Love Handles (34 page)

“The circumstances—”

“With Liam no longer an employee.”

“But—the designs are the same—you have to—”

“It would be a waste of our mutual resources,” Kimberly said.

“Hey, don’t worry about my end. They’re already wasted. Might as well—”

“No. But I hope we get the chance to meet some day.” She sounded like she meant it. “Best of luck to you.”

“Just a few minutes—”

The phone clicked, decapitating her hope.

Her hand sunk down to her lap, thumb over the power button on her phone. She wasn’t sleepy anymore.

Could Liam have called his old girlfriend out of spite—

No, she couldn’t believe he would do that. Not without telling Bev first, to rub her nose in it and teach her a lesson.

No, not even then.

Ball was still sleeping on the edge of the sofa. Bev ran her hand down her back, savoring her warmth, grateful she wasn’t entirely alone. “Go ahead and sleep in, lazy butt.” Bev tucked the fleece sample yardage around her. “I’ve got to take a shower and have a nervous breakdown.”

She went out for a bagel before facing the tragedy in her office. She didn’t know what was worse—that she’d recreated the best designs and somehow managed to display them on foam core in a semi-professional way and it was all for nothing, or that she was relieved she didn’t have to show her efforts to anyone else. For all her work and pride at how far she had come, it probably wasn’t good enough to land a big deal.

And now she didn’t have to tell Rachel that the original presentation was sabotaged. She’d just hide it all away in a closet and tell her the meeting was canceled, and they’d find another source of capital—from somewhere—until the standard accounts signed their orders and money was flowing again.

Everything will be fine.

After leaving Rachel a message on her voice mail, she made her way across town to her car in the discount lot and drove west until Geary Street ended at the Pacific and the sky was a blinding white panorama of fog.

Parked in front of the Cliff House, squinting at the sea lions and the gulls squatting on the rocks, Bev sucked in an enormous breath and dialed her father’s number.

“I was wondering if you’d call,” he said.

“Hi, Dad. How are you?”

“Save your breath. What do you need?”

That got her. She pushed open the car door and stepped outside into the cold, gasping as the hard wind blew her hair sideways across her face. “A little emotional support, first of all. Is that too much to ask?”

“I hear your mother’s up there. Pushed all your buttons again, didn’t she?”

She squeezed the phone in her hand, tempted to throw it over the concrete retaining wall to the rocky shore below. “I need to ask you a favor.”

He chuckled. “Here we go. Lay it on me, sweetheart.”

“Fite is having a short-term cash-flow problem—”

“Oh, Bev.”

“Don’t say it!” She picked up a pebble from the wall along the sidewalk and hurled it as hard as she could into the ocean. It was too small to see where it landed, if it even reached the water. “I’m hanging by a thread here. I’m so close. The last thing I need is another person who claims to love me putting me down and doubting my abilities.”

“I was just going to say—”

“I know, I know. You told me not to try and I ignored you, and here I am crawling back to you for help. But I’m almost there, Dad. I’m working my ass off and I’m good at it. All I need is one little thing from you and I refuse to listen to all the reasons you think I’m going to fail.” She sucked in a deep breath and bent over to the cracked sidewalk to find a bigger stone to throw.

He paused. “Your mother must have really done a number on you.”

“Not just her. Kate. Ellen. You and Andy. Each one of you tells me what I can’t do, why I’m not good enough, tough enough, whatever. Just because I’m not like you.” She threw another rock, grunting with the effort and feeling a strain her shoulder. “I’m sick of it! Just help me out, all right?”

A gust of wind kicked up and whistled across the mouthpiece of her phone, deafening the line. If her father said anything she couldn’t hear it. Feeling drained, she brushed the hair out of her eyes, sucking in another breath of ocean air, and got back in the car.

The phone was quiet. She pulled it away from her ear to read the display, see if he’d hung up. He hadn’t.

She heard him clear his throat. “First of all, let me apologize,” he said finally.

Closing her eyes, she sank back into her seat and rubbed her shoulder. “It’s okay. I shouldn’t have lost my temper—”

“Hold on. You’ve had your say. Let me have mine.”

She swallowed. “Sure. Go ahead.”

