Just for a second, I doubt whether or not the information Abby gave me is accurate. However, I keep my focus on the screen and cross my arms. “Right,” I say. I’m sure of one thing: John had something to do with taking those files out of our building. I need proof. Come hell or high water, Joe, even though he’s impatient and probably wants to get home to his family, is going to search through video until I catch John in the act.
“That’s all Saturday,” Joe says. He looks up at me as if what I’m looking for isn’t likely to exist.
“Then go to Sunday,” I say.
“What?”
I avoid looking at his grimace.
“You heard what I said.”
Joe sighs then plays the video until I ask him to stop. We call it quits when we reach the day I discovered the files missing. Shit! I’m beginning to suspect that John is a little smarter than I thought. I pat Joe on the shoulder to thank him for humoring me.
I stomp across the pathway and past the North Star Holdings building. Right now, John is winning, and it causes my blood to boil so hot that I don’t feel the cold on my skin. I make it to my car, get in, and slam the door.
“Fuck!” I shout as I pound the steering wheel.
It’s time to figure out what to do next. I think of Abby. So much bad is going on right now that I don’t want to call her, although I would love to see her face tonight and, better yet, make love to her.
I turn on the engine and back out of the parking space. A call comes through my car speaker system. I hit answer. “Hello?”
“Hello, Mr. Patrick?”
I stop the car. “Joe?”
“Yeah, it’s me. I think I’ve found what you were looking for. Are you still in the area?”
I slam my vehicle into park. “I’m still here, and I’ll be in in a second.”
7:48 p.m.
Joe replays the footage in slow motion. John unlocks the door and walks into the building by himself. Eleven minutes later, he exits. When he returns, three men in gray khaki shirts and pants are with him. It takes the men several trips to carry the boxes out the door. John shuffles back into the building. I’ve got him.
“I think there’s something else you’ve got to see,” Joe says.
A few minutes later, Misty shows up. She’s wearing tight stretch pants and a puffy jacket trimmed with fur.
“That’s that Misty woman,” Tyler, the other guy who’s in the room with us, says.
“She’s hot.” Joe glances at me for corroboration.
My frown deepens. There’s no way I’m going to encourage this conversation. I lean over Joe to confirm what I think I’m seeing. John and Misty have just left the building together.
“Can you get me video of those two going all the way to their cars?” I ask.
“You bet,” Tyler says.
Every muscle in my body is tense. Tyler presses a few buttons and types in a date and time. A new camera view pops onto the screen. It shows John walking Misty to her car. He opens the door for her. They stand close to talk. She plays with her hair in the way that she does when she’s trying to flirt. I’m amazed how sharp the images are. I can even see her bat her eyelashes. John leans in closer to her. My heart is beating as though a drummer in a rock band is pounding it. Misty pulls her hair across one shoulder. John glances over one shoulder then the other, and then he goes in for the kiss. My heart sinks, but at the same time, I can’t help but crack a little smile.
I pat both of them on the back. “Good work. Very good work.” My smile just won’t fade. “Could you get me a download of all the video we just watched?”
“Sure!” Joe says.
When I walk out of the building, my feet feel as if they’re walking on air, and I’m not so hot under the collar that I can’t feel the stinging cold air.
18
Nolan
Tuesday, December 29
6:34 a.m.
I roll to the side of the bed and sit on the edge. I barely got any sleep last night. There’s too much on my mind. First, I won’t be able to rest until John’s goose is cooked. Second, I can’t get Abby off my mind. I haven’t seen or spoken to her in almost a week. I can’t believe how much I think about her. Last night, I actually considered driving to the cabin just to sleep in the bed where we made love. Smelling her again would be like a shot of espresso. The only thing that stopped me is that I think it’s insane to want her that badly—I only met her five weeks ago.
I shake off the longing for Abby and jump into the shower. Today’s going to be another long one. Once I’m nice and clean, I head to my office to watch that beautiful footage I obtained yesterday.
“Nice,” I mutter. My eyes shine as I watch John kiss Misty dead on the mouth. They’ve got tongue action, too. There’s no doubt in my mind that they’re fucking. It’s just like John to use a woman and discard her when he’s done with her. Misty isn’t the first woman in our company he’s carried on an affair with. Of course it’s all hearsay, but this is the first time that I can prove it.
Yesterday when I got home, I watched the video about five times before saving the file to my hard drive and on two flash drives. I pick up one of the flash drives and roll it between my fingers. This one, I made for Liza. I hate to be the one who has to break her heart, but I can’t let her stay with a man like John without her knowing the truth. Damn Liza. Why did she have to choose this loser to marry and have a child with?
I put the gravity of what I have to do on the back burner and send an e-mail to Pete with the video attached. I write, “For your records. Let’s discuss tomorrow morning with John. Arrange the meeting. I have an appointment with Sidney, the bank manager, this morning. Will update you.”
8:26 a.m.
“You’re early,” Sidney says, flashing me a toothy smile.
We shake hands.
“Of course, and thank you for seeing me on short notice,” I say.
Her smile expands. “That will never be a problem as far as you’re concerned.” She’s looking me straight in the eyes as if she wants me to extract a secondary meaning from what she just said.
