Karen Woods

by The Devlin Diaries (Triskelion) [lit]

  Another time, she confronted him, “Do you have a problem with my work?”

  “Not with your work, no.”

  “Fine, then just leave me to it.”

  She doubted she would ever forget his dry laugh, or the way that just being in his company made her nervous and slightly short of breath. She didn’t want to analyze the reasons too closely for her reactions to him.

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  She didn’t even like him, yet her mind was filled with thoughts of being close to him, with growing fantasies about the man.

  The two weeks that he had been gone on Reserve duty had been a godsend, both on a business and personal level. She had gotten a real feel for the company without Jase constantly checking on her. Her father headed a vast and diversified operation with myriad interests in real estate development and civil engineering.

  The phrase ‘right hand man’ fit Jase’s role perfectly. Just seeing the day to day operations with him here and with him gone convinced her that her father was profoundly dependent upon both Jase, as VP operations, and upon Melissa, as VP finance. And it was painfully obvious to her that Harry Devlin knew just how much he leaned on both of them.

  Mary Kate wondered if there would ever be a real place for her in that support structure, or within the family, as far as that went.

  It was clear to her that Harry’s health wasn’t particularly good. Yet, no one had bothered to tell her what it was that was wrong with him. From the diet that Billie had him on, it was probably something to do with his heart or blood pressure. But Mary Kate hadn’t brought up the subject, and neither had anyone else. All that had been said was that Harry was expected to retire within the year, leaving the reins of the company firmly in Jase and Melissa’s capable hands.

  Having found her way into the Devlin corporate computer network, Mary Kate had learned much more about her father’s business, and she was still learning. But her exploratory forays into the system were limited to the time before and after regular office hours, or during her lunch hour. Not the least among her discoveries was that her father’s computer system security was far too lax. Mary Kate was able to easily access information which she should have never been permitted to see, or even to know of its existence. If she had wanted to, it would have been easy to alter the files to reflect anything, including the transfer of large sums of money to herself or to anyone else. And she suspected that any twelve year old hacker who lucked into the system could have done so, as well.

  This whole situation made her nervous. She wondered if this was a test of her honesty. That sounded to her like something Jase would orchestrate. If it was, then she knew someone, probably Jase or his deputy, was monitoring everything she was seeing and doing on the system. If it was, there was a log showing everything at which she had looked. That would not be a difficult thing to do. The only thing she liked less than being monitored was the thought that perhaps her father’s computer security was actually this inadequate.

  Yet before she spoke to her father about this, she wanted to make sure just how bad the system actually was. She needed more time to do that. She was making notes and had the outline of a preliminary report already drafted in her mind. She knew she would have to talk to her father soon, one way or another, about this.

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  Mary Kate’s concentration was on the computer monitor and the figures displayed there as she was preparing a report on the cash flow of one of her father’s less profitable operations. She didn’t hear her father walk up behind her. Instead, she finished editing the report, and issued the commands to place it into the print queue. Only then did she turn around to see him.

  “Mary Kate,” Harry said with a shade of desperation in his voice, “please tell me that you do play golf?” “Yes, Father. I play.” “Good. A member of our foursome is down with the flu. We’re playing at the club with Norman

  Richter, the head of Richter Development.” “How’s the proposed buyout coming? Or should I ask?” “No. You don’t need to ask. It isn’t going well. Norman is resisting the offer. He’s just stubborn

  enough to sit still while his company goes down the tube, rather than lose any degree of control. That’s why we need you with us. I want to soften him up with some low pressure socializing, then zing him with the hard facts. You are a passable golfer?”

  “I’ll probably never do the LPGA circuit, but I won’t embarrass you on the course. I don’t have any clubs of my own, though. Mine burned up in the fire.”

  “Minor problem. Pick up a set of clubs and a new bag at the pro shop out at the club. Pick up a new outfit and shoes, as well. Don’t go cheaply on anything. Norman knows top quality and tends to judge firms and people by possessions. Have everything put on my tab.”

