Stray (17 page)

It was probably naive of me to expect Megan to keep her mouth shut about what had happened. I didn
’t want to see Jon, didn’t want to hear the lies he would no doubt tell about his relationship with Ashleigh and definitely didn’t want to be close enough to feel his masculine pull, inhale his scent and be tempted to fall into bed with him again.

It had been all I could think of, ever since I’d learned he was engaged to Ashleigh. It made me sick to think of him holding her the way he held me, even if she had been the first. It made me particularly sick to think of her mouth on his cock, or maybe it was making me sick that I had done that, worshiped him in that way, when all I was to him was a fling. I couldn’t get the images out of my mind, and I couldn’t make myself quit feeling a longing to have him in my bed again. If I saw him, I knew I’d break down, and what would that make me? A slut, a whore, and a home-breaker. Even if he wasn’t already married to her, engaged was the next best thing. You didn’t break up an engaged couple, not if you had a shred of self-respect.

I’d taken the coward’s way out, left the clinic so that I didn’t have to see him. I’d even put myself forever in Megan’s debt by asking her to meet him there when he returned, all so I wouldn’t have to face temptation. When Mrs. P came calling to see if Maharajah was visiting me, I begged her to come in for a cup of tea and a talk, hoping that her presence would save me if he came here.

“What’s wrong, dear?” she said, sitting with a cup of peppermint tea in her hands and a look of disapproval at my glass of gin and tonic.

“I’ve got myself in a pickle, Mrs. P. Fell for the wrong guy and just found out he’s engaged to someone else. I feel like a fool. A dirty fool.”

“Well, dear, you aren’t the first to make a mistake of that nature. You’ll survive.”

Her matter-of-fact attitude took me aback. “How do you know?” I had to ask.

“Because Mr. Padgett’s floozy survived. Not that you’re a floozy, dear. But we women are resilient. When I found out about her, I divorced the bastard…”

Her sentence was cut off by my bark of laughter at her language.

“Well, he was, a right bastard,” she repeated. “Then he married her, and before long he was cheating on her, too. So, you see, it all comes out right in the end. He has three wives to which he’s paying alimony, though I got the lion’s share because I was the first. And now here I am in my lovely mountain home, which I always dreamed of, and with all my lovely cats. By the way, dear, you didn’t answer. Is Maharajah here?”

Mrs. P knew that I often borrowed a cat to warm my lap, but I hadn’t seen Maharajah, and may not have let him into my apartment if I had.

Just then, an authoritative knock on the door signaled that I’d been right to worry. It couldn’t be anyone else but Jon. I looked through the security spy-hole, and there he was, looking frightened. I turned to Mrs. P and whispered, “He’s here. What should I do?”

“Why, don’t let him in, of course, dear. Would you like for me to send him away?”

God help me, I let her do it, hiding around the corner as she opened the door with the chain on.

“Jon Miles! Fancy seeing you here,” she said. “Are you the wrong guy that Erin’s been telling me about?”

I could have died right then. How could she say that to him? Wasn’t it obvious that I didn’t want him to know I still harbored feelings for him?

“Mrs. P, if she’d just talk to me, I could explain,” he pleaded.

“I’m sure you can’t explain away an engagement, dear boy. I’m disappointed in you. When we spoke the other day, I thought well of you. I’m afraid you’ll have to leave. Erin doesn’t want to see you, and frankly, neither do I right now.” With that, she firmly closed the door. Jon was sputtering, trying to say something else, but the door was shut and we couldn’t hear him through it.

I had mixed feelings about the way she’d handled it, first confirming for him that I had feelings for him, and then turning him away in no uncertain terms. That part was magnificent. I gave her frail shoulders a squeeze.

“Thank you. I couldn’t face that,” I said.

“Well, dear, you must pull yourself together, hold your head up. After all, you are the wronged party, and society will condemn him for it. And now I really must be going. I have to find Maharajah. Will you be all right?”

I assured her that I’d be right as rain now, though I had every intention of finishing the bottle of gin if I didn’t pass out first. Maybe I’d get some dinner in me first. I told her to come back and get me if she needed help finding her cat, and closed the door behind her. Mrs. P really was an old dear, but who would have thought she’d have been strong enough to stick it to a cheating husband? The thought was almost funny.

 “Hey, Doc, could I come over? I need some advice,” I said, wincing at the sound of my own voice. God, how pathetic was this, crawling to someone I hadn’t even known well a week ago to beg for help with woman problems. I tried to make a joke of it. “After all, if you turn out to be my father, you’ll be wanting to give me advice all the time. It’s good I’m asking for it, yes?”

“Jon? What the hell is wrong with you, boy? I didn’t even recognize your voice.” Oh. So much for the joke, then.

“Never mind, I’ll figure it out,” I said, no longer willing to expose my vulnerability to Doc. For a minute there, I’d needed a father like a sixteen-year-old boy in pain from his first love throwing him over. As a thirty-four-year-old man, I was just a fool. No amount of advice would straighten this shit out, and I didn’t have time for it anyway.

