In It For the Money

by Cathy Perkins

  “It’s just like with Shaw.” Her fingers tightened into fists. “If Tate gets...killed, he can’t explain or defend himself.”

  “He’s not going to die.”

  Don’t even think that.

  “He has to be okay.” Tears threatened and she blinked them back. When she thought her voice would be steady, she said, “Otherwise, whoever is really doing it—the sabotage, the messed up parts.” Her voice cracked. “They can blame everything on Tate.”

  “If you’re right, that this was aimed at Tate because of the sabotaged part...”

  The tears overflowed.

  “Hey...” JC pulled her closer and stroked her hair and back.

  Finally, the tears stopped. She fished a tissue from her purse.

  Clutching the crumpled tissue in her fist, she turned to face him. “If somebody kills Tate, their problem goes away. All they have to do is plant some bogus evidence and say, ‘He did it.’”

  “I have to tell you. Right now, it looks bad for him.”

  “But Tate didn’t do anything.” She slammed her clenched fists against her thighs.

  JC sighed. “You wanted me to tell you what I could. I just know there are officers looking at him, and the scuttlebutt isn’t good for Tate.”

  “There’s zero proof he was involved in anything illegal or unethical. And there’s that picture of the guy at the hospital. And—”

  She couldn’t mention the fake cars parts or the vendor account or—

  JC squeezed her hand. “I’m not saying whoever’s behind this is smart. And I’m not saying Tate’s actually involved.”

  Regardless of what JC could do—legally—at least he’d sorta said he believed her.

  “Yeah, but.” She grimaced. “I know the next words out of your mouth are going to be ‘stay out of it,’ but it’s personal now. They came after my cousin. They’re trying to set him up as their fall guy.”

  If only she’d gotten a chance to ask Tate about that damned vendor account and who Adrian Mazur was. No way was she going to tell JC about either until she could prove Tate wasn’t the villain in that disaster.

  “Your personal relationship is exactly why you should stay out of it. You can’t be objective.”

  “Let me do my job.” She tapped her chest. “I’ll bet you anything this is about money. I know more about finances and forensic accounting than anyone in your department.”

  “If you want to play it that way, then answer this. How deep is Cascade Precision in the hole with this product?”

  Her eyebrows clashed together. “You know I can’t tell you about George’s finances.”

  “Is he in enough financial trouble he might do something unethical?”

  Would he? Hadn’t she wondered the same thing? “From what I know about him,” she answered slowly. “He wouldn’t be involved in...something like that.”

  The more she thought about JC’s question though, the angrier she got. “And I cannot believe you asked me that. That you think Desert Accounting would, damn, that you think I would keep an unethical client. Are you questioning my ethics?”

  JC pressed, “What if you didn’t know a client was doing something wrong?”

  She narrowed her eyes. “What do you think you know about my client?”

  “These bad car parts—both the defective ones and the sabotaged ones—are coming from somewhere. Who else but an insider could provide the designs or make the parts?”

  She winced. Hadn’t she asked Rick exactly the same question?

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  My Little Problem (The Replacements)

  Early Monday morning, Holly hunched over her office desk and probed through George’s accounting records. Where was the employee section? George had given her access codes that should get her into those protected files. She scanned the account headings in the general ledger, moved the mouse and tapped possibilities.

  Each dead end made her more aware of passing time.

  Time was not her friend this morning.

  Laughter, footsteps and closing doors meant the staff were beginning to arrive. For a nano-second, she considered asking Sammy for help with the computer. Shaking her head, she chased down another rabbit hole. No way would she drag any of her staff into this mess.

  She frowned at the screen. What was she doing besides wasting time?

  Damn.

  Why couldn’t George’s accounting system be a data room like her due diligences used? She could always find the pieces she needed there.

  Finally, she burrowed into the sub-ledger containing the employee records. She typed Adrian Mazur into the search bar and tapped “enter.”

  The wheel turned, scanning through more records than she’d expected.

  Come on. She held her breath. Give me someone.

  The search came up empty.

  Damn.

  Mazur Adrian.

  Nothing.

  She tried just the last name.

  Nothing except a fifty-two year old woman.

  With a resigned sigh, Holly admitted the second person in the vendor file probably wasn’t one of George’s employees.

  Was the guy yet another setup? Another person pasted in place to serve as a front for the real villain?

  It seemed unlikely. If he actually received money through this vendor link, he needed a connection to the account. Tate was the wallpaper, the deflector name entered as the contact person.

  She drummed her fingers on her desk. The guy had to be planning to get money for something. Otherwise, why set up the file in the inventory records?

  Maybe he was that stupid?

  Or maybe he worked for Mikhail at Quality Distributing...

  She leaned back in her chair, considering that possibility. If the vendor file was created by accessing the records at the Quality Distributing warehouse, could Mazur have thought he was setting up a file inside Mikhail’s system? Who could she ask whether vendors could be added on the fly? Some software programs allowed it.

  Her mother might know, but how to ask without having to explain why she needed to find out?

