DRAGONJULS Storybook
~ Actions and Consequences ~
J M Dragon
Part Nine
© 2000 by J M Dragon
Email: jmdragon1@hotmail.com
Disclaimer: See Part
One
Chapter Thirteen:
Jace had arrived at her hotel and given the message that she had received an urgent call from home and could she return it as soon as possible. The desk clerk smiled at the petite blonde with the friendly countenance and sparkling green eyes. She had a quiet beauty that simply grew on you the more times you saw her. He had seen her three times today. Only problem he had was, she had signed in as a Mrs. Warriorson and the ring on her finger indicated some kind of attachment, but she was travelling alone!
"You come from around here Mrs. Warriorson?" the desk clerk asked her and gave her a smile that was infectious.
Jace smiled at the man who was about her age and had black hair and grey eyes that had a friendly look about them. Mind you his work would dictate that he had to be friendly at the very least.
"No. No, I live abroad." She retrieved the noted message and was about to turn away towards the bank of elevators when the man spoke again.
"But you're American right?" the man persisted with his questions.
"Yes, born and raised in California around LA and you?" Jace decided a polite question wouldn't be giving the wrong signals. The guy was just trying to be friendly.
"I thought so. I'm from Kansas, moved with the hotel chain. Hopefully the next move will be head desk clerk in another hotel, one as prestigious as this I hope." He laughed softly and waved his hand to the plush surroundings.
Catherine had insisted that only a first class hotel would be adequate. She felt, as Jace was alone it would probably be much safer. The security in the better hotels far outclassing those in the lower priced hotels and it wasn't as if money was a problem!
"I wish you luck Mr...Andrews, now I'm afraid that I need to go and make my call it's early in the morning at home." Jace smiled her goodbye and headed out this time and didn't turn, but grinned when he answered.
"Bye Mrs. Warriorson, and the names Mike." The voice held an anticipation of her using it at some time.
Making her way quickly to her large suite on the penthouse floor, she threw down her purse and kicked her shoes into the corner and giggled at the thud as they hit the floor…just like home. 'Home, now why do I need to call home?' Jace had at first been distressed inwardly at the request and it set a worried knot in the pit of her stomach. There wasn't a reciprocal call to Catherine to attend to, so she relaxed slightly. No point in panicking until she knew the facts. It was one of Catherine's first rules and she was learning that rule pretty fast.
Collecting the phone that had a good extension cord, she settled into the deep velvet cushioned sofa and her face softened at the luxuriant feel the object had as it enclosed her in its depths. Jace dialled the number directed and waited.
The waiting was for no more than a minute, but for Jace it seemed like an hour and a sleepy voiced Grace answered.
"Grace? Grace what's going on? I have a message to call you urgently." Jace asked quickly. The pregnant woman needed her sleep and did not need to stay up half the night waiting for phone calls. Maybe there was a major problem looming?
Grace wiped a hand across her eyes and smiled at the veiled panic in her friend’s tone.
"Sorry Jace, it's not life threatening, but I thought you'd want to know."
Jace looked at the receiver as always-cryptic remarks from her friend. She and Catherine made a pair in the obscure conversation stakes that's for sure.
"Know what?"
Grace smiled at her end, predictable Jace, but in such a lovely way.
"I hate to tell you this, but the girls have the measles. They started to come out with the spots at about the same time. Couldn't have been more than a couple of hours after you left. The doctor confirmed it today. Said they would be ill for the next week, but then just itch for the next couple of weeks or so. Jake so far miraculously hasn't contracted them, but the doctor doesn't hold out much hope that he will miss it."
"Oh, the poor babies. Are they real sick Grace?" Jace was tempted to ring the airport immediately and find the quickest route home, even if it meant she had to change aircraft several times.
"Well, yeah they're not happy bunnies right now. Elena is screaming the place down, but seem happiest when my mother holds her. Tonight she's in with mom in her bed, about the only thing that quiets her down." Grace informed the concerned mother who was thousands of miles away from her daughter.
"What about Lisa? Grace she's not always the toughie we all see everyday." Jace asked concerned about the small child, who couldn't possibly be more her child other than if she'd given birth to her.
