Leave It to Cleavage (8 page)

No, nothing about her marriage to Tom felt very entertaining at the moment. She tried to dredge up an image of him posing for a Ballantyne catalogue, but the image just made her want to cry.

Miranda reached out a hand and placed it over her grandmother’s. “I may have to pledge some personal assets to guarantee something at the bank, and I was hoping you’d sign the house on Hilton Head over to me. It’s supposed to be mine on my fortieth birthday, but it would help to have it in my name right now.”

“If it’s money you need, Miranda, all you have to do is ask.”

“I don’t want your money, Gran. I just need to look a little better on paper right now.” At least she intended to back up her claims with
real
assets rather than fake receivables.

“Well, of course, Miranda. That house is yours, and it makes no difference to me when you take possession of it.”

“And you won’t say anything to Mom or Dad.”

“My lips are sealed.” Her grandmother moved her chopsticks toward the remaining piece of pork and smiled as she lifted it to her mouth. “You wouldn’t believe the secrets I can keep.”

Blake took a beer from the refrigerator and went into the family room, where he sank down into the perfectly worn leather recliner. Gus and Andie were in their rooms, and the only noise was the muffled thump of the bass from Andie’s stereo on the other side of the house.

In the relative quiet, Blake eased all the way back in the recliner, toed off his boots, and considered the existing pieces in Miranda Smith’s puzzle.

To date he had one anonymous phone caller, lots of gossip, and Miranda Smith’s sudden interest in her family’s brassiere company—plenty of small things that didn’t add up, but nothing big enough to sink his teeth into.

Of course the Truro grapevine was busy producing all kinds of theories about the state of the Smiths’ marriage. At the Dogwood Café, odds were being laid on how long Tom Smith would stay away and how much his wife might or might not want him back. No one except his anonymous caller actually considered Tom Smith missing.

A troubled marriage wasn’t really a matter for the law. But Blake could do some discreet poking around. He could have a little chat with the bank and the airlines; maybe get in touch with his buddy who handled investigations for Visa and MasterCard. Just a little nosing around to get a feel for the situation. If, in fact, there
was
a situation at all.

Of course, his best potential source of information was Miranda Smith herself. He raised the beer to his lips as he pictured the long legs and the clear green eyes. Then he replayed their encounters at the pool and at church, and the odd look in her eyes when she’d talked about Tom.

Something was going on, that much was clear. And he was just the man to figure out what it was. All he really had to do was put himself in her path, let her know he was watching, and see what happened. He’d be just like that proverbial penny and just keep showing up.

chapter
8

T
he day of her meeting with Fidelity National, Miranda got up at dawn and drove to Atlanta for a 10:00
A
.
M
. hair appointment. She’d prepared for the meeting as best she could; now she needed a new look to go with the corporate image she intended to present. It was critical that she be taken seriously.

By ten-thirty the floor around Miranda’s chair was littered with strands of long dark hair.
Her
long dark hair. Just lying there. No longer attached to her head. She forced her gaze up from the dark piles covering the salon floor to the mirror in front of her. Antonio had pulled out a razor and was wielding it with abandon, transforming her long, heavy locks into a short, businesslike hairstyle—the kind favored by news anchors and corporate VPs—the style she’d asked for and which she now sincerely regretted.

Her gaze stayed fixed on the stranger in the mirror while Antonio spritzed something all over what remained of her hair, poofed up the top layer with his fingers, and whipped the cape off with a flourish.

“Ees really something, no?”

What it was was short. Very short. Miranda swallowed. “It’s really, really . . . something all right.” She swallowed again and told herself that grown women didn’t cry over their hair—at least not in public.

She leaned in toward the mirror and tilted her head from side to side, but her hair was still short. With a last longing glance at the hair she was leaving behind, Miranda followed the stylist to the front desk. Without the familiar weight of hair on her shoulders, she felt naked and exposed. The air tickled her neck and tears pooled in her eyes.

“Ees very stylish. Very
now,
” Antonio enthused.

