Читать книгу The Tycoon's Takeover - Liz Fielding - Страница 7

‘HAVE you seen this, JD?’

Jordan Farraday turned from the e-mail that had just arrived in his inbox. His secretary was offering him a magazine, folded back at the ‘Who Got Hitched’ page. ‘You read Celebrity magazine, Christine? I had no idea you were that interested in the loves and lives of the rich and famous.’

‘I live in hopes of seeing you in there one of these days,’ she replied, as he took the magazine from her. ‘Having a little fun.’ Then, ‘I wasn’t sure if you knew.’ She paused. ‘You didn’t say anything.’

‘I knew.’ He glanced at the photograph of his cousin, caught at the moment he placed a wedding ring on Flora Claibourne’s finger, and felt an unexpected pang of something he couldn’t quite identify. Envy? It was ridiculous—and yet Bram looked different…complete. As if he’d found something he’d been looking for all his life. Nonsense, of course. It was just the reflected glow of satisfaction from a woman who’d got exactly what she wanted. ‘There’s a paragraph in the late edition of the Evening Post,’ he said. ‘Presumably they picked it up from this.’

‘Bram didn’t call you? Before? After?’

He looked up, a wry smile twisting his mouth. ‘Would you?’

She shook her head. ‘Those Claibourne girls are quite something. I wonder what they use?’

‘Use?’

‘Spells, charms, love potions…’ she offered. ‘I’d have said that your cousins were two of the most unlikely marriage prospects in London.’ Then, with a slight gesture that deferred to him, ‘After you.’

‘Thank you,’ he said drily.

‘Yet first Niall and now Bram have succumbed with a speed that suggests something added to the water.’

‘Grief fades in time. The playboy life loses its charm. They were ready to fall in love,’ he said dismissively. ‘My mistake was to put them in close contact with two of the most interesting women in London.’

‘And you’re about to spend a month in the company of interesting woman number three. Their big sister. The boss lady who’s presumably taught them everything they know. Are you crazy?’

‘No, Christine, single-minded.’ He glanced again at the photograph. ‘Unlike my cousins, who seem to have had other things on their minds, regaining control of a department store is my priority. At the end of the month I shall have done just that.’

‘You don’t need to shadow India Claibourne for five minutes, let alone a month, to achieve that.’

‘No,’ he agreed, ‘I don’t. But it’s polite to give the lady a chance to make her case.’

‘Rubbish.’ Her eyes narrowed. ‘You’re up to something.’ And when he didn’t bother to deny it, she said, ‘It’ll all end in tears.’

‘That,’ he said, ‘is the plan.’

‘If you’re suggesting they’ll be her tears, I think you should go back to the drawing board,’ she said, retrieving the magazine and holding up the picture as a warning. ‘Consider what happened to your cousins when they got involved with the Claibourne girls.’

‘That was just a sideshow, Christine. This is the main event.’

‘You’re playing with fire.’

‘It wouldn’t be the first time,’ he pointed out.

‘When it comes to taking a chance with money, I’d put my last silk shirt on you. This is different.’

‘Are you suggesting that I don’t know what I’m doing?’

‘Heaven forbid,’ she declared. ‘I’m simply suggesting that if you value your freedom you should invent a crisis that requires your presence on the other side of the world for the next month. Leave the Claibourne & Farraday business to the lawyers.’

‘Bolt for cover? And have the City Diary editor amuse his readers with the suggestion that I’m running scared of India Claibourne? They would enjoy that.’

‘There are worse things than being laughed at. Marriage isn’t just a word, JD. It’s a sentence. I know. I served nearly ten years before I managed to tunnel out.’

‘Christine, we’ve worked together for a long time. You know me probably as well as anyone on this earth. Are you really suggesting that I won’t be able to spend a few hours in the company of India Claibourne without falling so hopelessly in love with her that I’ll be on my knees within the month?’

‘Accounts are already organising a sweepstake on how long you’ll last,’ she replied.

It did not escape his notice that she hadn’t answered his question. But then she didn’t know the full history. For his cousins control of Claibourne & Farraday was just good business. For him it was personal. Deeply personal.

