Fire & Ice ~ The Drake Legacy: Book One (10 page)

And so, just like that, we cuddled for a while, until I’d finally cried off all my bad energy and completely soaked through the front of her knitted blue jumper.
 

Just having her here like this, I felt so thankful all of a sudden. She was like a big bowl of chicken soup; practically
guaranteed
to make you feel better. And before long, I’d wiped away my tears and taken a few gulps of my almost-cold mug of tea and then I’d begun to explain the strange turns of events that had made up last night …

But as I tried to describe that icy-eyed fellow in the Excelsior’s lobby (pretending it was the lobby of the local multiplex cinema, instead of a glitzy billionaire’s ball), I had to change events around little; unable to explain just
why
I’d picked up the card. And as my mind raced forward to the steamy goings-on in Xander’s apartment too (which I realized I couldn’t tell Mom
either
) I realized I had to start changing my story round, to protect my modesty a little.
 

“So Xander just starts freaking out when he sees me talking to this guy I don’t even
know
,” I explained. “And he tells me to leave him alone.”

“He sounds kind of messed up,” she offered.
 

I nodded. “I think he is … And I was so looking forward to last night, too.”

As I said it, another pang of worry shot through me: what in the world would happen on Monday morning?
 

“If I’m honest, I’m pretty scared about seeing him at work on Monday,” I said.
 

“There, there, dear,” Mom said, stroking my damp hair out of my eyes. “I’m sure things will all have blown over by then. The best thing to do in the meantime is just to get plenty of rest and I’ll cook you up a nice, healthy lunch. I’ve seen the kinds of things you’ve been eating recently …”

“Thanks Mom,” I said as she got up and left the room, closing the door gently behind her.
 

§

I lay there in bed for a while, trying to get back to sleep, tossing and turning, my head filled with worry and jumbled images: Xander telling me to “Get out,” the look of shock and disgust when he saw the business card, and the icy blue eyes of Caleb Marchand, whoever
he
was, piercing me with their frosty intensity …

And then, all of a sudden, my mind flitted once more to that family dinner, five years previous; we were all sat around the table laughing, having fun, my mom off in the kitchen preparing to serve up her famous lemon pie desert, my uncle and aunt over on a visit from London, England, when my dad suddenly grew quiet and touched his face, and said he wasn’t feeling so great.
 

And then, out of nowhere, his eyes just rolled right back in his head and he clutched his arm and then he toppled and fell backwards off his chair.
 

“Mom!” I screamed. “Mom! Something’s terribly wrong with Dad!”

I was only seventeen.
 

I didn’t know what to do …

I knelt down next to my poor daddy and brushed the hair out of his forehead and told him to stay strong, whispering to him, over and over, that he’d be okay …

But he wasn’t.
 

He was pronounced dead by the emergency doctor, right there in our family dining room, just a short while later.
 

Oh Daddy
, I thought as I lay in bed, five years later, so sad and miserable and unsure what to do with my life and my future.
I sure hope you’re up there somewhere, watching over me. Because right now things feel pretty far away from perfect …

Chapter Fifteen

§

A Different Man

On Monday morning, I strode into the office with a gigantic knot of worry in my stomach, big as a bowling ball. Maybe I was being paranoid, but I felt like the whole floor, all fifty or so of them, knew exactly what had gone on between us on Friday night; it felt like a hundred pairs of eyes followed me over to my desk outside Xander’s office.
 

I sat down and took a deep breath, and when I reached out my hand to turn on my computer terminal, I noticed I was physically shaking.
 

I wished my Mom was still staying with me; it would have been good to see her again this evening, but of course she needed to head back home to take care of things at her baking
 
company.
 

I’d waved her off, late last night, standing on the kern, trying my hardest to hold back the tears. At least she’d left me some healthy, comforting food in her wake. Right now my little fridge was stocked full of chicken soup, vegetable bakes, and individually wrapped sandwiches to see me through the week.
 

Just then my computer terminal pinged into life and I immediately opened up the calendar application, scrolling through to the current week’s engagements. I needed to see when Xander was going to be in the office next, to prepare and steel myself.
 

It said that he should be in any moment and that he was to be spending the whole morning here, before heading off to a lunch meeting at a Thai restaurant in the city a little later.
 

I felt another lurch of nerves in my stomach, and another wave of sadness, and decided that I couldn’t face going back to my apartment alone tonight. So I pulled my cellphone out of my purse and began composing a message to Lauren.
 

I’d only got as far as the ‘h’ of “hey” when I heard an ice-cold voice above me.
 

“Put that away.”

I looked up, shocked, to discover that it was Xander.
 

He’d appeared at my desk, seemingly out of nowhere, and his brow was knitted, his dark eyes filled now with an expression an awful lot like hate.
 

“S-sorry,” I stammered, still taken aback by the horrible tone of his voice. “I was just …”

“You were just wasting company time,” he interrupted, snapping the words at me violently. “Now please put that away and get on with some work. Now that you’ve had time to get settled in here, I’d like you to tackle some data entry …”

At this, he walked over to a filing cabinet in the corner of the office and lifted out a
huge
stack of printed spreadsheets, there must have been thousands of pages, dumping the heavy stack on the side of my desk with a
whumph.
I looked at the top of the first one; it was extremely intricate, columns and cells of long, complicated numbers and calculations.
 

"These all need typing out and formatting again from scratch,” he said. "I need you to re-enter all this information please."

"But what's wrong with-" I began.
 

"Just do it, Carrie," he growled. And I felt such shock at his new, angry tone — something I'd never heard come from him before, save for Friday night in his bedroom — that I just nodded and mumbled, "Yes sir."
 

