Loved Me Once (Love, Romance and Business) Page 17

  "Here," Maggie said, starting to hand the cat back to the woman who was now standing, breathing hard, just a few feet away in the relatively dim hallway.

  The woman took a deep breath. "Could I impose on you to carry him back into my apartment?" She moved closer, and Maggie could see that her right arm was in a sling.

  "Of course," Maggie told her, holding Tommy Cat in the crook of one arm and scooping up her briefcase in the other.

  "I'm Martha Evans, by the way."

  "Hi," Maggie responded, "I'm Maggie McLaurin."

  The woman said nothing to this, but went ahead. She opened the door at the end of the hall, and then reclosed it behind Maggie, who was now holding Tommy Cat with somewhat more difficulty as he had begun to squirm. They were in another hallway, but this one was definitely more residential, with a sophisticated graduated-hue paint job, a long Oriental runner of unusually pastel coloration, and four dimly glowing chandeliers. There were two doors on the right-hand side of this hall. Martha Evans went past the first to the second, toward the back of the house, which was — Maggie realized — somewhat deeper than the central unit.

  "Here we are," Martha Evans said, opening this second door.

  "Where would you like me to put him down?" Maggie asked her, trying to hang onto the restless cat. "He's really beginning to want me to put him down."

  "If you don't mind, my dear, let's take him into the conservatory. It's just through here. That always distracts him, and you'll be able to reach the door without having to race him."

  By dropping the briefcase and hanging onto Tommy Cat with both hands, Maggie was able to make it through the French door.

  "There," Martha Evans said with satisfaction. "You can let go of him now."

  With relief, Maggie released the irritated cat, who at once validated his person's assessment of what he'd do by going to a perch at the far end that overlooked a tree.

  "I think we can slip away now with no trouble," her hostess said, almost whispering.

  Maggie followed her into what appeared to be the library of the apartment, which was lovely, like a suite in London in which she'd stayed.

  "What a charming place," she said sincerely. "It looks like Colefax and Fowler."

  "How clever of you to notice that. I find the decor quite soothing. Now, Maggie, you must allow me to offer you some tea, or perhaps you'd prefer coffee?"

  "Neither, I'm afraid," Maggie answered regretfully. "I've got someone in my office downstairs waiting on me."

  Her hostess looked puzzled for a moment, then her face cleared. "You work for TTI, next door."

  "As of today," Maggie told her, "so things are hectic."

  "Christmas week is a bad time to be too busy with work. My late husband Braxton always said work lasted through the year, but Christmas came only once."

  Maggie smiled in agreement, edging toward her briefcase. "That's very true, Mrs. Evans, but unfortunately the timing this year is odd. I'm not even going back to Atlanta for Christmas."

  "You're from Georgia? So am I. We must have a chat sometimes about that. Now, let me open doors for you."

  Back downstairs, Jennifer was almost done. Maggie watched her as she began to pack up her equipment bag.

  "Have you thought of anything else you'd like in the way of hardware or software?"

  "How about a Mass Multiples setup? Dual screens, between eighteen and twenty-two inches would be great. And a fax machine? It could go over there on that middle bookcase shelf. And there's no hurry. I'd just like to have it in place by the end of next week."

  "Will do," Jennifer said. "The Mass Multiples monitor setup has to be ordered and may not be here by then. The fax machine I can have in place in a few days."

  Maggie thought she was about to leave, but the tech insisted on standing by while Maggie depowered each device in turn, then repowered and went back online, using the password she'd provided.

  "Everything's fine," Maggie told her, "and I really appreciate your staying. I am on one short deadline to get ready for the TTI status conference next week."

  "I know," Jennifer told her. "Alysha said that Mr. Scott told everyone to drop everything else and do anything you need. It's killer that you're so jammed up right at Christmas."

  "I knew the drill when I signed on," Maggie grinned, "but thanks for the thought. Now, why don't you go home? Just leave all these boxes and we can get rid of them tomorrow. Unlike me, you probably have a life."

