A Business Engagement

by Jessica Steele

  She had, she discovered, found one very good way of getting the legal person to shut up. Indeed, as water soaked her lap, all that could be heard was a deathly silence.

  She wanted to die. She knew her pale skin was scarlet as she looked up from her sodden skirt—and met the hard-eyed glance of the chairman full-on. His expression was grim. Oh, Lord! And she hadn’t wanted to draw attention to herself!

  Mortified, she cringed inwardly. But it was perhaps out of mortification that pride came to her aid. As she saw it, she had two choices: either she sat there dripping water onto the carpet—a humiliation she did not need—or she got out of there.

  She got to her feet and, refusing to whisper—she who had not intended to say a word at this meeting—tilted her chin a proud fraction. Addressing the whole of the board, she stated, ‘It seems I need to go and get dried out!’ Oh, brilliant—she sounded like some half-demented alcoholic!

  Ashlyn went quickly, her face burning. She headed for the door, but someone got there before her. She looked up, and her humiliation was complete. Without saying a word Carter Hamilton opened the door.

  She did not thank him, although he had left his place at the board table to come and open the door for her. With her head still in the air she sailed out from the meeting—and heard the door close behind her with a decisive click.

  The pig! The swine! If that wasn’t saying ‘And don’t come back’ she didn’t know what was! Not that she would dream of going back—ever.

  Having passed through the ante-room, she somehow—though how, when the many-storeyed building was a maze of corridors and offices, she wasn’t sure—managed to find the ladies’ room. She looked down at her skirt and very nearly gave way to tears.

  She hadn’t wanted to come, wished she hadn’t, and no doubt the whole of the boardroom had erupted into laughter the moment that door had shut. Oh, confound it!

  Ashlyn was in the middle of reiterating to herself that the whole idea of her being a member of the board was ridiculous anyway, when the ladies’-room door opened. She looked up as an overall-clad, motherly-looking woman of about fifty came bustling in.

  The woman took just one look at Ashlyn’s skirt and, with a cheerful calm that said she took everything in her stride, said, ‘You’re Miss Ainsworth, and I’m Ivy, the general indispensable dogsbody around here.’

  ‘You know me?’ Ashlyn queried, blaming the slowness of her brain on the fact that she had worried so much last night that she had barely slept. Perhaps that had contributed to her almost falling asleep in that ghastly meeting.

  ‘Just your name. Word came down from the boardroom that I should get into my Wonderwoman outfit and find you. You can’t go out like that!’ Ivy rattled on. ‘If you’ll come with me, I’ll have you sorted in no time.’

  By then Ashlyn was happy to have someone else attempt miracles. Though where she was going she had no idea as, chatting nineteen to the dozen, Ivy took her on a journey via corridors and a lift. Who was it who’d instructed Ivy to find her? Certainly not him!

  ‘This is my cubby-hole,’ Ivy announced brightly, showing Ashlyn into a room that was an Aladdin’s cave of brushes, brooms and buckets, with a chair, a table, a box of new tights and an ironing board. Ah! ‘If you’ll let me have your skirt...’

  ‘I can do it,’ Ashlyn smiled, getting out of her skirt and already starting to feel more human.

  ‘Of course you can,’ Ivy agreed cheerfully, and made Ashlyn laugh when she added, ‘But it’s my iron and my ironing board.’

  Ashlyn handed her skirt over and, having had so many words bounced around her in the boardroom, found it a balm to be able to talk and have a normal conversation for a change as she watched Ivy go to work.

  In no time—or perhaps time was passing quicker now that she was away from the boardroom—her skirt was blotted with a clean towel, dried with a hairdryer, and finally pressed.

  ‘Fancy a cup of tea while we’re waiting for your skirt to settle?’ Ivy asked.

  ‘I’d love one,’ Ashlyn agreed, and was beamed at by Ivy, who, to Ashlyn’s mind, was more the wonder-woman than the dogsbody she had first described herself as.

  By the time she was dressed again and had finished her tea, Ashlyn felt much better. And, her equilibrium restored, she sincerely thanked Ivy for her help.

  ‘You look better than you did,’ Ivy remarked. And, as Ashlyn went to leave, she added, ‘I’m going your way; I’ll come with you.’

