Chapter 30
Mark dropped his forehead into his hands. He’d been at his laptop for hours, poring over figures going back a couple of years. It was looking like Gloria and Dick were right. He did suck at business. He rubbed his bleary eyes and his lids scratched like sandpaper.
Bottom line, he was a failure. He’d let down himself, Harrington’s, and now Meri. Way to go, Newman—getting fired the day after you proposed. He couldn’t ask her to marry a man who was unemployed. Couldn’t put her in the position of having to end it, either. He’d at least be man enough to break it off himself.
And—shit—he got up and began to pace the room. What about her father? Like Mark, he was heir to a family business. But unlike Mark, Xavier had built Domaine St. Pierre into an empire. He imagined Papa’s haughty reaction when he found out his son-in-law-to-be had been canned—by his own aunt.
Hands on hips, he gazed down at his laptop. If only he could find a way to make sense out of all this data. Something just didn’t jibe. Head pounding, he went to a kitchen cupboard, found the aspirin, and tossed down a couple pills, dry. Was it his poor business acumen that prevented him from figuring it out, or was something else wrong with the numbers? He sat down, scratched his head, blew out a breath, and went back to work.
Within minutes, he saw it, there, in black and white. His eyes bored into his computer screen as he compared his own hard drive statistics against Dick’s reports on the zip drive, twice—three times. He went for his cell, but it wasn’t where he always tossed it, in the tray by the door with his keys and wallet. He patted his pockets and did a rapid scan of every surface in the living room.
Then he swore a blue streak, remembering. He’d left it on the conference table in Gloria’s office. It must have been under some papers when he rushed out. He dashed to the corner of the room where the old-school landline sat for emergencies like this and realized he didn’t have DeVon’s cell memorized. It was programmed into his cell. Gaaa! He snatched the receiver from its cradle and raced back to his computer to look up the number of the law firm. While the phone rang, his mind raced ahead. He checked his watch: five ’til six. He’d be lucky if DeVon was still there. Would someone please pick up the damn phone? He had to drive to the wine country tonight.
Finally, an office assistant answered and, after another long wait, found DeVon.
“Thank god.”
“You just caught me. I’d like to take a run, burn off some stress, but this rain . . .”
“Hang tight, can you? I’m on my way over.”
The Swedish tall case clock chimed eight times. “Où est-il?” demanded Papa, with a saturnine look at Meri. Where is he?
“Papa, hush,” Savvy intervened.
“I’m sure Mark will be here any minute,” said Char.
They’d eaten all the lovely hors d’oeuvres Jeanne had knocked herself out preparing, and drank God only knew how many glasses of wine.
“He is an hour late. C’est incroyable,” Papa mumbled to himself, then raised his voice. “Bruno!” Instantly, his stony-faced butler appeared from the kitchen. “You will tell Madame Jeanne that we will eat our dinner now.”
“Bien sur.” Bruno nodded curtly and disappeared.
“You all go ahead. I’m not hungry,” said Meri. Feeling her sisters’ concerned eyes on her back, she left the living room, plodded up the stairs to her suite, and shut the door behind her. She lay down on her stomach with her phone nearby. She’d tried reaching Mark, but her call had gone straight to voice mail and he hadn’t returned her text.
There was only one reason Mark would be a no-show for their family supper. He’d met with Rainn today at the flagship store. Now, not only did Mark know about Meri’s sordid past, he also knew she’d committed a lie of omission, after she’d scolded him for lying about being a Harrington. He had promised everything was out in the open now, and it was when it came to him. But not to her. Her full confession planned for later tonight was useless now. Rainn had beat her to it. Now she’d lost her one, true love. And she couldn’t even tell her family why.
She put her face in her pillow. The clock downstairs chimed eight-fifteen, eight-thirty, and nine. And then she lifted her head when she heard a different sound—the discreet electronic tone alerting the household that an approaching vehicle had been sensed on the premises.
She held her breath to listen, to be sure she hadn’t imagined it. There it was again. She got up and ran to the rain-streaked window to see headlights coming down the drive. Did he actually have the nerve to show up for dinner three hours late, without calling?
