Diana turned to see a pretty red-headed woman with a belligerent expression on her face glaring across the short distance between the small lobby and that left-hand hallway. Diana had barely registered the familiarity of the redhead when she heard Tisha Olivares-King suck in a deep breath of outrage.
“Don’t you dare interfere with this!” Tisha snarled at the red head.
The red-headed woman—Skye Kincaid—put her hands on her hips and snarled right back at Ms. Olivares-King. “The poor woman is here on business, Tisha. Business! I know you don’t know anything about business other than how to spend the proceeds, but it might behoove you to let your sons conduct the day-to-day running of this company so that they can keep funding your designer-spending habits. Don’t you think?”
The shriek of outrage coming out of Tisha’s mouth actually made Diana’s eardrums crackle. Candace cringed as well, but Diana could have sworn she saw a flash of admiration on Candace’s countenance. Not that Diana could blame the receptionist for that. Diana had known the Kings her whole life and she had never heard anyone stand up to Tisha like this before. Never!
“Come on then, Diana Appleton.” Skye marched across the lobby and grabbed Diana by the hand. Bending down, Skye swept the attaché case off the ground and then thrust Diana’s cell phone at her. “Let’s go. I think Edward will have a few minutes to chat with you before his next appointment.”
“Thank you?” Diana didn’t actually know what to say. She was practically frozen inside from fear of what Ms. Olivares-King was going to do next. “But if Edward is busy I can arrange to meet him some other time.”
“He was staring blankly at his computer screen like five seconds ago,” Skye informed Diana. “Of course, that was while he was waiting for his mother to vacate the office, but still. I’m pretty sure he can spare the time.”
“Skye, you need to watch yourself!” Tisha called after them. “You are not bulletproof. You know that?”
“I know!” Skye called over her shoulder. “And days like this I wish I had just let Tex Johnson strangle you to death with his bare hands!”
Diana was absolutely floored. She swallowed and licked her lips as she struggled to come up with something appropriate to say as they quickly walked down the hallway toward the big corporate offices at King Security Solutions, Inc. Diana had never actually been up here. She had only ever visited Edward in his office down on the accounting and finance floor.
“I’m sorry I was so rude to you yesterday.”
Wait. Had Skye just said that to Diana? Diana felt strangely guilty. She struggled to find her words. “I’m the one who should be apologizing to you. It’s obvious to me now that you know what the King brothers have to deal with in their home life.”
“Possibly,” Skye agreed. “But I haven’t known them as long as you have and there’s a certain advantage to having shared history. I’m a rather new player on the scene. It pisses Tisha off because she just doesn’t have any leverage over me and Jason right now.” Skye’s expression darkened. “I’m sure that will change. It always does, you know?”
It was a rather extraordinary bit of insight for a woman who seemed so young. Perhaps her rough background gave her insight into people that Diana hadn’t really accounted for when she had done her snap judgment in the coffee shop. That meant Diana had been even more unfair than she had first thought.
“I appreciate your help,” Diana told Skye. There. That was at least heading in the right direction.
“Don’t thank me yet,” Skye retorted. “I have no idea how Edward is going to react when he sees you. He was kind of hard to read this morning when I told him I’d run into you yesterday morning.”
Diana almost swallowed her tongue. “You told him about that?”
“Of course!” Skye turned and frowned as though she could not believe that Diana would have thought otherwise. “You should never keep secrets or think that things won’t come out in public. They always do. It’s best to be as transparent as possible otherwise someone will use your secrets against you the first chance they get.”
“Wow,” Diana whispered. “Okay. You’re a lot braver than I am.”
“Not braver.” Skye sounded grim as they turned into an open office door. “Just a little more well-versed in all of the shit that people can do to you while your back is turned.”