  Ashlyn had no idea where in the vast building they were, and was grateful again to Ivy when she led her once more through a maze of corridors and to the lift.

  Courtesy to the older woman made her hold back when Ivy pressed the button for the top floor. That was where the boardroom was, but even if her life had depended upon it, Ashlyn knew she could not go back in there. The boring meeting was probably still going on—she’d die rather than cause a commotion by going back to take her place.

  Her intention to wait until Ivy left the lift and to then press the button marked ‘Parking’ was not fulfilled. For even as the doors opened and she smiled, ‘Thank you again, Ivy,’ indicating that she was going to another floor as Ivy got out, a mature male she recognised as having been at the board meeting came around the corner. He spotted the lift was open and made for it.

  Ashlyn had no option but to put a finger on the button to hold the doors open. She had to keep it there for some while, for as he got in someone else came around the corner—and someone else. Oh, no! Not him!

  Carter Hamilton nodded, but otherwise ignored her. She was aware of him, though. Aware that he had moved to stand just behind her. So aware of him was she that she could almost imagine his breath on the back of her neck.

  Someone else got in. She took a step back—and came up against a firm body. Her breath caught. She felt suddenly electrified. Hastily she took a step to the right—and realised that he must have felt too close for comfort too, for he moved a fraction to the left. She looked down, caught sight of one very expensively clad foot. She quickly looked up again and, just as someone else pressed the ground-floor button and the lift doors started to close, Geoffrey Rogers—friendly Geoffrey Rogers—hared in.

  ‘Ah, Ashlyn!’ he exclaimed, ignoring the others and sounding pleased to see her. ‘All mended?’

  He made her deluging of the boardroom table, and consequently herself, sound an everyday occurrence. She warmed to him. ‘Ivy’s a marvel,’ she smiled, wanting quite desperately to get out of the lift. She found Carter Hamilton totally unsettling.

  ‘We can all testify to that. Broken shoelaces replaced, buttons...’ He halted. ‘You’re joining us for lunch, of course?’ he queried, clearly expecting her to say yes. She stared at him, wondering if it was the done thing after a board meeting for everyone to go and have a meal somewhere.

  She was about to refuse; another helping of boardroom talk, even if helped down by a first-class meal, was something she had no appetite for. Then, all at once, she became aware of a tense kind of stiffness emanating from the man with the expensively clad feet.

  ‘You’re all going?’ she queried pleasantly, saving herself to tell him that even if it meant she never ate again she was ducking out of this one.

  ‘Only a few of us. We’re entertaining a couple of overseas visitors.’ Geoffrey Rogers smiled a warm, inviting and encouraging smile. ‘Do come,’ he urged, and kindly made it sound as if he would be devastated if she did not.

  Quite why, instead of declining straight away, she flicked her glance upwards over her shoulder to the man on her left she could not have said. He was so close—but oh, so distant! So close that she could read nothing but hostility in his eyes. So distant that she was positive he was one of the few who would be entertaining their overseas visitors, and certain he did not want her there.

  Feeling a touch shaken, she faced the front again. So, OK, he was the big cheese around here, but what right did that give him to look down his nose at anyone?

  Ashlyn opened her mouth to turn dow
n Geoffrey’s invitation, and only realised how much Carter Hamilton’s arrogant attitude had roused her pride when she heard herself brightly accepting, ‘It sounds like fun!’

  Geoffrey Rogers’ face was lit by a huge grin of pleasure, then the lift halted and they all piled out into a couple of waiting chauffeur-driven limousines.

  Ashlyn was thankful that she was in the vehicle that contained Geoffrey and another man—Carter Hamilton was in the one ahead. Oh, how she disliked him. So what the heck was she doing voluntarily having lunch with him?

  She could find no answer to that, but decided, since she was sure she now felt hungry, that to have lunch was not such a bad idea. And anyhow, since there were to be overseas visitors present, it was a certainty that boring boardroom business would not be a subject for discussion.

  The vehicle she was travelling in was caught in a sudden traffic snarl-up. Trust Carter Hamilton’s car to go sailing through! So by the time they arrived at the eating establishment he was already there—as were their guests—and engaged in affable discussion.

