There Will Be Fire

by Mark Von Kyling

  “And what?” Parminter asked.

  “He, or whoever hired him, wanted to find out who you are. And warn you to stay out of whatever it is that you’re involved in.”

  Parminter took another sip of coffee. He didn’t want to give them the satisfaction of knowing it, but what they were saying made complete sense. Howie had been right. There was something going on. “But why?”

  Robin paused for a second. “Probably someone has some kind of plan regarding the estate and they don’t want you fouling it up.”

  “Like somebody who doesn’t want me in the picture?”

  “Probably, maybe they don’t like the idea of you and her being together?”

  Parminter mulled on this for a second. It was entirely plausable. But before he could respond, Margaret chimed up.

  “Can we please talk about something else now? This is boring.”

  Parminter smiled.

  “I was thinking the same thing,” Freddy said and laughed.

  32

  The next day, Parminter stayed at Robin’s house until she had to take the girls to their grandparents. Then they took him home. He was feeling a little better, but was still a little shaky. The girls were very helpful towards him. They propped his feet up and brought him coffee. They were like proper little nurses and the sweetness of their actions helped him more than anything.

  “Don’t worry about your car,” Robin said. “Give me the keys and Freddy and I will go get it.”

  “That’s nice of you.”

  “Don’t count your chickens yet. It might have been towed,” she said and laughed.

  He laughed too, but realized that she might be right.

  “Bye, Daddy,” the girls yelled and left him on his own.

  His head was hurting less, but he was still a little drugged up from the medication. After the car was gone, he turned on the TV and immediately fell asleep.

  A little while later, he was awakened by the sound of knocking at his door. At first he had thought it was in his dream, but then saw there really was someone at his door.

  He walked over and opened it. It was Nicole. He was a little surprised but happy to see her there.

  “C’mon in,” he gestured.

  She walked in and gave him a hug. “What happened?”

  He gave her the details and then they went into his living room and sat down. “Can I offer you anything? I think I have some wine in the kitchen,” he said.

  “Oh, I don’t need anything,” she said. “I just wanted to see for myself how you’re doing. It was all over the building that someone got attacked. And then when you never came to pick me up, I figured out that it was you.”

  Parminter nodded. “Yes, it was me.” He almost told her about how the person had only stolen his ID, but decided against it. He didn’t want to cause her any undue alarm. Regardless of what Freddy and Robin had said, he didn’t really know anything for sure. It was possible that the person was just going to steal his identity. It was a long shot, but stranger things had happened.

  “Of course, the association is really downplaying it and pretending it didn’t happen. I’m just so sorry that I wasn’t there with you. It might not have happened.”

  “It was a random incident, Nicole. It would have probably happened regardless.”

  “Still,” she said.

  “It really looks like it hurts,” she said and came over and tenderly looked at his head.

  “It does. I won’t lie,” he said. “It feels better than it did, but he really got me good.”

  She winced.

  They sat in silence for a minute before she spoke. “I hope you didn’t mind that I didn’t come to the hospital but I didn’t find out which one they had taken you to until after you were gone.”

  “I know. I wasn’t there for very long,” he said. Then a thought occurred to him. “Now I have to have lunch with Joan Garrity again and this time I have to actually let her show me some condos,” he added trying to make a joke.

  She looked at him puzzledly and he explained that he had had to tell Ratledge his cover story as to why he was in the building.

  Without thinking, he blurted out something that had been bugging him. “I was concerned that the person who attacked me might have been after you, but I heard that you weren’t even in the building.”

  She looked at him strangely. “I was home. I told you that I was waiting for you and you never came.”

  “But Ratledge said you weren’t there.”

  She looked confused. “I was running late from a meeting, but I got there just before you were supposed to be there. I was probably in the shower when you were attacked.” She stopped talking suddenly. “Besides, how would he know anything about that? I don’t even know him that well.”

  Parminter shrugged. “Maybe he got his facts wrong.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know. I wish people would just mind their own business though.” She paused for a second and then took his hands. “I promise you, John, this will be over soon. We’ll be able to be open about our relationship.”

  “I hope so. It’s getting really tough to cover it up.”

  “I know.”

  Parminter nodded.

  She came over next to him. “I know it’s not much, but I’ll try to do something to help you feel better in the meanwhile.” She then began undressing and soon they were making love in his living room. Parminter’s pain was still there, but she was right, the sex did much to alleviate the discomfort.

  Meanwhile, outside the house, a silver Lexus drove by and paused outside of Parminter’s driveway.

  33

  A couple of days later, Parminter was finally settling back into his routine. The head pain was gone and he was beginning to feel like a real person again. He had experienced a lot of injuries the previous year. For a person who worked at home and wasn’t really involved in many activities, he sure had been busy. He had been hit by a car when he had been getting the paper and hit on the head when he had been visiting the woman with whom he was having sex. He wondered just how badly banged up he would have been if he was the sort of person who was heavily involved and overly scheduled with activities.

