A/N: Thank you to everyone who's reviewed this. If you're following along with the soundtrack (Craig Armstrong's "As If To Nothing") this chapter's track is "Amber."

Preferred Stock 2/?

Friday 11 November 2011
4:30

She had not needed an alarm clock since university, her body instinctively knowing when to come up out of the velvety darkness to full awareness, the temptation to sleep late ignored as she swung bare feet onto the soft carpet and padded over to her closet. She heard the soft click of the front door, knew it was Jemma, and felt her body shudder in anticipation. Going into the room was the hardest part, she reminded herself. After that, it was easy.

The soft pings roused him, the iPad instantly illuminating the room, the RSS feeds of financial headlines already scrolling across the screen. He could hear the click of the espresso machine starting, the television turning on, and he swung bare feet onto the black hardwood floor and strode into the kitchen.

It wasn't a large flat so much as it was a wildly luxurious one, and unsurprisingly sterile, considering he'd only been here for forty-eight hours. He required only three things in a home… a good bed, obscenely quick internet, and a proper espresso maker. Those things had never changed, not since he was at university and he'd brought his own bed, rigged an illegal connection outside the uni network, and inherited a rather fussy Italian machine from a former occupant of his rooms. Since those first days of learning to coax water through grounds, the service had changed to wifi, the beds had gone from Sealy, to Hypnos, to Haastens, and that old manual monster had become this sleek automatic machine that hissed and spit out flawless shots. He glanced at the television, and as he stood, naked, in a kitchen that still felt strange, he learned from CNBC Asia that the maverick/hotshot/prodigy/risk-taker/genius Matt Crawley was about to be put in place as chairman of Crawley Martin Thorpe. "No relation to the founding family," the anchor droned, and Matthew grinned.

"Thank God for that," he whispered to the barely-furnished room.

The room was already hot, and Jemma was flat on her back on the mat, her blue eyes focused on the ceiling. She would allow Mary only a few minutes to get used to the heat and humidity before standing and beginning the series of postures, ninety minutes in silence, the practice burned into them both. Pranayama breathing, half-moon, awkward, eagle, a brief break and the misery of the standing series, the agony of watching Jemma's tiny body flex into impossible positions, her foot above her head, her legs perfectly straight. It was always like that with Jemma, that surprising perfection, even when they were both barely out of university, and they met on the trading floor. No one ever believed Jemma could do anything, the fragile little blonde with giant blue eyes and a vulnerable look. It was a trap, of course. She was ruthless, brutal, a veritable machine on the floor and on the phones, second only to Mary in the strange maths of stocks and risk management. She moved up in Crawley Martin Thorpe as quickly as Mary did and Mary secretly hoped the two of them could run the place someday.

Of course, it was not to be. One night after a particularly insane day at work, the two had ended up in a peculiar bar in Shoreditch, and for whatever reason, the owner, a tall man with a literary streak and a way with taps bowled over Jemma. Three kids (theirs), two novels, (his), and a wildly successful yoga studio (hers) later, they still owned that quirky bar named "Dead Novelists," and Mary still couldn't figure it out. "You just know," was all Jemma would ever say.

They were into the floor series, which meant two things. One, they were nearly finished, and two, it meant camel pose, which was Mary's sole reason for enjoying this six-days-a-week practice.

Her back arched as she grabbed her heels, pushing her hips forward, head flung back. "It activates the fight or flight feeling," their first instructor had told them, and the sensation thrilled Mary as her head dropped almost to her feet. The rest was a blur, and then, just as the clock struck six, they finished, the final savasana a relief as Mary briefly closed her eyes, the cleansing sweat pouring off her. "Thank you," she whispered to Jemma.

"You don't have to keep saying that," Jemma replied. "Anyway, it should be namaste."

Mary grinned as she sat up and flicked a bit of sweat at Jemma. "All right. Namaste, bitch."

It was an old joke between them and they laughed as they picked themselves up, hung the mats to dry, and headed off to shower.

Shower and workout complete, he went back to the briefing book one last time as he tied his tie. As Mary Crawley's dark eyes glared at him from the left side of the page, he read through the highlights once again.

Le Rosey, Clare College, Cambridge (after his time), the floors of the London and New York stock exchanges, two years in Hong Kong and Tokyo, then returned to fund management and climbed the ladder, but was passed over for chief executive in favor of Patrick Thorpe, who was the entire reason Matthew was here to begin with.