Grace paused at that……Lisa had cried for Jace and Catherine. Surprisingly enough, she'd cried more for Catherine when she hurt the most. Judy had moved a small fold down bed into Lisa's room and was keeping the sick child company. Grace had felt so useless not being in any position to help and comfort the two girls. Her personal tears had made themselves known more than once in the last twenty-four hours from sheer frustration.
"Judy is staying with her tonight. She cried for you both. I feel so useless Jace, as I can't go near them!"
Jace heard the emotional frustration in Grace's words and knew that as much as her friend was in the same house it was no better than being thousands of miles away and probably the feeling was far worse.
"Hey, Grace it's okay. The girls will understand. Are you keeping Jake away from them?"
"Yeah. He's got one of the spare rooms in our house. He and Colin were trading soccer stories when I last saw them." Grace smiled at the memory of watching the dark haired boy with her husband talking animatedly about his passion for the sport of soccer. Although, she was sure that Colin had an equal passion for the sport, but on the spectator level only.
"Grace I'll call back in the morning and let you know what's happening when I speak to Catherine. Get some rest my friend and thanks for advising me." Jace heard the good night from her friend then the dial tone as the phone was disconnected at the other end.
Starring at the receiver in her hand, she contemplated the time it was three in the afternoon. She wasn't sure exactly where Catherine would be, but the first port of call had to be the office. She picked up her purse and looked up the number of Catherine's private office line and placed the call. It didn't take long to be answered and she heard the recipient of the call give her name as Ms. Tuscany.
"Ms. Tuscany this is Jace Warriorson, I need to speak with Catherine, is she available?"
"Oh, hello Mrs. Warriorson. It is nice to hear from you again. Unfortunately Ms. Devonshire isn't in the office. She was attending a meeting with the President of global operations Ms. Waverly." Rita wasn't exactly sure how much of the business Jace was privy to and left the comment open for interpretation depending on whatever knowledge she had.
"I see. Is there anyway you can contact her, it's quite urgent." Jace knew that normally Catherine refused to take a cell phone with her these days. Something about a broken casing that brought back bad memories. Jace had never actually understood the reference and probably never would.
"I'll try the mobile in the car she uses. If she's not there the chauffeur will know where she is and I can track her down for you. Will that be okay?" Rita knew that if she had to go looking for the owner herself in New York she would. It would be the end of her career here, if Catherine didn't receive this message.
"Thanks. Ask her to call me at the hotel and it doesn't matter what time it is." Jace responded softly, her mind tripping over making independent plans for travelling home.
"Are you okay Mrs. Warriorson? Do you need any help prior to me finding Ms. Devonshire for you?" Rita asked concerned that the woman was alone in another city, obviously with a problem.
Jace smiled at her end that was really very thoughtful of the woman she'd barely spoken to.
"Thanks for the concern Ms. Tuscany, but everything will be fine." She
finished the call and sank back into the depths of the sofa and wondered what to do next.
Catherine looked over at the woman who she had hoped would eventually control the Xianthos operation without much guidance and help from her. 'How wrong can one be?' Catherine thought, maybe it was time to consider selling the operation altogether!
"You're starring at me?" Constance stated dryly. She didn't feel that much better, cleaner maybe, but that was all. She craved another drink and the pills she'd been taking would take the edge of any perceived pain she encountered. This woman in front of her had insisted on water for them both with the meal and even watched over her like a baby to make sure she ate at least some of the food that Catherine had chosen for her. Damn woman was like a hawk. She saw everything and they had already argued when Catherine found her trying to sneak a couple of painkillers.
"Sorry. My mind was elsewhere for a moment. How are you feeling now?"
"I feel lousy and you know it! I need some pills Catherine. My head aches and my mouth feels so dry!" The woman pleaded, but saw nothing but a shuttered look in those ice blue eyes that bored into her very essence.
"Yes, I know. It will get worse before it gets better, but hopefully in your case it will be a short span because you've not been taking the booze and pills for years. I do take it that it's only pills and not hard drugs?"
