Silent Partner

by Stephen Frey

  Tucker reached down and grabbed her arm, pulling her from her seat. “It’ll be nice. It isn’t cold.”

  “But—”

  “Hey, I’m a spontaneous guy,” he said, laughing. “What can I say?”

  She was laughing too as he led her across a yard and toward a waist-high white picket fence. “You’re insane.”

  “You got that right.” He picked her up quickly and put her down on the other side of the fence, then hopped over, grabbed her by the hand and took off, leading her through a garden.

  “We’re going to be arrested.” She laughed as they jogged. “I’m going to end up in jail.”

  “At least you’ll be alive,” he muttered.

  A few minutes later they had made it to Angela’s apartment.

  “Well, good night,” Tucker said, standing on the landing outside her apartment door. They were both still breathing hard from the run.

  “Do you want to come in?”

  He shuffled his feet. “Well, I—”

  “To call a cab, I mean. Or maybe for a glass of water.”

  Tucker started to say something, then thought better of it. “I’d better not. I mean, no, that’s all right.”

  Angela reached out and took his hand. “I felt safe tonight because I knew you were there, John.”

  “I know.”

  “And I’m glad you’re going to be around for a while.”

  “Me, too.”

  Angela squeezed his thick fingers. “Do you really think someone would go after Hunter?”

  “Yes,” he said quietly. “I’ve seen it before when it comes to Mr. Lawrence. You have to bevery careful.”

  She took a deep breath and looked out into the darkness. “Well, thanks for getting me home.” She tried to pull her hand away, but he held on to it for a moment.

  “Angela.”

  “Yes?”

  “There’s something you ought to know about . . . “ His voice trailed off.

  “What is it, John?”

  “I just, well, I just want you to understand that I . . . “ But once again he didn’t finish.

  “Tell me.”

  He shook his head. “I have to go,” he said, turning away.

  “John!”

  “Call when you need me, Angela.”

  And then he disappeared into the night.

  Angela never heard about the explosion that incinerated the Town Car minutes after she and Tucker had left it. Lawrence’s people were able to keep the incident out of the newspapers. A remotely controlled incendiary device affixed to the underside of the Town Car’s chassis had been set off by a button pushed by one of the two men riding in the car that had followed Angela and Tucker from the hotel.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  “You met with him last night?”

  “As I communicated to Mr. Hill, we had dinner together.”

  “Dinner?”

  Angela’s anticipation of an early morning meeting with Dudley and Hill had been warranted. She had arrived at her desk just before 7:30 and Hill’s executive assistant had been waiting. The woman hadn’t even given her a chance to get settled, barely allowing her the opportunity to take off her coat before leading her to the elevators and the fiftieth floor. “Yes, dinner.”

  “Just you and Jake Lawrence.”

  “Several of his associates were there, but we were the only ones eating. The only ones actually in the room.”

  “That seems pretty intimate. It’s surprising that you would agree to something like that after telling us what he did to you in Wyoming.”

  “I was careful,” she answered.

  “Were you now?” Dudley asked. “And did he try anything this time?”

  “No. This time he was a gentleman.”

  Dudley shot Hill a cynical glance. “As if he really tried anything in Wyoming.”

  Angela gritted her teeth. The faster she was out of Dudley’s office the better, but she couldn’t allow that comment to go unaddressed. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  Dudley’s eyes narrowed. “Perhaps you were the one who became physically aggressive with Lawrence in Wyoming. After all, he is one of the wealthiest men in the world. Lots of women probably have Cinderella dreams about him. Perhaps he was the one who rejected you so you made up the whole story to try to save yourself the embarrassment in case he told someone the truth.”

  “That’s ridiculous!”

  “Easy, Ms. Day,” Hill urged soothingly. “We’re all under a lot of pressure. Why don’t we get into what you and Mr. Lawrence discussed last night.”

  Angela stared at Dudley, hoping he might look up so he could see the fire in her eyes. But he didn’t. “We focused on the company he wants to acquire,” she replied, her voice strained. “The target.”

