Remember When (Foster Saga 1)

“I thought women were more interested these days in discovering how high they can climb on the corporate ladder.”

“We are, but unlike men, we’re learning early that we can’t define ourselves by our success or lack of it at work. We want more from life than that, and we have more to give than that.”

Cole frowned in confusion. “Are you implying that career-oriented women make up a significant part of your magazine’s readership?”

She nodded, clearly enjoying his misguided notions. “The demographics are going to surprise you. Based on our market surveys, sixty-five percent of our readers are college-educated women who have, or have had, successful careers. There’s been a growing trend among American career women to postpone having children until they’re in their thirties, then to take a hiatus and stay home during their children’s formative years. Once they stay home, they throw themselves into raising children with the same dedication and zeal they brought to their former careers. They’re high achievers, used to taking charge and making a difference. Some of them worked in creative areas, others in business and finance. They bring all that creative and organizational ability with them to their new roles, except they don’t have any outlet for it—other than their homes. They start looking at ways to improve on their homes, to personalize them, and make them more functional or more beautiful. Their need for self-expression combines with a natural desire to conserve money, and presto—they discover Foster’s Beautiful Living. And through us, they discover themselves.”

“That’s a pretty tall order for one magazine,” Cole said, annoyed with himself for noticing how beautifully she spoke. And moved. And looked.

“Foster Enterprises does much more than publish a monthly magazine. We also publish coffee-table books and market a line of environment-friendly, all-natural cleaning products. We also market do-it-yourself ‘kits’—those usually are created either by my grandfather or under his supervision. We started out doing seasonal television specials around the holidays on CBS, and the ratings were so high that CBS wanted to sign us to an exclusive contract for six specials a year. I turned it down because I think we’re better off financially, and from an exposure standpoint, doing a weekly program and syndicating it. Our production costs are relatively low, so CBS’s offer to underwrite them in return for an exclusive contract didn’t appeal as much to me as it would to someone with a more costly show, such as a sitcom or even a talk show.”

“It sounds like you’ve got it made.”

“That’s how it sounds, but that’s not how it is. The truth is, we’re under tremendous pressure all the time, not only because competitors have been springing up everywhere, trying to carve out a piece of our reputation and our profits for themselves, but because the public seems to hold us to higher standards than our competition, and we have to live up to that. The pressure is intense to constantly come up with newer and better ideas for every issue, every book, every television program than we’ve done before. We have to look better, be fresher, and offer more than everyone else. That was a lot easier to do before, when we were virtually the only game in town, than it is now. We’ve actually fired two ‘spies’ who were planted by competitors.”

Cole stared at her in shock. “Somehow, I always associate corporate spying with the areas of electronics or defense.”

“I know, so did I—until that happened. The other problem is our public image,” Diana said, bringing up Dan without actually referring to him, “and keeping that intact can be a public relations nightmare, not just for me, but for all of us. We have to be careful about everything we say and do, no matter where we are or who we’re with.”

“All of you?” Cole repeated. “I thought you had the biggest problem in that area because you’re primarily identified with the magazine.”

“I gave you that impression in the living room, but it wasn’t completely accurate. We’re all identified with it. The thing that made Foster’s Beautiful Living unique from the very beginning is that it was, and is, a family endeavor, and the public has always been attracted by that So, unfortunately, has the press, which means we can’t even disagree on some minor point when we’re filming a program without later reading in some gossip column that ‘There’s trouble in the Foster paradise’ or some other idiotic catchphrase.

“My mother writes a column for the magazine that’s one of its most popular features. In it, she reminisces about her girlhood recollections of holidays at her grandparents’ homes, the things her mother taught her, and jokes about some of her fears when she gave early parties. She tells stories about Grandma and Grandpa and Corey and me when we were young. All of us have appeared in the photo layouts from time to time, and our readership has come to feel that they know us. The public who buys our magazine, regards all of us as friends. When Corey married Spence, handmade congratulatory cards arrived by the truckload. When the twins were born, readers sent thousands of baby gifts, all handmade. We ended up featuring some of them in a baby issue. When Grandpa broke his leg, more gifts and get-well cards arrived. To the public, we have to remain one big, happy family, living the good life that we expound upon in our issues.”

