Sharon woke up the next morning with a splitting Headache and a temperature, so she didn't have to lie to David when she called him at home.
'I flew home a night early, I'm coming down with the flu, started throwing up and it's so hateful being I'll in hotels. I didn't miss any of the conference though, just the ball and Bryan is there to cover everytime that does happen.
David was sympathetic. 'Don't worry about it. I think that you did the right thing. I hate being I'll in hotels myself'.
'How are you? Feeling any better?' she asked, reminded that he had been ill before they left. In fact that was the reason she had had to go to the conference with Bryan in the first place. How much different she would have felt today if he had gone with her. She broke off a sigh Incase he heard it and started asking questions.
I'll be back on Monday. I'm okay', he said. 'Maybe you caught the same bug I had? I hope I didn't give it to you. Have you got a headache?'
'Frightful one'. But she suspected it wasn't flu that was making her head ache, although since she had been sick several times that day, she knew now that it wasn't just her shamed revulsion over letting Bryan make love to her that had made her throw up the morning after when she had woken up to find him gone,leaving just a curt note behind.
'High temperature? Thirsty? Shivery?' David asked.
'All that's.
'It sounds like what I had. Well, one comfort is that it doesn't last long. Stay in bed and call a doctor, and don't come to work until you are one Hundred percent again'.
'I won't David. I left my conference notes with Bryan. He will give them to you if you want them urgently but it would be easier for you read them after they had been typed up'.
'Forget about work, Sharon's, David told her. 'Just concentrate on getting well.
By evening, she felt terrible. It was definitely flu and she stayed in bed, shi eating under a thick winter duvet, dosed herself with aspirin and drank alot of squash and orange juice and water. She didn't eat at all, couldn't keep anything down.
When she went back to work, she had lost weight and looked pale. David gave her a concerned look as she stepped into his office.
'You have been ill. You look terrible'.
She laughed. 'Thank you, David. You're so flattering. 'Did Bryan give you my conference notes? Have they been typed up?'
'Yes, I've skimmed through them'. He talked about some of the topics which had been discussed at the conference, asked her some questions, then said, 'Guess who came into the office yesterday?'.
Blankly, she said,'Who?'
'Gerhard', David said laughing. 'He told me he'd run into you at the conference. He's in London with a team from the German bank' to hold talks with the Bank of England. We are having Lunch later this week- I told him that I'd bring you along if you were back at work. Ate you free on Thursday?'
'I think so. I'll have to checky diary though, I'll let you know'.
She wasn't sure that she ever wanted to see Gerhard again. Seeing him now would always remind her of what happened at the conference
It really wasn't his fault but just maybe if they had not been discussing him and his intention towards her, Bryan would have gone straight to his room and she to hers and there would have been no incident where she would have been fighting to prove his gentlemanliness which had led to her tripping and falling and Bryan with her and how they had ended up in bed.
She sighed silently. It was all just so stupid. How could she ever forget what happened at the conference when she worked here, under the same roof with Bryan and could hardly a oud seeing him everyday.
If she was sceptical about seeing Gerhard because of the things she considered the shameful events at the conference, then she should perhaps stop working at the bank so that she would also avoid seeing Bryan who was the perpetrator and the person who had kept treating her with remoteness and condescension since after that night.
And why should she be so unfair to Gerhard? It wasn't his fault. Any of it. He didn't even know what had happened. Nobody did. Red colour stained her cheeks. She hoped nobody ever would.
She went into her office to look at her diary and sat behind her desk, staring at nothing, wondering how she was going to feel when she finally saw Bryan again.
The phone rang. It was one of their investment managers, sounding gloomy. 'Sharon, I'm having issues with one of our clients. He is threatening to take his account away because he is not satisfied with the way I am managing his money. Could you speak to him? Have lunch with the two of us sometime this week?'
She looked at her diary again and sighed. 'Okay, Peter. Friday is free. Who's he again?'
'He's Wright'.
'Okay send me his file together with all the shares you've bought for him and how they are doing. I suppose we're making money for him?'
Peter drooled apologetically. ' I have had one or two strokes of bad lucks.You remember that investment we were trying to talk the clients into buying in the fall which fell through not long afterwards, I took some of that for him'.
Sharon was sad. That had been their mistake. They should never have got into it but it had looked okay in the face of it.
'Why didn't you get rid of the shares for him, switch into something else?'
'You know that is not our policy. David likes us to ride the ups and downs instead of buying and selling. That was my instruction and I stuck to it'.'But Peter there are exceptions to the rule one of which is when a company is being run by crooks. And the company manager absconded with so much finds. Look fix the lunch for me t week and not this anymore so that it would give me more time to make some rearrangements'.
And Peter thanked her and rang off.