Take Down (The Men of the Sisterhood)

by Fern Michaels

  “The siblings only speak when it is absolutely necessary. There are two armed camps within the company, each with its own spies. And even Philip, though a noncombatant, has his spies to keep tabs on the other two. They’re all mentally ill,” Dennis said, disgust ringing in his voice.

  “Are you saying she is the one who actually makes payments but only on Otto’s say-so? That he has to approve all expenditures other than for routine things?” Harry asked.

  “Yep. And Gellis hates it. She’s under his thumb. And it isn’t just that he has control that she hates. She also hates Otto himself, Jamie said. I’m not sure what her feelings are for Philip. Jamie did say she referred to Philip as Mr. Switzerland and even called him Swiss behind his back. Meaning, of course, that Switzerland is neutral, and so is Philip. Nonetheless, as I said, he has his spies, too, so he has to know what the other two are doing. It’s just that he doesn’t make waves, stays out of the limelight.”

  The front door buzzed. Everyone looked up until Maggie said, “It’s Ding with our food. Be right back.” She was as good as her word, returning carrying two shopping bags.

  “Harry, you might want to think again about leaving. It’s really snowing out there, and the wind is starting to gust something terrible. Call Yoko to see if you absolutely have to leave. You came on your motorcycle, and that’s not good,” Maggie said.

  “You can take my car, Harry, if you have to leave,” Jack said.

  Harry held out his hand for Jack’s keys. And that was the end of that.

  Chapter 5

  “You guys finish up here and I’ll set us out a picnic in the lobby. Coffee, beer, or soft drinks?” Maggie mentally cataloged the order and left with the food. Fifteen minutes later, she had a picnic set up on the floor, using a blanket throw for a tablecloth. Colorful cushions served as chairs as they sat Indian fashion.

  Dennis opened the plantation shutters so they could see the snow falling on the city. “This is just great,” he babbled. “We were all together on Christmas, and yesterday we were all together to make a miracle for Nikki, and today we’re together again with a plan to take down one of the most lucrative privately owned companies in the country. Someone for sure is watching over us,” he said, excitement ringing in his voice.

  As the group munched and chewed their way through their winter picnic, they talked about mundane things just to lighten the mood as they watched the icy snow that peppered the windows in the front of the building.

  “Charles would really pitch a fit if he heard us talking business while we’re eating,” Ted said.

  “We are not discussing Charles, today or any other day,” Jack said, his face dark with anger at the mere mention of Charles Martin’s name.

  “So, Dennis, are you still going to the Galleria to pick up the suits?” Maggie asked.

  Dennis laughed. “I went on their website and ordered them. They will be ready for pickup tomorrow at eleven o’clock. Then it’s just the haircuts, and we’ll be good to go.”

  “When Dennis told me where he was going for his haircut, I nixed that and made an appointment with my hairdresser for all three of you guys to get your hair done. Michael’s Salon on Fern Terrace. He gave me a hard time when I explained what I wanted. Michael is a stylist and doesn’t like high and tight haircuts, but he’s going to do it as a favor to me. Your appointment is at noon. Don’t embarrass me; make sure you guys tip well. Then we’re good to go, and not one minute before.”

  “Has anyone given any thought to how we’re even going to get into the Andover Building, much less to these guys’ offices?” Espinosa asked. When Jack and the others had discovered that none of the Andover siblings had left the area for vacation, they’d changed plans to deal with the possibility that they would all be going in to work, and, if they did, they would beard them in their own den, so to speak, hence the concern about getting into the Andover Building.

  Jack burst out laughing. “Since when does the FBI need an appointment for anyone? That shield is all you need to gain entrance anywhere in this country. Speaking of FBI, Bert and Sparrow were supposed to call in. Guess Annie and Myra are keeping them busy. Anyone think we should call them, or are we good?”

  “I think we’re good,” Maggie said. “Am I the one who stands by the desk in the lobby when you guys enter so whoever is behind said desk doesn’t alert our . . . prey?”

  “A gold star to you, Miss Spritzer.” Ted grinned. “We’re looking for total surprise.”

