Out Of Love Part 32

"Mom . . ." Her mouth suddenly dry, she got up and ran herself a gla.s.s of water from the tap. With her back turned, she continued. "I never said anything about dating women because it never mattered before. There wasn't anyone I cared about this much."

"Judith, don't stand there and tell me you care about some woman"-she said the word with contempt-"more than you do about your only brother."

"I think I already know how you feel about this sort of thing.

It's going to take some time to get used to, but-"

"I'm not going to get used to it. It's not natural."

219.

"It is for me, Mom. It's the only thing that is." She took her seat again at the table, but this time, slumped back in her chair.

"You were married to Kevin."

"I know. That seemed right to me at the time, but it wasn't."

"How do you know? If you had stayed with him, you wouldn't be so confused."

The obvious retort, which Judith suppressed, was if she had stayed with him, she would have moved to Boston. "I'm not confused, Mom. This is who I really am."

Halina just shook her head, not making eye contact at all. "It's not who I raised you to be."

"No, but sometimes I feel that you raised me to be Victor's caretaker." She could see that her words stung, but the issue of Victor-and not her s.e.xuality-was what she needed to confront with her mother. "I love Victor. You know I do. And I've been there for him my whole life. That isn't going to change because I'm in love with a woman."

"It will if you're never here."

"I will be here, Mom. But I need you to step up when I can't be. Whether you agree or not with my choice, I deserve to be happy with somebody I love. It's not fair for you to ask me to give that up for Victor."

A cold silence followed, which Judith took as her cue to leave.

That was a lot to dump on her mother, and they both needed time to think about it.

"I want you to come with me tomorrow to pick him up. I'll call and ask them to have him ready to go so we won't even have to go inside."

Halina's expression of angst hadn't changed. Nor did her resolve not to speak.

"And by the way, Mom . . . her name's Carmen. Carmen Delallo. It would have been nice if you'd asked."

220.

Bed . . . hotel . . . j.a.pan. Bits and pieces of information filled in the blanks in Carmen's head as she jerked herself awake.

Phone . . . Tuesday . . .

"h.e.l.lo."

After a beep, Cathy's voice broke through, followed by an echo of her words.

"What? Hold on." She sat up and turned on the light. Six thirty, which meant it was six thirty p.m. back in Chicago. She slapped the speakerphone b.u.t.ton and ran both hands through her hair. "Good morning."

"To you. Lenore's here with me, but we're about to go home."

"What are you guys doing there so late?"

"Something happened we thought you should know about."

"This doesn't sound good."

"It's not," Cathy said. "I'm going to let Lenore tell you about it."

Her bladder was screaming. She would have gone to the bathroom had it been just Cathy. But her vice president war-ranted a show of decorum.

"Carmen?"

"Hi, Lenore. What's up?"

"I got a call on my cell phone today from Art Conover."

"That a.s.shole. Let me guess. He wanted you to persuade me to sell him the company."

"No . . . actually, he wanted me to come work for him. And he offered me a lot of money."

Carmen felt the muscles in her chest and arms tighten.

Losing Lenore to Art Conover would be a body blow. "And what did you tell him?"

"I told him my cell phone was for my private use, and to please tell whoever gave him the number not to do it again."

She blew out a breath of relief. Whatever she had done to earn the loyalty of her staff, she was glad she had. "I appreciate 221 that, Lenore. And I appreciate you." And she was infinitely thankful she had made her vice president before this ever came up.

"I know, Carmen. I'm happy where I am. But there's more, I'm afraid."

"More?"

"I'm not sure, but I think he talked to Raul too."

Raul leaving would gut them, especially in the middle of the transition project. "What do you mean you're not sure?"

"I'm really not. I was with him in the break room when his cell phone rang. He didn't take the call, but I heard him ask Richard who had that area code. It was the same one as when Art called me."

"Dallas?"

"Yeah."

"I guessed I shouldn't be surprised." She heard mumbling on the other end of the line.

"Cathy says to remind you about the no compete clause. Raul signed one, didn't he?"

Right, the no compete. "Yes, everyone did. Cathy has them in the personnel files." No one in her company could just leave and go to work for Art. They all had signed agreements not to work for an industry compet.i.tor for a period of two years after leaving TDG.

"So we're safe, right?"

"Yeah, except two years from now it may not matter. We need to head this off, or we're all going to be looking for work."

"That's more or less what Art told me. You want me to talk to Raul? Remind him about the clause?"

"Not just Raul. Call a full staff meeting for tomorrow and tell them you heard from Art."

"You want everyone to know about this?"

"He may be talking to everybody-Richard, Kristy, all the a.s.sistants. Tell them they might get a call, and if they do, they 222 should mention the no compete clause in their contracts. If he's going to play hardball, he's going to have to play it with me, not my staff."

