by Carol Caiton
Simon looked around the table. "Officially, I fired her last Friday."
"Well Malcolm hired her back on Saturday."
"Of course he did." Simon laughed. "Rehired her as an interpreter?"
"Yes, for Nimah. But only for the day."
"Hold up," Ethan jumped in. "Who's Nimah, and why did we need an interpreter?"
"That's right, you were out of town on Saturday. Elliott tried to phone you but you didn't answer."
Malcolm gave him a brief summary on the incident involving Nimah, Dalton, and Jessica."
"Why in God's name was she serving coffee at Urns & Leaves when she could be working for the U.N?"
"Because, professionally, she's keeping a low profile."
Mason's eyes narrowed. "Why?"
"Who's she hiding from?" Oliver asked at the same time.
Malcolm pursed his lips. "Interpol."
"What?"
"Interpol?"
"What the hell did she do to attract their attention?"
"Nothing," Michael answered. "Nothing at all. But Interpol isn't the only reason she's hiding."
Malcolm raised a brow then nodded toward Michael, giving way to his greater knowledge of the situation.
"It started with an asshole named Qasim Zafir," Michael said. "Who's dead, by the way. The bastard actually tried to buy her from her father—who's also dead, by the way. Her father was murdered after he refused Zafir's third offer."
"Murdered?"
"Ah, hell."
"Yeah. But it wasn't Zafir who killed him. It was some French investor who decided Jessica and her father's money should marry his son. So the investor popped Zafir and made it look like somebody avenged her father. Then he took Jessica under his wing, and almost got what he wanted."
"What happened? Did she find out what he did?"
"No, she doesn't know it was him yet. But she overheard a couple of the son's friends talkin' about him scammin' her."
"And she ended up here."
"Yeah."
"So why is Interpol after her?"
"Actually, they're only watching to see if anyone else comes after her. White women with blonde hair tended to disappear around Zafir, and Interpol's hoping for a lead—waiting to see if any of Zafir's people decide she was responsible for his death."
"And you're only now telling us this?"
"Yeah. I've been keepin' an eye on things. It doesn't look like anyone's interested in traveling halfway round the world for revenge. And Interpol's onto the French investor now. I figure they'll have him in about a week, then everyone'll know Jessica didn't have anything to do with anything." He shrugged. "Unfortunately, they're gonna have to do a little more legwork to uncover what's left of Zafir's setup, but at least that's two assholes who won't be walkin' around free."
"Geez, Michael."
"Does Falkner know about this?" Simon asked.
"Yeah, Kyle knows. He marched his new little wife down to the federal building Monday afternoon and made sure whoever else needs to know this shit knows it too." He smiled and leaned back, balancing his chair on two legs. "And now he won't let her go anywhere without him."
"Well, we can't have her on staff now that she's married."
"We may have to," Mason said, surprising everyone. "Or at least contract her services unless we can find someone else who speaks Farsi. Dalton received a death threat last night."
"Ah, fuck." The front legs of Michael's chair hit the carpet.
"What happened?"
"A brick was smashed through his passenger window and a note was tossed inside. Dalton heard the glass break, but by the time he made it outside, all he saw were taillights."
"He call the police?"
"Yes. Then he phoned me."
"What did the note say?" Oliver asked.
"It said, 'Return her or you will die.' Three guesses as to who the author wants returned."
"Only need one."
"I got directions to his house and arrived just as the police did.
"An American would say, 'Return her or you'll die.' Or, 'Return her or die.' He wouldn't say '. . . or you will die,' ya know?"
Murmurs went around the table.
"All right," Malcolm said, "Short of hiring a pair of body guards for Dalton, what do you suggest?"
"First of all, whoever left that note knows where Dalton lives. And when Dalton doesn't produce Nimah, she said he—or they—will be back," Mason reminded them. "So I suggest we ask Dalton to leave the area for a while, maybe offer an unscheduled, paid vacation. We'll have Ethan set up a few surveillance cameras, and hire a couple of PIs to watch the house."
"But isn't that like saying RUSH acknowledges accountability—you know—if we don't catch whoever's responsible and something happens to Dalton?"
"Michael, if something happens to Dalton, you can pretty much count on a lawsuit. Nimah is legally of age to make her own decisions, but if one of our employees is murdered because of an incident related to his position here, his family is going to look closely at that connection."
Malcolm intervened. "How long do you propose we make this paid holiday?"
"I'd say start with two weeks, see what happens, then take it from there."
"Dalton won't like it," Ethan said.
"Probably not," Mason agreed. "But I think he'll go along with it."
Malcolm made a note on his legal pad then turned to Oliver. "Work up the numbers for us."
"Got it."
"All right, let's move on. We're running short on time today. Elliott, what's the status of our land bid?"
"No word yet. We probably won't hear anything until the end of the month."
"Any thoughts on adding another salon somewhere on property?"
"We just opened two salons in the mall," Michael pointed out.
"True. But they fill to capacity almost daily."
"Has our female membership increased that much?" Michael looked over at Simon.
"Only by three this month. But we underestimated the demand." He thumbed through his printout. "The thirty-minute massage is at the top of those demands, followed closely by nail treatments, hair, and . . ." he smiled, "pubic sculpting."
