Far from being judgmental, or appalled by her behavior as an eighteen-year-old, Stuart listened to her entire tale without a sign of emotion—not even surprise when she told him the identity of the father of her baby. In fact, so disconcerting was his bland expression and unwavering silence, that when Meredith finished her recitation, she said hesitantly, "Stuart, have I made everything clear?"

"Perfectly clear," he said, and as if to prove that, he added, "You've just finished telling me that your father is now willing to use his influence to get Farrell's zoning request approved with the same disregard for the illegality of influence peddling that he displayed when he had Senator Davies block it? Right?"

"I—I think so," she replied, uneasy about his smoothly worded condemnation of her father's actions.

"Pearson and Levinson represent Farrell?"

"Yes."

"That's it, then," he declared, signaling the waiter for the check. "I'll call Bill Pearson in the morning and tell him that his client is unjustly putting my favorite client to a lot of needless mental anguish."

"Then what?"

"Then I will ask him to have his client sign some nice papers, which I will draw up and send over to him."

Meredith smiled with a mixture of hope and uncertainty. "Is that all there is to it?"

"Could be."

Late the next afternoon, Stuart finally called.

"Did you speak to Pearson?" Meredith asked, her stomach churning with anticipation and apprehension.

"I just hung up a minute ago."

"Well?" she prodded eagerly when he didn't go on. "Did you tell him about my father's offer? What did he say?"

"He said," Stuart replied sardonically, "that the entire matter between you and Farrell is a highly personal one, which his client wishes to first deal with from that aspect and later—when his client is ready—his client will dictate the terms under which a divorce will be obtained."

"My God," she breathed. "What does that mean? I don't understand!"

"In that case, I shall endeavor to strip away the polite legalese and translate for you," Stuart offered. "Pearson was telling me to go fuck myself."

The profanity, which was completely out of character for Stuart, told Meredith that he was far more annoyed than he was letting on, and that alarmed her almost as much as the incomprehensible attitude of Matt's lawyer. "I still don't understand!" she said, lurching forward in her chair. "Matt was very cooperative that day at lunch —until he got the phone call about the Southville rezoning thing. Now I'm offering to see that his rezoning request is approved, and he won't even listen."

"Meredith," Stuart said firmly. "Did you hold anything back when you described your relationship with Farrell to me?"

"No, nothing. Why do you ask?"

"Because," he replied, "from everything I've read and heard about him, Farrell is a logical, intelligent man— coldly, almost inhumanly logical according to some people. Logical, busy men don't go out of their way to get revenge for petty grievances. It's a waste of their time, and in Farrell's case, his time is worth a great deal of money. But every man has a limit to what he's willing to take. It's as if Farrell's been pushed past that limit, and he wants a fight, he's spoiling for it! And that makes me very, very uneasy."

It made Meredith more than uneasy. "Why would he want a fight?"

"I have to assume he wants the satisfaction of revenge."

"Revenge for what?" Meredith implored in an alarmed cry. "Why would you say such a thing?"

"It was something Pearson said—he warned me that any attempt on your part to push this divorce through court without prior and complete approval from his client would result in what he called even more unpleasantness for you."

"More unpleasantness?" she repeated, flabbergasted. "Why would he want that now? When I had lunch with him last week, he tried to be nice. He honestly did. He joked with me even though he really despises me—"

"Why?" he interrupted intently. "Why would he despise you? What makes you think he does?"

"I don't know. It's just something I sense." Dismissing that unanswerable question, she continued. "He's understandably furious over the Southville thing, and he was undoubtedly offended by the things I said to him in the car after lunch. Could that be what got under his skin and 'pushed him past the limit'?"

"Could be," Stuart replied, but he sounded unconvinced.

"What are we going to do now?"

"I'll think about it over the weekend. I'm leaving for Palm Beach in an hour to spend the weekend with Teddy and Liz Jenkins on their yacht. We'll work out our strategy when I get back. Try not to worry too much."

"I'll try," Meredith promised, and when she hung up she made a herculean effort to thrust Matthew Farrell out of her mind by immersing herself in work. She'd succeeded reasonably well two hours later when Sam Green asked to see her right away. As he'd promised, Sam had rushed his staff to complete the project that was preventing him from going to Houston and negotiating with Thorp for the Houston property. Three days ago, Sam had called them, hoping to arrange a meeting this week, only to have Ivan Thorp tell him there was no point in coming down until next week.

Smiling, Meredith watched him heading toward her desk. "Are you ready for your Houston trip?"

"Thorp just called me and canceled our meeting," he said, and sank into the chair across from her, looking angry and harassed. "It seems that they accepted a twenty-million-dollar contract on that land. The purchaser wanted the deal kept confidential until now, which is why Thorp stalled about meeting with me. The property is now owned by the real estate division of a large conglomerate."

Sick with disappointment and adamantly unwilling to accept defeat, Meredith said, "Contact the new owners, and find out if they'll sell it."

"I already have, and they're perfectly willing to sell," Sam said, his voice edged with sarcasm.

Surprised by his tone, Meredith prodded, "Then let's stop wasting time and start negotiating with them."

"I've already tried. They want thirty million and that figure isn't negotiable."

"Thirty million! That's ridiculous!" Meredith exclaimed, half rising from her chair. "It's insane! The property is worth twenty-seven million, tops, in today's economy and they paid only twenty for it!"

"I pointed that out to the director of their real estate division, but his attitude is take it or leave it."

Meredith got up and restlessly walked over to the windows, trying to decide what to do next. The Houston property, with its location near The Galleria, was the most desirable site for a Bancroft's branch that she'd ever seen anywhere. She wanted that store built there, and she wasn't going to relent. "Are they planning to develop it themselves?" she asked, returning to her desk and leaning on the edge, her arms crossed over her chest, lost in thought.

