Run For The Money

“That’s true.” She sighed into the phone. “Promise me you’ll call Ed.”

“Fine! I promise.”

Around five o’clock, Taylor came into my office and closed the door. She looked positively radiant. Tossing a stack of invoices toward me with check copies attached, she said smugly, “I called China Pearl and they say all of their invoices have been paid. Then I called Robert Wang at the CERF office in Beijing, and he checked these invoices against the copies he keeps before he mails the originals to us. He doesn’t have any of these invoices. Which means they were generated by someone outside the invoicing department at China Pearl.”

I eyed the invoices. “They’re identical to the ones from China Pearl. Somebody went to a lot of trouble to get these printed. I wonder if they have fingerprints on them?”

Taylor looked like she wanted to cheer. “Yours, Pink. Your fingerprints are all over them. You’re the one who approves all invoices for payment. Remember?” She glanced at my printer. “Did you know every printer has a unique imprint, that printer companies make them that way, so they can trace which printer was used to generate documents?” Her green gaze went to my computer. “And did you know computers have a unique identity, that the cops can trace any Internet transaction?”

My violent tendencies were coming to the fore. I guess we’re not so far from our caveman ancestors. If I’d had a club, I’d have conked her on the head. “Did you know I leave this office every day a little after five and the printer and computer are alone until nine o’clock the next morning?” I leaned toward her and crossed my arms on my desk. “Give this some thought, Taylor. As much as you resent me, would you really feel good about me going to prison if I’m not guilty?”

She glared at me with open hostility. “I’d throw a party, and invite some of the staff from the old firm. You don’t have a clue how many of us hated you, Pink. Always ordering everyone around, demanding we work unholy hours, giving us bad performance reviews for stupid things like wearing the wrong clothes and cussing in front of clients.”

“So I deserve to rot in prison because I insisted the staff present a professional image? Because I took my job seriously and expected others to do the same?”

“You were such a bitch about it all.”

“It was always all about the job, and making sure I did the best I could for the firm. That’s called loyalty.”

“You wouldn’t know loyalty if it bit you in the ass!”

I leaned back, realization dawning on me. “This isn’t about how I did my job at the firm. This is about that night you called and asked me to lie to your husband about where you were. You wanted me to say you’d been at my house, and I refused.”

“We were friends! I needed help, and you blew me off.”

“That was a million years ago, when we were still staff slaves. You’ve been divorced almost six years. And you’re still blaming me?” I shook my head, more disgusted than I would have thought possible. “Face it, Taylor, I wasn’t the one boinking the client’s mailroom guy. That was you, and to hold such a grudge because I didn’t go along with your lie is seriously chickenshit of you.”

“It’s not that you didn’t go along with the lie. You ratted me out to the big dogs at the firm. Because of that one indiscretion, I was way behind everyone else in promotions.”

“You’re wrong, Taylor. I never said a word to anyone.”

“Liar!” She grabbed up the invoices and waved them around. “You’re gonna get what’s coming to you!”

It took a superhuman effort not to lose my temper, but I managed. “If you finger me as the rat, you’ll regret it, Taylor. I’m not behind this, but someone is. I suggest you find that person and lay off this immature grudge-fest.”

So far, so good. I hadn’t lost any ounce of professionalism, or sunk to Taylor’s level.

Then she went over the line. With a smirk on her wide mouth, she said with dripping venom, “I figured out a long time ago, your problem is that you’re a coldhearted, frigid bitch. George told me he had to get it somewhere else because you quit putting out.” She stepped back toward the door and reached behind herself for the doorknob, just before she lobbed a nuclear bomb into my lap. “You divorced him because he slept with whores, but didn’t you ever wonder if he got some he didn’t have to pay for? You were the office joke, Pink, because half the women up there had a little bit of George. We all felt sorry for him, did you know that? I remember a Christmas party when George was doing Beth in the ladies’ room. You went in there, and had no clue they were in the stall right next to you.” She laughed. And laughed.

Unable to stop myself, I stood and shouted, “Get out!”

When she kept standing there, laughing, I reached for my coffee cup and hurled it at her, just as she opened the door. The damn thing flew right through the opening and crashed across Samantha Booker’s desk, knocking over a pencil cup and splashing coffee all over Samantha’s pretty white blouse.