This wasn’t just about a department store. That was the public dispute, one that had been thoroughly rehearsed thirty years earlier, and the outcome was a foregone conclusion—as India Claibourne must know. Her father must have warned her that she couldn’t win, but she was stubbornly refusing to accept the inevitable, refusing to play by the rules.

He wasn’t taken in for a minute by her invitation for him and his cousins to spend time at the store, to ‘shadow’ her and her sisters, see how the store was run in this high-tech media age. She was just playing for time while she and her lawyers tried to find some loophole in the partnership agreement that would allow her to remain in control.

Not that he was complaining. If he’d planned it himself, it couldn’t have worked out better.

That he would take over from Peter Claibourne now that he’d retired was inevitable. India Claibourne’s decision to put up a fight, giving Jordan the opportunity to reverse history, humiliate her as her father had humiliated his mother, was icing spread thickly on the cake.

Christine was still waiting for some response, he realised. ‘A sweepstake?’ he repeated. ‘On what, exactly?’

‘On how many days it will be before you, um, get down on your knees.’

‘My knees? And why would I do that?’

‘To propose to the lady. Beg her to marry you.’

‘Oh, please!’

‘I realise that’s an alien concept for a man of your wealth, name and all-round fanciability. But it cannot have escaped your notice that she’s got a matching set.’

No, it hadn’t escaped his notice. India Claibourne was as lovely as she was rich. But she had one fatal weakness: she’d do anything to keep control of Claibourne & Farraday. ‘And a proposal would be enough, would it? For some lucky soul to win this sweepstake?’

‘A diamond on the lady’s finger is one option,’ she admitted. ‘But the hot ticket is for a wedding.’

‘Within a month? How likely is that?’

She held up one finger. ‘Niall Farraday Macaulay married Romana Claibourne in Las Vegas on Day 29.’ A second finger. ‘Bram Farraday Gifford married Flora Claibourne in Saraminda on Day 30. I’m sure that anything they can do, you can do better.’ Then, with a grin, ‘Three’s a charm, JD.’

‘Is that so?’ He shrugged. ‘Well, here’s the word from the horse’s mouth. If you’ve got money to waste on such nonsense, make sure you draw the number with “No Wedding” written next to it. Believe me, whatever gossip you may read in your magazine, it’ll take more than a seductive smile to get me in front of a registrar.’

‘The lady has more. A whole department store more. Why don’t you save time—and lawyers’ fees—and propose a dynastic marriage? That way you both win. You have to admit that she’d make any man a stunning consort.’

‘I’m admitting nothing. And I thought you were opposed to marriage on principle?’

‘Arranged marriages are different. The participants have more realistic expectations. And this would be more like an advantageous merger of two companies—something you know all about.’ Taken with the idea, she went on, ‘I can’t understand why it hasn’t happened before—in the days when marriages were arranged for gain, rather than left to chance. The families must have been close at one time.’

‘There has been quite enough dynastic marriage-making in the last few weeks without me joining in. And I don’t need a consort, no matter how stunning she is. All I need is for the Claibournes to hand over what is rightfully mine with the minimum of fuss.’

‘If it was minimum fuss you wanted you’d have sent in the lawyers two months ago. You want something else, and I have no doubt you’ll get it. I just hope it makes you happy.’ Then, ‘But don’t eat or drink anything while you’re at the store. Oh, and don’t, whatever else you do, get a haircut in the salon.’ And she grinned. ‘Just in case India Claibourne uses hair clippings to cast her spells.’

‘I’m sure you’ve got something important to be getting on with while I’m making my presence felt at London’s favourite department store tomorrow, Christine. Swapping knitting patterns, perhaps? Or phoning your daughter to discuss her latest pregnancy?’ he suggested, signalling that as far as he was concerned that particular subject was now closed.

‘Don’t do it, JD,’ she said, not in the least bit intimidated. But then he hadn’t expected her to be.

‘Or maybe you should give careful thought to the possibility of taking early retirement and becoming a full-time grandmother,’ he continued, his expression still in neutral. ‘I could get one of those sexy girls with long legs and a degree in Business Studies to replace you.’

‘You wouldn’t do that.’

‘Oh? And why not?’