Constance gave her a pained look and then averted her eyes to look out over the window of the small restaurant they had frequented. Rita had sent over clothes from a good store that had obliged on her request for certain items of clothing immediately.
"Yeah. It's the pain killers that I had from the doctor after the shooting, I must have hoarded them or something." The or something was that she'd called the doctor for replacements saying that she was plagued with headaches at work and could he help. Yeah, he helped all right. It helped her into a living hell.
Catherine had decided that the only way to help this woman was not leave her alone for the next few days or even a week. So, she'd already informed Stephanie her housekeeper to make up a spare room. Rita was sending over various items of clothing to last a week.
In the meantime Constance's apartment was being 'cleaned' or perhaps, even fumigated. It was being given a paint over in pastel shades that might help, new decoration, and new start. Catherine didn't envy anyone the cleaning task in the apartment. Rita had volunteered to oversee the work during the week, now to inform the woman before her.
"Constance, you asked for my help. So, I'm going to do that, but you will have to move into my apartment if you want it to succeed. Let us face it, yours is far from a pleasurable habitat at this time."
Constance glared at her. She knew that during the day she would have to put up with Catherine, but to live in her apartment, no way!
"NO!"
"Well, that was certainly to the point I must say!" Catherine gave her a look that had both of her eyebrows raised at the vehement refusal.
"You can't want me in your home in this state." The woman replied hoping that Catherine had all the family with her and that would rule out the possibility.
Catherine smiled she'd known that everything had been going far to easily. You don't just give up on your fixes because someone asks you. You have to work at it and sometimes you lapse, she sure had in the past.
"Personally in your state, no I don't! Then again, if you improve, I might let you out on your own again but...it's kind of like having children Constance, you have to teach them every step of the way. When it comes to some things in life and this my dear is a some thing!"
"You talk in riddles." Constance said quietly, ‘what the hell was she saying exactly?’
"Fine. Putting it bluntly, you're a child to me. When my children are naughty they get the required punishment. Constance yours is to stay with me until we both know you can handle it on your own. Any questions?" Catherine added for the hell of it.
"You’re calling me a child?" the woman blustered and her face went a red tinge under the dusky colouring.
"Yes. You can call yourself other names if you chose. However, that about suits the case here. I honestly thought you had more guts in the face of adversity Constance. Funny how you can be wrong about a person." Catherine stated quietly.
"I can do this. You watch me!" Constance angrily shouted back and Catherine raised a finger and shook it at her as people had turned to see what the noise was about on the tables nearest to them.
"I intend to Constance. So, now we have that point taken care of, I need to go to the office, care to join me?" Catherine waited half expecting another refusal. This time she only received a haunted look out of the dull brown eyes.
"Everyone knows now don't they?" Constance said her voice trembled at the emotion she felt.
"Actually most think you're an arsehole super bitch, who loves to throw a tantrum now and again, or at the moment, all the time. But yes, there are some that know the truth. Or at least as much truth as you've allowed them to see." Catherine said voice monotone and stating facts.
"You want me to go inside the building again knowing that?" Constance's voice broke on the words.
"Certainly, bloody do! Let us say, it's your first step towards getting your place back as my President. At the moment, I've decided to take on the role again until -- we know the score as my son would say."
Catherine hadn't wanted the responsibility. This would entail her moving to New York for some months, or maybe a year and moving the family. That was going to be hard on them all, but she knew particularly on Jake, who had been happy at the new school he attended, which co-incidentally was the same as his best friend. God, that was going to be difficult, and was going to hurt her more than him when she told him they would be leaving.
"You don't want that surely?" Constance was amazed she'd suggested it. It was well known Catherine had put her family first these days.
"Want it? No! Have to take it? Yes! Can you imagine the state of the business if I let you go and have no replacement ready and one that the market actually sees as an adequate replacement?
"I'm sorry." The younger woman turned her brown eyes to the ice blue ones turned towards her sincerity uppermost in the depths.
Catherine looked at the woman and smiled wryly, "Yes, I actually think you are sorry. So, how about we get back to the office. We have situations to salvage."
