“Julius is deliberately trying to destroy my husband’s company,” Diana said, her voice tight with fury and frustration. “It’s common knowledge. Julius wants to exact vengeance on me because I left him. He can’t abide losing. He’s Arkwright the Alchemist. He always wins.”
The two women who had just entered the room watched the scene with hushed fascination. Diana ignored them.
Grace assessed her options. There were now three people blocking the room’s only escape route. A Witherspoon Way affirmation flashed through her mind. Be the eye of the storm. It is the only way to control the chaos around you.
It took everything she had to smile at Diana but she managed the feat.
“It’s all a huge misunderstanding, Mrs. Hastings,” she said. “The rumors are wrong. I can assure you that Julius is not out to destroy your husband’s company.”
Tears sparked in Diana’s eyes. “Tonight that son of a bitch gave a very nice, very noble speech about the importance of legacies and honor and making a difference. But what he’s doing to Edward and the Hastings family makes Julius a complete hypocrite. You tell him that, damn it.”
“If you know Julius as well as you think you do,” Grace said, “then there is something else you should know.”
Diana frowned. “What?”
“Julius is very, very good when it comes to business. You said it yourself. They call him Arkwright the Alchemist.”
“You don’t have to tell me.” Diana dashed the back of her hand across her eyes, smearing her makeup. “Believe me, I’m well aware that he’s a legend in the business world.”
“Then stop and think about this for a minute,” Grace said. “If Julius Arkwright actually had set out to destroy your husband’s company, Hastings would have filed for bankruptcy months ago. The firm would be in smoking ruins. Julius doesn’t mess around. I would have thought you would remember that aspect of his character.”
It was Diana’s turn to stare. She did not say a word. The other two women were still frozen in place. For a moment no one moved.
Grace couldn’t think of anything else to say so she turned and yanked a towel out of the dispenser. She marched toward the trio who stood in her way.
“Excuse me,” she said.
She did not stop. Abruptly the three scattered. Grace kept going. She obeyed the little sign on the wall that advised her to use the paper towel to open the door. Tossing the towel aside, she escaped into the hall.
The door closed softly on the still-life-with-bathroom-fixtures in the ladies’ room.
Twenty-Five
When he saw Grace coming toward him through the crowd, he knew that something had happened in the short span of time that she had been gone—something unpleasant.
She wore a simple, sleek black gown with a demure neckline, long sleeves and a narrow skirt. Her hair was pulled up in a severe twist. He suspected that she had gone for a look suited to an up-and-coming businesswoman. But he thought she looked more like a sexy little cat burglar weaving her way through the knots of people. When she drew closer he saw the mix of relief and wariness in her eyes.
He took her arm and instinctively checked her back trail. He saw no one who appeared alarming.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, keeping his voice low.
She wrinkled her nose. “I’m afraid there was a small scene in the ladies’ room a few minutes ago.”
That stopped him for a moment.
“What the hell kind of scene could occur in a restroom?” he finally asked.
“I ran into your ex-wife. Or, rather, she ran into me. I think she followed me into the ladies’ room.”
“Damn.”
Grace’s mouth tightened. “Brace yourself. It gets worse. There were witnesses.”
“All right, let’s take this step by step. First, define scene.”
“Diana Hastings cornered me and made some accusations. It was awkward. She’s very upset, Julius. Angry and scared. That is not a good mix.”
He tried and failed to come up with a reason why Diana might be angry with Grace.
“She can’t be jealous of you,” he said. He stated that as the blunt fact that he knew it was. “She’s the one who left me, remember? So why would she confront you?”
“She’s not mad at me,” Grace said. Her tone made it clear that she was doing her level best to exert patience. “I was just a placeholder.”
“For what?”
He was starting to feel as if he was falling down the rabbit hole. Every man knew that what happened in the ladies’ room was supposed to stay in the ladies’ room. He was pretty sure there was a rule about it somewhere.
“Diana is harboring a great deal of fear and frustration toward you,” Grace said quietly. “She took it out on me—probably because she’s terrified to confront you directly. She thinks you’re trying to get revenge against her and Edward Hastings by destroying the Hastings family empire.”
The pieces of the puzzle finally slipped into place. He allowed himself to relax a few notches.
“I see,” he said. “That business.”
“An unfortunate turn of phrase, as it happens.” Grace narrowed her eyes. “Yes, that business. She wanted me to deliver a message. She said she was aware of what you’re doing and that she thinks it’s . . . not very nice.”
He blinked. “Those were her words?”
“Well, no,” Grace said stiffly. “More forceful language was employed. But that’s neither here nor there.”
“Don’t worry. What’s going on at Hastings has nothing to do with me. Hastings has been digging its own grave for the past eighteen months.”
“I assured Diana that you were not responsible for the company’s troubles.”
He was strangely gratified by that news.
“You said that?” he asked. “You told her that I wasn’t the one undermining Hastings?”
