by Rose, Carol
“Yes.” He said, his voice fainter. “Those layouts—no, over there. They’re ready for print. Good.”
Dropping her head forward and rubbing her aching forehead, Eden waited for him to return to their conversation. She felt more and more each day like a juggler, desperate to keep her lies up in the air.
“Sorry,” Joe said, returning to their conversation.
“No problem.” Outside her open office door, Eden saw Cheryl at her desk, busily preparing reports for the board meeting.
“So you think we ought to put together some ideas for this new Swiss product?” he asked. “Just to be safe?”
“Yes,” she told him. “It doesn’t hurt to be prepared.”
“True. Let me see,” Joe murmured. “I’ll have an hour this afternoon to go over your suggestions and notes. Did you---? Yes, I see you’ve sent me back the preliminary sketches with your notes. That’s good. Well, give me some time and we’ll get something together, to be on the safe side.”
“Great,” Eden’s face felt strained as she forced a smile, hoping it would infuse her voice.
Joe said, “I appreciate your calling me on this. You’re right. Michele—or her evil step-daughter—would have gotten all over my case in the event of a sudden reversal of their decision to cancel the project. I’ll call you tomorrow or the next day and let you know what I think.”
“Wonderful.”
Eden lowered the phone into its cradle.
On an open Payday bar wrapper lying on her desk, a stray peanut remained. Picking it up, she popped the salty treat into her mouth, downing the last of her morning carton of chocolate milk. The dregs tasted chalky on her tongue and she tossed the carton into the trash under her desk.
War might be hell, but this was damned close. At least when you were at war you didn’t have to pretend to work with the enemy. It wasn’t just the stress of the work load that was keeping her wound tight enough to break. It was the lying and more lying.
She’d have thought she’d gotten more accustomed to it by now.
Eden swallowed, her gaze straying to the large sealed envelope that sat in the middle of her desk, front and center. She’d been avoiding even looking at the thing.
The final report from Roberte Bergere. The results of his work on the anti-aging cream.
Gazing at the envelope without opening it, she knew what the report would say. Bergere had delivered his results to her by phone, only sending the report by Fed Ex to confirm his findings.
Lifting the envelope as gingerly as if it held a bomb, Eden drew another breath, deeply inhaling before breaking down and slitting it open. Pulling the papers out, she scanned the words swimming in front of her gaze, a clutch of excitement and culpability holding her breath. She knew it was stupid to feel guilty, but all her efforts hadn’t lifted the emotion that sat on her heart like a boulder.
Making herself read the report, she saw the confirmation. The product was good. Better than they’d hoped. For a scientist of Bergere’s standing, the words used to describe his test results were surprisingly giddy.
“…better than anticipated…revolutionary impact…minimal residual side effects…”
Reading through the letter several times, she sank back against her chair, letting her breath out with a whoosh that didn’t loosen the sensation of tightness in her chest.
This was it. This product had the potential to turn the company’s diminishing revenues around. Bergere’s final report also had the potential—more of a certainty—to swing the board to support her as CEO. They wouldn’t overlook the fact that Michele had been prepared to pull the funding for the miracle product.
Eden pulled out her briefcase and stuffed the thick report inside. Knowing she was alone, she still felt furtive as she shoved the case far back under her desk.
Putting up a hand to again rub the tight spot between her brows, Eden refused to continue arguing with herself about her actions in the past few months.
Everything she’d done had been done for the good of the company and the employees that depended on Michele Cosmetics to pay their credit card bills and put braces on their kids’ teeth. If she hadn’t taken this action, all her years of effort on the company’s behalf would have gone down the drain and hundreds of people would have had to scramble for work.
But wasn’t it really about her own job? Getting what she was due?
Shoving the disturbing thought aside, Eden spared only a minute to assure herself that she deserved the CEO job. Ambition was nothing to be ashamed of in a capitalistic society.
It made no damned difference if her primary motive was selfish. She’d had few choices, none of them good.
The phone on her desk rang.
“Yes,” she said, grabbing another Payday bar from the box under her desk.
“Ms. Merritt.”
It took her a minute to identify the voice. “Yes. Mr. Applegate. I appreciate you returning my call.”
“Well,” the older man said with humor in his voice, “when an executive vice-president of the company that employs me calls me up on the phone….”
“I’m sorry if I’m interrupting your day too much,” Eden said. “How are things on the Michigan side of the lake?”
“Very good,” he responded quickly, “except for the problems we union folk are having getting a decent contract offer from the company.”
“Yes,” she said, “that’s what I’m calling about.”
“You are?” he said, sounding surprised.
Eden knew he’d was wondering what could be motivating her to step outside the usual channels of labor-management negotiations. “Yes, I am. I realize the slumping economy has hit the rank-and-file pretty badly and I’m concerned that we find a way to keep the bottom line good for the company while taking care of our people.”
Stressing the last two words a little, Eden hoped Tom Applegate would pick up the delicate message she was trying to convey.