Before Diana could even speak to that sentence she found herself standing in a huge office that looked as though it had been recently emptied of about half the contents. The desk was there. The bookshelves were empty. Boxes and boxes of books sat in a corner of the room and the overstuffed leather furniture had been covered and was piled with the boxes as though it were waiting for removal. There were two very plain wood slat chairs sitting in front of the desk where Edward King had his head bent low over a ledger.
“Hey Edward,” Skye said cheerfully. “Look who I rescued from a full assault by your mother. The poor woman was standing out in the lobby and I honestly think Tisha was trying to rub her face into the carpet. It was all very dramatic—per Tisha’s usual methods.”
Diana felt her face flame red hot. She had the unfortunate complexion of a true blonde with its horrible tendency to turn red at the drop of a hat and skin that sunburned the second she stepped out of the shade. Strangely enough, Diana felt ridiculous standing next to Skye Kincaid. The red-headed woman was bouncy and confident and athletic. Diana was studious, pale, quiet, and pretty much afraid that everyone on the planet was judging her lacking. It wasn’t a great feeling.
“Diana,” Edward said as he looked up from his ledger. Then he glanced at Skye. “I’m sorry, did you say that my mother was assaulting her?”
“Yep. Totally.” Skye nodded emphatically and then pointed at the door. “I was on my way to meet Jason. So I’ll just head on out and let the two of you chat. I believe Ms. Appleton has some business issues she needs to discuss with you.”
And with those final bubbly words Skye bounced right out of Edward’s office and let the door slam closed behind her. Diana turned to Edward and tried not to give into her dry-mouthed, tongue-tied desire to stare. It was a pretty futile attempt.
Chapter Four
Edward wondered if he looked as dumbstruck and stupid as he felt right now. Diana Appleton was standing in his office with a completely blank expression on her face, and Edward would not have blamed her if she had started picking up books from the box in the corner and lobbing them at him in retaliation for what his mother had done to her only a few moments before. Assault? Edward could only imagine what Tisha had been up to out there in the lobby. For whatever reason, Tisha had hated Diana from the beginning. There had been absolutely no reason for it. Diana was probably one of the most even-tempered and nicest women that Edward had ever met.
“First of all,” Edward finally managed to begin. “I want to say that I am so very sorry for whatever ridiculousness took place in the lobby of our corporate offices.”
Diana’s blue eyes widened briefly. Then a tiny smile kicked up the corner of her full lips. “Well, that is certainly a very politically correct way to respond, Mr. King. Thank you. I appreciate and accept your apology for behavior you have absolutely no control over.”
Edward tried not to be bowled over and distracted by the way she looked. Diana had a quiet and classic beauty that had always appealed to Edward. He didn’t like flashy or overdone. He didn’t like bold women. Someone like Skye with her brash and forthright manner would have driven him nuts. Edward admired not only Diana’s tall willowy frame, he found her pale blonde hair, porcelain skin, and fine delicate features attractive as well. She was currently dressed in flattering black slacks, half boots with a low heel, and a pale green blouse that truly accentuated her very feminine presence. Her blonde hair was swept up into an elegant chignon and tiny pearls decorated her earlobes. This was a classy woman. Perhaps that was why Tisha disliked her so very much. Tisha was never truly elegant. She could have probably starred in a reality show called Housewives of Dall
as if there had been such a thing.
“You look fabulous,” Edward told Diana suddenly.
One elegant golden brow lifted in surprise. “Thank you. I would say that you look good as well, but honestly you look rather tired and I might describe the look you’re sporting as rumpled.”
“Yes, that would fit I think.” Edward stood up suddenly. He had been sitting there and poor Diana had been standing. He gestured to one of the wooden ladderback chairs. “Please feel free to sit. I’m sorry the chairs aren’t more comfortable, but this office is only on loan.”
Diana perched on the edge of a chair. “Yes. I was wondering. I went to your other office downstairs but was told you had moved up here.”