“Naturally. But I don’t think that’s going to be enough to defuse the situation.”
He thought about that for a moment. “No offense, but what the hell do you know about Hastings’s financial problems?”
“Nothing,” Grace admitted. “I just pointed out the obvious to Diana.”
“What, exactly, is the obvious?”
“I reminded her that you are very good at what you do. I told her that if you had been trying to destroy the company for going on eighteen months, Hastings would have crashed and burned by now.”
“Huh.”
He couldn’t think of anything to say to that so he steered her into the auction room. He was aware that almost every eye in the place followed them to their seats. He could feel the tension vibrating through Grace.
“Ignore them,” he said into her ear as he sat down beside her.
“Easy for you to say.”
“All we have to do is buy that overpriced chunk of art glass that you picked out earlier and then we’re out of here.”
“Right. And I would remind you that you were the one who said we had to buy that beautiful piece of art glass.”
“I said we had to buy something. I didn’t give a damn what we bought.”
“It’s a really beautiful piece of glass,” she said, very earnest now. “I’m sure it will look lovely in your condo.”
He started to tell her that the bowl was going to be hers. He had seen the way her eyes glowed with appreciation when she looked at it earlier. But before he could say anything he realized she had gone very quiet. Alarmed, he gave her a quick head-to-toe appraisal.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“I’m fine,” she said softly.
She was focused on the stage. Her calm, serene expression made him suspicious.
“You’re doing some kind of breathing thing, aren’t you?” he said.
“I’m using one of the Witherspoon affirmations as a mantra, if that’s
what you mean, yes.”
“Which affirmation?”
“Let’s just say that I am in my peaceful place where negative energy cannot touch me.”
“How is that working for you?”
“Shut up and get ready to bid.”
Twenty-Six
Burke Marrick was tall, sexy and gorgeous in the dark, dangerous ways of fictional vampires—all sharp cheekbones and mesmerizing green eyes. Mr. Perfect was too good to be true, Millicent thought, but he was certainly interesting.
She watched him slide gracefully into the booth across from her. She was halfway through her martini but she might as well have been drinking liquid excitement with a twist of nerves. She was, after all, about to make a business proposition to the man who had, in all likelihood, murdered Sprague Witherspoon.
Somehow, knowing that Burke was probably a killer just made the whole thing all the more thrilling.
“I got your message,” Burke said. “What is this about?”
His voice suited the rest of him, vampire-soft and seductive. Everything inside her tightened with anticipation. This was the feeling a woman got when she decided to have sex with a devastating stranger, she thought. But Burke wasn’t any random pickup. He had a major part in the play she had been scripting for the past few months—ever since he had arrived, unannounced, on the stage. True, the story line had changed from the original version but she was nothing if not adaptable. She had learned the trick early on in life when she had concluded that nothing on the streets could possibly be as bad as life with a violent stepfather and a drug-addicted mother. Her theory had proven correct.
The trendy South Lake Union bar was crowded, just as she had known it would be at this hour. The din of conversation, laughter and background music would provide privacy for the discussion she intended to conduct with Burke.
“Thank you for agreeing to meet me here,” she said.
She was about to do something very daring, something she had never done before. But as the Witherspoon affirmation said, We grow only when we dare to move out of our comfort zone. She had always considered the affirmations to be downright silly, albeit great marketing tools. But she was willing to admit that this particular affirmation had some truth in it.
One thing was certain, if there was ever a time to take risks, this was it.
“Your message said that you wanted to talk about something that was of mutual interest,” Burke said. “What is it?”
She smiled, satisfied. “Good to know I was right about you, Burke. I pegged you as the sort of man who likes to go straight to the bottom line.”
“What is the bottom line in this case?”
“Money,” she said. “A lot of it.” She paused for emphasis and lowered her voice. “Not as much as you would have had if your own plans had worked out the way you had hoped, but still, a lot of money. And an opportunity to make more.”
Wariness sparked in Burke’s eyes but his smile was polished and perfect.
“I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about,” he said.
“Then you must think I’m as naive as Grace Elland.”
The waitress appeared at the table and looked expectantly at Burke.
“What can I get for you?” she asked.
Burke glanced at Millicent’s glass and raised a brow.
“Vodka martini,” Millicent said. “Dry. Straight up. With an olive.”
Burke smiled. “Sounds good.”
“Got it,” the waitress said. “I’ll be right back with your cocktail.”
Millicent waited until the woman had vanished into the crowd. Then she idly stirred her drink with the little plastic spear on which the olive was impaled.
“Let me give you some background,” she said. “I don’t have a CPA degree. I never went to college. But I am very, very good when it comes to juggling money, and I’m very, very good with computers. I handled Witherspoon’s taxes and his investments. I had access to Witherspoon’s personal as well as his business accounts. He didn’t like to be bothered with the small stuff of daily life. He was a Big Picture guy. I paid his bills—all of them, including those related to Nyla. I’m the one who transferred her allowance into her account on the first of every month.”
