Children of Dynasty

by Christine Carroll

  “How do they do that?” she asked.

  “They’re snakes.”

  The commentary continued while the video showed Rory shooting a dirty look at the camera. “It appears the lovers aren’t happy with our roving eye.” The film showed them beside his car on full display for the metropolitan viewing area. The kiss began.

  When Rory had taken her in his arms, it had been beautiful. In grainy, poor quality night video, they appeared cheap and shoddy. Like one of those late-night shows where the host wandered the seamy side of the city after the bars closed.

  With a sinking feeling, Mariah wished they’d had more sense.

  By morning, she was even more upset. “When will this publicity end?” she asked Rory as they dressed, he in his clothing from the day before. Her Victorian bathroom was crowded with the two of them vying for space with a huge bathtub on claw feet.

  He paused in the act of buttoning his rumpled dress shirt and looked at her in the mirror over the sink. “It never ends, but I suppose it might ease up when things get settled one way or another.”

  She hoped the settlement he spoke of meant some kind of permanent arrangement between them. Last night in bed, Rory had touched her with an intensity that matched her own. More than once during the night, she had nearly told him she loved him, but had held back. As passionate as he was, she sensed some darkness in him; a reluctance to give everything she sensed was inside.

  Though they needed to get moving, she to the hospital to meet with her dad and the cardiologist, she wanted to put her arms around Rory and have him hold her once more.

  She did not because he was tucking in his shirttail with brusque efficiency, annoyance over the press coverage in his expression.

  “This is only the start,” he said. “My leaving DCI will be a bombshell.”

  Not just “On The Spot,” but the business sections of several papers and magazines would no doubt run stories on the rift between father and son. Mariah was sure she’d be named as the cause of their estrangement.

  Rory borrowed her brush to tame the waves of his hair. She smoothed her black pantsuit that served as armor when she had a tough day planned.

  They left her place around six and drove through gray dawn to his townhouse. Mariah made coffee and brought a mug to his home computer, where he was adjusting his résumé to reflect the work he’d done for DCI.

  While it printed on thick, creamy paper, Rory sipped from his mug with a thoughtful look. “I didn’t think I’d need another one of these lists of my qualifications, not after I went into the family company.”

  Mariah figured that no matter what Davis had done, it must be difficult for a son to make a break with his father.

  Rory changed into a gray double-breasted suit and they set out. Running fast against the traffic into the city, they arrived back at Bayview. The sun was fully up, sparking diamonds on the water to the east, and the site was already bustling. Mariah’s car was surrounded by contractor’s vans, pickups, and the small, worn econoboxes the workers afforded on hourly wages. Rory got out of his Porsche and kissed her in front of a group of men who catcalled and whistled.

  “Wish me luck.” He held up crossed fingers.

  Mariah straightened his bright red interview tie. “Call me as soon as you know something.”

  “No matter what, I’ll see you this evening,” he promised. “I hope John’s doctor has good news.”

  An hour later, Mariah entered Dr. Heidi Hanover’s office with her father. The stout woman built like a fireplug inspired confidence with her no-nonsense manner. “I’m sorry I was out of pocket last night when you threw us a scare,” she told John.

  He gave a tight grin and a shrug. “I got bored sitting around.”

  Mariah heard in his voice how he longed to do something useful.

  At their last visit, Dr. Hanover had expressed hopes for a complete recovery. This morning she was more guarded. “John, I know you’re raring to get after it, but I’m afraid you’re in for a deal more rest before that happens.”

  Mariah put a hand on her father’s arm and felt the muscles tense beneath her fingers. His ears reddened. “I’ve got a company to run!” At least he did until the end of the week.

  “This is never easy.” Dr. Hanover spoke in a gentle tone. “Do you think I’ve ever seen a patient who thought it was good time for them to slow down? Now, if you want to get back on your feet, you’ll have to be patient and keep out of the office.”

  “I’ve been staying with him,” Mariah put in.

  Her father shifted in his seat. “She’s been counting every fat gram that goes into my mouth.”

  Dr. Hanover smiled at them both. “One thing for you both to remember. When John decides he’s ready to take care of himself, I think it’s safe to let him. Independence is a crucial issue for him now, especially since he can’t make a contribution in the workplace.” She gave him a serious look. “Just keep your emergency call button close at hand.”

  After driving her father home later in the morning, Mariah settled him into his living room recliner and sat down opposite, where she could see the Japanese tapestry that spoke to her of father and daughter. “Do you need me to stay with you?”

  “No,” he said irritably, fiddling with the string of the call button around his neck. “You heard the doc and you’ve got work to do saving the company. Without me there, you’ll have to keep in charge.”

  There was one trouble with that, and it was in her purse: The tape with the “On The Spot” footage from Sunday, along with the Monday night segment she’d taped while she and Rory sat on her bed. Strange, she thought, that Arnold hadn’t said something when he confronted her and Rory last night at the hospital. Or told her father after they’d gone. But, if he had heard about Sunday night or seen last night’s episode wouldn’t he have mentioned it?

  She could go along to the office without revealing her shame, but the time had come.

