The Devil in Denim

by Melanie Scott

  “Perhaps,” Shelly said. “But the few times I’ve met her, she’s come across as the complete doting mother. Will’s her only child. I doubt she’s told him no many times in his life.”

  Maggie nodded. “Maybe. But that’s where you two come in. Will’s been trying to play dirty. He has to be behind all those nasty little stories that have been popping up in the news about Alex and Mal and Lucas, though we haven’t been able to pin him to anything yet.”

  “You want us to try and find out who he’s feeding information to or where he’s getting his information from?” Hana asked.

  “No. I want you to find out what skeletons are in his closet. Will Sutter is arrogant and just a tad slimy. I’m guessing he’s pushed his luck a bit too far a time or two. I went through his HR records from when he worked for us but there’s nothing. But I can’t believe he’s completely clean. I’m going to go talk to Ally Kaminski—she was head of HR back then—and see if there were ever any complaints, but I need whatever I can get my hands on. Drinking. Drugs. Jaywalking. And, in particular, any evidence that his dad and his doting mama hushed it all up nicely.”

  “You want dirt,” Shelly said with a grin.

  “I want a little persuasion,” Maggie corrected. “If Mama doesn’t want to listen to reason, then I want to make sure that I’ve got some facts on my side that might persuade her otherwise.”

  “Hardball,” Hana said admiringly.

  “Yes,” Maggie said. “Will is messing with the Saints, and I’ve had about all I can take of people trying to rearrange my life to suit themselves in the last few week. Team Sutter is going down.”

  “Well, then,” Shelly said. “Let’s start digging.”

  * * *

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” Alex asked.

  Maggie looked down at the boarding pass in her hand. Dallas, Texas. Home of Corinne Sutter. Who had, somewhat to Maggie’s surprise, agreed to a meeting.

  Maybe it was a terrible idea. Maybe Mama Sutter would send her home with her tail between her legs. Maggie hoped not. She and Shelly and Hana had worked their butts off for almost twenty-four hours straight. And then she’d dragged Gardner into the mix for the next twenty-four. All that digging had paid off.

  This might be their last shot. The vote was still too close to call and Will’s campaign had continued relentlessly over the last two days. So she might as well swing for the fences. “I’m sure. Someone’s gotta run into the burning building, right?”

  His hand tightened around hers. “Is that why you’re doing this? To prove something to me?”

  “No, I’m doing it to save the Saints, idiot.” She smiled up at him, swallowing against the lump in her throat. Now was not the time to lose her cool. “So smile for the cameras and kiss me good-bye.”

  That got her a dimple flash. And another all too short and tantalizing kiss.

  She tried not to think about how much she was going to hate it when the press went away and Alex stopped faking it, and headed for the security line.

  * * *

  Mama Sutter didn’t believe in simple living, that much was clear. Maggie stared at a house that was fit for Scarlett O’Hara—huge and white with a colonnaded front porch that possibly would have fit Maggie’s entire apartment underneath it—and took a last moment to go over her plan. She needed her wits about her. Mama might play the perfect groomed and subservient business wife and mother, but Maggie knew that was rarely how things worked. This woman had a network of influence and control that probably covered half the country. Which was exactly why Maggie needed to convince her to get Will to give up on his bid. She only hoped that coming here wasn’t going to backfire.

  A young girl with blond hair ruthlessly pulled back into a roll at the back of her head and a conservative gray suit showed her into the house and into a sitting room done in shades of cream and yellow and pale green. Maggie remained on her feet while she waited for Mama to arrive. It didn’t take long. The sound of tapping heels preceded her, as did two Afghan hounds groomed to within an inch of their lives. The dogs sniffed briefly at Maggie and then went and sat on one of the Turkish rugs nearest the window, curling themselves up into large balls, both of them keeping their eyes on the doorway.

  Apparently even the dogs behaved themselves properly in Mama’s house. Pity her son didn’t.