“Thank you.” He cleared his throat again. “First of all, I apologize for my bad taste in choosing your mother. I bear primary responsibility for that. She’s never been the nurturing type and since I’m not either, you’ve been left holding the shit end of the stick.”

“But—”

“Let me finish.”

She bit her lip. “Sorry.”

“However,” he continued, “as much as I hate to admit it, you wouldn’t be the terrific person you are without her DNA. And since there’s nothing we can do about changing the past anyway, you’ll just have to accept my condolences for your unlucky break in the mother department and move on.”

Terrific person?

“Now, about this crazy idea you have that I think you’re going to fail.”

“It’s not crazy. You practically said just that when we had lunch that day. Andy too.”

“You misunderstood us. You’d never worked in a struggling corporation, people depending on you, lacking the resources to make it work. We were afraid you didn’t realize what you were getting into. That you’d be unhappy.” He paused. “Like us.”

Her breath caught. She’d never thought he was unhappy with his work—just life in general. “You’re unhappy?”

“Not always. But often. I see Andy falling into the same trap and it would kill me to watch you make the same mistake. No family, working a hundred hours a week, pissing your life away. And for what? I’ve made a mess of a couple marriages, but one thing I’ll never regret is having you and Andy. The best thing that ever happened to me.”

Bev wiped her eyes. “Oh, Dad.”

“And it kills me that you think I’d want to rub your nose in your mistakes. If I’ve ever done that before, I’m sorry. My own father was like that and I never forgave him. Dead almost thirty years and I’m still shouting at him in my sleep.”

She didn’t know what to say. He’d never spoken about his father, never hinted at any unresolved pain. Her tears threatened to wash away her contacts; she dug into her purse for a tissue. “I always wondered about him.”

“He wasn’t easy but he provided for us. That was a man’s job back then,” he said roughly. “Can’t live in the past, but I don’t want to repeat it either. You’ve got to know I love you.”

She smiled. “I know.”

“And that I’m proud of you. Always have been. If I criticized your job it’s just because I thought you deserved better. You do deserve better,” he said. “This company of your grandfather’s—they’re lucky to have you.”

She closed her eyes and felt the tears escape down her face. “Thank you,” she whispered. “That means so much.”

“And whatever I can do to help you out, I’m honored to do it. I wish I hadn’t screwed up, driving you to wait this long to ask for my assistance,” he said. “Andy feels the same way. He’s chomping at the bit to fly up there and support you, but I told him we had to wait for an invitation. Out of respect.”

She had to put the phone down to blow her nose. After she could speak, she lifted it back to her face. “Thank you, Dad.”

He didn’t respond right away. “I love you, sweetheart.” He cleared his throat roughly. “So, now that that little Oprah moment is out of the way, what can I do for you?”

She watched a sea lion, balancing on the edge of a large rock in the surf, roll onto its back and wave its flippers like a child making a snow angel.

Then she looked at herself in the rearview mirror, into her bright, red-rimmed eyes, and felt a surge of power, love, and hope.

“I need Annabelle Tucker’s direct phone number,” she said, and smiled.

Chapter 23

W
hen Bev walked into Richard's office, he was combing his hair and staring off into space. She had to tap on the door frame to get his attention. “Morning.”

Clutching the comb in his palm, he glanced down at his desk, slapped a book shut, and frowned up at her. “You’re early.”

“I had to move up another meeting.” She smiled and took a seat across from him, pretending not to stare at the Tom Clancy hardcover he had under his elbows. Nice to know somebody had a little extra time. “I got your message.” First the Target call, then her dad, now Richard. Bad day to use the telephone.

“You need to make a decision today,” he said. “Payroll’s next Friday.”

She looked into his droopy face. At first she had felt sorry for him getting fired and rehired and having so little respect among the other management, if Liam was any judge. But now she knew better. “I’m not going to lay off two dozen people just because you say so.”

He frowned down at his desk “You got rid of everyone else who knew anything.”

“I didn’t get rid of anyone.”

“Ellen would disagree.”

“You don’t work for her anymore.” She looked down at the stack of spreadsheets in her lap, flipped through them until she found the worst one. “I have a question about some of your numbers.”