He turned the page to see Patrick, although he knew him on sight from the endless stream of stories about him. All the privileges and none of the brains of his distant cousin Mary, and yet the elder Crawley and the boards had seen fit to put him in charge.

"And look where that got you," he murmured to the darkened room.

Jemma looked critically at Mary, her eyes roving up and down her longtime friend's lithe form.

"Say it," Mary moaned.

"Nothing," Jemma replied. "Just.. Leave your hair down."

Mary looked at herself in the glass, at the carefully arranged knot at the base of her skull. "Why?"

"You look like your great-grandmother. Take it down. Wear it down. Look as gorgeous as you are.". She inhaled the last of her tea and stood up. "Tell Eddie I said hello."

"Tell her yourself," Mary muttered as Edith limped into the kitchen and poured herself a mug of tea. She nodded at Jemma's greeting and looked at Mary. Without a pause, she reached over and took out the pin holding Mary's hair. Mary grimaced and went back down the hall.

Eddie held out her hand to Jemma, who took it in hers and began to massage it, working deep into the palm for a few minutes before rubbing the forearm and then switching hands. "Better?" Jemma murmured, and Eddie nodded. "You should get up and do yoga with us."

It was the only thing that would make Eddie laugh, and she did as she took her tea back into the studio.

The part of the briefing that fascinated him most was not the story of the current family, but rather that of the founding one, and he turned it over in his head one last time as he shrugged on his jacket.

Founded in 1923 by Matthew Crawley and David Martin, Crawley-Martin had been a small firm committed to low-risk investment during a heady time in the markets. Crawley, who was once heir apparent to the Earl of Grantham, had begun as the firm's chief counsel, but became something of a savant in investing, wise and cautious, yet able to see a smart risk and take it. Clients may have lamented the 'slow and steady' sometimes, when they saw other firms get big returns on big risks, but when 1929 rolled around, the ones who stayed with Crawley-Martin were the lucky ones. There were lean years, of course, but when the markets began to limp back, Crawley-Martin clients and the firm itself had portfolios that were the envy of every investor around the world. Whether it was luck or brilliance, it didn't matter when they owned Bulova Watch, Electric Boat, and Zenith Radio stock, when they saw returns in the 1930s that no company could duplicate today. William Thorpe joined the firm in the fifties, and the firm did not stop growing, did not stop impressing the financial world with its acumen and fortune until 2007, when a series of disasters began taking down the entire financial world. Crawley Martin Thorpe initially stayed above the fray, having ignored the wishes of clients and mostly avoided the quick and subsequently dirty money of the mortgage bubble, but in 2009, allegations of potential insider trading had rocked the firm, and while no one could pinpoint who was responsible, and the phone recording that would have proven the investigators' case or proven them wrong was destroyed, the choice of Patrick Thorpe over Mary Crawley as chief executive officer seemed to be the most blatant indication that the once-brightest star at the company was at the heart of the German affair.

Now, as the company teetered on the edge of destruction, Patrick Thorpe's leadership so clearly to blame, it was now not so clear what had happened on that call, nor why the chairman emeritus, Mary's own father, a man considered to be one of the cleverest in the business, had made such a stupid decision.

Matthew Crawley was not someone who tolerated the imaginary religion of "gut instinct" in this business. He did his research, he knew all the possibilities, and he made the best choice. That he could do it quickly, and seemingly without thinking was, he believed, a testament to hard work and brains and not the stupidity of feeling.

Yet as the elevator descended and he walked out to his ride, he had the feeling, as did Ben Macmillan and his researchers who had put together the book on this firm, that Mary Crawley had been wronged in some way, and while he was there to be the company's saviour, not hers, his own research and study (which had, clearly not involved looking at her picture enough) told him all he needed to know about what role she would play in his restructuring, regardless of the rumor that hung over her.

Mary returned, hair down, the mane of nearly-black hair swinging. "Satisfied?"

"It's not for my benefit. It's for yours." Jemma wound a thick scarf around her neck. "You know you told your sister to make sure they got a good picture of you."

Jemma knew her far too well, and Mary rolled her eyes as Jemma leaned up to kiss her on the cheek. "Good luck. And make friends with him."

"What?"

Jemma slung her bag over her shoulder. "All right, you don't have to be best friends, but you shouldn't fight with him."

