BSS-619 Her Husband's Boss by Karen Ziegler


Chapter 1


Maxwell Alexander eased back in his plush desk chair and swung around 
toward the massive grey-tinted window behind him. Only two weeks ago, 
he had been able to gaze down unblinkingly through the golden May 
sunlight to the traffic-clogged Los Angeles intersection five stories 
below, but summer had come scorching in on the heels of spring and now 
the air shimmered with heat and a hazy blinding glare. The sky seemed 
to drop down suddenly thick with smog, like a stifling shroud over the 
sprawling city. The newspapers had been reporting that the level of air 
pollution was critical and had already reached the danger point twice 
during the past week. As usual, the papers had blamed it on the 
complexes of heavy industry that surrounded the city and editorial 
writers were crying out for more stringent anti-pollution measures.

With an impatient snort, Max turned his chair back around toward his 
broad mahogany desk and picked up the latest copy of New World Steel, 
Alexander Steel Company's bi-weekly magazine. He grinned perniciously 
at the striking cover photograph that met his gaze--a shapely, long-
legged blonde sunbathing next to a sparkling bright blue river with a 
few gleaming white smoke-stacks rising over the trees in the 
background, gently puffing out pale balls of smoke into the unsullied 
sky. The caption read: "Pollution--What's All the Fuss About?" Even 
though the picture had been taken months ago, it still amused him to 
think of how he had been keen enough to take advantage of a 
steelworkers' strike to scrub down those smoke-stacks and then burn 
tons of newsprint in the huge furnaces to produce that innocent-looking 
white smoke.

The "clear blue stream" had been a bit more of a problem, considering 
the sulfurous waste that was being constantly dumped into the river by 
the steel mill, but, just as the photographer had said, "There's 
nothing you can't do with the right camera filters, and good 
equipment." Sure, it had been expensive and time-consuming, but hell, 
he thought smugly, it was well worth it. It was exactly this kind of 
clever, creative thinking that kept him in his position as president, 
and major stockholder, of Alexander Steel, the booming company that his 
uncle Morton Alexander had founded.

Yes, he mused proudly as he chewed off the end of one of his expensive 
Havana cigars, he deserved every damned Wing he had ever got. After 
all, it had taken him years to reach his present position, and by God, 
he had had to scheme and connive, in ways that few people could really 
appreciate, to gain control of this industrial empire. In a rare moment 
of humility, he found himself thanking the gods of fate that he had 
become so thoroughly successful, had become a man who was wealthy and 
powerful enough to avoid the unpleasantness of the smoggy Los Angeles 
summer by remaining safely ensconced in the comfort of his lavishly-
decorated, air-conditioned office.


End of Page 1. See bss-619.txt for full story.