  "You don't mean you're going to work tonight?" Jennifer asked pityingly, obviously not of the Rachel mode.

  "What has to be has to be," Maggie grinned. "Thanks again. I really do appreciate it."

  It was only when Jennifer had departed, leaving Maggie standing in the middle of this rather odd space that she was struck by the strangeness of the encounter with Mrs. Evans. She knew that Tom — or at least his foundation — owned three houses in a row, this one, which was the center house, and the house on either side. Mrs. Evans' apartment was definitely in the same house as Alysha Harding's office. So who was Mrs. Evans? Certainly not a caretaker. Her attitude had been very much that of owner-in-residence, which meant, Maggie realized, that Martha Evans was Tom Scott's aunt. Had to be.

  As she sat down at the desk, her phone rang. It was Alysha.

  "There are a couple of things we didn't discuss that you'll need to know, Miss McLaurin. If you're working after hours, that is after 6 p.m., and need anything, Security is the extension you call. Nothing happens here after hours that doesn't go through Security. It's a TTI rule. Do you see that red button on your desk set? If you want food called in, just let them know what you prefer, and they'll arrange it. If you think there may be someone unauthorized in the building, call Security and they'll check it out. They're even in charge of the maintenance crew, so if you need a light changed or something heavy moved, they can help you with that too. If you decide you want to use one of the bedrooms in the Staff House rather than go home, call Security and they'll tell you which ones are available."

  "So you have overnight lodging here?"

  "For staff and visitors, yes," Alysha told her. "There are several small bedrooms on the second and third floors of the third house. Anyone who needs to work off and on through a long schedule or who gets caught here by weather is welcome to stay."

  "Convenient," Maggie remarked.

  "We've tried to think of everything necessary to help the project get off the ground faster," Alysha said, obviously pleased at her recognition. "As to leaving after hours, I don't think I mentioned that, when you're ready to go home at night, let Security know and they'll have a car collect you." "I don't live that far away," Maggie protested. "I can get a cab, or even walk."

  "It's a company rule," Alysha repeated.

  "Understood," Maggie capitulated. "So anything I need from essentially this point forward, I call Security."

  "That's correct. Another thing you should know is that after 10 p.m. all the doors are not only locked by remote control, but also alarmed, including the French doors to the garden at the back of the room you're using. Only Security can dealarm."

  Maggie thanked her again, called Security and asked for a cheese pizza with mushrooms and a Diet Coke. She then tied her thick hair back away from her face, removed her jacket, and settled down to work. The laptop hadn't yet gone to sleep, and it took only a quick click to get into Word. She hadn't planned to work tonight, but this meeting with Tom the next afternoon was too good an opportunity to miss, especially given her recent discovery that no research had been done on the ground, as it were. She clicked happily away, glad to be back at the computer doing something that she understood all too well.

  In what seemed only minutes but in reality was over an hour, her phone rang. It was Security. Her pizza had arrived, and one of their people was on the way to her location to deliver it.

  The guy from Security, who looked early- to mid-twenties, did not even bother to knock. "Hi gorgeous," the newcomer said, setting the pizza on the corner of her des
k. His gaze drifted visibly to her chest.

  Maggie, still startled, frowned slightly. "How much is the pizza? Do I owe you anything?"

  "No, but if you did, I know how I'd take it," he said, still looking pointedly at her chest.

  "Really?" Maggie said, as frostily as possible.

  "That's a nice pair of puppies you've got there. Ever consider having them trained by someone who knows how?"

  "What?" Maggie asked, thinking she must have heard him wrong. He looked so straightforward and businesslike, except for the continuing, highly inappropriate direction of his gaze.

  "You've been around the block a couple of times, cutie. You know what I mean," he snickered, "And just think of the benefits. A well-trained puppy knows when to heel and when to snap to attention," the idiot continued, getting in deeper every second . "And how to take correction," he added with a wink. "When they need it, and I'm the one who knows . . . "

  Maggie looked at him appraisingly. He was wearing a name tag. "Well, Josh, I'm curious. Is this how you greet all new employees?"