  “Dad … I need to tell you something before I go to work.” Mariah rummaged in her bag for the tape. “Tom, April, none of the managers respect me anymore.”

  “Nonsense.” Still restless, John jerked the lever that readjusted the height of his feet.

  “No, it’s true. Because of this.” She held up the VCR tape. “Didn’t Arnold tell you about ‘On The Spot?’”

  John frowned. “No.”

  Mariah set up the tape and pressed play. When the show’s logo came up, her face flushed and she closed her eyes. Yet, she must face this.

  She opened her eyes, but tuned out the TV and watched the drama unfold on her father’s face. First disbelief, then shock registered in his gray eyes when he saw Rory standing in the rain outside his front door. Mariah gave the show a single glance and then looked away from the sight of her closing the door in Rory’s face. When it reached the part where he rested his forehead on the screen door, John motioned Mariah to the hassock beside him.

  She sat, her heart pounding.

  As the Monday night segment began, John scowled. The kiss in the hospital parking lot once more came across as tawdry and she bowed her head. How could she explain that it had felt so right after believing she and Rory had his approval?

  When the segment dissolved, she felt a hand on her shoulder. “Daughter.” He massaged in small circles over the tightness in her muscles.

  Mariah lifted her head and searched his eyes. “You’re not angry?”

  He moved his hand to chuck her under the chin as he had when she was small. “You heard what I said about you and Rory. If you love each other …” He paused, and though she had come to know she once more loved Rory, she could not speak for him.

  When she did not reply, John went on, “You may have to fight Davis, but not me.” He nodded toward the TV where the screen had dissolved into a snowy pattern at the end of the tape. “As for being angry, it’s time someone put a stop to those buffoons. They destroyed Charley’s viewing, and now they’re trying to ruin you and Rory.”

  He squared his jaw
and lifted the phone, selecting a preprogrammed number. “Ed?” She guessed he was speaking to Grant’s corporate attorney Ed Snowden. “Have you seen this ‘On the Spot’ crap?”

  A pause while Ed apparently admitted that he had.

  “I want you to call their studio and put the full weight of Grant Development behind getting them to cease and desist. Threaten them with DCI, too; Davis can’t want his son dragged through the dirt like this. No more harassment of Mariah,” he glanced at her, “or young Campbell. No quiet settlements. Ask them if they want the whole expensive jury trial circus in a city where they can’t beat Grant and Campbell.”

  Although relieved by her father’s support, Mariah went to the office with a sense of dread. She called the managers of all departments to the conference room and while she waited for them, she wiped her sweaty palms on a paper coffee napkin.

  Tom Barrett arrived first. The bags beneath his eyes looked deeper than ever. With a brief nod to Mariah, he busied himself pouring decaf from a silver pitcher on the sideboard and seemed to have trouble getting the right mix of cream and sugar. She wanted to go to him and tell him John was on her side, but Arnold Benton entered.

  Giving her a dark look, he started to speak, then bit it back and pulled out a swivel chair. One thing she could not figure: If he despised her so, why had he not taken the opportunity to sully her by telling her father about “On The Spot?” He could not have known the older man understood falling in love with the wrong person.

  April Perry came in looking camera-ready in a tailored teal suit with black braid trim. Rather than meet Mariah’s eyes, she settled into a swivel chair and aligned her Waterman pen and pencil set perfectly beside her black leather organizer.

  When the rest of the group had gathered, Mariah rose and made her announcement. “Last night John went back to the hospital.”

  A murmur like a low wind moved through the room.

  “This morning his doctor indicated his recovery is going to be longer than expected.”

  “How long?” Tom growled.

  “I wish I could say.” She watched them all take it in and could see the moment when concern for their boss gave way to doubts of her leadership ability. “In the meantime, he has asked me to continue to act for him.”

  “That’s a joke,” Arnold leaped in. “Sunday night’s ‘On The Spot’ was bad enough, but did you all see it last night?” He looked around the group.

  A few people nodded. Tom looked embarrassed.

  Ed Snowden put up a hand for order. “I saw that piece of trash,” he said in his deliberate manner. “John has, too. This morning he called to have me threaten them with a lawsuit, putting the complete power of his company and his name behind stopping the harassment of both Mariah and Rory Campbell.”

  The room grew still and she watched the staff digest the news. It was clear most of them had thought she was estranged from her father over Rory.

  After a few seconds that felt interminable, Tom was the first to meet her eyes. He gave a nod.

  April picked up her pen. “All right. I’ll call a press conference and publicize our position.”

  “Don’t.” There was no way Mariah was going to have more publicity if she could help it. “Let Ed call them and see if it does any good. I’d as soon this died down without more …”

  Arnold leaned forward. “Without more muckraking? If you had stayed away from your father’s enemies, none of this would have happened.”

  Mariah could tell him Rory was not her father’s enemy, but what good would it do?

  To change the subject, she turned to chief engineer Ramsey Rhodes. “Is there a status report on the accident?”

  He consulted his notes. “It now appears that heat stress on the cable is a possibility.”

