There Will Be Fire

by Mark Von Kyling

  As she turned to leave his car, she stopped.

  “I wonder if that car realizes it’s parked in front of a fire plug,” she said tipsily and walked over to the entrance of her building.

  Parminter looked over and saw that it was the same older model Mercedes that had followed him home the other day. Did this person live here or was he really being followed?

  8

  After dropping Nicole off, Parminter sat in his car for a moment and looked at the Mercedes. On an impulse he decided to go into the lobby of the condo and tell someone in management about the car being parked illegally. He figured this would be the best course of action considering that he had no idea who he was dealing with. It would also be an indirect way of gathering more information into the situation.

  After a few minutes of looking around, he finally found someone who seemed to be in charge. After he told them the details, he decided to go back to his car and wait. However, by the time he made it outside, the car was gone. He had really hoped to see someone running outside to rescue their car from being towed and was disappointed that this hadn’t happened. He also wished that he had been able to get the license plate number, but it had been parked in such a way that he couldn’t easily get to it. His leg was aching and he hadn’t felt like walking over to it. He now cursed this oversight and wished he had been more aggressive in his efforts.

  He drove back to the suburbs and thought about the situation with the Mercedes. It seemed as though while he only knew Raoul Goldman on the periphery, he was involuntarily being included in the network of his acquaintances and social connections. The problem was that he knew so little of what was really going on. Everybody that seemed to be involved, he only knew socially or from back in his high school and college days. This was definitely an odd situation for him to be in.

  After he got home and parked his car, he went inside his kitchen and immediately made himself some coffee. If he was going to be involved, he needed to find out more. He wanted to know more about these people and their world. He then made a call to the one person he knew would probably know everything that was going on. The one that knew everything that went on in the city and also had the biggest mouth. He called his real estate agent, Joan Garrity.

  * * * * *

  The next day he met Garrity at The Copper Cistern. He was rather vague about what he wanted to meet her about, but knew that she would accept his invitation because she was always trying to get him to sell his house and buy a bigger one. She was the person who had originally sold him the place when he had first moved back to the area and had the idea that he had much more money than he actually did and was always looking for a way to exploit this. She showed up in her usual larger than life get-up. She was wearing a bright yellow hat and yellow suit with bright orange shoes. She looked like a middle-aged lady version of Tweety Bird. And knowing her, this was probably the point.

  After getting through the usual pleasantries, they ordered their food. Once the waitress had left, she turned to him.

  “So, John, are you ready to get out of that McMansion and move into a real neightborhood?” she asked. “I’ve got the most beautiful condo on the waterfront that you would die to have. It’s near everything and the girls would love to come and stay there with you. There are the cutest boutiques nearby.”

  “No, I’m happy where I am,” Parminter said cheerily. “I wanted to talk to you about something else though.”

  Garrity was obviously disappointed, but soon started smiling again. She knew that she would get him to buy eventually.

  “Well, what’s on your mind then?” she said taking a sip of her sweet tea.

  “I want to know what exactly is going on with Raoul Goldman. I know that no one really wants to say anything bad about him but after the dinner party the other night…”

  At that Garrity started laughing. “Oh that. Let me say that you had better get ready. From what I’ve heard, there’s going to be a lot more of that going on.”

  Parminter looked incredulous. “More of what? More people going to dinner parties and putting guns to their heads?”

  She waved him off. “No, silly. A lot more people coming forward and talking about how badly he ripped them off.”

  “Really?”

  “Apparently there a lot of people out there who aren’t exactly happy with their accounts. It seems that he was playing fast and loose with some of his clients’ money and the details are just coming to light.”

  “But I thought he was on the up and up. That’s why so many people used him.”

  She started laughing again. “You have a lot to learn, don’t you? You don’t use a guy like him because he’s on the up and up. You use him because he makes you lots of money.”

  “So he was making them rich?”

  She laughed again. “Richer. Regular people don’t use a money manager like Raoul Goldman. People who use services like his are the types who are wealthy but want to get to wealthier.”

  “Without understanding the details or what it is that’s making them wealthier?” Parminter said, understanding.

  “Exactly. They don’t work for their money like you and me, John. They just get born into it and never know any differently.”

  Their food arrived and they started eating.

  “So what’s the problem then? Everybody knows there’s some risks involved in investing.”

  “Yes, John. It’s true that some of these people are stupid, but they’re not that stupid. It’s just that now some of them have gotten together, or rather their lawyers have gotten together and they’re finding some problems with their statements. The only problem is that most of them don’t really know how much money they have or how much they’ve made.”

  “Or how much they’ve lost.”

  “Yes. Also, the fact that Goldman distributed the most immaculate statements that stand up to complete scrutiny hasn’t helped things either. The only way they can find out what exactly was going on was to get him to tell them and…well, you know that’s not possible.” She chuckled again.

  Suddenly an idea occurred to Parminter. “So do you think one of them could have set the fire?”

