The emotions he was experiencing were unfamiliar. Over the years countless women had walked into and out of his life, but these entrances and exits had always been orchestrated by Hector himself. He had given them only a cursory thought after they had gone. Now he found himself in mortal dread. He realized how very little he knew about the real Hazel Bannock. He was fully aware that she was no ordinary woman. He knew she could be totally ruthless; if that were not the case she could never have climbed to the position of pre-eminence which she now occupied. There were multiple layers and hidden depths to her which he could still only guess at. Up to this moment he had been totally blinded to any flaws in those depths. Now he realized that he was more vulnerable than he had ever been before. He felt naked and defenceless. For the first time he was not in complete control of a relationship. He was hanging on the thread which Hazel Bannock held in her hand, and which she could snip as blithely as he had cut free those other women. The roles were reversed and he was not enjoying the sensation.
'So this is what it feels like to be really in love,' he thought bleakly. 'Seems to me it's a highly overrated pastime.' Hazel did not reappear to take lunch in the company canteen. Instead Hector went to Cayla's room and invited her to join him. She tried to refuse, but he insisted. 'I am not going to let you lock yourself into this ghastly little room and fret.' They shared a table with Paddy O'Quinn, Dave Imbiss and the young company doctor. The three younger men had not seen a pretty white girl for months and they competed to try and impress her.
Hector dreaded having to spend the rest of the day in his own office, waiting for a summons from Hazel, or for some other sign that she remembered his presence on this earth. He left a message with Bert Simpson's secretary to give to Hazel when she was free. He changed his boots for a lighter pair, then went out into the desert and started to run. Four and a half hours later he returned to headquarters drenched in his own sweat. He had run the equivalent of a standard marathon, but he had not succeeded in leaving his demons out there in the sands. The secretary was watching for him from the windows of her office, and she hurried to meet him as he came in the front doors.
'Mrs Bannock has been asking for you. She wishes to see you in Mr Simpson's office at your earliest convenience, please, Mr Cross.' The phraseology of the message was not reassuring.
'Please tell Mrs Bannock that I will be with her at once.' Hector ran to his own suite. He stood under the cold shower for less than a minute, dried himself so quickly that the clean shirt he threw on had damp patches down the back. He combed his hair while it was still wet, scrubbed his teeth with extra paste on the brush. There was no time for a shave, so he set off immediately for Bert Simpson's office. He found himself hurrying and he forced himself to slow down to a more dignified pace. He knocked on the door to the office and her voice bade him enter. He drew an involuntary deeper breath as though poised to dive from the high board into cold water, and opened the door. She was alone in the room, seated behind the desk. She looked up from the sheaf of documents she was perusing. Her gaze was even but unreadable. She stood up without a smile.
'We can't go on like this,' she said. The earth shifted under his feet as though in a quake. It was as bad as he had feared. He knew he was about to be dumped into the recycle bin. With a huge effort he hardened his expression.
'I understand,' he replied.
'I don't think you do,' she said firmly. 'You know that I have to take Cayla back to Houston first thing tomorrow morning. She must have professional care immediately. I have not seen you all day. That was bad enough. But now I have to leave you here. It's going to be like ripping a chunk out of my soul. We can't go on like this. I have to have you by my side, night and day, for ever.'
Hector felt joy rising up to fill the cold and empty space within him. He could find no words that would not make him sound like an idiot. He held out his hands to her and she came to him. They embraced with a fervour not far short of desperation.
'Oh, Hector!' she whispered. 'How cruel of you to have left me to exist without you all these lonely years!'
'All that time I was searching for you, but you were so damned elusive,' Hector replied.
After a while she led him to the leather sofa under the windows. He placed his arm around her and she pressed herself against him.
'All right, now we have to be serious. We have to make plans before I am forced to leave you,' she said. 'I ought to leave right away, but I cannot deny us the joy of one more night together. Cayla and I will go early tomorrow morning. I considered asking you to come with us. But you have new arrangements to put in place here.' She broke off with a laugh. 'I am getting a little bit ahead of myself. I have a proposition for your consideration. Do you want to hear it?'
