A Promise to Cherish Page 5

  By the time she left the office, her nerves were at the breaking point. She arrived at her townhouse tired, angry, and depressed. In the front foyer she stripped off her shoes and pantyhose and left them lying in a heap. There was something about bare feet that seemed to take the stress off her head.

  In the rear-facing kitchen she reached unseeingly into the refrigerator for a peach, and sank her teeth into it while roaming over to the sliding glass door and staring at her tiny private patio, fantasizing about calling the Human Rights Commission to complain that she was being discriminated against. But what could the complaint be? That Old Fat wanted to make her vice-president and give her a raise but she was declining the offer? There was nothing illegal about Thorpe’s ploy to make his firm eligible as a minority contractor. It was only unethical! And Lee adamantly refused to be his patsy in the scheme.

  She prowled the living room, heaping curses on Old Fat’s fat head! Spying the newspaper, she checked the Kansas City Star, but as she’d suspected, no one wanted estimators. The Construction Bulletin turned up nothing more, and Lee’s depression grew.

  Sitting on the floor, her back to the sofa, she crossed her arms over upraised knees and rested her forehead there. The peach pit grew warm and slippery in her hand. She raised her head wearily and propped her chin on an arm, studying the precision pleats of the off-white custom-made draperies she was still paying off in monthly installments.

  She’d worked so hard to get this place. She brushed a hand over the thick nap of the rich, rust carpet. She’d bought the townhouse only six months ago, and though she had a long way to go before it was completely decorated, she loved the furniture she’d managed to buy so far. She had modest dreams of adding decorator items piece by piece, of completing the finishing touches as she could afford them.

  She sighed, slunk low onto her tailbone, and caught the nape of her neck on the cushion of the tuxedo sofa, which was covered with an arresting Mayan design of rich, deep earth tones, its soft depths strewn with plump matching cushions. Lee’s eyes moved to the spots where she wanted side chairs.

  But the room made her suddenly feel lonelier than ever. She studied the plants in the baskets, willing them to grow faster and fill up the extra space. Her eyes moved next to the only other item the room possessed—a loosely strung God’s-eye on the wall behind the sofa, its rust, brown and ecru yarns so inexpertly stretched around the crossed dowels, that there could be no question it had been done by a child’s hand.

  Yes, the room was decidedly bare and lonely, but it was a beginning, and if she lost her job, she would lose this too.

  Dejected, she wandered back to the kitchen, threw out the peach pit, rinsed off her hands and opened the refrigerator again only to find herself, some two minutes later, still staring into its almost empty space, remembering a day when she had shuffled and rearranged, trying to make room for family leftovers.

  She closed the door on her memories, wishing the judge could see now what she’d made of herself since she’d faced him in court. Carrying a quart of milk onto the patio, she sank into a webbed lounge chair and drank the remainder of her supper right out of the red and white carton, too dispirited to care if it was in a glass or not.

  It was much later when she finally plodded upstairs. The second floor of the townhouse had two bedrooms and a bath. As she neared the door of the smaller room, she slowed. Stopping, she reached inside and switched on the light. A pair of twin beds with heavy pine headboards took up the far wall. Between them stood a matching chest of drawers whose rich, dark wood looked richer against the bright scarlet carpet, but whose top was bare—nothing there but a lamp and an unopened box of paper tissues. Still, the room was completely decorated. The bedspreads and draperies were crisp and new, with an all-over design of NFL insignias in a blaze of basic colors. On the wall beside one bed hung two Kansas City Chiefs pennants.

  Lee studied the room sullenly, biting back tears that stung her eyes, feeling again the frustrating sense of unfairness that she could never shake at the thought of the boys.

  She counted the days.

  A brown and white cat padded silently into the room and preened his fur against Lee’s ankle.

  “Oh, P. Ewing, you’ve been on the bed again, haven’t you?”