  Finally the footsteps halted and Mama appeared in the doorway. She was tiny, maybe five foot four in three-inch heels, but she was so well put together in a beautiful pale blue dress and pearls that Maggie started to feel distinctly rumpled.

  Eyes the same odd pale blue as Will’s studied her, seemingly cataloguing every wrinkle in her suit and stray hair. “Miss Jameson, welcome to Dallas.”

  Maggie fought the urge to curtsy. “Thank you, Mrs. Sutter. And thank you for seeing me.”

  “I will confess, I was a little surprised when you called. I understood from William that you had turned down his offer of employment.”

  She’d never heard a Texan accent sound quite so cold before. She’d met Corinne a time or two when she’d been a teenager, but she didn’t remember her being this intimidating. Obviously Maggie hadn’t been in her bad books back then. “Yes, ma’am, I did.”

  “Then perhaps you’ll enlighten me as to what it is you wish to discuss? Won’t you sit? Would you like a drink? Iced tea perhaps?”

  “That would be lovely, thank you.” Maggie sat in one of the delicate-legged armchairs closest to her, putting her bag at her feet.

  Mama gave instructions to the girl in gray and then sat opposite Maggie. She took another moment to look her over. “You look different from your picture in the paper. Different from the last time I saw you too.”

  As far as Maggie could remember, she’d been roughly seventeen the last time they’d met.

  “Yes, ma’am. That was some time ago.”

  “Indeed. And here we are again. But I doubt you came to reminisce, so why don’t you get to the point?” Her tone was sweet but steely.

  “All right. I need you to get your son to drop his bid on the Saints.”

  One perfectly groomed eyebrow lifted a fraction. “And why would I do that?”

  She’d try the polite way first. “Well, ma’am, I can’t see why you’d want Will spending his time on baseball—let alone a team in need of as much time and effort as the Saints—when he has Sutter Corp. to run.”

  Corinne inclined her head. “In my experience, dear, men need hobbies.”

  “The Saints aren’t a hobby, Mrs. Sutter.” She put some steel of her own into her voice.

  “I appreciate you’re upset, Miss Jameson,” Corinne said. “But sometimes in business there are winners and there are losers. You can’t take these things personally.”

  Maggie kept her smile polite. “But I do take them personally. When it comes to this particular business at least. The Saints belong in New York, and they belong with owners who care about them, not just someone who wants a hobby. I’m sure you can appreciate that. Your husband and you built quite the empire together. You wouldn’t want to hand it over to someone who didn’t care about it, would you?”

  “I’ve handed it over to my son.”

  “Your son who’d rather play baseball owner than do what he needs to do to protect your family’s legacy?”

  “My son who is a grown man who can make his own decisions. And why you think I can influence him to change his mind is somewhat beyond me.” She smiled. An expression more reminiscent of a snake baring its fangs than any friendly gesture.

  “Perhaps I overestimated,” Maggie said. “Which is a pity. Because, I’m afraid, if you don’t—or can’t—change Will’s mind, then I’m going to have to start sharing the truth about him with the rest of the world. Starting with the police and the team owners.”

  Corrine’s smile went rigid. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “I think you do.” Maggie pulled out the folder from her bag, flipped it open. “Because as far as I can tell it was Wil
l’s dad and you who paid for him to get out of trouble all those times. Hush money. Bribes. Call it what you like. It must have been easy the first time, to get a juvenile record sealed, to make sure he still went to a good school. I’m not so sure about the times since.”

  She spread out the photos they’d collected. And the list of names. Ally Kaminski had remembered one Saints employee who’d come to her with a complaint about Will. About passes that didn’t stop and feeling uncomfortable. At the time the woman hadn’t wanted to make a formal complaint. But her name was a start. And then she’d told Maggie some others. Once they’d known there was something to find, Shelly and Hana had gone into overdrive. And hit pay dirt.

  Corinne stared at her. “How did you get these?”

  “I don’t believe that matters, ma’am. What matters is I have them.”

  “And you’d use them? Like a petty blackmailer?”

