Not Without You

by Taylor, Janelle

  He gulped more scotch. “That changed things. I just really looked at her, you know. And she’s cold. I mean cold. Like there’s something wrong there. Even sex feels calculated.” With that, he jumped to his feet and paced the room. “I’m not kidding. I think there’s something seriously wrong with her. Like she’s missing.key parts.”

  Kelsey gazed at Will in surprise, hearing an echo of her own thoughts when she was at her lowest over Sarah. “I agree,” she said.

  “She’s so single-minded it’s scary,” Will added, fueled by Kelsey’s words. “Obsessive. I’d almost go so far as to say sociopathic.”

  Jarred frowned. “You’re the first one to admit that she does excellent work. She’s made a couple of deals with some tough negotiators that left us both in’awe.”

  “But don’t you see? That’s part of it. She doesn’t have normal feelings, so she’s terrific at working with those hard-edged types. They can’t hurt her. No one can hurt her,” he added.

  “So what are you going to do?” Kelsey asked, realizing Will had come to some kind of decision.

  “I’ll do right by the baby. But I’m not going to marry her. That’s not going to happen.”

  “Does she know this yet?” Jarred asked.

  “I never said I would marry her. She’s the one who spread that news. I’ve just kept quiet. Thinking. But I talked to Dad about it and he agrees with me.”

  “When did you talk to Dad?”

  “This afternoon. Before you saw him. He told me to get away from Sarah, and it was almost a relief to hear someone else agree with me.”

  “You could have asked me about her,” Kelsey reminded him lightly. “I’ve never been a fan.”

  “Do you think she’s been involved with drugs?” Jarred said, his eyes narrowed in serious thought. “She was a friend or acquaintance of Chance Rowden.”

  “I’ve never seen Sarah use any kind of intoxicant,” Will said. “A glass of wine or champagne, maybe, but even then they’re left half full. She’s too… in control.”

  “What does she want?” Kelsey asked. When both men turned to look at her, she said, “I mean, everybody wants something.”

  “The baby?” Will guessed, shaking his head.

  “That really doesn’t sound like Sarah.” Jarred was thoughtful. “I realize that she’s pregnant and that she probably planned it, but don’t you think she’d rather have the whole company? That’s the kind of goal she’s after.”

  “Does she know about the will?” Kelsey asked.

  “The will,” Will repeated slowly. “You mean Hugh’s stipulation? No. I don’t see how. We’ve never talked about it.”

  “I was just wondering if that’s why she got pregnant.” Kelsey shrugged.

  Will turned to regard Kelsey in a way she found totally uncomfortable. She could almost see the tumblers falling into place inside his head. “No.”

  “Having an heir doesn’t matter,” Jarred argued. “I’ve told you both that. Will is part of this family and that’s that. All the speculation over Hugh’s will is a waste of time!”

  “But Sarah wouldn’t know that!’ Kelsey said. “Even your mother doesn’t seem to really get it.”

  “Oh, she gets it,” Will said. “She just doesn’t like it.”

  But Jarred sat quietly, filled with growing dread over Kelsey’s words. “Sarah wouldn’t know that,” he agreed. “She might think having Will’s baby would ensure both his future and her own.”

  “God.” Will rubbed his face with his hands. “I’ve been such a jackass.”

  “And if she thinks that, she might worry that I’ll have an heir before I’m forty and then it all goes to dust,” Jarred added.

  Fear crawled across Kelsey’s skin. It was all she could to do to keep from wrapping her arms protectively around her abdomen. “This is all conjecture,” she whispered.

  “But there’s a ring of truth there,” Will said.

  “I need to tell her the truth,” Jarred said suddenly, jumping to his feet. “Then maybe she’ll back off.”

  “Back off?” Will asked.

  “From trying to kill me,” he said calmly, reaching for his coat, “or harm my wife and unborn child.”

  The phone rang almost the instant Jarred’s Porsche had backed out of the driveway. Kelsey jumped, snatched the receiver, and exchanged a worried look with Will, who had insisted on going with Jarred and been summarily turned down. Jarred wanted to face Sarah. He wanted the truth and he wanted it now.

