At Your Service

by Amy Jo Cousins

  "That is exactly correct. As the owner of fifty percent of the corporation—" she indicated herself "—my approval is necessary for any major business decisions, and I can assure you that I have not approved any of these offers." She smiled gently now and began the process of easing them into acceptance of this sudden about-face. "I understand, of course, that alter the merry chase you've been led, you might be inclined to doubt my statements without some further reassurance as to their validity. Which is why I invited our corporate attorney, Mr. Franklin O'Connell, to join us today, so that he can verify what I'm telling you. Franklin?"

  The attorney rose from his seat at the table and nodded. She continued.

  "It occurs to me that some refreshments might be appropriate while we continue our discussion. Please feel free to speak with Mr. O'Connell while I arrange things. Thank you."

  Not until she stepped out of the room into an adjoining office did she allow her shoulders to sag with relief. She was going to pull it off. It was there to be read in their faces already. They believed her, based only on her clear self-assurance, and the questions they would ask Franklin would only reinforce the fact that she was the sole authority in the Haley Group. With exactly fifty percent of the corporation in her name, she couldn't sell off any part of the Haley Group herself, either, but she could certainly block the moves made by Charles and her mother.

  She'd just done exactly that.

  Picking up the phone, she punched in the number for room service and placed her order, directing them to send the server in with a passkey, so as not to interrupt the meeting with a knock. She stopped for one last glance at herself in the mirror before heading back into the battle zone.

  Her hair was perfect. Her hair, her makeup, her Chanel suit and heels, all fit her as if she were born to wear them. And indeed she had been. But she'd unconsciously put her hair up in the same chignon she'd worn to work at Tyler's, and the contrast between her image there and the one that faced her now froze her in place. She felt like two separate women walking around in a single body. One of the women had to be a lie, and she wasn't sure anymore which one she wanted to be true.

  Back around the conference table, the conversation was lively but clearly bowing to the inevitable. When the waiter arrived and discreetly arranged a small banquet table along a side wall, nearly everyone accepted a glass of wine or a cocktail. The large gentleman even availed himself of several cold appetizers, the consumption of which had an immediate positive effect on his mood.

  "Why don't we remove ourselves to a more casual setting, now that it's clear we won't be doing any business this afternoon?" he suggested with a vague wave toward the casual arrangement of couches and armchairs at the opposite end of the room.

  "An excellent idea," Grace answered, and walked with him. The remaining investors followed more or less agreeably. At that moment, she knew without a doubt that she'd won. All that was left were the formalities.

  When the glasses were emptied and overcoats and furs retrieved from the closet, when she'd shaken the last hand and bid a firm goodbye to Franklin, she closed the door with a click behind the last well-wisher. A couple of drinks and some charmingly prepared snacks, and they had been uniform in cursing that shameful Mr. Huntington, praising her decision to postpone any further discussion of business for the time being, and begging, every last one of them, to be kept in mind if she decided in the future to reconsider selling.

  She'd won. The cold sliver in her heart at how she'd been forced to connive and conspire behind the backs of her onetime boyfriend and her family would go away eventually. Franklin was prepared for her resumption of directorial control as of Monday morning. Grace had taken back her life.

  She had less than three days to figure out how to break it all to Tyler.

  The golden rays of the setting sun shot through the windows of the Tyler's Bar & Grill and lit up the liqueurs in their glass bottles like rows of jewels reflected in the etched mirror behind them.

  To Grace, the slowly dimming light was like a relentless time bomb, ticking out its countdown in a graphic visual display of her eroding time until confession.

  She'd managed to avoid intimate conversation with Tyler during the past forty-eight hours, accusing herself of lapsing back into cowardice with every passing minute. As for Tyler, he hadn't questioned her about a thing, including her late and hurried arrival to work on Friday night. He'd simply greeted her with a grin and gruff, "Get to work, or I'm taking a percentage point off your partnership." Even with the joke, she could feel him taking a step back from pressuring her, and wanted to tear her hair out with remorse and frustration. His consideration balanced against her deceit seemed an unfair trade.