Sidney is tall and slinky. Her makeup is perfectly applied, and her hair looks as if she stepped off the front page of Maxim magazine. One look, and it’s hard not to appreciate how attractive she is. When she first started handling our family’s account, she wore a wedding ring, but for two years, I’ve haven’t seen it on her finger. Married or unmarried, she’s always been flirtatious. I’d thought about probing into her personal affairs to find out if she’s still attached, but I always ran into a mental block. She reminds me too much of Kelsey. The next go-around, I want a gal who’s deeper than the average woman. I want a sharp sense of humor and a woman who can appreciate how sunlight rests on top of a frozen lake and makes the landscape appear as if a bevy of diamonds have been strewn across it.
I return the smile but make sure I keep it and my tone all business. “Thank you.”
“Okay, well, let’s go to my office.”
The bank isn’t busy today. We pass the big Christmas tree, and I’m reminded that this was the first Christmas I spent without my dad. I was four and a half when my parents divorced. Ever since then, we’ve had an arrangement: I spend Thanksgiving with my mother and Christmas with my father. It was only after I turned twenty-one that I skipped Thanksgiving with my mom and spent both holidays with my father. Bill was like a magnet to everyone who knew him. He was great to be around. He never had an agenda and always gave great advice. He was a great listener, too. I could’ve chosen to be a clown who juggled in front of supermarket, and if that made me happy, then he would’ve supported me in that decision. He was a great man, and that Christmas tree reminds me of that fact.
We make it to Sidney’s office. I sit across from her, and she starts shuffling nervously through a stack of papers that are stapled together.
“I have to tell you, Nolan, I did some probing, and I can’t find where Bill made a large purchase a month ago. My assistant even searched his account from the
last year, and there were only land purchases, which you signed off on. See?” She hands me a stack of documents.
I go through them. She’s right. I’m already aware of each purchase. I was hoping I would find exactly what I was looking for during this one trip to the bank, but apparently, I have to dig deeper.
“Well, thank you.” I hand the papers back to Sidney.
She takes the other end. Her face is flushed. “You can keep them.”
“I already have copies.”
She nods and takes the pages. “So, Nolan,” she says before I can excuse myself.
“Yes?”
“I’m so sorry to hear about your divorce. I’m divorced, too. It’s a tough process to go through.”
I try to think of some similar circles Sidney and I may run in, but I can’t think of one. “If you don’t mind me asking, how did you hear?”
She turns redder. “Um, your ex-wife was here yesterday. I didn’t speak to her directly…” She shrugs. I can see by the look on her face that she’s panicked that I’ll ask who told her and she’ll have to admit to gossiping.
“Do you know why she was here?” I realize how severe my expression is, so I loosen it to make her feel at ease.
“Um, no,” Sidney says.
Another question is on the tip of my tongue, but my time is limited. My goal is to catch a rascal by his toe, not figure out what Kelsey has going on. Suddenly, I’m struck by illumination.
“Have a nice day, Sidney,” I say.
“Well, is there anything else I can help you with?”
“No, but thank you for the time.”
Sidney’s mouth falls open just as I shoot to my feet and head out the door. I have a feeling she wants to continue chitchatting, but I’m on a mission that can’t be delayed.
10:12 a.m.
I go back to my father’s house to see if I can rustle up a clue. I use my remote control to open his gate. I know for a fact that Betty, his current wife, who happens to be Liza’s mother, is in Eugene, Oregon, for at least a month. Bill’s death also took her by surprise, and she couldn’t handle being in the house without him. So she packed a suitcase and went to go stay with her sister for a while.
I open the door to the six-car garage and park next to a red Rolls-Royce that has only been driven twice since my dad bought it eight years ago. Bill wasn’t a flashy man, but he liked to acquire a toy every now and then, not to show off for the world but to keep hidden and admire in private. I take a moment to regard the car’s rims and classic body shape. One thing’s for sure, after we’re gone, it’s just another inanimate object that’s going to collect dust.
I use my key to let myself inside the house and disengage the alarm. I stand in the silence and emptiness of the wide-open foyer. The floors are made of handcrafted French terracotta tile. I head to the office and commence my search. I look through every single drawer on his desk and the solid-wood file cabinets. Nothing. I go upstairs to the sitting room and take the Dexter Ingram mural my dad bought while on vacation in London off the wall. I struggle a little because the painting is large and heavy. It takes a few minutes, and I nearly knock a hole in the wall, but I get it down and lay it flat on the floor. I’m sweating like crazy, so I take off my jacket, which I should’ve done before struggling with that ugly painting of a man pruning roses in a field under the blistering sun.
I’m relieved to see that the safe is still in the wall. My dad and I were the only ones who knew of its existence. I enter the passcode, and the door opens.
“Shit…”
It’s empty.
