Risking Trust (11 page)

Standing on the brick stoop, Roxann maneuvered three briefcases stuffed with files from her father’s office, and attempted to shove her key into the front door lock. On the third try, the briefcases forced her off balance and the key missed its mark.

She blew out a heavy breath and eyeballed the lock. “Don’t do this to me.” All she wanted was some semblance of a meal and to get off her feet. Not a lot to ask.

Dumping the briefcases would have been a good idea, but even that seemed hard. She’d only have to pick them up again. Bad enough they were a reminder she’d put in a fourteen hour day, on a Saturday no less, and still had to start going through her father’s old files.

Saturday. She missed the Cubs game. Wasn’t that just great? The only thing offering any pleasure was the looming start of baseball season and she couldn’t even manage to watch a pre-season game.

The pinch of keys against her straining fingers drew her attention and she uncurled her hands, watching the keys fall to the ground. Now she had to pick them up. Damned door. She gave it a solid kick and a knifing pain shuddered through her big toe.

“Ouch.”

Standing tall, she stared at the lock for a second before retrieving her keys from the stoop. “You can do this, Rox. Just get the key in the lock.”

She tried again. The key hit its mark, the lock tumbled and the weight of a relieved sigh settled in her throat. She opened the door, dragged the briefcases behind her and gave the door a backward kick. Teetering on one foot, her body swayed too far left and—
crash
—she landed in a heap on the hardwood floor, the pain from the impact shooting into her hip and down her leg.

“Ouch.
Dammit
.” She slammed her hand on the floor and the sting shot up her arm.

Tears threatened and she held her breath because—absolutely not—she would not cry over briefcases. Maybe she’d cry over her father’s death and a newspaper in crisis, but not over three damned briefcases. Not today. Not ever. She counted to ten and set her mind to the task ahead.

Her left foot had somehow gotten wrapped in the straps of two of her cases. Okay. No problem. She reached to untangle herself, but the twisted straps kept her hostage.
Just relax a minute and try again
.

She reached for one of the briefcases. Stopped. No. Can’t do it. She opened her mouth and the motion triggered something. Something primal and urgent and frightening and she began an ear-splitting, someone-is-cutting-off-my-hands screaming that makes the neighbors want to call 9-1-1. And it kept coming. Yes, a volcano of screams had erupted and she couldn’t stop them.
Please stop, please stop, please stop.
Fat tears darted down her face and plopped onto the dreaded briefcases. She rocked back and forth, back and forth, back and forth feeling her arteries pump until she was sure her body would split from the pressure.

“He was there,” she howled, fists balled, nails biting into her palms. “And then he was gone. That was it. No goodbye. Nothing. I had things to tell him and I’ll never be able to. No. Stop this. No more.”

What was this insanity? The control freak in her tsked-tsked, while the grieving daughter assured her it was okay, that she wasn’t having a nervous breakdown.

Either way, she had to pull herself together. Only crazy people carried on this way.

Her throat and lungs ached from the screaming fit and she slumped to the side and rested her head at the base of the stairs. Heaving breaths rocked her body and she concentrated on taking air in and blowing it out.

White flag time.

She gazed at the well-lit living room and praised automatic timers. At least she wasn’t on the floor in the dark trying to free herself. She gave one of the briefcases a shove with her free foot.

The thing she needed at this moment was a run. She’d simply run until all feeling drained from her body and she collapsed. Only, she didn’t have it in her to get off the floor, much less go for a run. The grind of the last weeks had finally caught up to her and the physical and emotional exhaustion kept her body a step behind her brain. She needed sleep. The glorious, non-medicated sleep she’d enjoyed before her father dropped dead in front of her.

When did her life become this living hell? She sat up, pulled her knees into her chest dragging the cases, her own personal ball and chain, with her.

Trapped. In her own life. She pushed the thought aside.
No. Settle down.
The fatigue was too much.
I need sleep
.

She stayed on the floor, her foot still tangled, while the quiet of the house seeped into her. How could she have allowed it to get this bad? Even if her father was dead, his presses destroyed and the mayor maligning the
Banner
at every opportunity, she shouldn’t melt down this way.

