Many Shades of Gray (31 page)

He glanced toward the marble fireplace at all of the awards his companies had accumulated before turning his attention toward his prized possession. He gazed at the framed oil painting and went to it.

The artist had done an excellent job of capturing his emotions on his wedding day. His love for his wife was reflected in the painting. For five months they had been happy. He’d managed to put Tommy Strong out of his mind for the most part, but now Tommy was becoming more than a pest. He was becoming a downright thorn in his side.

“Damn,” Simon said aloud and reached for the control panel to open the wall concealing the numerous computers and ticker tape machines which hummed in their own soundproof environment. He checked out all of his companies, yet it didn’t generate the energy in him that work usually did. For almost four years now work had become a distant second. His love life had pushed that aside. His wife was his number one priority and he wasn’t going to let anything change that. He stepped back and pushed the button to conceal the machines and walked down to Harold’s office.

“Harold,” he called, knocking and opening the door at the same time. “How’s it going?”

“I thought you weren’t coming in?”

“I changed my mind,” Simon answered, looking around Harold’s office. Harold’s office was almost as large as his and the huge mahogany desk was twice as large as Simon’s. Simon looked at the sparseness of personal mementos. The only picture in Harold’s office was one of Simon when he was about twelve and Harold wasn’t even in it.

The man had been like a father to him and for the past year Simon had treated him little better than a servant. And all because of his own arrogance.

“You’re looking tired, Simon. What’s wrong?”

“Your call didn’t help.” He swiped his face with the back of his hand. “It looks like I painted myself into a corner.”

“You can always find a way out. Your marriage is happy. Keep it that way. Tell her.”

“I know I should,” Simon sighed. “But now it’s more difficult.” He walked toward Harold’s fireplace, picked up a Faberge egg and tossed it lightly in his hand, knowing Harold was more than likely holding his breath as he toyed with the expensive trinket. It had been a gift from his good friend, Simon’s father. There weren’t very many eggs held by private collectors. Most people wrongly thought there were more. He knew what the egg meant to Harold and after a couple of minutes he deposited it where he’d found it.

“We almost had our first fight today,” Simon informed Harold. Then he turned toward the window as though he’d find the answer in the heavy paisley drapes and dark green walls.

He didn’t.

“What was your fight or your almost fight about?”

“I went crazy when you called to say that Tommy Strong was still trying to dig up information on me. Isn’t it enough that he’s tried every tactic to turn my in-laws against me?”

“What did you do?”

Simon sighed and sat in one of the heavy leather chairs and propped his feet on the edge of the expensive desk. “I went through her planner and scratched out every day she’d put in there to work with the man. When she found me doing it, I ordered her not to work with him.”

“You ordered her?” Harold laughed, then shook his head. “And you were banished from the kingdom by your new bride, I take it. We all know very well she doesn’t take to orders.”

“Actually I wasn’t banished. I decided I had pushed my luck far enough for one day and I regained use of my few remaining brain cells and left before I did any permanent damage.”

Harold studied the man who was not only his boss but his friend and surrogate son. Knowing him so well he knew without a doubt that Simon Kohl had not so easily conceded defeat. He saw the twitch at the corner of his mouth and knew he was now worrying about something he’d done. “What have you done, Simon?”

Simon smiled, slowly bringing his feet from the desk. “You think you know me so well, don’t you, old man? Well, guess what? You do.” He got up to clap Harold on the shoulder. “I don’t want her working with Strong, and since ordering her is not going to work, I decided that I would take matters into my own hands.”

“And?”

“And I ordered Peters to only give her a month to give the book to him.”

“A month? But you told me she hasn’t been doing much writing.”

“She hasn’t.”

“Then how the hell do you expect her to finish it in a month?”

“I don’t care if she finishes the damn book. I just don’t want her with Strong. That will give me time to think of something. I’m thinking maybe we can go abroad for a year. I don’t know and don’t care. I just know that I don’t want her near the man.”

“You can’t dictate to her, Simon.”

“I’m her husband.”

“You don’t own her.”

“Not you too?” Simon said. He stared at Harold. “All my life you’ve been telling me that the fact that my ancestors were in the slave trade had nothing to do with me. That no one would ever find out, that my grandfather had changed the family name, that my father hated knowing so much that he couldn’t even bring himself to tell his wife and she was white. How the hell do you think I feel about telling my wife, who’s black?”

“Simon you’re not—”

“Don’t,” Simon said, putting his hand up to stop Harold. “Everyone keeps telling me that I don’t own Janice. Tommy Strong, Janice, and now you. And you know how much that remark hurts me. But still you said it, so I have to wonder, do you think the genes of my forefathers run in my veins?”

“It was just an off-the-cuff remark. I didn’t mean anything by it.”

“Sometimes those are the truest statements. I don’t want to own her, but I don’t want her to hate me like my mother did my father. I don’t want her to doubt me and I’m running out of options.”

“So you’re going to Europe to hide?”

Simon stared. “I just want to give my marriage a fighting chance.” He thought of his words, then smiled thinly. “Let me rephrase that. I don’t want the fighting, I’m sick to death of the fighting.”

“You can run the businesses from anywhere. That’s not a problem. Matter of fact, in the last week the employees have not been as happy as they usually are. You’ve been pretty hard on everyone, including all the publishers. You used to allow them freedom to do as they pleased. Now you’re pushing yourself down their throat and making demands. People are more loyal when they’re treated like friends.”

“I’m trying to protect my marriage. Don’t you understand that?”

“I understand that you don’t have to work so hard at it. Janice loves you.”

“I know she loves me,” Simon answered and headed for the door. “I just want to keep it that way.”

“Where are you going now, home?”