  “What’s the name of it?” Dudley snapped.

  Dudley seemed more on edge than last time they had met, Angela observed, as if he knew the enemy was closing in. “Mr. Lawrence ordered me not to disclose the name of the target to anyone. He wants it kept confidential.”

  “Bullshit!” Dudley barked.

  “Settle down, Bob,” Hill pleaded.

  “Shut up, Carter. Tell me the name of the company, Ms. Day, or so help me . . .”

  Angela saw fury flash cross Carter Hill’s face for the first time, as if he’d almost reached the breaking point, as if he couldn’t take the role of lapdog any longer. “So help you what?” she demanded, her voice steely. Suddenly she was in the driver’s seat. She could feel it. She was Dudley’s only direct connection to a man he believed was stalking him. Like it or not, he needed her.

  “Perhaps you can tell us what industry the target operates in,” Hill suggested when Dudley remained silent. “Would you do that?”

  “Retail. Convenience stores, specifically. Lawrence already owns a chain called Cubbies, and he intends to grow it substantially with this acquisition.” Hopefully that would throw them off the track long enough for her to meet with Walter Fogel. When they found out she had misled them, she’d blame it on Lawrence by telling them she had only found out at the last moment that the true target was Proxmire.

  “Well, there are only a few publicly held convenience store chains,” Dudley commented. “I can probably figure that one out on my own.”

  “I’m sure you can,” she agreed. “Now, if that’s all, I’m going to go back down—”

  “That’s not all, Ms. Day,” Dudley hissed. “You’ll leave when I say you can leave.”

  “All right,” she said evenly, “Mr. Chairman.”

  “What else did you talk about while you dined with Mr. Lawrence?”

  “A number of things.”

  “Did you discuss the fact that he has now increased his stake in Sumter to 10 percent?”

  Dudley was a man on the run, sensing that his pursuer was gaining ground, and his predicament gave Angela immense satisfaction. Deep down she was hoping that Jake really was lying to her, and that his ultimate intention was to take over Sumter, kick Bob Dudley out on his ass, and, at least temporarily, replace him with Carter Hill. “Yes, we did.”

  “And?”

  “And that was all. I was the one who brought up the subject. I told him I had checked the latest 13-d filings and was aware of the fact that he now held 10 percent of the bank.”

  Dudley scoffed. “I assume he continues to maintain his innocence.”

  “Innocence?”

  “I assume he continues to claim that his purchase of Sumter shares is simply a passive investment and that he has no intention of making a run at my bank.”

  “That’s right.”

  Dudley passed a hand through his silver hair. “He’s a slimy son of a bitch.”

  “Mr. Lawrence did ask one interesting question,” she volunteered.

  Both men glanced up quickly.

  “What was that, Angela?” Hill prompted.

  She’d been waiting since the moment she’d walked into the office to deliver this round from the howitzer. Dudley might keel over from
a heart attack when he heard what she was about to say, but she wasn’t going to be the one to give him CPR. “He wanted to know if I thought you would make a good chairman, Mr. Hill.”

  For a moment the room was deathly still, then Dudley exploded. “I’ll kill the bastard! I’ll kill the fucking bastard!”

  Angela glanced out of the Honda Accord’s passenger window at the stately homes and beautifully manicured lawns and gardens of Richmond’s West End. Liv had picked her up in front of the Sumter Tower for lunch, then headed out to the city’s most affluent neighborhood. “Why are you bringing me all the way out here?”

  “It’s an experiment,” Liv answered evasively.

  Angela rolled her eyes. It seemed as if there was always a surprise with Liv. “I can’t be gone from the office too long. I’ve got things to do.”

  “Like what?” Liv wanted to know. “Good God, you work yourself to the bone for that bank. What have the stuffed shirts at the top ever done for you? You can play hooky every once in a while.”