  How much duplication was there between George and Mikhail’s records inside the warehouse computer system? With the recent increase in production, the suspension inventory was stored at Quality Distributing’s warehouse for ease in distributing the stock to various vendors. But Cascade Precision’s inventory records for the suspension were also available inside the warehouse. She narrowed her eyes. George had sent her separate codes in order to access his inventory records, so maybe there was a parallel system for the warehouse staff to use to input inventory for both George’s and Mikhail’s activity on the part.

  Was it a reasonable assumption?

  How could she get into Mikhail’s records and find out?

  Without telling him about the fake vendor, why would he tell her anything?

  So far, she was in agreement with George not to mention the file or the pallet of suspect parts to Mikhail or his staff. While there was nothing specific she could point to about what was wrong with the parts or where they came from—no objective facts, she thought with an eyeroll—she didn’t fully trust the man.

  Whoever Adrian Mazur was, if he didn’t work for Cascade Precision, it simply made sense he had a connection to Quality Distributing.

  Identifying Mazur was another item Mikhail could answer—if she could think of a decent, but innocent sounding reason to ask him.

  Of course, if he was involved, her question would raise a red flag.

  Or ten.

  Her computer chimed a fifteen-minute meeting warning. Frowning, she closed out of George’s records and picked up the file for her meeting. The client would arrive soon and she needed to have their details at the top of her mind, not George and Tate’s problems.

  The phone rang, an outside call. It could be a client. Or a reporter. Or Ashiro.

  She let the call roll to Tracey.

  Her cell phone chimed. She glanced at the screen. Laurie.

  Afte
r hesitating only a second, Holly tapped to accept.

  “Are you okay?” Laurie asked. “I saw the article about Tate getting hurt. I checked on him just now—”

  Holly had deliberately avoided looking at the newspaper that morning. “I’m fine. Had Tate woken up when you checked?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Listen, I gotta—”

  “I know you’re busy. What can Rick and I do? We can distract you—”

  “You can’t date Rick.”

  Laurie laughed. “Sure I can. You’re not my mom.”

  “I’m his boss.”

  “Come on. Call JC. You need to get out and get away from everything. The guys can drink beer and we can talk.”

  “I wish I could. Maybe I can catch you later at the hospital when I check on Tate.”

  “Text me when you’re headed over. Oh, in case I miss you, I called Gwen and told her we wouldn’t be at book club this month.”

  “I can’t believe it’s already been a month,” Holly said. “How long do you have to use the walking cast?” Laurie had injured her ankle at the last book club meeting.

  While Laurie chattered about a boot and physical therapy, Holly poked for why her stomach was rolling like the Columbia River during the spring melt-off tumult. Whitecaps and churning.

  What had that breakfast sandwich had in it? She eyed the box in the trashcan. Peanuts sometimes made her nauseous, but surely there weren’t nuts in a breakfast burrito.

  “I have to go,” she interrupted. Still clutching the phone, she sprinted for the restroom.

  Her mother pushed open the door as she flushed the commode. “Holly? Sweetie, are you okay?”

  Holly rinsed her hands, flushed her mouth and wondered if she still had a toothbrush in her desk drawer. “Super.”

  “I know you’re under a lot of stress, and this thing with Tate—I don’t understand any of it.” Donna placed papers on top of the dispenser, pulled several towels and handed them to Holly. “I wish you’d called me yesterday. I could’ve come up to the hospital and stayed with you.”

  “JC was there.”

  To question me.

  That wasn’t fair. JC had stayed until the doctor came out and told them that Tate was in a coma. Then basically he’d told them to go home.

  “Good. I’m glad you weren’t alone.”

  Holly dried her hands. She risked a glance in the mirror and grimaced at the pale-faced reflection. “Who’s keeping you from being alone?”

  Donna drew in a sharp breath, then slowly released it. “I’m at a different stage of my life, Holly. I have friends, and right now I have you. If your father showed up on the doorstep tomorrow, I wouldn’t take him back.”

  Holly’s gaze jumped to her mother. “Really?”

  “Really.” Color flooded Donna’s cheeks.

  Holly tried to wrap her mind around yet another revelation from left field. Her mother had no interest in reconciling with her father?

  Then again, why was she surprised by her mother’s reaction? Look how hurt—okay devastated—she’d been over JC and Meredith. And she and JC weren’t even married when Meredith entered the picture. If he really had walked out on her, would she have ever agreed to start up with him again?

  Donna’s hands closed into fists. She took a deep breath and straightened her spine. She plucked the papers off the towel dispenser. “Part of the reason I was looking for you is your father rejected our initial proposal on buying his half of the practice. He’s demanding the full cash value up front instead of an installment agreement.”

  “Full value?” Holly sputtered. “That’s not how a practice is sold and he knows it.” She propped a hip against the counter. “He also has to know we can’t raise that much cash. If we have to sell...”

  What would she do then? Was this the universe offering an easy out of her current impasse? A built-in reason to go back to Seattle? Return to Falcon and the mergers and acquisitions team in a power position?

  Donna stormed across the restroom. “It is not fair to put us in this position.” She paced back and forth. “What do you want to do?”

  “I don’t know.” Holly’s father rejecting the offer had always been theoretically possible, but she couldn’t believe it was slapping her in the face. “Isn’t there usually a drawn out process to a divorce settlement?”