She must look a wreck, she thought, flying to the mirror to check her face. It resembled the red sphere they used to play dodgeball with back at Lindenwood School for Girls. She splashed cold water on it, straightened her shirt, and went out into the hall to find Char standing outside her own suite.
“Is that him?”
Meri nodded.
“Do you want me to get it?”
“No,” Meri said in a subdued voice. “I’ll see him. Alone.”
“Are you sure?”
Meri nodded and, peering out through swollen eyes, carefully put one foot in front of the other to descend the staircase. Savvy and Papa were waiting in the foyer.
“Merlot.” Papa pointed back toward where she’d just come. “Go back upstairs. I will take care of Mark Newman.”
She stopped, giving him a look.
“Papa,” warned Savvy.
“But, Chérie . . .” said Papa with a step in Meri’s direction, his tone veering from brusque to paternal. “You are très affolée. Too distraught to see anyone at this late hour. Besides, he is not worthy of you. Allow me to deal with him. To tear his limbs from his body one by one and beat him with the bloody stumps—”
“Papa! Out!” commanded Savvy, jerking her head toward the solarium entryway, where she stood waiting, hand on the doorknob.
Meri pulled back the drape an inch to watch Mark exit his car, dash through the rain and up the steps. She dropped the curtain and walked mechanically to the door.
He was dripping wet from his sprint, but it didn’t occur to her to invite him in. Bizarrely, the only thing that went through her mind was, He forgot his trench coat again. One of these days he’s going to catch a really bad cold.
“Sorry I’m so late.”
“You couldn’t have called?”
“I left my phone with your number in it at the office and yes, I could have looked it up, but I was up to my neck in a meeting and then when I realized how late it was I decided I should talk to you about this in person. . . .” He sighed impatiently. “Can’t I just come in?” He angled his shoulders to push by her. She didn’t budge.
He paused, measuring his words. “Meri. A lot has happened since last night.”
“I know.” Her eyes began to fill again as she stepped back.
He scowled. “You do?”
She looked at the floor and nodded.
“Er, can we go in the living room or something?” he asked, leading the way to the room where they’d cuddled at Christmas. If only things could’ve stayed that way forever.
There, he sat down on the edge of a couch facing her, his expression as serious as she’d ever seen it. He leaned forward and clasped his hands between his knees. “Ahem. I don’t know where to start.”
He was breaking up with her. It was plain as the nose on his gorgeous face.
“Mark, I was going to tell you everything later tonight. . . .”
“Tell me what?”
She started. “You talked to Rainn today, didn’t you?”
He brushed that away. “Just hear me out. I got canned today.”
Meri blinked. “Fired?”
“That’s not all. I found out Dick’s been sabotaging me.”
“Dick?”
“Harrington’s chief financial officer. Ever since I became a buyer, he’s been taking every opportunity to tear me down. Last year I introduced a new line called Keltoi, and all indications were that it flopped. Dick used that failure to undermine my business sense with Gloria.
“This year, with our numbers even worse and the economy still not recovered, Gloria was game to let me try again. I wanted you, but when you wouldn’t agree to be marketed under St. Pierre, Gloria stepped in and chose Rainn instead. Rainn’s line bombed too. No surprise there, but Dick blamed me again—even though Rainn was never my choice to begin with.
“My instincts told me that something wasn’t right, so I went back and studied last year’s sales from every possible angle. When I compared the raw data to Dick’s reports, that’s when I realized he’d manipulated Keltoi’s numbers to make it seem like they hadn’t done as well as they actually had.
“Meanwhile, he’s been making himself indispensable to Gloria, worming his way into her personal life, using her for vacations. . . .”
“Wait a minute. What happened to the money from the Keltoi sales?”
“It’s too soon in the investigation to make accusations, but all signs point to old Dick pocketing it.”
“But how could he get away with that? Don’t you keep track of units sold, as well as dollars?”
Mark nodded. “He changed the units report to make it look like there are still pieces there, when there aren’t.”
“That’s horrendous! How long has this been going on?”
He shrugged. “I’ve only just started following the trail. He could have blamed the unit loss on shoplifting or employee theft if he was ever challenged. But he didn’t plan on being around that much longer. He’s been trying to convince Gloria to buy a place in the islands for some time now. Probably thought he’d be safely out of the country by the time he was found out.”
