Free The Shadow of Your Smile by Mary Higgins Clark Page B

paused. “Or him,” he added.
    “I know we’re not gender-conscious. I’ll find someone good to replace me, I promise,” Esther said.
    For a moment, watching the troubled face of Greg Gannon, Esther’s heart had softened, seeing in it the ambitious young man who had joined his father’s business a week after his graduation from college. But then any pity she felt evaporated. With all that he had, if he really was cheating, he was doing it for himself, and gambling with other people’s hard-earned money, she thought scornfully.
    Thomas Desmond had asked her to copy him on Greg’s appointments. “We need to know who he’s wining and dining,” Desmond had said. “I doubt they’re all in his official appointment book. We know some of his calls go through your office phones, but not all of them. We’ve wiretapped the people we suspect of tipping him off to mergers and acquisitions but all those calls that Gannon made to our other targets were on prepaid phones. Fortunately some of the guys who are passing on tips aren’t smart enough to use the phones we can’t trace.”
    “Many of Greg’s calls don’t come through me,” Esther had agreed. “Obviously he has a cell phone, but I pay the bills for it and it’s all routine stuff. But there are plenty of times when I try to pass on a business call to him in his private office and he doesn’t pick up. I’m supposed to assume that he’s on with the family or personal friends, but it happens so often he couldn’t just be on his regular cell phone.”
    Acutely aware that she had promised Thomas Desmond that she would provide evidence regarding Greg Gannon’s business activities, including his lunches with clients, Esther said, “Mr. Gannon, I’ve got you down for lunch with Arthur Saling. Shall I make a reservation for you?”
    “No, Saling wanted me to meet him at his club. He’s a potential new client and a big one. Keep your fingers crossed.” Gannon turned to go back into his own office. “Hold all calls until I let you know, Esther.”
    “Of course, Mr. Gannon.”
    For the rest of the morning it was business as usual. Then Esther received a call from Greenwich Village Hospital. It was from the executive director of development. This time she heard and understood the lack of cordiality that had previously been present in his voice. “Esther, this is Justin Banks from Greenwich Village Hospital. As you certainly must understand we are planning to break ground forthe new Gannon Pediatric Wing. The pledge the foundation made has been overdue for six months and quite frankly it is absolutely necessary that it be fulfilled now.”
    Dear God, Esther thought, Greg made that pledge almost two years ago. Why hasn’t it been paid? Carefully she chose her words. “Let me look into it,” she said, her voice professionally calm.
    “Esther, that isn’t good enough.” His voice was rising. “The word is getting around that the Gannon Foundation is announcing grants that it has no intention of fulfilling, or at least not fulfilling until they have been so watered down that the purpose for receiving them is defeated. I and several of my associates insist on having a meeting with Mr. Gannon and with anyone and everyone on the foundation board. We want to tell them they simply can’t do this to the children we serve and hope to serve in the future.”

18
 
     
    Monday afternoon, after his first day at his prestigious new law firm, Scott Alterman went for a run in Central Park. Over the weekend, he had been constantly berating himself. It had been a stupid and serious mistake to show up at the brownstone where Monica lived. He had startled her, maybe even frightened her, and that was not the way he intended to pursue her.
    He knew that four years ago he had come on much too strongly to her and should have had the brains to realize that Monica would never even
think
of dating her best friend’s husband.
    But now Joy and I are totally split, he thought, as he