  “We’ve had a number of conferences.” Donna lifted the papers clenched in her fist. “This is a court date notification. It involves you this time.”

  “Why?” And why are you just now telling me about this?

  “Preliminary valuation issues. You’ve grown the business. Expanded what we do. He abandoned the business. Us. It’ll get messy.” Donna hesitated, then rushed ahead. “We might have to sell.”

  “You know I’m talking to a valuation expert. I’m working on arranging financing. Figuring out how to make the buyout possible. Why didn’t you tell me about this sooner?”

  A guilty expression wrinkled Donna’s face. “I wanted to handle it. You’ve given up so much. Your career, your friends.”

  “That job’s still there in Seattle. And I still have friends. Don’t feel bad about me.” Holly gritted out the words.

  Outrage grew behind the dutiful daughter façade. She’d felt responsible when her parents had a crisis. She’d stepped up. She’d done what needed to be done. And now, completely focused on their own agendas, they were totally screwing her over.

  Without talking to her about it, her parents were considering a sale to meet her father’s ridiculous demands? What did that mean for her future?

  “You know, Mom.” Mom. Not friggin’ Donna. “I need time to think about this. As usual, you two have made a mess and left it on my doorstep to figure out how to clean it up. So, if you and Dad plan to cut me off at the knees, I need some time to process that. To decide what I want and need.”

  Surprise replaced some of the anger in her mother’s eyes. “We don’t want to hurt you.”

  “Really?” Holly’s filter was gone. “I don’t hear anything in this discussion that even remotely considers my position.”

  “But you have JC.” Her mother spread her hands imploringly. “What about him?”

  “Did you miss the part where you are being completely screwed over by a man? Why would you expect me to change all my plans—plans I altered to accommodate you, by the way—for a man who hasn’t indicated he’s willing to accept me or my goals? What I want out of life.”

  “You’re overreacting. We can—”

  “Did you expect me to meekly say, ‘Oh, of course. Sell to the first person who comes along.’ I’ve worked myself half to death for what, seven, no eight goddamn months to fix things for you two. You’ve pushed me and pushed me to stay and take over the lead role here. You asked me to buy out the practice. And now you’re jerking that rug out from under me? What the hell do you want from me?”

  Donna’s mouth opened and closed in stunned silence. “I… I had no idea you felt that way.”

  That makes two of us.

  Warmth flooded Holly’s cheeks. She felt like a total bitch.

  Donna pulled in a deep breath. “I’ll talk to my—our—attorney. If you’re going to be my business partner, I’ll make sure to keep you involved in any future discussions. If you still want to buy out your father, take over the practice, I’ll fight him every step of the way. If you want out, I’ll sell and give him whatever we agree is fair. But it kills me to see you driving yourself so hard that you’re making yourself ill.”

  She stared at her mother, speechless.

  “It’s your decision. Think about it—in all your spare time. We can talk about this later.”

  She shook her head. “Sorry about going off on you. I’m not sure what to say other than, wow, you surprised me.”

  The door opened behind Donna. One of the staff poked her head into the room. “Tracey’s looking for you, Holly. Your client’s here.”

  Great. How much of that conversation did the whole office hear?<
br />
  “Okay. Thanks. I’ll be right there.” Holly tossed the crumpled towels in the trash.

  “Oh, and Holly?” Her mother touched her arm. “Put on a little lipstick before you meet those clients.”

  Sure. Because lipstick solves everything.

  Forty minutes later, the clients left the office with an understanding of their financial position for the year and promises to send copies of their deferred compensation programs. Somehow, Holly would have to find time to review the documents for compliance with the new tax rules.

  Rick caught her as she reentered her office. “You getting anywhere on the vendor account?”

  She shrugged. “I’ve got a name. Why?”

  “I spent some time yesterday chasing materials.”

  “Oh?” She sat behind her desk and Rick dropped into the visitor chair.

  “Basically, I compared records. X subassemblies went to Mexico along with the material to complete the whole suspension. We got Y components back—about ten percent fewer. Mexico claims scrap for the difference in the subassemblies received from the subcontractor, but makes no claim on the valving system that Cascade Precision produces.”

  “Where are the extra valving systems?”

  “According to Cascade, those extra systems are in Mexico—accounted for by the assembler.”

  “Okay. Playing devils’ advocate.” She propped her chin on her hand. “It could be the subassemblies are lousy and got rejected.”

  “That’s possible.” Rick leaned back and draped an ankle over his knee. “We can’t exactly go to Mexico this week and check. But where’s the evidence of parts being scrapped?”

  “Good point.”

  She leaned back, swiveled the chair and stared out the window while she thought.

  “Keeping it simple,” she mused, “George sends ten valve systems and ten subassemblies to Mexico, but only gets nine complete suspensions back. So where’s the missing material?” She tapped the chair arms, then pivoted toward Rick. “What if, instead of scrapping the subassemblies, someone is using them to make those lighter, transposed-SKU parts we found at the warehouse? Could they have been made in Mexico instead of being tampered with here? That would explain why the weights were consistent in transport.”