Angel Falling Softly - By Eugene Woodbury Page 0,2

clear her ringing skull of the siren’s song. She reminded herself, reprimanded herself: there was still Laura, the daughter who would live, the daughter who needed her attention as much as the daughter who didn’t even know she was there.

Chapter 4

Butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth

Milada’s driver from Executive Ground Transport was young, well groomed, and extraordinarily polite. His name was Steven Day. A premed student at the University of Utah, he was married and had two children, a fact she found stunning in this day and age. Steven met her at the front desk and accompanied her to the limo.

“Eagle Gate Plaza,” she said. She placed her parasol on the seat next to her. It was a short ride, so she kept on her gloves and hat. The Lincoln merged into traffic. Milada said, “Steven, I gather that you’re working your way through college.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Is this not difficult, with a family to support at the same time?”

He glanced at her reflection in the rearview mirror. “It’s a lot of work, ma’am, but we’re getting by.”

“You must have married quite young to already have two children.”

“We met at Brigham Young University my freshman year. We got married right after my mission.”

“Your mission?” She recalled her Frommer’s Utah guidebook. “Ah, you mean a proselytizing mission.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Steven turned onto South Temple and stopped beneath the pink granite facing of Eagle Gate Plaza. He walked around the car and opened the door. Milada said, “I shouldn’t be needing you for the rest of the afternoon.” She added, “From now on, we shall use the parking garage entrance.”

Milada rode the elevator to the seventeenth floor, where Loveridge & Associates occupied all but two suites. She presented her card to the secretary at the front desk. “I’m here to see Mr. Loveridge.”

“Just a minute, ma’am.” She digested the information on the card. “Your sister’s in the south conference room.”

Kammy could be counted on to be punctual.

A minute later, a man walked up to her. “I’m Edward Christensen. Mr. Loveridge has asked me to take care of any concerns you might have.”

As Jane had predicted, they’d assigned her a handler. Milada supposed that her embossed business card reading Chief Investment Officer, Daranyi Capital Management was not by itself persuasive, especially when the woman presenting it looked barely twenty.

They shook hands. “Milada,” he said, motioning for her to accompany him, “we’ve arranged for one of our conference rooms to be at your disposal whenever you’re in town. Here we are.”

Milada strode ahead of him into the conference room. Kammy was leaning back in a chair reading a medical journal. Her stocking feet rested against the edge of the heavy oak table. Her platinum-blond hair was tied back in a ponytail. Her fedora and slicker sat on the table. She was wearing green hospital scrubs.

Kammy looked up at Milada, her eyes shielded by her wraparound sunglasses. “It’s about time. The seminar starts in thirty minutes.”

“The seminar?” Milada echoed.

“The Biomedical Informatics Seminar at the University of Utah. You insisted, remember?”

Milada remembered.

The room faced south. She closed the curtains, removed her hat, and took out her small Sony laptop. Edward stood in the doorway like a bellhop waiting for a tip.

“Is there anything else, Milada?”

From the corner of her eye, Milada was sure she saw Kammy smirk. She said, “Edward—”

“You can call me Ed.”

“Edward,” she said again. “You may begin by addressing me as Miss Daranyi.” Still wearing her sunglasses, she looked directly at him. “Before I left New York, I asked Mr. Loveridge to prepare the SEC filings on Wylde Medical Informatics. I’d like to see them now.”

“Yes, Miss Daranyi.” Edward wheeled around and marched out of the room.

She said to her sister, “You have read the prospectus I sent you?”

“You couldn’t have bought a company in Seattle or San Francisco? The UV index got up to nine yesterday.”

“You tolerate sunlight better than I do. Be thankful this isn’t Phoenix.”

“I’m just saying.”

“The prospectus?”

Kammy shrugged. “Did you know the company started out as a chain of funeral homes? Love the irony.” She grinned, showing her sharp lateral incisors. “The informatics stuff looks solid. The long-term demand for genome-sequencing data is all upside as far as I can tell. Tie it into the genealogical data and you can do deCODE genetics one better. I figure that’s the market you’re aiming at.”

“You can do deCODE genetics one better. You’re going to be running it.”

“Yeah, right.”

Milada sighed. “But it looks solid, you said.”

“The people in charge of the science seem to know what

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