  But for two days she'd taken guilty pleasure in pretending that all was well between them. She'd smiled until her face ached while she worked in perfect harmony with Tyler at the restaurant, and luxuriated in two nights of falling to sleep, tired but cherished, in his arms. When he'd asked her to run the restaurant for him early Sunday morning so he could take care of some long-delayed personal business, she'd agreed with alacrity, happy to be able to pay back some of the debt she owed him.

  The bar phone rang, its attached light blinking as a visual reminder. She delivered a Manhattan to one of her regulars at the bar and snagged the phone on the third ring.

  "Tyler's Bar and Grill, this is Grace. How can I help you?"

  "Grade? Merci. Thank God it is you."

  "Paul?"

  The front door swung open and Tyler strolled in, his casual smile instantly brightening at the sight of her behind the bar. He nodded at his customers, dropped a word or patted a back as he passed them, and ducked under the counter to join her. A loud noise dragged her attention back to the phone.

  "Paul? I'm sorry. I wasn't listening. What are you so frantic about?"

  "Frantic? Frantic? I show you frantic. If I catch that stupid fiancé of yours, with my hands around his neck, I show you frantic. That boy, idiote, he—"

  Tyler was advancing on her with slow, deliberate steps, and the look in his eye drained her of all ability to think. Her muscles grew weak. She fumbled with the phone as it began to tumble from her hand.

  "Paul," she interrupted, "don't worry about Charles. He can't do anything now. I've taken care of it." Her lover's arm curled around her waist and yanked her against his body. "Got to go. Call you soon. 'Bye."

  "But, Gracie, it is necessary to tell you—" His words vanished as she clicked the off button and dropped the phone to the floor.

  "Hi."

  "Hi, yourself."

  "How's my bar doing?"

  "F-fine," she stuttered as his thumb grazed the side of her breast in a slow rise to brush lightly over her lips. Her mind refused to form complete sentences. "Brunch, good. Slow afternoon. Picking up again now."

  "I've missed you all day," he whispered before replacing his thumb with his mouth and short-circuiting her entire system. Her body and brain were still reeling as he pulled slowly away from her with a last caress.

  "Who's Charles?"

  "My ex," she answered without thinking, and instantly felt tricked. The words had slipped out before she had a chance to think and she wondered if that had been his purpose.

  "Ex-boyfriend, hmm?" Tyler leaned against the back counter and crossed his arms as he considered her thoughtfully. "He wouldn't be the guy who's been troubling you, would he?"

  The thought flashed through her mind that he was entirely too close to the mark. This was followed immediately by the idea that she'd never find a better opportunity to tell him the truth.

  "Want me to beat him up for you, Gracie?" he teased, and tugged at the ends of her loose hair.

  "Tyler..."

  "What a charming scene, my dear. I do hope I'm not interrupting."

  The oily tones that snaked into her moment of silence from behind her stiffened her back and iced her blood. It was a voice from her nightmares, one whose power she thought she'd taken away. She realized suddenly how wrong sh
e was about that as Tyler looked over her shoulder.

  She knew who he saw.

  "Can I help you?" Tyler snapped, placing a hand on her shoulder to hold her still, keeping her back to the room.

  "I think not," came the upper-crust drawl. "Although you've clearly been helping yourself to my future wife."

  She felt Tyler's hand tense and thought he would leap over the bar to defend her. But this was still her battle. Come to confront her in a way she hadn't expected or wanted, but hers nonetheless. She placed her hand on Tyler's chest, looked him in the eye and shook her head.

  Then she stepped away from him and turned to face him.

  "Charles."

  He hadn't changed, his blond hair sweeping carelessly across his forehead, thin lips pursed as if he smelled something rotten, and soft, delicate hands posed artfully in front of him as if he were concerned that if he touched a surface he might catch something. Even his voice, refined in East Coast prep schools and universities and archly superior, was the same.

  "Good evening, Grace."

  "What are you doing here?"