  Lee looked down, watched the cat move sinuously against her, then crossed to one of the beds to plump its pillow and smooth the spread. On her way out she scooped up the cat, buried her face in his fur, and reached for the light switch. But she paused in the doorway and turned, assessing the silent room once more. “Oh, P. Ewing, what if I lose my job?” she lamented. “I’ll have to give up this place.”

  ON Friday morning Lee was working on a bid for a simple sewer and water installation in Overland Park, which would service an area where a shopping mall was to be built. The bid letting was scheduled for two that afternoon. These last few hours were always the worst. The phone constantly jangled with calls from salesmen giving last minute quotes on materials, from reinforced concrete pipe to catch basin castings. She’d just received a price quote on sod replacement which was several cents under the previous low bidder and was recomputing the labor subcontract cost when the phone rang. Preoccupied, fingers still flying over the calculator buttons, Lee reached unconsciously for the receiver, cradling it between shoulder and ear as her eyes continued scanning a column of numbers.

  A moment later she realized she’d picked up a call meant for F.A. A smooth, masculine voice was saying, “. . . can come to terms on that twelve-inch reinforced concrete pipe we’ve had laying around the yard. The flaws are in the reinforcing, not in the concrete itself, so it’d be mighty tough to detect.”

  F.A. chuckled, then returned in a silky tone, “And we’ll split the difference right up the middle?”

  Horrified, Lee jerked the receiver away from her ear, clutching it in white knuckles, realizing she should have hung up the moment she’d identified the call as someone else’s. But it had happened so fast! She rested the receiver on her job sheets and stared at the lighted button on the face of the phone, waiting, digesting what she’d heard. With each passing second her disgust grew. She’d heard it said many times that F.A. knew every dishonest trick in the book and wasn’t afraid to use them. But she’d never had proof before. Using substandard materials, price fixing, collusion, buying off the competition before bids—there were countless deceits it was possible to practice. Some were illegal, some merely dishonest. But either way, until now it had been no more than hearsay.

  The light blinked off, and Lee slipped the receiver silently back in place.

  She was still sitting there in a turmoil when F.A. rounded the doorway into her office. This morning the gnawed stub of an unlit cigar was clenched in his teeth.

  “Whoever you got to supply the twelve-inch reinforced concrete pipe on that Overland Park job, we won’t be goin’ with them. Gonna get that pipe from Jacobi.”

  “Oh?” Lee retorted coldly.

  “Yeah, you can figure it at twelve-fifty a foot, materials only.”

  “And what margin of profit are you working on at twelve dollars and fifty cents a foot?”

  His beady little eyes narrowed on her like laser beams. The cigar stub shifted to the opposite corner of his mouth. “Never mind, just figure it at twelve-fifty a foot.”

  Lee erupted from her chair. “No, you figure it at twelve-fifty a foot!”

  “Me! That bid’s due at two o’clock this afternoon and—”

  “And it won’t be turned in by me, not with flawed pipe from Jacobi figured into it!”

  His sausagelike fingers slowly extracted the wet cigar from his lips. “So, Little Miss Big Ears has been listening in on somebody else’s phone conversations, huh?”

  “Yes, I heard you and Jacobi on the phone just now, but it was entirely unintentional. As a matter of fact, I only heard about ten seconds worth of the conversation.”

  “But it was enough to give you a sudden case of morality, is that it?” He managed to make
the word sound quite dirty.

  Lee’s insides quivered. She pressed a thigh against the edge of her desk to steady the nerves that wanted to fly in six directions. “It’s dishonest!”

  Thorpe shifted till his shoulder leaned toward her like a baseball pitcher studying signals from a catcher. He jabbed the cigar butt before her nose. “It’s profit. And don’t you forget it!”

  “Profit earned at the expense of the taxpayer . . . and the environment, I might add!”

  “Well, bye-dee-ho!” F.A. ran his eyes around the walls of her office as if searching for something. “Too bad we ain’t got a stake around here so you can tie yourself to it and strike a match,” he sneered.

  Lee was already jerking her desk drawers open, setting her briefcase on the chair, snapping it open, separating personal items from company items.