  And he wanted Will to stay with Kelsey.

  “Hello?” Kelsey answered.

  “Where’s Jarred? Is Jarred there?” Nola’s sharp voice inquired.

  “Umm, no. He just left. He’s on his way to see Sarah.”

  “What? Why?”

  “Business issues,” Kelsey said lamely, glancing at Will for support. He lifted his hands in surrender.

  “His father’s awake and desperately wants to talk to him. Get him over here!”

  Kelsey held the phone to her chest, muffling her voice. “Did he take the cell phone?” she asked Will.

  He glanced at the desk, where the cell phone lay. “You can call him at Sarah’s.”

  “I’ll get him to the hospital,” Kelsey told Nola before gently hanging up in the middle of her next diatribe about Jarred being always unavailable at the most desperate times.

  Will placed the call to Sarah’s place, unhappy that he had to spoil the surprise of Jarred’s visit, but there was no answer. He left a message, asking Sarah to call him at Jarred’s. “She’s not there,” he said. “Or not picking up anyway.”

  “Then he’ll come back. I’ll tell him as soon as he returns.”

  “I’d better go see Dad,” Will said, gathering up his own coat. He hesitated. “Want to come? Jarred won’t like to have you left here alone.”

  “Yes,” she agreed after a moment’s hesitation. Scratching out a note to Jarred, she grabbed her own cell phone, then followed Will through the cold night to his car.

  “Are you really pregnant?” Will asked, as she slid in beside him.

  She hesitated before answering. She hadn’t forgotten Jarred’s urgent admonitions earlier. But Jarred himself had more or less spilled the beans first. Deciding it couldn’t matter now anyway, she said simply, “Yes.”

  He smiled. “Congratulations.”

  Sarah wasn’t in. Jarred stood outside her rather swank apartment on the north side of the city and considered ringing the bell one more time. It would be a waste of time, he decided, though he was surprised she wasn’t home. It was near midnight and tomorrow was a workday. Say what you would about Sarah, she was almost never absent nor tardy.

  A baby. Even with all the changes flying around him, he couldn’t quite get over the humbling realization that he was about to become a father. He could clearly remember how angry and miserable he’d felt when Kelsey had told him about her first pregnancy. It was ironic that he’d believed the child was Chance’s merely on Sarah’s word.

  Sociopathic.

  Jarred shook his head. Will wasn’t generally prone to drama, so the word was exceedingly harsh. Jarred had known Sarah for years, and no, she wasn’t warm. She wasn’t even particularly likable, he decided, recognizing with painful irony that he’d never cared for her. He had not been all that likable himself. He’d known it and hadn’t cared. He’d nearly lost Kelsey over it. Falling in’ love with her had thawed him a bit, but the ice had always been there. Protection against a weak, philandering father and an overbearing, self-absorbed mother.

  But there was no use making excuses for himself. What was, was. And Sarah was a problem that would have to be faced sooner or later.

  Without consciously planning his direction, Jarred found himself driving toward the Bryant Industries offices. Parking in his designated spot in the lot behind the building, he strode through damp air full of drifting fog to the back entrance. Unlocking the door, he stepped into the smallish room that led to the elevators and central foyer. The security gu
ard greeted him with a nod of his head, then returned his eyes to the small TV screen by the desk, which flickered with images.

  Inside the elevator, he thought of his father. They’d moved to these offices not long after Jarred had taken over. The business had been in a slow decline under his father’s ineffective control, and Jarred had been forced to leave graduate school early to put things right. Which was fine, as far as he was concerned. He’d jumped in feet first and started suggesting ideas to his father. Jonathan had nodded at him and agreed without enthusiasm, and when Nola demanded that he turn the business over to Jarred lock, stock, and barrel, he’d dismissed the whole thing with a smile and wave of his hand. He’d been, in a word, relieved. Relieved to relinquish responsibility. Only Gwen had mourned the changing of the guard. And Jarred had spent more than a few hours getting past her frosty regard, cajoling and comforting and generally making certain she felt needed and safe.

  Safe.

  Not a word in his vocabulary these days, Jarred thought with a pang of remembrance.