  "Slumming, apparently. The same as you are." His eyes skimmed her clothes doubtfully. "Buying off the rack these days, are we?"

  "Stop it, Charles."

  "Really, darling—" he waved vaguely at the small restaurant "—this place could fit in the lobby of Nice. I can't believe you've been hiding out in this shack all this time."

  "Shut your mouth." She rapped out the words, her voice raised. Several of the bar patrons shifted on their stools, as if ready to come to her rescue at a word. She saw with pleasure that she'd given Charles a start by yelling at him. He recovered quickly however.

  "It seems you've found your temper at last. Charming. I can't imagine that there's anything else worth sampling here."

  Her fist slammed onto the bar, rattling the glasses.

  "Running an announcement in the papers doesn't make me your wife, Charles, and dining out every night on the company tab doesn't make you a restaurant critic. You don't know anything about value and worth. Just trendiness, and money you didn't have to earn." Dawning nervousness radiated from the matching blue eyes blinking inches from hers. She didn't remember thrusting herself over the bar.

  "I repeat, what are you doing here?"

  "Well..." He paused, drawing a slim gold case from an inside pocket and carefully extracting a narrow, black cigarette. He looked expectantly at her. When she simply waited, motionless, he exhaled audibly and reached into the same pocket for a gold lighter. He proceeded then to press a button and hold the blue flame to the cigarette tip.

  His careful exhale blew smoke directly in her face.

  Grace felt the exact moment when Tyler decided he'd had enough. He shrugged off her restraining hand and reached over the bar in a move so fast that the cigarette was out of the other man's mouth and crushed lo a stub in an ashtray before anyone blinked.

  "I suggest you either answer the lady's question or remove yourself from the premises." He ground the cigarette out even further, leaving a split filter and scattered tobacco. His grin said, Try me. "If you can't make up your mind, I'd be real happy to help you."

  Grace saw Charles consider lighting another cigarette. He decided against it.

  "As I was saying, I've been receiving disturbing information from certain business associates of mine in the last few days." His air of sleazy assurance was less convincing by now. "It seems you've come out of hiding, Grace, and wrecked some of my more carefully laid plans. Once I figured out what was happening, I took Franklin out to dinner and poured brandy in him until he confessed. He always did think you were too big for your britches, darling."

  She swore mentally at Franklin. "And I always thought Franklin was too dumb to be a lawyer. At least one of us was right."

  "That's enough. Before we continue the insult fest, I think introductions are in order." Tyler didn't bother to offer a handshake. "I'm Tyler. This is my restaurant you're standing in."

  Her ex smirked.

  "Charles Huntington the Third, President of the Haley Group. I'm sure you've stood in more than one of my—of our—restaurants."

  But Tyler wasn't even looking at him. His eyes were locked on hers, asking for answers. She hadn't noticed him taking a step away from her, but could feel the distance now. Slowly, he extended a hand toward her.

  "I said introductions were in order, Grace." His voice rang sad chords in her heart. "I guess I mean all around."

  In her worst, most fearful imaginings, she'd never dreamed it would take place as badly as this.

  "Grace Haley."

  She shook his hand for what felt like the last time.

  "Of the Haley Group." His words were bitter ashes in his mouth.

  "Yes."

  "How stupid of me." The twist of his mouth cut at her like a knife. "It certainly does shine out of you. I wonder if I would have recognized you eventually." He closed his eyes briefly and she stiffened as he looked at her a moment later. Every trace of her was erased from his eyes. "I don't even want to know what game you were playing here." He laughed, harsh and short. "I always knew you were hiding something. Thought I'd wait until you trusted me enough to tell me. But I never would have guessed this."

  "I was going to tell you. Tonight," she whispered as her heart broke and spilled to the floor at his feet. Tyler just looked at her. She could sooner read a stranger's gaze.

  "It doesn't matter."

  She watched, refusing to believe, as he turned his back on her and walked away. At the far end of the bar, he carefully lifted the counter flap, walked through and replaced it gently. And she was falling, falling into (he dark pit that had opened beneath her feet and swallowed her whole. She was sure she must be screaming, but no one seemed lo hear her.