She nodded, her voice little more than a whisper. “And very, very short.”

“Jes, exactly.” He smiled, pleased, before heading off to greet his next client.

Determined to keep her greater goal in mind, Miranda paid for the haircut and drove to Phipps Plaza in Buckhead, where she made her way to the designer department of Saks.

“I need a suit,” she told the silver-haired saleswoman. “Something corporate but feminine. And I’ll need shoes and a bag to go with it. And I wondered if someone at the Lancôme counter could freshen me up?”

An hour and a half later she was seated in the reception area of the Atlanta office of Fidelity National in a black Armani power suit over a winter white silk blouse. A new Coach bag sat on the floor at her feet next to the matching shoes.

Any minute now she would have to walk into John Anderson’s office and start lying. If she was very lucky and he believed her tall tales, she would then go back to Truro and find a way to make those tales come true.

Miranda reached up to flip her hair over her shoulder in an automatic gesture she’d been making since childhood, but encountered nothing but shoulder. She was still adjusting to her lack of locks when an assistant arrived to escort her to John Anderson’s office.

“John,” she said, extending her hand for a brief, but firm, handshake as the banker came out from behind his desk to greet her. “Thank you for fitting me in today.”

“Glad to do it.” He led her to a seating alcove in the large corner office and motioned her to a chair.

Miranda sank down smoothly, folded her hands in her lap, and continued to maintain eye contact, something John Anderson wasn’t managing so well.

“I was surprised to hear from you rather than your husband.” He raised his gaze from her legs. “What can I do for you?”

Careful not to fidget, Miranda tilted her head and gave her version of the truth. “Tom is in China establishing suppliers for a new line we’re considering producing. We felt it made more sense for him to stay until everything’s set up satisfactorily, rather than waste time and money flying back and forth.”

As she spoke, she modulated her voice and controlled the speed of her delivery, being careful not to speak so fast as to appear nervous, or so slow as to appear uncertain.

“Very sensible.”

She smiled. “He’s asked me to keep things running while he’s away. You know, my husband and I met at Emory while we were working on our MBAs.”

“I didn’t realize . . .”

“Many of the decisions made at Ballantyne since my father retired have been made jointly by Tom and me.”

She didn’t mention that those decisions had been about wallcoverings and carpet. After all, she’d had better grades than Tom all the way through college, and her MBA carried just as much weight.

“I’m here because there’s a problem with some of our receivables.”

The banker looked surprised. “Yes, I sent a letter to your husband a couple of weeks ago stating our concerns.”

“I know.” She smiled again and managed not to mention where and in what condition she’d found the letter. She reached up to toss her hair, but, of course, it was no longer tossable.

“When I noticed the auditors were due next week, I decided to take a look at the receivables myself.” She smiled yet again and moved to the crux of the visit. “I called all the accounts to verify the amounts and the dating.” She paused and allowed concern to show on her face. “I’m afraid quite a few of them are having difficulty paying for the goods they received.”

Once again he looked surprised by her admission. Walking into a lender and admitting to bad receivables was highly irregular. But not quite as irregular—or dangerous—as the bank discovering those receivables had never actually existed.

“I’ve contacted all of them to work out repayment plans,” she continued. “But I don’t want our line of credit jeopardized.” She paused but kept her gaze locked with his. “I’ve come prepared to pledge personal assets to secure it.”

Surprise flashed over the banker’s features again. Miranda smiled and mentally crossed her fingers. For a moment she was back on a pageant stage waiting to hear the emcee call her name for the final five. When she thought she might pass out from holding her breath, the banker’s face cleared and he smiled back at her.

“Actually,” he said. “You’ve just made my life easier.” He lowered his voice to a confidential tone. “One of our largest borrowers is experiencing a severe financial crisis, and I need to send a full team of auditors to deal with it. Perhaps now that we’ve clarified your position, I can postpone your audit until their situation is resolved.”

Miranda smiled and uncrossed, happy to see someone else receiving the bank’s full attention.