His eyes darted up to her face. He didn’t take the paper she held out to him. “Oh?”

“In fact, I have a question about one number in particular. One kind of big number. From June.”

Richard’s lower lip, shiny with spit, began to quiver. He closed his eyes. “I shouldn’t have come back.”

His confession wasn’t as heartfelt as she’d wanted, but it would do. “You could have told me,” she said. “I know how . . . forceful . . . my aunt can be.”

“It was my idea,” he said. “All these years, and then he left it to a stranger. It just didn’t seem right.”

“She wasn't the owner. You had no authority.”

“One little bonus. She would pay you off, then come back. Full circle. I saw it as a Fite-related business expense.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “But then you didn’t take it, and, well . . . ”

“She fired you. That must have been a shock.”

“And she kept the money. Your grandfather had already taken out quite a bit of cash earlier this year.” He dropped his head into his hands. “Fite just doesn’t have the legs to pull through.”

Bev took out another stack of spreadsheets, barely controlling the urge to shake him. “It might if you stop paying executives who don’t work here anymore. Can you give me one good reason why you keep sending checks—very large checks—to Ellen’s home address?”

“It’s her salary.”

“She quit!”

He glanced away. “Nobody filled out the paperwork.”

Inside her, Bev felt the last strands of patience snap. She slammed her hands on the desk and leaned over it into Richard’s face. “Drop the bullshit, Richard. I’m your boss. Me. Not her.”

His face turned red. Eyes shining, he leaned under his desk, pulled out a briefcase, and flipped it open as he swiveled it around to her. “See? Just my lunch and the paper. You can walk me to the door.”

“Hold on. Just hold on.”

“Aren’t you firing me?”

“Sit.” She pointed at the chair. “There’s more I need to know.” She wanted to fire him—right after she’d impaled him with his Clancy hardcover—but she had to think of Fite first. If he left now, like this, with payroll hanging by a thread—

“I’m getting a lawyer,” he said.

And they could not afford a lawsuit right now. She leaned closer to him. “You might not need one, Richard, if you help me.”

He hovered over his chair, bracing his hands on the desk, and shook his head. “Right.”

“You know I’m desperate.”

His eyes fixed on her, unblinking. “Fite really is in trouble.”

“I believe it. But is it as bad as you’ve been saying?”

“We can’t go on like this indefinitely. If we lay off the numbers I told you, the rest of us should be good for another year,” he said. “Ellen said you’ll be gone by then.”

Don’t kill him. Later, maybe. Just not yet.
“I’ve given up too much to walk away now.” Her nose was only inches from his. “Or even a year from now. I’ve alienated my mother, my sister, given up my apartment, been kicked out of my house, turned away—” she closed her eyes and thought of Liam’s hands sliding over her hips, “—money, more money I’ve ever had in my life—and after all that I still don’t regret a thing. Even keeping you around is going to turn out to be good—for both of us.”

He stared at her. “You’re not going to fire me?”

“Not even if you want me to.”

“You should. What I did was very unethical.”

“I believe in second chances. Fite just needs a little time to get its mojo back.” She pointed a finger at him. “Without any layoffs. If Liam says you can work miracles I believe it. He’s not the type to throw around compliments.”

“Liam said that?”

“He did.”

Richard pursed his lips, squeezed them between his fingers, and sighed through his nose. “I can buy you another two months,” he said. “After that you can include me in the two dozen.”

It took her three days to reach the teen pop star she’d first met as an incontinent, hyperactive five-year-old.

“Oh, I totally got it, Bev,” Annabelle said that Saturday morning, sounding short of breath. From the sound of the music and the humming machines in the background, Bev guessed she was at the gym. “Don’t stress about a thing.”

Bev was on a long walk through Golden Gate Park, sucking in as much fresh, foggy air as she could after a week of living and sleeping in the Fite building. For once getting her heart rate up felt really, really good. Nobody needed to know she was wearing a Fite bra and Power Panties, or that her new crosstrainers made her want to break into a run. Liam couldn’t nag or tease or pressure her to do anything anymore, because he was gone.

Because he left.

After she’d rejected him.