'I am hanging on your sweet lips,' he replied.
'I would very much like to buy Cross Bow Security. The price on the table is forty-five million dollars cash on signature. But that is negotiable,' she added and Hector laughed.
'Wow, you work fast. But why would you want to give me all that money?'
'I don't do paupers. I like my men to be able to afford to buy me a drink or take me out to dinner.'
He laughed again then insisted, 'You do know that Cross Bow is valued at thirty-five million. What would your shareholders say if you shelled out ten million over the going rate?'
'Firstly, I have done the maths. Thirty-five undervalues the company. It's worth every dollar of forty-five. Secondly, Hazel Bannock and not Bannock Oil is buying Cross Bow. Have we got a deal?' She offered her hand.
'We have indeed got a deal.' He shook his head in admiration, and took her hand.
'I want to put Paddy O'Quinn in your place to take over Cross Bow. I want you to hand over to him as soon as you can do so in an orderly manner. That's why I'm forced to leave you behind for the time being.' She did not mention that she also had to make plans for his reception and welcome to their new home in Houston.
'Have you considered that this will leave me out of a job and starving to death on your miserly forty-five mill?' he asked.
'I have indeed considered that. It just so happens that there is a job going at Bannock Oil for a senior executive vice-president. You might care to consider it. The salary would be in the region of five million plus perks and bonuses per annum.'
'Would I be working close to the CEO by any chance?'
'You would be working directly under her during the day, and directly on top of her at night,' she answered with a salacious slant of those blue eyes.
'Cayla is right. You are damned kinky.' He laughed but suddenly looked serious. 'But I'm not qualified for the job you're offering me.'
'You're a smart boy, and you'll have me to teach you. You'll learn quickly.'
'Again I have to ask what your shareholders will think of my promotion. Won't they kick up a fuss?' he insisted.
'I can vote well over seventy per cent of the company's paid-up shares in Bannock Oil. People tend to do what I tell them without kicking up a fuss. Do you want the job?'
'I am certainly not going to be the one who kicks up a fuss. I want the job.'
'Good! That's all settled then.' She took both his hands and looked deeply into his eyes. 'God made you and me for each other.'
'Hallelujah! At last I am a believer!'
'We're leaving all the horrors behind us. Cayla is going to be fine, and you and I are going to have fun, Hector Cross.'
'We are damn sure going to do just that, Hazel Bannock.'
The chef had arranged for dinner to be served to the two of them on the terrace looking out across the bay. The crescent moon and the stars were magnificent but Hector and Hazel barely glanced up from each other's eyes to admire them. The wine was excellent but they did no more than taste it. There was so much they had to say to each other that they left most of the delicious grilled desert quails on foie gras on their plates when they went to the bedroom long before midnight. The first time they made love with furious haste. It was wonderful but not as good as those times that followed. At last, locked in each other's embrace, they sank into a sleep so deep that the terrible piercing screams brought them back only slowly from faraway places. Hector came fully awake a few seconds before Hazel. He sprang to his feet and grabbed the Beretta pistol from the bedside table.
'It's Cayla,' he said as he cycled a live round into the breech of the pistol and started for the door into the passage that divided the two bedrooms. Hazel followed close behind. Not wasting time turning the handle he put his shoulder to the door, ripping the lock out of the frame. He burst into Cayla's bedroom. Her anguished screams goaded him to even greater haste. With the pistol levelled and ready to engage any target, he made certain the room was clear before he switched on the ceiling light.
Cayla was curled up in the middle of the bed hugging her knees with both arms. But when she lifted her face towards him it was white as the sheets on which she lay. Her eyes were wild with terror. Her mouth was wide open. The screams that poured up from her throat were shrill like high-pressure steam escaping from a ruptured machine boiler. Hector darted to the windows and checked them swiftly to make sure that no intruder had entered that way. Then he threw open the wardrobe doors and looked under the bed. Hazel seized Cayla in her arms, trying to quieten and comfort her. But Cayla was struggling so violently that Hazel could not hold her, and she broke away. Gradually her screams became more coherent.
