Valentine's Vengeance

by Michele De Winton

  His eyes narrowed into all too familiar grooves. “What exactly are you accusing me of?”

  “Just what you accused me of five years ago.”

  “We settled that. I believe that it wasn’t you.”

  “But you don’t believe I’m not capable of stealing a different secret?” She held up the fake document he’d slid into the papers he’d given her. Damn. It seemed like such a long time ago that he’d wanted to prove she was a vindictive devil in a skirt. “I can explain.”

  “Oh I’m sure you can. You’re just as bad as my mother. She’s always got an explanation for everything.”

  “Your mother? What’s she got to do with…” Joe looked at Cara, hard, and saw, for the first time, the thing that had been staring him in the face for five years. The dark skin, the tall frame, Just like Anna Brooks. He’d been distracted by the wildness of her hair, the green eyes and the cat-like cheekbones, that and the different last name. “How did you know Brooks was being audited?”

  “Come on, like you don’t know.”

  “Enlighten me.”

  “I’m Anna Brooks’ daughter.”

  Out in the room, the words spun up to the ceiling before they came crashing down with a destructive fury. “You’re her daughter?”

  She sighed. “Yes.”

  “And you lied to me about it all this time?”

  “It just hadn’t come up yet.”

  He spat out the laugh. “You come in here, ready to tear me a new one, and then you pretend like being the daughter of Anna Brooks isn’t a big deal?”

  “It isn’t.”

  The anger pushed the words out in a hard clipped line. “You lied to me.”

  “I didn’t. I just didn’t tell you.”

  “It’s the same thing.” Then he clicked. “That’s why you took the fall when I accused you of stealing my information. You were protecting her.”

  “Yes. I was.”

  “So you know it was her that paid someone to get my information? And you don’t flinch, now when you know what that actually meant.”

  “I didn’t at the time, I only suspected.”

  “Don’t try and tell me you didn’t know she was trying to engineer the HoganTech take-over for Brooks.”

  “Okay I won’t.”

  “You’re going to be cute about it?” He started pacing his room. “I planted that document in the files I gave you, yes. Back when I still thought it was you who sold me out. I wanted to see where the information would end up. But then we…” he waved his hand at her. “Was everything that happened this weekend all a line? A way to get more information for your mother?”

  “No. I—”

  But he kept pacing and talked over her. “—You knew. And you didn’t say anything. When I asked you to move in with me. When I told you everything; about the trial, about what these years have been like for me. You knew and you didn’t say anything.”

  “I—”

  “Get out.”

  “What?” Cara’s face fell and for a moment, Joe felt like a brute. But hell, no one lied to him. It was something he couldn’t stomach. Wouldn’t stomach. He’d always known the only person he could depend on was himself, till last night when he thought maybe he’d got it wrong. But now, now she’d gone and proved him right.

  She straightened her shoulders and eyeballed him. “With pleasure. Like I’d want to work for someone who has so little understanding of what it means to look out for other people. She’s my mother. And we look out for each other. Deal with it. It’s what family do. It’s what Mr Tsiolkas understood. What the people at this company understand. Kings is destined to be as soulless as you because looking out for others is something you will never understand.” And, still tall, she stalked out of his office.

  “I take it you worked out the connection then.” Richard walked in after her.

  “She told me.”

  “And it didn’t go well.”

  “Not exactly.” He looked his employee, the closest thing he had to a trusted friend, in the eye. “Make sure someone escorts her off the property.”

  “You sure about that? She’ll be missed at Kings.”

  “Too bad.”

  He spent the next hour with Richard, finding out exactly what Brooks had been up to recently, and brainstorming ideas on where Mex Industries might go next to inflict the maximum amount of damage to his competitor.

  But by lunch time he still wasn’t feeling calmer. The look on Cara’s face as she spat out her diatribe about family kept echoing in his head but he wasn’t about to let her get under his skin. Not now. Not ever again. By dinner he was agitated and couldn’t settle and he hardly slept all night.

  The next day however he had a plan. The week was a blur, acquisition meetings took up as much of every day as he could manage while still keeping his commitments to his other companies running. Taking down Brook Pharma was never going to be an easy task, but things being difficult had never stopped him before. As he looked over the balance sheets of yet another Brook Pharma subsidiary, he cracked his knuckles, a gesture he always associated with his Uncle. It gave him pause.

  But he didn’t have time for fleeting memories. Right now he had another company to take down and it was going to take every inch of his concentration to make it happen. He rubbed his back. It ached like it used to when he was at the brink of a spiral into illness. For a moment he froze, the fear that his cure had been a false hope gripping his muscles. But he forced himself to relax. He’d been tested. Three times, and every time the results had come back negative. That part of his life was over. He could throw himself into work knowing he could see it through. Knowing he could rely on himself to make things happen.

  So why then, did he feel unsteady?

  “Sir?” His intercom buzzed and he flicked the button to talk to his PA.

  “Yes?”

  “Those numbers you asked for are in.”

  “Great. Thanks.” Pulling up his email, Joe opened the previous week’s sales numbers of every subsidiary of Kings. He buzzed his secretary. “Are you sure these are right? The King Kondom numbers are completely out of scale with the others.”