"What about The Pubic Zone?"
"Full. Consistently."
"Geez."
"Simon, give us a bar chart to look at next week."
Simon made a note of it.
"Elliott, we'll discuss it again next week."
"Sounds good."
"All right then, let's go to—"
"Yo, Malcolm, hold up a minute, will you?"
And there it was, Simon thought.
"We've got a situation," Michael informed the table.
Malcolm leaned back in his chair. "What sort of situation?"
Michael tapped his pencil on his spiral pad, then set it down on the table. "Holly McGarvey's been screwing with the system."
Everyone froze.
"How bad is it?" Oliver asked.
"Right now, everything's running normal. But she rerouted some information. Seriously messed with it. I've gone over it twice, and the system generated two blue icons about a month ago. But it looks like Holly got curious—maybe wanted to know who those two blues belonged to."
"How the hell did she even know there were two blues?" Ethan asked. "Does she sit at her desk and monitor the linking activity?"
"I don't know. Maybe. I'm really hoping that's exactly what she does."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Well," Michael sighed, "I backtracked through everything she did, and without naming any names, I know who those two blues went to."
"Keep that information to yourself," Mason said, "but go on from there."
"Well, the thing is, if Holly's not sitting there being curious, then the recipients of those icons paid Miss McGarvey a visit and told her they wanted the names of those women without going through proper channels."
"And she did this?"
"She not only did it, she removed both women from the active files.
They're just sitting there, dormant, as though their blues were accepted, but nobody knows it."
Mason scribbled something on his legal pad. "Did you correct what she did?"
"Not yet. I wanted to run it by you first, make sure I had the legal authority to go in there."
"Do it."
"Okay, consider it done. And by the way, as far as I'm concerned, her ass is out the door as soon as this meeting ends."
"Agreed."
"Agreed."
"Agreed."
"No."
Every head snapped around and six pairs of eyes stared at Simon.
"One of those blue icons came to me."
"Again?"
"Hell, Simon."
Simon braced himself and said, "I can't speak for the other blue, but as far as the one on my monitor is concerned, I called Holly to my office and told her I wanted to know who was behind it. I wanted her name, and I wanted her file deactivated in the system so I could have more than forty-eight hours to decide what I wanted to do about it."
"Shit," Oliver bit out.
"Did it occur to you that you were putting Holly's job on the line?" Elliott asked.
Simon faced Elliott. "There's not a person at this table who hasn't asked Michael to perform an unconventional search."
"This is more than an unconventional search," Oliver growled. "What you've done puts every one of us at risk." He slapped his pen down on the table. "RUSH's reputation is based on the linking program. What the fuck do you think is going to happen if this gets out?"
Simon faced each of them, business partners, friends, knowing Oliver was absolutely right. All seven of them had millions of dollars invested in RUSH. This was no small offense he'd committed. And the truth was, he hadn't given a single thought to anything other than his own interests—not to them, not to his own investment, nor to the thousands of employees who would lose their jobs if RUSH went under.
"If this becomes a legal issue," he said to Mason, "do whatever you can to check it at the outset and settle out of court. Draw up whatever papers are necessary to insure the settlement is my sole responsibility, and do whatever you have to do to protect RUSH." He looked around the table. "Holly didn't—"
"Holly should have gone to Mason or someone else on the board about this. That option was always out there."
Simon nodded because it was true. Then he turned to Malcolm. "You'll have my resignation on your desk by the end of the day."
"Ah, fuck."
"Goddamn it."
"Actually," Malcolm said, "I believe both our resignations should be turned over to Mason." He looked around the table. "The second blue was mine."
Everyone, including Simon, stared.
"And," Malcolm continued, "my actions mirror Simon's. Almost exactly."
"Shit, Malcolm. Goddamn it!"
"Great. Just great."
He looked at Mason. "You'll need to prepare a second set of settlement documents with my name in place of Simon's."
"Jesus Christ!"
Mason held up a staying hand. "Hold on. Let's step back and take a breather here. Simon. Malcolm. Go take a walk so we can discuss this without you."
* * *
Simon stood at the row of windows in his office, hands pushed into his trouser pockets, and stared out at the trickling fountain behind his corner of the administrative building. Malcolm's office was located diagonally opposite, facing front, but he thought Malcolm might be similarly occupied, staring out at the incarnation of a long-ago concept and wondering how to fix something that couldn't be fixed, how to make amends when trust had been broken, when something you did cut so recklessly into the lives of others, you wondered if it was even possible to earn their trust again.
His batting average wasn't particularly strong in that area. It wasn't so long ago that he'd been trying to convince Nina he wanted a monogamous relationship with her, only to have her walk in on him with Kaylene Woodrow. And how could he expect Hannah to accept that he wanted her blue icon after the way he'd treated her all these months?
A full hour passed before his cell phone rang and he was summoned back to the conference room like a recalcitrant adolescent. A glance at his watch told him Mason and the others would have postponed the second half of today's meeting and sent RUSH's management team away until a later time.
