Unfortunately, her unsupervised childhood hadn’t been because her parents had been the sort of free spirits who believed in letting their children be themselves and make their own choices. In Angela’s case, it had simply been because no one had really given a damn about her. So she’d made her own rules, controlled her own life, made her own decisions. Except for one all-too-brief period in her life – a time that had encompassed eleven months and five days. A period where she’d alternated between heaven and hell on a daily basis, but had still felt happier and more alive than at any other time in her life.
As she’d become so adept at doing these past few years, Angela firmly blocked out the memories that hovered so tantalizingly in the back of her mind. Instead, she focused her energies on the portfolio proposal she was finalizing for a prospective client – another referral from one of her largest accounts. Her ability to pick out suitable and well-performing securities gauged to the individual needs of each client was a large part of her success. Even in an office with over a hundred brokers, she was regularly ranked in the top fifteen percent for production credits.
Of course, most of the other brokers in the office would credit Angela’s success solely to the good fortune that had come her way via an otherwise tragic event. She had been a very junior partner to Barbara Lowenstein, one of the top producers in the office and certainly the most successful female among them. And when Barbara had suffered a sudden, fatal heart attack, fifty percent of her very lucrative book of clients had automatically been passed on to Angela.
And while Angela never failed to be grateful for the opportunity she’d been given, the success she enjoyed today was almost entirely of her own doing. She’d taken the accounts she had inherited from Barbara and tripled that number, not to mention adding substantially to each client’s portfolio value. But she continued to be subjected to professional jealousy from both male and female brokers in the office, and had learned some time ago to block out the catty, spiteful comments – much as she’d mastered the art of ignoring everything else in her life that caused her hurt or pain.
She was admittedly anti-social and a loner, but much of that was simply because she didn’t have the patience to deal with people who either disliked or envied her. She hated playing games and pretending to like someone just because it was the polite thing to do. Angela figured she could count on one hand the number of people in this office she actually liked or tolerated. One of those people was her administrative assistant Cara Bregante. Like herself, Cara was of Italian descent, though only on her father’s side, and also like Angela, she was a finance major, still working on her degree at night school. Cara was usually one of the first to arrive in the office as well, nearly always at her desk before seven a.m.
“Good morning,” greeted Cara’s cheerful little voice from just inside the doorway to Angela’s office.
Angela glanced up and couldn’t help the answering smile she gave her very young assistant. She seldom smiled these days but resisting Cara was nearly futile. The twenty one year old was adorable, charming, and so sweet she could melt the hardest of hearts – like Angela’s own. Cara was a tiny little thing, barely over five feet tall, and Angela always felt like a giant standing next to her. But unlike Angela’s super skinny frame, Cara was curvy, with full breasts and hips, and always hovering oh so close to becoming plump. She had a cute heart-shaped face, enormous golden brown eyes, and a mass of thick, glossy dark brown curls that tended to overwhelm her small face.
“Hey, Cara,” greeted Angela in return. “How was your class last night?”
Cara grimaced. “Gut wrenching. Sometimes I don’t think I’m going to survive this semester. It’s definitely the toughest one so far.”
Angela frowned, noticing how tired her assistant looked this morning. She knew Cara had a rough time of it – working full time to support herself and then struggling to finish up her finance degree at night, all without a penny of support from her family. Angela knew that she could have easily found herself in a similar situation if she hadn’t been lucky enough to receive an athletic scholarship to Stanford. Her mother would have never consented to paying for a college education, considering it a waste of good money, and her sweet but utterly spineless father wouldn’t have dared to argue the case further with his domineering wife.
“If you want some help studying, just say the word,” offered Angela. “And take it easy today, okay? Our schedule is pretty light and you look worn out.”
Cara gave a small shrug. “I’m fine but thanks for asking. Do you want some more coffee? I’m headed over to the lunchroom for some.”
“Sure, if you don’t mind. And before you ask, little mother, I do not want a donut or a bagel or any other free food that might be lurking around.”
Cara grinned. “Am I that predictable? Besides, I didn’t see any breakfast meetings on the schedule this morning. Not with the new hire from competition who’s supposed to be starting today.”
Angela barely glanced up from the research report on tech stocks that she’d been studying. “What’s so special about this one? It’s not often that Corcoran doesn’t pack the schedule full of meetings no matter what else is going on.”
Jay Corcoran was the office sales manager, and one of the bigger pains in Angela’s skinny ass. He was one of those overeager company men who did absolutely everything that management asked of him, and followed the corporate philosophy like it was religion. One of his responsibilities was to schedule meetings with the various mutual fund and annuity representatives, and he took that particular task to heart with a vengeance. It seemed to Angela that there was always one meeting or another going on, and the meetings almost always included some type of food service.
