For All the Wrong Reasons (15 page)

“Can we talk about your clothes, Mrs. Foxton?”

“You can call me Diana. And yes, you can.” She waited proudly for the compliments she knew were about to flow almost against his will. It must kill Cicero to give her compliments. “Go ahead.”

“They aren't suitable for the office.”

Diana started. Had she heard him right? But yes, he was standing across from her with folded arms and a direct, frank black stare.

“What's wrong with how I'm dressed, Michael?”

He paused. Actually, he hadn't taken the time to stop and analyze it. Her neckline wasn't low-cut, and her skirt reached to below the knee. The silk fabric clung sensuously to every inch of her, but you couldn't see anything. Maybe she was actually old-fashioned enough to wear a slip, or maybe she just wasn't wearing panties. Oh hell. Now his groin was starting to miraculously recover. Stop thinking like that, Cicero, he lectured himself sternly.
Cut that out.

“Your shoes,” he said, grasping at a straw. “Strappy sandals aren't good for office attire. And I prefer Mr. Cicero, Diana.”

FOURTEEN

Diana struggled to keep her cool. “You prefer to be called
what?
”

“Mr. Cicero. This is my company, and I'm the president. I like a formal attitude; it promotes respect.”

The big brute was staring her down. He was deadly serious. Diana wondered angrily if she should go back to Mrs. Foxton, but she didn't want to look childish. Blast him!

“If you have a formal office dress code,
Mr. Cicero,
you should have told me that before I got into work. Then I could have conformed to it,” she shot back.

Michael suppressed a smile of admiration. She was quick on her feet for a spoiled brat. But he wasn't going to give her her head—Michael was the boss here, and he had guys ten years older than he was reporting to him now. It was vital to maintain control, otherwise things would start slipping. And he didn't like it when things started doing that.

“We do have a formal dress code,” he replied, “but you're right, we don't have it written up. You can bring a dictation pad into my office after you've made my coffee. And that'll be your first task as my assistant. You'll meet the other people you'll be reporting to later.”

“Other people? I thought I was your assistant,” Diana said, bleakly.

She had the most awful feeling that this job wasn't going to be nearly as much fun as she'd anticipated.

“You're one of them—the most junior, as I said, a Girl Friday. Susan is my senior assistant, so you'll answer her phones when she's busy, make her coffee, and do whatever filing and photocopying she needs. She'll show you where all of that stuff is.”

“Great,” said Diana, with heavy sarcasm that Michael totally ignored.

“Follow me. I'll show you the kitchen.”

Diana made a face at Cicero's broad back as she teetered behind him toward the kitchen. It was functional like the rest of the space and absolutely tiny. She hadn't seen a kitchen this small since she was sharing a flat with her girlfriends back in London.

“Here's the microwave, the coffee machine, tea, coffee, and cookies. I keep milk and half and half in the fridge, employees can put their personal foods in there too, if they have bagels, or whatever. One of your duties is to keep the kitchen clean and nicely stocked. Our budget is forty dollars a week for everything, so keep within that. Mugs are up here.”

“Where's the dishwasher?” Diana asked, horrified. He was telling her she had to clean up a kitchen?

“There isn't one. You'll do all that yourself. Mostly you won't spend much time in the kitchen, though.”

“Good,” Diana said faintly.

“You'll be too busy filing and typing.”

Diana steadied herself. Was it her imagination, or were her shoes already starting to hurt? She couldn't take much more of this, and the day hadn't even started yet. But Cicero was looking at her—in these heels, he was maybe an inch shorter than she was, but it still felt like he was looking down at her—like he was trying to hide a smile at her dismay, like he expected her to quit any second.

Diana was spoiled and lazy, but she was also extremely stubborn. Her pride made her lift her head as she smoothed down her dress.

“Sounds good.”

“So we'll get to it. Fix me a coffee, and one for yourself if you want, and then come down to my office at the end of the hall, and we'll make a start.”

“Right,” Diana agreed.

She watched him as he turned sharply on one heel and marched off down the corridor. I hate him, she thought. Resentfully, she switched on the percolator and started to fish around for the filter cups. Thank God Felicity could not see her now. It was all
too
humiliating.