The phone rang. Great. Roxann stared at the cordless sitting on the end table. Instead of crawling over to it, she reached for one of her shoes and sent it sailing toward the phone. The world could just buzz off because she needed a damned minute.

A second later, someone pounded on her door and she sucked in a breath from the shock.

“Roxann!”

Her insides congealed and she tried to straighten up. Oh no. Not now. “Michael?”

The door flew open and crashed against the wall sending a whoosh of air by her. Not to mention nearly knocking her daffy.

Michael hovered in the doorway, his dark eyes glancing left, then right before zeroing in on her with such menacing focus he made Charles Manson look like a boy scout.

What a nightmare.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Where should I begin?”

Michael scanned the room for an unknown predator, but finding nothing askew, he looked down at Roxann and his heart thumped. She sat on the floor, her legs bound in the straps of three briefcases—
three?
—and wet tears ran down her face leaving a trail of some funky colored eye makeup. Chunks of hair jutted from her hairclip and she was missing a shoe.
Missing a shoe
? What was up with that? She, in no way, resembled the put together executive he’d seen that morning. What the hell happened here?

“Are you hurt? You scared the shit out of me.”

He’d parked two doors down and decided to call and let her know he was coming. When he reached the walkway he heard the screaming. Insane thoughts of some armed intruder doing hideous things to her flashed through his head and he went crazy. Completely flipping insane.

He squatted down, ran his hands up and down her legs feeling for broken limbs. Nothing bruised, everything in place. She was safe.
Thank you
. Walking in on her being beaten or raped would have turned him into a madman.

Placing his index finger under her chin, he tilted her head up. “You look beat, Rox.”

He held out a hand, she reached for it, shifted to get up, but collapsed back to the floor.

“I can’t move. I’ve got nothing left. He’s been gone four-and-a-half weeks and everything’s a wreck.”

He wrapped his arms around her, was mildly shocked when she didn’t pull away, and tried to think of something, anything that would comfort her. Nothing.
Useless.
“Rox, it’s not you. It would have happened if your father were here. Bad timing.”

Michael had seen grief before and despised its power. When she didn’t move, the caretaker in him kicked in. He unhooked the straps on each of the briefcases, unraveled them and, after setting them aside, scooped her up and deposited her on the sofa. He ran a hand over her hair. “Stay there, I’ll be right back.”

He hadn’t been in Roxann’s childhood home in twelve years. He’d known she’d taken over the house when her parents moved to a bigger home in the suburbs. He surveyed the room to get his bearings. Big changes. Sofa, two chairs, large ottoman that doubled as a coffee table, dining room on one side, hallway on the other. Kitchen in the back. He headed down the corridor. Jackpot.

He pawed through cabinets, shoving the freakishly lined cans—
Jeez-us
—and packages aside until he found the jumbo bag of M&Ms he knew would be stashed somewhere.

The leftover Chinese food in the fridge got tossed into a bowl and nuked until a spicy aroma filled the air. If he could smell it, it was hot.

Roxann was still sitting where he’d left her, but she had wiped her face dry and fixed her hair. The calm, in control Roxann had returned and his heart did that flip-flop thing because he’d helped. He handed her the bowl and a fork.

“Food first. M&Ms later.”

She smiled halfway. He’d take that. It was better than the destruction he’d walked in on.

“Thank you,” she said.

He sat across from her on the dark brown ottoman that matched the wing back chair and watched her eat. His heartbeat had resumed its normal pace and he decided he was way too old for this shit.

After a few more swallows, she set the bowl down. “What are you doing here?”

“I’ve got our recommendations ready and when I called the newspaper, the lobby guard said you’d already left. I figured I’d go over them with you and we’d jump on it tomorrow.”

“Your guys work on Sunday?”

“When they need to.”

“What service.” She ran her hands over her face. “Do you mind if I get cleaned up? I’m a mess.”

