on the floor as she headed for the elevator.
For a second, Dee feared she would pass out. Nothing like this had ever happened to her before, and worst of all, there was no one to blame but herself. She took two deep breaths, knocked on the door, and stepped inside.
‘Sit down.’ Ellis didn’t look up from his laptop.
She obeyed.
He continued with his work, giving her no indication as to what he was thinking.
She sat stiff-backed, clutching her BlackBerry for dear life. Waiting.
‘IT had a major glitch this morning,’ he said, still not looking at her. ‘The meeting was late getting started.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she said.
At last he pushed his chair back and looked up at her. ‘Marston refused the proposal.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she said again.
‘Not that it was a huge surprise, but I could have done without him berating me for hiring someone incompetent and irresponsible to take Beverly’s place. That didn’t exactly make my day. What the hell happened?’
She felt the heat rising up her spine and onto her ears. ‘I overslept.’ She forced the words out into the chilled room.
‘You overslept?’
‘Yes.’ She nodded imperceptibly, feeling the scrutiny of his glare.
For a long moment, he just stared at her. She forced herself to meet his gaze and held her tongue, afraid if she tried to say anything she’d burst into tears, and she despised women who cried.
‘That’s it, then? You overslept.’
She nodded again, swallowing hard.
‘Well, that’s a relief.’ He leaned forward in his chair and rose, almost as though he were going to leap over the desk and pounce. The tension in his body was palpable. ‘I was afraid you were lying on the freeway somewhere in a pool of blood. I’m so relieved that it was nothing so dire, and that you simply overslept.’ His voice gradually grew louder until he wasn’t exactly yelling, but neither was there any way she could miss his message as each word drove her deeper into her chair until she felt as trapped as if she had been tied there.
‘I’m sorry.’ She forced a whisper through the block in her throat, but the stinging behind her eyes warned that a swift exit would be necessary if she were to avoid the flood.
‘Sorry? You’re sorry? Tally had to pick up the slack. Do you have any idea how that looked? Just when I was starting to make progress with Marston, just when the man was beginning to listen to reason, you oversleep. You made Jamison’s deal seem all the sweeter, that’s what you did. Now, tell me what the hell’s going on.’
‘Pardon?’
He moved from behind his desk and paced the carpet in front of her like a bull ready to charge. ‘You’re supposed to be working to shore up the situation with Scribal. I told you up front that’s your major concern at the moment, then not only do you oversleep and miss an important meeting, but I find out you’ve been working on something behind my back.’ Before she could respond, he turned on her. ‘Is Trouvères what you’ve been staying up half the night and missing meetings for? When I hired you, I never thought you, of all people, would neglect your responsibilities.’
‘I’m not neglecting anything. If you would just –’
He interrupted her. ‘Don’t think just because I gave you this job, you suddenly know it all. I took a big risk hiring you.’ He stopped pacing and rooted himself in front of her, close enough that she had to strain her neck to look up at him. ‘You want to do something; you bring it to me first. You’re not ready to make that kind of decision on your own. You don’t have the experience it takes to … To … You’re not Beverly.’
His words were a hard slap, felt more than heard above the roar in her ears. She wasn’t sure whether the ragged breathing her brain finally registered in the chasm of silence that followed his tirade was his or her own.
The phone rang into the charged atmosphere, and Ellis jerked it from its cradle in a stranglehold. ‘This had better be good, Lynn. Wade? What the hell does he want? Can’t it wait? We’re not finished yet. I can what?’ He heaved a sigh of resignation and slammed the receiver back down. ‘Wade wants to see you right now. He says I can get back to you on this, and believe me, I intend to.’ He nodded toward the door. ‘Well, go on; at least don’t keep him waiting. Pick up the notes on the meeting from Sandra.’
She stood on trembling legs and turned to go. As she reached for the door, he called to her. ‘Dee, I strongly suggest you make no more attempts to prove Marston right about you.’
Sandra joined her in the hall. ‘I have the meeting notes for you.’
‘Just put them on my desk. Wade wants to see me.’
Sandra nodded. ‘Yes, I know. I told him he did. And I told him to give you a few minutes in the ladies’ to freshen up first.’ She offered a reassuring smile and turned on her heels.
Still breathing like a freight train, Ellis watched Dee disappear, shutting the door behind her. He grabbed the phone and called his secretary. ‘Lynn, hold all my calls. I don’t want to be disturbed … How long? Until I say otherwise, that’s how long.’ He slammed the receiver down, snapped his laptop shut, and stormed down the hall to the lounge.
