“Oh ye of little faith,” Nicholas exclaimed. “Harper, you know you’re the only thing that really matters to me,” Nicholas’s voice was sounding more serious now. “But I’m not losing sight of the fact that Brooks Fitzgerald McKenna’s company is in play along with Peachtree Plastics. The fact remains, if your company or mine loses to either one of them, neither you nor I will be able to go to our parents’ house for holiday dinners for years. We’ll never live it down. I don’t know about you, but I have a reputation here to protect.”
“You do have a point, Nicholas. This whole thing is so confusing to me. Why would Brooks even want to be bothered with this business? I’m not sure of his motives, but I do plan to get to the bottom of what and who is driving what in this whole process,” I said, treading lightly with this dialogue with Nicholas.
Too much talk about Brooks would send Nicholas into the ozone layer. He was insanely jealous of Brooks. Still, I was sure that he knew something about Brooks’ motives that I did not. And let’s face it. The keeper of the information is the keeper of the power. Nicky had information that I did not have. Nicholas had Lucia on his team, and God forbid if that woman ever, ever missed a beat. One might as well be Jonah inside the whale to be a force to contend with Lucia. Lucia was the whale and everyone else was the meal.
“I don’t want to talk about it. Let’s talk about dinner instead,” Nicholas pleaded. “We agreed in Vermont not to mix business with pleasure.”
“As if either of us can remember anything we did or said that morning in Vermont, Nicky. We were toasted,” I shuddered. “Totally wasted.”
“Yes and I loved every minute of our time together, darlin’.”
“Thank you for the cookies, Nicky. You made my day. Can I call you back after my appointments?” I asked, crunching a cookie in his ear. I’ll have a better sense of my schedule later today.”
“Your wish is my command, babe. But if you keep me waiting too long, I’m going go into high gear and whip out my woo-woo card,” Nicholas chided, laughing loudly. “And then I’ll have to get down and dirty.”
“Bye, Nicky. Busy, baby. Gotta run.” I giggled through the phone.
“The genie wants out of the bottle, Harper.”
And just like that Nicholas hung up.
Ummm, the cookies were good, but maybe I had waited too long to eat this afternoon. I was starting to feel queasy.
“Charlotte, tell Winston to bring the car around please,” I said over the intercom. “I don’t want to miss my appointment. Tell the management team that I’m putting the forecasts on the plastics acquisitions in Dropbox for their review. I want mock presentations to begin tomorrow.”
“Got it. I’m one step ahead of you,” Charlotte replied.
“We’re down to the final hours of perfecting our presentation materials. I want a full report in the morning,” I said, clicking off the intercom and taking a moment to catch my breath.
“I have it under control, Harper. I’ll have Winston bring the car around. You have an appointment with Dr. Richards at three and the fertility clinic at four-thirty. Mackenzie Rhodes is on your calendar for two-thirty, and Mr. McKenna has arrived. He’s not on your calendar. He’s walking through the lobby doors now.”
Charlotte escorted Brooks into my office and closed the door quietly behind him. I took one look at him and realized Brooks was not in a good state of mind. If I didn’t know better I would have thought he had been drinking.
“Why the hell haven’t you been returning my calls, Harper?” Brooks snapped at me.
“I’ve been busy, Brooks,” I snapped back, my eyes narrowing.
I hated the fact Brooks had shown up unannounced. That move never sits well with me from a man. I caught a whiff of alcohol on his breath as he moved closer to me.
“Last I checked, I don’t recall having to answer to you. I’m my own woman and I do what I want to do when I want to do it,” I sneered.
“Bitch, I tried to come to your aid, after hearing about you being caught in that bomb threat at your senator Daddy’s little fundraiser,” Brooks said, wobbling on his feet, and looking very reptilian. “You blew me off then and you’ve been blowing me off since. I don’t appreciate you snubbing me. I told you once if I’ve told you twice, you’re gonna be my woman, bitch. You’re gonna belong to me,” he said, stepping closer to me, slurring his words and waving his index finger back and forth at me.
