Читать книгу Long-Awaited Wedding - Doris Fell Elaine - Страница 9

Maureen pulled herself forward, her arms resting on the desk, her hands clasped. Her eyes remained closed. Even when she opened them seconds later, it was as though she faced a thick fog bank, the white vapors slowly lifting, a figure coming to meet her. It was an image at first, swirling her back in time…and then a remembered face. A remembered time. A remembered place.

Allen—the memory of all her yesterdays, the unhealed wound of her quiet tomorrows. Allen—tousled and barefoot in a blue wet suit, a surfboard under one arm. Allen—defiantly facing her mother, declaring his undying love for Maureen. Allen in uniform, turning back to wave as he boarded the plane that would carry him back to his ship. The ship that would take him to Cyprus.

Allen! Allen, out of her life so long ago, yet crashing back into her thoughts again and again. Refusing to leave on this harried evening as she sat alone at Fabian Industries.

It had not been like that with Carl Davenport, the vigorous, fun-loving man she had married. There had been good moments with Carl, but when he died, her grief had been measured. She had grieved for Carl, a dignified sorrow for someone who had been special. She remembered him periodically with sadness for his fast-paced commitment to racing, to living, even to her. With sadness for the dynamic, energetic way he lived, the foolish way he died.

Whenever she thought of Carl, she recalled a laughing, spirited man who lacked nothing financially, and yet who sacrificed everything careening around a race course. Sometimes on holidays or special occasions, Maureen still visited Carl’s mother in her isolated fifteen-room estate, enduring the long hours of a mother’s reflections while the elderly woman talked as though her son would walk into the room any minute.

With Allen, it was different. She had no ties with Allen’s family. The twenty-year-old memories were her own. She had grieved deeply for Allen, and when she remembered him now, she did so with searing intensity and always with thoughts of his child—a grown young woman now whose image she couldn’t conjure up to comfort her. That part of Allen that she could only think of as “Meggy.”

Allen. The well-remembered face of her first love with its Athenian features, a lock of wet black hair cresting over his broad forehead, the mesmerizing dark-brown eyes, the amused tilt of his head as he waved goodbye. A remembered time: high noon on the hard-packed beach. The sliver of a midnight moon peeking through the trees. The five o’clock flight that left on time. And the remembered places: Huntington Beach Pier, the iso lated campsite at Big Bear, the crowded terminal at John Wayne.

Now with missiles and mergers and mayhem crowding in on her, it could well be Allen Kladis who would unknowingly take her down, topple her corporate climb— A sharp knock on her door announced Eddie McCormick’s arrival. Without waiting for Maureen’s reply, McCormick shoved open the door and came in, a dark-haired stranger behind him.

She caught her breath. It was like seeing Allen walk into her room, the stranger’s likeness to Allen was so striking. Her palms dampened; her locked fingers tightened. She looked away, her eyes focusing on Eddie McCormick.

“Davenport, what in blazes went wrong this evening?” McCormick roared.

She steeled herself for a dressing-down and prepared to fight back, but at the sight of Eddie’s ashen face, she bit her tongue. The once robust man came across the room in a halting gait, strands of his sparse gray hair falling limply across his forehead. A year ago he’d been a giant of a man, but his illness was taking its toll.

“Well, Davenport, do you have an explanation for what happened tonight with that missile?”

“Eddie, I didn’t give that order.”

“Who then? Some idiot in your de-department”

She heard the quiver in his voice, knew that his anxiety was peaking. She considered offering him a chair, but thought better of it. These days he took common courtesy as unwanted sympathy. She did pity him, but not in the usual sense of the word. She ached for him. She hated his struggle for control, his need to blame.

Lately he had taken to standing with his hands folded, his stronger one gripping his left wrist in a futile attempt to control the tremors. Tonight he stood with his left hand in his pocket, but she could still see the jerking of his upper arm.

Parkinson’s disease is a cruel adversary, she thought.

She was accustomed to discussing industry problems with Eddie, but the thought of Allen Kladis’s brother standing in the shadows, listening to her, was disconcerting. She tried to keep a clear head, saying, “The order to launch was phoned in to the air base, but no one in my department gave that order, Eddie.”

“A gremlin?” he scoffed.

She ignored his sarcasm. “I talked with Roland Spencer at the Pentagon. He insists that someone at Larhaven made that call.”

McCormick dropped in the chair across from her. “I didn’t want the Pentagon involved.”

“Our contract is with the Pentagon. You are familiar with the last communication from them. No more tests on the Fabian missiles until the problems are corrected. I had nothing to gain by giving an order to the contrary.”

“My position,” McCormick said. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Taking over before Larhaven does?”

She didn’t argue. That had been the original plan. He would take an early retirement, and Maureen, groomed and qualified to fill the job, would have been Fabian’s first female CEO. Her disappointment at missing that opportunity was as keen and sharp as his mood swings.

Moving to the top had slipped through her fingers. Once Allen Kladis learned that she was on the corporate rung at Fabian, what chance did she have? Allen had always liked competition—but from his first love? If he had wanted to see her again, he would have come back long ago, wouldn’t he?

Sighing, she said, “Eddie, what matters now is who gave that order at Larhaven. And whether it will affect our government contracts.” She aimed her barb at the stranger. “As far as I’m concerned, Eddie, we’re still in business until Fabian and Larhaven sign on the dotted line.”

“Seems to me it is a bit more involved than signatures,” the stranger said.

Maureen allowed herself to look at him again, forced herself to do so. She drew in another quick breath. He was a shorter, heavier version of Allen, and equally attractive if it weren’t for the cunning twist of his mouth. In that flash she likened him to his father. She had seen the head of the clan twice—a stocky, powerful man, a tad over five-eleven, with an authoritative voice and steely black eyes. His wide mouth had curled at the corner—exactly the way this man’s was doing now.