While he listened, Cole was reassessing the extent of her achievements. It truly bothered him that someone who’d accomplished what she had, with very little help, and not much money behind her, thought so little of her accomplishments.

Cole moved forward and braced his hand on the tree trunk above her head. “Tell me something,” he said sternly. “Why do you think your mistakes are so enormous that they override your incredible success? In the living room, you downplayed all your own talent and achievements and made your successes seem like nothing more than dumb luck.”

She flinched and looked away. “You don’t realize how damaging my mistakes have been, or how many I’ve made.”

“Tell me what they were and let me be the judge of that. I promise to be impartial.”

Diana was glad of the opportunity to spend time with him, getting reacquainted, but she wished he weren’t so insistent about this topic. With a reluctant sigh, she leaned her shoulders against the trunk and gave in. “You got the gist of it in there. I passed up some wonderful opportunities over the years because I didn’t want to take a chance—I was afraid of growing too fast.”

Cole gazed down at her upturned face, marveling that Diana seemed as genuine and unaffected now as she had been when she was sixteen, and almost wishing that she wasn’t. This marriage of theirs was not foolproof, and he didn’t want to succeed in what Penworth had failed to do—turn her into a cold cynic.

“I think,” she joked, “I’m seeing your grim look right now.”

“No,” he replied with a half-smile. “That was my impressed look again.” Before she could question him about its cause, he replied to her earlier comment. “Businesses fail all the time because someone lets their dreams outpace their financial resources. It’s much wiser to err on the side of conservatism.”

“I erred on the side of foolishness. The largest of my mistakes was waiting until two years ago to market our own line of gardening and crafts products. When we finally did that, they sold like we were giving them away.”

“You must have had reasons for waiting, reasons that seemed sound at the time,” Cole pointed out.

“I did. Basically, I was concerned about quality control and start-up and warehousing costs. When we finally launched the product line, it was a huge success, which means we lost a lot of revenue while I was dragging my feet.”

“That’s hindsight,” Cole scoffed.

Diana refused to be patronized. Crossing her arms over her chest, she countered tartly, “Would you have waited and deliberated while all the competition was getting a head start?”

At the beginning of the discussion Cole had promised to be truthful. He kept that promise. “No,” he admitted.

“There, you see? You have daring and foresight.”

“No, I don’t ‘see.’ There’s one major difference between my

circumstances and yours. When I started Unified Industries, I had sufficient money behind me and more available if I needed it.”

She brightened, but just a little. “I did other things I wish to heaven I could undo.”

“Like what?” Cole persisted, reacting to some inner need to give her honest consolation even though he knew he was prying.

“As I said in the living room, I practically gave away shares in our new company to raise money to get us started, and later to keep us going.”

Cole felt a sudden desire to reach out and touch her cheek, and when he answered her, his voice was unaccustomedly gentle. “I’m amazed that at twenty-two you could talk a bank into investing in your scheme, let alone round up individual investors.”

Diana shrugged. “The bank wasn’t taking much of a risk, because we put this house up as collateral.”

Refusing to let her denigrate her accomplishments, Cole said, “Really? Then how did you get private investors to put up their hard-earned cash on a high-risk, no-potential-profit deal?”

“Oh, that,” she said with a rueful laugh. “I packed up my briefcase with official business plans and projections and called on my father’s friends. They all thought we were probably going to fail, but they felt sorry for me, so they patted my head and gave me five thousand or ten thousand—figuring all along that they’d at least end up with a tax loss they could use to offset profits on their income taxes. In return for that, I gave them stock certificates in the new company.” She sighed and looked away. “In short, I gave away so many pieces of our business that when they were added up, we were down to fifty percent for ourselves.”

“Diana, did you have any other choice?”

“If I had dreamed how profitable and successful we’d be now—”

“I’m talking about before, when you were starting up,” he said sternly. “Did you have any other way to raise the money you needed?”

She hesitated and then shook her head. “None.”

“Then stop blaming yourself for not being psychic and give yourself credit for overcoming hundreds of hurdles all by yourself—hurdles that would eliminate all but the most gifted and flexible entrepreneurs!”

Diana gazed up at his stern, handsome face and realized he was completely serious. “Coming from you, that’s high praise indeed.”