Chapter 5

“Oh my God, he’s here.”

Piper listened to her excited friend over a bowl of cereal and a cup of herbal tea.

“Why is it you sound like you’re talking about a potential Bumble date?”

Julia’s whisper was so low Piper had to stop chewing her food to hear her. “He’s so hot.”

“You might want to get over that if you want to keep your job.”

“A girl can fantasize.”

Piper swallowed and swirled the colored bits of marshmallows around the equally sweet, but not as bright, Lucky Charms in her bowl. She hadn’t eaten this much sugar in the morning since she was ten. But lately she couldn’t get away from the crap. Who knew her depression food would be meant for a four-year-old? “I guess that means Daddy gave his company to his son.”

“Nothing official has come through the pipeline, but that’s my guess.”

Piper filled her spoon, shoveled more sugar into her mouth.

“He wanted the HR file on you,” Julia said.

“Why?” Piper asked around her food.

“He asked why you were fired.”

“Ha! Tell him because his father was a misogynistic, womanizing asshole.”

“I’m sure that would go over really well.” Julia’s sarcasm was crystal clear. “He probably needs to know what Stone was working on . . . his schedule, meetings . . . stuff like that.”

Piper immediately found her mind listing off all the places for the newest Stone to find what he needed. Instead of voicing any of that, she shoved more food in her mouth. “Sounds like a problem . . . for him.”

Julia cleared her throat. “You know, you could play this right and maybe get your job back.”

“Not interested!”

“Why?”

She swallowed and set her spoon down. “The thought of sucking up to any Stone to get my job back makes me physically ill.” Considering her stomach started to churn at that very moment, Piper stood firm on her convictions.

“I wish you would try . . . Oh, shit. Floyd’s here. I gotta go.”

“Talk to you—”

Julia disconnected the call on her end, leaving Piper staring at her phone.

She pushed aside the cereal and looked down at herself. It was after ten in the morning, and she hadn’t yet gotten out of her pajamas and bathrobe.

Kitty sat at her side, eyes bright.

“I’m making a habit of this.”

Taking Piper’s attention as an invitation, Kit pushed his hundred-and-ten-pound rottweiler frame to his feet, his mouth open in a pant.

“I should probably take you for a walk.”

Kit slapped his jaws shut with the word walk and tilted his head just enough to tell Piper he understood her.

“All right, Kitty . . . let me throw on some clothes.”

His stub of a tail started to wag, and the panting began again.

“Chase! I didn’t expect you so soon.” Floyd Gatlin walked into the office after a single knock.

Chase stood and moved around the desk with an extended hand. “No time like the present.”

They shook hands as Arthur Ripley, Stone Enterprises’ CFO, joined them.

“Thank you both for making room in your schedules today.” Chase turned to Ripley, shook his hand, and then indicated for both men to sit in the chairs provided in front of the desk.

The men glanced at each other. “We’ve kept meetings outside of the office light since your father’s passing. It wasn’t uncommon for your father to be away a couple of days a week.”

“I assume those meetings have been canceled or rescheduled for you.”

“Without any direction, that was the plan,” Floyd said.

Chase took his father’s chair and placed his hands in front of him on the desk. “Probably for the best.”

Ripley was a good twenty years older than Chase, bald, trim, his suit tailor-made. “We weren’t sure who would be sitting in that chair.”

“No one was more surprised than me.”

Both men chuckled.

“And Alex. She couldn’t be here today, but she will be in a day or two.”

“Alex? Alexandrea?” Floyd asked.

“Yes,” Chase answered.

“Your father left Stone Enterprises to both of you?”

“You sound surprised.”

Floyd shrugged. “We haven’t been told anything.”

Chase leaned back. “Which is partly why I’m here today. Before the news of my father’s will becomes public, we wanted you to hear it from us first.”

They exchanged looks and stayed silent.

“He left it to us.” Chase paused and then clarified, if only to himself, “His children.”

Gatlin sighed. “What do you know about running this company?”

Instead of admitting he knew nothing, Chase said what he’d want to hear. “Business is business. Alex and I have both been in the corporate sector our entire adult lives. It will take a while to come up to speed, but we’ll figure it out. I assume that we can depend on the both of you to provide whatever we need to do that.”

Ripley’s slow smile felt like support, whereas Gatlin’s was guarded.

“What about your own business?” Gatlin asked.

“My second in charge is quite capable of running it while we figure this out.”

“Wouldn’t it be better to put someone else in this chair at Stone Enterprises while you’re ‘figuring this out’?”

“Who would you suggest?” Chase questioned. “You?”

“Well . . .”

Chase brought his hands together in front of him, fingertips touching. “All due respect, Mr. Gatlin, if my father wanted you to take over for him, he would have put it in his will. We all know that my father didn’t do anything on accident. Now, that isn’t to say that Alex and I won’t conclude that the company would be better off with someone else running it. Which may or may not be you. But in the meantime, your cooperation with this transition is imperative. The employees out there need to know they all have jobs and that nothing is going to change.”