  “When’s the tee time?” “An hour and a half.” “Cutting it close, aren’t you?” “You go on out to the club. Take my car,” he handed her the keys. “I’ve added your name to the family

  membership. Go on out. Talk to the club golf pro. He’s expecting you. Get the lowdown on the course from him. We’ll meet you at the clubhouse in an hour and fifteen minutes.” “Alright,” she said with a sigh. “I’m going. Just make certain that you clear this with Miss Teague. I

  don’t want any problems with her.” Harry smiled. “I still sign Dolores Teague’s paychecks.” “We aren’t expected to lose, are we? As a way of softening up Mr. Richter?” she asked suspiciously.

  “I need to know.” “If you don’t do your best, I’ll be very disappointed in you,” Harry replied. Then he smiled. “You

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  should know that Norman Richter is a scratch golfer. He’ll be difficult to beat.”

  “That’s all I wanted to know. I’ll be going out to the club in a few minutes, then. You said that the family membership covers me?”

  “I called out and added your name. By the way, the tests came back this morning. They were a match. But we knew they would be. Now, you don’t need to have any concerns about being seen in public with us.”

  “I was never concerned about that,” Mary Kate replied.

  “Weren’t you?” Harry demanded.

  “No, I wasn’t. I just wouldn’t have been very good company. There’s something to be said for the old convention of a period of mourning.”

  “I know,” he told her in a gentle voice. “But you need to move on with your life. I know you’ve turned down almost every invitation you’ve received.”

  That was true. Several of her co-workers had invited her to lunch, to dinners, or to parties. But aside from a few lunches, she had turned them down with the same explanation that she had given Keith, that she was in mourning. As far as that went, it was true. She really hadn’t felt much like being in company. The one exception to that had been her growing friendship with Alice.

  “Meet us in the clubhouse bar in an hour and fifteen,” Harry informed her. “And Mary Katherine, charge the clothes and equipment to me, please?”

  Mary Kate was seated at a table in the clubhouse bar, wearing her new golf outfit, and with her new, terribly expensive, clubs in the new bag by her side, when Steve Anderson, in tennis whites, came up to her. She was reviewing a stack of reports, trying to get the figures in her head before this meeting with Norman Richter.

  “Hello, Bonny Kate. Drinking alone at this hour. Shame on you,” Steve teased.

  Mary Kate looked at him for the longest moment, trying to place him. “Why, Mr. Anderson, I almost didn’t recognize you.”

  “Call me, Steve, please.”

  “Okay, ‘Steve, please’.”

  He chuckled. “Can I sit?”

  “That’s between you and your chiropractor. However, if you want permission, well, it’s still a free country. I’m expecting my father in a few minutes, however.”

  Steve Anderson lowered himself gracefully into a chair beside her. “Need a bracer to meet your father?”

  Mary Kate took a sip of her soft drink. “Never. This is tonic and lime. Very refreshing.”

  �
��So, I hear you’re working for your father.”

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  “That’s right.”

  “We haven’t seen much of you. I’ve seen you in passing, at Church, but that’s about it. By the time I’ve gotten around to try to speak to you, you had disappeared. I thought that we would have seen you here long before now,” Steve stated. “I was beginning to wonder if you were just a figment of my imagination.”

  “You frequently conjure women from the depths of your imagination? Funny, I would have thought you would have had enough live companionship to make that completely unnecessary.” She wasn’t going to take this guy seriously. But, it was fun to be with someone who appreciated her as a woman for a change.

  Steve laughed. There were few people in the bar at this hour of the afternoon, yet all eyes turned at Steve’s open laughter. “There isn’t a woman, anywhere, who could hold a candle to you.”

  “Certainly not. I wouldn’t let them. Burns are nasty things.”

  Steve laughed again. “Come on, why the hermit act?”

  “No act. I am a hermit.”

  “Come on. ‘Fess up,” Steve urged.

