For that matter, so was much of what she’d written. John had been right to want her to stop. She wasn’t just telling secrets; she was backing them up several times over. Perhaps because of her connection with Timiny Cove, she found people there who were willing to talk to her. Because of her connection with John, she likewise found people in his circle who opened up. She saw him more clearly than she ever had, and that picture emerged in her book.
Gradually she began to grasp what was in her hands. She had power. For the first time in her life, she had the means to move John in some way, shape, or fashion. It was a daunting realization.
That realization took on even greater meaning in the course of the next few weeks. Summer ended, Labor Day came and went, and business in the city picked up where it had left off. Hillary had dinner with Cutter one night. A week after that, she had lunch with Pam. In both of them she found an air of expectancy. At her prodding, both admitted that it had to do with the company.
One part of her—the part that had loved him for years—wanted to warn John. In her mind’s eye, he stood alone, arrogant and, therefore, defenseless. He had been wrong about the legacy, the beating, and the abortion. He had been wrong about a slew of other things. But he was in for a fall. She felt it in her gut. He was in for a fall, and a part of her still wanted to help him.
She didn’t see how she could warn him. She couldn’t betray Cutter and Pam, after the way they had trusted her. Besides, she hadn’t been in contact with John since the night she had told him off. She thought of calling him now, just to reestablish some sort of contact. But she feared he would hang up on her, and that would hurt.
In truth, she still loved him. She hated him for not loving her back, but she did love him. Her love was insane. Cutter told her so, Pam did, and Arlan did, and she knew they were right. But she couldn’t help what she felt. It was visceral, not rational. She couldn’t turn it off with a snap of her fingers. It was buried deep inside her and had been for twenty-seven long years.
John was part of her. He was the one person who had shaped her more than any other. She had learned that over the past few months. Revenge may have spurred her to write the book, but John was a force behind it in more ways than that. If she had become a dedicated writer over the years, it was to win his praise, far more than to distinguish herself from her family. If she wrote to exorcise her personal frustration, he was at the root of that frustration.
She wished it weren’t so. She wished she didn’t care what happened to him. She wished she hated him more than she loved him. But she didn’t. Whatever his fate, it would touch her.
That was why, when Pam called her on a cloudy Sunday in late September with the news that she and Cutter were meeting with John in the library of the Beacon Hill townhouse the following morning, she asked if she could come.
Chapter 27
FOR YEARS CUTTER HAD IMAGINED setting foot inside the townhouse on Beacon Hill. He had imagined what it would look like, and imagined the sense of triumph he would feel. He hadn’t counted on the sense of disappointment he felt as he followed Christian toward the library. The townhouse looked well kept and attractive. It was traditional in decor, although it had recently been redecorated. It was perfect in the same way as dozens of other houses he’d seen were perfect. It had no distinctive character whatsoever.
He didn’t have time to dwell on the sadness of that, or on how different things might have looked had Eugene lived there. Christian opened the double doors and gestured him in with the aristocratic tip of his head. Feeling a sense of anticipation, Cutter went forward. The moment had been a long, long time in coming.
Pam was sitting on a leather sofa looking beautiful. The sight of her enhanced the anticipation he felt. Brendan was by her side, looking twenty years older than he had when Cutter had seen him last. He immediately went over and offered his hand.
“Good to see you Brendan,” he said quietly, meaning it. “How are you feeling?”
Brendan gave a dubious shrug with one brow, then relented, smiled, and nodded.
“Cutter, do you remember my mother?” Pam asked.
He heard tension in her voice along with excitement, and tried to encourage her with a look before he turned to the other side of the room, where Patricia sat in a wheelchair. He had known she would be there. He had also known what she would look like, since Pam had described her to him more than once. It had been years since he’d seen her himself. She looked older now, but lovely in a fragile sort of way. She also looked extremely nervous and vulnerable, both of which he could understand. She hadn’t been in the townhouse since the day of the accident.