  Liv was right. The only pressing thing on her plate right now was to keep reviewing the package Jake Lawrence had handed her last night before she left his hotel suite. She’d already been through it once. Unable to sleep much last night, she’d spent time going through the information after Tucker had taken her home. Besides, she was having a difficult time keeping her mind on anything but the fact that Kate Charboneau was about to meet with Danny Ford and his lawyer. Jake had led the horses to water, but he might not be able to make them drink. Perhaps a little distraction wasn’t such a bad idea after all.

  “You seem preoccupied.”

  “No, I’m not,” Angela protested.

  Liv grunted. “I’ve known you long enough to recognize the signs. You haven’t said a word all the way out here. And your fingers couldn’t be locked together any tighter,” she said, nodding at Angela’s lap.

  Angela shook her head and smiled. “You think you’re so smart.”

  “You’re nervous about that meeting your lawyer is having this afternoon.”

  She had told Liv about the meeting but hadn’t provided many details. Not how or why it had come about. “If the guy recants his testimony, I might get to see Hunter more than two days a month. It’s a very important meeting. Of course I’m anxious.”

  “It’s important all right, but worrying about it won’t do you any good.” Liv gestured out the window at a particularly large home they were just passing. “Look at that place, Angela. It’s huge.”

  “It’s beautiful,” she agreed.

  “This is how the ‘haves’ live.” The boulevard was two lanes wide here and Liv zipped around a car in front of them. “By the way, I had an interesting call last night.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yup. The guy wouldn’t tell me his name, but he claimed he had information on Bob Dudley. Information Dudley wouldn’t want me to hear.”

  Angela’s eyes flashed from the window to Liv. “You’re kidding.”

  “No, I’m not. He kept asking me if I was committed to bringing down the chairman. Said he’d read my article in theTrib about Sumter and Dudley, and he wanted to know if I really had the stomach for a fight. The thing is, I just had my number changed again last week. Seems like I have to do that more and more often these days.”

  “What information did the guy have?”

  “He wouldn’t tell me. Said he’d call back in a few days, then he hung up when I started pressing him for specifics.” Liv paused. “He was probably just a crackpot, but I had my number changed again this morning just in case.”

  A chill raced up Angela’s spine. Jake Lawrence had the resources to get almost anything. Finding an unlisted number would be child’s play for his people. “Did you star 69 him?”

  “Yeah. The call was made from a pay phone not far from my place.” She laughed. “I didn’t even know there were pay phones anymore.”

  Angela took a deep breath. “How can you be so calm? Did you call the police?”

  “No.” Liv eased off the accelerator, flicked on the car’s turn signal, and entered a Sumter branch parking lot.

  “You should have.”

  “When you’ve been a reporter as long as I have, you get used to this kind of thing. Calling the police would be a big waste of time,” she said, swinging into a parking space next to a large Mercedes sedan. “Here we are,” she announced. “Let’s go.”

  Angela stepped out of the car and looked up. The Sumter branch building was a picturesque Colonial structure with a brick facade and white pillars in front. The area around the building was impeccably maintained, and huge trees obscured the building from the surrounding residences.

  “What are we doing here?” Angela asked as they headed toward the front door. A white woman coming out of the branch gave Liv a long look, then darted toward her car.

  “Conducting our experiment.”

  A few minutes later Angela and Liv were sitting in the glassed-in cubicle of a young loan officer. He was no more than twenty-four, Angela guessed. In all probability this branch assignment was only temporary for him, a part of the same training program she’d completed in her first six months at the bank. Sooner or later he’d be transferred downtown into the corporate lending department where he could make Sumter some real money. He had the right look. Preppy and monied. She knew what kind of salaries permanent branch loan officers made, and it wasn’t enough to pay for the Brooks Brothers suit and the flashy silk tie the young man was wearing. Besides, a young man like this wouldn’t be satisfied with a career handling mortgages.

  “I’m Trip Bishop,” he announced, smoothing his tie. “And you two are?”

  “I’m Liv Jefferson and this is my friend Angela,” she explained, gesturing at Angela.

