The Widow of Wall Street

by Randy Susan Meyers

  “The bank on Fifty-Third, please, Leon.”

  “Pleasure, Mrs. Pierce.”

  Phoebe worshipped Leon’s tendency not to make small talk. Being Mrs. Pierce meant providing smiles and sympathy, keeping up with births and deaths, bar mitzvahs and confirmations. Jake had pushed her years ago to become the maternal face of JPE. She carried the JPE employees around in her head: Wendy’s son’s crooked teeth, Connie’s mother’s breast cancer, Leon’s kids’ five college tuitions—they crowded her mind along with the people from the Cupcake Project and Mira House.

  • • •

  A pink-faced man materialized and ushered her into a hushed back room the moment she entered the bank. Perhaps the suited woman at the dais behind the security guard watched for clients with multimillion-dollar accounts, and then, when one appeared, summoned an executive with a stroke of a computer key.

  “Mrs. Pierce, how nice to see you,” he said. “Owen King,” he reminded her without a hint of judgment about her memory.

  “And you, Mr. King.”

  “How can we help you today?”

  She patted her purse. “I have a deposit.”

  Owen King showed every one of his overwhite teeth, smiling as though Phoebe brought bliss into his life. Were banks so desperate for cash? The banker ushered her into his mahogany paneled office. “What can I serve you, Mrs. Pierce? It’s so nasty out. Would you like something warm?”

  Warm sounded wonderful. Tears of gratitude threatened. Phoebe blinked, humiliated at appearing so fragile. Crazy rich lady, he must think, reeling from her stock losses. No, Owen, it wasn’t that. She didn’t even know why she was scared, or what of.

  • • •

  A deep-green throw enveloped Phoebe. She rubbed the soft cashmere between her fingers as she read her sister’s email.

  Ben and I have Charlotte for a couple of days. What is it with our kids—they have to reach back to the nineteenth century for their kids’ names? Pheebs, if Mom were alive, she’d gobble up this little girl. Blond curls springing out all over her head. Remember how Mom moaned and groaned about your stick-straight black hair? Horsetail hair, she called it. No wonder you smelled like rotten eggs for so many years with those awful perms!

  Anyway, we want you and Jake to come down and rest. Sounds like you’re both exhausted. No surprise, with everything going on. Our friends are terrified, watching their balances sink. Thank God for Jake. Even if he won’t come, you get down here. But make him come.

  Phoebe stopped reading, imagining a trip to Florida. Jake never relaxed there—not with clients everywhere. Maybe the only place she could take him to unwind would be the moon. But they could go somewhere with Ben and Deb. A cruise to Alaska. Ben never tried talking business with Jake. “What do I know from derivatives?” he’d say. “You take care of my money, and I’ll make the golf dates for us.”

  Then he’d put an arm around Jake and squeeze. Sometimes Ben got so overwhelmed by gratitude that he’d grab Jake by the shoulders and kiss him.

  “Such royalty, my daughter,” her mother would say if she saw Phoebe miserable while covered in cashmere. “My spoiled princess, are you feeling the pea? A little trouble and you fall apart? Your grandmother came over on the boat by herself at thirteen. Thirteen! Do that. Then complain to me. Raise ten children on the Lower East Side. Then complain to me. Lose two little ones to the flu. Then complain to me. Your life is golden, Phoebe.”

  CHAPTER 25

  Phoebe

  “Phoebe!”

  Jake’s scream startled her awake. How long had she napped? Hazy light came through the window. The rain had stopped. The clock showed 12:40. She swallowed. A sour film reminded her of the banker’s warm latte.

  “Phoebe.” Jake leaned on the doorjamb of her study as though holding himself upright. His grey skin brought strokes and heart attacks to mind. “Wake up, Pheebs.”

  “I’m up.” She threw off the light blanket and stood so fast she became light-headed. “What’s wrong? Are you sick?”

  “The kids are here.”

  “Noah and Kate?” She touched a hand to her chest. “Are . . .” She didn’t know what to ask first.