He held out a hand, and, out of gut protectiveness, when she put hers in it, he covered it with his free one. Softly he said, “It’s good to see you again, Mrs. St. George. I’m glad you’re here.”
“I’m not sure I am,” Patricia whispered.
He smiled and gave her hand a gentle squeeze before releasing it to greet the man standing nearby. “It’s a pleasure, Dr. Grossman.”
“Same here.”
Cutter had never met Bob before, but he liked him on sight. Pam said he was good to Patricia, even in love with her. Aside from that, Cutter was grateful for the support Bob had given Pam over the years.
He hoped some of that gratitude showed in his look, because in the next instant anything remotely relating to pleasure or gratitude vanished from his face. With no one else present in the room to divert him, he turned at last to John.
He had seen the man over the years from time to time, but always from a distance and with people between them. The distance now was no more than ten feet, and there were no people between them, just the venerable mahogany desk behind which John sat.
The last time Cutter had looked directly into John’s eyes was on a cold night in December seventeen years before. He had been a miner then, poor, uneducated, feeling hatred and pain. There was no pain now, but the hatred flooded back, and for a split second it was as strong as ever. In that split second Cutter remembered the threats that had kept him from Pam. He remembered the big brick house in Timiny Cove that had been sold, the baby that had been aborted, the five rows of metal studs that had torn up his back.
Then the split second was over, and the hatred was muted by the civility of the setting, the presence of Patricia and Pam, and his own hard-earned dignity.
He didn’t greet John. John didn’t greet him. They stared at each other in silent challenge, until John finally announced, “If you’re done with the social niceties, perhaps we could get on with this. I have a meeting across town at eleven.”
That left them an hour, which was more than enough as far as Cutter was concerned. He nodded, but before he could speak the door opened again and Hillary slipped in. She looked slightly breathless and more than a little frazzled. After a quick glance around, her gaze settled on John.
“What are you doing here?” he asked in a tone that made Cutter hurt for her.
“I wanted to come.”
“This is business.”
“I know.”
“You haven’t any part in it.”
Pam broke in. “I asked her to come. She has a vested interest in all of us.”
John’s features went even more rigid. “Is she taking notes?”
“No,” Hillary answered for herself. “I’m here as a friend.”
“Whose friend?”
“Yours.”
“And Pam’s, and his.” He jutted his chin toward Cutter. “I sense a confrontation here, Hillary. Better decide whose side you’re on.”
Again Pam spoke, less patiently this time. “There’s no need to take sides.” She glanced at her watch. “Since we have limited time, I think we should start.”
John sat back in his chair and leveled Cutter an icy stare. “I assume you’re here because you own company stock. That’s the only reason I’d allow you in my home. Do you understand that?”
“It is not your home,” came Patricia’s frail voice, drawing every
eye in the room her way. “It’s mine. It was left to me as part of my husband’s estate. You live here because I let you. When I decide that you leave, you leave.”
The swell of triumph in the air was nearly tangible. It came from everyone present but John. Incredibly, he maintained his poise. He didn’t even blink. Ignoring Patricia, he said to Cutter, “If you have something to say, spit it out. I don’t have all day.”
If Cutter had been holding a gun to John’s head—a regular fantasy of his—and John had told him to shoot, he would have done just that. In the absence of a gun, he said in a clear voice, “We’re taking you over.”
John nodded. “Uh-huh.”
“It’s true,” Pam assured him, but Cutter held up a hand to still her before she said more. This was his baby. It had been years in the planning and years in the carrying out. He wanted the pleasure all to himself.
“A while back, I started an investment banking firm. My partners and I have done well. Our client list has quadrupled in the last few years, and in that time, many of those clients have picked up St. George Company common stock. We have enough now to take you over.”
“That’s impossible,” John said. He was still sitting back in his chair with his fingers laced over his middle and would have looked complacent had his knuckles not been white. “You’d need a majority for that, but I can personally account for better than fifty-five percent of the company stock. Forty-five percent is held by the family, another ten percent by close friends.”