  She shook her head. “Lord no! That’s the last thing anybody would have wanted. These people want their money back not revenge.” She took another sip of her tea. “According to what I’ve heard, the fire was completely accidental. It was just one of the rare bad things that happened to Raoul. Or good if you were him and didn’t want to spend the rest of your life in prison.” She paused for second. “Or you hated him so much that you wish he was dead.”

  “I’m sure there’s a few of those.”

  She smiled. “Like who?”

  “Charles Abercrombie for one,”

  “I knew that’s who you’re talking about!” she said smiled.

  “He didn’t seem too broken up over it when Howie and I looked at the house.”

  “Yeah, I know. He’s almost crowing about it. He never made a secret about how he felt about Raoul or his house. But then again, I don’t think he would resort to anything like that. He’s a snob but he wouldn’t stoop to arson. Especially when he could afford to sue Raoul in perpetuity. He’s still got a lot of friends at city hall from back in his lawyering days, too. He just has too many other options.”

  Parminter nodded. She had a point.

  “But all that aside, now there’s no chance to pay back any of the money.”

  “That’s the bad part of it.” She paused. “Well, I shouldn’t say that. It’s still possible, but now it’s a lot more complicated.”

  “I see.”

  They continued to eat.

  “Remember this is just between you and me. I don’t really know any of this. I just know what people are saying,” she said.

  He nodded. “Do you know if Nicole knew what he was up to?”

  “I doubt it. She’s not exactly the high finance type, if you know what I mean,” she said, suppressing a laugh.

  He nodded again. She had
seemed to be a bit bubbleheaded.

  “And she’s just ditzy. I would think that Raoul probably just brought home the money and she spent it.”

  “She seems nice enough. I went to college with her but I didn’t really know her.”

  “Really? Still though, she had better watch out. These people who Raoul screwed over are going to watch their money back. And there’s no telling how deep this goes. There are even rumors that he was involved with the Russian Mafia. You know if he cheated them, they’re eventually going to come calling.”

  “Really?” Parminter asked, remembering what Ratledge had said.

  She laughed again. “That’s what people are saying, anyway. But I think that probably they’ve been reading too many thrillers. He was shady, but he wasn’t stupid.”

  Parminter wasn’t so sure about this but didn’t say anything.

  They finished eating and shook hands.

  “I really appreciate you having lunch with me, Joan. You’ve really put things in context.”

  “No problem, John. When do you want me to send an apprasier out to your place?”

  He laughed. He had to hand it to her, she was definitely persistant.

  9

  Parminter winced in pain as he once again began his nightly walk around the neighborhood. As he limped around the walking trail/sidewalk, he thought a lot about what Joan had told him. He absentmindedly waved at some his neighbors as they completed their similar nightly ritual. Some of them needed a little more than walking, Parminter thought. Some of them had definitely let themselves go physically. But then again, most everybody in the neighborhood worked almost all the time. Aside from some of the housewives, he seemed to be the only one who worked at home. Most of the husbands and almost all the wives were professionals and were probably too busy with their careers to care about their ever-expanding stomachs. At least they were trying, Parminter thought as he observed them huffing and puffing.

  He made it back to his house and went straight to the kitchen for a glass of water and was suddenly struck with a sense of dread about Nicole. He hadn’t wanted to ask Garrity about the black Mercedes because he knew he would have sounded like he was losing his mind, but suddenly, he realized that the car was probably following them. Whoever was driving it was probably checking on anyone who appeared to be connected to Goldman. When Garrity had mentioned the Russian mob, it had all made sense. He hadn’t said anything to her, but he knew from Howie that Goldman had contacts with a lot of different people in a lot of spheres of business.

  He thought back to a party at Howie’s he had gone to when he was still in college. He had come home for the weekend and Howie’s mother was out of town so Goldman was having a real throwdown. Parminter had gone to it with the idea that this was going to be a raging, college-style kegger, but when he had arrived, he saw that it was a far different scene. While a lot of his friends from high school were there, along with a lot of pretty college-age girls, there were also some scary, but well-dressed people who Goldman had invited. They were obviously not from college and did not really look like they belonged in that setting. Their fancy clothes and expensive jewelry were not enough to disguise their impoverished upbringings. These people were trying to look like they belonged to a class that they did not fit in nor ever would, at least not in this generation. Their money was too new and acquired too desperately. Frankly they were also creepy. Goldman had gone out of his way to show everybody there how these people were his best friends and how tight they were. Needless to say, it had been an uncomfortable night.

  Parminter came to the conclusion that if Goldman had liked associating with these types then, then why would things be any different now? If he had been so enamored of criminal types then, why wouldn’t he deal with them? After all, he was all about money and who had more money than criminals? And who would most likely want a legitimate money manager to make their finances look on the up and up?

  As he finished his water, he became more and more afraid for Nicole. If that car was following her, then there’s no telling who was driving it. She could be in danger. He wondered if the car was following anybody else. He had wanted to ask Howie, but knew that he would probably just get laughed at. And Ratledge, he had no desire to speak to him. Surely, he wasn’t the only one who had noticed it.

  He walked through his house and flinched as he bumped his injured leg into a chair. While he was glad that he hadn’t been killed or more seriously injured by the girl who had hit him, he did sometimes curse the fact that fate had chosen him for her victim. He went into his home office and turned on his computer to do some research for the next days’s trading.

