1 Executive Lunch

by Maria E. Schneider

  "You okay?" Derrick finally asked.

  "Yeah," I lied. I felt for my cap and realized it was missing. It must have come off when I fell over. "You?"

  He didn't say anything for a while. When he did, it was punctuated with his fist hitting the steering wheel. "Your brother was right."

  "About the setup?"

  "About a lot of things."

  I didn't know what to say, so I watched the dark buildings turn into homes with friendly lights on. "I don't guess Ted will be complaining about you mauling his wife though."

  He glanced over at me. "Hardly. After you jumped me, there wasn't room for her." A small grin threatened his features.

  "I didn't jump you!"

  "Man, it's no wonder those guys that attacked Strandfrost didn't get anywhere. You start moving, you're hard to slow down." This time he really smiled.

  I thought of the guys at Strandfrost and shivered. The window had been very dirty. What was Huntington doing in that neighborhood?

  Then again, all I had really seen was two figures by a dumpster. It couldn't have been him.

  Derrick reached over and touched my shoulder. "Hey, thanks for coming along, even if it didn't work out. I guess I should have listened to your brother and just tried to get her to talk to a counselor."

  I shrugged sheepishly. "No big deal. Sorry, I, uh…" I wasn't sure what I had done. She hadn't really intended to talk to him. As it was, we both ended up sticky and reeking of smoke and grime, but no one had gotten arrested or killed.

  Derrick pulled into my driveway. The motion detector light came on. He got out and walked me up the sidewalk.

  "Really," he said. "Thanks. And I'm sorry about your hat."

  "I'm sorry about the soda." Some of it had splashed onto his pants and shoes.

  He looked down and grinned. "You're something. Your brother told me to keep an eye on you or you'd do something crazy. Why in the world did you throw the coke on her?"

  That made me mad. Sean shouldn't have asked me if he didn't think I could do it right. Never mind that I hadn't exactly kept to the script.

  Derrick saw the scowl and grinned harder. "Don't worry. I won't tell."

  He was lying. He was going to fill Sean in because he was an honest cop, and he was Sean's friend. When Sean asked questions, Derrick would tell Sean I had panicked and made a fool of myself.

  "I thought I saw someone…" There was nothing I could say that was going to make sense.

  "Don't worry about it." He clucked me under the chin. "I guess it's a good thing you moved when you did. The lady looked to be out to cause trouble."

  Marilyn's plight was horrible. "Is there something we can do? Tonight, I mean, to keep her from getting hurt? If she isn't already dead or bleeding somewhere?"

  "I'll call in an extra watch on her house. If we get a domestic call someone will get there faster." He shook his head and deep sympathy showed in his hazel eyes. "There isn't a lot we can do unless she asks for help, you know?"

  "Yeah, I guess not."

  He gave me a crooked grin and backed away. "I'll call it in. You lock up."

  I got myself locked in and took a long shower. It didn't completely erase the bugs. They were still crawling about. At least I didn't have anyone waiting to beat the shit out of me.

  Snug in my favorite pajamas, I was halfway to bed when the doorbell rang.

  I sighed. "Derrick, I'm going to kill you."

  I grabbed a robe and marched out to let him in. "What now?" I demanded, opening the door.

  Had Derrick not just left, I never would have opened the door without checking to see who it was. It didn't occur to me that anyone besides him would be standing there.

  "Aaah," I screamed, backing away.

  "What is wrong with you?" Huntington advanced into my living room, forcing me further backwards.

  Derrick was long gone and…my gun was under the bed where it wouldn't do me any good at all. Huntington must have seen me at the bar and now he was here ready to…my brain stopped there. "Eeek," I screamed again and made a dash towards the bedroom.

  Huntington grabbed me from behind. "This isn't a game," he hissed. "Just because I hired you for a job doesn't mean you get to play detective and follow me around."

  "Help!"

  I couldn't tell if he was trying to shake me or I was quaking so badly he was just trying to hold on.