Gatlin’s shoulders started to relax, and so did his questions.

“We’ll need to call an executive board meeting with the shareholders and put them at ease. Preferably before the media jumps. I’d ask my father’s secretary . . . assistant to do this, but it appears he’s without one.”

“I’ll have Julia get on that.”

“Perfect.” Chase relaxed his hands on the desk once again. “I certainly don’t want to treat either of you like an assistant, but since I don’t . . .” He hesitated. “Why don’t I have an assistant? Do any of you know why she was let go?”

“Your father didn’t tell me,” Arthur said.

“I’m not completely sure either. I know she was late a couple of times, according to the staff gossip,” Floyd said.

Chase tapped a finger on the desk. “Regardless, we’ll need all the numbers. Quarterly statements, profit and loss. Anything my father was currently working on. Anything pressing or pending.”

Someone knocked on the office door.

“Come in.”

Julia walked in, a file in her hand. “I’m sorry, I can come back later.”

Chase unfolded from his chair. “No, we’re done here. Gentlemen . . .”

Floyd and Arthur followed Chase’s lead and stood.

Chase rounded the desk.

“We’re here to help,” Gatlin said before walking away.

“Thank you.”

Arthur paused and patted Chase’s back. “I am sorry for your loss. I’m not sure I had an opportunity to say that at the funeral.”

Nails.

On.

Chalkboard!

“There were a lot of people there.”

Another pat on his back, and Arthur dropped his hand. “I’ll get those numbers for you.”

Instead of thanking the man, Chase turned to Julia and accepted the file she handed him.

“Thank you, Julia.”

He turned and headed back into the office without looking at her.

“If there is anything—”

“I’ll let you know.” Chase heard the door close behind him as he opened the employee file of the fired assistant.

“Piper Maddox.” The first page in the file was the last correspondence. Her termination paperwork, which stated she had been chronically late without notifications and that her performance had declined in the months before she was let go. All of which were reported by Aaron Stone. Piper had signed her name with a giant P and a line.

The second evaluation was presented as a warning of the need for improvement for the eventual causes of her termination. It all seemed pretty straightforward . . . until Chase flipped the paper over and read a note by his father. That’s when doubt crept in.

Chase chuckled as he moved on to a performance evaluation from six months before that didn’t show any sign of problems. High praise from her colleagues and a satisfactory mark from Chase’s father. The one before that was a year before the last . . . same results. The evaluations went back five years to when she’d been promoted to his father’s assistant. She’d joined the company after what looked like an internship. His father’s assistant at that time had hired Piper as her assistant. Those evaluations were off-the-charts perfect and given by her immediate boss, who wasn’t Aaron Stone.

The last page in the file had a picture of her when she’d been hired. She looked like a young, enthusiastic intern. Brown hair and bright eyes with an infectious smile. Girl-next-door pretty with a hint of wisdom in her gaze. The fact that she had jumped through the ranks of her position so quickly, to end up as the assistant to the CEO in only a handful of years with the company, was impressive.

“This smells bad, Piper Maddox.”

Going with his gut, the one that suggested that a conversation with her might give some insight into his father’s actions, Chase picked up the office phone and dialed the number on the résumé.

On the third ring, she picked up. Instead of a hello or orderly greeting, she yelled into the phone. “Darn it, Julia. I told you not to call me from the office number!”

“I’m sorry . . . is this Piper Maddox?” he asked.

“Wait . . . what?”

“Miss Maddox? Who used to work with Aaron Stone.”

Her voice pitched higher. “Who is this?”

“This is Chase Stone.”

It sounded as if she’d pulled the phone away from her ear, the obscenity she used was muffled, but he still heard it.

“What do you want?” she finally asked.

“I am speaking with Miss Maddox, correct?”

“You called me, so yeah.”

She did not sound happy.

“I’m wondering if I could have a conversation with you in regard to your employment.”

“I don’t work there anymore.”

“Clearly. I’m looking over your termination paperwork, and something doesn’t feel right.” Chase lifted the picture of her and tried to imagine what her expression was right now. Not the smiling, happy-to-get-a-job one that was in his hand.

“That’s because it’s bullshit. Aaron Stone was a d—” Her words trailed off. “I can’t do this.”

Chase jumped. “Wait, don’t hang up.”

“You’re the son, right?”

“I am.”

“Then you know how your father was. I’m sure I don’t have to explain it. And since I was raised to not talk ill of the dead, I see no point in this conversation. Goodbye, Mr. Stone.”

The line went dead.

Chase stared at the receiver as a slow smile crept over his face.

Unlike every member of the office staff who had a vested interest in saying the right things and laying platitudes at Chase’s feet . . . this woman did not. The fact that she cut him off and came short of calling his dad a dick showed she truly didn’t have anything to hold back.

Which meant only one thing . . . he had to get her back in that assistant chair.