  As he prepared himself to get started, he thought about it again, but surely if Nicole was as rich as she was supposed to be, shouldn’t she have some sort of security system at the penthouse? He satisfied himself with the idea that this was probably the case. He didn’t want to involve himself anymore than was necessary. It would just look weird. Even though they had gone to college at the same time, it would not be appropriate. It would also make her look bad if she was seen too much with another man. This was still a small town and people were going to talk.

  He thought about calling his ex-wife but decided against it. She would probably just tease him about his overactive imagination. She had always said that he was seeing plots and schemes in everything because he was a writer. Besides he had already asked her about it and she hadn’t been able to offer much help. Sometimes, he was tempted to point out that when there actually had been a scheme going on between her and Freddy, but he didn’t. He put it out of his mind. Nicole would be okay. He was probably just being paranoid. Besides, it really wasn’t any of his business.

  10

  “That fucking Morris Fox!” Howie said angrily. “I fucking hate that guy.”

  Parminter and Howie had just driven to the Cock and Bull, a pub on the other side of the tunnel going towards the mountain. Howie had wanted to meet with Parminter but didn’t really want to go anywhere near his hotel because he didn’t want to risk running into anyone that might be associated with Raoul Goldman. It was sort of inconvenient to drive past dozens of bars to go to one on the outskirts of town, but at least it was a very cool place. The owners were English and made an extra special effort for authenticity and cleanliness. And they had the best fish and chips in town. Or anywhere else for that matter.

  After they had sat down and ordered their pints, Parminter asked him why he had all this hatred towards Goldman’s second-in-command. He knew that Howie had been to several meetings with Goldman’s lawyers and that Fox had been there so he figured this was why, but he wanted to find out more. From his experiences, these sorts of proceedings were usually tediously dull and hardly the thing to make someone lose their temper over.

  “He’s trying to screw me over, that’s why. He’s doing everything in his power to make sure that I don’t get what’s coming to me. He is supposedly representing Raoul’s company’s interests, but all he’s doing is stalling and delaying and performing all kinds of shady stuff just to put me off.”

  “But I thought you were in the will? He can’t change that.”

  “Apparently that scumbag can.”

  Their pints arrived. Howie was on a real tear. He always had been easily excitable, but since he had grown older, Parminter couldn’t help but notice that he had also grown quite vicious. At least he had been this way in the brief time that he had been back in town. It was very unbecoming and made him realize why they had most likely fallen out of contact. He was no longer the kind of person that Parminter particularly wanted to be around. Of course, Howie had been a little over the top in high school and had been prone to outbursts of anger and vindictiveness, but then he had just taken them for granted. A person can tolerate a lot from a person if he has never been exposed to a reality of not being around a person. However, once away from them, one’s perspective changes. Parminter’s certainly had. He now saw that Howie was a mean, petty person. And with money throw
n into the mix, he was absolutely detestable.

  “And that bitch wife of his is probably fucking him, the whore,” Howie said bitterly. “They’re in this together and they’re going to screw me out of what’s mine. I just know it.”

  “Don’t you think you’re being a little harsh about her?” Parminter said. “Her husband was just burned to death.”

  “Yeah, you know what they say. Birds of a feather.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Well, he was an asshole so what does that make her?”

  “A poor woman?”

  “No, an asshole by association.”

  “But seriously. Don’t you think you’re overreacting? They can’t change the will, can they? I mean they can contest it, but I thought it was fairly straightforward with no surprises. Nicole gets the bulk and you get your part and that’s that.”

  “It would seem that way, but apparently that bastard is going to try to delay the process so he can keep his hands on the money as long as he can. Him and that bitch. I’ve never liked her. So nice and so sweet on the surface. She’s such a snake in the grass. Everyone knows that you have to watch the nice ones.”

  “That’s a pretty mean thing to say about somebody.”

  Howie took a big gulp of his beer. “It’s true. I don’t like anybody getting in the way of my money. I earned that money because I had to put up with Raoul’s shit for so damned long. Hell, the only reason I’m in the will is because my mother made him promise and his lawyer said it would ‘tarnish his legacy’ to leave me out. I’m telling you, I’m not going to let anybody get in my way either. Not some bitch and not Morris-fucking-Fox!”

  Parminter took a sip from his pint. This just didn’t really make sense to him. Howie had to be confused.

  “But why would Nicole be wrapped up in this? I mean, isn’t she getting screwed over too?”

  “That’s what I don’t understand. Either she’s in it with Fox or she’s just naive and stupid. I mean, at the meeting today, here he is talking about interest and investments and all the while I’m starting to see red because I can see that he’s going to do an end run around the will. You know he’s got power of attorney and all kinds of crap. And he’s just feeding her a line of shit about how it’s in her best interest to do all this stuff that makes no sense and she’s just sitting there nodding and agreeing with him. I tried to talk, but they acted like I was the one who was being greedy. It’s that Fox!” Howie was so angry his eyes were almost bulging at this point.