  "What kind of idiot goes into that part of town late at night and sits in that bar of all places? Why did you follow me?"

  I struggled, but couldn't break away.

  He finally released his hold.

  Faster than any rat that lived downtown, I backed against the nearest wall, wondering what he was going to do to me.

  "Sedona, you can't go following me into dangerous situations. Or any other situation," he boomed out.

  I shook my head, inching towards the bedroom again. "Fo…followed?" I'd feel much better after I shot Huntington, Ted and any other boogey-men that might happen along.

  His shadow moved, and I jumped a foot in the air. We stared at each other in the half-light for several seconds. "Oh for…I knew you were a mistake," he said softly.

  He disappeared out the way he had come, slamming the door behind him.

  It took me a long time to peel myself off the wall and re-lock the front door. Afraid I was having a heart attack, I emptied the medicine cabinet, but there was nothing in there stronger than aspirin.

  It had been Huntington I had seen through the window. For some insane reason, he was up to something, and he thought I cared enough to track him into the worst part of town and sit at a roach infested table to watch him through a filthy window.

  "Not likely, damn it." I shivered and clenched my fists. I wish I'd had the presence of mind to tell him so, but I hadn't been thinking of anything except fight and flight.

  I took the gun from under the bed before I got up the nerve to go back into the living room and check the doors. They were both locked. The windows, painstakingly checked, one by one, were all intact.

  I took two aspirin since that was all I had and started pacing. It was two hours before I managed to think about crawling under the covers.

  I didn't sleep. Every creak and shift of the house was an enemy come to get me.

  Chapter 13

  Getting out from under the blankets when it was time to go to work wasn't easy. I wasn't talking just a bad hair day either. Modern makeup couldn't make a dent in the puffy black circles around my eyes. Extra mascara merely made it look like I added false eyelashes to the mess.

  I turned up at work looking like I had lived through a fire, but only by sacrificing my hair, my sanity and mashing my face repeatedly against a window.

  Turbo, ever polite, only stared for a fraction of a second before ignoring me. I checked my tests in the lab and then, equally polite, locked myself in my office. I called Abba, my karate teacher. He taught Shodokan, a Japanese form of karate. Shodokan didn't involve high leaps or dancing flips. It relied a tad more on strength than was good for me, but I was less likely to break any of my own bones if I kept both feet on the ground.

  Abba was pleased to hear from me. "Seedona!"

  "Hi, Abba. Do you have an opening in a Saturday morning class?"

  "Of course, of course! Saturday, you Americans like to sleep in. My students, they like the after work so they already awake!" He had a bit of an accent, but it wasn't hard to follow. I signed up for a couple of months worth of classes, and he willingly put it on my credit card.

  While I was making phone calls, I called a locksmith and made arrangements for him to double the locks on my doors and add some sort of window security. With the people I was hanging out with, I couldn't be too careful.

  Even in my current state, someone had the nerve to knock on my office door. I sighed and let Turbo in. He was trailed closely by Bruce, the Fed guy that had been in the first meeting to discuss my up-and-coming job. Bruce didn't appear to be wearing his shoulder holster.

  "Hi," I mum
bled. My official promotion was supposed to happen Friday. I wished this meeting could wait until then. Despite my new power suit, a set of summer silk navy pants and matching jacket, my second impression with Bruce was going to be worse than the first. I looked like a drunk returning from a long binge.

  "Bruce Heldon is going to take over your testing so I wanted to get your status." Turbo studiously inspected his pencil and notebook.

  Bruce took one look at me and tried to swallow his tongue.

  I began the stats in my best monotone. Bruce took a while to start paying attention. He was going to look like a fool when he had to ask Turbo for help. Turbo would probably talk to him in his extremely patient voice, the one that made me feel like an idiot.

  "So, uh…" Bruce trailed off into silence. He ran his hand across the top of his black nubby hair. "Uh…"

  "You do know how to run performance tests, right? You have to run direct attach tests, which is Alpha, and then pound the disks with network activity. Then you start Beta testing from the clients."

