Friday? What happened on Friday? Oh God! Molly had a flashback to her boardroom tryst with Jasper, remembering his hands, his mouth, the pure sensual pleasure … but there was no way Adam could know about it – was there?
She looked at him and Adam met her gaze, his expression steely, his jaw locked and impassive.
‘Molly you know what I’m talking about,’ he said slowly.
‘No, I’m afraid I don’t,’ she said lifting her chin defiantly, ‘you’re going to have to illuminate me.’
‘If that’s how you want to play it,’ said Adam, reaching for a remote control and pointing it at a television at the side of his desk.
The picture flicked onto a grainy black-and-white image. Molly’s face was immediately recognizable, thrown back in pleasure as she lay on the boardroom table, her skirt up around her hips, her legs splayed like the arms of a clock, a man’s head between them. Adam kept the television on a moment longer than was necessary, then snapped it off.
Molly could hear the sound of her own quickened breathing filling the silence. How could she have been so stupid? She had been in that boardroom a hundred times and never noticed CCTV. She tried quickly to think of something to say, an excuse, a denial. But it was useless. She had been caught red-handed.
‘Molly, we just can’t have that sort of thing going on in the office.’
She nodded solemnly and Adam paused.
‘I take it Marcus doesn’t know?’ he asked.
‘Of course not,’ she said, the words coming out like a croak. ‘It was a one-off. I was so stupid, so fucking stupid,’ she said, biting her lips in anger.
‘I think this Friday should be your last day in the office,’ he said flatly.
‘What?’ she gasped. ‘You’re joking!’
‘Why should I be joking?’ asked Adam angrily. ‘My events coordinator fucks someone who isn’t her boyfriend, my vice president – my friend – on my boardroom table. Why should I be joking?’
She could feel her heart pounding so loudly she was sure Adam could hear it. Right now Adam Gold had the power to destroy her whole life, to wipe out the entire existence she had become so comfortable with. The Standlings, the parties, the Maserati. Everything.
‘But I thought I was doing a good job, I thought …’
She looked up at Adam, her eyes pleading. ‘You’re not going to tell Marcus, are you? Please Adam, I beg you.’ Her voice was beginning to crack and real tears spilled down her cheeks.
Adam glanced away for a moment, shaking his head. ‘I won’t. For now.’
Molly breathed a sigh of relief.
‘But my loyalties are to him, Molly,’ continued Adam. ‘And if I get even a whiff that you’ve screwed around on him again, not only will I tell Marcus about your little extracurricular activity, I’ll get you blackballed from so many companies in London, you won’t be able to get a job in this town shovelling shit.’
‘Thank you, Adam, it will never happen again, I promise you.’
‘Don’t thank me,’ said Adam, looking at Molly with disgust. ‘Just get out.’
‘What do you mean, you haven’t told Marcus?’
Karin was furious. How could he not tell him? Men could be such idiots. She and Adam were sitting at the best table in a fabulous new chic French restaurant in Chelsea, and he’d made her evening by telling her he had just fired Molly, but then gone and spoiled the whole thing with some sort of weird twisted male logic.
‘But what would it solve, honey?’ said Adam, filling her glass with water which she drained almost immediately. ‘If she’s telling the truth and it’s a one-off, then there’s no point telling him. Marcus has had a run of bad luck with women, but he seems to really like Molly. If she’s a serial cheat, well then he’ll find out soon enough, but I’d rather it didn’t come from me.’
Karin couldn’t believe it; how had Molly been able to secure Adam’s silence? With sex? No, he wouldn’t do that – would he? She tried to put that thought out of her mind. What irked Karin the most was that it had taken such a huge amount of planning. Molly was such a slacker, Karin knew that she wouldn’t bother to fact-check or take references on anything. If she had, Molly would soon have discovered that HangDog Productions didn’t actually exist and that Jasper Goodman, the man she’d fucked on the boardroom table, wasn’t a gung-ho party planner with an impressive CV and a Rolodex of society contacts. He was Jonathan Gooding, an out-of-work actor and sometime escort who would do anything for money and who had deceived Molly Sinclair beautifully. Damn it! If only Adam had told Marcus. After Molly’s conniving in Monaco, there was nothing Karin would like better than to see the dreadful woman out of the picture. Well, almost nothing.
‘Don’t let Molly Sinclair put you in such a bad mood. She always seems to rile you,’ said Adam as the waiter placed their food in front of them.
‘I just have a lot on my mind,’ said Karin truthfully.
‘I hope this isn’t still to do with me not coming to St Tropez, is it?’ asked Adam, raising a crystal wine goblet to his lips. ‘Karin, this refinancing is crucial. It was the only time I could get all the guys from the bank together.’
She shrugged, smiling. ‘You know I’m not one of those demanding women who insists their boyfriend be there for every minor life triumph.’