“Need anything else?”
Dwight’s question reeled his thoughts back in. “No, I can handle things from here. It was just as I suspected.”
“What about the woman, Kennedy Bennett? You want me to check her out, as well? To see if there’s any evidence that she’s leaving with plans to take Rivers’s clients with her, as Matthews and Whitworth claim?”
“No. I can see where Matthew and Whitworth are trying to go with their allegations.”
“And you plan to shut them down.”
It was a statement and not a question. Dwight knew him well. “Yes, those are my plans.”
“Doesn’t surprise me. Out of curiosity, I pulled up an image of Ms. Bennett. She’s a looker.”
He thought so, too. And he knew it would be a waste of time to deny his interest in her because he was interested. “Glad you think so. I do, too.”
“It’s a good thing she has you in her corner, Haddison.”
Later that night, as Haddison prepared for bed, he thought about Dwight’s words. Little did his friend guess that Kennedy had him more than just in her corner. She was getting to him in a big way, and there wasn’t a single thing he could do about it. And even more surprising? He didn’t care.
“AREN’T YOU IN A good mood.”
Kennedy, who was at the copy machine, looked up to find Adelia standing there and smiled. Her friend had taken Monday off to accompany her son on a field trip with his school. “Yes. Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Umm, no reason. How was your date Saturday night?” Adelia asked her.
She knew the only reason Adelia had asked was because there was no one else around. Although it wouldn’t bother her if word got out that she and Haddison were seeing each other, she didn’t want to give people anything to talk about. “It was great,” she said, gathering her documents as she and Adelia began walking back toward her office. “He was the perfect gentleman.”
“He sounds pretty boring to me.”
Kennedy couldn’t help but laugh. “Trust me, he wasn’t boring.”
Adelia glanced at her watch. “If you say so. But you have to tell me about it later. I have that report to finish. When is Mr. Matthews going to announce to everyone that you’re leaving?”
Kennedy was surprised he hadn’t told anyone about it yet, especially Adelia, who was the best candidate to take Kennedy’s position of senior marketing analyst when she left. There was no one else better qualified, with or without a degree. She’d mentioned that fact to Mr. Matthews when she’d met with him on Friday. She thought he’d acted rather strange. It almost seemed as if he was ignoring the fact she would be leaving in a few weeks. Oh well, it wasn’t her problem.
“Okay, I hope to see you at lunch.”
A couple of hours later, Kennedy was back at her desk and had just ended a call with one of her clients when her in-office phone rang. “Yes?”
“Ms. Bennett, this is Millie Crawford, personal assistant to Haddison B. Wolf. He would like to see you in his office, if you have a moment.”
Kennedy raised a brow. “Yes, I’m free right now. I’m on my way.”
“I’ll let him know. He asked that you bring the McConnell file with you.”
She hung up the phone, wondering why she was being summoned to the head of security’s office? And what did it have to do with the McConnell file.
Still, there was nothing to be worried about. It wasn’t unusual for the head of security to question senior analysts about the security regarding a particular client, especially one that was a well-known technology firm. It was important that information about their business remained confidential and secure.
She hadn’t seen Haddison since their date Saturday night. But they had talked on the phone every night since then. Kennedy enjoyed listening to his sexy phone voice. He had called her Sunday night right after she’d gotten out of the shower and ready for bed. He’d told her about his day, cycling in the morning, and playing tennis with a friend later that day. He hadn’t said whether that friend was male or female, and she knew she didn’t have a right to ask.
He did tell her how much he had enjoyed going to the movies, and wanted to do it again. So they’d made another movie date for this weekend. Before they’d ended the call, he’d told her that he would be out of the office on Monday but would return to work on Tuesday. She’d had no reason to think she would see him today, but was glad she would.
When she stepped off the elevator on the fourth floor, she ran into Larry Matthews. He’d been waiting to get on the elevator and seemed surprised to see her. He lifted a brow. “Did we have a meeting?”
“No. I’m here to see Mr. Wolf.”
“Oh,” he said, nodding…and barely hiding a smirk? She wondered what that was about? “Nothing is wrong, I hope,” he said.
Why would he think that? “I’m sure nothing is wrong. He wants to see me about the McConnell firm.”
“That makes sense. No one is more knowledgeable about that account than you.”
She didn’t know whether he meant that as a compliment or not. Besides, as her manager, he should be just as knowledgeable as she was about any of the accounts. “Well, I’ll be going now.”
“Don’t let me keep you. I’m leaving and will be gone for the rest of the day,” he said.
That was his usual routine on Tuesdays. She’d heard that he and Mr. Whitworth left the office to play tennis every Tuesday after lunch. “I know. Enjoy your tennis game.”
He frowned at her. Why? Was his weekly tennis game on company time with Mr. Whitworth supposed to be some kind of a secret? If so, then she hated to tell him that everyone knew about it. God, she couldn’t wait to get out from under his thumb.
It was a shame, really. She had enjoyed working here — before Larry. And she knew she’d miss the people she’d come to know over the past five years, as well as working with certain accounts. But everyone deserved to feel appreciated. And Larry Matthews’s M.O. was to work her to death and take all the credit, giving her no recognition for the work she did.
The raise he’d given her three months ago was pitiful and the rating of ‘Expected’ he’d put on her progress report had been the last straw. She did much more than what was expected, and they both knew it. It was only when she refused to sign the evaluation and threatened to make a fuss that he’d changed it.
She figured that he must have some sort of plan in place for when she left, because he’d yet to tell her who would take her place so she could train them. The clients she handled were used to the way she did things and she needed to make sure her replacement knew which ones were to be handled with kid gloves.
Larry Matthews got on the elevator without saying anything else, and she headed toward the desk where Millie Crawford sat. The older woman glanced up and smiled at her. “Mr. Wolf is expecting you. Please, go right in.”
“Thanks.”
Kennedy walked over and knocked on the door. When a deep, husky voice said, “Come in,” she opened it and walked in, hoping like hell that Larry didn’t know something she didn’t.