"Good enough. How are things going in Tokyo?"

"I have two contracts to write today, and one more tomorrow.

Then my plane leaves at three."

"And you'll be back in the office on Thursday?"

"Physically. No telling where my head will be."

"Cathy says bye."

"Bye to both of you. Thanks for staying late to call."

She hung up and went straight to the bathroom. The idea of hiring a hit man to take out Art Conover was growing on her.

She sure picked a h.e.l.l of a time to travel halfway around the world. Art Conover was poaching her staff, and Brooke was clamoring for attention. And all Carmen seemed to want was more time with Judith.

She turned on the shower and went back into the bedroom to lay out her clothes for the day. She needed to finish these contracts and get back home. Judith would arrive on Friday night, and they weren't going to worry about anything but each other for two whole days.

She drew a small bottle of prescription pills from her purse.

She hadn't taken one of these in over three years, not since her niece died. Back then, the stress of Susanna's declining health and eventual death had twisted her chest into a permanent knot.

Screw Art Conover, she thought angrily as she stepped into the steamy spray. If he thought she was just going to hand over her life's work, he had another think coming. She was the industry leader because she knew the business better than anyone else, she worked harder and she surrounded herself with the best people. That's what her clients expected, not some off-the-rack book of numbers.

And what was up with Brooke? For the first time in her life, Carmen found herself actually wanting to say no to Brooke.

223.

Cathy had teased her about it at first, but hit it right on the nose when she pointed out that it probably had everything to do with feeling guilty that she hadn't told her about Judith.

"By the way, did I happen to mention my new girlfriend looks just like you? No, not just a little bit. A lot, actually." Carmen cranked up the hot water in the shower. "But it's not like I'm pretending to make love to you or anything. It's all just a coinci-dence. Well, yes. I was in love with you, but not like that . . .

because you weren't like that. If you had been like that, I could have loved you like that . . . but you weren't . . . so I didn't."

She had no idea how Brooke was going to take the news, and no clue about how to break it to her without her feelings becoming transparent. Maybe it was time to finally come clean, to tell her how she had felt all these years. That was ironic, telling her now that it didn't matter anymore. Why hadn't she done it when she got involved with Kim? Life would have been so much simpler.

"Because you would have left Kim in a New York minute if Brooke had even waggled her finger in your direction."

She just had to hope their friends.h.i.+p was strong enough that Brooke could handle the awkwardness of knowing she had been the object of l.u.s.t for thirty years. Maybe now she would understand why Carmen had practically run out of the room every time she had started to change clothes, or why she had always preferred sleeping on the couch to sharing a bed.

"But I don't need you anymore, you see. I've replaced you with a look-alike, my own personal Brooke Healey doll."

She finished rinsing and turned off the spray. Her words dis-gusted her. That wasn't how she felt about Judith. It was why she had noticed her initially, but it wasn't why she fell in love.

She wrapped in the hotel's oversized robe and stepped out, going straight to the bedroom to find her phone.

"Amie? It's Carmen. Is your mom there?"

She rubbed the towel through her hair and tossed it back into 224 the bathroom. She could hear conversation in the background. It was stupid not to have told Amie this was costing her about three dollars a minute.

"Hi, stranger . . . Yeah, I'm sorry I've been so busy. Let's try for dinner next week." Brooke had other ideas, pumping her for when she got back in town. "No, I've got some fires to put out at work when I get back. How about Monday night?" She wrapped one arm around her midsection, s.h.i.+vering against the cool air.

"Of course I miss you. I can't wait to see you."

They finalized arrangements to meet at their favorite restaurant and said good-bye. Then she dialed again and waited. In moments, Judith's voice came on the line.

"Someone in Tokyo is thinking about you." The feeling of relief was instant. "I love you . . . No, I only have a minute, but I wanted to hear your voice before I headed out. You have no idea how much I needed it . . . It's mostly stuff going on at work. I'll tell you about it tonight, but you just made it all better."

They traded sweet words and she hung up. It was as if she could actually feel the tightness in her chest begin to dissipate.

She reached for the bottle of pills again, squeezed it and dropped it back into her purse. Yes, she was feeling better already.

225.

Chapter 18.

Judith moaned as the last waves of her o.r.g.a.s.m receded. "That was a nice surprise."

"You didn't expect to come?" Carmen eased herself upward, allowing the d.i.l.d.o to slip out of her.

"I didn't know what to expect. I thought since I was wearing it, you would be the one . . ."

"When I wear it, you can expect to be face down across the coffee table." Carmen loosened the strap of the harness and tugged, prompting Judith to lift her hips so it could be removed.

"But it's always going to be about your pleasure."