"I wasn't planning on fighting with him." Just destroying him, she thought to herself.

"Well, don't. And read the book on him if you haven't. I think he might be good for the company."

"I did read the book. Clearly he didn't, otherwise he would have known who I was."

Jemma giggled. "Oh, Mary. In a club? Especially that one? I probably wouldn't have recognized you. Listen," and she brandished the thick report. "This is someone you can work with. This is someone who thinks the way you do about credit default swaps. This is someone who's here to undo the damage to this company, and frankly, I think he could pave the way for you to take over. You're not the one who screwed up."

"Not this time," Mary muttered.

"Even then, it wasn't you!" Jemma retorted. "You know that, I know that, Percy knows that. Alastair was on your side. For God's sake, I think even your father knows, only he's too much of a coward… sorry." She broke off. "Mary, you have a chance here to make things right. Just make sure this Matthew is going to block you before you try and block him." She looked at the picture. "Good Lord, how are you going to keep from staring at him? He's very pretty."

Mary looked again at the photograph, seeing not the sleek, suited professional, but the man from the previous night, the thick, wavy, slightly tousled hair, and the insanely blue eyes drawing her in again.

"You're smiling," Jemma said.

"No, I'm not," Mary replied, pulling the corners of her mouth down. "Anyway, he's not my kind of pretty."

"Bollocks. I'm off. Promise me you'll behave. I'll be around later if you need someone to talk to."

Mary waved at her as the door clicked shut and looked back at the book again. Anywhere else, at any other time, he was her kind of pretty, but now, knowing he was about to interfere with her life, she couldn't really stand the sight of him. She turned the page to glance at the resume one last time. Tonbridge, Emmanuel College, Cambridge (before her time), New York after that (how had they not met?), a brief bit in London doing risk management at a competitor before returning to Wall Street and proving his mettle as a fixer and reorganizer. Boards trust him, the briefing told her. They didn't trust me, she thought, and she felt that bile, that hatred rise once again.

Yet as the elevator descended and she walked out to her ride, she knew Jemma was right, not just about the pretty part, but also that she was about to deal with someone who could… could… make everything right, and it might be in her own best interest, and more importantly, the interest of the firm, to get along with him.

For now.

He heard the engine over his own before he saw it, the distinctive, powerful purr approaching him from behind, the slight rev of the engine drowning out the sound of his BMW motorcycle. He could see it in his rearview, a vintage Shelby Cobra, one of the fastest cars ever built, and grinned as he saw a woman behind the wheel. She might have a fast car, he thought, but he had one of the fastest motorcycles ever made between his knees, and as the light changed, he let himself peel out with perfectly controlled speed, staying just enough in front of the Shelby that she couldn't pass him.

Honestly, she thought as the light changed and the bike shot out in front of her, men and their little rockets. She eased the Shelby into gear, and let it go, allowing it to get dangerously close to his rear wheel, just enough to scare him, leaving herself just enough room to swing sideways to avoid him.

She knew what she was handling, he thought. That engine wasn't screaming at all, the power restrained as she kept up with him, through narrow streets. He didn't want to lose her in the traffic, and did not, as was his wont, weave through any stopped cars. He was damned if he was going to miss a moment of this pretend race, kept at a decent interval above the speed limit, and he wondered if he could manage to get her phone number at a stoplight.

Oh, he was a gentleman, wasn't he? She loved that he was keeping to the street and not dodging off with his motorcycle as he could. Sadly, she was coming to her stop, and she downshifted to take a turn, about to wave to him when he took the turn as well. Odd, she thought. There's only one place he could be...

She turned where he did, the Shelby whipping the curve so tightly it was as if the car actually bent in the middle. Their pace slowed to a sedate one, the road narrow and ending in a large security gate, the entrance for the underground parking for Crawley Martin Thorpe, and that's where… oh, damn it… where she was headed.

She didn't know anyone in the firm who owned a BMW motorcycle, at least not at the levels that mattered and would have access to this private entrance, and her heart began to pound at the possibility that her morning fun had been at the.. "Great," she whispered.

For the rider of that BMW was taking off his helmet and shaking out thick, wavy, hair, and turning to look at her with those ungodly blue eyes as she lifted her sunglasses and pulled off the scarf that kept her hair in place.

"Nice ride," Matthew Crawley said. "May I park next to you?"

TBC