  "When they've got a rack like yours," he smirked. "What's your job anyway? Are you another techie?"

  Maggie looked around. The array of boxes still stacked around the floor, with packing materials half in and half out, did make it look as if she were there working on the equipment. She ignored this question and went back to his original offer.

  "Do you have any references? Have you trained anyone else here?" She was trying to decide if he were getting fresh just with her or this were some kind of pattern that required managerial action.

  He looked at her as if to determine whether she was making fun of him, then decided to risk it. "Well, one or two, but I can't put out any names. Let's just say there are some happy hooters in the building."

  "I can imagine," Maggie said coolly. "Are there any other advantages to this training?"

  "Let's just say you get your office requests handled faster. Just about everything around here goes through Security, so how about it? Want to undo some buttons and a couple of hooks and let me see what we have to work with?"

  "I can see," Maggie said, "how a closer relationship with you could be useful to a woman willing to accept your generous offer, but it isn't right for me, Josh. In fact, I'd appreciate your not mentioning this again."

  "If you change your mind, gorgeous, let me know. And you can email me here, and if I don't hear from you by next week, I'll be back in touch with an offer you may not like as much. 'Course, sometimes, the training is better when the trainee isn't enthusiastic, at least better for me."

  He smirked and laid his card on the corner of her desk. "That's got my extension here. And my email address is titmanone@freecomet.com." He wrote the email address on the face of the card. "I'll do house calls by the way, for serious work. For those, I can furnish not just the clamps and weights but the tit harness, collar, and leash. As for the gag," he paused, obviously trying to make a decision about something. "As for the gag," he continued, "I normally ask the girl to furnish her own, but to train those pups, I'll bring a ball gag, new, just for you."

  "That's obliging of you, Josh," Maggie said. "But I've already told you that I'm not interested."

  "They never are at first," he grinned, "but you'd be surprised how quickly that changes. One girl here, all I have to do is to walk into her office and her nips get hard. Luckily, she's got that nice supply closet right behind her desk for emergency work."

  As soon as he was out the door, Maggie knew she now had something else to contend with, something better considered at home. She put on her blazer and topcoat, detached the laptop from the cabling, collected the network access information Jennifer had left, and hit the button for Security on the desk set.

  "Hi, someone there just delivered a pizza to me. That's right, the room at the back by the garden. Well, I've received a text calling me home. If anyone there would like the pizza, you're welcome to it."

  Her departure explained, she headed toward the door. If anyone accosted her, wanting to know why she didn't ask Security to get her a car, she could plead forgetting. At the moment, she wasn't in the mood to follow rules that were, at least for her at this point, counterproductive.

  It was cold outside, with evidence of weather that had been and yet more weather to come all around her in the slick sidewalks and the wind that was turning harsher by the hour. She began to walk up the street, to Madison, where she knew she was more likely to get a cab faster. In a way, she felt silly about leaving when she'd really needed to stay and work. Josh was just a kid. At least, he looked like a kid. She could handle him, had handled others like him; and he would be the better for the lesson. If only he hadn't mentioned that he'd done this before. That changed everything.

  Damn it, this situation was tricky. She was on a brand-new job. The business world she had heretofore inhabited was either corporate or corporate consulting, and the behavior that Josh Wells had exhibited would not have been tolerated for five seconds. But she didn't know the drill here. Did Tom have the kind of shop where sexual harassment was laughed at, even tolerated as acceptable as long as the female didn't cry rape? Would a woman reporting such behavior be setting herself up to be considered a bad sport, an hysteric or, worse, a liar with an agenda? That was hard to believe. In any event, totally apart from TTI's mores, there were the legal aspects, for her and for the organization.