“That’s our desire as well,” he said promptly. “We know Michele Cosmetics has to make money if we’re going to keep our jobs.”
Smiling with a genuine flash of amusement at Applegate’s skillful return, she replied as she knew he intended her to. “And I’m very aware that we need you at the plant there if the company has a prayer of continuing to make money.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” he replied. His satisfaction at her affirmation was conveyed in his tone.
“Well, I won’t keep you any longer from your work,” Eden said. “I just wanted to call and let you know how much your efforts are appreciated.”
“Very kind of you,” he said. “Your concern is also greatly appreciated.”
Eden hung up the phone gently after a few more exchanged pleasantries. The few interactions she’d had with Tom Applegate had given her a good opinion of the union representative. No matter what happened at the board meeting, she needed a clear, open communication with the workers.
Sorting through the pile of papers at her elbow, she located the latest sales figures on the Passions products and became engrossed in the report.
It wasn’t until she’d been hearing their voices for several minutes that she looked up from her work to see Michele standing next to Cheryl’s desk.
“…you just look so pretty today!” Michele trilled. “I was walking by on my way out to a doctor’s appointment when I caught a glance at the new way your doing your hair. Charming!”
Cheryl laughed, a self-conscious note in her voice. “Thank you. I’ve had it permed for so long this is a kind of extreme difference….”
“Nonsense. You were made for a page boy hair style!”
“I was afraid it’s kind of ‘young’ on me,” Cheryl confided.
“Now don’t be silly! You’re still a child!”
“I have a daughter in college,” Cheryl protested.
“That doesn�
�t mean anything,” Michele said, waving her hand dismissively. “The only age that matters is the age of our minds. Why I’m feeling so young these days, I’m thinking about wearing my hair in a ponytail!”
The immediate look of consternation in Cheryl’s eyes was quickly banished.
“I feel so young and alive—much younger than I used to feel—that its silly to even go see the doctor,” Michele pronounced, laughing, “but Carl insisted. I told him it was nothing but heartburn after a spicy dinner of Indian food, but he worries so.”
“You’ve been having chest pain?” Eden asked. She’d come to stand in the doorway looking at her former mentor with concern. The woman might have lost her mind, but Eden couldn’t forget her earlier kindness.
“Oh! Hello, Eden. It’s nothing! Really. Nothing,” Michele’s smile betrayed no worry. “Carl’s just so sweet to me. He’s taking me to his own cardiologist. He says that having found me at last, he’s not about to lose me! The darling!”
Eden could have found several other descriptive terms for Michele’s boyfriend, but she said only, “I’m glad you’re getting checked out. The incidence of heart problems among women is now almost as common as in men. You can’t be too careful.”
“I’m fine,” Michele said again, turning to leave. “But I must run. Carl will be waiting! Goodbye my worker bees!”
With this, she disappeared around the corner and down the hall.
“Okay,” Cheryl said, “I like that woman, despite her recent behavior, and I’m voting for her not having heart problems, but I’m no one’s ‘worker bee’!”
Eden laughed. “No disagreement here.”
Cheryl sat back down at her desk. “Maybe I should see a cardiologist. A small heart attack might at least get me out of having to compile these board reports.”
“There have to be simpler ways to avoid an unpleasant job. Quitting, for instance, or running off to Jamaica. Or both,” Eden told her, heading back to her own office.
She sat down again at her desk, the open sales report in front of her.
How easy it was to recommend the cut-and-run to Cheryl. Why didn’t it seem as if she had the same option?
She didn’t. It was a simple as that. There’d been too many months and years of investment, too much of herself on this particular line. There were things she’d had to prove to herself, and maybe to her family, as pitiful as that sounded. How did she give up on something she’d made her life work?
***
“So,” Alex said, grinning at his sister, “you have a date with Bryan.”
The sound of snow pelting the windows made a steady background.
Lauren looked up at him from the vegetables she was chopping. “Give me a break. We’re meeting for lunch next Wednesday. It’s not any big deal.”
“You lie,” he said, “and you’re blushing. I thought you’d gotten over that.”
“I’m cooking,” she said with mock irritation. “You get a little flushed when you’re hanging over a stove.”
“Then I ought to recommend Bryan to suggest you two take a culinary class together. I think he’d like to get you ‘flushed’.”
“Good grief,” she said in exasperated tones. “You’re just as bad as you were in junior high.”
“Yes,” Alex agreed with satisfaction. “I may have gotten older, but I pride myself on retaining my youthful goofiness.”
“No danger there,” Lauren said dryly.
“Bryan’s a decent guy,” Alex said more seriously, “but in a pinch I’d always choose you over him.”
She smiled. “Good to know. Now I can date him, marry him and hold his job over his head without any danger of him standing up to me.”
“You never have to worry about that,” Alex said. “The guy is a lawyer. They generally don’t stay unemployed for long.”
“True,” she said laughing. “So, let’s talk about your love life.”
Alex met the glance she threw him. “Okay.”
“Are you still dating Eden Whatshername?”