  Sweat broke out under Mariah’s arms. A welder, gone up the hoist just before the accident, and now no one could find him. Davis Campbell’s saturnine countenance appeared in her mind’s eye and what Rory had said at the Lone Cypress overlook echoed in her head. “The past few weeks … stepped up efforts. If he has his way, Grant will be wiped out.”

  “Ramsey,” Mariah said. “Does that mean the welder Zaragoza, or someone, did something to the cable to weaken it?”

  The engineer gave her his usual calm look. “You’re jumping to conclusions there. We’ll need scanning electron microscope pictures of the cable break to say for sure if the heat was due to something like a welding torch.”

  Mariah looked at April Perry. “This makes finding Zaragoza and questioning him more important than ever.”

  The public relations director fiddled with her pen. “Our PI is still looking, but the trail is cold. He thinks Zaragoza may have left the country.”

  “What if someone paid his way to cover both their tracks?” Mariah said.

  Arnold Benton shot to his feet. “That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve heard. You can go on investigating all you like, but the company’s reputation is in ruins and John isn’t coming back. We’ve got exactly out four days to get out from under the loan problem, and the only way I see is for all of Grant Development to be sold.”

  CHAPTER 20

  Just before eleven a.m., the time of his appointment with Takei Takayashi, Rory pulled his Porsche into the familiar campus-style complex of Golden Builders in Menlo Park. It was like coming home, for two years ago he had drawn the design. He set his car alarm and strode toward the octagonal center building, faced in gold glass to match the company name. In the courtyard, brick pavers formed a matching eight-sided spiral. He could still remember the pattern in a plot from the design software spread out on his drafting table.

  The place looked and felt good. Low buildings sprawled, surrounded by open space and gardens that invited one to contemplate. It matched owner Takei Takayashi, deliberate and thoughtful.

  Golden’s reception area was an extension of the exterior decor. A mural of aluminum, copper, and brass depicted the skeleton of a skyscraper under construction against a sunset sky and the Golden Gate Bridge. Usually Rory saw the promise of completion in partially finished structures, but today the mural reminded him of the accident at Grant Plaza.

  Pushing open the copper-clad door to the inner offices, he saw his reflection in the mirrored surface. His best suit set off his silk tie. Takei liked red.

  Rory brushed back an errant strand of dark hair that had fallen onto his forehead. Though he tried not to look apprehensive, his heart started to slam and he told himself to calm down. Inside a black leather folder, he carried his résumé.

  In Takei’s office the décor was traditional Japanese, with a gravel garden accented by bamboo along one wall of the room. Rory accepted green tea from his host in a tiny translucent cup. California-born Takei did a lot of business with Orientals and his parents had been immigrants. Taking tea together had been a midmorning ritual for him and Rory before green tea was supposed to be healthy.

  In traditional Japanese fashion, Takei made small talk for several minutes. It was considered Western bad manners to get to the point too soon. Rory made his replies, speaking of golf and both local and national sports. Finally, Takei set aside his teacup and placed his palms on his desk.

  Rory swallowed and willed his antiperspirant not to fail him. He drew out his résumé, placed the paper in front of Takei and looked the older man in the eye. “I came to see if I could get my old job back.”

  Silence gathered, and Rory’s dread grew. Despite his father’s claims that no one would hire him, he’d seen Golden as a safety net.

  “I am sorry,” Takei said.

  Despite the negative answer, Rory recognized the remembered kindness that had emboldened him to come.

  Takei’s expression softened. “You know I miss having you here. You could have been my right hand man some day.”

  Pride swelled Rory’s chest. “I’d like the opportunity for us to see if that could still work. I see myself in a hands-on role; my goal is to see my ideas take shape.”

  “That’s a r
easonable aim for you to have had, once.” Takei frowned thoughtfully. “I think now your job is to rise above breaking-in projects like this building. It’s time for you to get the overview of the development business, what your father’s got you doing on the executive floor.”

  When Takei described Rory’s ideal career managing DCI, it sounded infinitely reasonable. How could he get across that he would never succeed if Davis were giving the performance evaluations?

  “I don’t fit in with my father,” he confessed. “I need a place where I can be me, not the owner’s son.”

  “You’ll be the owner.”

  “The man’s fifty-seven and healthy as a horse. He won’t let go the reins till he’s at least seventy, if then. To him, I’ll never grow up.”

  “You now know the inside secrets of DCI. Even if you don’t talk about them, they’re in your head. You come back here awhile and then decide to make up with your father …”

  Rory’s face got hot. “You think this is a little family quarrel?”

  “It’s not just that. When I saw you with Mariah Grant at McMillan’s, I thought there was something between you. Now with the ‘On The Spot’ publicity, there’s no doubt you’ve got a conflict of interest.”

  How utterly stupid he had been, flaunting Mariah before the camera. “She and I don’t talk shop. I’d like to think you know me well enough to trust my word on that. And to believe I never talked about what we did here at Golden after I left.”

  Takei nodded. “I do trust you, Rory.”

  “Then understand that I need to leave my father again to make my own way …”

  Golden’s chief looked mournful. “If it were up to me, I’d take you back, but any of our directors who saw last night’s TV piece would think I was crazy to take the risk.”