Angela despised meetings of any sort, and the ones with the sales reps were the worst. Her sentiments were wholeheartedly shared with most of the other top producers in the office, who shunned the meetings as frequently as she did. And of course this drove kiss-ass Jay crazy, making him fear that it would be a bad reflection on his abilities as sales manager if every meeting wasn’t filled to overflowing with attendees. Thus, the hyperactive, annoying as hell sales manager – whom Angela had once likened to a Doberman Pinscher on crack –could be constantly seen trying to hustle one broker or another into attending one of the meetings. Angela just ignored him now, refusing to even look up when he popped his balding head inside her office, and tried unsuccessfully to entice, bully, threaten or beg her to attend.
Cara shook her head. “I think the new hire is a really big deal. Apparently he’s moving into George Barnhart’s old office.”
That bit of news got Angela’s attention. Barnhart had been the top producer in the office for almost two decades until he’d chosen to retire last year at the ripe old age of fifty-two. Most of the other brokers in the office had thought him crazy to call it quits when he was still at the very top of his game, but Angela had silently applauded his decision. The man had already accumulated tens of millions, and had wisely decided that life was too short not to start enjoying the fruits of his labors. Rumor had it that he, his wife, and their two teenagers were presently doing some sort of round the world trip on a sailboat.
Barnhart’s former office – easily the largest and most ideally located in the place – had remained empty. Angela had heard via Cara that at least half a dozen of the top producers had been campaigning for it, but the rumor had floated around for a while now that management wanted to keep the spacious office vacant in hopes of luring in a big producer from a rival firm. And apparently their waiting game had finally paid off.
“He must be a pretty big fish to land Barnhart’s office,” mused Angela. “Any word on who he is or what firm he’s transferring from?”
“Not yet, but I’ll see what I can find out. Be back in a few and then we can go over today’s schedule.”
Angela gave her assistant a wave as she went off in search of coffee, thinking that if it wasn’t for Cara she’d never know what was going on in the offic
e. She rarely ventured out of her little corner office, the one she’d been given rather grudgingly soon after Barbara’s death. But even though she would have been well within her rights to demand a larger office now, she was perfectly happy remaining in her secluded spot. Few people bothered her back here, and it was much easier to ignore the goings-on around her. Except for client meetings outside of the office or going to the ladies room, it was rare that she left her office at all during the work day.
What she had spoken up about, though, was having to share Cara with other brokers. For the first few months of Cara’s employment, she’d been assigned to work for two other brokers in addition to Angela. But once Angela had achieved the required level of production to warrant a one on one assignment, she’d set her foot down quite firmly on the matter. And so, for the past eight months, Cara had worked solely for Angela, and worked very, very hard. Angela knew without being told that Cara was one of the best assistants in the whole office, and that she was damned lucky to have her.
And even though Angela was more than five years older, Cara was the one with the mothering instincts – the one who fussed over her boss, fretting when she didn’t eat, telling her to take a break or that she worked far too hard. Most of the time Cara’s ministrations either annoyed or amused Angela, but they also touched her at the same time. No one had ever really fussed over Angela very much, and certainly not in recent years. And while there were only so many ways she could politely refuse the muffin or the plate of Chinese food that Cara continually tried to tempt her with, deep down Angela was grateful that her little assistant cared enough to keep trying.
It was several minutes later when Cara returned, a cup of coffee in each hand, and her amber eyes sparkling with excitement.
“Omigod, Angela, I saw him,” she said breathlessly. “McReynolds is showing him around the office as we speak, introducing him to everyone, and – wow! I didn’t get a real good look at him, just from a distance, but – wow! Let’s just say that every female in this place – and some of the men, too – are going to be very happy campers when they get an eyeful of our newest piece of man candy.”
Angela gave her assistant a wry smile as she picked up her steaming hot mug of coffee. “That good looking, hmm? Better than the new Osborne Fund rep you were crushing on last week?”
Cara’s perpetually rosy cheeks grew a bit pinker at her boss’s teasing. “I know,” she admitted with a laugh. “I’ve got a problem with hot guys. But new broker is way, way hotter than mutual fund rep. In fact, he might be off the scales hot. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anyone quite as, ah, jaw dropping.”
Angela had more or less learned to tune out the way Cara regularly gushed about one cute guy or the other, whether it was a broker in the office, the FedEx deliveryman, or someone she’d met at school. The irony of it all was that Cara was also super shy and never dated, though she claimed the latter was because she was way too busy with work and school. And it was probably a good thing she didn’t date, thought Angela quietly, because Cara was so sweetly, adorably naïve that she’d be ripe for the plucking by some jerk who’d be all too happy to take advantage of her gullibility.
“So what does this magnificent specimen of manhood look like?” inquired Angela with feigned politeness. She’d brushed Cara’s cheerful chattiness off a little too brusquely at times, and had recently vowed to try and be a little kinder, a bit more patient.
“Tall. Really tall. Like maybe he used to be a basketball player once. And huge. Oh, not like fat huge, I didn’t mean that. More like bulked up, like he lifts weights eight hours a day or something. He must have to get his suits custom made to fit a body like that.”
Angela’s already cold hands suddenly felt completely bloodless, and a horrible sensation of dread began to slowly permeate her entire body from head to toe. Telling herself fiercely not to panic or jump to any sort of conclusions, she kept her voice deliberately neutral. “Sure doesn’t sound like your typical stockbroker, does he?”