Mild surprise and a hint of respect gleamed in Burke’s eyes but he seemed more amused than alarmed.
“Interesting,” he said. “But now you’re out of a job.”
“Not for long. Witherspoon’s chief competition was Larson Rayner.”
“So?”
“Larson has concluded that the easiest way to take Witherspoon’s place in the motivational guru business is to recruit the very people who turned the Witherspoon Way into a powerhouse operation.”
Burke nodded. “Hiring his competitor’s people makes sense. I assume Rayner has made you an offer?”
“Yes. I told him I would be delighted to accept a position at Rayner Seminars. And then I thought about you.”
“I’m listening.”
“I know you were blackmailing Witherspoon for the last few months of his life because I was the one who transferred the money into a certain account earmarked medical expenses on the last day of every month.”
“I repeat—I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Burke said.
But there was an edge on the words.
She ignored the interruption. “Witherspoon was very clever about it. When he created the account he told me that the money was being used to pay the costs of hospice care for an elderly relative. I wasn’t suspicious at first. Witherspoon, being Witherspoon, wanted the very best private care for his dying aunt and he could afford to pay for it.”
“You should consider writing fiction for your next career, Miss Chartwell.”
“Please, call me Millicent. You and I are going to be very close friends soon. To continue with my story, you were smart enough to keep the payments reasonable—just a few thousand dollars a month. Everyone knows that it’s easy to spend that kind of money on private nursing care.”
Burke’s face remained impassive for a few seconds. In the shadowy light his eyes went gem-hard. But before he could say anything the waitress appeared with the martini.
When they were once again alone, Millicent took a sip of her cocktail and lowered the glass. She smiled.
“Let me give you the next chapter,” she said. “The money you made with the blackmail scheme was just penny-ante stuff, wasn’t it? You were after a much bigger prize—Nyla’s inheritance. But that seems to be slipping away, doesn’t it? If things don’t work out the way you hoped, you may have to pull the plug on your current business plan and move on to another opportunity.”
Burke considered that while he drank some of his martini.
“What do you know about my current business objective?” he asked.
“I’m aware of the real value of Witherspoon’s estate. But aside from the nice house on Queen Anne, the car and some artwork, the bulk of his fortune has vanished into thin air.” Millicent smiled. “The authorities suspect embezzlement but they’ll never find the money.”
Burke went very still. “Are you going to tell me that you were the one who made it disappear?”
She took another sip of the martini and lowered the glass. “I’m brilliant with money. Just ask Witherspoon. Oh, wait, you can’t because he’s dead, isn’t he? Who knew that he had a secret addiction problem—gambling, to be precise.”
“Thanks to you fiddling with his online accounts?”
“Yes.” She tried to assume an air of modesty but she was fairly sure she did not succeed.
“You set it up so that it would look like Witherspoon was embezzling from his own company to pay his gambling debts.” Burke whistled softly. “You’re good, Miss Chartwell. Impressive.”
“Thank you. But let me assure you that Sprague left a great deal of money behind
, and that money is safe in an offshore account. What’s more, I’m good enough to pull off the same operation a second time.”
Comprehension lit Burke’s eyes. “With Larson Rayner?”
She smiled and munched the olive.
“How?” Burke asked, suddenly intent.
Euphoria zinged through her. The dance of seduction was working. Now the real conversation could take place. She and Burke were two pros talking shop. This was so much more thrilling than seducing a random bar hookup.
“You’d be amazed at the kind of money that starts sloshing around when a successful motivational guru gets real traction,” she said. “And there are so many ways to skim off the extra cash.”
Burke frowned. “You’re saying that Rayner is getting traction?”
“He has been successful all along but now, with Witherspoon out of the picture, he’s set to go into the big time. He’s got the looks and the charisma. All he needs is a little fairy dust from Witherspoon’s secret source. If everything works out, you and I can ride the gravy train until we decide to get off.”
“Who supplies the fairy dust?”
She chuckled. “Grace Elland, of course. She’s the one with the magic touch. She took Witherspoon to the top. There’s no reason to think she can’t perform the same trick again with Larson Rayner. What’s more, Larson knows that. When he offered me a job today, he told me he was also making offers to Grace and Kristy. He wants Witherspoon’s team.”
“But Grace is the one he needs the most. What if she declines the offer?”
“Why would she do that? She needs a job. Larson will pay her double what she earned at Witherspoon and probably include a slice of the pie. She’ll take the offer, believe me.”
Burke swallowed some more of his martini and lounged into the corner of the booth.
She had him now. The one thing a professional con artist could not resist was the prospect of another big score. Running a successful con created a rush unlike any other.
“One question springs to mind,” Burke said. “Why invite me to join you on the new gravy train? What do you want from me?”