“Why don’t I get the paperwork started on the pledging of those assets?” Anderson asked. “Then I’ll be in touch again when we’re ready to reschedule.”

“Yes.” Miranda stood and smiled again, barely managing to restrain her relief. “That would be fine.”

She wanted to pump a fist into the air and do a victory dance on John Anderson’s desk. Instead, she extended her hand in parting and made a graceful exit, being especially careful not to kick up her heels on the way out the door.

Miranda’s euphoria was brief and didn’t survive her meeting with Dana Houseman, Attorney-at-Law.

Somewhere in her mid-fifties, Ms. Houseman wore a conservative gray suit and sensible black shoes. Her makeup was minimal and she had a calm, understated manner. But her brown eyes gleamed with intelligence and her voice rang with authority as she gave Miranda a quick education on the way the world worked.

“I’ll need ten thousand now and another ten thousand if we go to trial. And I’d like to put Harrison Maples on—he’s our best PI—to track down your husband. That’ll probably take another five thousand to start. The total will depend on whether your husband actually left the country or not. And how seriously he’s hiding.”

The attorney jotted notes on her legal pad and sat forward in her desk chair. “The law
does
provide means to obtain a divorce whether your husband is ever seen again or not, but what we really want is to find him, serve him with papers, and haul his rear end into court so that we can watch him try to explain his actions to a judge.”

Miranda definitely wanted to see Tom suffer, but she didn’t necessarily want him surfacing until she’d gotten things under control at Ballantyne. What if she were in the middle of turning things around and he just showed up?

Dana Houseman speared her with a look that made her glad they were on the same side. “You need to understand that as long as he’s running around out there he can show up and lay claim to half your business. Or do more damage to it. Or incur debt that you could be held responsible for. And if, as you’ve indicated, he’s committed fraud in your company’s name, you want to make sure he’s the one who’s punished for it.”

Miranda looked over at Dana Houseman and sensed the attorney was just warming up.

“And
that’s
assuming he’s alive, Mrs. Smith. If he isn’t, you could be looking at a whole other can of worms . . .”

“Yes, well.” Miranda swallowed. “I can see why finding him would be a good idea.” She smiled, but could feel the lack of wattage. The thought of actually seeing and speaking to Tom again felt completely alien and unimaginable. She’d been picturing him sunning on some Caribbean beach, but he could in fact be anywhere. Or nowhere.

Standing, Miranda slung her purse over her shoulder and leaned over to shake hands with the attorney. “I’ll have a check out to you as soon as possible,” she promised.

Just as soon as she figured out where to find the money.

In the rental car on the way back to Truro, Miranda compiled a mental list of things she needed to accomplish. All she had to do was convince the department heads she was working under Tom’s auspices, come up with a scathingly brilliant plan for saving Ballantyne before Fidelity National showed up to do their audit, and find a ton of money to pay her new attorney and PI while appearing as normal as possible.

At this point it was the
normal
that was going to be the biggest challenge. Normal would require her to conduct Guild Ball committee meetings and her Rhododendron Prep group at the high school as if she didn’t have a care in the world.

Normal
.

It had a nice ring to it. If only she could remember how it felt.

Andie Summers slung a sweaty towel over her shoulder and wiped her face with one end. She’d shot something like a hundred free throws and spent another forty-five minutes working on her layup in preparation for Saturday’s game against Claymore, and she was soaked through.

Tossing the towel out of the way, she dribbled down the court, automatically moving in at an angle to the basket to take her shot. The court was the one place she knew exactly what she was about; the rest of the time she felt like she was on a really bumpy roller-coaster and couldn’t get off.

Her dad and great-grandpa meant well, but neither of them was exactly qualified to teach her how to deal with all the confusing things she was feeling. If she tried to explain it, her father would get that panicky look on his face and hand her some kind of booklet like the one titled
Now That You’re A Woman
that he’d whipped out when she started her period. Her great-grandfather would make her tea and tell her not to worry. Both of them made complete fools of themselves whenever they were confronted with evidence that she was a girl.