Getting up, she sighed heavily and wondered how Jace was doing, not for the first time that day, or was it the thousandth, who knew? All that she did know was that she missed the woman with every fibre of her being and wanted nothing more than to hold her in her arms again.
Together they walked out into the bright afternoon sunshine and the
waiting car ready to take then anywhere they wanted.
.
Chapter Fourteen
**********
Constantia watched her friend Sarah talk with the stranger for the third consecutive day. Her friend had never mentioned the person in any context and that had Constantia puzzled in the extreme. Sarah loved to talk and never more so when it was someone new, but this appeared to be different, perhaps later over tea she would ask!
Constantia left her observation point on her balcony and wheeled her chair towards the table, which now held several photo albums and lots and lots of individual snapshots. She reached over and selected what must be the oldest one, flipping the pages initially stopping suddenly and placing a gentle finger over the faces of a laughing couple happily holding each other. It was obvious it was a wedding scene. That had been her mother and father. They had been so very devoted to each other. It had been a tragedy her mother’s death at the stillborn birth of a son, the son so dearly wanted. However, it wasn't to be. The light that had been part of the relationship around her parents, had died as suddenly as their mother had.
For Dimitrie Xianthos it had been the beginning of the end. The only reason he lived had been to see his two daughters attain maturity. Constantia had been the elder by three years. Elena had been six years old at their mother's death. Her father’s death when Elena had turned sixteen had been unexpected and to this day unexplained on the island. He had been found at the bottom of a mountain pass, obviously having fallen a long distance to sustain the injuries to his body that Constantia had briefly seen on identifying her father. Her father had loved to walk the mountains and was a very able man and he had not been that old. He must have been in his mid-forties only, still that was what...forty-seven years ago now. Turning another yellowing page over, she smiled at the various relatives who had come and gone along the way as time replaces the old with the new in most cases.
Then she stopped at a picture of her sister who had been ten years old and helping to place a crown of flowers on Constantia's dark head. The elder sister much taller and it proved difficult. She remembered so well that day. Elena had been so upset that she wasn't taller. She often stated that all the inches must have gone to Constantia. 'Yes her sister had often scorned her diminutive height, but she had been everyone’s favourite,' Constantia had often reflected in the later years, then again Elena had a gift of understanding quite out of context to her age or experience, the curse of the family line. The memories mostly good, some not, coming back like the tide that goes out each day shedding light back in dark places although hidden never to be forgotten.
Selecting another book of photos she smiled at her sisters Wedding day and the handsome young man she'd married, who had the devotion to her that Constantia had seen in her own parents marriage. Her sister had deserved no less.
Then there had been Adam Warriorson, the man who had helped them escape what would have been a bloodbath on the island. What many had deemed as the demise of the Xianthos family on Xianspiros. Yet the dashing sensitive Englishman had not abandoned them to their fate. He had smuggled them out one night with the aid of some very devoted islanders loyal to their family line. It had been difficult to leave the house and all their memories for another country and strangers.
It had been the best thing for her sister though. For she had met Stuart Devonshire and produced two fine children and she had known a deep love from her husband, children and sister. A single tear traced along the still beautiful features of the woman viewing a life long past, but that appeared to her as if only yesterday. She had missed her sister deeply and knew that Stuart had no light in his life after she died, as with all those that shared such a soul deep love.
With a trembling hand she picked up a small stack of single photos. The Devonshire children, the line that had promised so much and had never delivered! The son Lucas having died at eighteen, he had been so much like his mother had before him with the gentleness the patience. That had broken his father’s heart if it could have been broken even more. Constantia had sent Adam to relay the news. He had been the only one she could trust with the task and knew that Stuart would find compassion easier to take from his friend. She had found someone to take a message to Catherine. It had never been easy to live with the girl once their father had left them to live in the United States. She was family and the only one left to ensure the line survived. Catherine had been wild and her release from prison had been barely weeks earlier. Knowing Catherine she had probably descended into her darker ways. Who knew what to make of the young woman, she had not, but there were times when she thought maybe if she had had more compassion...!