  “It’s what all departments sent through. I’ll have someone double check for you.”

  Ten minutes later and the head of sales and the new head of PR and Marketing for King Kondoms were standing in his office.

  “These are some crazy numbers.”

  The sales manager nodded. “It was a crazy promotion. Cara was a wizard. Sorry.” He looked at the woman who had worked under Cara for the last year and was now having to step up, big time. “You’ll get no argument from me,” she said. Then remembering this was her job now, she added, “Of course it’s also to do with timing. Right time, right place makes a big difference to a promotion like that. Cara read the market perfectly.”

  Joe waved her off and directed his remarks at the sales guy. “Last week’s sales went up two hundred percent?”

  “Two hundred and six percent. We’d usually expect a bump around Valentines, but to be honest we don’t usually track sales weekly. Even still, it’s remarkable. Shame Cara didn’t stick around to see what she’d pulled off.”

  “Hmmm.”

  “The international press has been great too. The Aid not AIDS program went without a hitch. Thirty five million condoms distributed to women across the African subcontinent.”

  “Women?”

  “Put the protection in the hands of the people who need protecting most and success becomes easier,” she said. “It’s an investment of course, but the good-will that comes from it feeds right into our brand development.”

  “Right. Good. Thank you.” And he waved them out of his office, his shoulders tight and his stomach in knots. He shook out his hands. Two hundred and six percent. They were growth figures that would usually have had him writing a bonus check for the person who had made it happen. Not this time.

  No. But having Cara’s name spoken out loud did nothing to improve his mood. His bod
y felt empty, the space she’d snuggled into on his chest somehow hollow. No. He was not going to do that.

  His next meeting should have been a balm for his agitation, but even the news that he’d successfully bought a new start up pharma-tech company that Brooks had been looking to acquire didn’t even bring him comfort.

  At the end of the day he headed home, the black cloud over his head following him at pace. When it started to rain just as his driver pulled up to his building and he got out into an enormous puddle it was as if the world was going for humor but could only dial up old-time slapstick.

  When he’d finally shut the door on the day his mobile trilled and as it was an unknown number, he picked it up.

  “Congratulations.”

  “I’m sorry, who is this?”

  “It’s Anna Brooks.”

  Joe was stunned. Lost for a moment with what to say. Then he cleared his throat. “You have a lot of cheek calling me.”

  “And you have a lot of cheek going after my startup. But you won it fair and square so I’ll take it on the chin.”

  “How kind.”

  “No. Not kind at all. Although I guess you know a lot about being unkind Mr Diaz.”

  “Oh please. You and I both know there’s no room for kindness in this industry.”

  “Really? That’s what you really think?”

  “It’s what you think as well.”

  Anna Brooks took a deep breath. “I have a daughter Mr Diaz. A daughter who has a bigger heart than yours and mine put together by the sound of it. And right now that heart is broken square down the middle. She had to move out of that apartment and into a-pay-by-the-night motel with those two mangy dogs of hers.”

  Joe felt a pang of guilt. She’d lost her home as well as her job. “It was her choice to lie.”

  “She didn’t lie. She just hadn’t told you about me yet and do you blame her?”

  He clenched his jaw so tight he thought his teeth might grind themselves down into dust.

  But Anna wasn’t finished. “She’s too proud to come and stay with me but I visited today. It’s awful. Cara is a wreck. Her heart is broken and her spirit is oozing out of her day by day. My little girl, my strong, passionate, vibrant girl is a wilted mess and it’s my fault. I let her take the fall five years ago. It was convenient. But it was such a mistake. Don’t make the same mistake I did.”

  Joe felt his eyes bulge. “Pardon me?”

  “You heard me. I’m owning up to my mistakes. Now it’s your turn. Was she good at her job?”

  “Apparently.”

  “Don’t give me that. I’ve seen the sales figures for our prophylactic brands, you can’t tell me that you didn’t get the biggest sales bump you’ve ever seen since her Valentine’s Day shtick. Her campaign was amazing. Inspired. And now you’ve got a brand you can really work with.”

  It was true. Of course it was true. But Joe wasn’t ready to admit that yet. “If you’re so all about family, why did you let her take the fall for you?”

  “Because I’ve spent my whole life fighting guys like you to stay at the top. But I’ve realized that I don’t want to be like you. I want to be more like her. Look what she did for your brand by following her heart. By going out on a limb and putting people first. This industry is supposed to be about healing people and we’ve made it be all about money.”

  “Everything is about money.”

  “Of course. But not family. Family is about people and about love. She was willing to make you part of hers. If you can’t see what an incredible offer that is, then you don’t deserve her. Tell her it doesn’t matter that she’s my daughter. That you’ll work out a way to make sure there’s no conflict. I won’t press her on it and I’ll make it work my end. If you’ve got any cojones, get em out. Win her back.”

  As she’d been speaking, Joe had starting pacing his apartment and when she hung up, he pulled his phone away from his ear, unable to believe what had just happened.