She wanted to cry out, to ask about Allen.

The stranger eyed her curiously. He was casually dressed in dark slacks, an open-neck shirt, a forest-green sports jacket. He held up his hands and shrugged. “I’m a Kladis, but I don’t give the orders.” His voice was deep, half-amused, and his eyes mocking as they met hers. “That’s my brother’s department.”

Even without the name, she would have guessed it. The family resemblance was definite, the voice quality so much alike. “Allen Kladis?” she asked, thrusting the name between them, challenging him, hoping that he would speak of his brother.

“I’m Nick. Allen’s my elder brother, the company CEO.”

“The owner of the company, then? The one who would have given the order to the air base. Call him. Find out what’s going on.”

He winced, his gaze shifting quickly to McCormick and then to a space beyond Maureen’s desk. “Mr. McCormick, you told me you’d get to the bottom of this.”

He nodded. “But, Mr. Kladis, this is Maureen’s department”

Nick turned his gaze on her again. “Then I think you’re making a mistake, Miss Davenport. Larhaven had nothing to do with that launch.”

“Mrs. Davenport,” she corrected. “And Roland Spencer rarely gets it wrong.” She had to hear Allen’s voice—to know that he was really alive. “Why don’t you call Mr. Kladis and find out what’s going on?”

His eyes and tongue snapped at the same moment “You’re out of line, Davenport. We wouldn’t do anything to stop the merger.”

Wouldn’t you? she thought.

She knew that she wanted to place the blame for the misfired missile on Allen Kladis. But even more, she wanted to hear his voice.

“The number?” she said, lifting the receiver.

“Look, don’t bother my brother now. Allen won’t thank us for calling him this late at night.”

“Then when? When can I discuss this problem with him? The reputation of Fabian Industries is at stake,” she said evenly. “I have to have answers when Roland Spencer calls in the morning.”

“That’s why I’m here. I’m capable of making company decisions.” He glanced at McCormick.

But Eddie seemed at a loss for words. She wanted to cover for him. “We should stop production on the Fabian missiles,” she suggested. “Can I tell Spencer you’ve given the order for that?”

He nodded. “If that’s what you think best.”

“You’ll lose the government contract that way,” Nick argued.

“It will just affect part of the assembly line. The tests for the flaws will go on. It’s a good program. I dare say your brother will be pleased for the millions it will bring in.”

“Finances? That’s my department,” Nick told her proudly.

She frowned. “I thought your brother Allen was CEO.”

“Our father left the company to the three Kladis boys.”

But he left Allen in charge, she thought. She was certain of that. He had been grooming his eldest son for the job. It had been the reason that the elder Kladis didn’t want Maureen standing in the way.

“Oh, Allen got his hog’s share of the company all right Fifty percent. But Christophorous and I are still in the running.”

She heard the bitterness in his voice.

“Christophorous?” she asked.

“Chris, the kid brother. The one who likes flying better than building planes. Couldn’t care less who runs the company.”

For some reason she remembered Allen calling him the “waif” of the family—the non-Greek, the question mark, the independent thinker. “Dad will never mold him. He came along ten years after the rest of us. Blond and fair-skinned and Mother’s favorite.”

But it was Allen who mattered to Maureen.

She stood silently, the receiver dangling between her fingers. Staring straight into Nick Kladis’s dark gaze she asked, “Did you give that order to launch the missile, Mr. Kladis? To help the merger go through quickly?”

He didn’t answer, but Maureen was certain that she had struck a bull’s-eye. If Nick gave the order, was Allen even aware of it?

“Were you trying to humiliate Fabian Industries? Trying to force the bidding figure down?”

Or were you trying to undermine Allen’s leadership? she wondered. She had to talk to Allen. Or had Allen changed? Had he become shrewd and cunning like his brother Nick? As cagey and cruel as his father had been?

“I need answers, Mr. Kladis.”

“Wait until I tell my brother that a woman is handling the missile project.” He laughed sardonically, his dark eyes smiling nonetheless.

He was outwitting her for now. “Will you be around in the morning?” she asked.

He made a point of pushing back his cuff, glancing at his expensive watch. “It’s already morning. I’ll be flying out in a few hours. But we can talk by phone when you know what happened.”

You’re behind it, she thought. But why? You had no reason to destroy me, to tamper with my authority. But you’re in a power play with your brother.

“Then we’ll talk later,” she said.

“I’ll let Allen know.” Again his eyes were mocking, amused.

Long after the men had gone, Maureen lingered at her desk, thinking about Allen. She had long ago come to terms with him dying on Cyprus, but to learn now that he was alive—that she had been deceived by both father and son—was unthinkable. Now the only picture she could conjure up in her mind was the youthful Allen, the young man she had fallen in love with, untainted by the Kladis’s greed and conniving. But the businessman? The head of an aircraft company? Had he changed?

Meeting him again would be painful. Not meeting him would be unbearable.

Slowly she brought her attention back to the crisis at hand and jotted down notes for the morning schedule. At 2:00 a.m. she left a message on Dwayne Crocker’s answering machine, asking him to meet her at eight in the morning. She had a vague recollection of him talking about new statistics that would iron out the flaws on the Fabian missile project. She wished she had listened more closely. It was the most important thing he had said all evening.

When she came face-to-face with Allen Kladis, she wanted answers that would guarantee her own job, and secure her reputation. Dwayne Crocker, with his mathematical genius, could give her those answers.

She tidied up her desk, closed up her office and locked it, then went through the security checks with a forced smile and a pleasant good-night to the security guards as she walked out to the parking lot. The night was mostly gone, but automatically, as she reached the car, she glanced up and saw the evening star still glowing brightly in the pre-dawn sky.