Downsizing (19 page)

It was when Noah branched out into
construction that Cassie’s innate greed blossomed. She’d always
wanted more material comforts than Noah could provide her with, and
it had caused endless friction between them, as did her inability
to properly run their family life. He just thanked God that they
only had two children. She’d been an ideal mother to start with,
but when the reality of her situation didn’t match up to her
expectations, she quickly lost interest in her family. Numerous
times Noah came home from work to find someone babysitting and no
signs of any dinner being prepared for him.

Immersed in thought it took Noah a moment to
realize a new email had sprung up in his in-box. His heart lifted
when he saw that it was from Maxine. She must be having trouble
sleeping, too. Burning with anticipation he opened it immediately
and read her words three times in rapid succession.

You’re forgetting that the English
aristocracy was supremely arrogant. It wouldn’t have sat
comfortably with them to make too much effort to search for him,
thereby admitting that a French pirate was capable of outwitting
them. And as for the pirate’s literary aspirations, why is that so
strange? Do you imagine they were only capable of rape and
pillage?

I admire DduM’s imagination.
Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that although happily
married she’s widely acknowledged to have had lesbian tendencies,
too. Those experiences probably broadened her mind! M

Noah was euphoric. She’d answered him! She’d
kept her response short and focused entirely on literature, but he
didn’t care about that. She hadn’t completely forgotten him, and
that’s all that mattered. Feeling as though he could conquer the
world, he immediately cranked out a reply.

Blimey, I didn’t know about her sexuality,
but you’re right, it explains a lot. I’d be intrigued to learn
more. Which of hers should I read next?
He wanted to say more,
so much more that had nothing to do with literature, but knew
better than to push his luck and restrained himself by merely
signing off with,
N. xx.

It only took her one day to reply this time.
Try The House on the Strand and see what you make of her take on
hallucinatory drugs. The woman sure had vision! Perhaps it will
strike a chord and bring back memories of your own misspent
youth.

Noah bought a copy of the book the next
morning and, for the first time ever, put something else before his
precious work. He locked himself in his office, astonished his
receptionist by telling her to hold all his calls, and read it from
cover to cover before he left for home. He replied to her that
night.

Glad you didn’t suggest that I
read Rebecca. Tried it once and thought the new Mrs. deWinter was a
bit of a drip. Liked this one much better. Just goes to show
there’s nothing under the sun that hasn’t been done
before.

Without stopping to think, he added another
paragraph.
How are you, Max? Are you happy? Do you ever think of
me? N. xx

She responded by return.
Yellow card, Noah!
You forfeited the right to ask personal questions twelve years ago.
Don’t do it again! I’ll talk to you about literature, but nothing
else.

Damn, he’d pushed her too far. He composed a
suitably contrite response, and went to bed with a smile on his
face.

Chapter
Fourteen

More rumors circulated about forthcoming
changes at Metropolitan Pharmaceuticals, so when John set Maxine
and McFee another challenge, she suspected that whoever came out on
top would get that promotion. She was becoming more disillusioned
by the day with big corporations and the male culture that
dominated her working world. It was no longer her size that was
being held against her, but her sex, and she was tired of
constantly watching her back, fighting battles she didn’t know how
to win.

John had given them the three days he was
spending in meetings in Manchester to write a rebuttal to the writ
he’d given them. Maxine worked feverishly on her response and
completed it in two. When she knew that McFee was safely out of the
way, she took Poppy out to lunch and put a proposition to
her.

Poppy was now thoroughly disillusioned with
McFee. He’d dated her a couple of times, got what he wanted, and
then dumped her. Now he treated her with casual off-handedness,
rubbing salt into her still raw wounds by expecting her to field
the calls from his myriad girlfriends. Maxine intended to use
Poppy’s new found dislike of McFee to help her exact revenge.
Satisfied that Poppy knew what to do, Maxine swung into action that
afternoon. She wandered up to Poppy’s desk and, in a voice loud
enough to carry to McFee, asked her to type three copies of her
rebuttal and bind them in plastic folders.

