Taking Stock

by C J West

  “If you were talking about Erica Fletcher, you’re dead wrong.”

  “I can’t discuss it.”

  “You’re going to be embarrassed when the truth comes out. Not a great first impression on the almighty Marty Finch.”

  “If anyone’s going to be embarrassed, it’s you. Marty said so himself.”

  “I’m trying to help,” Stan pleaded, hating the sissy voice he used.

  “I like you, Stan. No one’s trying to make you look bad.”

  He wished that was true. “I’m sure you stuck up for me in there.”

  Sarah looked like she was going to be sick. Of course she hadn’t. She couldn’t say so, but he didn’t blame her.

  “Don’t let your feelings color your judgment,” Stan said.

  “Don’t even go there.”

  She was insulted and angry at the insinuation. She wanted to explode, but something inside her wouldn’t allow it, probably the same compulsion that had her lining up desk accessories.

  “Brad’s setting her up.”

  “The facts point to Erica.”

  “Brad’s facts. Look at the access logs if you’re interested in facts. The system says she was in the computer room a dozen times when she wasn’t.”

  “What were you doing in the security room?”

  “Saving your butt.”

  She laughed in his face, looking at him like a clown. “It’s your butt that needs saving. She’s been stealing under your nose and you’re still sniffing around her like a puppy dog.”

  He hadn’t taken this job seriously before Sarah arrived, but he knew she was wrong about Erica and it was going to blow up in her face. She was going to help Brad push this all the way to trial. By the time she figured out Erica was innocent, correcting her mistake would be messy and public. Firing a senior vice president for embezzlement would be front page news. The trust of every BFS customer would be shattered, the firm devastated. Hundreds of jobs would be lost, jobs Stan could have saved if he’d lived up to his responsibilities.

  He tried to keep a steady fatherly voice. “Don’t rush into this.”

  “I can’t discuss this with you. Marty’s keeping a tight lid on it.”

  “He trusts me. You know that.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “She’s being framed. If you weren’t so star-struck, common sense would tell you I’m right.”

  “You think you can read people in five minutes. You should try working a little longer than that.”

  “It takes a certain kind of person to steal. She ain’t it.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “I went with her to the security room last night.”

  Sarah stood up in a panic. She glared like she was ready to whip out the cuffs and haul him away. “What were you thinking?”

  “The access list’s been doctored.”

  “You don’t know what you’re getting in to.”

  “I was there. Someone’s screwing her over. It’s got to be Brad.”

  Sarah got up and closed the door. She sat beside him like a parent about to have the talk with a teenage child.

  “Accuse Brad and you have a big problem,” she threatened.

  He told her about the blank security tapes, the way the dates were misaligned and what that meant. They both knew it was Brad’s job to handle them. Sarah listened without emotion. He couldn’t tell whether she was ready to join him and help vindicate Erica or rush upstairs and use this information against her.

  Stan wrapped up his case. “We need your help to prove it’s Brad.”

  All he got was a cold glare.

  “Brad Foster is a senior vice president not to mention that he’s the CEO’s brother-in-law. I’m not running off into your fantasy world. Don’t ask me to.”

  “You’re living the fantasy, buying his imperial crap. Just because he’s got a big job and a big title is no reason to trust him.”

  “It’s over Stan. She’s suspended. She can’t even get back in the building to pick up her stuff.”

  Stan stared back dumbstruck.

  “We’re going to prosecute,” she said.

  Stan got to his feet and made for the door.

  “Not a word to her Stanley,” she called after him, “or it’s your ass.”

  Chapter Fifty-two

  Sarah kept herself far enough from Erica’s office furniture so she couldn’t accidentally leave fingerprints. She wished they’d brought Stan for his knowledge of police procedure. The thought made her chuckle after his rant that morning, but she wasn’t trained as a detective and she couldn’t imagine Herman was either.