“It’s temporary.” Edward almost kept talking. He almost kept saying that the reason it was temporary was because his brothers were taking over the company and he would be leaving to seek employment elsewhere. But that wasn’t common knowledge yet so he cleared his throat and tried to come up with something else. “We’ve had some very interesting developments around the company and I’m simply using the space to try to unravel the mystery.”
“Mystery.” She looked as though she was dying to say more. “Your family has been in the news a lot lately.”
“Yes.” Edward grinned. He could not help it. “My soon to be sister-in-law told me that you got quite upset in the coffee shop on behalf of our family.”
“Oh!” Her cheeks turned pink and she looked at her lap as though she were struggling to decide what to say. It was quite fetching actually. “I suppose I could be accused of jumping to conclusions. The newspaper told such a horrible story. They call her dumpster baby. Did you know?”
“Yes.” Edward sighed. Sometimes he could absolutely understand why Skye wanted to throttle her former Dallas Star editor. “That’s an exaggerated version of the truth. In reality, Skye should be commended for bringing herself up from a very rough start to life.”
“So she was found in a dumpster?” Diana leaned forward in her chair, her fingers clenched around the attaché case in her lap. “How horrible!”
“No. Her biological mother released her to a fire station. I believe she was left on their doorstep. That’s considered a safe place to relinquish custody of a child. No questions asked. After that she was placed in a group home and that is where she stayed until emancipation at seventeen.” Sometimes Edward could barely wrap his mind around the facts surrounding Skye’s life. “Can you imagine being on your own at seventeen with absolutely no help from a parent source?”
“No.” Diana bit her lip. Her gaze shifted down and to the right. Somehow it felt as though this conversation made her very uncomfortable and Edward reminded himself that her home situation hadn’t been that great. “Even though my parents weren’t the most supportive people ever, I did have financial help from them.”
Edward pursed his lips. He needed to ask her why she was here and just get on with it. Perhaps he was too cowardly to admit that he was afraid she would just get up and leave once she had stated her business and then he might not ever see her again. So he cleared his throat and went ahead and jumped into the conversational minefield. “I was sorry to hear about your parents passing this last spring. I’m sure that was a very difficult time for you. I cannot imagine shouldering that responsibility on my own with no siblings to rely on.”
Diana did not answer right away. The silence stretched long and for a moment Edward thought that he might have made things far worse between them than he had ever intended to do. Then she bit her full lower lip and looked up at him. The expression on her face was almost impossible to read. Her blue eyes were filled with pain. It flickered around and around the questions he could not begin to imagine to list.
“I called you,” Diana whispered. “I called you when they died and I have called you since. Why haven’t you answered? Why haven’t you even returned my calls or texts?”
Edward had no answer. He leaned forward in his chair and placed his forearms on the desktop. He wished that he could make her understand fully what he was dealing with here. “I’m sorry, Diana. I am. I never meant to hurt you. It’s hard to explain why I chose not to return your calls. The last several months have been absolutely insane around here because of my father’s hunting accident. His business partner siphoned money out of the payroll department. Our company is teetering on the brink of ruin and I don’t think my mother or my brothers fully understand the extent of it.”
“And that means you can’t pick up the phone?”
She tilted her head and a single strand of hair brushed against her cheek. He longed to reach over and tuck it behind her ear with one finger. He had no doubt that the silky feel of her hair would be worth the folly of touching her.
“It’s more complicated than that.” Edward could not explain more. Not without sucking her into the morass of confusing and conflicting events involving his father’s “hunting accident” and the strange involvement of a man who they had all thought to be his father’s best friend in the world. Edward was still not convinced that his father’s death was really an accident and he knew his brothers were not convinced either. Edward shook his head and tried to refocus on the moment. “You came here for a reason, I’m sure. How can I help you?”
She looked momentarily taken aback. Then she pursed her lips and sighed. “Fine. If that’s the way that you’d like to keep it. I came here to offer you a job.”
“Excuse me?” Edward was almost sure that he had heard her wrong. “What do you mean a job?”