'No! No! Please don't let him hurt me again.' Hector dropped his pistol on the bedside table and took her by the shoulders. He shook her, and stared into her face.
'Wake up, Cayla. It's me, Heck. You are having a nightmare. Wake up!' Her eyes focused. She shuddered and her screams cut off abruptly.
'Heck! Oh, thank God. Is it really you?' Then she looked around her in terror. 'He's here. Adam is here.'
'No, Cayla. You were having a nightmare.'
'I tell you he is is here. You must believe me. He was so close I could smell his breath. It was horrible.' It took both Hazel and Hector to calm her down. Then still holding her tightly Hazel slipped under the bedcovers with her and rocked her like an infant, crooning softly to her. Standing at the foot of the bed, Hector suddenly realized that he was stark naked and he backed away towards the door. Immediately Cayla shot upright and her voice rose again hysterically. here. You must believe me. He was so close I could smell his breath. It was horrible.' It took both Hazel and Hector to calm her down. Then still holding her tightly Hazel slipped under the bedcovers with her and rocked her like an infant, crooning softly to her. Standing at the foot of the bed, Hector suddenly realized that he was stark naked and he backed away towards the door. Immediately Cayla shot upright and her voice rose again hysterically.
'You mustn't go. You are the only one who can protect us. Stay with us, Heck. He will come back if you go. Please don't leave us alone ever again.' He snatched up the sheet that Cayla had thrown aside and draped it over his nakedness like a Roman toga. Then he sat on the end of the bed. Cayla subsided slowly and closed her eyes. As soon as he thought she was asleep again he stood up to switch off the lights. Cayla jerked into a sitting position. 'No! Don't switch them off. He will come back if you do.'
'Don't worry, sweetheart,' he reassured her. 'The lights will stay on, and I will not be going anywhere.' Both Hazel and Cayla fell asleep at last, clinging to each other with their heads on the same pillow. Hector kept vigil over them for the rest of the night. He watched their two lovely faces and listened to their mingled breathing and it gave him a sense of fulfilment such as he had never known before.
In the dawn he walked with them to where the Gulfstream stood with its engines warming and the two pilots already sitting at the controls. He went up the steps with them.
'I wish you were coming with us, Heck,' Cayla said.
'I'll follow you pretty soon.'
'How soon?' she demanded, and Hector glanced at Hazel for the answer. She was ready with the reply.
'Heck will be with us before the end of next month.'
'Is that a promise, Mummy?'
'It's a promise, baby. Now why don't you go and talk to the pilots and find out our flying time to Houston,' she suggested, but Cayla rolled her eyes.
'It's not safe to leave you two little devils alone together. You are not to be trusted.'
'Go!' said Hazel.
'Keep your hair on! I'm going.'
Hector stood alone and watched the sleek aircraft taxi to the end of the airstrip then swing around and with the screech of its engines arrow back towards him and rise into the air over his head. Framed in one of the oval windows of the fuselage Cayla was waving a pink handkerchief at him, and in the window behind her Hazel blew a double-handed kiss. Then they were gone.
Hazel phoned him at every opportunity over the next few weeks. Her first call was four days after she left Sidi el Razig.
'Cayla and I have already seen Doctor Henderson together,' she told Hector. 'She is a lovely lady. The very best there is. She got me back on track after Henry died. She has taken Cayla into her sanatorium where she can see her as many times a day as is necessary. While she's there Cayla will have a full medical checkup and I will make time to spend at least a couple of hours with her every day. What have you been playing at, big boy?'
Each time they spoke to each other the news was better. Cayla was making a strong recovery, but there were things that Hazel would only tell him when they met. They had been apart for almost a month when Hector could stand it no longer. She phoned him that evening.
