“Please call me Salim, Andrew. Mr. Washington is my father,” the man who looked as if he could straddle Mount Rainier in one leap corrected. “Zimbabwe was incredible. Just a beautiful country, but no safari for me. Just my usual humanitarian work for two months.”
“What I wouldn’t give to visit Africa,” the guard said, longingly.
“The Peace Corps might be the way to go. You’d be doing something worthy while at the same time experiencing a new country. I signed up for a two-year stint after graduating college. Since then it’s been very difficult for me to stay in one place for any length of time. Is Mr. Washington around?”
“I didn’t see him leave.”
Salim’s complexion was the color of raw brown sugar and his eyes were equally as light. He did a quick scan of the lobby as if expecting his father to jump out from behind one of the potted ficus plants. His glance rested briefly on Kennedy and she was treated to a warm smile that began at the corner of his tawny eyes and settled in his square jaw. She liked his full lips and the way his mouth turned up at the corners. He looked as though he laughed a lot.
“Who do we have here?” he said loud enough for Kennedy to hear him, turning back to the guard.
She didn’t hear the guard’s response. Probably just as well, she didn’t need some wealthy playboy flirting with her right before she had a meeting with his father. Her priority was getting back her car and she would focus on that once this meeting was over.
The petite, smartly dressed woman who came bustling out of the elevator must be the studio head’s assistant. When she approached the guard, Mountain Man swept her off her feet.
“Di, you look younger than ever,” he gushed.
“Put me down!” she said, chuckling. “I don’t have time for this nonsense. Though I am glad you’re back. We’ll talk later. I’m here to collect your father’s visitor,” the assistant said.
Salim Washington set Diane back on her feet.
The guard pointed to Kennedy and the petite woman came mincing over.
“Ms. Fitzgerald,” she said. “I’m Diane, Mr. Washington’s assistant. Have you been waiting long?”
“No, your timing is perfect.”
Kennedy looked over at Salim and he was no longer the smiling, affable guy who’d come sauntering through the lobby. He threw her a thunderous look of surprise and what looked like—no, it couldn’t be—disgust.
What was that all about? No time to psychoanalyze now, the television mogul was waiting.
Chapter 2
Salim would rather be anywhere but here. TSW Studios was a place he’d avoided like the plague. It was much too artificial an environment for him. But the old man’s assistant had called acting as if it was a life-and-death situation and because it was Diane, and he liked Diane, he’d dropped everything to come.
He was not here for the man who called himself his father, that was for sure. He wasn’t interested in anything that philanderer had to say.
His father, Tanner Washington’s autocratic approach to everyone in his life had turned Salim off. They were worlds apart in the way they conducted business and dealt with people.
Salim’s mother, Lucinda, had also called Salim telling him to go see his father. She was the peacemaker in the family and she’d finally persuaded him to hear the old man out. His self-suffering mother was the most wonderful woman in the world and he would do almost anything she asked, even meet with a man he disliked intensely.
He’d made one hour for Tanner Washington. So far that whole hour had been taken up by the young African-American woman with the Asian cast to her features. She was the woman who’d been seated in the lobby, the one he’d thought was very attractive.
More than attractive actually. More like beautiful, in a wholesome but classy sort of way. In an era where tats, weaves, piercings, bling and barely there clothing were in vogue, this woman, who wore minimal makeup and a conservative hairstyle, stood out. Salim had been especially intrigued by the outfit: a classic navy suit worn with sensible pumps and pearls. She certainly didn’t seem the type to work in a television studio, more likely a bank.
As the minutes ticked by, he was getting more and more irritated. She’d been behind closed doors with his father for far too long. He had places to go and people to see. What exactly are they doing in there anyway?
“Di, how much longer will he be?” Salim quizzed the old man’s assistant. It took a lot to address the old goat by “father.” An adulterer did not deserve that kind of respect.
“I scheduled his interview for an hour,” Diane answered in her usual, unperturbed manner. “If I’d known you were planning to pop in, I would have booked you time.” She lowered her glasses, looking at him.
Salim winked at Diane. “If you can fit me in I’ll take you to lunch, you gorgeous thing.”
“I can buy my own lunch, thanks. Save your flirting for that string of wide-eyed young things your own age that you impress with stories of your travels.”
He wished there was a string of young things. Lately he’d had no time for romantic entanglements, not even flings.
“You’re a hard woman, Di,” Salim said, clutching his heart. “One day you just might succumb to my charm. You know you’re a cougar in a fab suit.”
Diane settled her glasses back on her nose and gave him the full effect of her cold, unsettling stare. “I don’t think so. I like my men buttoned down and settled. I’m too old to babysit.”
Salim chuckled. He absolutely loved the woman and her droll sense of humor.
She was one of those ageless matrons who must have been a knockout in her heyday. Diane was the complete package: efficient, good looking, intellectual and fearless. She took no guff from her tyrannical boss, which was another reason Tanner kept her around. As studio head he was used to intimidating people. Diane simply could not be intimidated.
Salim hovered at Diane’s circular desk, listening shamelessly while she buzzed her boss.
“Your son’s been waiting to see you for almost an hour,” she said in an even voice that never changed, even when Tanner was having a hissy fit, which was often.
When Diane’s eyebrows rose a fraction, Salim guessed the old man’s response wasn’t exactly positive. Not that that came as a big surprise.
“You’ve got about fifteen minutes free after you’re through with Ms. Fitzgerald,” Diane reminded the mogul. “And you did have me call Salim earlier this week. You said you wanted to see him.”
Salim tapped the face of his Timex and whispered to Diane, “Tell your boss I have to be somewhere in forty minutes. Never mind, I’ll tell him myself.”
“Salim!”
He ignored her and strode toward the closed office door.
“You can’t just go bursting in on an interview,” Diane called after him.
“Watch me. My time is just as valuable as his.”
He paused briefly in front of the smoked-glass double doors that had Tanner Washington, President of TSW engraved on them. The T stood for Tanner and the S for Salim. It had never occurred to the pompous old ass to make it TSCW and include his daughter Christiane’s initials.
Tanner’s dream had been that one day his son would take over from him. Except Salim couldn’t care less about the superficial world of media entertainment and placating high-maintenance stars and volatile executives. That had always been a bone of contention between them.
Christiane was the one better suited to running a studio. She loved the glamorous life and had married Leonard Green,