  "You look kind of tired," he blurted out, completely ignoring my question. He was obviously wondering how I was going to pull off my new position.

  "I got a makeover." I smiled because he was beginning to be funny. "I guess the make-up didn't agree with my skin."

  Bruce nodded before looking suspicious. "So you scrubbed it off?"

  I shrugged. "Well, you know how it is. You can't get it off before your face swells. Hasn't your wife ever gotten her face done?"

  He struggled mightily with that one. I wondered how he intended to let me know that his wife had never returned looking like a monster. Turbo, damn him, took pity on the man.

  "I'm sure the swelling will be gone tomorrow," he said. "Nice suit by the way."

  Bruce took a second, but then nodded emphatically. "Yeah, nice."

  I smiled again and fought against laughing. "I'm thinking of trying a new makeup line at Macy's since this one didn't work out. Botanical. Maybe it won't bother my skin. What do you think?"

  Turbo rolled his eyes. "Could you just email the test results you have so far? And put together, in writing, the tests you would run if you were going to complete the sequence?" He knew as well as I that if I didn't write it all out, Bruce was going to be in his office asking for details because poor Bruce hadn't been paying the least bit of attention to my directions.

  Sally popped her head around the door before I could agree to send the stuff. Women are better than men when it comes to concealing surprise. We can look you right in the eye and think, "you fat cow," but it doesn't show on our faces. She smiled at the men, barely spared me a second glance, and said, "Oh, I can come back!"

  I shook my head. "Not necessary. Have you met Bruce? He's our newest performance engineer."

  Bruce stood and shook the hand that Sally offered. "I heard," she looked shyly at him, "that you were new. You must be taking Sedona's job. How nice!" She turned to me. "I just found out in the staff meeting that you are getting promoted. I stopped by to say congratulations!" She was dying to know how I had pulled it off. Instead she got a bonus, because not only had she confirmed that I knew about the promotion, she got to meet my replacement.

  I nodded. "Thanks. I'm still a little stunned."

  Her eyes narrowed while she considered whether that was a good opening for mentioning my battered appearance, but decided against it. Women didn't talk about that sort of thing in front of men unless they intended to be insulting. "I think it is just fabulous!" she said instead. "Allen told me you'll be moving to the other side of the hall, in the corner office. You'll just love it. It's bigger than your office and has a window!"

  She then turned to Bruce apologetically. "Will you be moving in here?"

  He nodded, his brown eyes darting back and forth between Sally and myself. She looked fabulous and professional. I looked...like a homeless person dressed to play a part.

  "Stop by when you get a chance," Sally suggested cheerfully. "We can plan the move." She waved and as she turned to go, she mentioned the suit. "That color looks great on you. You'll have to tell me where you got it."

  By the time I faced the gentlemen, Bruce had decided to go back into his stoic Federal character. He carefully blanked his face and let his training take over. I guess he figured if Sally could ignore my looks, he could. He stopped stuttering and asked a couple of intelligent questions. "What operating systems do I test under?"

  "You'll need to do all the Windows operating system stuff. Don't worry though. There are plenty of people that can help you if you need it."

  He nodded. "Send the test plan, and I'll stop by if I have questions."

  Turbo smiled politely and ushered him out of my office. At least we all parted on friendly terms. I hoped Bruce called Huntington and complained about my appearance. That bastard deserved to worry about his precious plan for saving the company. God only knew what he had been up to in the dead of night. Whatever it was, I wanted nothing to do with it, or him.

  I just had to figure out how to get myself out of this assignment. There had to be a way.

  Most of the day went by in a tired, hazy blur. Several people stopped by to congratulate me. Each time, I felt more the fraud.

  That evening, I returned to the condo, planning on packing my stuff and hightailing it home. Maybe Strandfrost management would be forced to let me keep the promotion even if I told them to hell with the side job. The only problem was that I wasn't certain quitting would make me safe. Huntington knew I had seen him.