*   *   *

Ernie had invited her over out of curiosity. He dealt with prying industry reporters every day, and he knew veiled insinuations when he heard them. This Felicity woman, a good-looking bird, one of Diana's crowd, he vaguely remembered her. It was weird for a woman to call a man out of the blue, wasn't it? Anyway, Ernie enjoyed gossip. He had closed some good deals from indiscreet tidbits from wives. Who was this Felicity hitched to? He couldn't recall. But Mira had not called this morning—probably disciplining some other guy, the hot little slut—so Ernie had time to muck about.

He had Consuela prepare a lavish breakfast and serve it out on Diana's recently landscaped terrace. He dismissed her, and settled down to wait. You didn't need the servants listening in when business was being discussed. Little bastards might go out and place orders with some online broker and make money off your insider info. Ernie didn't know if Consuela's English was up to that, but he didn't propose to take any chances. He had got rich by following a number of principles, one of which was to never take anything for granted, and another of which was never to trust a soul.

Felicity was ushered onto the roof terrace about forty minutes later, and Ernie was not disappointed. She was a lean little madam, much more in the standard New York style than his Diana, whippet-thin with glossy platinum hair, and a sharp, short dress in cranberry silk matched up with—nice—steep stilettos. They could do some serious damage walking up and down his back. Ernie could almost feel the sharp heels in his skin. His groin stirred mildly. He was intrigued.

“Felicity, nice to see you again. Take a seat.”

Dreadful accent, Felicity thought, sitting down and making sure to leave him a high view of her thighs, grasped at the top by viciously strong thigh-highs. She
was
wearing panties, if you could call a see-through Calvin Klein thong panties. What a delicious pad they had here. Quite wasted on an English country girl like little Diana.

“What a stunning garden. Diana really excelled herself,” she cooed as she settled opposite him.

“Yeah, I s'pose she did. Want a juice?”

Ernie lifted the pitcher of squeezed blood oranges and made to pour them for her. He felt slightly adrift; he didn't know quite the right thing to say, the way Di always did. This girl's sharp spikes were in his face, though. He couldn't concentrate. Ernie glanced admiringly at her long talons, blood-red, just like Mira Chen's. Mmmh. Not bad.

“Thank you. I suppose you're wondering why I've come?”

“The thought had crossed my mind. Though it's a pleasure to see you,” Ernie added, as gallantly as he could.

“I hope—I hope you won't think I'm being forward if I asked you to keep what I tell you in the strictest confidence,” Felicity purred.

Ernie perked up. Good, she
was
gonna spill the beans on something valuable.

“Not in the least. I'm very discreet, and I like my friends to be, too. As far as I'm concerned this nice breakfast never happened.”

“I hoped you'd see it like that,” Felicity murmured. “To be honest, I didn't know who else I should turn to. But I'm rather worried about dear Diana, and I thought you should know what people are saying.”

Ernie's brows knitted together and he leaned forward on his wrought-iron seat. “And what, exactly, are people saying, Felicity?”

*   *   *

Ernie stormed into his office, flinging his coat at a quailing Marcia.

“What's the schedule for today?” he demanded.

“You have Goldman Sachs at ten thirty, lunch with Dom Floyd from—”

“Never mind. Just print it off and bring it in here. With coffee. And hurry up,” Ernie snapped.

“Yes, sir.”

“And get me last month's sales breakdown by region. What are you waiting for?”

Marcia sensed his mood and fled with a muttered apology. Ernie slammed his inner door and flung himself into his dark leather chair, spinning as it swiveled, murderously angry.

Thankfully Felicity had had the sense actually to come to him. What would he have done if she hadn't told him what was going on? Ernie loved gossip; but he absolutely hated gossip that was directed at him. What bloody right did Diana have to go around whining and mouthing off to a bunch of New York tarts like Jodie Goodfriend and Natasha Zuckerman? Their husbands would be laughing at him over lunch at their clubs today. Probably by now the story had gone all around New York. Ernie had no doubt at all that he'd be reading about it in the gossip columns at some stage this week. He looked out of his huge windows at the stone forest of midtown. Full of people who might be reading about him … discussing him …
laughing
at him.