  Maggie waved her arms. “I did all this so you guys can clean up.” She looked over at Cyrus, who was sitting and waiting patiently for his dinner. Maggie had carefully picked all the meat off the side of the roast chicken that Jack had ordered especially for him. She added some vegetables and some roasted potatoes and set the plate down in front of the big dog. He looked up at Maggie, then at Jack, before he moved closer to the plate.

  “He’s not used to anyone else feeding him, which is a good thing. It’s all yours, Cyrus, go for it,” Jack said. Cyrus followed instructions and was finished within seconds. He nosed the hard plastic plate toward Maggie, not for a refill but to tidy up. Jack had taught him well.

  “You got anything for us, Abner? You said you only needed an hour, so what do you have?” Jack asked.

  “I’m pretty sure I have everything we need. At least on the financial end. I just have one more thing to do, and it will only take twenty or so minutes. I’ll meet you in the conference room. Do you want printouts for everyone, or will a show-and-tell on my part work, for now at least? If you want copies, then I’m going to need forty minutes.”

  “Copies would be nice. So we’re all on the same page,” Jack said.

  Maggie got up and closed the plantation shutters. “It’s really going to town out there. Can’t see anyone on the street. It’s getting dark, too.”

  “I’m going to walk Cyrus, but we’ll stay in the alley. We won’t be long because he hates getting his feet wet. How’s about someone making coffee?”

  Dennis volunteered to make the coffee. Maggie sauntered off to the ladies’ room, while Ted and Espinosa finished cleaning up the picnic and bundling all the trash. They both looked around. Neat as a pin, no sign that a picnic had even taken place.

  The snow that seemed to be coming sideways beat at Jack as he watched Cyrus meandering up and down the alley, looking for just the right spot. The snow was drifting, and the wheels of Harry’s Ducati were almost covered. Knowing how Harry loved and babied his cycle, Jack decided to wheel it into the BOLO Building. He whistled for Cyrus to get a move on, then had him put all his weight against the door to hold it open so he could wheel the cycle into the back of the building. Satisfied that the cycle was now safe, Jack held the door while Cyrus beelined for the kitchen, where he lay down and rolled over and over on the carpet by the sink to get the snow off his back. Jack spread a ton of paper towels around the cycle to catch all the drips, then took more and dried it off. He hoped Harry appreciated all the trouble he was going to for him.

  Jack smelled the coffee and grinned at Maggie, who had taken over coffee-making duties from Dennis. Maggie did make good coffee. “Need any help?”

  “Got it covered. This is going to work, isn’t it, Jack?”

  Jack hated it when Maggie looked and acted worried, because she was always so optimistic.

  “I am ninety-nine percent sure. Nothing is a given in this life; you know that, Maggie. Are you worried about something in particular or just worried?”

  Maggie looked up at Jack, who towered over her. “Well, maybe one little itsy-bitsy thing is troubling me.”

  “And what might that be, oh my intrepid reporter turned . . . what is it you are at the paper these days?”

  “It doesn’t matter what I am. Where are we going to get FBI credentials?”

  “They are on the way as we speak, courtesy of one Jack Sparrow and one Bert Navarro. It seems in Vegas you can get anything for the right price. And Sparrow got us genuine, authentic, as-real-as-they-come creds
. Clips and all. They are supposed to be here in the morning, but with the storm, I don’t know. We don’t move without them, that’s a given. If Sparrow says they’re golden, then they’re golden.”

  Maggie pretended to wipe sweat off her brow. “Whew. I was concerned, Jack. I won’t deny it.”

  “I think that what you’re trying to say without saying the actual words is that you are comparing our little group to the sisters, and we’re coming up short. How am I doing so far?”

  “Well . . .”

  Jack laughed. “Don’t worry till we get to the finish line. If we don’t cross it, that’s when you can worry. It’s not how we get there that matters, it’s that we get across it. Feel better now?”

  “Not really,” Maggie said, chewing on her thumbnail. Jack threw a wadded-up dish towel at her. She caught it and tossed it right back. “You carry the sugar and creamer, and I’ll take the pot. And just for that, you can come back for the cups and spoons.”