“Bitch? Exactly who do you think you’re talking to? You may as well turn right around now, discontinue this conversation, and come back another time when you’re sober and in your right mind,” I demanded.
“No I’m talking to you, you little bitch. You’re going to hear what I have to say to you now,” Brooks wobbled.
“Now you wait one minute, Brooks Fitzgerald McKenna. I’m not your woman, not now and not ever.”
“Oh yes you are, baby, because I’ve jumped into the little acquisition bidding process game with you and Mr. Sneaky Nicky Picky Licky Becker,” Brooks slurred. “I did it just so I can take that fucking plastics company away from him and you. And when I do, you’re gonna need me for that fucking-ass ketchup company to stay on your momma and senator daddy’s good side. Then I’m gonna give it to you as my wedding present to you, you cute little dick tease,” he slurred, breathing his hot breath in my face and pumping his chest out as if he were a proud peacock.
I turned my head the other direction, repulsed at having Brooks’s alcohol-laced breath being blown in my face.
“Then you’re gonna marry me and we’re going to be Manhattan’s most respected power couple. You got me, bitch?” Brooks said staggering. “I’m even going to knock your little tight ass up.”
“You must be out of your shitty little pea-brain mind, you asshole,” I said, fingering rapidly to push the emergency alarm button under my desk for Malcom.
“And who the hell are those from?” Brooks said staring angrily at the large pink basket of Hello Kitty cookies from Nicholas on my desk.
“None of your business. Get out of my office right now, Brooks. We can talk another time when you’re sober.”
Brooks leaned all the way into my space, grabbing me by my waist. He put his lips on my mouth, kissing me sloppily, pushing his tongue in my mouth, his hot breath smelling like whiskey.
I started pushing him back off me, yelling, “Get off me, you asshole,” just as Brooks began ripping the mother of pearl buttons off my blouse dipping his head low trying to kiss my breasts. He ran his hands up under my skirt, trying to make his way into my panties.
“Get out of here!” I screamed, scratching his arm and digging my nails in his biceps, forcing my legs closed, my feet kicking and flailing.
Brooks wrapped his hand around my hair forcing my lips against his, tugging hard on my panties.
“You know you want some of this,” Brooks said, still attempting to kiss me while rubbing his erection against my leg. I was turning my head from side to side to avoid his touch and fighting to squirm out of his reach. He grabbed my face, squeezing it hard in his attempt to hold me in place while he tried to force his tongue in my mouth.
“Oh I love it when you fight, my little dick tease,” Brooks slobbered.
I screamed loudly calling for help. Malcom burst through my office door. He grabbed Brooks with two hands, pulling him off me, hitting him hard in the jaw one time and then another blow to his midsection. My knees buckled and I fell to the floor forcing myself to crawl to the opposite corner of my office to get out of the way. Tears were streaming down my face.
Brooks bent over, yelling “motherfucker” at Malcom, and swung back at him wildly, staggering all over the office, his nose bleeding. Malcom punched him hard again, several times to the head and the body. I gasped, crawling back against the wall, watching as Brooks swung wildly. The two men fell across my worktable knocking over a couple of glasses and a pitcher of water that was in the center of the table. Glass began to fly everywhere. Nicholas’s cookie basket hit the floor and smas
hed into several pieces. Brooks was no real match or threat to Malcom. Malcom had Brooks’s neck in a chokehold, and was dragging him across the glass-covered floor.
“Malcom! Malcom!” I cried. “Please don’t kill him, he’s just drunk!”
Thank God I yelled at Malcom, because he was in some emotional place I’d never seen him go. I wasn’t quite sure he was going to be able to come back from the kill zone his mind had gone to in at the heat of the moment. Charlotte ran into the room, stepping sideways to avoid the broken glass. She immediately dropped to her knees at my side. She was as pale as a ghost as Malcolm yelled at her.
“Call the police!”
Malcom pulled plastic ties out of his back pocket and locked Brooks’ arms behind his back and cuffed him. Brooks spit in Malcom’s face. Malcom knocked Brooks straight out with his fist.