  “Ma’am, your son has been playing fast and loose with the truth all week. Not to mention that I know he was the one who saw fit to let the press know about my private life.” Shelly had been able to confirm that with one of her press contacts.

  “You mean your affair with your employer.” Corinne’s lip curled. “Your father should have raised you better than that.”

  “My father raised me to know a good man when I spotted one. And to play fair. Unfortunately for you, I was also raised with an ever-revolving roster of baseball players who wanted to be my big brothers. And quite a few of them made sure I knew how to play dirty when I needed to. Alex Winters is a good man, Mrs. Sutter. He plays fair. Your son has proven that. None of the stuff he’s been trying to smear Alex with has stuck. Any more than it will stick to Mal Coulter or Lucas Angelo. They’re all good men. They’ll be good for the Saints. But I don’t think Will would be.”

  She looked down at the photos, then back up at Corinne. “Now, I can understand a mother protecting her son. But I want you to be clear on something. I’m protecting my family too. Some of this isn’t so bad. The stuff you and Jack hushed up when Will was a kid … the drinking and the drugs and the car crash and his friend losing a hand— Well, he was a kid and I’m sure that most people would shrug that off as boys being boys, as ridiculous as that is. But this…” She reached out and tapped one of the photos. “Sexual harassment? Maybe more? Well, that’s a more difficult subject. A scandalous one. No team wants to smear themselves with that. And there are probably plenty of companies who won’t want to either.”

  Mama’s face had turned pale under the makeup. Maggie felt somewhat sorry for her but she pressed on. Because Will needed to change his ways and he needed to be kept far away from the Saints while he did it. “I can—and will—be just as ruthless as anybody else when it comes to what’s mine. So you need to make a decision about what you’re going to do for Will next. Give him free rein to keep going down his current path and I’ll be forced to pull him up myself. It would be much easier on everyone if it didn’t get to that.”

  There was a discreet cough from the doorway. Maggie looked up and saw the girl in gray carrying a tray bearing two glasses of iced tea and a plate of cookies. She reached down and flipped the folder of photos closed. Her heart pounded furiously as she waited while the tea was passed to her and the plate arranged on an occasional table between them. She couldn’t have eaten a cookie right then to save her life. She felt like she might throw up while she waited to see what Mama would do next.

  The girl retreated silently, and Corinne folded her hands in her lap. “All right, Miss Jameson. You have my attention. What do you want me to do?”

  “Well firstly,” Maggie said, raising her glass. “There’s a game we need to play called ‘let’s make a deal.’”

  Chapter Twenty-one

  “You look nervous,” Maggie said as she reached up to straighten Alex’s tie.

  He let her fidget. Fidgeting with his clothes was her way of looking nervous when she couldn’t afford to look nervous. He’d worked that much out over the last few weeks. “I’m fine.”

  They’d had a call from Mrs. Sutter early in the morning confirming that Will was going to do as they’d asked, but Alex wasn’t going to believe that until he actually got inside and heard the deciding vote cast in his favor. She’d also agreed to keep a close eye on Will and make sure that he didn’t do anything else that crossed the line. Alex was going to keep an eye on that too. He had his ways to get information, and any sniff of scandal surrounding Will and he would make sure that any woman who wanted to report him had the best support and legal team in the country. But until then, this was the best he could do. Other than making sure that at some point after the vote he and Mal and Lucas also had a chat with Will himself about the correct way to treat women. An emphatic chat.

  But for today, if Will backed off now, it was thanks to Maggie. She’d bearded the lion in her den, so to speak, and emerged victorious.

  Now it was his turn to try to do the same.

  “We’ll be right outside,” Maggie said with a final pat of his tie.

  She stepped back, and he had to stop himself from pulling her back against him and letting the feel of her in his arms drown out the roar of adrenaline in his veins. Instead he contented himself with breathing in the scent of her while he watched her rock back and forth on the heels of her boots, dark eyes burning with worry rather than heat.