Tears rolled uncontrollably down her cheeks now and the coolest of breezes dried them on her pale cheeks, her previously dark hair now silver splayed around her face. Looking at the picture she held in her hand one of Catherine and Lucas laughing together at a birthday party and Constantia surmised it was the last birthday for Elena. She hoped that her niece had now found some peace and happiness. For Catherine had always been the thinker and would see everything in a serious form unless someone pointed out that it wasn't so! The sadness that had surrounded Catherine Xianthos Devonshire had been there from birth. Only that one true love could release her to enjoy life to its fullest. Constantia kissed the photo in her hand and gave a tearful smile 'I hope you found true love Catherine and a peace for your roaming soul.' Turning she heard Sarah approaching.
"Consty you've been upsetting yourself with the old family photos again. You know they make you cry? I will go and fetch us tea." Sarah spoke quietly but with understanding at her friend’s tears.
"Ah, well at least I can cry Sarah. There are many now who cannot. So my dear friend let an old woman have her memories even if they do make her cry." Constantia looked at Sarah, her proud profile uplifted towards the sun, an arrogant stance and one very like a certain niece of hers.
Placing a comforting hand on her shoulder Sarah squeezed it gently and smiled back at her.
"I know. I know. We old women must have something to make us cry in this day and age, because I tell you Consty there doesn’t seem to be much romance in the young these days." Sarah waffled on as she made her way towards the kitchen area and her tea making duties.
"Sarah you are much to cynical. I think the young enjoy romance just as much as we do. But it is much harder to find with their busy lives, things have changed so much." Constantia laughed and waited for her friend to return.
"You're much to tolerant Consty. I wonder if Catherine ever found love this time around?" Her friend walked over to the balcony and had a small smile on her lips. She had seen Consty watching earlier and knew that eventually the woman would ask and she would tell, but it was a game. And they had so few games these days.
"Funny you should mention my niece, I was thinking very much the same thing myself." She looked again at the photo of the child and then glanced at one taken when the woman was seventeen, the last Catherine had allowed.
Sarah came over and glanced at the shots on the table.
"You know something, with those pictures and the recent one we had out of the newspaper Catherine could be taken for your daughter. Have you ever thought of that? The lovely raven hair, ice blue eyes you both share and tall the woman is tall!" Sarah smiled at the astonished look of her friend. She herself was five foot six, but her friend had been over six foot tall.
Constantia said nothing, but thought about the remark. It was something she had never ever considered, perhaps that was why Adam ...no! That was to ridiculous, a notion, and the emotion of the day taking its toll obviously.
"Tea Sarah. Let's have tea and you may tell me about the new friend you have gained on the beach." The two friends smiled with easy familiarity as Sarah went to retrieve the brewing tea and talk about the new stranger on the island.
**********
Catherine had been given the message to call Jace at her hotel immediately. She thought about making the call in the car, but would be denied the privacy she wanted when she talked to her partner. She flung open the door of the vehicle that had only just stopped, striding quickly out of the vehicle and practically dragged Constance with her from the car and who almost tripped over the sidewalk curb.
'Damn woman had been fidgeting all the way back after she was informed that Jace Warriorson need to talk to her urgently. Must have a powerful hold over her, that's for sure.' Constance thought as she followed, trying to keep pace with her employer into the security area for the personal profile check.
Several heads turned in their direction, as the tall owner of the company appeared to be escorting the company President in a less than elegant way, well pretty much dragging her along. Security watched the interchange between the two most powerful women in the building and smiled at the closed expression, of what appeared to be boredom at the delay in getting into her building and the other looked positively tired and drawn.
Within minutes both women were travelling in the elevator to the executive floor. The silence between them stretching out as each had thoughts different from the other. Catherine on her impending phone call she had to make to Jace. Constance on the need for a drink, any kind of drink that had a percentage of alcohol in it!
As the door opened Catherine could be mistaken for a blur as she sped down the short corridor and went into her office, leaving a somewhat puzzled Constance to follow behind and head for her own office.