  “Come.” He turned to walk away and then stopped. “I love you. You’re the blood running through my veins, sweetheart. You know, right?”

  Cancer. He’d brought them together to tell them. Please God. Give her strength. Let her hold up for him, for Kate and Noah. She took her husband’s hands and held them tight, kissing each one.

  “Of course I know.”

  They walked to Jake’s study. Kate and Noah sat side by side on the massive couch. The contrast between the rich red tapestry and her children’s bloodless, pinched faces tore at her chest. Jake fell into his chair, the soft brown leather worn to his shape, the matching hassock indented where he rested his feet as he read his endless thrillers. She took the wooden rocker. She sat slowly, feeling the easy ripple of the rocker moving with her weight.

  Please live, Jake.

  “Dad has something to tell us,” Kate said.

  “Right.” Phoebe kept her face calm even as her stomach folded like origami.

  “I have something to tell you,” Jake repeated. He twisted his wedding band in circles. “You’re not going to be happy.”

  “Rip off the Band-Aid, Dad,” Kate said.

  “This isn’t easy.” He looked out the window as though studying the skyline, avoiding Phoebe’s eyes, the way he did when he’d screwed up. “Explaining is almost impossible.”

  Phoebe crossed her arms. Forget cancer or a coronary, unless she tallied another woman under heart problems. If he thought he’d marry some mistress, a young trophy bitch, he’d better get rid of every knife in the house. Bastard.

  “Stop scaring Mom.” Noah turned to her. “The problem is business. We went into Dad’s office. Uncle Theo took us in after we went to him—”

  “We were worried, Dad.” Kate made a calming motion with her hand. “We wanted to talk to Uncle Theo about you taking money out of the brokerage account to—”

  Noah intervened. “We’re not questioning your authority, but—”

  “Enough.” Jake raised his hands, but instead of the flood of recriminations Phoebe expected, he covered his face and began sobbing.

  No. Dear God. Cancer was making him act crazy. Or another woman. He thought he was in love with some girl thirty years younger than him. Forty.

  Oh, but I also love you, Pheebs.

  She could just fucking hear him now.

  Noah put a hand on his father’s shoulder. Then he sank down and placed a hand on his knee. “Dad, you can talk to us.”

  Jake covered Noah’s hand with his own. “You’re a good boy. You’ve always been a good boy.”

  Cancer.

  “I . . .” Jake breathed deep enough to restart his heart. “Jesus, this is hard.”

  Kate perched forward. “Just say it, Dad.”

  Jake leaned back and looked up at the ceiling, his eyes not meeting theirs. “There’s no money,” he said. “Everything is gone.”

  Kate and Noah squinted as though Jake were crazy.

  “Gone?” Noah repeated Jake’s declaration as a question. “We lost our money? We—”

  “Not our money. Everybody’s money. Not lost. Not exactly. It was never there. I mean, it was there, but I never did anything with it.”

  “You’re not making any sense,” Noah said.

  This babbling—was prattling a stroke symptom? She tried to remember the signs.

  “I developed a . . . strategy. When things went south a while ago, I borrowed from Peter to pay Paul. I thought I’d catch up, but I couldn’t. I didn’t. Now almost nothing’s left. A strategy . . .” His words drifted away.

  “A strategy? Borrowing from Peter? Strategy? That’s a scheme, not strategy. That’s fraud.” Noah paced to the window and then circled back to the couch and Kate.

  “You raided clients’ accounts?” Kate whispered.

  “Not exactly,” Jake said.


  Someone had vacuumed out Phoebe’s blood and left this husk. “Then exactly what?” She shredded the fringe at the edge of the pillow in her lap.

  “There weren’t any accounts anymore. Just one big chunk of money.”

  “One big chunk? Gone? The investments can’t be completely gone. Those portfolios are packed with solid companies, Dad,” Noah said. “Something’s got to be there. I don’t understand. You’re not making any sense.”

  “Listen. There weren’t any investments,” Jake said. “Not anymore.”