  “I refuse to be a party to your . . . your flawed materials or your scheme to qualify as a minority contractor. Why, I wouldn’t be an officer of this company if Geronimo himself were president!” She piled up address book, legal pads, and portfolios in the center of her desk, each sharp slap like an exclamation point in the room.

  “Geronimo wouldn’t have the smarts it takes to run a business like this and turn a profit during a year as tough as this’s been! In one phone call I clear a smooth ten thousand. Now what the hell kind of fool would turn down money like that?”

  Lee stopped packing, rested her knuckles on the desktop, and skewered him with a feral glare. “And nobody’s the wiser when five years from now the pipe breaks and untreated sewage infiltrates somebody’s water supply, or . . . or runs into the Missouri River or—”

  “A regular Albert Schweitzer, ain’t you? Well, supposing I was to cut you in on a share of my take on this little deal, and you make me a minority contractor after all. Would a few thousand ease your conscience any?”

  His cocky, self-assured belief that anybody could be bought off only sickened Lee all the more. She was suddenly very, very sure she was doing what should have been done months ago. Suddenly her anger disappeared and a renewed sense of well-being swept over her. Her lips relaxed; her voice quieted.

  “Suppose it would. And what would be the next unethical thing you’d ask me to do? And the next? And how long would it be before you asked me to make the transition from unethical to illegal? You know, F.A., it isn’t just the money—it’s something much deeper than that. It’s something born in an Indian that can’t be programmed out. Call it elemental respect for the earth . . . or whatever you like. It’s part of the reason I do what I do. I can’t stop development or urban sprawl. But I can do my part to see that it doesn’t completely annihilate the environment. I agree with you, Geronimo probably wouldn’t be a rich man if he ran this company or one like it, but he’d probably rather drink clean water than deposit ten thousand dollars in the bank.” Lee scanned her cleared desktop, then chuckled and smiled at F.A. “Come to think of it, Indians never were famous for saving for a rainy day, were they?”

  Lee’s belongings were piled on the desk and the chair. She snapped the briefcase shut, picked up an armful of notebooks and folders, and turned toward the door.

  “But what about that bid for this afternoon?” Thorpe squawked.

  “Finish it yourself.”

  “Girlie, you walk out of here, you give up unemployment checks, cause I ain’t claimin’ I laid you off. And don’t look for no recommendations from—”

  The outside door cut off his spate. As if his recommendation was worth anything at all around this town, Lee thought, as she headed toward the parking lot.

  Her red Ford Pinto was parked right beside Thorpe’s long, sleek Diamond Jubilee Mark V. The navy blue sedan was covered with a fine layer of dust, as if he’d recently driven through a jobsite. Lee dumped her load on the back seat of the Pinto, then straightened and studied Floyd’s dusty status symbol. Imbedded in the glass of the opera window—still intact—was the illustrious but now lusterless diamond.

  With a sardonic smile Lee leaned over, breathed on it, lifted an elbow, and polished it carefully. She stepped back to survey it critically, nodded once, then clambered into her Pinto and drove away.

  BUT her cocky attitude had totally disappeared when, three days later, she’d turned up absolutely nothing resembling a job opening. As she paced the floor, she told herself she’d done the only thing possible. She was reviewing the miles she’d put on both her car and her feet during the past three days when her phone rang. Picking it up from the kitchen counter, the Honorable Sam Brown’s was the last voice on earth she expected at the other end of the line.

  “Who the hell are you trying to hide from?” he said without preamble.

  “What?”

  “I’ve been trying to get your damn phone number for three days!”

  “And just who might this be?” she queried with undisguised sugar in every syllable.

  “This, my little Indian, is the Honorable Sam Brown speaking. Just why in hell aren’t you listed in the phone book?”

  “Because I’m divorced and I don’t want any obscene phone calls. And why didn’t you just call Thorpe Construction for my number?”

  “I did, but it seems Fat Floyd developed a conscience—belatedly, I might add—and declined to give out confidential information.”

  “Why that fat rat!”

  “My sentiments exactly.”