'Paddy and I came back from Ash-Alman this morning. We spent a couple of hours with the Emir and Prince Mohammed. They were worried about me leaving Cross Bow, but when they heard I would be going to Bannock Oil they cheered up. Of course, they know Paddy and like him. So we are all squared away in Abu Zara.'
'What will be your next port of call?'
'I wanted to discuss that with you. I am planning for Paddy and I to go on to the shipyards in Osaka. What do you think?'
The Sanoyasu shipyard in Osaka was building a new supertanker for Bannock Cargoes Inc. It was an entirely revolutionary design and when launched would be the largest bulk carrier afloat. The whole project was running on a budget of almost a billion dollars. The construction was being carried out behind massive security precautions, for which Cross Bow was responsible.
'Good thinking, Hector.'
'I had another rare thought. What if you visited Osaka at the same time? Surely you could sneak away to nip across the Pacific for a few days?'
'You are the great tempter, Hector Cross.'
'How about it? I have been separated from you for months.'
'Weeks,' she corrected him.
'To me it seems like months.' She was silent for a while.
'Aren't you missing me?' he probed.
'Like I have lost both legs and both arms.'
'Then come!'
'I'm sure Cayla will be well looked after in the sanatorium. But I'll have to check with Doctor Henderson if it will be okay,' she mused aloud. 'I will have to let you know tomorrow.'
The following evening when she phoned her voice was singing. 'Doctor Henderson says it will be fine. Cayla says I should bring a big box full of her love to you in Osaka. I'll meet you there on Thursday.'
'Four more days to wait,' Hector lamented. 'I don't know if I will survive.'
They spent five days together in Osaka handing over the reins of Cross Bow's operation in Japan to Paddy, meeting with the design engineers and senior Sanoyasu executives and inspecting the mountainous hull of the new gas tanker on the slipway. The next day Hazel chartered a helicopter and they left Paddy to get on with it, while they slipped away together to fly up to a Shinto temple at the base of Mount Fujiyama to see the cherry trees in blossom. Wandering through the orchard they came across an ancient tree with a marvellously gnarled trunk. Hazel took Hector's hand and led him under the spreading branches. She leaned back against the trunk and glanced around quickly to make certain they were unobserved, then facing him she lifted her pleated white skirt above her waist and at the same time slipped the crotch of her lace panties to one side, to reveal her nest of bright golden curls. With two fingers she spread her bush apart and let the roseate lips of her sex pout through.
'This is what I have, big boy,' she said huskily. 'Now show us what you've got.' Then she stared. 'My God! He gets bigger every time I see him! What are you feeding him on?'
'At this very moment he is contemplating with the utmost relish his favourite snack.'
Fully dressed and standing up they made love, both of them titillated by the risk of being discovered in the act by one of the temple priests. The cherry tree shook as they rocked against the stem and white petals rained down on them like confetti, sticking in Hazel's blonde locks. Rapt in the ecstasy of her orgasm she made such a lovely picture that Hector knew he would remember every detail of it to the very last day of his life.
That evening they ate bluefin tuna sashimi and drank hot sake from ancient porcelain bowls in the quaint little guest house that was run by the lay priests in the grounds of the temple. Afterwards they retired to their private quarters where they made love on a silk futon, serenaded by the tinkle of the fountain in the courtyard. In the brief intervals between their bouts of lovemaking they talked. There was so much to tell each other and not enough time in which to say it all. Their most absorbing topic was the progress of Cayla's recovery.
'I didn't know how to tell you this before, it's so horrible. But my little girl was all torn up inside by those filthy swine. Do you know what a vaginal fistula is?' He was so shocked that he could not speak; instead he squeezed her hand and nodded. 'The doctors have repaired it surgically,' she went on, 'but while they were doing so they discovered that she was in the very early stages of pregnancy.'
'Oh, God! The poor little thing.'
'They fixed that also. Cayla was under total anaesthetic and she doesn't know anything about that part of it. We must never tell her.' He held her close, trying to comfort her with the contact. She sobbed softly against his chest and hugged him with all her strength. They were silent for a long time, and then she stirred and drew back a little.