  It had been nice seeing Nicole. She had left right after they had made love because she had another appointment with Abercrombie’s lawyers. She didn’t really seem like she wanted to go, but he understood. They were going to see each other again in a few days. He continued to keep what Howie had said about Abercrombie under his hat. After speaking to Robin, he realized that Howie was just being a blowhard. There was no need to alarm her unnecessarily. Or get himself involved in any sort of lawsuit.

  He settled back into his chair and looked at his computer. He had a vague suspicion that the market was getting ready to crash again and was analyzing the best way for him to cash out of as many positions that he held in order to take advantage of it. He was deeply in thought when the phone rang.

  It was Morris Fox’s secretary and she was asking if he could come to Fox’s office in an hour.

  “What is it about?”

  “He didn’t say. But I gather from what he said when he asked me to call that he wants to meet you.”

  That sounded fair. Parminter looked at his watch and saw that he could do it. He agreed and hung up.

  So, he was finally going to meet the mystery man, Morris Fox. Well, he wasn’t really that much of a mystery because he was very well known around town. Goldman had been the flash and Fox had been the brains. Any sort of suspicions that any clients may have had about dealing with a larger than life personality such as Goldman were always dispelled by Fox’s calm demeanor. At least that’s what Nicole had said andRatledge had confirmed it. It seemed as everyone in his current circle had spoken to Fox except for him. This made sense, of course, because he wasn’t directly involved in anything regarding the estate. Still, he wasn’t sure how Ratledge was connected to all this.

  He hurriedly got ready and went to his car. Naturally, he looked for the Mercedes
but didn’t see it. He was almost out of the habit of looking for it because it had been so long since it had made an appearance. Mr. Paul Ramos had obviously found what he was looking for. Either that or he had given up. All he knew was that it was a relief not to have that hanging over his head any more.

  Parminter parked in a lot across from the building where Morris Fox’s office was located and went in. It was a fairly nice place and gave off a good impression. It looked prosperous yet conservative, but then again Parminter realized that this was the point since Fox wanted people to trust him with their money.

  He made it up to the sixth floor and went into the office suite. He looked around and quickly found Fox’s secretary who told him to have a seat. He sat for about a minute before he was shown into the office.

  “Hello, Mr. Fox, I’m glad to finally meet you,” Parminter said, extending his hand.

  Fox stayed seated and didn’t take his hand. “Sit down. We need to talk.”

  Parminter was immediately put off. This was not the friendly meeting he had been expecting.

  Fox was probably in his early fifties. He was very tanned and bald with extremely short silver hair around the sides of his head. As Parminter sat there across from him, he thought that Fox looked more like a Euro-criminal or fashion designer than an accountant. He also seemed to be a very dour man, almost hostile. He also didn’t waste time getting down to business.

  “Listen, I don’t know what you think you’re doing, but you need to leave Nicole alone.”

  Parminter was taken aback. “What do you mean?”

  “You know what I’m talking about. I’ve seen your kind before. You come in on the fringe. You work your way in, make yourself a shoulder to cry on to widows like Nicole and then try to figure out a way to pick up the crumbs.”

  Parminter shook his head. “I’m not trying to do any such thing.”

  Fox gave him a hard look. “If you’re looking for cash, you’re not going to get it. If you’re obsessed with her, forget it. I’ve done a little research into your background, Mr. Parminter, and I see that until relatively recently, you were just barely scraping by as a writer.”

  “Yes, that’s true.”

  “So, now that you’ve got a little bit of money, you think you can play in the big leagues? It doesn’t work like that. You need to go away. Forget that you ever met Nicole and leave her alone.”

  “Is this about Howie?”

  “No, it’s about you. You’re not our kind, Mr. Parminter. You’re not one of us. You’re just a guy who’s trying to charm his way up. You were a writer. You know this story. It’s been told a thousand times.”

  “But I love Nicole.” Parminter gritted his teeth and tried to keep his cool. He wasn’t surprised at Fox’s open condescension. Regardless, he did not like being spoken to like this.

  “Of course, you do. Everybody does who meets her. That doesn’t mean anything. She doesn’t love you. Leave her alone.

  “Or what?”

  “You would be amazed at my resources.”

  Parminter sat in silence for a second. “I don’t know what to say.”

  “If you want your ex-wife and her husband to keep their jobs and be able to support your daughters, you would go away and forget that you even knew Raoul.”

  Parminter glared at him. He knew that this was something that Fox could easily do with one call to the right people.

  Fox then stood up and extended his hand. His demeanor had changed completely and was now showing him the face he normally showed the world. He smiled broadly. “I’m so glad that we finally had a chance to meet.”

  Parminter ignored him. “Were you the one who had me attacked?”

  “Do you honestly think I’m going answer that question?” Fox said and then closed his door.

  Parminter wasn’t surprised to see two Security guards waiting for him by Fox’s secretary’s desk. They escorted him out.