  Lights were on in the hallways. Lights were always on. Not a soul remained in the offices however. The place was tomblike and oddly forsaken. A building without people was lifeless and vaguely disquieting.

  He stood in his office, staring down at the street. The streetlights fuzzed, blurred by the ever lengthening trails of fog that moved ghostlike through half-empty streets. It was after midnight and Seattle was closing down. Not completely, for the city was never really abandoned, but this section of town, where businesses stood cheek to jowl, wasn’t exactly the hot night scene.

  Sarah…Gwen…His father had mentioned them both tonight, along with Will and himself. Glancing around his office, Jarred recalled where Chance had been standing that day he’d come to see him. A door had cracked open and Chance had scurried away.

  A woman.

  Crossing the room, Jarred opened the door and gazed into the anteroom that housed Gwen’s desk. He sat down in her chair and viewed his surroundings from that vantage point. With the doors to the outer hallway open, she could see everyone who entered the offices. She was a sentinel.

  Gwen had said she’d overheard Will on the phone with Trevor Taggart, but Will had said he’d overheard Sarah. Jarred believed Will. Truth rang from his words. A confession of his sins for falling under Sarah’s spell. Gwen had been wrong. She was, after all, frequently out of the office for various ailments, migraines chief among them, and when she was in the office, her effectiveness was hit and miss. Jarred had wanted to let her go, but his father had fervently disagreed, making Jarred feel like an ogre for even thinking about ousting such a loyal employee.

  But what were loyal employees made of anyway? he mused to himself, opening the top drawer to Gwen’s desk. Could Sarah be considered a loyal employee? Yes, given certain criteria. But what about overall? In the heart. Where it counted. Could an employer even presume to expect that kind of loyalty from people who turned to him for their livelihood? It was a symbiotic relationship at best, a parasitic one at worst.

  Paper clips and pencils and tape and scissors and several self-inking stamp pads with the Bryant Industries logos and a myriad of other stuff that made up the daily work of a secretary were scattered throughout the drawer. Jarred closed it and opened another, not certain what he expected to find. Nothing really. But he had a sudden, inexplicable urge to know more about Gwen. Inside the second drawer were current files of work yet to be done. Envelopes and a shrink-wrapped pile of unopened notepads with From the Desk of Gwen Harrington printed in red across the top filled it nearly to the top.

  The bottom drawer was locked. Jarred gazed at it. Jiggled it. One of those rinky-dink locks that he’d found so easy to unhook with a penknife. Grabbing the letter opener from the top drawer, he slid it gently to and fro, and then with more force when the lock failed to budge on the first try. Eventually he pushed through with a metallic thunk and the drawer slid outward as if invited.

  Nothing. A pile of papers. A couple of novels with yellowed pages, testimony to how long they’d sat discarded in the drawer. A half-burned candle, faintly smelling of vanilla. A picture frame. A pair of sunglasses.

  What was he hoping to find anyway? Some clue to his father’s past?

  The frame was buried under the novels. He pulled it out and turned it faceup. It was a picture of Gwen and Sarah, smiling into the camera. Summer. A company event, no doubt. The kind inspired by that overly cheerful woman in marketing. A let’s-get-together-and-be-greatfriends event meant to bring the members of the company together.

  Gwen had her arm around Sarah. Jarred frowned. Something about the photo.

  The elevator bell dinged.

  Jarred looked up as the doors slid open and Sarah herself strode into view. She stopped short upon seeing Jarred. “What are you doing here?”

  “I could ask you the same thing,” he returned.

  “I mean, with your father so ill. I just talked to Will,” she added by way of explanation. “He told me about Jonathan.” As an afterthought, she said, “I’m on my way to my office to pick up some papers I forgot.”

  “Just talked to Will?” Jarred repeated, his thoughts on the photograph. Sarah and Gwen. Gwen Harrington. Sarah Ackerman.

  Gwen Ackerman.

  “Shedoesn’t like the name,” he remembered his father telling him when he’d queried about why his secretary had changed it. He’d been seven, maybe, or eight. He hadn’t wanted to be at the office at all, but his father had needed to stop by and do some work. “So she changed it.”