  She stood awkwardly self-conscious in the center of the room, more unsure about this case than ever. Herman opened the door for Brad and a guy that looked about eighteen. The kid couldn’t have looked less eager if he’d been asked to flush the fish from the company aquarium. Brad stood behind him, arms crossed, prodding him on. Hacking into Erica’s laptop and opening it up for Sarah to peruse sickened the poor kid. He came from the help desk and like every other guy on this floor he dreamed about Erica. She’d probably helped him dozens of times when no one else would. According to Stan that was her way.

  The young man sporadically clicked keys. Brad became disinterested after the first few unsuccessful attempts and picked up some papers from the credenza and browsed until Herman barked at him. This job belonged to internal audit. Chastened, Brad dropped the papers, averted his eyes and slinked out the door.

  A knock sounded minutes later and a kid from the mail room swayed in, his body moving to a rhythm in his head. His ridiculously baggy jeans showed red boxers all the way around his hips. He dropped a bundle of folded moving boxes inside the door and fixed his eyes on Herman. When Herman nodded the kid replied with a clenched fist in the air as if knocking on an imaginary door. He hiked up his pants and left. Faces peered past him until the door swung closed. Word was spreading and there would be questions to answer when Sarah left the room.

  Sarah popped open a box to get started, but Herman sternly angled his nose toward the kid behind the computer. The clutter would take days of sorting and she was eager to dive in, but she’d have to wait until the kid was gone. He was the only entertainment available, so she moved next to Herman and watched the commands as he typed. The letters didn’t spell any words Sarah recognized and they appeared on the black screen then disappeared faster than she could follow. He paused occasionally to strategize and still the commands made no sense. After the fourth or fifth such pause, he stood up and handed Sarah a sticky note with Erica’s new password, one Erica would never know. He’d found nothing and it was no secret he hoped Sarah and Herman wouldn’t find anything either.

  Sarah patted his shoulder and thanked him.

  He dropped his eyes to the floor and shuffled out.

  When the door closed, Sarah took up her box and started carefully sifting through the piles on the desktop. The white pages held nothing but computer gibberish; lots of semicolons, parentheses, and oddly long words with too many consonants. Some of the handwritten notes in the margins made sense, but she could never turn this into any sort of a case. When she finished her first folder and placed it in the box, Herman cleared his throat. She looked up to find him watching with a smirk.

  “If you were stealing big money. I mean big money, would you leave the evidence on top of your desk?”

  Sarah’s face reddened and Herman paused to revel in his superiority.

  “That’ll take days to sift through. Just stuff it in a box.” As he said this, he leafed through books one at a time, holding them upside down and shaking them. Whether he expected something to drop from the pages or he was just being excruciatingly thorough was unclear. When he finished a shelf, he piled the books vertically and moved on.

  Sarah didn’t bother looking inside the folders now. To match Herman’s precision would take weeks and to find what they were looking for required expertise she didn’t have. Instead, she lumped the files and papers from the de
sk into three heavy boxes and stacked them by the door. Finally, she could see the desktop. She pushed the pictures and accessories to the corner, shut down both laptops and stacked them off to the side. Now that she had a clean workspace, she opened the next box on top and was free from bending to the floor for every item she packed away.

  The first drawer she opened was stocked with anything you’d need for an overnight at the office. Sarah packed a box with deodorant, aspirin, nail polish, shampoo and dozens of other essentials. Erica had surprisingly little memorabilia for someone who’d been with the firm so long, like a soldier on deployment. Sarah stacked a few framed photos on top of the toiletries box and moved on to more files. Armloads and armloads went into new boxes.

  Behind her Herman ruffled through file cabinets as methodically as he’d gone through the bookshelves. He smiled when he noticed her watching. “Not what you pictured?” he asked.

  “Not exactly.”

  “The hard work starts tomorrow, sifting page by page.”

  That job would be Sarah’s. She grabbed another stack of files from the bottom drawer. As she measured the gathering mass of work ahead, she fumbled and something heavy slipped from her hands and clunked solidly against the wooden drawer. When the manila pile lifted clear, she dropped everything, releasing a cascade of files that scattered at her feet. She wailed, frozen in place with two inches of papers covering her shoes.