He shoved his way out of his jacket and tossed it across the wing-backed chair, then practically strangled himself in his efforts to loosen his tie. From the coffee table he grabbed up the remote, and plunged the room into the wild, raucous ride of the third movement of Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata. Then he dropped onto the sofa struggling to breath, struggling to regain control, struggling to figure out what the hell had just happened. All through the meeting, when Dee didn’t show up, he was terrified that something horrible had happened; terrified t
hat he would lose Dee the same way he had lost Beverly. And the relief he felt at seeing her. Jesus, the relief was like nothing he’d ever felt before.
If Lynn hadn’t called, if Wade hadn’t demanded Dee’s presence … If Ellis had had one more second with her, he would have yanked her up from the chair and fucked her senseless right there in the middle of the day with all of Pneuma Inc. just outside his door, fucked her as though he might never get another chance, fucked her as though his life depended on it, and that’s exactly how it felt. He wiped cold sweat from his forehead, struggling to breathe. If he’d lost her, Jesus! He couldn’t even bear the thought.
He jerked open his fly and sucked a harsh breath as he released himself into his hand and began to tug on his cock like the world was coming to an end. Christ, he couldn’t go on like this. It felt like he was always either avoiding her or jerking off thinking about her. And fuck if he wasn’t thinking about her all the time; the shape of her, the feel of her, the sass of her. He’d never wanted anything so badly. And then – and then she’d fucked up so royally that all he wanted to do was punish her, to turn her over his knee for giving him such a scare, to – to … To fuck her until she couldn’t walk.
The image flashed through his head, of him bending her over his desk and shoving up her skirt, of him ripping aside her panties, of him making her sorry she’d overslept, of him making her sorry she’d made him feel all those things, things he didn’t want to feel, of him dropping his trousers and shoving his cock up into her very contrite, very wet slit and … That was it. Before he could reach for his handkerchief, before he could even think about making it to the bathroom, he convulsed his load onto the coffee table to the driving piano crescendo hammering into his ears and to visions of Dee Henning bent over his desk, moaning and writhing beneath him.
Chapter Ten
It hadn’t been Dee’s intention to spill her guts to Harris about the disastrous meeting. He stopped by her office to deliver a sandwich for a late dinner. He’d been in the neighbourhood, and they hadn’t had much time to catch up since she started work at Pneuma Inc. She’d promised him at least 20 minutes in exchange for the sandwich. It hadn’t taken him that long to figure out something wasn’t right.
‘I couldn’t even make an excuse, Harris. There were no excuses. Marston’s right. I was irresponsible.’ She knocked back the last of her iced tea, wishing it were something stronger, but knowing she had way too much work to do this evening to even think about drinking anything that didn’t involve high doses of caffeine.
Harris sat back in the chair and wiped his hands on the napkin. ‘You look like hell, Dee. When’s the last time you slept?’
‘This morning! That’s the problem.’
‘I mean really slept. A full night, peaceful dreams, teddy bear, the whole nine yards.’
‘I never thought it would be like this. I always thought I’d be so impressive, that I would somehow manage to pull everything off and come out shining. He’s gonna fire me, Harris.’ She quickly wiped at her eyes to stave off the threat of tears. ‘He might have already done it if Sandra and Wade hadn’t conspired to rescue me.’ The thought made her cringe. ‘It’s so humiliating. I’ve never needed rescuing in my life. I’ve always pulled my own weight.’
‘Yours and several other people’s as well, most of the time.’ Harris said. ‘So then what happened?’
‘Ellis said he’d get back to me, that we weren’t finished, but then he got called away, so I was spared the guillotine, at least until tomorrow.’
‘He’s not going to fire you, Dee. Does he have any idea the hours you put in? Is he still here?’
She shook her head.
‘Didn’t think so. And you were here how late last night with Wade Crittenden?’
She toyed with her sandwich. ‘I don’t know. I think it was two when I left. We had a couple of calls to Paris, and with the time change and all …’
‘And how long has this been going on?’
‘It doesn’t matter how long. It’ll have to keep going on until I figure things out, or Ellis finally decides Tally Barnes really can do this job better than I can. She must have been looking pretty damn good to him this morning.’
‘Who’s Tally Barnes?’
‘Someone who’s a little too helpful for comfort.’ Dee figured it was probably Tally who had been thoughtful enough to mention to Ellis that she’d been spending evenings with Wade, though she didn’t know how Tally knew about Trouvères.
‘Maybe you’re right; maybe you should be prepared just in case Ellis gives you the axe.’ Harris gave her a mock-serious look. ‘You should probably polish up your arias. Great sopranos are hard to come by.’
She threw her napkin across the desk at him and laughed. ‘True, but we mediocre ones are abundant.’