“Jon, wait. Come on over, we can have a drink. And I’ll introduce you to the hounds of hell,” he added, a hint of amusement in his voice. I hesitated. “Are you there? Jon!”

“I’m here. Sorry, Doc, I had a bad moment there, but I’m okay now.”

“Are you coming or not?” I thought about what it would mean if I went crying to a father-figure every time I had bad luck with a woman. Then I remembered that I’d never had bad luck with a woman before. What were the odds that it would happen in the future? And, whether or not Doc turned out to be my father, we had sort of committed to being friendly. Besides, I had something else to talk about with him. I might as well use this opportunity.

“Yeah, sure. Thanks.”

“See you in a minute,” he said, and then he was gone, the phone in my hand an alien object. I shook off the feeling of uncertainty and got in the car, wondering if he would remember to corral the pack of dogs.

Happily, I wasn’t pulled down and mauled by a pack of Yorkies when I got there. Doc answered the door and waved me in, pointing to the coat closet in the hallway where I could put my outdoor gear away. He clapped me on the back as he led me to a comfortable living room, full of big, old, leather furniture and the smell of good cigars.

“What can I get you to drink?”

“Scotch, neat,” I answered. “Thanks.”

“Don’t thank me ‘til you’ve tasted it, boy. It isn’t as good as your preferred brand. Where do you get that, anyway?”

I told him that the resort handled ordering it for me, so I didn’t know, but that I’d get him some if he wanted. He seemed pleased by the offer. His scotch wasn’t all that bad, maybe not as mellow as mine, but still rich and peaty, the way I liked it. When I’d sunk into one of the comfortable old chairs, he whistled and in tumbled the four Yorkies, tripping over each other and their own feet in their eagerness to get to Doc’s side. He introduced each to me, insisting that they shake paws with me. Now that they weren’t trying to rip me to shreds, I thought they were kind of cute, although I wouldn’t be caught dead with a lapdog like this as my pet.

“What’s on your mind, Jon?” Doc asked, once the Yorkies had settled down, one on his lap and the others in a pile by his side on the sofa.

“I’ve been wondering. If we do turn out to be, you know, would you ever want to try to find my mom again? I mean, I’m thinking about it. If I find her, would you want to know?”

“There hasn’t been a day in twenty or more years that I haven’t wondered about your mom, Jon. Sure, if she would talk to me, I’d love to know what made her leave, well, probably all the same questions you want to ask her. But what makes you think you could find her now, if your dad couldn’t then?”

“Facebook,” I said. “I don’t know why I didn’t think of it before. The internet in general. Lots of people are finding long-lost friends and relatives. You make up a poster with a picture they’d recognize and the details of who you are and who you want to find. Take a phone shot of that and post it on Facebook. People like to feel they’re a part of a drama like that. They re-post and their friends re-post. The world isn’t so large after all, you know. Of course, she could see it and refuse to come forward, but maybe after all these years, she wonders about me, too.”

I hoped so. I had no reason to believe she loved me; after all, she’d left me. But now that I was uncertain of my dad’s love, I felt very alone. Maybe because I was hurting over Erin. In any case, I suddenly actively wanted the old man across the room to be my father. I wondered how he felt about it.

“I’m sure she does,” Doc said. I could see why the townspeople loved him so much. He was brusque, true, but he was also kind. “That’s not what you wanted advice about, though, is it?” he asked, with keen insight.

“No,” I sighed. “Dammit, Doc, Egren’s daughter is making my life hell.”

“I expect that’s what you have to put up with when you’ve played her for a fool,” he said.

“Not helping,” I lamented.

“Maybe not, but you know karma’s a bitch,” he said. “So what particular hell is she putting you through?”

“She’s made up a rumor that we’re engaged, and she sent one of her friends to make sure Erin knows about it. Now Erin won’t speak to me.”

“I see. Can you blame her, son?”

Son. A casual word, spoken by older men to younger, whether there was any true relationship there or not. Many men my age hated it when people other than their fathers said it, but it gave me a thrill. I realized my own dad had never called me that.

“No, I can’t blame her, but I hate it that she thinks it of me, when it isn’t true. And that she won’t even let me explain.”

“And what would you say to her? That you were stringing the woman along to keep her father appeased? That doesn’t show you in a very good light, you know.”

Miserable, I dropped my head into my hands. “I know. I’ve screwed up. And if I can’t fix it, it’ll cost me someone I could truly love. Just in the short time I’ve known her, Erin’s shown me that she’s something special.”

“I can agree with that. I told you not to give her a reason to doubt you.”

“That’s just it, Doc, I haven’t. I mean, yes, I was with Ashleigh for the wrong reasons, but I broke up with her, almost a week ago. This rumor she’s started is just a lie!”

“Well, give it some time. I don’t think Erin is going anywhere, and it will soon become apparent that you aren’t in fact engaged to Ashleigh Egren. As early as tomorrow, I’d think. Is everything in place for your coup?”

“It is, thanks to you coming around, Doc.”