I close the safe and hang the painting back on the wall. Thank goodness it was easier to put back up. I sit on the red silk couch and stare at the painting. I’m still not close to figuring out which account my dad used to buy John’s new toy. For some reason, the tile in the foyer comes to mind. On the day the tile was installed, my father called me while I was in Chicago. I was frustrated, driving at a crawl, trying to get through the Circle, where the I-290 and I-90/I-94 intersect. He kept me on the phone for the entire half an hour or so, calmly giving me a play-by-play of how the carpenter was laying down each piece. Some things—like that Rolls-Royce, his flooring, his furniture, and even the watch he wore—he wanted to show off, but somewhere in his rearing, he was taught that being ostentatious would be like committing three of the seven deadliest sins—gluttony, greed, and pride. To the average human eye, my dad was a modest man, but those of us who could read him knew Bill liked to hide his flashy and exquisite things. So of course the account he used to purchase John’s expensive hotel wouldn’t be at the bank where they know him as the sensible, modest, and smart businessman.
I snort, amused as I visualize myself patting my own back, especially for what I’m remembering now. When I was a kid, my dad used to hide the stuff he didn’t want Betty to find in the glove compartments of his cars. I knew the one place she would never go looking—the glove compartment of his Rolls-Royce.
“That’s it!” I shoot to my feet, grab my coat, and race downstairs.
I run to the garage and pull open the door handle to the luxury car, praying isn’t locked.
It’s locked!
I look around the garage and force myself to think like Bill. My sight lands on a black cabinet. Tools. Keys.
I run to the other side of the garage and open the bottom drawer. “Shit.”
On top are a few letters from Citizens Midwest Savings and Loans. I laugh, surprised and delighted by chance. I read the slip. It gets better. The letter is a welcome from the account manager, Valerie Janis.
1:15 p.m.
My throat is scratchy, and my head hurts. I’m in my car, in the parking lot of the bank. I stretch my stiff neck from side to side then place a call. The phone rings.
“Good afternoon. Citizens Midwest Savings and Loans; Sara Mills speaking. How may I help you?”
“Hello. I would like to speak to Valerie Janis,” I say.
“Who’s speaking?”
As I drove over, I decided to give something a try. “John Sharp,” I say.
“Please hold,” the woman says.
After a few seconds, another woman says, “John, hi!”
I hang up and sniff bitterly. Of course… I suspect that he is, or was, fucking her, too. I put my hand inside my pocket and touch the flash drive that contains the security camera footage. Unfortunately, another heart is about to bite the dust.
2:25 p.m.
I walk into the bank and stand at the table where customers sign up to speak to an account representative. I don’t have to wait long. A pretty and petite blonde is on her way. She’s smiling as though it’s her birthday.
“Hi, how can I help you?”
She wants to flirt, and I need to play that card in order to get what I want. I read her nametag and smile. “Good afternoon, Sara. I would like to speak to Valerie Janis.”
“Sure!” she says in a high-pitched tone. She can’t be more than twenty-one or twenty-two years old.
I wink at her. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” After a brief hesitation, she struts off, displaying for me perfect posture and swinging hips. I feel terrible about leading on a woman I’m not remotely interested in. I don’t flirt often, but when I do, I’m effective.
After a moment, Sara walks out with a beautiful blonde who’s at least six inches taller and ten times sexier. I can tell Sara gave her a report about me because she’s watching me curiously.
“Hi, I’m Valerie Janis. How can I help you?”
We shake hands. She’s wearing a wedding ring.
“My name is Nolan Patrick. My father, Bill Patrick, maintained an account here.”
I see a flash of panic in Valerie’s eyes, but she quickly hides it. She touches Sara’s shoulder. “I can take it from here. Thanks.”
“Nice meeting you, Mr. Patrick,” Sara says, still smiling.
Valerie glares at her. She looks at Valerie and heeds the warning.
“This way p
lease, Mr. Patrick.” Valerie’s expression remains taut. She leads me to her office.
After we both sit, she tilts her head. “Did you just call, claiming to be John Sharp?”
I cross my legs and sit up straight. “Do you know John Sharp?”
She studies me with narrowed eyes. The look on her face says it all.
“Of course you do,” I say. “So does William Patrick maintain an account at this bank?”
She folds her hands on top of her desk and straightens her posture to meet mine. “I’m sorry, but that’s confidential information, Mr. Patrick.”
I glare at her. I can tell that she’s hoping I’ll give up and go now, but she’s prepared to fight just in case I stay and battle her. I take the letter out of my briefcase and put it on her desk. “I found this. Isn’t that your name?”
She looks down reluctantly. “Yes.” She forces herself to smile.
“Then William Patrick does have an account at this institution?”
“I can’t give you any of his account information.”
I snort facetiously. “You might not think so, but we’re definitely getting somewhere.”
“Mr. Patrick—”
“I figure that you let me into your office because you’re curious. I suspect you’ve done something illegal and you wonder how much I know.”
Valerie breaks eye contact and reaches around her desktop as if she’s looking for something but doesn’t know what it is.
I put my hand on top of hers. “This is your chance to help me before I send my legal team to officially look into my father’s account and his transactions. I’m precisely interested in a wire transfer he made on November twenty-fourth.”
She coughs as if she’s choked on her own saliva. I wait until she clears her throat. “We did nothing illegal,” she struggles to say.
“When you say ‘we,’ do you mean you and John Sharp?”
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