There is a noticeable hush in the office buzz when Judith Ryland strides through the glass doors of Ryland Transportation. She wears white from head to toe, even her short, glossy hair is a brighter, whiter shade of blonde today. Diamond studs sparkle on her ears and the stones are so big, people who don't know better would surely think they're fake. Everyone here knows better, everyone but the poor new girl at the secretary's desk.
Judith marches down the aisle toward Harris' corner office without so much as a nod to anyone she passes.
"Haaarrisss!" she calls out while removing her white leather gloves.
The new girl jumps in her seat.
"Uh oh," whispers a girl at the dispatch desk. "The tigress is baring her claws."
Judith tosses the gloves on the secretary's desk and is about to open Harris' door when the girl says, "I'm sorry ma'am but you cannot go in there right now. Mr. Ryland is not to be disturbed."
The secretary snaps her head toward gasps coming from the rest of the office staff. Judith stops in her tracks and turns to face the secretary who taps a pencil casually on her desk blotter, totally unaware of the career suicide she is committing.
A wry smile slowly spreads over Judith's thin coral lips.
"What's your name, miss?" Judith asks.
"Lydia," the girl says with a bright smile.
"Well Lydia, do you know my name?"
"Uh - "
"No. No you couldn't possibly know my name and have made that grievous mistake," Judith interrupts.
"Ma'am?" the secretary says, amused, "what mistake might that be?"
Judith snatches the pencil out of her hands and snaps it in half, letting the two pieces fall down on the metal desk with a ping.
"I beg your pardon!" the girl says.
"Yes, oh yes you should beg it," Judith says, her eyes dark holes of bottomless rage. "I am Judith Ryland," she says and the girl's eyes grow big.
Judith continues, clearly enjoying the moment, "And I own things," she says, stifling a giggle. "I own that pencil, this desk, the chair your large body sits on, this building, all those trucks out in the lot and the man behind this door who, what did you say….cannot be disturbed?"
The girl's chin starts trembling and Judith sighs in disgust.
"Pack your things. You're miscast here," she says to her.
"But this is my first day," the girl says, holding back tears.
"And your last," Judith says with a wide smile as she opens Harris' door and disappears behind it.
"I fired your secretary," she says to Harris who sits behind his glass desk with his back to her. He gazes out the floor-to-ceiling windows at the big parking lot of Ryland trucks far below.
"Turn around, Harris. You're being rude."
"Harris cracks his neck from side to side before slowly turning his chair around.
"Mother," he says with a tight smile. "What a surprise. What brings you by this morning?"
"Who did you anger, Harris?"
"What?"
"You heard me," Judith says and lobs her white Chanel patent leather clutch onto the middle of his desk. His papers flutter to the floor.
"Who's angry enough with you to tax my fleet with $133,000 worth of fines in just two days?" Judith says.
Harris inhales deeply. "Trucks get fined, mother. It's the price we pay for moving product quickly. We overload, remember? And sometimes we get caught. Dial down your paranoia."
Judith stares at Harris until he looks away. She slowly walks around his desk, running her long French manicured nails along the glass edge. Little scraping sounds make Harris want to cringe but he does not. Judith sits on his lap, turns his face to her and slaps it hard. Harris grabs the arm rests of his chair so tightly his knuckles turn white.
"Don't lie to me, Harris," she says still sitting on his lap.
A red welt starts forming on his left cheek. Judith pouts her lips, kisses her finger and pats the welt softly.
"Oh why did you make me do that, darling?" she says.
Harris sits unmoving and silent.
"Now tell me who it is so I can take care of it. You're in over your head, aren't you?" Judith says.
Little beads of sweat are appearing on Harris' forehead. He wants to stand up so fast that Judith is launched clear across the room.
Harris looks straight into his mother's eyes. "I'm taking care of it, mother. I don't need your help," he says and pats her knees sheathed in sheer silk stockings. Judith crosses her legs, bringing one knee into Harris' stomach. She moves it up and down, feeling his torso muscles contract against it. She laughs wildly, startling him, and gets off his lap.
"Oh Harris, you're so adorable when you try to be tough," she says and picks up her purse. "It's just not in you, my little prince. But you have a try at it, if you like, and I'll be here when you fail," she says over her shoulder as she walks out the door.
Harris picks up the nearest model truck and hurls it at the closed door, sending it to the floor in pieces. On the other side, Judith hears the crash and smiles.
Ann cycles through all the radio stations programmed on her car stereo twice without hearing any music to suit the mood. She turns it off and leans her seat back. It's five minutes past 11 in the morning. Harris is never late. She releases some anxiety with a deep breath and a big sigh. What is she doing here? She fingers her wedding band. Saving her home from her husband's misguided kindness, that's what.
She straightens her seat and taps her fingers on the steering wheel. Several trucks are scattered in this rest stop parking lot 30 some miles outside Dallas. A few men walk into the coffee shop and Ann squishes her face up in disgust. She knows these kind of men and what they want when they lay over in town for the night.
Suddenly her chest vibrates with the sound of a strong engine at full throttle. Harris' black Ferrari turns into the lot and slows to a crawl looking for her black Range Rover. Ann thinks how much his car looks like a cobra slithering along the dirt to its prey. He spots her and revs his engine, coasting over and pulling up facing opposite so their driver's sides meet.