  I was so tired, I laid down on the bed for just a few minutes. The sheets looked clean and the bed wasn't lumpy.

  I slept like a dead person.

  Sometime during the night, I must have crawled under the covers, but I didn't remember doing so. When dawn finally woke me, I couldn't figure out where I was.

  The antiques in the room came into focus. I remembered.

  "Is it Friday yet?" I whined. I thought about calling in sick. No one would doubt it after seeing me yesterday. But I had to keep some job, promotion or not. "What have I gotten myself into?" With very little energy, I dragged myself into the shower. My eyes were hardly swollen at all anymore, and I was starved. Everything I had mail-ordered had been delivered to the condo. I didn't have an iron, but I shook out another power suit, this one a charcoal gray. At least today my iris was visible.

  Grabbing the jacket that went with the pants, I was on my way to the door when the doorbell sounded. Warily, I stopped. Wrong address? More packages?

  I thought the doorman was supposed to announce guests. Or maybe I was supposed to ask him to do so. I couldn't remember.

  I opened it. The chain wasn't on because anyone, including someone my size, could break right through it. For some reason, Huntington had decided to knock politely this morning.

  "Hi."

  My eyebrows shot up. "What?"

  He ignored my surprise. "Breakfast?" He held up two bags. They were unmarked.

  "I don't think so." My stomach didn't agree with my answer, but I didn't care.

  "I came to apologize."

  I still didn't care. "I don't want to be late."

  "Executives are allowed to be late."

  He didn't push into the condo as I expected. I wish he would have. It would give me an excuse to shoot him. Not that I was feeling all that brave, and I didn't have my gun. "I'd like to go now." I addressed his shoes.

  He proffered one of the bags and reached into his jacket pocket. He pulled out some keys. "Your new vehicle."

  I looked at the keys. I shook my head. "Keep them for a while, would you?"

  He sighed. "Look Sedona, I was angry because I thought you had done something incredibly stupid by following me. When I came by to talk to you, you wouldn't answer the door. It wasn't until you finally answered that I realized you must have been in the shower. Then you started to scream and--"

  I pushed past him out into the freedom of the hallway. He reached out and touched my arm lightly as I passed. "Take th
e breakfast. I'll stop by tonight and explain."

  "Explain?" I looked over my shoulder and then down at his hand as he pushed the breakfast bag into the crook of my arm. "Explain." As if he could explain why he had been at Strandfrost and downtown in the scurviest part of town possible. Was he crazy?

  I couldn't walk away fast enough.

  Chapter 14

  My first meeting of the day was with Gary and his staff, including Allen. Whether I decided to continue with the undercover assignment or not, I still had to do the company job to which I was currently assigned--at least until I figured out what would happen if I quit the undercover part.

  I took the breakfast burrito that Huntington had given me into the meeting and sat down. There was orange juice and coffee in the bag too.

  "Coffee, anyone?" I offered. "I don't like coffee."

  Allen looked at me like I had sneezed in it. "Why did you buy it?"

  "It must have been an error," I lied. "I didn't order it."

  Gary looked up. "I'll take it."

  I pushed it across to him, and he smiled, the perfect avuncular businessman. "Hey, that reminds me. There's a conference in Tamarron this coming week. We need someone with a strong technical background."

  "Oh--," I choked out, wishing I could shoot myself.

  Dan Thorton, the finance guru, smirked. He always wore business slacks and a button down, just in case he was asked to present to clients unexpectedly. He patted his brown ubiquitous businessman cut with his well-manicured hand and gave me an up-down condescending look. "I was planning on going to that conference if it's all the same to you. I think that's what Gary meant." He winked to make it all friendly, the kind of wink that told me I was dismissed.

  Gary looked up from whatever he was reading, peering over his reading glasses. "No, I was talking to her. You can both go, but I'd like her to present to the clients. You're planning on talking to the financial analysts right?"

  Dan managed to get his mouth closed and act like he was in agreement. "Of course, of course. But I can certainly handle the technical sales."