Rita had seen the figures approaching, one at speed the other much slower and rather cautious she thought. Having seen Ms. Devonshire go past without a word and enter her office she knew that disturbing her at the moment was out of the question, even if it would be with her favourite beverage tea. Watching as Ms. Waverly walked closer to her office area, she smiled at the woman and nodded to the coffeepot.
Constance had taken her new PA for granted. She was ashamed of herself and the circumstances of their last meeting, notably at the police station the previous night or was it early this morning?
"Rita I'd love a coffee. Wouldn't be Irish by any chance would it?" Constance saw the shocked looked on her PA's face and knew that wasn't such a good joke after all. "Yeah, coffee straight is okay." Constance went over and opened the door to her office and noticed that it was neat and tidy with little paper work at all to be seen. She was positive that the desk had been covered when she left it abruptly the last time she was in the building.
She walked over to the desk, her gait weary in the extreme. It felt like she'd walked a marathon this morning. Sitting down in her chair, she reached over inside the draw of the desk and pulled it open. Expecting to find at least a quarter bottle of whisky inside, she was dismayed to find the draw empty, devoid of all objects.
"Fucking woman has stolen the drink out of the desk now!" Constance shouted and was confronted by her PA who had walked in with her coffee.
"I believe you asked for this type of beverage Ms. Waverly?" Rita stated in a calm voice. She had in fact removed the whisky bottle and cleared up the office.
"Yeah, I did. You can leave now Rita. When the boss gets off the phone let me know will you?" Constance with a shaking hand reached over and tried to drink the hot drink, but immediately put it down as several drops spilled onto the polished surface of the desk. Rita reached across to try and wipe away the marks, but was immediately pushed away.
"I can do that I'm not a child!" was the angry reply.
"Yes, I see that." Rita responded and backed out of the office and waited for Ms. Devonshire to ask for tea.
**********
"Jace? Please Jace, back up a little, exactly what have you arranged?" Catherine spoke softly and calmly to her partner who had been waiting for the call for two hours and had decided in the interim to make arrangements of her own.
"Look Catherine the best I could arrange was a flight to Chicago and then LA and finally onto Christchurch. That will get me there by tomorrow lunchtime in hours anyway!" Jace had been upset at the wait for Catherine, but had felt her place should be with the children, not gallivanting around the world considering a new life. There were the ones already in existence that needed her more at the moment.
"I can understand that, but…Jace, why the hurry? You can't do anything for them and you might get sick yourself?" Catherine said matter of factly. She was puzzled at the haste. After all there were plenty of people able and willing to look after the children and there wasn't anything she could do surely? It was only a normal child’s disease; hell everyone had it at some time.
Jace couldn't believe what she heard at her end of the line. Was there a monster inside her partner? Oh, yeah, it was called Xianthos. How had she forgotten? She sounded so off hand about the fact that two of their children were sick and needed love, care and attention.
"Are you crazy Catherine? Of course the children need us. They need their parents when their sick and feeling low and don't you dare tell me you have never felt like that as a child! Who cares if I get sick as well? We can all recuperate together!"
"I...well, I’d care. I obviously cannot remember. I can't afford to get sick at the moment Jace!" Catherine admitted sheepishly.
"No! No, don't tell me, Xianthos needs you again? You're putting that company before our children?" Jace was astounded at the words she heard from Catherine and waited for her to deny the accusation.
"Well, it's like this Jace, you said try and help Constance. Well I am, but the only way I can is to take back the reigns again. It will be awhile before she can take over so...." She wasn't allowed to say more as the phone was slammed down on her. 'Oh shit!' Catherine thought and put a hand through the hair at her temples. She was damned if she went and left Constance……and she was damned if she stayed and didn’t go home to the children, talk about a no win situation. It was bloody marvellous here -- she was trying to do the decent thing here, and it was turning out to be a nightmare!
Considering her options, she called Rita requesting some tea and then waited until Rita duly deposited the beverage on her desk.
"I need to make another call and then I'll be free. Shouldn't be much longer, is Ms. Waverly still in her office?"
"Yes, I think she's looking for a drink. But not the kind we normally serve out of the machines here." Rita responded honestly.
