Romantic Acquisition Page 0,66
as well since she couldn’t look at him. “Carlo Attracelli has been trying to get in touch with you for three days. He’s finally resorted to calling me as if I were your personal secretary. Call him now!” he ordered and left her office.
She reached for her phone thinking that she’d have to talk to him sooner or later. But the movement of her hand upset her stomach so she leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes, willing the bile to back down. Kate decided to ignore his command and searched through the piles on her desk. She finally found where she’d left off the night before and continued looking at fabric samples. By noon that day, she remembered the coffee shop conversation. She knew that the sale was about to be finalized and she wanted to let Carlo know that something was going on that didn’t seem right.
She walked by David’s office, intending to put some files back in the accounting storage area that was across the hall from his office. She heard him yelling and his words stopped her feet. “Sell all the damn shares now!” and he slammed down his phone.
Kate didn’t bother to knock. She just stood in the open doorway as David turned to a man sitting in one of the chairs. “We’re going to make this happen,” he said gleefully, rubbing his hands together. “By the end of the day, we’ll pull out of the ATI deal, they’ll owe us millions in the settlement agreement, then we buy up all the tanked stock and wait until it goes back up in a few months with the announcement of the new chairman.”
Kate couldn’t hold her silence any longer. “What are you talking about, David?”
David swung around and glared at her. “Never mind. Don’t you have some dresses or something to buy?” he snapped.
Kate could only stare at him. He was evil, she realized. “You’re going to make Carlo look like an idiot for recommending the buy out. You can’t do that,” she said, her voice soft and quivering.
David sneered at her. “Don’t give me that. The whole staff’s stock is going to soar in the next few months so you’ll be making a pretty penny on that as well.”
Did he really think she was that mercenary? “No, that isn’t the point,” she said, shaking her head.
“What’s the point? Your lover boy looking like an idiot?” he sneered. “That’s not my problem. If he doesn’t know how to play with the big boys, he has no business being out here.”
Kate was shocked. “You did leak information to someone in a bar a few days ago, didn’t you? That woman is going to spend all her savings on stocks in Jamison’s. Then the stock is going to tank because you’re going to illegally pull out of the deal. Is that it?” she demanded, getting angry now.
David rolled his eyes at her naiveté. “Don’t worry about that silly blond woman. If it’s who I think it was, we had a good time. She got what she wanted out of the deal plus, if she sells in time and doesn’t wait for another stock tip from a stranger, she’ll make a good bit of money on the sale as well.” He laughed at his plan. “But she probably won’t. If it’s the blond bimbo I think you’re talking about, she won’t pay enough attention to her stocks to know what is going on. It’s tough when you rely on bad information, isn’t it?” he snickered.
Kate stepped out of his office and stood in the hallway in shock. As she leaned against the wall, she heard him laughing “Don’t worry about Kate,” he said to the stranger sitting in David’s office. “She won’t blab to the SEC. She has too much loyalty to my old man. Besides, she’ll think about it and will realize that she’s going to benefit from what I’m doing as well if this plan works out. If she says anything to anyone, she’ll be caught in the situation even though she didn’t know anything about it.”
Those words horrified her so much that it got her moving. She ran back to her office to grab her keys before she left the building, not even bothering to take her coat. She headed to the elevators and reached her car in a daze.
“Where in the world am I supposed to go?” she asked herself once the door was closed and she was staring out into the bright