“
I’d like to leave one on John’s
desk so he sees it first thing in the morning,” she told her. “I’m
off to a meeting upstairs now, and probably won’t be back this
afternoon.”

As arranged, Poppy called her at her flat that
evening. “He fell for it!” she cried with malicious
glee.

“
What a surprise!” Maxine rolled
her eyes. “What did he do?”

“
I can’t believe his gall! He
wandered out not two minutes after you’d gone and told me I looked
nice. Nice! I ask you, what a nerve, when he’s barely spared me the
time of day since—”

“
And?” Maxine prompted.

“
Well, he suggested we go out
again sometime, and I pretended to be excited about the prospect of
another date with the rat. I’d left your rebuttal where he could
see it, and he picked it up and flipped through it.” Poppy’s voice
rose with indignation. “Then he calmly suggested that I put
his
name on
your
report, just as you predicted he
would. How did you know?”

Maxine almost smiled. “Because he lacks
imagination. Besides, he’d never have written a decent rebuttal on
his own, and it wouldn’t occur to him that you’re not still
besotted and ready to help him. What happened next?”

“
Well, I checked with John’s
secretary and found out that he had a lunch meeting at his hotel in
Manchester, after which he’d be checking out and getting the two
o’clock train back. I helpfully shared that information with McFee,
and he suggested that I fax
his
rebuttal to the hotel so
that John could study it on the train coming back.”

“
And did John get it?”

“
Oh yes, the cheating skunk even
had me call and make sure. Honestly, I—”

Maxine thanked Poppy, tuned out of her
colorful harangue and savored the prospect of the day to
come.

John’s first action when he arrived at work
the next morning was to call them both into his office. Maxine’s
beautifully presented rebuttal was sitting in the center of his
otherwise clear desk. McFee looked at it, unable to hide his smug
expression.

“
Afraid McFee beat you to it
again, Maxine,” John said, not sounding at all
regretful.

“
Really.” She tried to look upset.
“Ah well, the best man won, I suppose.” They regarded her with
identical expressions of surprise. “Can I look at his rebuttal to
see where I slipped up? I might learn something.”

John handed it over without a word. “How long
did it take you to convince Poppy to let you copy mine?” she asked
Lance conversationally.

“
Oh please, not that again. You
really must learn to be more gracious in defeat,
Maxine.”

Maxine quirked a brow, enjoying herself. “Have
you looked at your email yet, John?”

“
No, I’ve not had a chance.
Haven’t had an opportunity to study McFee’s rebuttal in detail yet
either, but at first glance it appears sound.”

“
Well, if you log on, you’ll see
that I emailed you precisely the same conclusions over an hour
before McFee faxed them to you.” Both men looked stunned. “You’ll
also see that McFee has such faith in my abilities that he didn’t
even bother to check my report for errors. If you turn to section
four, sub-paragraph three you’ll see that I, or rather he, has
quoted Donoghue v. Stevenson as additional grounds for denying the
action.” John and McFee both looked gratifyingly blank. “You really
should have paid more attention in Professor Makepeace’s lectures,
Lance. That case was one of his first examples of negligence and
had to do with a decomposing snail in a bottle of drink, if memory
serves. If it’s got anything to do with this case I sure as hell
don’t know what it can be. What’s the matter, Lance?” she asked him
sweetly. “You’ve been set up,
old boy
. You really should
learn to be more gracious in defeat, you know.”

“
Lance.” John scowled in his
direction. “Is this true?”

“
No,” he stuttered, his face
deathly white. “No, really, John, I can explain.”

“
I’d like to hear you try,” Maxine
said sweetly.

“
There’s been a mistake. Poppy
must have sent you Maxine’s rebuttal under my name.” He nodded
emphatically. “Yes, that’s what it must be.”