  What she did hear, from the depths of her fall, as the wind roared in her ears, was Charles's voice, pitched to carry to the corners of the room.

  "He didn't know who you were? Or about our engagement, either? My dear, how rude of you. Of course, the staff fall in love with you all the time, and I'm sure you didn't want to make him feel silly, did you?" Charles didn't even try to hide the spite in his words, but it didn't matter. She saw Tyler's step hitch and knew he heard them as truth. "Since Franklin told me you were returning to your old post tomorrow, I merely wanted to drop in to say welcome back, sweetheart."

  The slow swing of the kitchen doors marked Tyler's passage out of the room. The noise jarred her enough to shock her back into awareness. Was she letting him leave? This final evidence of her lack of nerve clicked something on inside her. Some-thing she didn't intend to shut off ever again.

  She flicked a glance at Charles as she would at a gnat. His self-satisfied grin and fingers that twiddled a goodbye wave toward the kitchen snagged her anger. She scooped up a wet, dirty bar rag and threw it smack in his face.

  "You go to hell," she snapped, before racing for the back of the house. "Benny," she shouted without looking back, "show the man out."

  "My pleasure, Grace."

  The sudden yelp from the bar barely registered as she burst into the kitchen, yelling Tyler's name. She ignored the startled questions of Susannah and Maxic and skidded to a halt in front of the closed office door. She threw it open. He certainly knew who it was.

  He didn't look up from his paperwork. The tumble of his hair over his forehead was as familiar to her as her own skin. She'd loved this man, and lied to him. That she'd done it to protect herself was less than nothing. She loved him still, even as she knew she'd lost him. There was only the truth left to try to heal some of the wounds she'd caused.

  "You knew I wasn't telling you the truth."

  Nothing.

  "You knew it. Can't we talk about this?"

  At last he looked up. She wished he hadn't when she saw his face.

  "Hiding something." He spoke the words slowly, as if testing the shape of them in his mouth. His grimace announced the verdict. "You're right. I knew that. I thought you were hiding from
a boyfriend, or had some family trouble."

  "In a way, that's—" she began. His voice sliced through hers.

  "No, Grace. In no way does my idea of what you were concealing match the truth." His raised hand silenced her protest. "You, one of the heads of this industry, nation-wide, told me that you'd waited tables in a diner once, correct?"

  "Yes, but—"

  "You are worth millions, and you told me you couldn't afford to rent an apartment, correct?"

  "But I couldn't—"

  "You're engaged to marry that man, and you told me that you loved me." He dropped his hand as if too tired to hold it up anymore. "Do you remember that, Grace?"

  "I was grieving for my grandmother," she said into the waiting silence. "My mother wanted it, and I went along because I was too numb to think. It didn't mean anything, and I broke it off when I left."

  In the silence that stretched between them, she could feel him shutting down, forcing his mind and his heart to close off the thought of her. The pain of it struck her like a physical blow.

  "I trusted you to tell me the truth when you felt you could." He knew that was true, but the final betrayal hurt too much for that to matter. He looked at her, wondered how she still managed to look so damn fragile to him. "I never thought you'd leave without saying a word."

  "I wouldn't do that." The words broke from her with the full force of her love behind them. But even when he knew she told the truth, it sounded like a lie now, to him. "Never. I was going to tell you tonight, before tonight. I just couldn't find a way..."

  "To avoid making me feel silly? Do you have any idea how stupid this makes me feel?" Frustration had him punching his fist into the side of the filing cabinet, leaving a sharp dent. The physical pain let him ignore the pain in his heart. "To have offered to share my life, my love, my dreams, with you? Only to find out that you're already worth a hundred times what I will ever build."

  "No! That's not true," she said, willing him with her eyes to believe her. "You've created something wonderful here, someplace unique and warm, and you know that. So don't tell me I could make you feel small. I've never thought that, and neither have you."