I have never been so ashamed of myself. I looked at Taylor and said in as calm a voice as I could muster, which probably wasn’t very, “Just know this, Taylor. If you don’t do the job Parker entrusted you with, and do it fairly and without bias, you’ll have a lot more to worry about than a tired grudge that’s solely based on your own pathetic paranoia. Do we understand each other?”

“Are you threatening me?”

“I’m warning you. Don’t screw with me, Taylor.”

With one last glare, she turned and walked out.

From across the hall, in the open area of desks in the bullpen, the handful of staffers at CERF all stared at me with wide eyes and slack jaws. I didn’t blame them. How often does a good catfight come along?

Chapter 2

By the time Mom and I got to the dinner party, I was ready to put myself up for adoption. All the way to Steve’s Georgetown town house, she twisted one emerald earring and muttered about how she shouldn’t have left Midland, that she had a million things to do, that her clients would suffer because she was gadding about the nation’s capital, going to some idiotic dinner party with people she didn’t know and probably didn’t want to know. That led into a diatribe about politics in the United States, and it was at that point that I tuned her out.

Regrettably, the cabbie didn’t tune her out, and by the time we arrived, they were in a hot debate about the state of the union. I guess Lou was awaiting our arrival because he opened the door of the cab. Mom didn’t notice until after she’d summarily told the cabbie he was a socialist radical and if he hated America so much, why didn’t he get the hell out?

Then Lou leaned in and handed the cabbie his fare and I honestly thought Mom would keel over in a dead faint. Her face was the color of a ripe strawberry. She took his hand and he helped her out of the cab, and while we stood there on the sidewalk, I introduced my mother to Lou Santorelli. It hit me that the two of them looked alike, with dark hair and eyes, and skin that leaned toward olive.

Lou didn’t smile, didn’t attempt to be gracious and welcoming, which I naturally expected because he was our host. Instead, he said in a curious voice, “If a man has a problem with how things are, does it make him a treasonous bastard who has no right to live here?”

It took her exactly twenty-three seconds to recover. I know because I counted, while I was praying she wouldn’t turn around and walk off.

“If all he can do is blame the government for every stinkin’ problem in his life, and insist how much better it is everywhere else in the world, then no, he doesn’t deserve to live here. He should take his pissy, whiny attitude across the ocean. Any ocean.”

Grasping her arm, he turned and walked her into the house. “It can be difficult to get a leg up, so maybe his pissy attitude is a result of struggling to make ends meet.”

Mom appeared to have forgotten her neurosis. “It is not difficult to get ahead, if a person is willing to work hard. Especially if that person is a thirty-year-old white male, with no disability of any kind except pure laziness.”

“Are you a feminist, Jane?”

Mom pulled her arm away from him. “I’m a hardworking professional woman who’s got no time for labels and bullshit.”

I’m still not sure why, but that struck Lou as funny. He laughed out loud, grabbed Mom’s arm again and walked her into a wide living room with soaring ceilings and quite a few expensive-looking antiques. Steve’s town house is beautiful, if a person is into the museum look.

The birthday boy was in the far corner, talking to a man with snowy-white hair whose back was toward the room. Looking at Steve, dressed in one of his beautiful suits, his short black hair a bit messy and his large, slightly hairy hand curled around a highball glass, I got that strange jumpy feeling in the pit of my stomach that I always get when I’m around him. It’s not unpleasant at all—just unnerving. I’m afraid to put a name to the feeling because I’m fairly sure it would be something like intense, unquenched sexual desire. And as much as I like Steve, as much as I admire him and like being with him, I know it would spell disaster if I ever slept with him.

For one thing, any chance of ever making things work out with Ed would be over forever. And I wasn’t ready to give that up. Not yet. For another, Steve is the antithesis of the kind of men I always assumed moved around Washington. He’s a widower who lost his beloved wife, Lauren, to cancer almost three years ago, and since then, he hasn’t gone out with anyone. Until me. I can’t figure it out, but Steve seems to think I need to be the next Mrs. Santorelli. And that’s without ever sleeping with me. If I did sleep with him, I just know he’d manage to get me to marry him. Imagine my trust issues with a senator. Yeah, it would never work.