  “The only confessions I make are to priests,” she replied with a laugh. “Somehow, I don’t think you qualify.”

  Steve shook his head. “That laugh of yours does strange things to me...”

  “Heavens, I wouldn’t want to do that. Doing strange things to lawyers can be hazardous to my financial health.”

  “Only if your intent was malicious... And I don’t think you have a malicious bone in your body.”

  Mary Kate laughed. “Bone, no? Cartilage, sinew, muscle, perhaps.”

  “Why have you really been in hiding?”

  “I haven’t been in hiding. This is just the first chance I’ve had to come out. I’ve been pretty busy.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Settling in. It’s been a challenge to find my feet.”

  “They’re where they’ve always been, at the end of your gorgeous legs,” Steve teased.

  “Why, so they are,” Mary Kate agreed affably with a teasing downward glance.

  “What’s a working woman doing at the club in the middle of the afternoon on a weekday?”

  “What’s an officer of the court doing here during the middle of the afternoon on a weekday?”

  “The judge took ill during the morning’s proceedings. There wasn’t anyone available to cover at such short notice. I couldn’t stand the idea of being cooped up on a gorgeous day like this, so, I’m giving myself some well deserved time off. Say, tomorrow evening, I’ve got time on the tennis court scheduled. My scheduled opponent is down with this summer flu that is going around. Would you take pity on a poor man and

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  play tennis with me?” “What makes you think that I play?” “Don’t you?” “Yes,” she admitted with a smile. “I’ve been known to play a match now and again.” “Alice says that you have a fierce backhand.” “Respectable, at least.” “Then, will you take pity on me?” “What time?” “Six.” “I should be able to get here from the office by then,” she told him, after a moment’s thought. “Loser buys the winner a steak dinner afterwards?” “I hope that your pockets are deep. I’m very hard to beat on a tennis court. And there are few things

  that I like better than a good steak.” “There will be a band here tomorrow night. There could be dancing. You might want to dress in something which will knock my eyes out.” “But they’re very nice eyes,” she teased. “It would be a shame to knock them out.” Then she laughed

  and added in a more serious tone, “Steve, this is a roundabout way of asking for a date.” “Isn’t it, though?” he admitted unabashedly. “Well, anything that works. I’m a pragmatist.” Mary Kate laughed genuinely. “Steve. I just don’t know about you!” “Good. Keep ‘em guessing is my motto.” “Funny. I had thought you would have rather gone by something like, ‘Woman is just woman, but bail

  is a bond’.” Steve laughed loudly. “Why don’t you marry me?” “Why don’t I?” she echoed, deciding to take that comment as a joke. “Possibly because I’ve never

  fancied being part of a harem.” Steve looked at her, suddenly serious, “I wasn’t joking. Will you marry me, Mary Katherine Devlin?” “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were serious.” “I am serious.” “Do you normally propose marriage to women who you don’t know?” His smile lit up his eyes. “Have to. The ones who know me won’t have me.” She rolled her eyes and laughed. “Steve...” “The answer to your question is ‘No’. In fact, I’ve never proposed to anyone, except you.”

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  “Well, I won’t hold you to it,” she offered. “Temporary insanity and all that.”

  “Suppose I told you that I wouldn’t mind?”

  “I think we had better work on being friends first, Steve,” she hedged. She sighed. “Besides, I don’t think I would be at all good for your career.”

  “Wanted for felonies in five states, are you?”

  “No, I’m not,” she said seriously. After a slight hesitation, she continued, “But I was engaged to a man who was convicted of several violations of the RICO Act, as well as embezzlement. He’s now wanted for questioning in the death of my mother. Let’s just say that my past leaves a lot to be desired.”

  “You’re not kidding,” Steve said, his voice quiet and awed, after a long moment in which he searched her face.

  “I never kid about my scarlet past.”

  “RICO? ... That act gets quite a work out in ways that the congress never intended. How did they apply RICCO to your ex?”

  “He was an investment broker. He laundered drug money, lots of it. And he stole from his other clients.”

