by Penny Jordan
Children were not something which were on her current agenda; once she was past her thirtieth birthday, with her career firmly established, then she might think seriously about the issue.
Mark agreed with her; she could not envisage and did not want to envisage their relationship ending, but neither at the moment could she imagine herself settling into cosy domestic motherhood.
It had surprised her at first that the city should boast such a busy, thriving accountancy practice, but Mark had explained to her that the business had originally sprung up to service those clerics attached to the cathedral who had independent means, growing steadily from that to embrace the engineering industries developing in the nearby towns. As the industries had prospered, so too had the practice.
The neat lines and pretty demureness of the building gave Deborah pleasure. Not for the world would she have admitted this to anyone else; that almost sentimental romantic streak in her nature was a part of herself she preferred to keep private.
She could just imagine Ryan’s reaction, for instance, if he ever caught her gazing dreamily at the building. He had been complaining only the previous month about how difficult it was to house modern technology inside such an old-fashioned shell.
It was no secret that he had tried to persuade the other partners to sell and move to a modern purpose-built office block on the outskirts of the city. They had not been of a mind to move, however, and Deborah suspected that Ryan’s wife, Alice, had influenced their decision. She might not be an active partner in the business, but her father was still held in such great respect that her views were always listened to.
Ryan had been furious about it, virtually flaunting his relationship with his current lover in front of everyone in retaliation for his wife’s refusal to do as he wished.
She had to know about his affairs, Deborah reflected, so why did she stay with him? Was it because she simply didn’t care what he did? Some women were like that, but not her; if she ever discovered that Mark had been unfaithful to her…
It wouldn’t be her pride that drove her to leave him if she did, nor even her self-respect; it would simply be the knowledge that something was broken… destroyed… that he… that their relationship was not, after all, all that she had thought.
The meeting at the factory had been far more difficult than she had envisaged—not because of the technical questions she had been asked, but because of the awareness of what her announcement was going to mean to the men who heard it.
She had already been unsettled by her interview with the widow, she admitted to herself as she walked into the building. She wondered what kind of man Andrew had been, to have left his wife so ill-prepared for the problems she was going to have to face.
She had heard one of the men at the factory commenting bitterly that he bet that Andrew had secreted enough money away so that his family wouldn’t have to worry, and for a second her sympathy for Philippa Ryecart had almost overwhelmed her professionalism and she had been tempted to tell him how wrong he was.
She had done no such thing, of course.
She grimaced to herself, imagining Ryan’s reaction to the news that she had allowed her emotions to get in the way of her professionalism. Mark would have understood, though. Mark! As she got into the lift she glanced at her watch, wondering if she had time to see him before her meeting with Ryan.
‘Don’t you trust me?’ she had challenged Ryan when he had told her that he wanted her to report back to him after she had visited the factory.
‘I do,’ he had assured her. ‘But you know how it is with some of the old brigade here.’
‘You mean they don’t think I’m up to handling this on my own?’
‘They’re an old-fashioned bunch. Some of them don’t think that liquidation and receivership is a woman’s field. How does Mark feel about your imminent promotion, by the way?’ he added conversationally.
‘He’s very pleased for me,’ Deborah had told him.
‘Mmm, well, it takes all sorts, I suppose,’ Ryan had told her, adding outrageously, ‘Personally, I don’t think I’d care too much for the thought of my woman overtaking me professionally. I like to be on top… Out of bed, although not necessarily in it.’
Deborah had known that she ought to make at least some sort of protest against his remark, even if it was only to point out to him that she was not Mark’s ‘woman’, his possession, but his equal partner in their relationship; but equally she had also known that to do so was to allow herself to be drawn into the sexually flirtatious verbal conflict that Ryan loved and excelled at, and that, once having allowed him to draw her into that arena, she could potentially be leaving the door open for him to try to take things a stage further.
She had no illusions about his motives. Ryan would seduce her if he could and for no better reason than that it would amuse him to do so. She was heartily grateful for the fact that he was quite simply not her type. He was a very, very dangerous man, and, even recognising what he was and what he was doing, she was still aware that there was a tiny perverse and very feminine part of her that was very keenly aware of how easy it would be to fall into the trap of wanting to challenge so much openly chauvinistic masculinity and sexuality, to make him acknowledge the power of her femininity.
‘Nothing to say?’ he had teased her softly as she’d fought down an irritating inclination to drop her gaze from his.
‘Sorry…’ she apologised vaguely. ‘What were you saying…?’
He had laughed then with one of those mercurial changes of temperament which made him so fascinating and so dangerous, but that night in bed with Mark, when he had switched their positions so that she was kneeling astride him, she had had a momentary and totally unwanted vision of Ryan. Even in allowing a woman the position which was supposed to establish her right of control, he would still demonstrate his need to dominate the situation; his hands, unlike Mark’s, would not guide her gently on to his body, giving her the freedom to orchestrate her own pleasure, but would instead hold her captive to the exhibition of his own desire while he pretended to let her take control.
