well in high school.”
Helen looked over at Meredith with a curious eye. “You’re saying you dated?”
Meredith swallowed a lump in her throat. Dated. That sounded so impersonal. So milk-shakes-and-a-movie. So innocent. “It was actually a pretty serious relationship. At least it was to me.”
“Ah.” Helen nodded slowly and leaned back in her chair. “And this is the first time you’ve seen him since that time?”
“The last time I saw him it was the afternoon of our senior prom. He said he’d see me in a few hours.” She gave a dry laugh. “It’s been quite a few hours.”
“I’m sorry, Meredith. It must have been a shock to learn you’d be working with him.”
“It was a surprise,” Meredith agreed. But, mindful that she didn’t want to sound like a whiner who couldn’t get over her past, she said, “I’m not saying I can’t do what you need me to here—far from it. But my experience with Evan today made me think that, in the interest of full disclosure, I ought to let you know. If you’re uncomfortable with me continuing under the circumstances, I’ll understand.”
Helen smiled. “The circumstances sound like they might lend themselves quite well to your success here. If you already know Evan, already have something of a rapport with him, that might make things easier, don’t you think?”
There wasn’t going to be anything easy about working with Evan, but Meredith nodded. “It could. But it could also make him uncomfortable. If he’s reluctant to work with me, I’m not going to be of much use to you.”
Helen glanced out the window for a moment with a faraway look in her eyes. Then she turned her attention back to Meredith. “Is he reluctant to work with you?”
“I honestly don’t know.” Meredith gave a self-effacing smile. It would have been too weak for her to admit that she didn’t want to work with him. That she was afraid to even be around him. “He didn’t seem as rattled by our interaction as I was.”
“Are you able to work with him, despite feeling rattled by it?”
This was a moment of truth. Meredith prided herself on her reliability, and this was a turning point in which she could either give in to her weakness and do something she’d probably be ashamed of for the rest of her life or stand tall and work through her discomfort, knowing eventually she’d come out on the other side of it.
Intellectually, it was an easy choice.
“Yes,” she said, more comfortable following her intellect than her heart.
“Then let’s leave things as they are,” Helen said, locking eyes with Meredith. “You came highly recommended, and with everything the company has been through recently we need the best people we can get so that Hanson Media Group recovers its once stellar reputation.”
“I’ll do my best.” Meredith stood to go. She was feeling a little bit better now and was embarrassed about the alarmist manner in which she’d come to Helen at first. “I’m just glad you know the truth now.”
“I am, too,” Helen said. “Thank you.”
Meredith left the office, then stopped outside the closed door and took a deep breath. She couldn’t tell Helen everything, of course, but she’d at least told her what she needed to know about Meredith’s past. Hopefully now that wouldn’t come back to bite her.
Meredith set off down the hall, looking for David, when she ran straight into Evan.
He looked at her, then looked behind her at Helen’s office door.
“Meeting with the boss?”
She swallowed. “One of them.”
“Anything I should know about?”
She took a short breath. “No. Nothing important.”
He looked at her for one long, hard moment. Then, without a word, he turned and walked away.
Chapter Six
Helen arrived at Shabu Hachi two minutes early for her 8:00 p.m. meeting with Ichiro Kobayashi, of the media conglomerate TAKA Corporation.
The restaurant hostess led Helen to the table where Ichiro Kobayashi and another man waited for her.
She smiled and bowed slightly, holding out a business card bearing her information in both English and Japanese to Kobayashi. He handed her one in return, likewise in English and Japanese, and though his manner was nothing short of courteous, she had the distinct sense that he was unhappy at having to deal with a woman instead of a man.
She repeated the process with the other man and felt the same sense of disconcertion from him.
His card said he was Chion Kinjo and he worked in acquisitions for TAKA, along with Kobayashi. His card listed offices in Tokyo, Kyoto and Shizuoka.
TAKA was a huge corporation.
It was distinctly possible that Helen was in over her head. She just needed to make sure she didn’t let on that she felt that way.
She put the cards in her pocket, then took out a small ornament she’d purchased from a Chicago artisan and gave it to Kobayashi as a souvenir of Chicago. It was customary, but she also hoped he would keep it and be reminded that this was a town he liked and wanted to return to.
“This is for you,” she said. “It’s a token of thanks and, I hope, a happy reminder of our beautiful city.”
He turned it in his hand and gave a nod of approval. “Very lovely. The detail is magnificent.”
Helen breathed one small sigh of relief. So far, so good, given the fact that they would rather have been dealing with her late husband than with her.
Kobayashi indicated she should sit next to him, which she took as a good sign. The moment they were seated, a waitress brought water to the table and, after a brief exchange with Kinjo in Japanese, filled their glasses, bowed and left the table.
“I’ve taken the liberty of suggesting a variety of foods from the eastern region of our country,” Kobayashi said to Helen. “I hope that’s agreeable to you?”
“Indeed.” Helen nodded. “It’s not often one gets to take a culinary tour like this with a native. I look forward to trying your selections.”
This seemed to please Kobayashi. He gave a polite smile then leaped right into business. “I’m sorry to hear of your husband’s death,” he said. “I would have liked to have met him.”
Had George been alive, there was no way he would have considered talking to these men about a merger. He would sooner have driven the company into bankruptcy.
In fact, he all but had.
“He was a good man,” she said, swallowing the lie as smoothly as a tall glass of lemonade.
“As far as his company is concerned, my associate and I have grave concerns about the