“Forty-five percent may be held by family,” Cutter informed him, “but thirty of that forty-five percent agree with this takeover.”
John’s reaction was subtle. Cutter had to hand it to the man; his self-control was like iron. Other than the faint paling of his skin, there was nothing.
“Thirty percent? How do you figure that?”
“Pam will vote for a change in company leadership. So will Patricia.”
“Patricia doesn’t control her stock,” John replied. “I do.”
“Not for long,” Patricia put in. Her voice was shaky, but her words were clear. “I’ve already asked my lawyer to see about returning control to me.”
Unable to ignore her a second time, John gave a negligent shake of his head. “He won’t succeed. You’ve been in a mental hospital for more than twenty years. No judge is going to suddenly decide that you’re competent.”
Bob Grossman straightened and said more forcefully than Patricia, “She’s competent. I’ll testify to it. She’s been competent for years.”
“Then why has she been hospitalized?”
“Because she chose to live in a defined environment.”
“If that isn’t crazy,” John tossed off, “I don’t know what is.”
Pam had stiffened and was about to come to her mother’s defense when Bob beat her to it. “It’s not crazy. Most people have the need to build walls around themselves. Some do it in the form of a close group of friends, others in the form of a business, others in the form of where they live. No, there’s nothing crazy about Patricia, and believe me, I know what crazy is.”
“That’s right. You’re a psychiatrist. You’ve been treating her all these years, yet you claim she’s competent. Quite frankly, that sounds like fraud.”
Bob was unfazed. “The majority of people in therapy are competent. One has little to do with the other. And as for Patricia, she’ll be leaving the hospital soon. We’re getting married.”
Cutter hadn’t known that. He was happy for Patricia, and glancing at Pam, he read the same on her face. John, too, looked pleased, but in an ugly way.
“Ahhh,” he said. “Now it makes sense. You were taken with the woman, so you kept her at the hospital all this time. You accepted the hefty fees she paid for room and board, and the even heftier fees she paid for your services. Suddenly, when you sense fresh money in the pot, you say that she’s competent, that she should be discharged, that she can marry you. I’d think the medical board would like to hear this story.”
Pam flew to her feet. “Oh no you don’t, no-oo you don’t. You’ve pulled that trick one too many times. Threatening to blackmail Bob won’t work. He hasn’t done a thing wrong.”
“He took advantage of a helpless woman who depended on him.”
“I’m not helpless,” Patricia said in a huff. “I let myself be helpless when I was younger. That was when you took advantage of me. Bob has never done that.”
“I’m aware of the ethical considerations here, Mr. St. George,” Bob said. “At no time during Patricia’s stay at my hospital have I taken advantage of her. I haven’t touched her physically. She pays the same fees as every other patient. And she has been seeing another therapist, not me, for a year now. Besides, when we get married, we’ll be living in my house, a house that I bought twelve years ago and have been paying off ever since. I won’t take her money. I’ve already told her that, and I’ll be putting it in writing—at my insistence, not hers.” He took a quick breath. “Sorry, chum, but you’re barking up the wrong tree.”
“I’m not your chum,” John ground out.
“Thank God for it,” was Bob’s response, and for a minute there was utter silence.
Cutter ended it by clearing his throat. “I’d suggest we move on.” He waited only until Pam was seated before saying to John, “You’re outvoted. Pam favors a change, Patricia favors a change, I favor a change, and so do my clients.”
John’s voice came more sharply. “Your clients only know what you feed them. If they took the time to read the company reports—”
“They’ve taken the time—”
“—they’d see that the business is thriving under my leadership. There’s no cause for a change.”
“They feel there is.”
“Only because you tell them that.”
Cutter shrugged. He was feeling pretty good, pretty confident, pretty satisfied with the way things were going. John was starting to worry. He was starting to look a little pinched around the mouth. His hands weren’t linked anymore, and he was sitting straighter.