  Steve whistled through his teeth.

  “Not exactly the type of girl you need to take to a Bar Association function, am I?”

  “Beautiful, honest, witty. I would be proud to have you on my arm, anytime, anywhere,” Steve told her. “The male members of the Bar would be enchanted by you. The female members, jealous of your beauty and wit.”

  “Right,” she replied. “Steve, I jumped into a relationship once, and got burned, very badly. Those scars are permanent. I have no desire to repeat the experience. Why don’t we start by seeing if we can be friends? If it develops into something else, then it does. I’m not completely ruling out the possibility. But I’m not going to rush into anything, and I won’t allow myself to be rushed. Understand?”

  “Friends,” he echoed as if savoring the word. “Yes,” he said as he took her hand and lifted it to his mouth. He lightly kissed her palm. “Does this feel like friendship?”

  Mary Kate blushed brightly as she retrieved her hand from him. “Don’t push me, Steve. It’s been a long time since I’ve let myself think about a relationship with a man.”

  “There’s been no one serious in my life since my wife died five years ago.”

  “I’m sorry, Steve, I didn’t know...Hey, I thought you had never proposed.”

  “Gwen proposed to me,” Steve replied. “She was a real wool burner, that woman. She saw what she wanted and went for it... Sadly enough, that’s what killed her...”

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  Mary Kate took his hand. “Steve...”

  “It’s okay. I’ll tell you about her sometime, when we know each other better.”

  She cleared her throat as she loosed his hand.

  Harry, a man who had to be Norman Richter, and Jase just walked into the room. She hadn’t seen Jase for any length of time since he had returned from Reserve training; a fact for which she was profoundly grateful. But she should have expected that Jase would be included in this golf foursome. Yet, she hadn’t even thought about it. She only hoped that Harry wouldn’t pair her off with him. The last thing she wanted was a shouting match on the fifteenth hole. She thought she could probably bite her tongue for that long, but she knew she wasn’t likely to get through eighteen holes without blowing up at him, not if he continued to act in his same pattern.
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br />   She sighed. “You’ll have to excuse me. Here’s my party. I’ll have to leave you. See you tomorrow. If you still want to play tennis?”

  Steve caught her hand as she rose. “I’ll be looking forward to it, Mary Kate.”

  “Just bring tons of money. I hear steaks here are very expensive,” she replied with mischief in her voice.

  Mary Kate walked up to the three men. “Well, gentlemen, are we walking the course, or cheating by taking carts?”

  Norman Richter smiled and laughed. “Have pity on an old man.”

  “Funny, I don’t see any old men here.”

  Norman turned to Harry. “Harry, your daughter is not only beautiful, she is silver tongued.”

  “At times,” Jase stated amusedly. “But, she has the Devlin disposition. She’s one tough cookie under that sweet exterior.”

  Mary Kate laughed. “Thank you, Jase. I’m extremely proud of that characteristic.”

  He smiled at her broadly. She found herself remembering how she had felt in his arms. She drew a deep breath and forced the remembrance away.

  “Well, gentlemen,” she offered, “it’s almost our tee time.”

  “What did Steve want?” Jase asked as they were riding between the second and third hole.

  “A date.”

  Jase stole a long sideways look at her. Mary Kate saw him looking at her. “Steve’s a friend of mine, a good friend. But I wouldn’t be happy with his dating Missy, and I’m not happy with his dating you. He changes women the way other men change clothes. He’s not anyone you should become involved with. He’ll hurt you if you aren’t careful.”

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  Mary Kate smiled softly. “I’m twenty four years old, Jase. I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself, as you should well know.”

  Jase nodded. “Touche” he said in a pained voice. The silence between them was thick. “I suppose I owe you an apology.”

  “Or ten.”

  “I don’t want to see you with a broken heart, Mary Katherine.”

  “I’d almost think you cared,” she replied bitterly as she looked up at the cart ahead of them in which her father was riding.