Echoes of Titanic

by Mindy Starns Clark

Yanni faltered for a moment and then said, “My stylist is Maurice, but I can never remember the name of the place. ‘Hair’ something. It’s a couple of blocks that way.” She pointed up the street before turning to Kelsey again. “But from what I understand they might be going out of business soon. No point in starting up somewhere new if they’re only going to close down anyway.”

  Kelsey nodded, her face neutral but her mind spinning. What was Yanni trying to hide?

  “Anyway, I need to get going. Mr. Hallerman thinks I left early today to run to the bank, so I would appreciate it if you don’t say anything to anyone about seeing me here.”

  “Sure. No problem. Since I’m banned from the office right now anyway, I don’t know who I would tell.” She was about to meet up at a restaurant with her EA and her whole team, but she didn’t think it necessary to mention that fact. She had no intention of telling anyone about her encounter with Yanni—at least, not unless the need arose for some reason.

  As the woman turned to go, Kelsey decided to push things a little bit further. “I was just about to check on Vern and drop off a little something. I never know what to bring when someone has passed away, but I figure you can’t go wrong with dessert, right?”

  “Guess not.”

  “That’s their building across the street there. They have a condo on the sixth floor.”

  Yanni hesitated, clearly flustered, and then she pointedly looked at her watch and took another step away. “I’m sure he’ll appreciate that,” she said evenly. “This can’t be easy for him. Gotta go. See you around.”

  “Yeah, see you.”

  Kelsey stood there at the corner and watched Yanni walk away, wondering what that had been about. As Gloria’s executive assistant, she could have had plenty of legitimate reasons for being in the building, especially now in the wake of the woman’s death, such as dropping something off or getting something signed.

  So why had she lied?

  The light changed and Kelsey stepped in with the crowd to move across the street. She had to give her name to the doorman in the lobby, and after he called upstairs to announce her arrival, she continued on to the elevator. Her mind was still rolling around various possibilities when she reached Vern’s door. She was about to knock when it swung open and he stood there waiting for her. Unlike Yanni, he didn’t seem flustered at all. For a moment, she wondered if he even knew the woman had been in the building.

  Putting that from her mind, Kelsey gave him a hug and told him she was sorry for dropping by without calling first but that she wasn’t going to stay. “I just wanted to check on you and see how you were holding up,” she continued. “Oh, and here.” She handed the boxed cake to him. “This is a little something to have in the house in case any guests come in from out of town.”

  He seemed genuinely touched as he took the box from her and placed it on a hall table.

  “I’d love to invite you inside, but I was just heading out,” he said as he grabbed his keys from a hook by the door and walked into the hall. “I’ll go down with you.”

  “How are you holding up, Vern?” Kelsey asked as they walked toward the elevator. “Is there anything I can do for you?”

  He shook his head. “No. I’ve been getting by and I have a lot of support from family, friends, and people from the office.”

  Kelsey considered the possibility that Vern and Yanni were having an affair. The two of them had certainly had numerous interactions over the years at various work-related functions. Many of those had ended up being a combination of social time and after-hours business, with Gloria being pulled away to handle some important matter or another, leaving Vern to fend for himself. It wouldn’t have been unusual for his wife’s secretary to step in and entertain the man in her absence. Perhaps something had developed between them. Of course, he was a good twenty years older than the strikingly beautiful Yanni, but some girls went for older guys, and he was a handsome man, his silver hair and lined face only serving to make him look more distinguished.

  Then again, if he’d been having an affair with another woman, would he have been quite so distraught the night Gloria died? Kelsey had been by his side and had seen how genuinely heartbroken he was. Had that been the behavior of a man who was cheating on his wife?

  Suddenly, a comment he had made that night popped into Kelsey’s mind. He had asked the detective whether or not he thought Gloria had meant for him to be the one to find her body. Between sobs, Vern had said something like, If that’s what she was trying to do, I deserved it. At the time, Kelsey had taken the comment generally, as in he hadn’t been the best husband in the world. Now, she realized, he could have been speaking more specifically, and those were the words of a man who was guilty of some tangible act.

  “So I ran into Yanni just now, outside,” she said nonchalantly as they stepped into the elevator and she pressed the button for the ground floor.

  Looking completely unruffled, Vern nodded and said, “I asked her to come over and help pick out Gloria’s burial clothes. I figured that since she worked with her every single day, she’d probably know best what Gloria would have wanted. I’m hopeless at that sort of thing.”

  She studied him for a long moment, knowing with everything in her that not only was he lying right now, he’d probably been lying to his wife for so long that he’d become a master at it. He stood silently next to her, watching the numbers change on the elevator display.

  Finally, deciding that it was none of her business anyway, Kelsey let the Vern–Yanni connection go and asked about the funeral arrangements instead. He gave her the name and address of the funeral home and said that visitation would be tomorrow night from six to nine.

  “The burial will be Saturday morning,” he added, “but that’s for immediate family only.”