“I made Facets,” he said in a commanding voice. “Those stores are mine. Neither you nor anyone else in this room is going to take them away from me.”
Cutter turned first toward Pam and Brendan, then Patricia and Bob. When he caught sight of Hillary, who was pressed back against one of the library doors with her arms wrapped around her middle, staring at John, he felt a moment’s compassion. At the same time, he wanted to shake her into realizing that what was happening was for the best. He couldn’t believe that she still loved the man—couldn’t believe that she’d ever loved him.
Slowly he turned back to John. “It seems,” he said in a quiet and dignified tone that, given his modest beginnings, mocked John, “that you won’t have much choice. We have the votes.” He reached into his blazer and pulled a thick envelope from its inner pocket. “I have the proxies necessary should we decide to call an emergency meeting of the board.”
“You’re not calling a meeting of my board.”
“It’s my board, too,” Cutter took pleasure in reminding him. “I’m a stockholder.”
“An insignificant one.”
“Alone, perhaps. But I’m not alone. I have all these other people just dying to get you booted out.”
“You’ve brainwashed them.”
“I didn’t have to do anything as drastic as that.” As business associates of Cutter’s, they were more than ready to follow his lead.
“You have no legitimate reason to have me removed.”
“Do I need one?”
John came to his feet then and set his shoulders back. “You sure as hell do. I made this company. My record is impeccable. Our profits have grown every year. The stockholders have received healthy dividends.”
“That’s not the point,” Cutter replied calmly. “The point is that you serve at the will of the board of directors, which serves at the will of the general stockholding population.”
“The board is on my
side.”
“Maybe the old board. The new board won’t be.” He waved the envelope that was still in his hand. “I have a proposed slate of officers here. It’s an interesting group. I think they’ll want their own man as head of the company.” No longer pale but slightly red-faced now, John looked as though steam were building inside him. “And that man is you?”
“Me? God, no. I have my own business. I don’t want to be head of the St. George Company. But I do have some people in mind for the job. All of them have experience with international corporations.”
“None of them are part of this family. My father conceived of the St. George Company as a family business.”
“Your father,” Cutter spat back, losing it for a minute, “would have kicked you out long ago if he’d known all you did to Pam and Patricia. And to me.” He took a steadying breath. “You don’t have to worry that the company will go to pot. It’ll thrive, even expand.”
“It’s my company.”
“You’ll certainly still own your stock—”
“I am the company.”
“Not for much longer. As I started to say before,” he held up the proxies one last time before slipping them back into his pocket, “we can either call an emergency meeting or wait for the annual meeting in November. If you resign now—”
“I’m not resigning!” John bellowed, sounding so much like Eugene that Cutter had a moment’s pause, but only a moment’s. That fiery temperament was about all the two men shared. Remembering Eugene, remembering how much heart and soul the man had, how much he would have wanted for Patricia and Pam that they hadn’t had, Cutter was hardened.
“You have a choice,” he told John coolly, curtly. He was finished with toying. It was time for the belt with the five rows of metal studs. “You can resign now, in which case an acting president will be chosen until the annual meeting. Or you can fight us. If you decide to do that, we’ll call an emergency meeting and push things through sooner. We have enough votes, John. More than enough votes. You don’t have a chance of winning. It’s just a question of how hard you fall.” He barely paused for a breath before hauling back and swinging the belt again. “If you fight us, we’ll get dirty. You’ll go down anyway, but we’ll bad-mouth you all the way. On the other hand, if you submit your resignation and get out of the picture, we’ll be quiet. You can pack up your things and take your expertise somewhere else. You’ll get a job in a minute. They’ll fight over you, and the only explanation you’ll have to give for leaving the St. George Company is that you wanted a change. Or you can sell your interest in St. George and start a new business. Or you can retire. You can move down south or out west. In any case, you’ll have your reputation intact. If you resign. Within the week.”
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