Children of Dynasty (38 page)

Tom’s arms came around her, he squeezed so hard she feared for her ribs.

“We can get through this,” she said, “if we all stick together.”

“But Wendy,” he sobbed, his big chest heaving.

“She’ll understand if you join Gamblers Anonymous and stay with it this time.”

Gradually, the storm subsided and they held each other, rocking gently back and forth.

At last, Mariah pulled back and stared into his eyes. “Promise,” she ordered. “Promise you won’t do anything foolish.”

After a long moment, he nodded. “I’d hate to miss seeing that bastard get his.”

She scrambled on the carpet for the suicide note and tore it. First long ways, then across, she kept on shredding until there was no piece large enough to read. Then she grabbed a china bowl full of paper clips, emptied it, and dumped in the confetti. Knowing that Tom smoked, she held out her hand, “Lighter.”

“Let me.” His hand trembled as he pulled out a Bic and flicked it with his thumb. The paper caught slowly at first. Then it blazed up and cast a flickering vermilion light over the desktop and the side of the cardboard box. Within a minute, it had subsided into charred wisps of black ash.

“I didn’t read that,” she announced, “and Dad will never hear of this from me. What you tell him is up to you.”

“I want to tell him everything,” he said. “I’ll drive out there now.”

“Do you want me to come?” She still feared for him.

Tom patted her shoulder. “I reckon there’s things a man has to do for himself.”

In the ladies’ room, Mariah dashed cold water on her face. While she dabbed at her swollen eyes, it occurred to her she might have been foolish to let Tom go alone. If he had been acting, helping burn the evidence of his intent, he might still do something like crash his car. The insurance company wouldn’t know it was suicide.

Though she found it almost impossible to believe her well-loved friend had manipulated her, Mariah stopped in the middle of repairing her makeup. While she’d been pulling herself together, enough time had elapsed for Tom to get to Stonestown. She had to check, and if he didn’t show soon, she’d have to break her promise not to tell her father what had happened.

Mariah rushed back to her office and dialed the number at home. As she listened to the ringing tone, fear clutched at her.

On the sixth ring, her father answered.

“Is Tom there?” She gripped the phone.

A moment of silence. Then, “He’s here,” in an infinitely weary voice.

She let out her breath. “Dad, I want to come over.”

“Later. Let Tom and I talk.”

She didn’t want to hang up, but he was right. Though she had known about Tom’s gambling in the past, she wondered if she would have been so quick to cry in his arms and offer forgiveness had she not feared he was suicidal. And now, how John dealt with his best friend’s betrayal was between the two men.

“All right, Dad. I’ll see you this evening.”

As she replaced the receiver, one thing puzzled her. Tom had suggested he offered to spy for Davis Campbell, rather than Davis overtly attempting blackmail. Of course, no matter how it had started, the result was the same. Davis had known he was buying one of Grant’s men by paying his gambling debts.

Had Rory been aware, or was he as uninvolved in his father’s chicanery as he claimed? Though her love wanted to declare him innocent, she was bone weary of trying to decide whether he truly cared for her or had been playing an elaborate charade. If he were the flame and she the moth, then her wings were damned near burned through.

Slowly, Mariah slumped forward until her head rested on her folded arms on the desk. Pain lanced through her, and she closed her eyes.

“Well,” said an acid male voice from her doorway.

She opened her eyes to find Arnold Benton watching her with an ugly expression. Jeans and a T-shirt had replaced his usual neat suit and the skin around his eyes looked sallow.

“Arnold.” Her cheeks flushed, for no matter his acerbity, she had falsely accused him. His walking out on the job now seemed the act of honor he had declared it to be.

“I came to see if John was here, but with you at his desk …”

“No, he’s home. Yesterday turned out to be too much for him, in a lot of ways.”

“I can well imagine,” Arnold said bitterly. “You all believe you found your spy and are well rid of him.”