After I figured out he was the one who bought the billboard, I told him thank you for the offer, but no. He wasn’t surprised, he said, but he also wasn’t giving up.

When he caught sight of me he waved me over, and I left Mom with Lou, which she failed to notice because they were really getting into it about women in America while the bartender mixed her a whiskey sour.

I was almost to Steve when I realized the old man was Richard Harcourt, a retired Speaker of the House. Steve took my hand and folded it into his, then kissed my cheek and introduced me. “Richard, this is Whitney Pearl, but she goes by Pink. We met when she testified before the senate finance committee during the Marvel Energy investigation.”

Richard shook my hand and smiled warmly. “I watched it all on C-SPAN. You’re a true hero.” He dropped my hand, but continued smiling. “Interesting nickname you have. Lotta redheads get dubbed Red, but I’m not seeing why they call you Pink, especially with all that blond hair.”

“I’m a CPA, sir. Because my last name is Pearl, people started calling me Pink Pearl, like the erasers.”

“Ah, I see. Very clever, that! Mind if I call you Pink?”

I returned his smile. “Be my guest.”

“Good, and you should call me Richard.” He winked. “Or Very Handsome and Wonderful Old Man, if you prefer.”

I couldn’t help laughing, and decided I liked Richard Harcourt.

“Steve tells me you were in China for a couple of weeks just after the earthquake.”

Of late, it was my favorite subject and I admit, I got kinda wound up about it. When I was done, and after I’d made the case for people to donate money to CERF, Richard chuckled and said in a pseudowhisper, “You’re preaching to the choir, Pink. I wrote a check with a lot of zeroes on it just last week.”

“I beg your pardon, sir, and thank you.”

He lost a bit of his joviality and said, “Pretty damn good speech you’ve got there. I suggest you spin it to a few well-heeled people who’ve convinced themselves your boss should be the First Gentleman. Tell them their money’s better spent on the Chinese relief effort than a lost cause.”

“Sir?”

He harrumphed loudly. “Didn’t you know Madeline Davis is planning to run for president?”

“I hadn’t heard, no.” Why hadn’t Parker mentioned it? I glanced at Steve. “So a woman’s going to run for president, and she’s got some big money behind her. Imagine that.”

“Will you vote for her?”

“Well, she is a smart woman.” I turned again to Richard. “Who’s supporting her?”

“Top of the list is Bill Mulholland.” At my puzzled expression, he added, “Old New York family. Got money dating back to the Mayflower, no doubt. Sits on lots of corporate boards and hobnobs with royalty.”

“And you think I should call and ask him for a donation because you’re convinced any campaign money he gives to Madeline is wasted?” Maybe I didn’t like Richard so much. I drew myself up a bit. “You’ll pardon me, sir, if I decline to follow your suggestion. Insinuating that Madeline hasn’t a prayer of winning without knowing who else might run can only indicate a gender bias I obviously don’t support.”

Instead of taking up the gauntlet, Richard laughed as though I’d just told a great joke. He leaned close to Steve and said, “She’ll do, son. She’ll do just fine.”

Then he was gone, and miraculously, Steve and I were alone in the corner. But not for long. An entire flock of guests were descending on us from across the room. I quickly asked Steve, “What did he mean, I’ll do?”

He grinned at me. “Richard is convinced I should throw my hat in the ring for president. He says the first thing I need is a wife, and he thinks you’re just the ticket.”

I was speechless. Seriously. Maybe it was the whisper of the thought of becoming First Lady of the United States of America, or maybe it was the thought of sleeping with the leader of the free world on a nightly basis, or maybe it was thinking about living at the most primo address in the country.

“What’s wrong, Pink? Don’t you think you’re up to being First Lady?”

My mom’s neurosis can sometimes be mine, as well. “Steve, I’m a CPA from a dusty oil town in West Texas. I went to a public university. I don’t even have china. Come to think of it, after my apartment was broken into and ransacked last month, I don’t have any dishes at all.”

“The guy living at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue right now is from your hometown. In fact, so is the First Lady. If you ask me, it’s sort of cosmic. And by the way, they have plenty of dishes at the White House.”