He removes his sunglasses and smiles. "You look like you're going to be sick, Annie. What's the matter? Don't have the stomach for bribery?"
Ann tosses her hair. "Don't be silly. It's hot and you've kept me waiting in this parking lot full of fat, disgusting men in overalls."
Harris chuckles. Little Annie, so much feistier than she looks. He changes his train of thought before he becomes aroused.
"Yes, well, I had an unexpected visitor," he says.
"Oh? You don't like surprises. Don't they know that?" Ann says.
"Yes," Harris says, clenching his jaw.
Ann pauses and cocks her head. "Oh. I know," she says, smiling, "I know who it was. The only person you'd allow to keep you from me. Judith! Judith came to see you!" she says, throws her head back and laughs.
Harris' eyes narrow and he glares at her.
"You're in trouble, aren't you Harris? You're mother's noticed the tickets, hasn't she?" Ann claps her hands together. "Let's see, she demanded to know who's behind this, right? Poor Harris, still doesn't play well with others. And Judith wants to fix it but you've told her it's handled, haven't you? Oh you're in a pickle, Harris," Ann says and laughs so hard she snorts gasping for breath.
Harris' pale face becomes mottled with shades of red. The blotches of pigment travel up to his bald head and also down his neck. Furious, he gets out of the car and puts his face right up against Ann's.
"Listen to me you smug bitch. Have you forgotten who you are? Hhmm?" he says as Ann continues giggling.
"You know Harris, I think I've changed my mind. Deal's off," she says and starts her car.
Harris reaches for his cell, quickly scrolls through some screens then holds the phone inches from Ann's face. She stops laughing and her smile fades.
"Yes? Well change it back," he says, "or these photos of you in your previous career end up in Bobby's email. You were trash then and you're trash now. You just have a new coat of paint."
Ann's green eyes blaze at him and she turns her car off. "You're your mother's son, aren't you? Get in."
Now it's Harris smiling as he slides in beside her. She looks straight ahead, trying not to appear defeated. This is when Harris lusts for her most; the moment when she realizes she's outplayed. He licks his lips and runs his hand along the inside of her thigh, gripping the inseam of her jeans with his finger nails. The sensation is oddly pleasing, to both of them.
"Stop it!" Ann finally says, pushing his hand away.
"Oh Annie," he coos. "You haven't been tended to in quite some time from the looks of things. Not like I do it, anyway."
She turns her head away and looks out the window.
"I know every curve, every crevice," he says, pushing his hand deeper between her legs. "Let me loosen it all up for you Annie, right here, right now," Harris whispers and suddenly squeezes her right breast tightly.
Ann gasps and grabs his hand. For a second she pushes it further into her breast, then pries it off and slaps the same cheek his mother did.
"Get your hands off me! You're pathetic, stuck in the past. I've moved on, Harris. And up," Ann says straightening her olive silk blouse.
Harris wants to kiss the smirk off of her face. His eyes settle on her long, slender ivory neck. He wants to wrap his hands around it and squeeze until her eyes roll back into her head.
As if sensing his deviance, Ann scoots further away from him. "Back to business," she says. "I overheard JR on the phone to Bum Sunday night talking about squeezing you with commercial enforcement. He's paying off his contact in cash. I couldn't find any record of payment in his room."
Harris raises an eyebrow at the mention of searching JR's room.
"But I did find something interesting. JR's had season tickets to the Cowboys for years and I found an envelop from the team in his closet but no tickets inside. Only the seating chart showing his assigned box," Ann says and hands Harris a copy of the photo she took with her cell. I'd bet whoever's sitting in JR's box is involved in this deal somehow. Maybe brokered it for him," she says.
Harris looks at the paper, expressionless. He outlines the box on the stadium's seating map with his index finger and then makes circles around it like a bullseye. He folds the paper and puts it in his shirt pocket.
He smiles at Ann and reaches for the door handle when she says, "Harris? What are you going to do to JR?"
He runs his hand down his salt and pepper facial hair and straightens his silver tie atop his black shirt. Then he taps Ann's nose with one finger like you might a child and says, "Exactly what you asked, Annie," then exits her car.
Ann's widened eyes follow Harris around the front of her car and into his Ferrari. "Harris!" she calls out to him through his open window, looks around and whispers, "How will I know when it's done?"
"You'll be summoned to the hospital Friday night. Or the morgue if all goes well," he says and starts the car.
Ann laughs nervously. "So if he's at breakfast Saturday, you failed…..or lost your nerve," she says.
Seeing the look on Harris' face now, she regrets that remark. The cunning and ruthless Harris looks back at her; the quiet storm she was lucky to escape. Harris doesn't say a word but makes a gun out of his index finger and thumb, smiling wryly. He pulls the imaginary trigger at Ann and speeds off leaving her to choke on a dust cloud.
A small distance down the highway Harris screams in rage. A guttural sound explodes in the small interior of his Ferrari and he hits his steering wheel with both hands repeatedly, imagining he is bludgeoning Judith, Ann, Sue Ellen and every other woman who's ever mocked him.
His thoughts turn to the mighty JR Ewing.
"Your days are numbered, you son of a bitch. You should have stayed out of this. You think you own me? You don't," he says just as a little prairie dog scurries across the road in front of him. Harris swerves his car to purposely run over it.