“I need someone with your talents. You speak most of the classical languages fluently including French and Italian. We have a growing number of our domestic investors that want to invest in business ventures in places like Italy and France. You speak Spanish, Italian, and French. The latest investment push is for people to start investing in real estate overseas. Italy and France are popular, but there are areas of Colombia and Mexico that seem to be equally tempting to investors. They’re buying up real estate and then planning to retire there. It’s really popular right now and I know deep down that you would be the perfect person to help myself and our small company provide good, honest, and solid service to our customers.”
Edward was stunned. He could not imagine the possibilities. Travel to places like France and Italy was a big enough enticement. But what kind of shifter would he be if he did not take the opportunity to run through the forest of Colombia and along the beaches of Mexico? He could imagine himself as a big pale gray wolf playing in the surf in some far-flung exotic location.
And perhaps the most enticing part of that mental image was thinking about being there with Diana. What would it be like to play in the ocean and feel the tide tugging at his fur as he swam while Diana was right beside him with her arms locked around his neck or her fingers scratching all of those itchy spots behind his ears? He could enjoy her company in the moonlight as a wolf and then go home and make love to her in the body of a man who absolutely adored the woman in his bed.
Edward shook his head. His mind was being ridiculous. There was no way that any of that was going to occur. Ever. He had to pull his mind out of the unreal and plant it firmly in the moment. Clearing his throat, he gazed at Diana and wondered exactly how to say this without being rude. “I appreciate you thinking of me.”
“But you’re not interested.” Diana snorted and shook her head. Her body language changed. She put her hands primly in her lap atop her case and her spine was ramrod straight. “Even though you absolutely detest working here with your family, you don’t want to take an opportunity like this. Even though you aren’t planning to stay here at King Security Solutions, you don’t want to work with me. You’re what? Afraid? Too busy doing what your mother wants you to? What’s the excuse this time, Edward?”
“Right now?” he said roughly. He was angry at her, but there was no reason for it. She was absolutely right and maybe that’s what pissed him off the most. “How about I’m trying to figure out where three hundred plu
s thousand dollars went so that our company can bring its payroll accounts up to date. Maybe I’m trying to get our employees paid because it’s the right thing to do. I can’t entertain the notion of doing anything else until that is done.”
“The money was routed where?” Diana was suddenly leaning forward. Her eyes were bright with interest. “The Caymans? Switzerland?”
“Virgin Islands.”
Diana’s brow furrowed. “Someone routed the money to the Virgin Islands? Why? That’s not a good place to hide anything. The IRS has too much of a presence in that industry now.”
“Yes. Which makes me think that someone wasn’t actually trying to reroute the money to hide it. They were just trying to muck things up.” Edward gestured to the ledgers. “At the moment I’m auditing the transfers because what happened is that each transfer happened as though it was a regular payroll transaction.”
“So they just changed the source account?”
“Yes.”
Diana’s eyebrows shot up. “That’s actually quite clever from an accounting perspective. Because your standard accounting audits wouldn’t catch it. The books would actually match. The only thing missing would be the correct direct deposit source accounts.”
“Right.” Edward offered her a wry chuckle and ran his fingers restlessly through his hair. “Do you know how embarrassing it is to be an internet security solutions company who basically got hacked from the inside and then wound up with their employees’ money getting stolen right out from under their noses?”
“Do you think that’s part of the plan?” She set her case down and stood up to lean over his desktop. She was trying to see the ledgers. He should have stopped her, but it was too much of a relief to have another set of eyes.
Then Edward realized what she’d said. “What do you mean part of the plan? To make us look incompetent at our own business?”
“Yes. It would be a pretty clever way to damage the company if that was your goal,” Diana pointed out. “Have you thought about who would actually have a real reason to want your company reputation ruined?”
Billion Dollar Wolves: Boxset Bks 1-5 Page 27