I didn’t have a chance to respond, because the gaggle of guests were upon us. The rest of the cocktail hour, Steve guided me around the room, introducing me to senators and representatives, high-ranking military personnel, the IRS commissioner and the Mexican ambassador. After that we went for dinner in a dining room large enough to land a plane, where I was seated next to Steve at the head of the table and Mom was seated next to Lou about half a mile down at the far end. I was excited when the Chinese ambassador, Mr. Wu, was seated just across the table from me.

Steve noticed my enthusiasm. He leaned close and said quietly, “Most men give flowers and jewelry. You get the Chinese ambassador.”

Startled, I looked into his dark Italian eyes. “You invited him just for me?”

He nodded and gave me a funny little crooked smile. “Now’s your chance to ask him about Mrs. Han and the China brides.”

That bizarre jumpy thing in my stomach morphed into a warm, intense feeling that was as foreign as Mr. Wu. I swallowed hard. “Thank you.”

His smile kicked up a notch. “You’re welcome.” He turned to greet Mr. Wu, then introduced him to me.

Wu’s English was perfect and we talked a great deal about the relief effort. After a while, I felt comfortable enough to ask him about something that had bothered me while I was in China. “I helped a survivor there, a pregnant woman named Mrs. Han, whose husband was killed. She was naturally very distraught, but it struck me as odd that the main cause of her distress was that she wanted to go home. The woman looked Asian, but not Chinese, and she spoke very little Chinese. It turned out her primary language was Russian. She told a story about being taken out of Siberia and brought to China as a bride. She said there are others like her, living in China, brought there to be wives to Chinese men because there’s such a shortage of females. I wondered if this is something the government sponsors.”

Mr. Wu looked shocked. His soup spoon clattered against his plate. “This woman, where can I find her?”

China clattered from behind the ambassador. I glanced back to see one of the waitstaff, a striking blond woman whose name tag read “Olga.” When she noticed me watching her, she quickly turned and headed for the kitchen.

I redirected my attention to Mr. Wu. “Unfortunately, while I was looking for a policeman to help us, she disappeared, and I was unable to locate her again.”

“This is most disturbing. Did she give you any indication who brought her into China?”

I shook my head. “As I said, she didn’t speak Chinese, and the woman who translated knew only rudimentary Russian. After Mrs. Han disappeared, the CERF contact in Beijing, Robert Wang, said it’s not uncommon for people to be disoriented after something like an earthquake.” Remembering the poor woman, her tear-streaked face, swollen belly and woeful dark eyes, I felt a knot form in my throat. Where was she now? And what of the others? Mrs. Han said she’d been brought into China with five other young women from her village in Siberia.

Watching Mr. Wu process the idea, I said, “During my visits to China I’ve been proposed to several times by men in search of a bride. There’s obviously a need for women.”

He relaxed a bit, darted a glance at Steve, then leveled his gaze at mine. “It is true that the female-to-male ratio in China is shrinking, which leaves many of our young men without the opportunity to marry. It’s an unfortunate result of our law allowing only one child in a family. Because of our custom that parents live with their son in their later years, a couple who has a son is assured of a home. Those with a daughter do not have that option.”

“Because a daughter goes to live with her husband’s family?”

He nodded. “Many women abandon their baby girls at birth, then try again until they have a son. Despite this, the one-child law is good, because without it, there would not be enough natural resources to support the population. The side effect is the shortage of females. I suspect that an enterprising person has been recruiting women from outside of China to fill the gap.”

Olga returned and collected our soup bowls. When she asked Mr. Wu if he was done, I noticed her heavy accent. I thought she sounded Russian. Of course, to my West Texas ears, anyone from an Eastern bloc country would probably sound Russian. And I did have Russia on the brain.

“Thank you for alerting me to this problem, Miss Pearl,” Mr. Wu said. “First thing tomorrow, I will contact someone who can look into this unfortunate business.”

“If you hear any word on Mrs. Han, I would very much appreciate the information.”

Olga hurried off with the tray of dirty soup bowls, then reappeared with the salad course. She set a plate in front of Steve, then looked a little flustered and snatched it away. He shot her a confused look, to which she smiled and mumbled an apology. “I have forgotten the garnish. Please excuse me.” Before he could protest, she turned, still clutching the salad tray. She stumbled as she rounded the table and one of the salads slid off the tray and into my lap.