  Once at the corner, she got a cab quickly. That was one of the few advantages of the current economic meltdown in the city: cabs were easier to come by. All the way home, she thought about what had happened, personally torn between anger and a strange desire to laugh at that kid and his ridiculous presumption. She thought about her position as a new hire. Reporting this would complicate things, but — after mentally reviewing the encounter — she knew she had no choice. As a manager, new or not and able to handle the harasser herself or not, it was her duty, ethical and legal, to report what the young man himself admitted was serial behavior. Josh Wells had mistaken her for a new clerical employee and probably thought her vulnerable by reason of both the position and the lack of organizational knowledge that went with the newly hired status. He had gotten offensive with her precisely because he thought he could. She had been able to handle him without undue stress on her part precisely because she knew he couldn't. But where did that leave new employees lacking her status or experience? She sighed. Damn, why couldn't anything, just once, be simple?

  The cab had almost reached her building before she realized that at least the peculiar encounter had achieved one thing that nothing else had in the last few days: for several minutes she had completely forgotten about Miles and those intense nights last week that were now beginning to assume an almost dreamlike quality.

  She had an incredible urge to call and tell him what had happened and get his advice about the best way to handle it with the TTI HR people. She'd come to realize in the last year and a half that Miles had good business judgment. In that time, she'd even discussed a couple of nonproprietary issues with him, factoring his input into her decisions, so it would be natural to contact him and see what he thought about this. She had even taken her cell from the briefcase and started to say his name when she suddenly stopped. This was exactly the kind of thing they had fought over. He obviously considered her too naïve to handle herself properly when confronted with a personally ambiguous situation. This was the last issue she could discuss with him, if indeed she could discuss any issue with him. He'd sounded completely indifferent when she'd called him earlier in the day. She dropped the cell back into the case and sighed. She was going to miss Miles even more than she'd thought. It wasn't just that, against her will, she could still feel his hands on her body. He had insidiously inserted himself into her routine, which was in some ways worse.

  The night doorman opened the cab door and held it for her, then held open the door to the lobby of her condo building. "There's a package that the office told me to tell you was delivered upstairs this afternoon."


  "Thanks, Jim."

  Usually she felt good to be returning to the building, safe and secure. Tonight, in the elevator, her head was almost numb with everything that had happened, and she still had a lot of work to do before morning. It was going to be a long night.

  Call The Lawyers, Cue The Politics!

  At 8:30 the next morning, the last full day of work at TTI before the half day on Christmas Eve, Maggie — having decided on her strategy vis-á-vis Josh Wells — was in Alysha Harding's office. Alysha, who was opening mail, looked up in surprise. "You're early. Most people around here don't come in before nine, if then. Anyway, I have a message for you. Mr. Scott texted me earlier. He and Dr. Halbrooks changed their flight plans and left a couple of hours earlier than they'd intended. He wants to know if he can meet with you at two instead of four."

  "Whatever works," Maggie told her. "Do I still come here?"

  "Yes, preferably about ten minutes in advance of the appointment, and I'll take you to him immediately."

  "I appreciate it," Maggie told her. "Look, before I get buried in work, there's something I want to verify. I forgot to ask you yesterday about HR. Who handles employee issues — you know, benefits, EEO, that kind of thing? And do I contact them, or do they contact me?"

  "Everything's administered by PeopleMatters, an HR consulting firm under contract to TTI," Alysha told her. They'll be in touch with you, but if you have questions in the meantime, I put a card and one of their brochures in the Manila envelope with the fax yesterday. Also, it's my understanding that Rachel Inman left the material you requested in a binder on your desk."

  "I appreciate it," Maggie said, turning to leave.

  "And if there's anything else anyone can do . . . " Alysha began.

  "I appreciate it," Maggie repeated.

  Back in her office, Maggie opened the briefcase and withdrew the Manila envelope. The HR brochure was indeed inside, and it was informative as to benefits but skimpy on the legal stuff. Nothing here about commitment to EEO, a fair workplace, a workplace free of harassment, or any of the other legal hedges to which she'd become accustomed in the corporate world. So, was that in itself a clue that prioritization here was completely different? Still, the law was the law, and they had to take that into account somehow. She reread the brochure. Still nothing. She got out the TTI binder that Tom had given her and scanned its table of contents. Nothing here either, only a rather self-congratulatory introduction about the caliber of the people who would be involved in TTI.