John’s expression was so scathing that Maxine
almost felt sorry for McFee. Then she recalled that his first
instinct had been to pass the blame off onto Poppy, and her
embryonic sympathy evaporated.

“
Can I speak to you alone, John?”
she asked.

“
Get out, McFee. I’ll deal with
you later.”

McFee scurried toward the door, looking as
though he couldn’t get out fast enough.

“
Are you going to sack him?”
Maxine asked as soon as the door closed behind McFee.

John sighed. “I wish it were that
simple.”

“
Never mind. Obviously I’ll get
the promotion, and when he has to report to me I’ll soon knock him
into shape.”

“
It’s not as simple as that
either, Maxine.”

“
Don’t tell me you’re still going
to promote him, even after all this?” Maxine, who’d expected
nothing less and thought she was prepared for it, found that she
wasn’t. Too angry to sit still, she stood and paced John’s
office.

“
You know he stole that last
rebuttal from me, even though I couldn’t prove it, which is
probably why you didn’t promote him then. I knew he’d do it again
and that’s why I set a trap for him. It was disappointingly easy.”
She paced some more. “John, I’ve got a better brain than him, I’m a
better lawyer, and I’ve got more integrity in my little finger than
he’s got in his entire body. I work a damned sight harder than he
does, too, but my career’s stalled because I don’t happen to have a
rich daddy to smooth my path for me.”

“
It’s not my decision alone,
Maxine. The powers that be like him.”

“
Ah, the managing director’s been
to Scotland as well, has he?”

John shrugged and had the grace to look
ashamed.

“
It’s a game, Maxine. At the end
of the day that’s what it comes down to, no matter how intelligent
you might be. And you, I’m afraid, don’t seem to want to play by
the rules.”

“
Why? Because I’m not prepared to
sleep my way to the top? Because I hurt your pride when I wouldn’t
let you get your leg over?” She was really angry now, and
shouting.

“
Calm down, Maxine. We’ll sort
something out.”

“
Too right, we will.” She glared
at him. “I’m leaving, John. I’ve had it with this
outfit.”

“
Are you resigning?” he asked,
looking relieved.

“
Oh no, you don’t get away that
lightly. I want a golden parachute and a glowing
reference.”

“
I’m not sure that’s
possible.”

“
Anything’s possible if you want
it badly enough.” She dropped into the chair in front of his desk,
in control of herself once more.

“
Still, have it your way. I can go
quietly at the end of the month or shout it from the rooftops and
blow the lid on the regime of sexual harassment that prevails in
this
old boys’
club
.
Who knows, I might even throw in
a few home truths about that golden boy of yours while I’m at
it.”

“
So that’s what this is all
about.” John sighed. “A word to the wise, don’t even bother. You
don’t have a shred of proof, and even if you did somehow manage to
win, you’d be finished in this game. No one would want to touch
you.”

“
Perhaps, but you’re assuming that
I still care. There are plenty of other, more worthwhile things, I
could do.” She eyed him speculatively. “Well, what’s it to
be?”

“
Give me until the end of the
day.”

Maxine left his office and switched off the
mini-recorder that had been whirling away in her pocket, confident
that she wouldn’t need to use it. John was worried about her
threats. He couldn’t afford any scandal, however ambiguous, that
would get in the way of his own ambitions, so he would find a way
to grant her request.

She felt like a load had been lifted from her
shoulders when she left work early and headed home after receiving
a curt message from John that her demands would be met. Annoyingly,
Greg was away and she had no one but Noah’s picture to share her
triumph with.

She was supposed to be dining with Charles,
but wasn’t in a sociable frame of mind and canceled at the last
minute. She didn’t bother with supper and curled up on the sofa
with a chilled bottle of Chablis to contemplate a future that was
alive with possibilities. Maxine wasn’t a big drinker, but for the
first time in ages she had no one to please but herself. She had no
deadlines to meet, no corner to defend, and could set about working
her way through the bottle with determination and a clear
conscience.