“Yes,” he confirmed, nodding.
“And still…interested?”
“Why would I still be seeing her if I wasn’t interested?”
“I don’t know.” Lauren stirred the soup she was making. “I guess I’m asking how interested you are.”
“Very,” he said slowly. “Very interested.”
He couldn’t help worrying about Eden. She seemed more distressed—worried and shut off, somehow. He knew the looming board meeting occupied most of her thoughts. After the showdown, the pressure would ease up. But he hated it for her.
“Really?” Lauren turned away from the stove to look at him. “That’s great. So you’re bringing her to Thanksgiving dinner next Thursday?”
“I don’t know,” Alex said, getting up and wandering over to stand next to her. He picked up a carrot and took a bite. “Eden’s not big on holidays. Bad family experiences.”
“That’s too bad,” his sister said sympathetically.
“Yeah.” He turned to lean against the counter where she continued chopping vegetables to add to her soup.
Lauren looked at him. “This is…different for you. Really serious.”
“Yes,” he admitted, taking another bite of the carrot stick he’d swiped. “I met her because of a business deal I’m working on—the cosmetics company I told you about.”
“Michele Cosmetics. I remember.”
“It’s all very much still behind the scenes,” he told her. “We’re planning on laying a proposal before the board at an up-coming meeting.
His sister nodded, still chopping.
“The trouble is…I started this thing as business-as-usual and it has…taken a turn.”
Lauren glanced at him, waiting for him to go on.
“I’d been researching Eden’s company and I wanted to get a toe-hold, you know, a little information to leverage our bid.” Alex paused, finding it difficult to put into words the fact that he’d initiated his relationship with Eden for business purposes. “I had my investigative firm check out the executives of the company. There were several possibilities—people I could have approached—but I had photos of Eden….”
He stopped, struggling with the reality of how deceitful he’d been. It sounded even worse when spoken aloud.
“So you went ahead and got ‘information’ from her because you wanted to meet her?” his sister asked.
“Yes,” Alex said heavily. “I needed to approach someone in the company and she was—“
“Really attractive,” Lauren finished for him. “I understand that. So you’re attracted to her and, since she’s seeing you personally, I’m guessing she was attracted to you, as well as, working with you. So, where’s the problem?”
“That last part,” he said, his lips in a wry twist. “Eden doesn’t know…she didn’t know what I—“
His sister put down her knife, saying in disapproving disbelief, “You got involved with her because of the company and didn’t tell her that? You told her you were just interested in her?”
“I am interested in her,” Alex said emphatically. “Very. That’s the problem. Usually we research the principals of a company to decide which one to approach initially. Naturally, we approach them through other-than-business channels because to do it directly would draw reprisals on their heads.”
“But you don’t usually date them?” Lauren said, the disapproving note still in her voice.
“No!” Alex knew his frustration was visible. “This was different because I wanted to meet her. I saw her pictures and just…had an impulse. And then when I got to know her….”
Picking up her knife, Lauren pointed it at him. “You know where that impulses like that get you. How many times have we talked about you needing to follow the ‘rules’ more? Your ‘situation ethics’ have finally gotten you into
trouble.”
Struggling not to feel like he was fifteen again, he said, “Yes. That’s fairly clear at this point. And if I didn’t have feelings for Eden, I’d just bail out of the personal side—which I shouldn’t have ever gone into. At least, not like this.”
“But you do have feelings for her,” his sister said in a softer voice. “That does make things more complicated.”
“Thank you.” He walked over to look out the window at the snowstorm. “Now you see my dilemma.”
“Yes,” Lauren said slowly. “I do.”
“There’s more….” Alex hesitated. “When I was researching her background—something we always do before approaching someone—I discovered that, on her original application, she lied about having a relative in the business. They wouldn’t have hired her if they knew she had a blood relative in the business.”
Lauren stopped chopping, slewing around to look at him. “And you told her you’d found this out?”
“Yes,” he admitted. “But just to help her see that she had to do something, had to take action before someone else found out and fired her.”
“Wow.” She went back to cutting the vegetables. “So you told her you knew her secret and you then suggested that you and she should take-over this company? You didn’t give her much choice, did you?”
“No,” he said. “But I never planned on revealing her secret to anyone at Michele Cosmetics, regardless of whether she worked with me or not. Just the fact of Eden’s family connection to a business rival put her job in jeopardy. If I found out, so could other people. All the way around, my plans for the company made the most sense for Eden.”
He stopped, hating that the entire thing sounded sleazy as he stood with his sister in her cozy kitchen.
A silence fell in the room, broken only by the pelting of the snow at the window and the rhythmic chopping of her knife.
“This isn’t about the money for you anymore,” Lauren concluded.
“No, it’s not. And it hasn’t been from almost the beginning.” He went back to the table, sinking into the chair he’d vacated. “The situation at Michele Cosmetics is all fucked up. Michele Broussard has brought in some bimbo to groom for the job Eden should have. Hell, Eden’s been running the company for nearly a year. It’s crap.”