“I’ll say. And I didn’t get a good look at his face, darn it, but he’s very dark. Oh, not his skin, he isn’t African American or Latino. I meant his hair. It’s – well, it’s as dark as yours, I suppose.”
Angela was grateful she was sitting, and that her legs were well hidden beneath her desk because they were starting to shake uncontrollably. “Did you – ah, catch his name? Or what firm he used to work for?”
Cara shook her head. “Not yet, no. Pretty much just saw him being introduced around. I can try to find out more details if you’re interested.”
“No, don’t bother.” Angela would have waved a hand in dismissal if she hadn’t been afraid it would start trembling as badly as her legs were. “I’m sure all the news will be forthcoming soon.”
A wide smile made Cara’s already glowing face light up like a Christmas tree. “And McReynolds will probably bring Mr. Hunky around to meet everyone soon enough. It definitely looked like he was making all the rounds.”
Beneath the cover of her desk, Angela crossed her fingers. “I doubt he’ll come all the way over here. One of the reasons I like this corner office is because so many people forget it exists.”
Cara shook her head in dismay. “I’ll never figure out why you squirrel yourself away all the time. Honestly, Angela, you’re way too young to cut yourself off from the rest of the world. And I’m willing to bet McReynolds does bring him back here to meet you. After all, the new rankings came out yesterday and you cracked the top ten last month.”
This bit of news startled Angela. She’d admittedly had a great production month in March due to the addition of several new clients, but hadn’t even let herself hope it would be enough to catapult her that far up in the office production rankings.
She gave a careless little lift of her shoulders. “Last month wasn’t typical and you know it, so I wouldn’t get used to this state of affairs. By next month I’ll have dropped down to reality.”
“Don’t be so sure. About the rankings or about McReynolds bringing Mr. Hunky over to meet you. My hunches about this kind of stuff are almost always right.”
Angela was struggling mightily for control at this moment, fearful that she’d explode with a full blown panic attack otherwise. As she’d become so adept at doing for the past few years, she firmly shoved her anxiety to a place where she could turn it off, and forced herself to focus on something else.
“Let’s go over our schedule for the day, okay?” she told Cara briskly. “Otherwise, we’ll get interrupted by half a dozen phone calls.”
Throwing herself into her work had been Angela’s salvation these past few years, and when she couldn’t be at the office she was usually running. So long as she stuck firmly to her routine, kept herself too busy and too exhausted to let her mind wander into places that were dark and dangerous for her to visit, she could cope.
And for the next couple of hours that was exactly what she did. She spoke to clients on the phone, made changes to several stock portfolios, read over some research, and emailed Cara with more than a dozen different tasks that needed taking care of. She allowed herself to get so caught up in her work that she temporarily forgot about the new broker in the office. The one she was absolutely terrified wasn’t new at all to her; who had, in fact, been the reason she’d been inhabiting this ghost world of hers for the past few years.
Angela worried her bottom lip as she continued to wage a mental battle with herself. It couldn’t be him, she reasoned. There was no logical reason why it would be. He’d been like a king over at Jessup Prior, with everyone in the place catering to his every need and whim. He’d been the George Barnhart of the office, except that he’d been even more successful and from a much younger age. Angela could think of no good reason why he’d give all that up to change firms at this point in his stellar career, to put himself through all the work involved in transferring his client base and getting used to a new way of doing things. No, none of it made sense and she was being completely irrational to even think t
hat the man Cara had described could be – him. He wasn’t the only tall, powerfully built stockbroker with dark hair and custom made suits in this city.
For that matter, she reasoned, the new broker could even be an out of town transfer – from San Jose or even Los Angeles. Reassured, she returned her focus to her work.
It was typical for her to keep both the door and the blinds to the outer window of her office closed, as they were this morning. Doing so helped her focus and blocked out any distractions, and since Cara was almost fanatically efficient at handling all the incoming calls and emails, they tended to communicate largely via instant messenger during the workday.
There was no way, therefore, when it happened, for her to have ever seen it coming. And for all the times she’d envisioned how she might react should a situation like this ever actually occur, her response was nothing like her previous imaginings had been.
With a cursory knock at best, the office manager – Paul McReynolds – opened the door and strode inside her office briskly, followed by the tall, dark-haired, and thoroughly intimidating man who’d shattered her life and haunted her dreams for too many months to count. But instead of reacting in one of the many and varied ways she’d imagined over the years – scorn, tears, anger, indifference, outrage – or, God help her – joy – she’d never expected to just feel the same sort of blissful numbness she’d enclosed herself in for so long.
Paul McReynolds was speaking, but for all that Angela could care he might as well have been babbling in Klingon. And then he was stepping over the threshold, invading her territory, her corner retreat, and the perpetual iciness of her extremities seemed to spread through her entire body.
“Angela, come and meet the newest member of our team. Though you’ve probably already heard of the legend that’s Nick Manning.”
Shattered Page 2