Harris caught the napkin and slam-dunked it into the trash. ‘Ah! What a life it would be for you, Dee!’ He stood and moved behind her desk, placing a light kiss on the top of her head. Teaching snotty-nosed kids their scales after school, auditioning for all the local musicals. Your mom would be so proud.’ He looked down at his watch. ‘I’ve gotta go. Some of us still have a life.’ He shrugged. ‘Well, at least Kendra does. See you later, Ms Diva.’ He kissed her again and left.
Ms Diva. Harris and Kendra used to call her that all the time back when she was running here and there to music lessons and auditions, before she defied her mother and went off to study for her MBA. The memory of her day of emancipation still made her stomach churn.
‘When were you going to tell me? I’m your mother, for God’s sake!’
Dee remembered everything about that day like it was yesterday. Her mother had paid a surprise visit to her dorm room after one of Dee’s professors had let the plan slip to her while picking up his kid from a piano lesson. The colour in her mother’s cheeks always made her look like a porcelain doll when she was angry, and she had been enraged.
‘There was no point.’ Dee continued packing. ‘I knew how you’d react.’
‘Of course you knew how I’d react. How would you expect me to react when you throw your career away?’ Her mother paced in front of the bed breathing like she was about to explode.
‘There is no career, Mom. When are you gonna admit it? I’m not that good.’
‘You are that good. You’re just lazy, that’s all, lazy like your father. You don’t practice enough, you’re not focused enough. You don’t appreciate the sacrifices I’ve made for you to have this chance.’
Dee kept packing.
‘What about Cats? I’ve talked to the producer, and he’s willing to give you an audition. You’re a shoo-in, Dee, you know that.’
‘Of course I’m a shoo-in, Mom, it’s a local production. Anyone who can carry a tune is a shoo-in.’
Her mother glared at her. ‘You know that’s not true. The Oregonian will be covering it, and that means people will see you, will hear you. That’s all you need, darling. That’s all you’ve ever needed.’
‘That’s all I need for what?’ She slammed a stack of T-shirts into the suitcase. ‘So I can sing with some minor chorus and give lessons to brats who don’t practice like you do, just to pay the rent?’
Dee hadn’t seen it coming. Looking back now, she should have. The sharp impact of her mother’s hand hard across her face nearly knocked her backward onto the bed. Inside her mouth, she tasted blood where her teeth had cut her cheek. For a second the world blurred in front of watery eyes, but she blinked, straightened herself, and continued to pack. She knew it always made her mother angrier when she just took the abuse, when she didn’t argue or cry or get angry. That was power, something there had been precious little of in her life until then.
‘I gave up my chances to be great when your father knocked me up. I didn’t have to do that, you know? I gave up my life for you, to see your gifts nurtured, to see you had the chance I didn’t get, and this –’ She kicked over the second suitcase already packed and sitting by the bed. ‘This is how you repay me?
’
‘It’s a great opportunity, Mom, one I may never get again. And I’m good at it. I’m really good at it.’ The woman had never acknowledged Dee’s 4.0 grade point average nor the listing of good schools she could have easily gotten into. There was no need for any of that in her mother’s eyes, not when her daughter was going to be a great soprano, or a star on Broadway. Yet somehow it had never entered her mind to wonder why none of those scholarships were music scholarships.
Her mother sniffed. ‘Well, you might as well unpack, because I’m not paying for it.’
As if she even could, Dee thought. She had only managed to go to university at all because her grades were good enough for scholarships and because she always held down a part-time job or two in addition to her classes. ‘It’s already paid for, Mom, everything.’
Dee slung her bag over her shoulder and picked up the two suitcases, one in each hand. Her mother followed her into the hall, still ranting. ‘I should have listened to your father. He said we were too young to have a baby, he said I should think of myself and my career.’ Dee’s ears burned as several doors along the hall opened and students stuck their heads out to see what the noise was about. They should have known it was just Dee Henning’s mother making a scene again.
‘Dee?’
She started, not at all sorry to have the instant replay of her past interrupted.
Ellis stood at the door dressed in a tuxedo, and for a brief second the combination of his looks and the serene, slightly puzzled expression on his face made her wonder if she were dreaming. If so, she was pretty sure she didn’t want to wake up.
‘What are you still doing here?’
The memory of their encounter that morning nearly took her breath away, and she braced herself. This was it. He hadn’t forgotten. He was here to fire her. Well, at least she wouldn’t have to angst over it all night.
She scrambled to look a bit more business-like, tidying her jacket and running a hand through her hair. ‘Ellis! I wasn’t expecting you.’ In spite of herself, she felt guilty for the sandwich break she’d taken earlier.
An Executive Decision (Executive Decisions Trilogy) Page 7
