The Value of Vulnerability (2 page)

The
second woman iterated: “It’s just a rumour.”

“What? That Jarrell sold the company? Or that Ford Howard is a sociopath?”

Some nervous titters. “Both.”

Sociopath?
Was that how the world saw him?

Brett’s dying.

Still, not an inkling of an emotion the world would deem appropriate.

“Just because Howard
buys up small companies to shred them doesn’t mean he’s a sociopath,” one of other men objected.

“I wouldn’t mind if he showed up,” a woman chuckled. “Sociopath. Predator. Don’t care.
I’ve seen his picture. He’s eye candy.”

M
ore laughter. More relaxed this time.

“Someone would have told us
something
,” one of the men said. “We run this damn’ company!”

“
Xcess is doing great.”

Xcess Technologies
—the little IT company that could, but couldn’t anymore—would be a subsidiary to Braxton Howard Group in less than ten minutes. ‘Excess’ would be a more appropriate spelling, as that was what its previous owner, Jarrell, had been guilty of, both personally and professionally. Ford’s more generous offer several months ago should have been accepted then. But Jarrell, holding out for a sweeter deal, had misjudged his team, his company, the market, and—most notably and foolishly—Ford.

“I can assure you it isn’t,”
retorted a different woman, echoing Ford’s thoughts. “And if BHG has bought us, we’re all done. Jarrell left us to run his baby while he spent the proceeds on women, cars, and coke. We’ve done a bad job of it.”

Smartest person in the room.

“Ford Howard is not going to walk through that door,” the man arguing the point said.

So Ford did.

***

T
here was much forced joviality. Most of these people would be lucky to retain their positions let alone their humour in the storm that was to come. Ford wouldn’t be there to see it, of course, and did not care one way or another.

I
dly, he spun his cellphone on the table, and straightened a little in his chair. “All right. To iterate the detail in the NDAs you have all signed: no announcements until Monday. No point ruining the holiday party for the staff.”

While he voiced this observation for the appearances of kindness, it was in fact m
ere practicality. Security shifts would rotate over the weekend to ensure that soon-to-be-former executives did not raid or sabotage files, but there was no point in making things harder than necessary through a general announcement.

“Will you join us tonight?” one of the
Xcess VPs asked with overblown welcome.

What part of ‘no announcements’
did they miss? He couldn’t be seen there.

Idiots.

Never mind that he had no interest in holiday parties or crowds or people in general.

But all he said was, “I think not.”

He rose, signalling the end, and out they went, with shuffling feet and nervously exchanged glances. Alone, he stood at the window to gaze across Toronto’s downtown core, the south view dazzling from this elevation on the lower edge of College Park. Condominium and office towers, stadiums and busy streets, innumerable cranes marking the ceaseless building boom, and the CN Tower upstaging all else—a bold, brightly lit testimony to engineering brilliance, despite its age.

The vision blurred
as snow started and his focus softened. Sighing ever so slightly . . . it was a disagreeable venting, as in the same moment he wished his conquest netted something
more
, he knew his nature disallowed more than a frustrating sense of mere satisfaction.

Nothing wrong with being satisfied.

True. Besides, Xcess Technologies was a minor conquest, barely worthy o
f acknowledgement let alone something
more
.

What’s wrong with you?

Now, there was a question.

Something was off.

He looked around the boardroom, but there was nothing to account for his unsettled thoughts.

Still on the table, his cell emitted the strains of
Psycho
’s violins. The habitual grimace deepened as he stared at the phone.

Brett’s dying.

The violins stopped. He waited with detached curiosity . . . No signalling beep of voicemail.

Catching up
both phone and overcoat, he subdued his morose thoughts with the same practised ease with which he tamed his cowlick, knowing there would always be the need to repeat the action. Yes, he was disparaging and dismissive of simple joys. Completely reasonable, considering the experiences behind his thirty-three years. Typical stuff. Textbook, really. Three seminal moments . . .

W
ell, that was exceedingly cliché. Things were always in threes. Three acts to a story, three wishes from a genie, three characters in a joke.

Three seminal moments walk into a bar . . .

Of course, it was more than just those moments. It was the lack of positivity in almost every aspect of his life’s history—optimistic and cheerful times that would have eased the impact of those events. No, those three seminal moments had occurred in a fertile environment of dismay on which to rest, survive, and thrive. The agar of his life story.

Dear lord.
His life was not a Petri dish. Was it?

People have always wanted things from you,
his mental litany began. It was a rare but superficial life review that occupied him whenever he felt unsettled, as he did tonight. Clear reminders of why he was the way he was, and why it was utterly reasonable.

At any rate,
exercising emotional economy—
is that what we’re calling it these days?—
served a purpose. He could never be taken in again.

There should be comfort in that thought
. He could not fathom why solace eluded him.

Solace
.

The word shook him as it flew through his mind, shattering the amused and practised superficiality of his life’s review, disturbing dusty recesses where shrouded emotions lay dormant
, where discontent and fear—
yes, fear
—and other flotsam was quietly veiled. But that veil stirred now under the force of that word. And in that dark corner in his mind, he glimpsed the real problem for the first time:

His
discontent stemmed from dislike rather than appreciation for the hardness growing in him, and the fear that in another ten years he would not recognise himself. The fear that in another twenty, he would not even remember that any doubt had disturbed him. And that in some distant future, age and death would find him—the first person in history to utter on his deathbed:
I wish I’d spent more time at the office.