  “Okay.” Jack looked over at the clock on the range. Abner’s forty minutes were almost up.

  Jack timed his second trip just right. Abner, his arms full of papers, held the door with his back so Jack could enter.

  “We are in business, lads and one lassie, as Charles used to say,” Abner said, dropping the stack of papers on the long, polished conference table.

  Chapter 6

  Abner knew that he was the center of attention as he separated the papers he’d carried into the conference room into individual packets and handed them across the table. “I can give you the highlights, and then we can go through the pages one by one so you can see everything I found and all be on the same page. Please hold your questions until I have finished. Everyone okay with that?” They all said they were okay with his proposals.

  “So, Andover Pharmaceuticals is way more than solvent. As a matter of fact, it is bigger and in better financial shape than virtually any privately owned company in America, other than Koch Enterprises. To be sure, their valuation did take a hit in the aftermath of the Anmir drug lawsuits, but they have recovered quite nicely, even if going public is no longer feasible. And that is in part because they were able to keep a lid on things by settling with the parents of the children who passed away. They also dealt very aggressively with anyone who didn’t want to settle. While what you are now holding in your hot little hands was printing out, I skimmed through the faxes that came through from Dennis’s source, Mr. Jamie Farrell, former employee in the office of Andover Pharmaceuticals’ CFO.

  “By no stretch of the imagination are the Andovers nice people. That is the bottom line. Fear and intimidation are what they live and work by. Nothing we could do to them would equal in cruelty what they have done to those who got caught up with that horrendous drug, both in terms of what happened to the kids and what happened to those who tried to expose Andover for what it has become, essentially a big-time criminal enterprise.

  “They brought out their big guns, the best and slimiest lawyers in the country, to fight the class-action suit. For every negative that came out, they fought it with an over-the-top positive. When the class-action hit, it didn’t get much play because Andover donated millions of dollars’ worth of drugs to Doctors Without Borders, and it was their generosity that the cable news channels and the papers played up. Andover employs a kick-ass PR team, one that is way ahead of the curve. It’s like they can anticipate bad news before it happens, and they squelch it. I tried calling their number-one guy, but he never returned any of my phone calls. That’s about all I have. Other than the fact that I hacked into the head of the PR team’s e-mail account. It boggles my mind how stupid some people are. Especially this PR guy, whose name is Duke Winslow, by the way, and is the one calling the shots. I made copies of all the pertinent e-mails. The guy is slick, and he commands big bucks.”

  “Did he do anything illegal?” Jack asked.

  “It’s all a matter of interpretation. Yes and no, more no than yes. But that’s just my opinion. You’re the lawyer, Jack, so that’s your call.”

  “What else do you have?” Espinosa asked.

  “I,” Abner said dramatically, as though waiting for a drumroll, “have every single bank and brokerage account of the company, plus the personal banking and brokerage information for all three Andover siblings, and if I do say so myself, they are loaded. Between the company and the three of them as individuals, they could fund several third-world countries into the next millennium at least.”

  “Well, damn,” Maggie said. “And to think they’re fighting Nikki right here on the home front. I say we take every red cent they’ve got! Since their kids seem like nice people, I hope they’ve set something up for them and funded it already, because after we are finished, there is going to be nothing to leave them.” The others agreed.

  Jack looked at Abner. “Can you make that happen, Abner?”

  Abner laughed. And laughed some more, as he flexed his fingers. “Oh, yeah,” he drawled. “All I need is someone to sign the checks and we are good to go. So, my question to you, Jack, is can you get me that signature?”

  Maggie’s eyes narrowed, and she answered for Jack before he could make his tongue start to work. “You know it!” Jack’s features split into a wide grin as his head bobbed up and down.

  A beeping sound came from where Dennis was sitting, then the same sound came from Ted’s position, followed by the identical sound from Espinosa’s area.