‘What’s wrong?’ Mark had asked when she’d lifted herself away from him.
‘Nothing,’ she had told him as she’d lowered herself to take him in her mouth—out of guilt for thinking about another man at such an intimate moment, or out of the more prosaic realisation that on this occasion she was simply not likely to reach orgasm?
She wanted to be with Mark now, she admitted as she got out of the lift; she wanted to unburden herself to him, to let down her defences with him in a way she never could with Ryan and admit how much what she had had to do today had upset her.
However, Ryan was already walking down the corridor towards her.
‘Good, you’re back,’ he announced. ‘Come into my office and we’ll run through everything.’
‘A debriefing session?’ Deborah asked him drily.
He gave her a quick, sexually challenging smile. ‘My dear Deborah, I’d be delighted to debrief you if that’s what you want… but not in my office, eh… ?’
Just in time Deborah managed to stop herself from grinding her teeth and pointing out that his comment, as well as being unsubtly schoolboyish, was also a form of sexual harassment.
It might be true, but it would also be counterproductive, so instead of making any response she ignored what he had said, simply accompanying him back to his office instead and sitting down in the chair he waved her into.
‘So let’s start with the bank and the widow,’ Ryan instructed.
‘As we already know the bank holds a charge over both the company assets, such as they are, and all the personal assets as well.’
‘Which are?’ he asked.
‘Not very much: the equity in the house, and a handful of insurance policies, which of course are worth nothing since he committed suicide.’
‘Mmm… and any private, hidden resources?’
‘I don’t think so,’ Deborah told him. ‘Or at least, i
f there were, his wife… widow… isn’t aware of them.’
Her expression changed slightly as she remembered how shocked Philippa had looked when she had learned the full extent of her husband’s debts.
‘Are you sure about that? After all, she’s got every reason to try to hang on to anything he might have managed to put aside, hasn’t she? And it certainly isn’t unknown for men in Andrew’s position to resort to a little bit of company fraud and hive off company assets for the benefit of his family.’
Deborah shook her head. ‘He wasn’t the type,’ she told Ryan.
His eyebrows rose. ‘Too honest? Oh, come on, Deborah…’
‘Not too honest… too arrogant and too egotistical,’ she corrected him. ‘I don’t think it ever occurred to him even to think about his wife and sons. I don’t think he was even prepared to accept that the business had failed.’
‘Mmm… well, we’ll let that one ride for the time being, but it might be a good idea to keep an eye on our widow… just in case she decides to take an unexpected holiday abroad or suddenly discovers an inheritance from a long-lost relative!’
Deborah put down the file she was holding. Ryan’s sexual manipulation she was prepared to tolerate, but when it came to her professionalism…
‘Either you’re prepared to trust my judgement, Ryan, or you aren’t. And if you aren’t…’
‘Yes?’ he invited when she paused.
She took a deep breath and told him levelly, ‘If you aren’t, I’d rather you found someone else to handle the liquidation. I can understand that having backed my promotion you’re anxious that I don’t foul up, but if you can’t trust me to make a basic character judgement…’
‘It isn’t that I don’t trust you,’ Ryan told her smoothly. ‘It’s simply that I suspect that because of your own nature you aren’t always aware of quite how devious others can be. Your honesty and openness are traits I greatly admire in you, Deborah, but when it comes to judging other people…’
‘You think I’m too naïve to know when I’m being lied to…’
‘Well, let’s say that I think you could be inclined to err on the side of compassion.’
‘Because we’re both members of the same sex?’
‘Well, there is that, although in my experience your sex is more inclined to be enemies than allies… Have you arranged another meeting with the widow?’
Deborah shook her head. He hadn’t taken her up on her challenge, but he hadn’t backed down either. Typical Ryan, and unless she wanted to be branded as ‘emotional’ she suspected she would have to let the matter drop.
‘Well, it might be an idea if you did.’
‘If you think I should. Perhaps you’d like to be included in the meeting so that you can make your own assessment of her?’
‘If you feel that you need me there, then of course I’d be delighted to help.’
This time Deborah did grind her teeth.
‘What about the factory? How did you get on there?’ Ryan asked her, deftly changing the subject.
‘I explained the situation to the workforce and advised them that they’d all be issued with redundancy notices. I also explained to them their position as preferred creditors.’
‘Mmm… Did you tell them that we’re only expecting a low dividend and that they’ll be lucky to get as much as fifty pence in the pound of what they’re owed?’
‘No, I didn’t,’ Deborah told him evenly. ‘After all, we don’t know yet that that will be the case.’
‘Mmm—I forgot to warn you this morning: it might be an idea to get a security firm in to guard the place. We don’t want anyone taking it into their head to stage a sit-in. We want to get everything sold off and the liquidation completed as quickly as possible.’