  He didn’t like seeing that expression on her face. He might have screwed up his relationship with her, but he didn’t have to compound that by totally screwing up her life and losing the Saints to Sutter. He wanted to see her smile again. A real smile, not one faked for the public. He could earn that much back at least.

  “I’m sorry you can’t come in with us.” The owners were holding a special meeting but it was them and the MLB executives only. Plus himself, Lucas, and Mal of course. Lucas was sitting, waiting, his fingers tapping on the keys of his laptop as he studied the screen. Alex had no idea if Lucas was reading patient notes or going over their presentation, but either way he envied his friend’s ability to focus in on one thing only and shut out the rest of the world. Mal, on the other hand, was, well, not exactly pacing by the window, but he was definitely in perpetual motion as he moved from sitting to standing to moving over to talk to Tom, and then starting the process all over again. “I’d take you in there if I could.”

  Maggie smiled at that. It was strained and nervous, so it didn’t count as a real smile, but it was a start. “You’ll just have to struggle through without me.” She hesitated, pressing her lips together nervously.

  “What?”

  She shook her head. “Nothing. Good luck.”

  “Maggie…” She’d been acting strangely since she’d come back from Texas. Nothing he could quite put his finger on. Just different. She’d thrown up a wall between them after she’d broken up with him, one that he hadn’t been able to breach. It was still there but it didn’t feel quite the same. He had no idea if that was good or bad, and he’d been too busy with all the last-minute preparation for this meeting to have any real shot at trying to find out what was bothering her. She’d shut him down pretty fast the one time he’d tried to start a conversation.

  After that he’d decided maybe he didn’t want to know. No point getting his hopes up. She’d made herself clear. Besides, it was hard enough going through this stupid pretense. Every time he took her hand, every time he kissed her, he didn’t want it to be a lie. But she’d said no. Said enough. And he had to respect that. Even if it was killing him.

  Just as it was killing him to think that soon they wouldn’t need the pretense anymore and he wouldn’t even get to touch her at all.

  Gardner came up beside him. “It’s time. They’re asking for you.”

  Alex aimed one last smile at Maggie and then led his friends into the lions’ den.

  * * *

  The waiting was killing her. Maggie looked over to where Tom sat on the edge of the sofa, eyes fixed on the screen showing ESPN above their seats. It was showing a footb
all game, so Maggie knew Tom wasn’t as interested as he was pretending to be. The fingers tapping one knee were a giveaway, for a start. “Surely it shouldn’t take this long?”

  The tapping stopped briefly, then resumed as Tom turned toward her. “It will take as long as it takes. Those guys like to shoot the shit, you know that.”

  She looked back at the door to the conference room. It was still firmly closed and apparently quite soundproof. There was no sign that there were people in the room behind it. She felt completely shut out. And not entirely sure that she wouldn’t throw up if the damned vote didn’t finish soon. “It feels like something’s gone wrong.”

  “Nothing’s gone wrong. Quit panicking. Alex and Mal and Lucas know what they’re doing. Winters will win them over.”

  Yeah. Alex. Laying on that devilish charm. Talking them round. Making them see things his way. Making them want to believe in him.

  That man. The one she’d kicked out of her bed but hadn’t quite removed from her heart. The one who had been weakening her resolve every moment they’d spent together. The one who was so annoyingly irresistible that she was starting to have trouble remembering what her objections to seeing him had been in the first place.

  Over the last few days, slowly and steadily, a little voice had been growing louder in the back of her mind. Surely there was a way to make it work? A way that they could work together and be together.

  It would be easier if she wasn’t working so closely with Alex of course. He wasn’t going to give up the CEO chair any time soon, that much was clear, so she needed something else to focus on. A piece of the pie that could be hers.

  Once the Saints were secure, there would be money for some of the programs she’d gotten Tom to begin but they’d never really had enough money to do the way she’d wanted. Urban youth leagues. Women’s programs. One day—even an actual women’s league. Lots of possibilities. A new path.

  But would she walk it alone?