Boss Man

“He didn’t,” Violet replied at once. “He just…insinuated it.” She sighed. “He’s right. I am fat. But I’m trying so hard to lose weight!”

Her mother held her hand tighter. “Listen to me, darling,” she said softly. “A man who really cares about you isn’t going to dwell on what he considers faults. Your father used that same argument to me,” she added unexpectedly. “He actually said that he went to that other woman because she was slender and well-groomed.”

“He…did?”

She grimaced. “I should have told you. Your father never loved me, Violet. He was in love with my best friend and she married somebody else. He married me to get even with her. He wanted a divorce two months later, but I was pregnant with you, and in those days, people really gossiped about men who walked out on a pregnant wife. So we stayed together and tried to make a home for you. Looking back,” she said wearily, lying back down on her pillows, “perhaps I made a mistake. You don’t know what a good marriage is, do you? Your father and I hardly ever did anything together, even when you were little.”

Violet pushed back her mother’s disheveled hair. “I love you very much,” she told her parent. “I think you’re wonderful. So do a lot of other people. It was my father’s loss if he couldn’t see how special you were.”

“At least I have you” came the soft reply, with a smile. “I love you, too, darling.”

Violet fought tears. “Now I really have to go,” she said. “I can’t afford to lose my new job before I start it!”

Her mother laughed. “You be careful!”

“I’ll drive under the speed limit,” she promised.

“Mr. Wright isn’t married now, is he?” Mrs. Hardy wondered.

“Yes, he is. He refused to sign the final divorce papers.” She laughed. “That’s why he had the fight with Mr. Kemp.”

“Is it spite, do you think, or does he still love her?”

“Everybody thinks he still loves her, but she’s making a fortune working as a lawyer in New York City and she doesn’t want to come back here.”

“They have a little boy. Doesn’t she think his father has any right to see the child?”

“They’re still arguing about custody.”

“What a pity.”

“People should think hard about having children,” Violet said with conviction, “and they shouldn’t ever be accidents.”

“That’s just what I’ve always said,” Mrs. Hardy replied. “Have a good day, darling.”

“You, too. The phone’s right here and I’m going to write down Mr. Wright’s number in case you need me.” She penciled it on the pad next to the phone, smiled, and went to get her purse.

Duke Wright lived in a huge white Victorian house. Local gossip said that his wife had wanted it since she was a child, living in a poor section of Jacobsville. She’d married Duke right out of high school and started to college after the honeymoon was over. College had opened a new world to her eyes. She’d decided to study law, and Duke stood by and let her have her way, sure that she’d never want to leave Jacobsville. But she got a taste of city life when she went on to law school in San Antonio, and she decided to work in a law firm there.

Nobody understood exactly why they decided to have a child in her first year as a practicing estate lawyer. She didn’t seem happy about it, although she had the child. But a live-in nurse had to be employed because Mrs. Wright spent more and more time at the office. Then, two years ago, she’d been offered a position in a well-known law firm in New York City and she’d jumped at the chance. Duke had argued, cajoled, threatened, to try to get her to turn it down. Nothing worked. In a fit of rage, she moved out, with their son, and filed for divorce. Duke had fought it tooth and nail. Just this month, she’d presented him with divorce papers, demanding his signature, which also required him to remit full custody of his five-year-old son to her. He’d gone wild.

To look at him, though, Violet thought, he seemed very self-possessed and confident. He was tall and bronzed with a strong face, square chin, deep-set dark eyes and blondish-brown hair which he wore conventionally cut. He had the physique of a rodeo star, which he’d been before his father’s untimely death and his switch from cowboy to cattle baron. He ran purebred red angus cattle, well-known in cattle circles for their pedigree. He had all the scientific equipment necessary for a prosperous operation, including high-tech methods of genetic breeding, artificial insemination, embryo transplantation, cross-breeding for leanness, low birth weight and daily weight gain ratio, as well as expert feed formulation. He had the most modern sort of operation, right down to lagoon management and forage improvement. He had the most modern computers money could buy, and customized software to keep up with his cattle. But his newest operation was organic ham and bacon that he raised on his ranch and marketed over the Internet.

Violet was staggered at the high-tech equipment in the office he maintained on his sprawling ranch outside town.

“Intimidated?” he drawled, smiling. “Don’t worry. It’s easier to use than it looks.”

“Can you operate it all?” she asked, surprised.

He shrugged. “With the average duration of secretarial assistance around here, I have to be able to do things myself,” he said heavily. He gave her a long look and stuck his lean hands in the pockets of his jeans. “Violet, I’m not an easy boss,” he confessed. “I have moods and rages, and sometimes I blow up when things upset me. You’ll need nerves of steel to last long here. So I won’t blame you if you have reservations.”

Her eyebrows arched. “I worked for Blake Kemp for over a year.”

He chuckled, understanding her very well. “They say he’s worse than me,” he agreed. “Okay. If you’re game, we’ll give it two weeks. After that, you can decide if it’s worth the money. That’s another thing,” he added, smiling. “I pay better than Kemp.” He named a figure that made Violet look shocked. He nodded. “That’s to make it worth the aggravation. Come on, and I’ll show you around the equipment.”

It was fascinating. She’d never seen anything like the tangle of spreadsheets and software that ran his empire. Even the feed was mixed by computer.

“Not that you’ll have to concern yourself with the organic pork operation,” he added quickly. “I have three employees who do nothing except that. But these figures—” he indicated the spreadsheet “—are urgent. They have to be maintained on a daily basis.”

“All of them?” she exclaimed, seeing hours and hours of overtime in statistics before her.

“Not by hand,” he replied. “All the cowboys are computer literate, even the old-timers. They feed the information into handheld computers and send it to the mainframe by internal modem, right from the pastures,” he told her.

She just shook her head. “It’s incredible,” she replied. “I hope I’m smart enough to learn all this, Mr. Wright.”

He smiled approvingly. “There’s nothing I appreciate more than modesty, Miss Hardy,” he replied. “You’ll do fine. Ready to get started?”

“Yes, sir!” she replied.

It was a short day, mainly because she was so busy trying to learn the basics of Duke Wright’s agricultural programs. She liked him. He might have a bad reputation, and she knew he could be hard to get along with, but he had saving graces.

She managed not to think about Mr. Kemp all afternoon, until she got home.

Her mother smiled at her from the sofa, where she was watching her daily soap operas. “Well, how did it go?” she asked.

“I like it!” Violet told her with a big smile. “I really do. I think I’m going to work out just fine. And, besides that, I’m going to be making a lot more money. Mama, we might even be able to afford a dishwasher!”

Mrs. Hardy sighed. “That would be lovely, wouldn’t it?”

Violet kicked off her shoes and sat down in the recliner next to the sofa. “I’m so tired! I’m just going to rest for a minute and then I’ll see about supper.”

“We could have chili and hot dogs.”

Violet chuckled. “We could have a nice salad and bread sticks,” she said, thinking of the calories.

“Whatever you like, dear. Oh, by the way, Mr. Kemp came by a few minutes ago.”

Violet’s world came crashing down around her ears. She’d hoped to not even hear his name, at least for another few days.

“What did he want?” she asked her mother.

The older woman picked up a white envelope. “To give you this.” She handed it to Violet, who sat staring at it.

“Well,” she murmured. “I guess it’s my final pay.”

Mrs. Hardy muted the television set. “Why not open it and see?”

Violet didn’t want to, but her mother looked expectant. She tore open the envelope and extracted a check and a letter. With her breath in her throat, she slowly unfolded it.