CHAPTER 1
Conrad Pearson, disgraced son of a couple who ran a rural highway maintenance business 300 miles to the south, arrived at Penney's Crossing off a feeder flight on a cold frosty morning to begin his new job at assistant chief accountant at Kline and French.
The wiry 28-year old, with bleached curly blond hair, been thrown out of the family business where he'd been finance manager after $15,000 had been found missing from the company's operating funds. Conrad's own sleuthing had established office manager Kitty Smith had been milking the funds for two months to meet her husband's gambling debts.
Conrad's problem was he'd occasionally dated Kitty when between women when he became horny. Feeling somewhat beholden to her, he convinced Kitty if she resigned he'd admit to the theft.
Kitty resigned that day, claiming she had cancer and the overly sympathetic Mrs Pearson doubled Kitty's termination pay. Conrad confessed to his mother who'd discovered the discrepancy during her quarterly internal audit. He'd expected his parents would have been upset but lenient because it was only a lousy fifteen thou.
But no, he was fired and told to get out of their sight.
Conrad had defended himself, inviting his father to just kick his ass and cut his salary. Kevin appeared to accept that idea but Conrad's mom, who tended to become erratic when challenged, screamed no way her son the thief had twenty-four hours to leave. Once again Conrad was to learn his dad tended to do what his wife Susan demanded.
Conrad applied for several jobs and finally secured way well to the north as a senior accountant after two telephone interviews. Fortunately the recruiter checked out Conrad with his father rather than his mom and Kevin Conrad who praised his son's abilities and his commitment to absolute professionalism.
Conrad arrived at the city that he would learn that locals called The Crossing and first impressions pleased him. Many new buildings downtown mixed with solid long-standing structures, many of which appeared to have architectural merit. Yes he could feel comfortable living here with rivers passing on the west and east boundaries with their confluence a couple of miles beyond the city to form a bigger river.
He'd arrived just after 8:00 am with only two bags, with his other possessions included his beloved motor-cycle in storage in a barn on his widowed aunt's farm. He'd sold his Ford F-250 pickup to her foreman.
The cabbie took him to an inexpensive hotel. Conrad booked in for two weeks to give him time to find more permanent accommodation and went out for coffee, choosing a restaurant almost opposite the department store of Kline and French.
The day manager took him to the table and poured coffee.
"Stranger in town?"
"Yeah Miss, I start across the road today."
"What in corsetry?"
Conrad really appreciated humor and smiled and said admin.
"What's your name baby?"
"Adele as my nametag says."
No waitress was arriving. She said, "What do you want?"
He produced a blush from her by saying, "What are you offering" and to his delight she said, "Do you wish to date me?" rather than demand was he attempting to date her.
"Yes Adele. Do you have a boyfriend?"
"Yes."
"But if we are discreet you'll be happy to date me?"
She smiled and said exactly and that he had good understanding. Her view was he was a stranger in town and would be working at her favorite shopping place.
Adele smiled warmly. "I'm sure you will only regard my gesture as friendship."
"An omelet and two pieces of whole meal toast please Adele. You have made me feel I should eat."
She smiled and walked off, probably aware her butt would be his focus.
They would both have to admit she had a great looking body.
Conrad was delighted. He'd only just arrived in the city and already had a potential friend and he even had the fleeing thought Adele might oblige if he pressed for sexual favors as she appeared to like him. He had no problems with dating a supervisor of a restaurant, believing all women should not be judged solely on where they were at in life.
Adele, whose parents owned the restaurant and two others in the city, emerged from the kitchen and smiled in Conrad's direction, noting he was watching workers entering the premises of Kline and French through the staff only entrance.
She served him his meal and said Thursday evening would be fine. He really hadn't focused and assumed she was talking about the weather.
When the main doors of the four-level department store opened, Conrad left the restaurant, waving to Adele who blew him a kiss.
That warmed him.
Crossing the busy street in rush hour, Conrad wondered if the store did indeed have a corsetry or corset department or was it part of lingerie? He thought the brunette Adele would look rather alluring dressed in a warm red bra and panty set.
"Down boy," he muttered.
Maureen French was standing in admin reception and pointedly looked at her watch as he arrived. He recognized her from her CV on the store's website.
"Hi Mrs French. I'm careful with figures but a little sloppy about punctuality. I give accounting the thrust of my diligence and accuracy than my regard to clock-watching unless time is of the essence."
Well what could she say to that? Well she looked quite unimpressed.
"Good morning Conrad, call me Maureen," she said a little stiffly. "Please follow me."
Conrad followed her quite trim figure and wondered what was her choice of lingerie color today, if indeed she wore any. Perhaps he should ask?
"We've received your signed contract and it's in order. Your web page went live this morning."
"I'm impressed, most efficient."
"We try to perform well for our stockholders and that's why we've paid more to hire you for this new position, to inject more strength into finance and accounting. It has become a bit slow and, to use your word, sloppy. You have had a little experience as an investigatory accountant."
"Yes but sloppiness refers to standards as does under-performance and the finger for that would point to the chief accountant."
Maureen, by then seated and waving him to a chair, squirmed and murmured, "Who is Mr Kline's son."
"Ah," Conrad grinned. "I suspect I have been hired to expose my principal's short-comings."
She looked uncomfortable once more and said, "Please let this be our little secret."
They chatted and then she said, "Come through and meet Tubby, oh god, I meant to say my business partner Anthony Kline."
"And that little slip shall be our secret Maureen."
She smiled gratefully.
As to be expected, Anthony Kline was considerably over-weight and had a soft pudgy handshake, the kind of handshake women appear to detest. Left almost wishing he could wipe his hand after it had been shaken, Conrad understood why women felt like that. He had no desire to think of Mr Kline's sweaty lingerie... er underwear.
Coffee was served and they had a cozy chat that ended when Anthony announced he was off to a business appointment.
"We have quite a bit of money invested in you Conrad, make sure you earn it."
Conrad didn't acknowledge the fat prick's rude comment and thought well that placed him firmly in Maureen's camp.
Maureen had briefed Conrad that she was the director responsible for finance and admin while Anthony supervised retailing and marketing and their worked jointly on store operation. Her next action was to introduce Conrad to everyone working in finance/accounting.
Freddie Kline was almost as fat as his father and didn't offer to shake Conrad's hand, to the relief of Conrad, but was warm in his welcome.
Conrad found he was to share a large office with the internal auditor. The very attractive babe who, surprisingly, looked vaguely familiar scowled at him when he addressed her breasts as Maureen introduced the internal auditor as her daughter Christie.
"Hi," Christie said crossly, not using his name.
Conrad recalled her name and face from his study of the web site but had no recall of her surname.
"You also received your masters from Lansdale."