“Arnold, I …”

He put out a hand to stop her and cast his gaze upward as though thinking. “And no doubt Davis Campbell arrived with the merger offer to keep Grant out of the bank’s hands.”

Yesterday, Mariah would have suspected him of being on the inside track with DCI. Today, she figured he must have seen Davis and Rory while storming out.

With a sigh, she pushed to her feet. “Dad turned down Davis’s offer of the loan value plus a million. He says he’d rather go into bankruptcy than sell to the Campbells.”

A surprising smile played at the corners of Arnold’s mouth. “Good for him.”

Mariah’s brow furrowed. “You were the one pushing a sellout to Campbell yesterday.”

“Of course I was. From a business standpoint, it’s the right thing. But on a personal level,” his tone softened, “I know it would destroy John’s spirit to go down that way. He would rather be in the poorhouse than take Campbell’s money like a handout thrown to a sick and pitiful creature.”

Mariah turned to face Arnold. “That’s exactly what he said.”

“I do know your father.” He sounded sad. “Very well.”

“We … I was wrong about you. I know now that you’re not the spy.” She did not intend to reveal that Tom was. “You must know that Dad never could believe it was you. He tried to call you for hours last night.”

Arnold grimaced. “I listened to the phone ring, but I was too angry to talk. This morning I woke up and knew I had to come here. To try, in the name of our friendship, to convince him I would never have betrayed him or Grant Development.”

“He knows that.” She had been too caught up in her feud with Arnold over which of them would be favored to see the man clearly. “I understand that you care for him.”

Arnold looked over his shoulder toward his office. “I also came by to pick up my things.”

“But, aren’t you going to stay until …?”

“Until the end?” He shook his head. “Mariah, it’s over tomorrow. I may as well get my chessboard and the like.”

She wanted to cry out, as she had to April, that there must be something they could do, someone Arnold knew in the financial community to call, but his slumped posture told her it was no use. In that moment, she knew that if her father thought there was any hope of saving the company, he would have insisted on coming in today.

Arnold gestured toward the desk she had been lying across when he arrived. “I always thought I’d be happy to see you in despair, but somehow I’m not.”

“Perhaps because you know my loss is also Dad’s.”

“And mine.”

She looked into his pale eyes and saw they shared the same frustration at a dying dream.

Arnold straightened his shoulders. “I’ll get my things and catch up with John later.”

Seeing him walk out made the end of Grant Development even more real. She supposed she should start gathering up her and Dad’s items so there would be no confusion as to property.

The phone on the desk rang.

Rory … no, not Rory. She would have to stifle this knee jerk reaction to every call.

As she reached to answer, she noted her bare left hand. Only two days ago, she’d planned to visit her safe deposit box at First California and get the ring as a surprise for Rory. Now she resolved to sell it at the first opportunity.

The phone rang again.

Not Rory, but someone with good news, a big deal. Even the sale of Grant Plaza would now be acceptable if the company could be preserved. It made her ache to see the spire from the window, glowing in the perfect morning that mocked her troubles.

On the third ring, she managed to break out of her reverie. “Mariah Grant.”

“Glad I caught you in,” Lyle Thomas said, so warmly she could almost see his thousand watt grin. “Whatever plans you had for lunch just changed.”

All she wanted was to go home, climb into bed, and pull the covers over her head. Except that she would not be doing that, but making more calls. She could not give up the reins of Grant Development until they were torn from her hands.

“Lyle, I can’t have lunch with you.”

“You have to eat.”

“It’s a long story, but things couldn’t possibly be any worse right now.”

“Trust me, it’ll be worse if you don’t go.”

When things had fallen apart at Wilson McMillan’s, Lyle had been on her side, but she couldn’t go off on a noontime jaunt. “Time is of the essence on the foreclosure. It all ends tomorrow.”

“Heard it on the street.” Lyle’s voice firmed. “What if I told you I could solve that?”