‘Precisely because I’m not sexy. I’m safely middle-aged, plump and motherly,’ she said, heading back to her own office. ‘You know I’m not going to fall in love with you and make life difficult in the office. I’m also the best secretary in the world. Probably.’ When she reached the door, however, she paused and looked back at him. ‘Twenty-one days,’ she said. ‘If she gets you on Day 21, I win the sweep.’

‘Try and get your money back,’ he suggested. ‘Sell your ticket to someone really gullible.’

‘Goodnight, JD. Don’t work too late. All work and no play…’ She left the proverb hanging, closing the door gently behind her as she left for the night, and he finally smiled. She might be talking rubbish about India Claibourne, but she was right about one thing. She was the best secretary he’d ever known and he wouldn’t be trading her in for a younger model any time soon. Then, as he turned back to his PC and the e-mail from India Claibourne, his smile faded. It wasn’t long. Just one line. It said:

Two down, one to go. Are you ready to quit, Mr Farraday?

Clearly she’d been afraid that with his advance guard neutralised by her lovely sisters he might change his mind about shadowing her during June. This was a ‘dare-you’ challenge to his masculine pride.

Christine was wrong, he decided as he switched off the screen. He wasn’t the one playing with fire. It was India Claibourne who was about to get her fingers…and anything else she cared to risk…burned.

India Claibourne paused in front of the department store that had borne her family name for nearly two centuries and looked up.

Claibourne & Farraday.

A byword for class and style. The name said it all.

In fact it said rather too much.

The Farraday grated. A lot. Their silent partners hadn’t done much—other than accumulate capital and take their share of the profits—in living memory. Her living memory, anyway.

She didn’t have a problem with that. They were equal partners and were entitled to their share of the profits—welcome to them—as long as they kept out of her way. But they weren’t keeping out of her way. Since her father’s sudden retirement, following his heart attack, they had become disturbingly vocal.

‘Good morning, Miss India.’ The commissionaire tipped his top hat to her.

‘Good morning, Mr Edwards.’ She paused, stepping to one side, out of the way of early arrivals at the store. ‘The customers seem eager this morning.’

‘Summer is always busy, miss. London is full of visitors and they all come to Claibourne’s.’

She smiled at the way he automatically shortened the name.

Claibourne’s.

It had a ring to it. It was easy to say. And once she’d seen off Jordan Farraday that was what the store would become. Claibourne’s.

No more Farradays. Ever.

‘My wife showed me the wedding picture of Miss Flora in Celebrity magazine last night,’ he continued, as she lingered at the entrance, her fertile imagination supplying a pleasing picture of the frontage with just one name above the door. ‘She looked quite radiant. It’s wonderful for the store…both Miss Romana and Miss Flora marrying Farradays.’

Which brought her swiftly back to reality. Jordan Farraday’s advance guard, his cousins and partners in his bid to take over control of the store, were now her brothers-in-law.

Her delaying tactics—having the Farradays shadow them to see what running a department store actually entailed—had backfired. Badly.

But she smiled nonetheless. ‘It’s very exciting for them. For all of us. I wish I could have been with them.’ Her sisters, however, having fallen under the Farraday spell, had chosen to get married first and only tell their families afterwards. Or, in Flora’s case, leave them to find out like everyone else when they read it in the newspaper.

She couldn’t fault their reasoning. In their shoes, she’d have done the same.

Meanwhile they were all wisely keeping their heads down in their honeymoon hideaways, leaving the field clear for the main battle.

It was between her and Jordan Farraday now. But then, it always was going to be between the two of them. She was in control of the store, sitting in the seat he believed to be rightfully his.

Her sisters, his cousins, were interested parties. But she and Jordan were the ones with the most to gain—or lose.

She had one month left—this month—to show him that if the Farradays thought they could run Claibourne & Farraday in their spare time they were wrong. This was no longer an emporium for gentlemen, a place where the customers were all known personally.

Her father had continued to think of it that way long after reality had suggested otherwise. But she had hauled it into the modern era and, now he’d retired, the sky was the limit. But first she had to see off the Farradays. More specifically, she had to see off Jordan David Farraday.