“No problem.” Michael stood as she walked toward the stairs. She used her foot to sweep the briefcases aside, saw the portfolio and blueprints he’d dropped by the door and picked them up.

“Thank you,” she said, handing him his things.

Roxann soaked for ten minutes in a shower that left her skin warm and pink. The extreme heat helped to ease the tension that had settled into a tight ball between her shoulder blades. Her body felt bull dozed.

And Michael had witnessed it.

Yeesh.

How humiliating having the man she once loved watch her crumble in defeat.

She pulled her wet hair into a knot behind her head, slipped on her favorite jeans and a white T-shirt and made her way downstairs.

Michael sat at the kitchen table, the sleeves of his Notre Dame sweatshirt pushed up to his elbows while he reviewed his notes. He shifted toward her, hesitated and then smiled. She wasn’t the only one uncomfortable.

Reclaiming the bowl of Chinese food he’d brought into the kitchen for her, she sat across from him. The bag of M&Ms sat open in the middle of the table.

After sliding his things over, Michael moved next to her and sat close enough that his denim clad leg brushed her thigh. A zing of heat whipped through her and she cursed her body for the betrayal.
Way too needy tonight.

She turned her attention to the blueprints of the
Banner
.

“We suggest you install cameras throughout the building, inside and out.” He used his pen to point to different areas of the building. “Fixed cameras on the doorways and pan-and-tilt throughout the interior rooms.”

“Pan-and-tilt?” Roxann asked, chomping on an M&M.

“They constantly sweep back and forth throughout the room and when motion is detected they begin recording. We can also set them to record constantly. It’s all digital.”

“Right. Is there an area where we’ll have monitors? Can the guards see what the cameras are taping?”

“You can set up monitors at the existing desk in the lobby or in a less conspicuous place, but you’ll still have to have a guard in both places at all times.” He jerked a shoulder. “It’s up to you.”

She tilted her head sideways. The lobby would indeed be a prison entry. All they were missing were strip searches.

He put a hand on her shoulder. “I know it’s a lot.”

No kidding. Here she was, a woman who’d rather take a sharp stick in the eye over a loss of routine, being forced to endure huge adjustments, some life altering, one right after another. She drummed her hands on the table. “Keep going.”

She could handle this. It might kill her, but she’d deal with it.

“You also need card reader access—”

“That’s the key card thing?”

“Yes. Card readers on all exterior doors and probably some interior ones. You’ll have to tell us which interior doors. The only unlocked exterior door would be the lobby so visitors can access the building. The employee entrance would have card reader access.”

“We’ll always know which employees are in the building?” she asked.

“Yes, but it’s not foolproof. Someone could piggyback—walk in with another employee who already swept their own card—or someone could use another employee’s card. The card readers would be wired to computers allowing management to generate a report of who came and went.”

“That’s a good idea.”

“It’s important. I have them in our building. Also, all windows would be armed with glass break. If someone breaks a window, the alarm will sound.”

Michael flipped to the next page of the blueprints.

“Cameras would also be installed in the parking garage behind the building as well as the warehouse. The warehouse should have key pad entry and an alarm system. Bottom line, no one enters any part of the building without being seen.”

“You did all this in one day?”

“You said fast.”

Twelve years ago this man had been emotionally devastated and lost. The military had tested him in a way that left him unable to decide what to have for lunch. Watching him now, discussing security for a major corporation, she felt a pang of remorse that she’d never gotten the chance to see him become
this
Michael Taylor. She popped another M&M in her mouth while analyzing the blueprints. “I’m wondering if it’s too much. I don’t want innocent employees thinking we’re spying.”

“After what happened in your pressroom, it should be a non-issue.”

She folded her arms, forced herself to not chew on her lip. He was right. Those responsible for the pressroom situation needed to know she wouldn’t allow the equipment to be desecrated without precautions being put in place. She had to protect the employees by making sure this never happened again. Prove to them their jobs and livelihoods were safe.

“What do I need to sign?”

“Nothing now, I’ll get you a contract outlining everything. We’ll start first thing tomorrow. Let your people know to expect us.”