Full stop. An arm through one
coat sleeve.

The hem of the long coat puddled on the carpet tiles as Ford halted all movement.

Damn. Surely it’s not as bleak as all that!

Then w
hy the mental shudder, as if it were the worst possible outcome? Bloody hell. It were as if he was having Stephen King ghostwrite his autobiography.

Well, not quite as terrifying
—as dark—as Poe
, he supposed.

Enough. For whatever reason, he was having a peculiar night
, feeling somehow exposed. Raw. With nothing to account for it. But his mood would settle. It always did.

He
exited the boardroom, speaking briefly to his chief of security before pushing through the door that led to the elevators. As it swung shut behind him, the lock clicked and the light on the security pad turned red.

H
e surveyed the space that main reception occupied. The modern and open layout was unremarkable, though the desk was impressive. Boasting a high front ledge, its imposing bulk squatted before the bank of elevators, immediately intimidating visitors. Ford genuinely admired it. He venerated anything that could intimidate.

Accounts for
my expansive ego
.

The amused
intent of that fell flat.

He glanced at the cell
, thinking of the news it had brought. There was no guarantee it was true, at any rate. As for her, while he might not answer many of her calls, he had unambiguous apathy about the entire relationship.

H
e hadn’t assigned her the
Psycho
ringtone because it was a
good
relationship.

Phone pocketed, h
e waited for an elevator, pensively studying the modish Xcess Technologies logo that graced the front of the desk.

“Hells!”
a disembodied feminine voice muttered distinctly.

Ford looked up sharply.
“Hello?”

A tiny gasp
. A thud, like a head striking wood, and then, “Er, hello.”

He
peered over the ledge, and a face popped into view, poking up from beneath the work-surface edge of the desk. Struck at once by the humour dancing across her features, Ford would later note the large hazel eyes and sensual mouth, but for now, the genial good nature of the woman was the overwhelming characteristic.

“Wow,” she said, staring. “Just . . . wow.”

Ignoring the implied compliment: “Are you alone down there?”

“So far,” she grinned.

It was infectious, that grin, but Ford suppressed the urge to respond in kind. “What are you doing?”

“It’s terribly embarrassing to tell a stranger,” she demurred.

He placed a hand on his chest and bowed slightly. “Ford.”

“Rheum, rheum,” she mimicked a revving engine, and very sexily, too.

He bit the inside of his lower lip. “And you are?”

“Erin.”

“Now we’re not strangers anymore.”

“Thanks, Forrest Gump.” She laughed. “I’m having difficulty.”

“Anything I can help with?” he ungrammatically turned on the charm.

“How are you with stilettos and thigh-highs?”

He rubbed a fingertip over his dark eyebrow. “On or off?”

“Oh, the off was a given,” she
said, gaze flicking over his face and shoulders—all she could see of him from her position—appreciatively. “I rarely dress up, and was trying to keep things to an uncomplicated minimum, but I’m resigned to just not being girly.”

As she pushed herself to her feet in a lissom movement and stepped around the desk, giving him a full view, Ford could not disagree more.

Tall, even without the stilettos, the ankle strap of one unfastened, the woman was the embodiment of what Ford considered feminine. Dark-blonde hair with paler highlights fell in semi-curled waves over her soft shoulders and down her back in long layers, the curling tips brushing toned bare arms. The supple material of her dark-red dress clung to and plunged between full—
luxuriantly full, bury-my-face-in delicious
—breasts, skimmed a narrow waist and flared hips, ending mid-thigh on long, slim legs made, in his opinion, to wrap around and squeeze a man.

His eyes travelled slowly back up, stopping briefly at each of the most interesting points.
“Perhaps ‘girly’ is not so inaccurate a term as you think.”

“Ah, you are too kind.
Except that you’re staring.”

“I’m not likely to apologise for that any time soon. What
were
you doing on the floor?”

“
Just trying to hurry. More haste, less something else. There’s a saying.”

“Speed.”

“Sorry?”

“More haste, less speed.”
He inventoried her assets again, dispassionately categorising them as all physical. Not that it posed a problem. When it came to choosing women, brains were not high on his list of necessities.

“Right. That’s it. Your encyclopedic knowledge of
, um, sayings, must come in handy. Like at parties.”

Startled, he met the
amused hazel eyes that taunted him ever so slightly. He wasn’t hiding his admiration for her physicality, but perhaps he was being more obvious than usual.

“
I’m having the greatest day.” She chuckled, grinning widely. “Anyway, I fell off the chair trying to do up my shoes, and stayed there.” Reaching over the ledge, she retrieved a curling iron.

“Do you always fix yourself at your station at seven in the evening?”

“Oh, it’s not my station. I wanted to borrow Steph’s iron.” She wound a lock of hair around the shaft, held for a moment, and released it into a pretty ringlet. Promptly, she raked her nails through her hair and the ringlet broke apart to disappear into the mass of waves.

“What do you do here?”

“IT.” Another lock received treatment similar to the last.

“I gathered that, being an IT company
.”