  Carter gave her a curt look as she approached but she ignored him and went into hostess mode. And he, to reluctantly give credit where it was due, put aside whatever he was feeling, and sounded almost pleasant as he introduced her to the two Americans, William Trevitt and Fitzgerald Unger. Both were warm and friendly, approaching their late forties and easy to get along with.

  ‘What will you have to drink, Ashlyn?’ Carter asked.

  Kind of him to ask—poison, she knew, would have been his choice. She would be driving later and almost asked for a mineral water but quickly changed her mind. She didn’t want him or anyone else to recall that she had wanted a drink of water back in the boardroom—but had not managed to have one.

  ‘Orange juice, please,’ she requested, as pleasant as Carter in front of the two visitors. Carter gave the order to a hovering waiter and all eight of them took to chairs and couches. ‘Are your family with you on this trip, Mr Trevitt?’ Ashlyn enquired of the American seated nearest to her.

  ‘Call me Bill,’ he invited, and went on to tell her how his wife had been unable to accompany him because of her mother’s ill health, and how, on the next trip, come what may, he was going to insist that she come.

  Ashlyn, with one notable exception, sincerely liked people, and just as sincerely was interested in them. And so she passed a very pleasant five minutes in conversation with Bill Trevitt. She listened intently too, and automatically included others in their conversation. But she was glad that Carter and Fitzgerald Unger were seated far enough away not to need to be included.

  She found herself sitting in between Fitzgerald Unger and Geoffrey Rogers at lunch, and was not sure what to make of Geoffrey when, in the manner of Bill Trevitt, he asked her not to call him Mr Rogers but to call him Geoff.

  ‘Thank you,’ she smiled. She caught Carter Hamilton’s frowning glance on her and wondered what she’d done now! Clearly Geoff Rogers was a little bit of a flirt—and at his age he should know better! But that flirtatiousness had been lacking when Bill Trevitt had suggested straightforwardly that she call him Bill.

  But, Geoff being a flirt aside, she had sorely needed a friend that day, and he had been the only one to welcome her with any show of friendship.

  So she ignored Carter Hamilton’s frowning glances and, while eating her meal, chatted either to Geoff or more particularly, since he was their guest, to Fitzgerald Unger.

  She found Mr Unger an enjoyable man to talk to, and learned he had two sons at college, and a daughter born after a gap of ten years.

  ‘I can tell you love her to pieces,’ Ashlyn smiled.

  ‘She’s pretty cute—even if I do say so myself,’ he agreed proudly, adding, ‘And, if I may say so, you’re pretty cute yourself.’ Ashlyn was just about to murmur ‘Thank you’, for there was nothing in any way overfamiliar about him, when he tacked on, ‘And very, very young to be a member of Carter’s board. You must be one very bright lady.’

  Oh, don’t tell him! She silently begged that no one who had a mind to would explain exactly how she came to be a board member. It would be just too humiliating. ‘Oh, I don’t know about that,’ she mumbled, starting to feel a little pink as she realised that all conversation had ceased, and that everyone had heard the last part of Mr Unger’s conversation. ‘Actually,’ she went on to confide, as she somehow felt she must, ‘today’s board meeting was my first.’

  ‘Not too bad, was it?’ Bill Trevitt chipped in, plainly a man who ran a board of his own, and who was aware of how awesome a first meeting might be to a junior member.

  ‘Not too bad,’ she lied with a smile.

  Bill smiled and it seemed he could not resist asking her chairman, ‘How did Ashlyn shape up, Carter?’

  Carter looked from him to her, and under the tablecloth she crossed her fingers and prayed he would lie sooner than let a member of his board down—while at the same time acknowledging that he hadn’t grown to be such a figure of trust by lying to people. Carter, to her horror, slowly drawled, ‘Let’s put it this way—the minutes of the meeting should make some very interesting reading.’

  No! She didn’t believe it! She had an idea that, by law, minutes had to be taken, but they didn’t have to be a record of everything, did they? Oh, heavens—surely the PA hadn’t taken down how she’d water-marked the highly polished table, and had followed that by giving herself a jolly good drenching?