T
en minutes later, Mariah stood on the curb while Lyle pulled up in his Mercedes. He had the convertible top down and his Viking looks had both male and female heads turning on the sidewalk.

She opened the substantial door and got in.

Lyle guided the car into the lunchtime traffic on Market Street. “Tough day?”

“The pits.” Mariah twisted in her seat to look at him. “What did you mean about something that could save the company?”

He put on his turn indicator and headed west on Geary. “Could I ask you to wait until we get where we’re going? What I have to show you is important, and I don’t want to louse it up.”

A few blocks later, Lyle took a right onto Van Ness.

“Where are we going?” Mariah asked a few minutes later, as he took Lombard west toward the ocean.

He gave his most attractive smile. “I thought Sausalito.”

Sausalito was the last place she wanted to go. Memories of Rory haunted every waterfront shop, the marina calling her to step onto the dock and see if his boat was there. A vision of the sailboats, the music of their shrouds …

“Can’t we go someplace else?” At least in his trousers and fine silk shirt, Lyle wasn’t dressed for boating.

“Not for the meeting I’ve set up.”

All right, then it would be Sausalito, for anything that might save the company must be considered. Though impatient to know what Lyle was up to, Mariah settled back into the luxurious leather seat.

A few minutes later, he drove up the approach to the Golden Gate. They passed through the tollbooth and he accelerated onto the bridge.

“How are you holding up?” he asked kindly.

“Don’t ask. I’m at wit’s end trying to think of a way out of this.” As he had refused to enlighten her before they got to Sausalito, she changed the subject. “What’s been up with you?”

“Let’s see.” His tone was teasing. “I’ve been watching ‘On The Spot’ quite a bit.”

Her face went hot. “How can you joke about that?”

“How can you not?” he countered.

She couldn’t smile about anything, especially not since she and Rory had been the topic of the video mag. “Just thinking about it makes me feel like I’ve got a stone on my chest.”

Lyle gave her a sidelong glance. “Is the stone for the show or for Campbell?”

The weight got heavier. “It’s over with him.”

“You satisfied with that?” This time his blue gaze skewered her, reminding her of his reputation in the courtroom.

She crossed her arms over her chest. From the high bridge, the Bay appeared and disappeared between the rapid-fire strobing of openings in the rail. The far tower rose in salmon-tinted majesty, supporting the huge conduits that swept up from the center of the bridge.

When she did not answer, Lyle’s attention went back to the road. The wind ruffled his blond hair. Another minute passed and they were in the middle of the bridge.

“If I play my cards right, I can make ‘On The Spot’ next,” he said with a casual air.

“Have you landed a high-profile case?”

“No such luck.” He gave an exaggerated grin. “I figure ‘On The Spot’ will have me on with Sylvia Chatsworth, since I’m planning to take her to dinner tonight.”

Mariah burst out laughing. “You and Sylvia?”

Lyle’s expression shifted to a pout. “You don’t approve?”

Her laughter died. For all his mugging, he was apparently serious.

She looked out at a container ship piled with cargo boxes. If Sylvia took up with Lyle, she wouldn’t be with Rory anymore.

Tamping down a ridiculous surge of joy, Mariah focused on Lyle. “You and Sylvia could be a wonderful political move.”

His jaw clenched enough for her to know she’d struck the wrong chord.

“You’ve really fallen for her,” she amended.

“I have fallen for her,” Lyle agreed. “She puts on a tough act sometimes, but underneath there’s a woman who could be for me.”

Better Lyle under Sylvia’s spell than Rory …

Had she said that out loud? No, for Lyle continued to drive with hands relaxed on the wheel.

It was past time to stop this. Rory would never leave DCI. He’d remain a single playboy or get into another bad marriage, if not with Sylvia, then with someone of whom Davis approved. Imagining herself scouring the papers and watching “On The Spot” for news of him, she wondered what it was going to take to get him out of her mind.