“No, I think I’ll pay a little visit to Mr. Strong.”

“What abut Janice?”

“She’s home. I told her I would be home by three to make up for my actions.”

“You know, Simon, if you’d just trust her you wouldn’t have to spend so much time or money making up.”

“Maybe I like making up, Harold. Did you ever think of that?” He laughed softly.

Janice looked at the monitor on her computer. She’d never experienced writer’s block, but if it felt anything like what she was having at the moment, then maybe this was it. All she knew for sure was that she kept staring at the same line, deleting it, replacing it and writing it again.

Her mind wasn’t on her book. Her mind was on her husband. For the past two weeks he had been more possessive than ever. She had curtailed her work with Tommy, only doing neighborhood canvassing when there were other authors involved. Her seeing less of Tommy should have made her husband happy. It hadn’t. Simon wasn’t happy. But he wasn’t telling her anything.

Janice punched the button to turn off the computer. Maybe if Simon wouldn’t talk, Tommy would. She glanced at the clock. It was only noon. She would be back long before Simon returned.

Janice ignored the questions that the staff asked about her destination, telling them only that she would be home by the time her husband returned. She liked all the staff, but wasn’t so naive as to not know that they reported her movements to her husband.

For a change she found a parking slot for her Jeep near Tommy’s bookstore and fortified herself against the thoughts that were twirling in her mind. I’m not going against what my husband wants. I’m not going to work with Tommy.

“Hi, Neal.” she said to the clerk as she went into the store. “Is Tommy in the back?”

“No, he’s shelving books.” Neal grinned. “I think he’s taking all of yours off. He’s pretty pissed at you.”

“I’ve been doing all that I can. I’m married to a man Tommy doesn’t like. I’m doing what I can to help. You understand that, don’t you?”

“Yes, I understand, but then I’m not the one who thought he stood a chance with you.”

Janice ran her tongue unconsciously over her lips, wanting to deny that she had encouraged Tommy, but remembering the kisses they’d shared and knowing that she had in some way. Wanting to have closure with Tommy, she had inadvertently added fire to the flame.

“What are you doing here? Your husband faxed me that you weren’t available.”

Janice looked toward Tommy, surprised that she’d not heard him come up. “I know. I wasn’t available earlier.” She would talk to Simon later about what he’d done.

“Then why the hell are you here? I don’t really need your sporadic help. We can do this without you.”

Janice touched his arms and pushed against him. “Can we talk in the back room?”

“I’m busy.”

“So I see. I can help you with the books.” She began removing books from cartons and walking around the store with them, knowing that Tommy’s need to control things would have him at her side and making sure she was putting them where he wanted.

“You made a mistake, Mary Jo.”

Janice looked at the books in her hand. “What did I do?”

“I’m not talking about the books. I’m talking about your marrying Simon Kohl. You should cut your losses and get out now before you start having babies and you’re tied to him forever.”

For a moment she stopped and glared at him. “Is that what a baby means to you, Tommy, that you’re tied to the mother forever?”

“I didn’t mean it like that.”

She moved from him, wondering why the past still had the power to hurt her. Tommy had hit too close to the truth. Janice thought she was pregnant but she hadn’t told her husband. She’d been waiting for the perfect moment. She hadn’t even taken a home pregnancy test. It was just something she’d felt intuitively, that a life was growing inside her. She’d already made a doctor’s appointment to verify what she already knew. And she wanted this time to be different. She wanted her baby to be born in love and peace and she wouldn’t get either if she didn’t get to the bottom of what was caught in Tommy’s craw.

“Why do you keep saying that?”

“Have you ever wondered how Simon’s family made their money?”

Janice knew where this was going, where things always went with Tommy. She walked away toward a stack of magazines and pulled the old copies.

“Have you?” Tommy asked, following her, not bothering with the fact that there were customers in the store.

“I don’t care,” Janice turned to him and said hotly.

“You don’t care if Simon Kohl’s family owned slaves?”

How the hell could she not care? How the hell could she tell Tommy that she didn’t? “Listen, neither Simon or his father or his grandfather owned slaves.”

“What about his great-great-grandfather?”

“Now what? Am I supposed to convict my husband for sins of the father?”

“Why the hell not?”

“Don’t you think I’ve done things I’m ashamed of, Tommy?” she asked him softly, biting off each word, the anger competing with the pain. “Don’t you think I have my own skeletons in my closet? I love my husband and he loves me.”

“Yeah, right.”

“Is that what’s going on between you two? You’re trying to prove his family had something to do with slavery?”

“Isn’t that important?” Tommy asked, amazement in his voice. “What the hell happened to you, Mary Jo?”

“I grew up, Tommy. There are many shades of gray. No one is without sin, either those we’ve committed or those that have landed on us by virtue of our ancestors. I won’t fault my husband for things done long before his birth and as a friend, an old friend, I ask that you stop trying to destroy him.”

“I won’t,” Tommy said. “As long as I have breath left in me.”

“And what purpose will it serve?”

“Maybe it will make you choose a side.”

“I have chosen. I’ve chosen my husband.” She looked sadly at Tommy, then the books she was holding. She handed them to him. “I have to go.”

“Your leash has gotten shorter, hasn’t it?” he said to her back.

But Janice didn’t bother to turn and answer him. Instead, she said goodbye to Neal. “I might not be around too often,” she explained. She took Neal’s smile as his unspoken acceptance. She would never be able to have a friendship with Tommy and for that she was sad.

She walked out the door and into the path of a man heading for the store. She looked up and into the cold gray eyes of her husband. Her cheeks burned with guilt, then anger, as the thought that he’d followed her consumed her. Neither spoke.