  “Got it. Thanks.” Kelsey had to wonder exactly what constituted “immediate family” for the Pooles. Gloria and Vern had no children, and she knew Gloria’s parents were gone. Outside the office, the woman’s life must have been a sad, empty affair. No wonder her job was all she had lived for.

  Kelsey had one more line of questioning for Vern. She tried to think how to phrase what it was she wanted to know. Finally, she just came out with it. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

  “Can I ask you a strange question, Vern? It’s going to sound odd, but I really, really would appreciate an honest answer—a one hundred percent honest answer, okay?”

  “Okay…” he said, suddenly looking nervous. Poor guy, he was probably expecting her to ask about Yanni. Instead, she launched into an issue of far more importance to her right now.

  “Five years ago, when my father went into semiretirement, everybody at the company expected him to the fill his absence by promoting from within. Instead, he brought in Walter Hallerman from the outside and made him CEO.”

  Vern nodded, and as he did she couldn’t help but detect in his expression something like relief. She continued.

  “I know Gloria was very hurt and angry about all of that back then. What I want to know is…well, it’s kind of hard to say this…”

  “It’s okay, Kelsey. What do you want to ask me?”

  She let out a breath and looked off to the side, a sudden sadness overwhelming her. “What I want to know is if she ever really got over that, or if she remained bitter for the rest of her life.”

  “That’s your question? I don’t understand. Of course she got over it. It’s been five years, for goodness’ sake. She was none too happy at the time, you’re right about that, but eventually she moved on. Why would you think she hadn’t?”

  Kelsey shrugged. “Because since she died certain things have come to light, things she did recently that seem, um, pretty malicious. What I’m trying to figure out is if she’d been acting out of anger—either at the company or at me—or if there was some other reason for her actions.”

  Vern’s eyebrows raised. “Malicious?”

  Kelsey could feel her cheeks growing hot. As mad as she was at Gloria, it still fe
lt terrible maligning the dead this way. “Malicious toward me, Vern. I don’t want to go into detail, but what I’m trying to figure out is whether she was acting to hurt me personally or if she was trying to inflict damage on Brennan & Tate.”

  Vern didn’t answer but instead just looked at her incredulously.

  The elevator reached the ground floor and the doors opened.

  “I know it sounds crazy, but I have…evidence that she hasn’t exactly been acting in the best interests of the company. I have a feeling I know why, but before I pursue that I just wanted to double-check with you.” Stepping out of the elevator, Kelsey turned toward Vern, locking eyes with him. “Was Gloria mad at me? Was she holding some sort of grudge against me? Did she hate me? Or was this all about what happened in the past and I just got hurt in the process?”

  Vern slowly shook his head, and either he was a very good actor or he was genuinely stunned by her questions. “I honestly don’t know what to tell you, Kelsey. You have to know as well as I do that Gloria loved you dearly. You were like the daughter she never had.”

  Tears threatened at the back of Kelsey’s eyes, but she willed herself not to cry.

  “She loved the company too,” he continued. “She lived and breathed Brennan & Tate. I don’t know what kind of evidence you have, but I’d have to see it to believe it. I mean, sure, she had her occasional irritations with management or frustration with a client or a coworker, but who doesn’t? Gloria was as dedicated as they come.”

  Kelsey nodded skeptically.

  “I’m sure it’s no secret that her career and her company ranked far above her marriage. Far above me. I learned to live with that a long time ago. But if you’re going to sit here and tell me she didn’t love you or love that place with all her heart, I have to say you’re wrong. Dead wrong.”

  They grew silent as his words hung in the air between them. Kelsey wasn’t all that surprised at what he was saying, nor at the conviction with which he was saying it. Before she found that letter on Gloria’s computer, she would have said the same things to anyone else who asked.

  But now she knew differently.

  She walked silently through the lobby toward the door to the street, Vern following along behind her.

  “Is there any chance your evidence could be wrong?”

  “I found an incriminating document on her computer.”

  “Someone else could have put it there, Kelsey. Someone else could have been trying to make her look bad, though I can’t imagine why.”

  “That thought crossed my mind at first, but so many things have come to light. Gloria was up to something before she died. I guess I just wanted your opinion as to whether her actions were against me personally or against the company.”

  They reached the door and Vern pulled it open. “Well, as her husband, I’m telling you the answer to that question is neither. She loved you and she loved B & T. All the evidence in the world couldn’t convince me otherwise.”

  Kelsey nodded, moving out onto the sidewalk. When she turned back toward him for a thanks and a goodbye, she realized that an odd look had come over his face.

  “What is it?”

  He shrugged. “I was just thinking…well, she had been acting kind of strange the past few weeks. Very stressed, very anxious. It got so bad that the other day I told her she needed to go see her doctor and get something for her nerves.”

  Kelsey thought about that. Though she and Gloria interacted frequently at work, they had both been busy lately on different projects and had barely done more than speak as they passed in the hallways—and even that happened only once in a while. The last time they had spent more than ten minutes together had been almost four weeks ago, when they had met up on a Saturday morning and gone to the Union Square farmers market together. Now Kelsey realized that if something had been bothering Gloria, she wouldn’t have been around her enough to know it.

