The Ties That Bind

make."
    Shannon eyed him. "How did you make that one copy? I thought Garth kept track of every piece of paper relating to that bid that came out of Bonnie's typewriter."
    "There are limits to what any man can do in the way of security measures." Wes smiled. "And I had some inside help."
    "Bonnie." Shannon took a deep breath and expelled it slowly.
    "Bonnie thinks she's in love with me. Women in love will do strange things."
    "It's incredible. Everyone around Garth was plotting against him."
    "Including you," Wes snapped.
    Shannon ignored that. "All right, you managed to make one copy of the document. Why didn't you make two or three copies?"
    "Are you kidding? And risk having some investigator find it in my possession?" Wes shook his head at her dumb question. "Even having one copy on me for a few hours made me very nervous. I hadn't realized how tense this sort of thing makes a man. Besides, I didn't get the copy until the last minute. Bonnie was willing but not terribly clever. She finally got it made for me the day of the party. Right around lunchtime."
    Shannon's eyes widened. "Oh, my God."
    "That's right. If it hadn't been for your little diversion that day, Bonnie might not have had a free moment to take the bid down to a copying machine and run it. But when you showed up, Garth seemed to forget all about his normal paranoia. He was concentrating on you so much, he didn't bother to pick up the bid papers and put them in his briefcase before he took you to lunch. He just locked his office door. Bonnie has a key to that. She and I just waited until you left the building and then we went back inside, hoping Sheridan had been careless. Sure enough, all the papers were lying there on the desk, just as we'd left them. She grabbed the bid and ran it off while I kept an eye out for Garth's return. I don't mind telling you, I was getting a little nervous. I had wanted to transfer it that night and time was running out."
    "The night of the party," Shannon began slowly, "how did the bid document get into my tote? Did you mistake it for Bonnie's ?"
    Wes's mouth twisted savagely. "I had the bid inside my jacket when I arrived. I had a hunch Bonnie would draw the line at being the agent I needed. She was too scared. She'd been reluctant to go as far as she had and I wasn't sure how much farther I could push her. So I told her I would take care of the final transfer to Kenyon. After I'd been at the party a while I told Kenyon he could pick up the bid inside the tote bag with the crazy design on the side. Then I wandered down the hall to the bedroom and slipped the thing inside the only tote that was on the bed."
    "But there were two totes," Shannon argued. "Mine and Bonnie's ."
    "Not when I slipped into the bedroom," Wes gritted savagely. "I found out later that Bonnie had taken hers into the powder room for a few minutes. They both looked alike to me when I saw them earlier in the office. Since Bonnie had made a point of leaving hers in the bedroom, I assumed the one that was on the bed was hers. At any rate, I put the bid package in the one tote bag I found and left."
    "Kenyon was supposed to wander in later and retrieve it. But Kenyon made the mistake of making a pass at me en route."
    Wes nodded. "Garth saw him and went into his hands off my woman' routine. After which he apparently sent you into the bedroom to grab your purse because he was dragging you home early."
    "So that's how I wound up with the document in my tote," Shannon muttered.
    "After which, you were smart enough to take advantage of a real windfall, weren't you?" Wes looked thoroughly disgusted. "Hell, I made it easy for you, didn't I? I don't know what your original plan was, but when you found the bid in your tote, you could afford to abandon whatever complicated plan you originally had in mind when you seduced Sheridan. Life had suddenly gotten much simpler. But I'll tell you something, Shannon. You've made a serious mistake by continuing the affair with Sheridan. If you had any sense, you'd have transferred the bid to your client and gotten safely out of Garth's way. When he finds out what you've done, you won't stand a chance. He won't let another woman get away with betraying him. Believe me."
    "Garth knows I didn't steal that bid package."
    Wes cocked one brow. "Just because you played innocent and called the cops last night? I wouldn't count on it. Sheridan's been acting a little strangely for the past few months but no one claims he's come down