"No."

"You said a conglomerate owns it. Which one?"

Sam Green, like nearly everyone else at Bancroft's, was obviously aware that Meredith's name had been linked with Matthew Farrell's in the gossip column, and he hesitated several seconds before he answered. "Intercorp."

Disbelief and fury made her lurch upright and glare at him. "Are you joking!" she exploded.

His scowl turned ironic. "Do I look like a man who's joking?"

Aware that Sam's reluctance to mention Intercorp made it unnecessary to pretend this was purely a business battle, Meredith said furiously, "I'll kill Matthew Farrell for this!"

"I consider that threat to be privileged lawyer-client communication so I won't have to testify against you if you do."

Emotions ran riot through her entire body; she stared at Sam in rage and disbelief while Stuart's prediction that Matt was out for vengeance banished any doubt that Intercorp's purchase of the land had been a coincidence. Obviously this was some of the unpleasantness Pearson had warned Stuart about today.

"What do you want to do next?"

Her stormy blue eyes snapped to bis. "Next, after I kill him? Then I want to feed him to the fish! That vicious, scheming—" She broke off, schooling her features into a semblance of calm, and walked behind her desk. "I'll have to think this over, Sam. Let's discuss it on Monday. "

When Sam left, Meredith began to pace. She paced the length of her office, back and forth across the windows, trying to conquer her fury so that she could be objective and effective. It was one thing for Matt to make her personal life a nightmare; she could deal with that through Stuart somehow. But now he was attacking Bancroft & Company, and that panicked and infuriated her more than anything he might have tried to do to her personally. He had to be stopped—and now. God knew what else he planned to do—or worse, what schemes he'd already put into motion.

Angrily, she shoved her fingers through the hair at her nape, and continued to pace until slowly she calmed down and began to think. "Why is he doing this?" she said aloud to the empty room. The answer was clear—it had to be his way of retaliating for having his Southville zoning request turned down. Matt had been pleasant at lunch last week—until he got that phone call about Southville. Her father's interference with Matt's zoning request was obviously the cause of this battle.

But it was all so unnecessary now! Somehow she had to make him listen to her, had to make him understand that he'd won his battle, and her father was conceding it. All Matt had to do to get his rezoning request approved was to resubmit it to the commission! Since Stuart wasn't available to advise her not to do it, Meredith took the only course open to her: She marched over to the desk and dialed Matt's office.

When his secretary answered his phone, Meredith deliberately deepened her voice, trying to disguise it. "This is—Phyllis Tilsher," she lied, using her secretary's name. "Is Mr. Farrell in?"

"Mr. Farrell has gone home. He won't be in until Monday afternoon."

Meredith glanced at her watch, surprised to see it was already five o'clock. "I didn't realize it was so late. I don't have his home phone number with me at the moment. May I have it please?"

"I am not permitted to give out Mr. Farrell's home number to anyone," she said. "Those are Mr. Farrell's instructions."

Meredith hung up. She couldn't bear to wait until Monday before trying again, and calling him at the office was a waste of time anyway. Even if she gave a false name, his secretary would undoubtedly insist on knowing what she wanted before putting her through. She could go to his office on Monday, but in the mood he was in, he'd probably refuse to see her and then have his security people toss her out of the building. If she couldn't make him listen to her at his office, and she didn't dare wait until Monday to try, she had to get to him at... "Home!" she said aloud. Reaching him at home was a much better plan; he wouldn't have a secretary at his home who'd already been told to refuse to let her talk to him. On a wild chance that he might have a listed phone number, she picked up the phone and called information.

The operator was sorry to inform her that his number was unpublished.

Disappointed but not defeated, Meredith hung up. Now that she'd decided to talk to him at his home, she wasn't going to give up. With a viable plan in mind, and the opportunity to see it through, Meredith possessed a calm, iron resolve that was in complete contrast to her delicate appearance and soft voice. Trying to think of someone who might know his private number and be willing to give it to her, she closed her eyes and concentrated. Matt had escorted Alicia Avery to the opera, and Stanton Avery had sponsored Matt as a prospective member at the Glenmoor Country Club. Smiling with satisfaction, she looked up Stanton Avery's number in her private phone directory and dialed it.

According to the Avery butler, Mr. Avery and his daughter were staying at their St. Croix residence and were not expected to return for another week. Meredith considered trying to pry their phone number in St. Croix out of the servant, but on quick reflection she realized Stanton wouldn't be likely to give her Matt's number. He'd be more likely to guard Matt's privacy from the woman who'd insulted him at the opera, and whose father had blackballed Matt's membership at Glenmoor. Meredith hung up, and then called Glenmoor, intending to ask the club's manager to get Matt's phone number from his application for membership.

But Timmy Mattin had already left for the day. And the office was closed.

Biting her lip, she accepted the fact that she now had no choice but to go to Matt's apartment. The prospect of confronting an infuriated Matthew Farrell, especially on his own ground, was chilling. A shiver ran down her spine when she recalled the savage look on his face when she'd railed his father a dirty drunk. Tipping her head back, she closed her eyes, while within her regret mingled with fear and anger. If only her father hadn't interfered with Matt's zoning request... or humiliated him by blackballing him at Glenmoor. If only she hadn't lost her temper in the car... then their lunch would have concluded as pleasantly as it had begun, and none of this would be happening.

Regrets, however, weren't going to solve her monumental problem, and she opened her eyes, bracing herself for what she had to do. She didn't know Matt's phone number, but she knew exactly where he lived. So did everyone else who read the Chicago Tribune. Last month's Sunday supplement had contained a four-page color layout of the fabulous penthouse apartment that Chicago's newest and richest entrepreneur had bought and furnished in the Berkeley Towers on Lake Shore Drive.