I watched as Brooks hit the floor with Malcom dragging him across the room and out the door, his white shirt bloodied. Charlotte ran to my desk phone and called 911.
“Are you okay Harper?” Charlotte said, running around in a circle in a state of hysteria.
“I’m fine,” I said, breathing heavily, my heart racing a mile a minute. “Can you bring me a cup of tea or something? Put something strong in it too, Charlotte. I can’t believe this is happening to me,” I said, moving over into my office bathroom to check my appearance and to pull my clothes back together.
Luckily I kept a spare change of clothes in my office. Despite the fact that my hands and knees were shaking, I wanted to be able to make myself presentable for my next appointment. I wanted my sense of normalcy back. I wanted to try to recoup fast and pull myself together. Except when I looked in the mirror to comb my hair back in place, I had large bruises on my arm, my thighs, and another bruise on the side of my face. I willed myself not to lose it.
Brooks Fitzgerald McKenna just brought himself a death wish from Nicky.
Charlotte returned with a spiked tea for me, and one for herself.
“Harper what do you need me to do?” Charlotte said, her voice trembling.
“I think I just need a moment to collect myself,” I said.
I sat down for a minute and drank it to calm myself, grabbing another of one of Nicholas’s Hello Kitty pink cookies, still wrapped in cellophane, off the floor. I munched down on the cookie hard, wondering what I was going to say to Nicholas. He wanted to have dinner with me tonight and now I had to explain these bruises all over me. This was not going to be good. I swallowed hard, holding back more tears. I needed to call Mackenzie. She would know what to do, I thought to myself, feeling totally out of control and flustered.
“Charlotte, can you get Mackenzie on the phone for me please?” I asked, brushing crumbs off the front of my fresh blouse and working hard to steel myself to keep my hands from trembling. I simply refused to lose it.
“Mackenzie,” I whimpered through the phone. “I just need to talk to you right now and hear your voice,” I said, holding back the tears. “Are you busy? Do you have a free moment?”
“Anything for you Harper,” Mackenzie said. “I was just about to call you. I need a raincheck on our two-thirty appointment today. I overbooked.”
I paused, sniffing hard to collect my thoughts.
“What’s wrong Harper? You sound like you’ve been crying. Has that shithead Nicholas upset you again? What’s wrong honey, tell me,” Mackenzie begged.
I took a deep breath so as to calm my words so I wouldn’t sound like a complete babbling idiot.
“Brooks Fitzgerald McKenna just showed up to my office totally drunk. He was hollering, screaming, and calling me a bitch, mad because I had not been returning his calls these last several weeks. He was slurring his words, staggering, and insisting that I was his woman and that we were going to be married,” I said, talking fifty miles an hour, not even pausing to breathe between my sentences.
“Oh my God,” Mackenzie gasped.
“Then he said that he had jumped into this acquisition process with Joduku Plastics because he was going to own the company and that it was going to be my wedding present from him,” I sniffled.
“Has that fool completely lost his mind Harper? I think he’s losing it. Seriously. I heard on the grapevine the other day when I was doing a photo shoot for some big wigs in the garment district that McKenna Textiles was having some financial trouble.”
“You did?”
“Something about McKenna Textiles not being able to make their deliverables timely and that their creditors were all over them for overdue payables,” Mackenzie babbled on.
“Wow. Do you think that was why he was so drunk in the middle of the afternoon? Mackenzie, Brooks was tearing my blouse off. He was trying to force his hands under my skirt. I had to call to get help from Malcom,” I said, exasperated.
“That sorry piece of shit!” Mackenzie shrieked.
“I was so scared. Malcom beat the hell out of him, cuffed him, called the police, and dragged him out of here. I thought Malcom was going to kill him for sure.”
“Jesus, what a mess,” Mackenzie said. “Stupid asshole Brooks Fitzgerald McKenna.”
“Yeah and now I’ve got bruises all over my body and face. I don’t want Nicky to see me like this. He’ll have a fit. It will be a race to see who’s gonna kill Brooks first: Nicholas or Malcom,” I said, shaking my own head now.
“Or me,” Mackenzie said. “I’m going to kill him myself.”