  34

  Parminter was stunned when he left Fox’s office. He couldn’t believe what had just happened. Maybe Howie was right after all. After all, it was now clear that Morris Fox was a complete snake in the grass. It made complete sense now why Howie felt the way he did. It also made sense what Robin had said to him when she had warned him not to deal with these people. They didn’t play by the same rules as everybody else because the same rules didn’t apply to them. Morris Fox had the influence and the connections and the money to change the playing environment. He could reach outside the game so to speak and change the programming to fit his will. But Parminter knew that some basic rules did still apply to the bastard. It was just like dumb technology versus smart technology. A sledge hammer would always win against a computer.

  But he wasn’t going to resort to anything like that. He wasn’t even sure if this relationship with Nicole was even worth it. He didn’t know where it was going or if it would even pan out after the estate was settled. Maybe he was being used by her. Sure he was happy being with her, but he could be just as happy being with someone else, couldn’t he? He wasn’t a teenager anymore. He was long past the puppy love phase of life. He just wasn’t sure what to do.

  Lost in his thoughts, he walked around for a while and eventually found himself at a bar near the university called Darrin’s. He went to a booth and ordered a beer. He technically wasn’t supposed to be drinking alcohol because of the head injury, but figured that what had just happened to him overrode this warning. He just wasn’t sure about what to do. He was tempted to call Nicole, but he understood that he had to get some distance from the situation in order to see clearly. He wasn’t supposed to see her until the next day. He had to have time to think.

  He looked out onto the street outside the window and thought about how he had gotten himself into this situation. It was completely unlike him to get involved in anything of this nature. He usually never even got involved in anything. He just did his own thing and that was it. Although he hated the term, he was what people classified as a loner and situations like these were probably the reason why. Whenever he stuck his neck out or tried to do anything in life, it always turned into a complicated mess. Apparently the same thing was going on with his being in a relationship. It just couldn’t be normal.

  He still didn’t know what to do as he ordered his second beer. But then his cell phone rang. It was Nicole. Before he could say anything, she started talking.

  “I’m so sorry, John. I’m so sorry that Morris did that to you.”

  “Thanks.”

  “I don’t know what got into him. I guess he’s just protective of me because Raoul was his best friend. He sees enemies everywhere.”

  “It certainly seemed that way. He was not being nice.”

  “You don’t deserve that.” She then took a breath. “I’m going to have to come clean with him about us, John.”

  “That’s what I was thinking, too,” he said and took a sip of beer that the waitress had just brought him.

  “Where are you?” she asked.

  Parminter told her.

  “That’s great. I’m at the dentist getting my teeth cleaned. I’m only two blocks over. I’ll be there in five minutes.”

  They hung up. After speaking to Nicole, Parminter suddenly felt much better about the situation. He really wanted this one to turn out well and maybe it would. However, as usual, he began to prepare himself for the worst even though he hoped it wouldn’t come to that.

  35

  After Parminter had gone to Nicole’s condo, they had made love. As cynical a person as he was, he couldn’t believe that he felt some relief when she had said that she would tell Morris Fox about their relationship and tell him to back off. Despite his earlier thoughts, he was feeling good. The cynic inside of him was still there, of course, and rationalized the idea that everybody needs to be loved was a recipe for disaster. Despite this, he felt really much better about things when he went home immediately afterwards. His only regret that day was that he would not be there to see the look on Morris Fox’s face wh
en Nicole told him.

  The next day, as he went about his routine, the more he thought about how Morris Fox had treated him, the angrier he became. How dare Morris Fox speak to him that way? How dare he imply he was just some kind of social climbing gold digger? It really pissed him off. Morris Fox was just an accountant from a prominent family who had been lucky enough to hook up with Raoul Goldman. Parminter was sure that if he wanted to do he would be able to more than find some meager beginnings somewhere along Fox’s family tree. He looked forward to when Nicole told him about their relationship. It would be fun just to watch the discomfort that his presence caused. If anything, he would be sure to make this relationship work just to stick it to Morris Fox.

  Parminter was in the kitchen making himself a sandwich when the doorbell rang. He abandoned his food and answered it. He had no idea who it could be.

  It was Robin.

  “Well, this is unexpected,” he said smiling. “Come on in.”

  Robin looked a little uncomfortable and stayed where she was.

  “Is something wrong?” he asked immediately getting scared. “Is it the kids?”

  She shifted. “Maybe I should come in. You probably need to be sitting down for this.”

  She followed him into his living room and they sat down on the sofa. Forgetting about his sandwich, he was so intrigued about what she was going to say that he also completely forgot his manners. He didn’t even ask her if she wanted anything to drink.

  “John, this came through and I thought I should be the one who told you about it.”

  Parminter paused.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You’re going to get served with a restraining order.”

  “A what?”

  “You know, a restraining order. It’s against you. You’re going to be required to stay one-hundred feet away from Nicole.”