He frowned as his intercom buzzed and his secretary announced that a client was waiting to see him. ‘Look, I haven’t got any more time now, but there are still a few points I need to go over with you. This client is going to take up the rest of the afternoon, but we can take care of what’s left after he’s gone. We’ll go to the wine bar at six.’
He was already standing up, dismissing her, not allowing her to refuse the suggestion.
Irritably Deborah went back to her own office. She should have thought about that point he’d raised about security for the factory herself and it galled her that she hadn’t done. She could do it now, though.
‘Sorry,’ the office manager told her when she got through to the firm they always used. ‘But we can’t get anyone there until Wednesday now. Would you believe we’re short-staffed?’
When she had put the receiver down she picked it up again, punching in Mark’s extension number, but it was one of his colleagues who answered the phone, telling her that Mark was having a case meeting with their head of department.
She would have to get hold of him later to warn him that she was going to be working late. Briefly she wondered what his meeting was about, and hoped that it might be some new business.
He had become very reticent recently about discussing his work with her. She frowned, reflecting on this. It wasn’t like him to be so edgy and irritable, and she had felt hurt by the way he seemed to be shutting her out of his professional life, as well as by the attitude he had taken to her promotion.
His obvious disapproval had taken the edge off her pleasure and sense of achievement, and today’s events had underlined the fact that her promotion had come about through another person’s downfall. She didn’t feel particularly sorry for Andrew—in her opinion he had been a weak and very egotistical man—but his wife, his family, and those who had been unfortunate enough to be employed by him… She tensed a little, wondering how she would feel if Mark had been one of those men who would be going home today to break the news to their partners that they were out of work.
Of course she and Mark were in a very different situation; they were both professionals with separate careers, neither of them financially dependent on the other.
How many other lives besides his own had Andrew ruined with his reckless refusal to listen to anyone else’s advice, his egotistical belief that he was immune to the dangers and risks inherent in his narrow-viewed way of running a business?
She wished now that she hadn’t agreed to meet Ryan after work. In her present mood it was Mark she wanted to talk to, to confide in and share her emotions with.
* * *
Mark waited tensely as Peter Biddulph, his boss, finished studying the list he had in front of him.
Peter was about ten years older than Ryan, but a very, very different type of man. He was quiet, solid and not the type to put himself at risk in any way, but the clients trusted him and felt that their business affairs were safe with him. He was a calm, pragmatic man who seldom became irritated no matter what the provocation; a man whom others, including Mark, liked and admired.
Mark knew from the office grapevine that over the years there had been several attempts to entice him away from the practice, but he was not ambitious in the sense of wanting the prestige of a high-profile lifestyle or the material benefits that went with it.
The good name of the practice, though, meant a good deal to him, as did the success of his side of the business, and it was no secret within the firm that beneath his outward calm he was becoming increasingly concerned about the way in which the liquidation and receivership side of the practice’s business was beginning to overtake their own.
‘Ah, Mark,’ he said now as he put down the list he was studying, steepling his fingers together and frowning as he studied them. ‘I’ve got a list here of the accounts you took over when you joined us.’ His frown deepened. ‘Originally there were fifty names on that list. Now there are under forty.’
Mark could feel his tension increasing, his skin growing tight and hot across his facial bones as he fought down his instinctive need to defend himself and let Peter finish speaking.
‘We all know, of course, that these are difficult times for industry. The recession and its af
termath are going to be felt for some years to come. Any business portfolio containing, as yours does, so many small industrial concerns is bound to mirror those effects. It isn’t, after all, mere coincidence that the liquidation and receivership side of the practice is increasing in almost exactly the same numbers as ours is decreasing, no matter how much Ryan might choose to pretend that such an increase is hard-won and the result of energetic personal endeavour. The senior partners are not, of course, oblivious to the effect of market forces, but Ryan does tend…’ He paused, frowning, and Mark knew that it was a sign of how disturbed he was by their falling business that he was actually discussing Ryan in such terms with him.
It was obvious there was no love lost between the two men; they were complete opposites in every way after all, and there was even some gossip—never substantiated—that before Ryan had come on the scene Peter had been dating Alice. If it was true Mark wondered if she ever regretted having married Ryan instead. Peter was a devoted and faithful husband and a doting father to his three daughters, while Ryan…
‘When you originally came to us, Mark, the expectation was that with projected business growth you would ultimately become head of your own department, overseeing our industrial accounts, with your own qualified staff beneath you. However, obviously now…’
He looked up at Mark and told him quietly, ‘At our last board meeting Ryan suggested that, in view of the loss of business in the industrial sector, instead of being expanded it be combined with our shop-business accounts, which have also been heavily depleted because of the recession.
‘Needless to say I pointed out to the senior partners that all the signs are that the worst of the recession is over, and that history indicates that in its aftermath new businesses will flourish and that again, historically, such new businesses will in their early stages have to make heavy calls on our expertise and time, something we shall not be able to give them if our own staff resources have been depleted.’
