Sidney Sheldon - Mistress of the Game

Annabel watched Max shrink. Why does he let her crush him? What power does she hold over him?

“That’s enough, Eve,” she said. “You’re confused.”

While the doctor took Eve’s blood pressure, Max took Lisa Jenner aside.

“Has she been like this the whole time? Or is it worse, you know, when I’m here?”

“You mustn’t blame yourself, sir,” the maid said kindly. “She has her lucid moments. But this is pretty much par for the course. She’s been writing a lot. That seems to calm her.”

“Writing? Writing what?”

“I don’t know. Just rambling, I think. She won’t let me see it. She keeps all her papers locked in the desk drawer.”

Later, Max repeated to Annabel what Lisa had told him. “Do you think I should open the drawer? Take a look?”

“No,” Annabel said firmly. “She may be old and mad as a hatter, but she’s entitled to her privacy.”

In fact, Annabel Webster couldn’t have cared less about her mother-in-law’s privacy. Her only concern was for Max. God knows what venomous drivel is in those papers. As soon as she drops dead, I’ll open the drawer myself and burn them.

Lexi was late home. Again.

Gabe couldn’t hide his disappointment. “I made dinner. Two hours ago. Where the hell have you been?”

“At work.” As always when she was in the wrong, Lexi’s tone was aggressive. “Just because you’ve lost your ambition, it doesn’t mean I have to.”

Gabe’s face crumpled with hurt. The irony was that he’d taken a backseat at Phoenix in order to spend more time with Lexi. He hoped eventually to persuade her to marry him and start a family. But whenever he brought up either subject, she either ducked the question or put her “bitch” hat on.

“You’re lying. I called the office. You left hours ago.”

“Oh, what, so you’re spying on me now?”

“Not spying. You were late. I was worried.”

“I’m a big girl, Gabe. If you must know, I was at a business meeting.”

“With whom?”

“None of your damn business!”

Lexi stormed into the bedroom, slamming the door behind her. Pulling off her clothes, she tried to get her head together.

Why am I doing this? Why am I pushing him away?

Lexi loved Gabe as much as she ever had. More. But her stress levels were through the roof. She was preparing for the greatest battle of her life-the battle for control of Kruger-Brent-and she couldn’t tell Gabe, or anyone, what she was doing. The stakes could not be higher. If she failed, she would lose everything. Her fortune, her company, perhaps even her freedom.

Actually, there’s another rule. I didn’t tell you about it because it never happens…

You are supposed to win. You have to win by losing.

What if she won back Kruger-Brent, but lost Gabe?

She pushed the thought from her mind. She would win the game. She had to. Once she had Kruger-Brent, and her revenge on Max was complete, then she would make it up to Gabe. He wasn’t going anywhere.

Kruger-Brent failed to make payments on a loan in Singapore. The bank foreclosed on one of its properties. The amount involved was so small, Max never even knew about it. A Singaporian middle manager was fired. Kruger-Brent refinanced. End of story.

A few weeks later, a similar oversight in Germany led to another loan being called in. Again the amount was small.

Lexi made a note of the dates.

Karen Lomax, a financial journalist at the Wall Street Journal, received a phone call. After she hung up, she turned to her colleague Daniel Breen.

“Hey, Dan. You heard anything about credit problems at Kruger-Brent?”

Daniel Breen shook his head. “Have you?”

“Some lady just called. Said I should look into bad loans in Asia. Think there’s a story in it?”

Daniel Breen shrugged. “Only one way to find out, I guess.”

The cards were being dealt.

Gabe opened the file in front of him, skimming through the pictures.

“So she’s not having an affair?”

The private investigator shook his head. “From the evidence I’ve seen, sir, no, she’s not.” Gabe’s shoulders sagged visibly with relief. “However…”

Gabe looked up.

“There are some…anomalies.”

“What sort of anomalies?”

“Financial. If you turn to page twelve of the written document, it’s all in there.”

Gabe turned. Slowly, methodically, he started to read.

The first few weeks of Gabe’s love affair with Lexi had been like a dream.

Gabe had not believed it possible that he could love again after what had happened to Tara and his children. Certainly not while his grief was so raw. But in those first miraculous weeks at Robbie’s African hideaway, Lexi had breathed life into his deadened heart. When Gabe woke in the small hours, sweating and screaming Tara’s name, Lexi would wrap her arms around him and hold him till the nightmare passed. Gabe spoke about his children often, returning again and again to the terrible events of his birthday like a dog crawling back to its vomit. Lexi listened. He poured his guilt into her hands, and she took it from him, as gently and graciously as if he’d been giving her a bunch of flowers.

But eventually, inevitably, real life intruded upon their lovers’ idyll. Gabe handed over the day-to-day running of Phoenix to others, content to focus on Lexi and his charity work. If Tara’s murder had taught him one thing, it was that love and life were too precious to be wasted pushing paper around an office.

Lexi didn’t see things that way. She could no more stop working than stop breathing. Templeton was based in New York. Gabe moved to the city to be with her. He enjoyed New York, the energy and the excitement, but he never stopped feeling like a guest in Lexi’s apartment. As a first step toward building a new, joint life together, Gabe bought an exquisite period house in Bridgehampton. Somewhere for them to get away, to make time for each other.

“What do you think?” He led Lexi around the wood-paneled rooms, each simply but beautifully furnished with chesterfield couches and Irish linens from the White Company. “I tried to make it peaceful. An escape from the city.”

“It’s…it’s cute.” Lexi tried to sound enthusiastic. But inside she thought: I don’t want to escape from the city.

Gabe’s face fell. “You don’t like it.”

“I do! It’s not that. It’s just…when are we going to use it?”

“On weekends.”

“I work weekends, baby.”

Lexi didn’t just work weekends. She worked early mornings and late nights. She worked Thanksgiving and Labor Day. Gabe hadn’t realized that her fateful trip to visit her brother in South Africa was the first vacation she’d taken in over five years.

It wasn’t only the long hours. It was the secrecy. Lexi often talked in her sleep, rambling about Kruger-Brent and Max and revenge. She seemed to be anxious that time was running out. But when Gabe asked her, “Time for what?” Lexi pretended not to know what he was talking about. Not long ago, Gabe had been shocked when David Tennant, Lexi’s right-hand man at Templeton, mentioned in passing that the company was in trouble.

“Lexi’s been liquidating assets faster than any of us can keep up. The money disappears into these obscure holding companies, then poof, it’s gone.”

When Gabe challenged Lexi about this, she was dismissive.

“David’s a worrywart. I’ve moved some cash around, that’s all.”

“He says you’re stripping Templeton bare.”

“He’s exaggerating.”

Conversation closed.

Recently it had reached the point where Gabe felt he had to make an appointment to speak to Lexi at all. When he did, all the subjects he wanted to discuss-marriage, children, their future-were off the agenda.