"Okay. Call me if she moves out of her office and I mean that Rita." Catherine commanded her lips tightly set at the thought.
"Will do." Rita left her to her next call.
Picking up the receiver she called the hotel again. It was several minutes before the line was answered. She heard a subdued Jace at the end of the line. The operator had informed Jace of the identity of the caller.
"Have you changed your mind?"
"No! That's impossible at the moment. But I wanted to tell you I love you." Catherine stated simply, but the inflection in her voice gave the person at the other end no doubts of the sincerity of the thought.
Taking a deep breath Jace felt the tears she'd held back flow freely down her cheeks. Catherine would have hugged her and wiped them away had they been together in the same room.
"Yeah I know." The bleak answer told Catherine that this time she wasn't totally forgiven.
"I love the kids too Jace. But would there be anything that I could do other than perhaps get sick also?" Catherine asked. A few words too much this time and didn't know what to say to salvage the situation. She already knew she'd dug a big hole for herself and without being in the same room with Jace, she wasn't sure her charm would have the healing powers it usually had.
"I guess you're going without me then?" the forlorn reply seemed to echo in Jace's hotel room.
"Yes!" the reply from her partner adamant.
"Will you call me when you get home?" the request tentative in the extreme.
Jace heard the hesitant request and shook her head, how dense could Catherine be at times. "Yes, I'll call you. I need to go pack and take a taxi to the airport. The first flight is in an hour."
"Safe journey Jace and give my...well, I'll talk to you tomorrow I guess." Catherine wasn't sure what to say now.
"Tomorrow, yes I'll call." Neither woman wanted to be the first to sever the connection without saying the three words that needed to be said.
"Jace, I love you." Catherine replaced her receiver and starred blindly out of the window of the office as a single tear rolling down her left cheek. ‘This love business certainly had it’s difficult times. How on earth did people live together for decades.’ Shaking her head she wiped away the tear and gave a wry scornful look at the moisture. Certainly this type of situation had never occurred in her life before. God help her if anything did happen to Jace. She stood up and walked towards the door and another trying hour or two with her President. Her heart was now winging its way towards her partner where she physically wanted to be.
Jace placed the instrument to her cheek and the tears dripped onto it as she caught and held those words to her heart. 'I love you too Catherine and I hope I never live to regret not saying those words to you today. Tomorrow I’ll make it up to you I promise!' she replaced the receiver in its cradle. Going slowly over to the bedroom dresser that held her few clothes, she packing them swiftly, and within fifteen minutes was in a taxi on the way to the airport and the long flight home.
**********
"We have a booking for a child." The rasping voice of the man at the end of the phone said to the elegant woman taking the call.
"When do you need the child?" the woman asked interested in the new development.
"Now! No, I could say immediately, but this one must have specific features and we've been given a little time," came a low laugh emanating from the voice piece.
"So, exactly how long have I got to retrieve this specific child?" the woman was irritated by the man's perversity.
"Three months maximum. The sale will go through and we will have a nice tidy sum to share. I'm sure with your talent for the selection, you will not need the full time allocated, but things are changing in this business. The acquisition of children isn't quite as easy as it was." The man snipped at the woman and her talents.
"Yes that's true, but when have I ever let you down yet?"
"No. No, you never have, but there is always a first time for everything." The man answered with harsh laughter.
"Yes, there is, but not with me. I'm a perfectionist and I will come up with the goods, whatever it takes!" the woman expelled defiantly.
"In that case, you'd better know exactly what type and specific features our client wants." The man proceeded to do give the particulars of the required subject as the woman listened intently. Her smiled fairly beamed when he had supplied the data she needed.
"Thanks I'll be in touch when the goods are available and in a short space of time, I think."
"You already have a candidate in mind?"
"Yeah. I think I do. Just have to be there at the right time. I’m already in the right place and that’s the only tricky part. Mind you, a good challenge never hurt anyone and I like a good challenge." The woman ended the call, picked up her leather gloves, strolled out to her car and the drive home. It was a very interesting request, but feasible, eminently feasible.
Continued in Part 10
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