'You and the company are all mixed up together in my mind.'
They stood like that for a few moments with only their foreheads touching. Then their noses brushed, and their mouths. Although their lips were together, they didn't kiss.
'I love you, Suzie,' he whispered, his voice sounding young and scared. 'I know I get crazy sometimes, but you've got to promise me you'll stick with me. Please, babe. I need you so much. Oh, God, I love you. Promise me you'll always be there for me.'
He gripped her hands at her sides so tightly he seemed to be trying to couple their flesh. At that moment, she realized how fiercely she loved him. Her throat had constricted and she couldn't talk-she couldn't force out the words he needed to hear. Instead, she parted her lips and gave him a dark, desperate kiss.
Chapter 16
'Slap some paint on his shirt, Susannah,' Sam said three weeks later, as he placed a two-by-four over a pair of sawhorses. 'I'm embarrassed to be in the same room with him.'
Mitch looked down at his crisply pressed work shirt and a pair of dark blue jeans with razor-sharp creases. 'What's the matter with the way I look? We're building a wall, for Pete's sake, not going to a fashion show.'
Sam snorted, and Susannah smiled to herself. Building the partition to separate the assembly and storage areas in their new office space was the first job the four of them had done together, and despite the fact that Sam and Mitch had been trading jibes all morning, the wall was taking shape rapidly.
She had spent the first two weeks of October scouring the Valley for office space, but it had been difficult finding something that was adequate and yet met their limited budget. With Mitch as a partner, they had easily secured a bank loan. Each of them was now drawing a minuscule salary, and their cash flow problems had temporarily eased. But they all knew the loan was only a temporary stopgap, and in order to postpone going to the venture capitalists, they had to scrimp wherever they could.
She had finally found office space at a reasonable rent in the back of a tilt-up, one of the low rectangular buildings that filled the Valley's industrial parks. It wasn't a large area, but it was bigger than the garage and, with a few additions, would meet their needs. They had begun constructing the dividing partition the day before.
'I'll bet you go to a tailor to get your underwear made,' Sam said to Mitch as he held the board for Yank to cut.
'My tailor doesn't make underwear,' Mitch replied. And then, 'I've heard there's a market in the Orient for human hair, Sam. It occurs to me that if you'd sell yours, we could buy this building instead of just renting it.'
Susannah groaned. 'Tell them both to be quiet, will you, Yank? They're giving me a headache.'
'You didn't have a headache this morning.' Sam leered at her, and then swung the two-by-four around so that it gently slapped her rear.
She absolutely refused to blush. If she were going to work with men all day, she at least had to pretend to be one of the guys. 'That's true,' she countered sweetly, 'but I'll certainly have one by tonight.'
Mitch smiled. Although she knew he was still watching everything she did and waiting for her to take a misstep, their relationship was at least superficially cordial.
She went over to help him support a joist he was nailing into place. 'Boy, are you lucky you joined up with us. They wouldn't have let you do work like this in Boston.'
He looked down at her from his perch on the ladder, with a hammer in his fist and a satisfied expression on his face. 'This is great, isn't it? I haven't had so much fun since I was in college.'
She grimaced as she tried to ease the cramp in her shoulders. 'You were supposed to be the sane person in this partnership. Now you're as crazy as the rest of us.'
On the other side of the room, Yank was driving Sam wild by insisting on measuring every board to the sixteenth of an inch. Finally Sam couldn't stand it any longer. 'We're not doing brain surgery, for chrissake! It doesn't have to be exact. Just saw the son of a bitch in half.'
But Yank, with his engineer's passion for precision, didn't know how to compromise. By afternoon, Sam refused to work with him any longer, and Susannah was forced to take his place.
As Susannah worked, her eyes followed Sam. She kept wondering when it would wear off, this need to touch him every moment they were together. She knew that he was arrogant and frequently self-centered, but he was also the most compelling person she had ever met. He waved challenges in her face like red flags, and pushed her into another universe with his lusty lovemaking. With Sam, she could be bold and strong. Without him-But she couldn't bear to think about life without Sam. Left on her own, she would probably crawl back into her proper hollow shell and stay there until she died.
She realized that the events the night Mitch had joined the company had changed their relationship. Both of them sensed that they had nearly lost something precious. Ironically, Sam was the one who had begun to press the idea of getting married. Being Sam, he had painted word pictures for her of what their marriage could be-the endless
They christened the wall with a six-pack of beer that evening and spent the next day moving in. At ten that night, dirty and exhausted, they made their way to Mom & Pop's.
Mitch had been talking for some time about the need for a formal organizational chart. Yank had said that he wouldn't accept any title except Engineer, but even Sam knew that the rest of their responsibilities had to be better denned. After the waitress had taken their order, Mitch pulled a neatly folded piece of paper from his pocket and slid it toward the middle of the table. Even before he opened it, Susannah suspected that it was the organizational chart he had been talking about.
It was illogical to hope that she could retain her position as president. Mitch had far more experience and was the better choice to head the company. But although she was reconciled to the fact that she would be demoted, she wasn't going to let Mitch give her an empty title. If it meant another fight, then so be it.
Mitch unfolded the paper and straightened it with his fingers. It was the roughly drawn chart she had expected, and her eyes first fell on Yank's name written in neat block letters slightly below center. He was listed as Head Engineer.
Sam gave a hoot of laughter and pointed to his own name. 'Chairman of the Board. Yeah, I like the sound of that.'
And then, to her astonishment, Susannah saw she was listed as President and Chief Operating Officer, while Mitch had appointed himself Executive Vice-President of Sales and Marketing.
Mitch took in the expression of surprise on her face. 'Being president sounds impressive, Susannah, but it'll be mainly dirt work for a long time. I hope you're up to it.'
'But you're far more qualified. Why-'
'Marketing technical products is what I do best, and it's why you recruited me. I don't want to be distracted with day-to-day operations. You've said that you're a detail person. Now you're going to have to prove it.'
Her mouth felt dry. Even though this was what she had wanted, she was frightened. They weren't operating out of a garage anymore. What did she know about running a real company?
Mitch called for a vote, and before the pizzas arrived, she had been officially elected SysVal's first president.
On a warm and sunny afternoon just before Halloween, Susannah was in the Gamble garage packing up the last of the equipment. Mitch had been right, she thought, as she slapped a pile of tools in the carton with a little more force than necessary. Being president sounded a lot more impressive than it was. Everyone had gone off and left her to do the final cleanup. Yank was working on the prototype, and Mitch had flown to Boston to see his children. Sam was supposed to be helping her, but he had run off a couple of hours ago and not returned.
In the past two weeks she had been able to handle most of the emergencies that had popped up, and the company was still running. Although Yank continued to grumble about the way the three of them had strong-armed him into leaving Atari, the work on the prototype for the self-contained computer was now progressing much faster.