  But when the silence fully settled he looked around the empty room and wondered if she was right. She hadn’t told him who her mother was. Had he leapt on that too hard? “I felt guilty at doubting her. And scared that she’d tricked me again.” Saying it out loud brought clarity to his mind. He’d let his guard down with her. Let her in again like no one else. And he’d been scared that he’d got it wrong again. But what had Anna Brooks said? Cara had been willing to make him a part of her family.

  Was that what he wanted?

  On a whim he dialed his uncle’s number. His uncle Fernandez picked up on the second ring. By the time he’d rung off, Joe was calm and his heart felt like it might burst. His uncle had been so excited to hear his voice. His mother had told Fernandez what Joe had done, the cure that his company had made possible, and his uncle had been trying to persuade her for months to call Joe back. But she was too bashful. When his uncle put the phone to his mother’s ear she finally told him herself what he’d needed to hear. That she was proud of him. That she missed him. That she was so glad he’d gotten out into the world and done something so big, so bold, so fearless. Something she’d never have dreamed possible for any of her children. They hung up after she’d promised to take up his offer of treatment and some time in the States.

  And then Joe was back, alone, in his empty apartment, the silence growing colder by the second. But now, he knew what he needed to do. He was going to show Cara that he knew what family meant. That he knew how to make people and progress work side by side. He shot off an email to his PA requesting an urgent head of department meeting for all of the Kings brands first thing in the morning. And then, flicking back through his phone log, he dialed the last number in on the display: Anna Brooks.

  10.

  Cara pulled herself out of the mess of sheets and blankets and threw a couple of dog biscuits to Muttly and Boris. Neither of them touched them. “Come on, give me a break. I’m not going out there in this weather.”

  A burst of rain rattled the windows and an icy cold gust of wind swept under the badly fitted door of her room.

  Out of the mess of weather noise, the knock at the door was sharp and made her jump. Dragging the blanket around her, Cara stumbled to the door and opened it to a courier. “Can you sign please?”

  “Oh my god. You’re on your bike in this?”

  He shrugged and juggled from foot to foot, she assumed to keep warm. “Faster you sign, faster I’m not.”

  She dashed out a hasty signature and took the package. Tearing it open when she’d shut the door to the elements, well, most of them, she pulled out a thick card: an invitation.

  “No way.” Scanning the document quickly, Cara got to the end and then read it again. She was being invited to a press conference at Kings. “In what world would I want to go to that?” she asked Muttly and he whined pitifully in agreement with her. “I mean, he’ll be there. Standing all tall and smoldering and taking the credit for my amazing campaign.” Boris whimpered. “And then some newbie will get up and try and take the credit too. By announcing a new campaign with Africa. Maybe an adopt-an-African-stray-dog promotion to build on the whole be-nice-to-animals thing. Gah. Bastards.” She slumped back onto the bed and threw the invitation into the corner.

  But then her phone rang. Checking the display first, she pressed answer. “I’m fine Mom, honestly. It’s not that bad here. And I’ll find a proper place soon.”

  “Good,” her mother said coolly. “But that’s not what I’m calling about. Did you get the package?”

  Cara’s hackles rose. “Which package?”

  “The one about the press conference. I just got one. I assumed they’d send you a copy as you were the instigator of their success.”

  “I doubt Joe Diaz is going to call a press conference thanking me for my years of service,” Cara said dryly. Although the thought did make her smile.

  “Who knows. But you didn’t answer my question. Did you get it?”

  “Yeeees I got it.”

  “Good. Well then, you should g
o. You can’t hide forever.”

  “Um, from Joe Diaz? I think you’ll find that I can. He told me to get out, after trying to set me up!”

  “True. The man is a fool. But if you won’t take money from me to pay your rent then you’re going to need a job. You can’t live in that place forever. In fact you shouldn’t be living there at all, you’ll die of pneumonia and so will your dogs.”

  Cara looked down at Muttly and Boris and the two of them looked up at her with such doleful eyes that she thought for just a minute that they were in on it. “That’s totally unfair.”

  “It is. And the world is a cruel and heartless place. But it’s much better with you in it. Someone will figure that out and give you a job and you’ll be able to make some more magic like you did for Kings. So come. I’m picking you up. See you at five.” Then, as she always did, her mother rang off and Cara was left staring at her phone. Cara fell back onto the pillows and tried to pretend it wasn’t happening.

  When she’d walked out of Kings, she’d thought she’d never set foot in the building again. But there she was, the doors opening, and her feet taking one step then another into the foyer.

  Joe Diaz had killed all her efforts there and he’d killed them in less than five minutes. More than that, he’d killed her trust in human compassion. How could he have shared what he did with her and then ripped it away so easily? The kind of man who could do that either had lizard blood in his veins, or had replaced his heart entirely with some sort of machine. Yes, that’s good, just think of him as a robot when you see him. Because despite the smile she had plastered on her face, feeling more and more plastic by the minute, Cara’s insides were shaking like a day old puppy at the thought of seeing Joe again.

  She smoothed down the black pantsuit she’d decided on in an attempt to look sleek and watched her mother’s face twitch as she noticed again the slight iron mark along the leg. At least her hair was sort of behaving. The wet weather usually sent it into a wild frizz of curls, but it was so cold, her hair seemed to have given up and was laying mostly flat against her head.