  Bishop smiled over his desk. “Nice to meet you, Angela. Now, how can I help you, Ms. Jefferson?”

  “I need a mortgage,” she replied. “I’m buying a house out here in the West End.”

  Trip’s smile faded. “Here in the West End?”

  “Yes. Over by Saint Christopher’s School. You know, the boys’ private school?”

  “I know where Saint Chris’s is.” Trip scrunched up his face. “My parents live over near there. That’s expensive territory, Ms. Jefferson. You can’t get anything for less than half a million. You sure you can afford that?”

  “I’m sure.”

  “Okay. Well, you’ll need to fill out a loan application. You can go over there,” he suggested, gesturing at a counter. “When you’ve completed it, someone else can help you if I’m busy.”

  “I’ve already filled one out.” Liv pulled a completed application from her purse and placed it down on the young man’s desk. “I stopped by yesterday and picked it up.”

  “We will be discussing personal items such as income and net worth, Ms. Jefferson,” Trip explained as he opened the application. “Would you rather your friend waited in the lobby?”

  “You can say anything you want in front of her. She’s a good friend,” Liv said quietly, patting Angela’s hand.

  Trip’s eyes followed Liv’s fingers. “You’ve checked the unmarried box. Have you ever been married?”

  “Yes.”

  “Divorced?”

  “Yup.”

  “How many times?”

  “Why do you need to know that?”

  “It’s just a standard question.”

  “No, it’s not. The form simply asks if I’m divorced, not how many times.” She sniffed. “But I will tell you that I am neither receiving nor paying alimony.”

  “We’ll check that out.”

  “I’m sure you will.”

  “If it’s even necessary,” he added quietly.

  “Why wouldn’t it be?”

  “No reason,” Trip answered nonchalantly. “It says here that the house you want to buy is going to cost nine hundred and fifty thousand,” he said, scanning the information on the pages.

  “Yes, that’s right.”

  “Why would you w
ant to spend that much on a house out here? Wouldn’t you be happier in the Fan? We’ve got a couple of branches down there. I’d be happy to call one of those managers and set you up with an appointment. If the real estate broker you’re working with now doesn’t cover that area, I’m sure we could help you find another one who does.”

  “I live there now,” Liv answered calmly. “I’m moving out here.”

  “What broker are you working with at this point?” Trip asked, pulling a notepad from a drawer.

  “A friend at one of the bigger firms.”

  “Which firm?”

  “Does that really matter? I’d rather focus on getting this mortgage, if you don’t mind.”

  “Okay, okay,” Trip agreed, putting down his pen. He scanned the application. “You claim on here that you are going to be able to put80 percent down. With closing costs that would amount to more than seven hundred thousand dollars.”

  “I’m well aware of that.”

  Trip’s eyes flashed to another section of the application. “This says that you currently rent an apartment, so you have no existing home equity. And you’ve listed savings of under a hundred thousand dollars.” He looked up. “How exactly do you plan on coming up with a seven-hundred-thousand-dollar down payment?”

  “If you must know, a wealthy relative of mine died recently. I’ll be inheriting close to a million dollars in a few weeks.”

  “A million dollars?”he asked loudly. “Wow. How did your relative come into that kind of money?”

  “None of your business,” Angela cut in.

  Trip gave Angela an irritated glance, then reached for a calculator and punched a few buttons. When he was finished, he grimaced.

  “What’s wrong?” Liv asked.

  Trip smiled stiffly. “Nothing.”

  Liv smiled too, aware of the young lending officer’s dilemma. “I make over a hundred thousand dollars a year,” she pointed out, “which you can easily verify. I can handle the monthly mortgage payment, including real estate taxes.”

  Trip rubbed his eyes as if he were developing a migraine. “Real estate is a tricky asset to invest in, Ms. Jefferson. Are you sure you want to put the majority of your inheritance into property right now? These are uncertain economic times. Why not be safe and invest the money in a more conservative vehicle? Say, a certificate of deposit.”