“I’m sure he didn’t mean any of it, Mackenzie. You know Brooks is practically harmless. He wouldn’t hurt a flea. He’s a big overgrown arrogant baby at heart.”
“Girl, don’t even think about giving that slug a pass. Try to play this down with Nicholas if you can.”
“I don’t know what to do.”
“You can either tell Nicky the truth, or avoid him until the bruises clear, which will take some time.”
“Somehow the latter doesn’t feel like the right answer.”
“Or you could slap on some big designer sunglasses, makeup, and hope he won’t notice,” Mackenzie said, thoughtfully weighing out all my options.
“Oh this is so bad. Not to mention McKenna Textiles has made the short list which means I have to see Brooks again.”
“No, bad is that Nicky has to see him again. You’re not exactly the problem,” Mackenzie said.
“What a stupid asinine idea for Brooks to involve himself in these matters for some silly purpose of winning me over. We were never like that, Mackenzie,” I insisted.
“Honey whatever it is that you whip on these men, can you bottle it up and give some of it to me please, because I swear it’s golden. You drive all these guys straight out of their mind right into insanity mode.”
“More like I attract crazy, huh,” I shuffled in my chair, grabbing another cookie. “I’m changing the subject, Mackenzie. How are things with you and Mr. Stephen Parks, “Miss I’ve-Got–a-Secret?” I teased her, looking through my cosmetic bag to find some lipstick and concealer.
“I should have told you earlier but I didn’t know where things were headed between Stephen and me. I hate you had to find out about us that way at the fundraiser. That was such a crazy night with the bomb threat and all.”
“Well the good news was he made sure you were safe.”
“Safe yeah, but he forced me to leave my camera behind when that Russian asshole grabbed my Nikon. It was a good thing I had been uploading my shots all night into my iCloud account. This is business for me. I’m not sure Stephen respects that.”
“Well it was also about your life, Mac. Stephen’s trained to think about those things. You should cut him some slack. So tell me how are things going between you two?”
“I suppose things are moving along for us. It’s hard to say. I’m not ready to bring him around Gill Jr. just yet. I never like to expose my son to a man unless I know the relationship is going to get serious and go somewhere. I don’t want Gill Jr. to experience any more loss than is necessary. So I have Stephen on a long leash right now
.”
“Wow. You and Stephen. This is really going to get interesting. Are you looking to get serious?”
“Stephen’s the kind of guy that is always playing his cards close to his vest. He’s a hard nut to crack. He doesn’t open himself up very easily. Ever since the bomb threat at the fundraiser, he’s been acting like he’s the great protector or something. All macho alpha male,” Mackenzie teased.
“He’s the consummate alpha male,” I said, squinting through my pain, hoping Mackenzie wouldn’t notice it in my voice.
I knew she wanted to kill Brooks.
“Some days I find myself looking over my shoulder wondering if he’s watching me or something. We’re both treading very lightly I think. Taking it one day at a time. I’m not sure where this is all going to go, but I’m going to enjoy the ride for a change and have some fun in the process.”
“Are you suggesting he has stalker tendencies, or is your imagination running away with you again, Mackenzie?”
“Well if he’s a stalker, just remember I’ve got a camera and I see all kinds of things through this lens of mine. He’s the one who should be careful. Maybe I’ll stalk him.”
We both giggled and laughed. I moaned out loud because it hurt my face to laugh. I so needed this moment with Mackenzie to bring me back down to Earth from all the excitement with Brooks.
“So Mackenzie, what shall I do about Nicky and this business with Brooks?” The thought of how Nicky would take this news was weighing heavily in the back of my mind. I knew I had to step into this. Unfortunately I wasn’t going to be able to go over or under this mountain, but through.
“It’s going to be bad either way,” Mackenzie said, her words just confirming my own line of thinking.
“Might as well err on the side of truth, girlfriend. That’s the best advice I can give. But when I see that shithead Brooks Fitzgerald McKenna I’m definitely going to kick him in his balls, Harper.”
Now that’s the Mackenzie I know. Forever loyal.
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