~*~

Despite my worry over Erin and the distraction of learning that I might not be who I thought I was, I was ready for today. The shareholder meeting would commence at eleven a.m., and our business would be concluded by noon, followed by a catered lunch. I couldn
’t quite picture how that would go. Presumably, I would have been elected the new CEO, and the shareholders would congratulate me. Whether Egren would stay or not remained to be seen. I wouldn’t have, if the shoe were on the other foot.

I’d left Doc’s the night before with little resolved. We wouldn’t know the truth about our relationship until the results were ready, and they’d take a little longer than the usual two days because of the extra steps in differentiating between brothers. I didn’t know how I’d feel if I learned somehow that I was Doc’s brother’s son instead of Doc’s or the son of the man I’d thought of as my father all my life. Could it even be someone else? Someone no one knew of? Clearly, my mother had been free with her favors, even sleeping with brothers if Doc’s suspicions were true. I pushed the circling questions out of my mind, because they could lead to ideas I didn’t need in my head during the meeting.

Doc had elected to vote his shares himself, promising he’d support my bid. That meant he’d be at the meeting, and I welcomed his physical presence in my support. I also expected Mrs. Padgett, though I wasn’t sure now that she’d be there, after our painful discussion at Erin’s door last night. Various other locals who’d given me their proxies had said they’d like to see Egren go down, but others owned businesses and couldn’t take the time away. For the sake of projecting confidence, I dressed carefully that morning to look the part of a successful CEO of a multi-billion dollar enterprise, my goal for the past three years—ever since my purported father had been killed in that car wreck.

I had three hours to kill before the meeting started, and nothing left to be done in preparation. I had already made a detailed plan of what my first tasks would be as CEO. There were department heads that needed to be fired, shaken up or promoted, a construction contract to be voided, public relations announcements to be made, of course. I’d be incredibly busy for the rest of the day and in fact for the foreseeable future. But for three hours I had absolutely nothing to do.

I thought hard about visiting the clinic, trying to talk to Erin, even taking her out for coffee if she’d go. Decided not to, simply because I’d want to spend some time with Max, too, and dog hair on my bespoke suit wasn’t the impression I wanted to make at the meeting. If it didn’t go well, that would be another issue I didn’t need on my hands for the meeting, too.I paced the suite for a while, and finally threw myself down with the USA Today that had been delivered with my room service breakfast.

The ads in the newspaper for jewelry and other traditional Christmas gifts reminded me that the holiday was only a week and a half away, and I had no one with which to spend it. I tore my mind away from that line of thought and paced some more. It was the longest three hours of my life, and that included the vigil in the hospital three years before, while doctors fought unsuccessfully for my dad’s life. At last, it was time to go to the meeting room.

I slipped in at the last possible moment, not wanting to catch Egren’s attention. He was working the room, shaking hands with the other board members and a few shareholders. His demeanor told me he hadn’t yet read the agenda. Good. I wanted to see his face when he did, but I didn’t want to confront him before that. It would spoil the surprise. There was an unpleasant surprise waiting for me in the room, too, I discovered as I surveyed the crowd to see who was here. Ashleigh. What was she doing here? There was no time to find out as Egren took the head of the table and called the meeting to order.

Mechanically and without looking at the agenda, he called for the secretary of the board to read the minutes from the last meeting. Afterward, he called for the motion to accept the minutes. The motion made and seconded, it was time for him to at last look at the agenda for the next item of business. I watched him closely, waiting for him to tumble to what he was reading. My reward was the slow draining of blood from his face as he stared at the paper in his hands, followed quickly by a flush that made him even redder than normal.

“What is the meaning of this?” he demanded, looking around the table at the major shareholders until he found my eyes. “YOU!” he cried.

Now everyone was looking at their agendas and a murmur had started among the spectators in folding chairs that faced the table. Egren fought for control, finding the gavel he seldom used and rapping once for order.

“There is an item on the agenda calling for a vote to oust the current CEO,” he announced, his voice faltering as he uttered the last two words. “I’ll entertain a motion.” It was show time for me. He’d already guessed I was behind it, so there was no point in holding back.

“So moved,” I said.

“Second the motion,” rang out Doc’s gravelly voice.

“All in favor,” Egren ground out.

“AYE!” from around the table, and even some from the floor. Egren sank back into his chair, knowing the outcome before the vote had been counted. As the secretary rounded the table collecting the ballots, Egren watched me pull out more than a dozen proxies. Ashleigh had risen from her seat in the spectator section and was whispering to her father, who nodded. I imagined she was asking him what this meant, or whether I was behind it, if she understood. I couldn’t tell which.

After collecting the ballots at the table, the secretary also collected them from among the spectators, but I knew it wouldn’t matter. My shares, the proxies I’d voted, and Doc’s support would be an overwhelming majority. Egren would be ousted. The next item on the agenda would be a vote to put me in his place, and that vote would go about the same as this one, perhaps with a few of the minor shareholders changing their vote one way or another. They still wouldn’t be able to make a difference except to make my victory more or less overwhelming. We waited, the table silent and the onlookers murmuring softly until the secretary stood and rapped the gavel before announcing the outcome.