  Herman jumped to her side urging her to keep quiet. He saw the black handgun lying at the bottom of the drawer and kicked it shut. He trained his eyes on the door, posing at attention nearly a minute, expecting someone to burst in, but no one did.

  Sarah grabbed the phone and dialed, but before she could finish, Herman pressed the switch hook.

  “Who are you calling?” he asked.

  “The police. Last night in the parking garage – this is the gun.”

  Herman held out his hand for the receiver. He dialed a number and spoke firmly, “Where is he? No. I need him now. Pull him out. No. Right now! Send him to Erica Fletcher’s office on twenty-two.” And he hung up.

  One minute later Marty Finch walked in.

  Herman pulled open the drawer for him.

  “Anyone touch it?” he asked.

  “No,” they said in unison.

  “You’ve got my attention,” Marty said. “Find anything else?”

  Herman indicated the stack of boxes packed by the door. “It’ll take weeks to sift through all that.”

  Marty nodded, his face darkening as he decided what to do.

  Sarah still had the urge to pick up the phone and dial 911. “The police can match this gun to the bullets from the parking garage. They can tell us what happened,” Sarah urged. It was the right thing to do.

  Marty eyed her a second then exchanged a sharp look with Herman.

  “Herman, go find some plastic to wrap this thing up. We’ll stick it in the safe.” Marty rested a hand on her shoulder and waited for the door to close behind Herman. “Sarah, this is big news; the biggest news in this firm’s history. I don’t want this getting out until we’re ready to answer every possible question. Understand?”

  “No police,” she said halfheartedly.

  “Finish your work,” Marty said. “Then we’ll talk.”

  Marty walked to the door and twisted the knob, inspecting the lock as he did. “This won’t do,” he said. He eyed the piles against the wall and the laptops on the desk. “I’ve got a secure room next to my office. I’ll have all this moved there. Your work will be safe until you’re done.”

  Sarah wondered who he was protecting.

  Chapter Fifty-three

  Erica’s horse followed Gregg’s off the trail and into a patch of tall grass by a small pond. The big brown Morgan held steady for her to dismount and seemed to know Gregg would leave her to graze nearby. Even if delivering young women to this romantic hideaway was routine for the horse, it was anything but for Erica. A light breeze blew ripples over the water and sent downy white clouds drifting overhead. Erica nearly forgot the terror of the last forty hours as she lay back in the grass and let the bright sun force her eyes closed. The breeze played in the grass and the horses munched and snorted. Her favorite bench in the park paled to this place. There were no voices, no pavement, and no cars. Something tapped in the distance, a woodpecker perhaps. Erica homed in on the sound feeling her chest rise with each inward breath and then melt as she released it.

  Gregg sat at attention next to her watching the woods for trouble. He had an understated power about him and he took to the role of protector without fanfare. He’d tried to hide the shiny revolver under his arm, but she’d felt it the first time they embraced. Being around men had always put her on edge, but everything about Gregg was comforting. Even the gun was reassuring in his hands, a powerful force he’d wield on her behalf. She reached for his hand without opening her eyes. She trusted Gregg without a hint of fear. His determined pursuit had been worrisome for a long time, but now his steadfastness had become contagious.

  She lay at ease for the first time since her last visit to the farm. Gregg was upset that she was going back to the city, but she had no choice. Left alone, Brad would build an ironclad case against her and when she did return, she’d be headed for prison. She had to prove Brad’s guilt. The evidence she needed was in Boston and that’s where she needed to be. Gregg hated the idea, but she’d made her decision.

  When it was time to go, Gregg prepared the horses and helped Erica up into the saddle. They roamed down a wide section of trail among the pines and followed lush green fairways back up the slope toward the barn. They’d ridden five miles and never left the Turner’s farm. Erica had never imagined a place so vast existed in Massachusetts. They emerged from the trees a half mile below the barn and she gazed off at the far edges of the fields as they dismounted and walked the horses the rest of the way up. Gregg showed her how to groom the horses and then they went inside to shower and change for the trip back to the city.