  “So how did you get it?”

  “I spent sixty-five bucks taking out a dumb redhead and buying her dinner, then plying her with a German wine because she works for Ma Bell.”

  Lee was dumbfounded. “You whaaaat?”

  “And all she was good for at the end of the evening was a chaste good night kiss.” He chuckled wickedly.

  “I told you, Brown, I don’t accept obscene phone calls.”

  “Too bad, cause the redhead finally gave over—your phone number, of course.”

  “Brown, you scheming weasel, are you saying you bribed the girl to get my unlisted number?”

  “Call it what you will . . . I got it, didn’t I?”

  “For what?”

  “I heard Fat Floyd gave you the ax.”

  “Well, you heard wrong. I quit.”

  “Bully for you. Have you got another job yet?”

  “Are you kidding? I’ve been beatin’ feet from one end of this town to the other, but it’s hopeless.”

  “Listen, I’ve got a proposition for you.”

  “I’ll just bet you do, but I’m not that desperate yet. If it’s the same one you offered the redhead on her doorstep, keep it.”

  “You’re the most suspicious woman I ever paid sixty-five dollars for, you know that?”

  “And I’ll bet there’ve been plenty, right?”

  “Quit your goading, Cherokee, this is legitimate business. I’d like to talk to you about coming to work for me.”

  “You wh—”

  “But I won’t discuss it on the phone. I never carry out an interview by phone, only face to face. Are you busy tomorrow night?”

  “Brown, you’re crazy!”

  He went on as if she hadn’t spoken. “I’m busy all day tomorrow, including lunch, or we could get together then. But I’ll be free by—oh, say, four thirty. Why don’t we meet someplace for cocktails and discuss it then?”

  “Brown, I can’t come to work for you. It’d be like jumping from the pot into the fire!”

  “Listen, I’d like to stay and listen to all this sweet talk, but I’m on the run as it is. Meet me at fifty-three oh-one State Line Road and we’ll discuss it sensibly. Fifty-three oh-one State Line . . . got that?”

  “Sam Brown, I don’t trust you. What makes you think—”

  But he’d done it again.

  “Brown? . . . Brown, come back here!”

  He’d left her with a dead receiver, and before the address escaped Lee’s head, she was scrambling for a pencil.

  Chapter FOUR

  FIVE-THREE-OH-ONE State Line Road turned out to be a place so grandi
ose that Lee drove right past it two times without even considering it might be the right spot. It was magnificent. Perched imposingly at the crest of a hill, it dominated the view with a white facade that reminded Lee of an antebellum mansion. Staring up at it, she fully expected Scarlett O’Hara to come flouncing through the door. The horseshoe-shaped drive rose toward the building, encircling a curve of lush green grass and an imposing flower bed that provided the only clue to the building’s identity—a stunning “C C” formed by vibrant red and white geraniums.

  It appeared to be a country club, backing up to Ward Parkway, perhaps the most prestigious street in town with its countless fountains and mansions built by the oldest, moneyed forefathers. Lee had no doubt whatever that the place had a private membership of the highest echelon.

  And Sam Brown was a member of this?

  Leaving the car, Lee critically swished a hand over her skirt—thank God she hadn’t worn slacks! Even the dress seemed less than adequate, for it was only a casual two-piece cotton outfit of brown and white stripes, the top an athletic looking slipover with ribbed waist, cap sleeves, and boatneck styling.

  The shrubbery around the entrance looked artificial, it was so perfectly manicured. Tubs of potted flowers blossomed in colorful profusion on either side of the steps. Halting just short of them, Lee pulled a wand of lipgloss from her purse, checked her face in a tiny mirror, and applied a gleaming line of amber to her lips. Clamping her clutch bag beneath an elbow, she entered the “C C”—whatever it was!

  She found herself in a vast room with high, wide windows off to the left through which the afternoon sun lit a tasteful grouping of antique furniture. A fireplace flanked the conversation area while enormous bouquets of silk flowers made the elegant old furniture appear even more valuable.