  “You can’t just change your name,” Jarred had responded self-importantly.

  “Well, Harrington’s her name, too, so that’s the one she’s using,” was his father’s dismissive response.

  “Yes, I just left Will,” Sarah answered blithely. “We’ve got plans to make now, you know. I hope your father hangs on. Really. It’s so sad. I don’t think Will can get a divorce quick enough to make this marriage go through before summer!” she added with a short laugh, her attempt at humor falling flat. “He is going to be okay, isn’t he?”

  “I’m not sure. He’s not doing well tonight.”

  “What have you got there?” she suddenly asked. “Why are you sitting at Gwen’s desk?”

  “I don’t know,” he answered honestly. “Looking for answers, I guess.”

  “Answers?” She was instantly on alert. It was as if antennae had grown from her head.

  Jarred nodded, watching her. “Dad was rambling. Talking and muttering. He’s worried someone’s out to get me. I got the feeling it was a woman whom he was involved with.”

  Now she stood stock-still, her eyes wide, more white showing than normal. Her lips quivered faintly, a product of the rapid fall and rise of her chest. “But you’re at Gwen’s desk.”

  He glanced at the picture, turned it to face her. “Your mother?”

  The color ran from her face so quickly that Jarred got to his feet, intending to steady her. But she stepped away as if his touch would burn her. “She didn’t want anyone to know.”.

  So it was true. Jarred found the idea faintly repellent. Gwen did not seem the motherly type, and Sarah certainly wasn’t daughterly. “Why?”

  “She hated my father. He left when I was a baby. She felt like a failure.”

  “Your father?”

  “Samuel Ackerman,’’ she spat with distaste. “A drunk. A wife beater. Your father helped her get through the whole thing. I could show you the cigarette burn on my inner thigh, courtesy of my loving dad. It was after that she left him.”

  This was more information than Jarred had expected. He felt sorry for her suddenly and faintly guilty for not knowing. “Why didn’t you ever say anything?”

  She actually sneered at him. “Oh, really. Like you’re the soul of understanding. You wanted to fire my mother just because she’s older.”

  Her animosity toward him flickered out like hot flames, representative of a burning, furious core. She hated him, he realized. All the
se years of pretending absorption in him and it had all been an act! He wondered, suddenly, if she felt the same way about Will. “Sarah, you didn’t just talk to Will. He’s at my house. He’s been there a few hours.”

  “I meant earlier.”

  Jarred hesitated, but he decided to push for the truth. “And he said you’re not getting married.”

  Abruptly her nostrils flared as her famous control flooded away. “You Bryants! Always so ready to help as long as you get something in return. Isn’t that the way it is? So high and mighty, but soulless, every last one of you.”

  “You said my father helped your mother.”

  “Some help! A lousy job and sex on command. Prostitution. Spread your legs for a raise, my dear. Why do you think she stayed all these years, huh? For the benefits? He promised it to me. He promised it all to me. He said I was as much his child as either you or Will ever were. I might not be blood, but he said it didn’t matter. He loved me. Called me his little girl.”

  Sociopathic.

  Jarred saw what Will had seen. Something wrong there. Obsessive. A poisonous snake. Outwardly commanding, but inwardly seething.

  And wrong. Jonathan Bryant might be many things, but Jarred knew whom he loved and how he felt. This scenario was all in her head. “If you think your child will inherit because it’s Will’s, you’re wrong. That’s not how it works.”

  “I know how it works. You can lie and lie and lie. I know how it works.”

  “I built this business up. It’s outside my grandfather’s will. Eighty percent of Bryant Industries is mine alone. Even if Will were to inherit, it would be a small amount compared to the company’s overall worth. That doesn’t mean I don’t want him to inherit, I’m just saying—”

  “Liar!” she screamed. “Lying, lying bastard! Don’t think you can fool me. I’m on to you. And that snide little bitch you married can’t bear children at all!”

  “You’re deluded,” he said.

  “Where are you going?” she demanded as Jarred got to his feet and headed toward the elevator.

  “Home. And you can pack up your things tonight. Your employment at this company is over as of now.”