Ernie had found it hard going at first, climbing the New York ladder. His social life had been the answer. Diana and Ernie, the new golden couple in town. I'm a good husband, Ernie thought. She spends for England and I never say a word, but the first little problem, and she's washing our dirty laundry in some downtown cafe, making me look ridiculous.

He could just see the headlines. “‘
PRINCESS
'
DIANA IN MARRIAGE MESS
!” His lovely facade shattered for no reason. It wasn't like Diana actually enjoyed sex, or that he'd showed her up in public—he'd never taken Mira to any of their habitual restaurants, or squired the bitch to some public function. If Diana felt she'd had a problem, she could have come to him, couldn't she? But noooooo, Ernie thought, angrily, to himself. Not to me, to some clique of witches, which is as good as taking out a front-page ad in the
New York Times.

He swiveled around on his ergonomic chair and sipped his fragrant coffee, served up by Marcia in a Limoges cup. It did nothing to soothe him. What were riches and power if you looked ridiculous?

In five minutes of brooding, Ernie had convinced himself that he was the victim. He was the one who had been played falsely. That silly little cow. Diana was a fucking embarrassment.

He pulled a report on distribution out of his desk drawer and went through it with a yellow magic marker, slashing whole sections and finding extra places where they could lay off workers and boost profits. How this frigging company had survived so long without going under was a mystery to him. It carried so much fat, and for what? For a so-called gilt-edged reputation? The only thing he wanted around him gilt-edged was his stocks, Ernie mused. Anyway. Back to the current problem, one more damn thing he had to worry about. He had a PR department here that took care of press problems for him, and it was highly paid and effective. Diana was his at-home PR department, except that she'd now be getting him exactly the kind of attention he spent a fortune avoiding.

Why couldn't she be more understanding? That was the question. Ernie brooded angrily. Marcia came back in with the sales report and he snatched it from her without a word. Who was Diana kidding, exactly? There had been an unspoken agreement between them from day one as to what this marriage was going to be. It wasn't that many girls who were kept in the lap of luxury without ever having to lift a finger, was it? Sex with Diana had been OK at first, but it was boring as hell now. She wasn't a fit match for him.

I work
hard
to keep that little cow in the style of a fucking movie star, Ernie thought. Least I should be entitled to is a little fun. All on the down note, no scandal, nothing.

He thought of Felicity. She was a good mate, that girl. Felt he should be warned, but didn't say a word against Diana. She'd made lots of jokes, like she didn't believe the story Diana dreamed up, but if it was true, who really cared? What had she said? “A wife does one job, a mistress another. That may seem very European to you, I suppose—” and laughed. Ernie wasn't sure exactly where the Yanks got the idea that in Europe every married man had a mistress and it was socially acceptable—from what he could tell it was exactly the opposite—it was the New York way of doing things. But he liked Felicity's joke, and he agreed with her. Got her head screwed on, that broad. Who was she married to? Couldn't recall. Come to think of it, he didn't recall a wedding ring either. He'd have to look her up. Marcia kept a Rolodex out there with a few choice facts about everybody he knew. That way, if Joe Bloggs called, he could ask about baby Janie Bloggs or his recent fly-fishing vacation in Canada and give a good impression of somebody who actually gave a fuck.

He thought he might give Felicity a little Rolex. Just a thank you. At least he had a chance of containing the damage now. Yesterday night he'd felt bad when Diana asked him about it. Now, wounded, angry, victimized, Ernie burned with indignation. He'd have to have a little heart-to-heart with her and lay down the law.

“Marcia,” he said, pressing his buzzer to the outer office. “get me Mira Chen on the phone. See if you can fit in a PR meeting with her about five
P.M.
”

“Yes, Mr. Foxton,” Marcia said, carefully neutral.

Ernie breathed out. It was the best he'd felt all day. And anyway, if Diana didn't like it, it was his way or the highway.