  “Any idea what was stressing her out? Was it something to do with work, or maybe something personal?”

  He shrugged, eyes darting away. “I assume it was work. She spent almost all of Monday night down at the office.”

  Kelsey squinted. “This past Monday night? The night before she died?”

  He nodded. “Yeah. I mean, she came home at a decent hour—earlier than usual, actually—but then she got a call around ten or ten thirty, one that got her all worked up. Said she had to get back to the office to handle a crisis. By the time she got home again, it was almost morning. She probably slept all of an hour, and then she had to go back to work.”

  Unfortunately, he couldn’t remember anything of the phone conversation that had sent Gloria to the office that night and didn’t even know who she’d been talking to. Kelsey asked if they could check the caller ID, but he said it had come on her cell, and that was being held by the police for now.

  Kelsey thought of what Ephraim had told her the day before, that Walter and Gloria had had a big argument in the auditorium on Monday afternoon. She had a feeling that the call later that night had been a continuation of their argument—though what had brought the woman back to the office and kept her there until dawn, she had no idea. At least that explained why Gloria had looked such a mess on Tuesday prior to the ceremony. She’d pulled an all-nighter, something she was too old to do.

  With a final hug, Kelsey thanked Vern for his help, and he thanked her for the cake and the visit. Then she made her way back to the subway and down to the financial district as quickly as she could, thinking over their conversation all the way there.

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-FIVE

  The High Yield Cafe was located on Stone Street, a lovely little cobblestone lane about six blocks from the office. Lined with restaurants on both sides, the street was closed to traffic and was one of Kelsey’s favorite dining spots, especially in the summer, when the restaurants moved some of their tables outside for dining alfresco.

  In April, however, it was still chilly enough that she would have to be content with sitting indoors. Fortunately, their usual café was more of a lunch spot than a dinner draw, and at five fifty on a Thursday night it was half empty. The hostess was happy to set her up at a table for six, and soon she was settled in, facing the door and waiting for her group to arrive.

  Despite the rush hour subway ride, she’d managed to make it to the restaurant a little early, and she was glad. Not only would she be here to greet her guests when they arrived, but she’d also have a few minutes to clear her head and focus. The waitress brought her a cup of decaf coffee, and she sat and sipped it as she thought about her research team.

  Things moved fast in the world of investing, and lots of information had to be assembled quickly. Her group of highly skilled individuals, each with a different area of expertise, could research the various elements of a potential investment and help guide her to make wise decisions. Along with Sharon and herself, the team was comprised of a financial analyst, a background researcher, a technical expert, and an advisor, each one among the best in the company and handpicked by her.

  With every prospect who came their way looking for financing, Kelsey and her team would go into action, whether that prospect was pushing an invention, creating a plan for a new business, or helping with the expansion of an established company. It was up to her and her team to evaluate the background of the prospect and their business or idea. Once that had been done, it was much easier to determine whether the proposal in question would be a good investment for Brennan & Tate or not.

  Three or four years ago, the procedure had been for Kelsey to take her team’s findings to Gloria, who would then make the final decisions about the investment, based on the team’s information and her own experience, instincts, and other factors. But for the past year Kelsey had been making final recommendations herself. She had done quite well thus far, bringing in good money for the firm. The Q on her lapel attested to that.

  Her hope tonight was that she could use her team’s investigative skills to solve the issues that ha
d risen up this week and were threatening to destroy both a company and a legacy. She would present them with the information she had managed to collect thus far—about Gloria, Rupert, and Queen’s Fleet Management Group—and then they could run with it, using their knowledge and resources to come up with some answers or at least a solid theory or two.

  Kelsey glanced at her phone to see that it was 6:02 p.m. They should be arriving any minute, so as she continued to wait, she pulled from her purse the questions she’d written up on the train. She skimmed through the whole list, starting with, Why was Gloria trying to reach Rhonda the day she died?, and then she jotted down a few more, ending with, What were the terms of the takeover offer and how did the board respond?

  It was a start. Some of the questions were closely connected, and she was sure the answers would overlap. There was just so much she needed to know. Thank goodness they had agreed to help her!

  After a while, Kelsey checked her phone again and was startled to see that it was nearly six fifteen. Where was everyone? They were usually a prompt bunch. Time was money in their business, after all. Frowning, she was about to call Sharon and ask what was holding them up when the restaurant door opened and in stepped Walter Hallerman. Kelsey’s breath caught in her throat, and for some strange reason she almost felt guilty, as if she’d been trying to get away with something bad and had been caught red-handed.

  Walter spotted her and began winding his way between the tables to her place in the corner. She sat there watching him come, her pulse surging. His face was grim, and she knew she was about to be reprimanded. She could just feel it.

  When he reached the table, he stood there stiffly, glaring down at her.

  “Your team isn’t coming, Kelsey.”

  She took a deep breath and told herself to remain calm.

  “And why not?”

  He shook his head. “I already told you that your access to the company has to be limited. That includes not using B & T resources to run your own maverick agenda.”