  Gregg followed the flow of traffic back to Boston rarely passing anyone. He stayed centered in his lane, sternly focused straight ahead, eyes avoiding Erica in the passenger’s seat. The slow driving was his protest. If he thought the delay would give her time to change her mind, he was wrong. She knew he was angry and that worried her more than anything she’d face in Boston, but she still needed to go.

  The impasse held for the final half hour of the trip. Gregg wanted her to go home with him and nothing short of that would do. He couldn’t understand that she wasn’t dainty and helpless like Claudia and Dianne. She might never be the kind of woman Gregg needed, but she wasn’t changing and she wasn’t letting go. He’d have to adjust.

  Watching his sharp features she felt a new fear. Their relationship had changed radically in a short week. He was important to her now. She was clinging to him and anything that upset him, anything that pushed them apart threatened to make her crumble. The thing she feared most was telling him about her father. Her childhood would be so foreign to him after the storybook life he’d led. She couldn’t tell how he’d react. He might be incredibly compassionate or detached like he was now. She’d have to find a way to tell him eventually, but it wouldn’t be anytime soon.

  The car stopped at the alley behind Erica’s apartment. His eyes begged her not to go, but her door was open, her feet already on the sidewalk. She kneeled over the seat and brushed his lips with hers. The short goodbye turned into a dangerously long embrace in plain view. She took a long, melancholy breath and backed into the alley, her eyes following the car as it powered away.

  Two hours on horseback had stiffened her muscles more than if she’d run the entire distance. A long, hot shower had relaxed her, but the uneasy ride with Gregg had magnified her tension and intensified the pain in her legs and butt. Three teenagers walked by and paused to look at her alone in the alley before moving on. When they disappeared, she pushed ahead, tuning in to every voice and footfall.

  Each step to her back door was
painful and she stopped on the landing to loosen up. She massaged her quad through her new running suit ever vigilant for any movement behind her in the alley. The apartments above were quiet, their occupants off at work this time of day. She rested a sneaker on the small concrete stoop and stretched. After a few reps on each side, her leg muscles felt flexible again and she stepped through the back door into the hall. The lobby was empty, the twisting staircase and the floors above quiet. Instead of going up, she passed through the corridor and out the front door for a quick run.

  There on the sidewalk, she hoisted a leg to the railing for one more stretch and scanned the street. Down the block, a car came to life. The Corvette’s exhaust grunted mightily above the hum of the city. She began lifting her other leg to the railing, but suddenly broke off in a trot away from the Corvette coming toward her. She jogged at an easy pace. The traffic forced the Corvette to stop twice before the corner and she moved well ahead.

  How long had he been waiting for her to come home? He’d made a huge mistake in the parking garage and he was trying to fix it now. The threat of losing everything made Brad desperate to catch her. He’d do anything to stop her from telling the truth about that night. Why had she let Gregg drive away? His gun would be comforting now.

  She turned the corner toward the river and once she was out of sight, she broke into a full run and dashed across the street to the shelter of the parked cars on the other side. She ran down the sidewalk as Brad broke free of the traffic at the corner and pulled closer. A shot now would be difficult. He’d have to match her pace, shoot through the passenger’s side window, and avoid hitting the parked cars between them, all while driving. He wasn’t likely to hit her, but even a lucky shot could kill. She watched the Corvette creeping up behind and at the same time looked for places to hide. There wasn’t a cop anywhere on the street. Barely a soul was out.

  Her legs ached as she bounded faster down the sidewalk just several yards ahead of the car. She spurred herself through an intersection ahead of a blue pickup that lurched across behind her. The signal changed. The red light would stop Brad and give her a moment’s breath. Her strides shortened as she looked back. She’d almost stopped when the Corvette ran right through the red light, slowing only to let the pickup cross in front.