Not in Her Wildest Dreams(22)

This bloody audit. Why wouldn't it come together the way it was supposed to?

Oh, who was she kidding? She could blame the odor in the office, and  Sterling picking fights with his father, but she knew the real reason  she couldn't concentrate.

Walter said something, low and final, then the door to his office slammed.

Here it comes, she thought, and heard feet tramping up the stairs. She covered her face, hoping, praying....

"Sign this," Sterling said from the door.

She uncovered her face and folded her arms on the desktop, trying to maintain a wall of indifference.

It was impossible. He wore jeans and a company T-shirt, but his dander  was up, making it an effort to meet his intense gaze. It had been an  effort all week. Nothing had changed since they'd spoken at his  grandmother's house, but everything had. Now, instead of the air being  filled with old hurts and resentments, it rang instead with I was into  you.         

     



 

Kids with an unspoken crush. Adults in a contentious, impossible  situation. Undercurrents. She felt like her lungs were in a vice every  time she was around him.

"I'm busy," she told him. "Quit fighting with him. It looks bad to the employees."

"Oh, is this my mother's living room? I was looking for Paige Fogarty's  office." He glanced at the nameplate on the door. It read ‘Grady  Fogarty.' He stepped in anyway and started to swing the door closed  behind him.

"Don't. It smells like cigarettes if I close the door."

"No, it smells like cloves and oranges." He followed his nose to her desk. "Actually, today it smells like something else."

She pointed to the plug-in diffuser burning essential oils and the  bottle of patchouli, mildly annoyed when he picked it up to read the  label. She wanted to believe it was because she didn't want to lose  another minute, but it was really because every time she so much as  passed him in the hallway, her imagination ballooned with his admission  that he had been interested back then. How could she have read him so  wrongly? Why did it matter? Get back to the audit, hormone-case.

"I thought it was your shampoo," he said, setting the tiny bottle back  on her desk. "I could smell it in your hair when you were getting coffee  this morning."

Her mechanical pencil slipped out of her grip. "Really. I'm, um, trying to work."

"Me, too. Sign this and we'll both get on with our day."

"I wish you wouldn't play me off against him."

"I'm not. I'm bringing my request to the principle who actually reads and considers."

"But I don't have time to read and consider."

"I also brought that list of equipment you wanted from Quinn." He  rustled through the papers he held and offered her a page, then drew it  away when she reached for it. "You give me what I want, I give you what  you want."

"No, you give me the list or I'll swear at you."

"I've been sworn at all morning. I'm starting to like it." He flicked  the list onto her desktop and pulled up a chair, settling into it with a  sigh. "Dad doesn't like change."

"I hear that. Literally." She skimmed the list and let out a sigh of her own.

"What?" he prompted.

She debated briefly, but there was no one else she could confide in. It  wasn't like she'd be telling him anything he couldn't find out himself  if he took a minute to look.

"This," she said. "It's a classic example of why I didn't accept the  financial statement without an audit." She turned the paper and showed  him what she was reading. "This figure? That's what is shown as the  value of capital assets. Yet you look up here and half of them have been  crossed off and a bunch more written in. So does that make the  financial statement accurate? No. It's out by at least thirty thousand  dollars on this line alone."

He tilted his head. "You look cute with glasses."

She'd forgotten she was wearing them and adjusted their position on her  nose. "Every piece of paper I touch has a story like this."

"But you're fixing it, right?"

"No!" She dropped it and looked at the ceiling. "That's what the whole  world thinks an auditor does. They think you do all the work over again  and do it right this time. If we did that, it would take the same amount  of time it took to do all the work the first time and audits would last  for years."

"Instead they only feel that way."

She gave him a filthy look that made him chuckle.

"I know what auditors do. I'm just having fun." When she raised a  challenging brow, he said, "You look at a company's procedures and test  the data. If everything is copasetic, you put your stamp of approval on  the financial statement. If you come across a gray area, you suggest  adjustments." He waved at the list. "Ask Olinda to fix it."

"She's kind of overworked right now, fixing all the other errors and irregularities I've stumbled across."

"Really?" He sobered.

"I'm not questioning anyone's integrity," she hurried to add. "I haven't  come across anything that leads me to believe there are intentional  misstatements."

"But...?"

She bit her lip, desperate to get some things off her chest.

He reached back and swung the door shut with a muted bang. "Tell me."

She'd been watching Sterling all week. He took his role here as  seriously as she was taking hers, intent on improving operations at  every level. This might be valuable information he could use. Besides,  who else could she talk to? Walter?         

     



 

"It's just... I've seen books in this kind of shape before." Tension  drained from her as she opened the valve. "The technical term is  ‘cluster-fuck.'"

His mouth quirked. "I'm familiar with that term. Used it once or twice myself since I've been here."

She leaned back with relief. "So it's not just me."

"Nope."

"You know, I wouldn't have been able to hire anyone to do this audit.  The professional risk is so high I don't like attaching my own name to  it. I can't believe this company makes money."

"You should take a walk with me. You'll wonder how they make beds."

"And what you said about resisting change?" She leaned forward on her  desk. "It's epidemic. You wouldn't believe the flack I'm taking from  Olinda. Frankly, I'm afraid to take this list to her and ask her to  clean it up. She'll hate me."

"I'll do it," he offered.

"That's not the point. The point is, there's so much. I'm feeling time  pressure and-" She pointed at the pages he still held. "More just keeps  coming."

"You can't refuse to read this." He tilted the pages against his chest,  protective. "I'm closing with the Boston distributor, but it won't work  without this upgrade."

"I can't do it today. Tonight I have this thing-" She scrunched her hair  in her fists and let go. "That's another thing. People figure, now that  I'm in town, I have nothing better to do than spend my evenings  shopping in their living room."

Sterling frowned. "Tupperware? Do people still make that stuff?"

"They do, but this is something else."

"Sex toys?"

"No." She came close to smiling at that. "Dried flowers and art, or so  I'm told. Olinda is redecorating." At least Britta would be there.

"You know, I delivered and set up Olinda's Nordic Queen yesterday. I kept thinking the place needed some dried flowers and art."

Did he have to make this fun for her? She was trying to resist him over here.

"Good eye," she shot back. "Anyway, that's what I'm doing tonight so I  won't get to that proposal until tomorrow night at the earliest-"

"Actually, you're busy then, too. The LFBA meets every third Friday at the country club."

She snorted. "I'd rather spend the rest of my life shopping for dried  flowers than attend one meeting of the Lying Effing Bastards  Association."

"Hostile. What's that about?" He seemed genuinely puzzled.

Her valves seized. All her desire to confide dried up as she thought of  the way those men had treated her at the hospital a couple of weeks ago.  The way she and her family had been treated for years by the top tier  in this town.

"I'm just under the gun," she muttered. "Too busy for a social dinner."  She picked up her pencil and found her place on the list of figures.

"Paige, the ninety employees on the floor depend on their jobs and the  whole town depends on those ninety people having jobs. We need to  reassure them."

"My mom knits security blankets. This could be a win-win."

"You're acting partner."

Partner. That sounded hideously official. "Only until I sell."

"Fair enough, but you are. People are wondering if they can rely on the  factory the way they used to. They need to see you. Both of us. They  want to shake our hands and hear us tell them all is well. That's  networking one-o-one."