Malcolm rounded the corner at the opposite end of the corridor and waited for Simon to join him, both equally grim. Then they went inside and took their usual seats.
"Okay," Mason said, "this is what's going to happen." He looked from Simon to Malcolm. "We discussed accepting your resignations and the long-term effect it would have on RUSH. We discussed the penalty in our partnership agreement as well, and this is what we came up with." He leaned forward. "Today never happened. Michael found a glitch when he took a look at how our new programmer is doing. The blue icons that should have been delivered to you were delayed and will turn up on your monitors today. This is why Michael comes in once a month—to make sure everything's running smoothly. Corrections to the system will be made and when those blue icons arrive, they'll come with the normally allotted forty-eight hours to make your decisions." Again, he looked back and forth between Malcolm and Simon. "We, however, want those decisions made and entered into the system before Michael leaves here today. Either accept or decline. That's it. Agreed?"
Both Simon and Malcolm nodded. "Agreed."
"Good."
"What about Holly?" Simon asked. "I—"
"Holly's gonna be looking for a new job," Michael said. "Your blues aren't the only thing she's been foolin' around with, so she and I are gonna have a little chat. Without witnesses."
So, Simon thought, she was going to lose her job after all. If what Michael said was true, and there was no reason to believe it wasn't, she was indeed a wildcard. He knew she'd been tapping into the system to assuage her curiosity and he remembered the unease he'd felt when he realized what she'd been doing. Now he wondered what else she'd been up to.
He didn't have to ask how Michael planned to ensure her silence. Holly wouldn't be talking to anyone about RUSH. Nor would she be talking about anything that happened here. In fact, Michael would urge her to forget she was ever involved with RUSH at all. When someone had the kind of genius Michael had, technology could ruin a life.
"And I've got a couple other people in mind to replace her," Michael added. "A couple of programmers I know who'd be damned interested in buying out my shares. One's out in Sacramento, and the other works out of Boston. I say we go that route so the person running the show has a bona fide interest in keeping it legit."
"Agreed."
"Agreed."
"Sounds good, Michael, why don't you set it up for us to talk with them.
Michael nodded. "Will do."
"All right," Mason said. "We have a company to run and the expertise of each of us is needed to do it, so let's call it a morning and get back to work."
That was it? Let's get back to work? The reprieve was jarring after being confronted with the potential disaster of his actions.
Ninety minutes later, seated at his desk, a brief chime sounded, indicating a communication from the corporate data base. He typed in his password and there, in the bottom corner of his monitor, sat the status-2 blue icon that would link him to Hannah Breckenridge.
He didn't have to think twice. Reaching for the mouse beside his keyboard, he positioned the cursor over the plus sign and clicked.
Three photographs filled his screen, a large one of Hannah smiling, happy, and two smaller ones, equally carefree. Her blue-gray eyes sparkled, her golden-blonde hair floated down past her shoulders, and in one photo, the numerous bangles and bracelets she wore covered her wrist.
He took his hand away from the mouse and stared. He'd wanted her for so long, he couldn't drag his eyes away.
* * *
Malcolm crossed the threshold into his office and quietly closed the door. For several seconds he stood unmoving, his eyes focused on the shaft of s
unlight streaming through the far wall of glass onto the softly glowing, pale marble statue. For a long time, he'd wondered if her shoulder-length hair was blonde or brown, her eyes light or dark, her nipples soft blushing pink, or deep dusky rose. The artist's last name, chiseled into the outer portion of her upper arm, like a brand that accompanied the scarring lash beneath it, was Hart. And for just as long, he'd suspected Hart was the subject of her own work. The sculptor had painstakingly carved every curve and every inflicted wound into the marble. There were nineteen of them scored into the stone, including the one beneath her name.
Silently crossing the carpet, he stopped in the same shaft of sunlight and lifted his hand to caress his thumb across her name. The six-inch pedestal on which she stood placed her nearly at eye level with him. But her true height would bring her no higher than his chin
Lowering his fingers, he traced the slanted scar that stretched four inches along her outer arm. He knew now that her hair was a streaked, burnished bronze in dim lighting and a paler golden color in the light. Her eyes were almost clear, crystalline green, and her full name was Lauren Mackenzie Hart—the name revealed by Holly McGarvey's delve into the linking system.
Upon learning the identity of the woman behind the blue icon and connecting the name Hart, he'd hired a private investigator in order to learn more. But it still caught at his breath when the pale marble he'd stared at so many times during the past year came to life in full color after ten photos had been delivered to him in a manila envelope. He couldn't say the number of times he'd passed his fingers over each scar, cupped her breast in his hand to know the shape of her, or smoothed his pal over the rounded curve of her buttocks. In all ten photos her scars were covered by clothing, but there had been no mistaking with whom he'd been linked.
To his deep regret, however, Lauren Mackenzie Hart didn't want a link, blue or otherwise. He didn't know why she'd applied for one since, according to the report he'd received, she was planning to leave the country. She hadn't even lived in Florida until a week ago. Her permanent address, according to the gallery at RUSH's mall, was in New York. Apparently she flew into Orlando three weeks ago, filled out an application for membership, returned to New York two days later, then came back last week to take up temporary lodgings.