  ‘Can’t wait to see them!’ she heard herself chirrup; she was down but not out! ‘May I ask how many members you have on your board, Bill?’ She swiftly and, she hoped, not too obviously moved the conversation away from herself. ‘Or, forgive me, is that something I shouldn’t ask?’ Having revealed just how raw a recruit she was to this game, she sat outwardly composed, glad that no one knew what a mass of anguish she was feeling inside.

  ‘Not at all. It’s common knowledge,’ Bill Trevitt obliged. ‘Fitz here is my deputy. But besides him...’

  Talk centred on business procedures in their two countries for a while. Geoff Rogers did not take part, though. Whilst everyone else was engaged in another conversation, he asked Ashlyn where in London she lived. ‘You do live in London?’ he queried.

  ‘Hertfordshire,’ she replied.

  ‘You came in by train?’

  ‘By car. I left my car in Hamilton Holdings’ car park.’

  ‘Damn—and I was going to offer to drive you home,’ he said regretfully.

  Because she couldn’t quite gauge if he was serious, teasing or flirting, Ashlyn did the only thing possible—she laughed. And at once felt herself pinned by a pair of dark disapproving eyes. Ye gods—now what had she done? She’d had just about enough of him!

  She turned her head. She was fed up with Carter Hamilton, he of the smouldering look. But as she chatted a moment or two more with Geoff Rogers she was very much aware of a pair of annoyed dark eyes watching her.

  So she smiled at Geoff as if hanging on his every word—white the dislike in her heart for the chairman quietly festered. It was plain that he resented her being at this lunch—she was beginning to wish she had never come! Dratted pride.

  And it was just as plain to her—even if he was masking it from the others—that Carter Hamilton was furious she was part of his board. Well, if he was so furious, he should never have done that deal with her father in the first place.

  Ashlyn began to feel a bit better when she realised just how badly Carter Hamilton must have wanted her father’s firm. Or, rather, the site it stood on. So huff and puff to you, she thought defiantly, and started to change her mind about not turning up for the next board meeting—she might go, just for the sheer hell of it.

  ‘I expect you know London well,’ she turned to chat comfortably with Fitzgerald Unger.

  ‘I lived here for a year one time,’ he answered, and they talked about various parts of London that they enjoyed until lunch drew to an end.

  How it happened Ashlyn was never sure. But one moment they
were leaving the restaurant, to mill about outside, and the next the others had gone off in the two limousines that had driven up out of nowhere and she was left standing on the pavement alone with Carter Hamilton.

  He hailed a taxi—naturally one came at once. ‘May I give you a lift back to your car?’

  He made it sound like an order! Despite that ‘May I’ he was ordering her around! Well, did she have news for him!

  She stared up at him, up into uncompromising, stern dark eyes. She realised that while taking part in the other conversation at the lunch table he must also have been listening to herself and Geoff Rogers—or how else could he know that she’d driven in and where she’d parked her car? She refused to be intimidated by him.

  ‘Thanks, but no!’ she answered shortly. Take a lift with him? She’d sooner crawl!

  His eyes narrowed. Oh, my word! He wasn’t used to anybody refusing to accept his orders, was he? That made them even. She wasn’t used to being bossed about either.

  She did not care for the glint that came into his eyes, though, and very definitely did not like his words when, not mincing matters, he rapped, ‘Very well. You can hear it from here.’ And while she was wondering what in creation he was talking about he snarled, ‘Leave Geoff Rogers alone!’

  Her jaw dropped. Scandalised, she stared at him. So stunned was she by what he had just tossed at her, she didn’t react for a moment. ‘Leave him alone?’ she finally echoed.

  ‘I knew it was a mistake to have a female cluttering up the board,’ he grated.

  Anger arrived, and she was glad of it. Overbearing chauvinist pig! ‘Forgive me for not being one of the chaps!’ she retaliated hotly, and was ignored for her trouble.

  Ashlyn weathered Carter’s icy look—clearly he wasn’t used to tart-tongued women. ‘You realise that Rogers is married?’ he charged equally acidly.

  So what had that got to do with the price of carrots? ‘We didn’t discuss his wife!’ Ashlyn snapped waspishly.