'But it's going to be all right now. The first tests show that Cayla is not infected with HIV or any other sexually transmitted disease, and she is recovering well from the surgery. Thelma Henderson is working her special brand of miracle over her. Cayla trusts her. Apart from the terrible traumatic events that my baby has suffered, she is also consumed by guilt. According to Thelma, Cayla believes that she has betrayed both my trust and her father's memory. She thinks that it is entirely her fault that she allowed herself to be seduced by that horrible monster. However, Thelma has made significant progress with her. No more nightmares for a while. She says that Cayla will soon be fit enough to go up to the ranch in Colorado with us. It has always been her favourite place in all the world. Mine too. Cayla wants to visit Henry's mausoleum and of course all her horses are on the ranch.' She propped herself up on her elbow. Hector could sense her eyes close to his face in the darkness. 'I truly believe that it's very important for you to spend some time with her,' she went on. 'You know how good you are with her, and how she dotes on you. To a large extent you have filled the great gap that Henry left when he died. You've become a real father to her, darling. You see, both of us Bannock girls need you.'
'Of course, I could return with you to Houston right away, and leave Paddy to find his own way around the Cross Bow operations in Nigeria and Chile.'
'You know I could never agree to that.' She shook her head. 'The company's security arrangements are of paramount importance. No, I will return to the States on a commercial flight tomorrow, and leave the Gulfstream at your disposal to speed up the handover process with Paddy. I want you in Houston by the twenty-fifth of this month. Do you remember we promised that to Cayla? Apart from that the board is having an extraordinary general meeting the following Monday to ratify your appointment. I have a strange premonition that they are going to approve of you. You have friends at court.' She smiled for the first time. 'After that the three of us can fly up to the ranch together.'
Three weeks later both Hazel and Cayla were waiting to meet Hector when the Gulfstream landed at William P. Hobby airport in Houston.
'God! I missed you,' Hazel whispered as they embraced.
'Not as much as I did you.'
'When you have finished with him, Mummy, may I have a little bit of what is left?' Cayla asked sweetly. Hector looked at her for the first time.
'Wow! You are looking great, Cay.' He was lying. The truth was that she was still very frail and pale, but he kissed her on both cheeks. Then he took one of the women on each arm and they went out through the VIP entrance into the car park to where the uniformed chauffeur was holding open the door of the Cadillac for them.
Hector was expecting Hazel's Houston home to be palatial and pretentious. He was way off the mark. It was in the rural outskirts of the city on what was obviously still a working cattle ranch. To reach it they drove through lush paddocks of alfalfa in which grazed herds of white-faced cattle. Then they passed stables and outbuildings before they came to her home.
'Looks like JR's pad in Dallas Dallas,' Hector remarked.
'This is Houston, Heck,' Cayla reminded him. 'We don't like to mention second-rate cities around here. Just wait until you see the master bedroom suite. Mummy has had it completely redone, especially for you.'
'Cayla!' Hazel said sternly.
'Oops!' She put her fingers to her lips. 'I wasn't supposed to tell you.' She was blithely unrepentant, and winked at him in a conspiratorial manner.
'Anything you want to know around here, just ask your old pal, Cay Bannock.'
The board meeting was planned to last for an hour and a half. In the end Hector held the board members enthralled for almost four hours. Hazel had never heard him speak to an audience before and even she was taken by surprise. She found her heart warming with pride as she listened to him. He was so handsome and self-assured. His grasp of his subjects was firm and extensive. He presented his thoughts in a clear and logical manner, and yet his choice of words was riveting and thought-provoking. He fielded all their questions adroitly, and his replies had them all nodding their heads in agreement. Of course John Bigelow, the retired Democratic senator for Texas, tried to trip him up. But Hazel had warned Hector about him, and Hector turned the tables on Bigelow so neatly that the others burst into spontaneous applause. As Hazel had predicted Hector was elected to the board by a unanimous show of hands. They crowded around to congratulate him.