It shouldn’t be difficult. The man was a venture capitalist, not a retailer. He really couldn’t want to take on something so time-consuming. It was control he wanted. The last word. At least she hoped that was all he wanted. A prime site, the name alone, would be a big prize for one of the retail chains. But he wouldn’t…couldn’t…

A shiver, as if someone had walked over her grave, goosed her flesh.

Jordan Farraday showed his pass at the rear entrance of the building, parked his sports car in the space that had been allocated to him, then asked the security guard at the staff entrance to ring through to India Claibourne’s office to let her know he’d arrived.

She wasn’t there.

‘Will you pass on my best wishes when you speak to her?’ India, dragging her mind back from a nightmare vision of the plans Jordan Farraday might have for the store, glanced at the commissionaire. ‘Miss Flora,’ he prompted as he opened the door for her. ‘I hope she’ll be very happy.’

‘Thank you, Mr Edwards. I’ll tell her.’

Most days she used the staff entrance at the rear of the store, but occasionally, having parked her car, she took the time to walk around to the main entrance, look at the window displays and enter the store as if she were a customer. Remind herself of that first time when, four years old, she’d been brought to the store by her grandmother to visit Santa’s grotto and had believed she’d walked into the Aladdin’s cave in her storybook.

As she walked into the marble and mahogany entrance hall, spangled with coloured light from the Tiffany stained glass window that rose up three floors through the stairwell, the rush of excitement, the sense of wonder was as powerful as ever.

She would not give this up for anything. Ever.

But it occurred to her that sitting in her office waiting for Jordan Farraday to turn up and take it away from her was entirely the wrong strategy. Romana had dragged Niall off to a charity bungee jump. Bram had been given no choice but to join Flora on a research trip to a tropical island.

Neither of them had had time to draw breath, settle into the standard ‘I’m a man and I know best’ routine.

They hadn’t known what had hit them until it was too late. She had to ensure that for the next month she was the one in front and Farraday was always following her. If he ever turned the tables and took the lead it would all be over.

Sitting at her desk going over last month’s sales figures when—if—he responded to the challenge in her incendiary e-mail wouldn’t fit the bill. He’d be expecting that and he wouldn’t be impressed by her ability to read a balance sheet.

She had to be doing something that was totally outside his normal experience. Something that would give her an advantage. With a whole department store to play with, it shouldn’t be that difficult.

She glanced at the noticeboard listing the special events taking place in the store that day. An all-day specialist doll collectors’ fair in the gallery. A cookery demonstration, with a celebrity chef doing his stuff, in the food hall at lunchtime. A book-signing by a well known American author in the country to promote her newest blockbuster novel. Bags of opportunities for photographs, she thought as she took the lift to the top-floor office suite.

She needed to keep her photograph in the papers. Remind everyone that she was running the show. She’d get Molly in the PR department on to that, as her sister was away. The lift door opened to dust sheets and the sound of hammering, and she smiled a little grimly as she crossed to her office.

Jordan Farraday might be sharing it with her for the next month, but he wouldn’t enjoy the experience much.

‘Indie…’ Her PA appeared in the doorway. ‘We’ve got a small problem in the nursery department.’

‘How small?’

‘Baby-sized. One of our customers left it a little late to do her shopping and she’s gone into labour. The paramedics have arrived, and they’ll be moving her to hospital as soon as they can, but I thought you’d want to know.’

‘I’d better go down there—make sure everything possible is being done.’

‘Well, actually…’ India paused on her way out. ‘There’s no need.’

‘No need?’

‘It’s being taken care of. Since you weren’t here, JD took charge—’

‘JD?’ India frowned.

‘Jordan Farraday. His staff call him JD, he said.’

‘Jordan Farraday? He’s here already? In the store?’ Her mouth was working on automatic, she realised. A bit like a goldfish, and making about as much sense. Of course he was here.

She’d been mentally redesigning the frontage, chatting with the commissionaire, taking her morning stroll through the main selling floors while Jordan David Farraday had gone straight to the top floor and was already taking over her job.

‘He arrived on the dot of ten o’clock. You said you were expecting him some time today, so when Security buzzed through I told them to send him up.’

‘I was expecting him to ring and let me know when he was coming. I wasn’t expecting him to just turn up…unannounced!’