It took a bit to clean up the mess—this in the midst of Mr. Wu tut-tutting and Steve glowering at Olga, who looked ready to run away. Or burst into tears. Feeling for her, I hastened to assure her there was no harm done.

“But, miss, you’ve spots on your pretty pink dress. Please, come to the kitchen and I will clean?”

I didn’t see much point. The dress was destined for the dry cleaner. But Olga was beside herself, and Steve looked uncharacteristically annoyed, so I followed her to the kitchen. Just as I suspected, club soda didn’t faze raspberry vinaigrette. I thanked her anyway, assured her it was quite all right and escaped back to the table.

As I took my seat, I noticed Mr. Wu’s forehead was wrinkled in concentration, his gaze fixed on a spot somewhere behind my shoulder. “Sir,” I said, “my apologies if what I said has upset you.”

He looked at me and shook his head. “Nothing of the kind, Miss Pearl. I am glad to have the information.”

When Olga returned with a fresh set of salads and set his before him, he picked up his fork and started eating. He seemed upset, and even though I was relieved to know he would do something to investigate the China brides, I felt guilty for bringing it up.

He ran a finger along the inside of his collar as though it was too tight, then gave me a weak smile. “This earthquake is a bad, bad thing. So many homeless, and so many without families. It will take many years to recover fully. Thank you for helping my country.”

“You’re welcome, Ambassador Wu. I’m glad to be of any help, especially because I’m very fond of China and her people.”

After all the salads had been served, the conversation turned to other topics.

The ambassador’s attention was on the guest to his left, and Steve said under his breath, “You’re fantastic.”

“Not hardly. Just nosy.”

He smiled at someone down the table, then his gaze moved to my cleavage, then to my eyes. “Nice dress, Pink. Even with salad dressing.”

“Thank you.” My stomach started that weird jumpy thing again. Oh, man. My first bite of salad didn’t go down well, so I set aside the fork and concentrated on the wine.

“Now that the finance committee is adjourned for a while, I’ll have a lot more free time. You’ve been here two weeks and I’ve only been able to see you twice.”

“I’m pretty busy myself, Steve.” And I was about to be a lot busier, searching for the rotten dog who set me up. I wondered what Steve would think about it, and how he’d feel about marrying me if he knew I could potentially ruin all future political races. Even if I didn’t intend to marry him, I wanted us to be friends, and I prayed all over again that the culprit would be nailed before anyone else found out about it. Even being friends with Steve would be impossible if word got out about the bank account with my name on it, and five hundred thousand of CERF’s dollars deposited in it.

“Is something wrong?”

I gave him a reassuring smile. “Not at all. And you’re right, it will be nice to spend some time together.”

Olga appeared at my elbow and pointed at my plate. “The salad is wrong?”

“No, it’s fine,” I said, wishing the woman would leave off being so attentive. She looked like somebody who had just realized she’d boarded a plane to Cleveland instead of the one to Paris. “I’m just not very hungry.” Blame it on Steve, making my stomach do that squiggly thing.

Olga nodded and picked up my plate, then moved to the next guest.

As happens at all dinner parties, the ebb and flow of conversation created a dull roar, with no voice particularly audible. Until I heard Mom.

“You arrogant son of a bitch! You invited me and the IRS commissioner so you could get your own agenda front and center.”

“The only reason you’re so angry is that you know I’m right. Without people like you, CPAs on the front lines, standing up and demanding a simplified tax law, nothing will ever change. It’s your duty to do so, and your life is wasted if you shrug off the responsibility.”

“My life is a lot of things, buster, but it sure as hell isn’t wasted! I’m calling a cab because there’s no way I’m listening to any more of your bullshit. You’re crazy, Mr. Santorelli.”

I leaned forward a little bit and saw that she was no longer in her chair. Neither was Lou. Yet, I could hear her distinctive West Texas twang, along with Lou’s deep, clipped voice. Where were they?

Steve touched my shoulder and I turned to look at him. “This is a very old house and the ventilation system’s pretty rudimentary. I think they must have gone into the study, at the front of the house.” He glanced up at a register close to the ceiling of the dining room. “It’s like a P.A. system.”