“What did Gloria say? She took you back, didn’t she?”
“I haven’t had time to fill her in. All of this happened just this afternoon. DeVon and I have been going over the ramifications all evening. I lost track of time. That’s why I’m so late. We put things on hold ’til tomorrow morning.”
“I can’t imagine how you must be feeling right now.”
He rubbed the back of his neck. “Pissed off. But relieved, too. My instincts might not be half bad, after all. For people or business.”
He stood. “Where is everybody? I need to apologize to your father for ruining our dinner.”
“No.” Meri raised worried eyes to him. “Not yet. There’s something I need to tell you, too, and it can’t wait one more minute.”
“Why are you getting upset again?” He sat back down, across from her, and took her hands. “Whatever it is, I can handle it.”
“You say that now.”
He frowned with concern.
“I did something I’m ashamed of.”
“What? When?”
“Back when I was in college.”
He huffed. “Who didn’t?”
“I’ve asked myself a million times what motivated me to do such a stupid thing. I think I’ve figured it out, but I’m not sure I’ll be able to make you see.”
“Try me.”
She drew a ragged breath and sat back to put some distance between them, to prepare herself for his reproach. “After we lost Maman and Papa sent us to separate schools, I was so homesick, tossed in with a bunch of strangers who were as lost and lonely as I was. Oh, no one talked about it outright, but you could see it in their eyes. There’s a name for us: throwaway kids. Children who have everything except someone who cares enough to tuck them in at night.”
Telling him this was like slogging through mud up to her knees. But Mark’s kind green eyes—the eyes she’d fallen in love with the first time she’d seen them at the lowly diner—gave her strength.
“The culture at my prep school was rampantly”—there was no better word for it—“promiscuous.” She held her breath and tried to gauge his reaction so far, but his expression was unreadable. She rushed on before she lost her nerve. “Sex was a way to connect, to feel wanted. I slept around. A lot.”
He chuckled softly. “Did you think I was a virgin before I met you? We’ve both had lives. Made mistakes. Plenty of them.”
“We haven’t both made sex tapes.”
To her shock, Mark threw back his head and laughed. “Is that what this is all about? I saw it. Rainn showed it to me the last night we were in L.A.”
Meri’s eyes flew open wide.
“The lighting’s poor, the quality atrocious. Your face was in shadow the whole time.”
Her hand shot to her breast. “You can’t tell it’s me?”
“You didn’t know that?” He looked at her quizzically.
She collapsed into the plump couch cushions.
Mark laughed again. “You never watched it!”
She eyed him askance. “I couldn’t bear to. But wait, are you positive? That film can never humiliate my sisters or Papa?”
He came over and sat by her side, wrapping an arm around her. “Aw, babe. Has that been bothering you all this time?”
She half-laughed, half-sobbed with relief. “I’ve never been so glad not to have tattoos.”
“I’ve always wondered about that. When I met you, I thought for sure you would.”
She sniffed. “Thought about it a lot. Think I was the only Gates student who didn’t have one.”
“My spontaneous girl actually thought about something before going through with it?”
“I couldn’t find anything I liked enough to make it part of me forever. Besides. I’m scared of needles,” she added, honking into the balled-up tissue in her hand.
Mark squeezed her. “I like you without tattoos. It’d be a crime to mar that creamy skin.”
“So there’s no way anyone would know that’s me in that film? I have to be sure.”
“Tall, skinny brunette with a great ass? Could be anyone.”
She rolled her eyes but couldn’t help grinning.
He drew a line along the curve of her jaw with a fingertip, then pulled her close again and murmured, “Got to admit. Over the past few months, you’ve shown me more moves than an acrobat.”
She buried her face in his shoulder. Maybe she wasn’t too far gone. She still had enough grace left to blush.
He lifted her chin and his eyes probed hers. “But I hope I’ve taught you something too: sex doesn’t have to be just a mash-up of body parts. It seems to me we both still have a lot to learn about love. About trust. Maybe we can figure it out together.”
“Now.” He held her at arm’s length. “Are we good?”
Good? She felt like a new person.
“No more guilt?”
She gave him her very best smile.
Mark rubbed his stomach and looked around. “I’m starved. Are there any leftovers?”