‘I was supposed to say, Go away, we aren’t ready for you?’ India raised a hand in a gesture of apology, shook her head. ‘I gave him coffee and put him in your office. There is nowhere else,’ she complained.

No, there was nowhere else. It had seemed like a great idea when Romana suggested ripping out underused offices and moving Customer Services to the top floor in order to create more selling space. And why hang about? Get in the builders, create a noisy, dusty atmosphere and maybe, without an office—or even a desk—to call his own, JD Farraday would be less inclined to linger in the store. It was time she needed. Not her arch-nemesis following her every move.

‘I’m sorry, Sally. You did the right thing, of course, but just because he was sitting in my office did you have to treat the man as if he were already running the place? Did you have to tell him about the population explosion in the nursery department?’

‘I didn’t. Someone came rushing in with the news and he just sort of…well…took charge,’ she said, a little breathlessly.

‘Great.’ She took a deep breath. ‘But I really do think I’d better go and see what’s happening downstairs.’ She was in no rush. In fact she had a sudden craving to be somewhere else. Lying on a deserted beach, perhaps. ‘Do you ever just wish the alarm clock hadn’t gone off? That you’d slept through the day?’

‘Not this one, I promise you. JD Farraday is not a man I’d ever want to miss.’

‘That’s all I need. A secretary with a crush on a man who wants to take over my store.’

‘His name is above the door too. And I don’t have a crush. My personal life is fully spoken for.’ Then she grinned. ‘But I’m not dead.’

‘That’ll be a comfort to you when he’s sitting in my chair and you’re looking for a new job.’

‘Oh, come on. That’s never going to happen.’

‘Two months ago I might have agreed with you.’ Suddenly she wasn’t so sure. Her fallback position was the equal opportunities argument. He had a centuries-old agreement stating that control should pass to the ‘oldest male’. She was basing her equality on being ‘oldest female’. Would a lot of old men in wigs be swayed by the logic of that argument? Or would they—as she suspected—go for just plain ‘oldest’. Farraday, after all, was a man with a track record for making money. All she had to offer was a lifetime’s knowledge of the business and a passion to turn Claibourne’s into a household name—not just in London, or Britain, but in the world.

‘Hey, if all else fails you can always do a Claibourne on him.’

Dragged back from the yawning chasm of failure, she frowned. ‘A Claibourne?’

‘Flutter those long dark lashes at him. Once he’s in love, he’ll forget all about taking away your toy.’

‘Oh, great. I’m trying to convince everyone that I can run this store on merit and you want me to seduce the man. Whatever happened to thirty years of women’s liberation?’ As she turned angrily away she snagged her tights on a battered cardboard box. Great. The day that she’d begun with an uneasy feeling of foreboding was rapidly going downhill. ‘Sally, what the devil is this?’

‘Oh—’ She sucked in her teeth as she saw the damage to India’s tights, took a new pair from a supply she kept in her bottom drawer and handed them over. ‘Sorry. The builders left it there. They’re files from your father’s office. Pretty old stuff, but I thought you might want to look at them before I sent them down to the basement.’

‘But I cleaned out all the filing cabinets in Dad’s office.’

‘These were right at the back of that big walk-in cupboard. It looked like a box of old catalogues, but, knowing how disorganised your father was, I thought I’d better check before it went down the chute into the skip. The files were at the bottom.’

India flicked through the top file. Thirty years old, it dated from the time her father had taken over the store from JD Farraday’s grandfather, and her scalp prickled with a rush of excitement. ‘Sally, that designer skirt you’ve been drooling over…it’s yours. Charge it to my account.’ Cutting off her thanks, she went on, ‘Just shift these files first,’ she said, peeling off the torn tights and replacing them. ‘I’d hate JD Farraday to fall over them and sue us.’

‘Why would he do that? Wouldn’t that be like suing himself?’ Then, realising that it was not a conversation with a future, she said, ‘I’ll put them in your office.’

‘No!’ India took a deep breath. ‘No, don’t do that. Arrange for them to be put in my car.’ The last thing she needed was Jordan Farraday looking over her shoulder as she went through them.

Correction. The last thing she needed was Jordan Farraday. Full stop.