The Guest List (33 page)

Peter Aaron Kelly looked around his suite of offices and grinned. He’d done it. He made it happen. And he’d pulled it off right on schedule. He patted himself on the back as he made his way into the private lavatory that was as big as his family’s living room back in Idaho.

Pete, as he liked to be called, stared at his reflection in the huge plate-glass mirror that took up one entire wall of his private bathroom. He straightened the knot in his tie. Not just any knot but a Windsor knot. He loved Windsor knots because they looked so neat and finished. The suit wasn’t half-bad either. Custom-made Armani that draped his lanky frame to perfection. Not that he normally wore such attire, but it was a special day, and he owed it to his people to look his best. If he showed up in his jeans, a washed-out, ragged Berkeley tee shirt, and his tattered baseball cap, no one would take him seriously. The power suit and the Windsor knot shrieked,
PAY ATTENTION.

The eight-hundred-pound gorilla and founder of PAK
Industries continued to study himself in the mirror. No one would ever call him handsome. Nor would they say he was cute. Articles, and there were hundreds of them, said he was interesting. One even said he was chameleon-like, whatever the hell that meant. Those same articles then fast forwarded to his financials and more or less said he could be ugly as sin because no one cared, and with all that money in the bank, he was the CIC. His secretary had to translate that for him. CIC, she said, meant Cat in Charge. If he wanted to, he could start purring right then. He laughed at the thought.

“Hey, Pete, you in here somewhere?” his longtime motherly secretary shouted from the doorway. Pete ran a loose ship, and as long as the work got done, he didn’t care who wore what or who said what. Familiarity in the workplace worked for everyone’s comfort zone.

“Just checking my tie, Millie. Do you need me for something?”

Hands on her plump hips, Millie stared at ther boss. “Well, would you look at you! You want some advice?”

“No, but that isn’t going to stop you. Spit it out.”

“You look silly. Ditch the duds and go back to being you. You only get dressed up like that when you go to funerals. Did someone die, and you forgot to tell me? We always send flowers or a fruit basket. By the way, some personal mail just came for you. I put it on your desk earlier while you were getting dressed. I think it’s the third request for your RSVP in regard to your alma mater’s fund-raiser. You might want to take care of that.”

Pete walked over to his desk to see a large, cream-colored square envelope with the return address of his alma mater. Millie was right, he needed to get on the stick and make a decision one way or the other.

“Well? So, who died?”

He was off-balance. Just the sight of the cream-colored envelope and the return address rushed him back to another part
of his life. A part of his life he didn’t want to deal with just then. “No one died. I’m dressed like this for the ten o’clock meeting. Then I have that photo op with Senator what’s-his-name. I still don’t know how I got roped into that.” His voice was so cool, so curt, Millie drew back and closed the door. She rushed around the floor warning everyone that the boss had his knickers in a twist and was all dressed up. Something was going on. The entire floor huddled as they tried to understand why the boss would attend a meeting in a suit and tie even though he was going to have his picture taken later. Peter Aaron Kelly didn’t give a damn about suiting up for photo ops. Everyone in the whole world knew that.

“And,” Millie said importantly, “the boss is wearing Armani and not his regular hand-stitched Hugo Boss funeral attire. Something is definitely going down this morning. He’s chipper, though, so it must be a good thing. Well, he was chipper until the mail came,” Millie muttered as an afterthought.

While Pete’s staff whispered among themselves, he was busy ripping open the envelope Millie had left for him. She was right, he had twenty-four hours to say yea or nay. Even at that late date they were still willing to have him as their guest speaker if he would commit. “Well, boys and girls, I don’t see that happening anytime soon. I’ll send you a check, and we’ll call it square.” To make himself feel better, he scribbled off a sizable check and tossed it in the drawer with the invitations. Millie would take care of it. He’d have her send off an e-mail or overnight letter nixing the speaking gig.

Screw it all. Now he was in a cranky mood. He flopped down on his custom-made chair, whose leather was butter soft, and propped his feet on the desk. He had fifteen minutes to, as his mother used to put it, woolgather. He made a mental note to ask her if she still used that expression.

Pete opened the drawer again and reached for the invitation. He twirled the cream-colored square in his hands. Maybe he should go back. So what if he’d made a promise to himself
never
to do so. People broke promises all the time, especially when the person made the promise to himself.

As the minute hand on his watch crawled forward, Pete slid the invitation back into the top drawer of his desk along with the two previous invitations. Maybe he’d think about it later. ot too much later, he cautioned himself. The reunion was across the country in two days.