"Good," he said, nodding to himself, then striding past me, yanking open the door to his office, and slamming it hard behind him.
 

§

I worked hard all morning, but the stack of pages was so ridiculously large it felt like I'd made very little difference. My head was pounding and all the numbers had begun to swarm and swirl together and I was working slowly and methodically in order to avoid any mistakes. Heaven forbid I should be asked to do it all again …
 

I knew deep down that he was just doing this to punish me, but I was still not quite sure what I'd actually
done
that was so wrong … And I really didn't like this new, cold side to him.
 

The longer I worked, the angrier I got, feeling that I was being punished for something I wasn't even guilty about it.
 

All of a sudden, I stood up.
 

It was as if someone was controlling me, and I was no longer fully responsible for my own actions.

I left my desk, marched up to the door to his office and, before I could change my mind, barged in.
 

Xander was speaking on the phone; he froze, open mouthed, staring at me wide-eyed with a mixture of surprise and confusion dancing across his swarthy face. Then, composing himself again, he said into the mouthpiece of the phone, "I'll call you straight back, something's come up."

He placed the phone very gently and calmly back on the desk, then looked up at me, one eyebrow raised, crossing his fingers and resting his elbows on his desk in front of him.
 

"Can I help you, Miss Lawrence?" he said with a professional calmness so icy it made my blood boil.
 

"I don't know," I blurted out. "I don't know
what
it is you think I've done wrong, but I swear to you that I haven't done it …"

"Whatever do you mean?" he asked, in the same cold, condescending tone as before.
 

"Stop pretending," I said, almost shouting now. "You're mad at me, admit it, and I don't even know what I've
done
…"

“Oh, you know
exactly
what you've done …" he growled, his eyes narrowing. "Or who," he added under his breath.
 

"Oh?" I replied. "Is this about …"
 

I searched in my head for his name.
 

“Is this about
Caleb
?"
 

At the mention of this name, it was like a self-destruct button had been pushed inside Xander. He stood up immediately from his desk, slamming both his hands down, an angry flush rising to his cheeks.
 

"Get out of this office," he roared, little bits of froth gathering at the corners of his mouth. "And don't you ever come back."

"Fine," I screamed back. "I wouldn't want to work here anyway, for a maniac like you.”

And with those final words, I turned and strode out through the still-open door to his office and out past all the rows of desks and pairs of eyes who, this time around, had definitely heard absolutely everything …
 

Chapter Sixteen

§

Into the Fire

"It makes no sense," Lauren said on the phone that evening. "And he's being a total asshole."

"Yeah," I agreed. "I just don't understand it. Obviously, this Caleb guy pushes his buttons, but there's absolutely no need to take it out on me, the way he did. It was awful, Lauren.”

"Especially like that … And so close to the anniversary of …"

"Don't worry," I interrupted her. "I'm okay."

"I know, but I've a good mind to call him up, tell him what's what. What he did is no way to treat a person, especially someone as beautiful and fantastic and warm and caring as you …"

"Thanks," I said, feeling so lucky and glad to have a friend like Lauren. "But
promise
me you won't call him, okay?"

She was the kind of person who might actually follow up on a threat such as this.
 

"Okay," she said, a little annoyed. “But just give me the word and I’ll tear his balls off.”

"So what do I do now," I said, trying to steer her away from this line of conversation, "apart from look for another job?"
 

"Well, what
about
this Caleb guy?" she said, taking things in a direction I hadn't even considered. "What do we actually know about him? Maybe if you find out some more about Caleb, Xander's weird mood swings might make a little more sense. Not that I'm letting him off the hook, you understand."

“It’s certainly an interesting idea," I said. "And thanks, Lauren."

"Don't mention it. Let me know how you get on, sweetie."

The way she called me that reminded me for a brief second of Mom, and again I felt so thankful that I had such a good, caring friend, hot tears welled up in the corners of my eyes.
 

“Speak to you soon,” I said, then hung up.
 

§

That evening, inspired by what Lauren had suggested, I decided to do a little internet detective work. I typed in ‘Caleb B. Marchand’ and ‘Ignis Incorporated’ to see what I could find, but it seemed like there was much less information available than when I’d first Google-searched Xander.
 

There were hardly any photos of Caleb, save from one or two grainy long-distance pics, and the only information I could find was a rather sparse company website for Ignis and the information that Caleb was CEO. It didn’t even say what Ignis Inc
did
.
 

I decided to give the office number on the website a call.
 

I don’t know what I was expecting to find, but I was surprised when the voice that answered it sounded suspiciously like Caleb’s.
 

“Hello?”
 

“Hi … Um … I’m looking to speak to Mr Marchand,” I said, hesitantly.
 

“Speaking,” the cold, stern voice said.
 

A strange, icy thrill ran through me, just like when he’d grabbed my arm in the lobby. I shook the feeling from my head.

"My name's Cassie Lawrence," I said, "and we met, very briefly at the ball on Friday."

"Oh yes," he laughed, warming up a little. "I gave you my card. And you dropped it on the carpet in front of me.”

"That's right," I said, a little embarrassed.
 

I hesitated for a moment, unsure quite what to say next. Why
had
I called exactly? I couldn't just outright ask him what was up between Xander and him, could I?

But as I was scrabbling around for something to say, I felt relieved when he took control.
 

"I'm glad you finally called me,” he said, his tone lowering a little.
 

Even just over the phone, I could picture him; those cold, piercing blue eyes, his blonde brow, his prominent jaw-line, so similar to … to ..
who?
 

"Listen, why don't you come over to mine for a drink this evening?" he continued, taking me a little off-guard. "There's a business matter I'd like to talk to you about, actually …"