  “We all have the same alert on our phone for anything pertaining to Andover,” Maggie said as she looked down at her phone. “It’s kind of like TMZ or Radar Online, the gossip sites on the Net. Okay here is what it says: ‘Mr. Otto Andover, CEO of Andover Pharmaceuticals, will be hosting a New Year’s Eve party aboard his yacht, after which he will be leaving for a month in California. He will be taking the yacht and captaining it himself.’” Maggie looked around at the others. “Where are we going to nail these three? If he’s getting set to have a New Year’s party on his yacht and take off for California, I’m thinking that he, and probably the others, just might not be going into the office this week. I’m also thinking time is of the essence here. How are we going to play this? By the way, there was no mention of Philip or Martha attending the party, which is likely to further complicate things.”

  “We need to find out if the three of them are at work this week. I can call to ask,” Dennis said.

  “Do that, kid,” Ted said, but Dennis was already clicking away on his phone. They all listened in awe as Dennis rattled off a spiel about the Chamber of Commerce’s wanting to do something special for Otto, Philip, and Martha to show their appreciation for all Andover did for the community. Three minutes later, Dennis was sporting an ear-to-ear grin as he shut down his phone. “I am happy to report that all three Andovers are spending the week at their respective homes, and Otto’s secretary said she could schedule something the first week of February. You heard me say I would get back to her.”

  “That means we hit them at home, then,” Jack said. “Here’s the thing, though: I wanted a paper check for Nikki. What are the chances of Martha or Otto or Philip having a checkbook at home? Zip, I would think. With the other stuff, Abner can just do the wire transfers.”

  “Well, as long as we’re pretending to be the FBI, why don’t we just march into the Andover Building, which is probably being manned by a skeleton crew this week, go to Martha’s office, and help ourselves. Isn’t that what the FBI would do?” Dennis said.

  “In a perfect world, yeah, that’s what they would do. With warrants. And then everyone will get a good look at us. Remember, we are still going to be here after the three of them are gone. We need a plan. I’m thinking you need to call that guy Jamie Farrell to see if he can help us. In the meantime, I’m going to call Bert and Sparrow and walk Cyrus, who I think ate too many of our leftovers. You guys kick this around and see what you come up with,” Jack said.

  Jack hunkered down into his heavy jacket as the snow swirled about him. He shivered as he pressed th
e speed-dial button that would connect him with Bert, who would arrange to have Sparrow listen in with another click of a button. He rattled off the reason for the call as he watched Cyrus travel the length of the alleyway to find his favorite spot to do what he had to do. Today, for some reason, it was taking the big shepherd longer than usual, probably thanks to all the table food everyone sneaked to him. Minutes later, he said, “Do you think we can pull this off, Sparrow?”

  Sparrow laughed. “When you say the magic words, it’s like open sesame.”

  “And those words would be?” Jack said, his teeth chattering. Damn, it was cold.

  “The magic words are, ‘We can arrest you and hold you for seventy-two hours without a lawyer, and we’ve been known to lose paperwork on more than one occasion. ’ That’s if anyone gives you any trouble or wants to look at you too closely. Use a light disguise, but nothing obvious. Different people tend to remember different things, which causes doubt on a positive ID. Keep it cool and professional and no one will give you any trouble. People in a situation like you describe have a tendency to look everywhere but at the agents. I’ll take care of things on January 1, when I take over my new office, in case there’s any kind of blowback. Like I said, the fibbies are notorious for losing paperwork.”

  Bert chimed in and laughingly agreed with everything Sparrow had said.

  Jack saw Cyrus bounding toward him at a good clip. He quickly opened the door and repeated the same process he’d gone through earlier, when he’d taken the shepherd outdoors. His teeth still chattering, Jack ended the call just as Sparrow was saying he’d hit town tomorrow evening and give Jack a call.

  The connection was terminated. Jack jumped around a few minutes, windmilling his arms to try to get warm as Cyrus rolled over and over on the kitchen carpet, which was still damp from his previous expedition into the wilds of a D.C. blizzard. Jack let loose with one final violent shudder and marched back to the conference room, where the others were waiting, with the exception of Abner, who had retreated to his lair.