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“We made a mistake in judgment,” Daniel conceded. “It wasn’t our intention to slight you.”
“I don’t feel slighted, I feel babied. I don’t need protection, Dad. Or coddling. Or special favors. When it comes to business, I’m not a daughter or a wife, I’m an officer of this corporation.
“I should have been consulted on something this major, I don’t care how busy I was or what my travel plans were. You were remiss and just plain wrong to exclude me from those discussions. I’m also mad as hell at both of you for letting me be made a fool of in front of Morris Blume and Nadia Schuller.”
“I apologize,” Daniel said.
“So do I,” Noah echoed. “I’m terribly sorry that you were embarrassed today at lunch. I take full responsibility for that.”
She didn’t verbally accept their apologies, but Daniel took her silence as a tacit pardon. “Are we still on for dinner tonight? Maxine’s making pot roast.”
“We’ll see you at seven,” Noah confirmed. Daniel split an uneasy glance between them and then left them alone.
Maris went to the window and turned her back to the room. Noah remained where he was, still perched on the corner of his desk. Several minutes passed before she spoke. “I’m sorry I lost my temper.”
“It hasn’t been that long ago that I told you how beautiful you are when you’re angry.”
She came around quickly and angrily. “Don’t patronize me, Noah.”
“Don’t be so goddamn sensitive,” he snapped.
“I resent belittling, sexist remarks like that.”
“That’s a sexist remark? Can’t I pay you a compliment without your reading something into it?”
“Not when we’re fighting.”
It was upsetting, and a little alarming, that his charm seemed to have lost some of its effectiveness. “What’s with you, Maris? Since you got back yesterday, you’ve been as prickly as a porcupine. If working on this project,” he said, slinging out his hand as though to shake off a contagion, “is going to cause a chronic case of PMS—”
“And that’s not sexist?”
“—then I recommend you—”
“This has nothing to do with that!”
“Then what?”
“Nadia.”
“Nadia?”
“Did she know about your meeting with Blume?”
He covered his discomfiture with a short laugh. “What? You think I called up our local gossip columnist and leaked the story?”
Folding her arms across her middle, Maris turned back to the window. “You’re lying.”
He came off the desk. “I beg your pardon?”
“She knew, Noah. Nadia’s the most conniving woman I’ve ever met, and ordinarily she makes no secret of it. In fact, she takes pride in it. But when Blume mentioned his meeting with you, she blanched, looking as though she’d just been exposed. Then she couldn’t hustle me away from him and out of there fast enough. As we said good-bye, she oozed goodwill, but nervously.” She came around slowly. “She knew.”
The look she gave him was so damned superior, it enraged him. He felt blood rushing to his head. He imagined capillaries bursting behind his eyeballs. Fury pulsated through him. Only by an act of will could he keep his voice from revealing it.
“Why would I tell Nadia, Maris? There was nothing to tell. If Nadia knew, she heard it from Blume. I’ve seen them with their heads together on more than one occasion. They probably stroke each other for inside information.”
“Yes, that’s how it works,” she whispered as though to herself. When she refocused on him, she asked, “If Blume told her, why didn’t she write about it in her column?”
“That’s simple. WorldView owns a chain of newspapers that carry her column. She couldn’t risk inflaming them by blabbing that David had thumbed his nose at Goliath, which is exactly what my meeting with them amounted to. If I’d known it was going to cause this much hullabaloo, I’d have continued avoiding them. I swear to God, I thought that meeting would be the end of their persistence.”