  “You’re not making any sense!” Noah repeated the words with more emphasis, almost shouting as he pointed at Jake.

  “There were stocks once, but I sold them when things got bad. And then I covered them.”

  “Covered them how?” Noah asked.

  “With what we got from new investments.”

  “How long has this been going on?” Kate’s voice shook.

  Phoebe shivered as she tried to make sense of Jake’s words, the children’s questions.

  “I only need a few days. Next week I’m meeting with the lawyers—Gideon and his guys. He’s the best in New York. We’ll figure something out.”

  “How long, Dad?” Kate repeated.

  “Too long.” Jake bent over and mumbled to his shoes. “I’ll put everything right.”

  Kate pressed between her eyes. She placed her cup on the coffee table, rose, and marched to where Jake sat. He appeared suddenly shrunken and old.

  “Put it right?” Kate shook her hands at him. “Figure something out? You’re talking about a Ponzi scheme. That was your fucking scheme, Dad? That was your secret recipe? That was how you made the money soup? Jesus fucking Christ, there’s no making this right.”

  Forever she’d remember Kate swearing at Jake and him remaining silent.

  “A Ponzi scheme?” Phoebe asked.

  “A fraud. He paid his clients’ so-called profits with infusions from new investors. There was no profit. He just gathered more people to fleece. He never invested anything,” Kate said. “Dad’s a thief.”

  Jake lifted his head. “We still have some cash. I wrote out checks already for the people that matter. Listen, plenty of people made loads of profit before this.”

  “Can you hear how insane you sound? They profited ’cause you gave them someone else’s money!” Kate closed her eyes and shook her head before continuing. “Let’s get this totally straight. You took people’s money to pay other people. It was all made up.”

  Phoebe ripped at her palms with her nails.

  Concentrate.

  It was all gone?

  He stole it?

  Phoebe needed to focus. She forced herself to stare at the chair on which Jake sat. The needlework pillows her sister had made. “Why do you show that crap?” That’s how Jake talked about presents from her sister. But she’d fought him. She put out the pillows.

  Jake dredged up his in-charge face, trying to grasp control and retain his roar of ownership. “Not always. I’m not saying that. Problems came, and obstacles kept happening. I didn’t set out to do this thing.”

  “So how long? A month? A year? A decade?” Kate asked.

  Jake threw up his hands. “Not a month. Or a year.”

  “Longer?” Noah had been able to read his father since childhood.

  Jake remained silent until Noah repeated himself. “Longer, Dad?”

  “Much longer. Don’t you understand, Noah? Mom?” Kate shook her head in disgust. “He’s a criminal. We’ll be pulled down with him now that he’s told us.” She wrapped her hands around her upper arms. Her thinking posture. Phoebe tried to break free of her frozen coffin. Slivers of ice filled her throat.

  They all watched, waiting for Kate the analyzer, Kate the problem solver, to conjure magic. Finally, she opened her eyes. Unwrapped her arms. She stood. “We’re going, Noah. Come with us, Mom.”

  He stole money? He made it all up? Phoebe was locked in a conversation time delay as daughter Kate transformed into business Kate. Her daughter’s mind raced incessantly—didn’t Phoebe always say that about her girl?

  Kate placed a hand behind Noah’s back. Phoebe wanted to go with her competent daughter, her tender son. Walk away from this stranger.

  But look at Jake with his shaking hands. He looked like ashes.

  “I never meant for this to happen,” he said.

  “Who held the gun to your head?” Kate said.

  “I’ll make it better.” He turned to Phoebe. “I can fix this. I promise. Gideon’s the best lawyer in the field. He’ll know what to do.”

  “Mom, if Noah and I stay here, we’ll be accessories. Please. Come with us.”

  “You won’t be in any trouble, Pheebs. You’re my wife.”

  “How much did you put in her name, Dad?” Kate asked.

  “You think I’d hurt your mother?” Jake asked. “I never involved any of you.” He wept again, the sounds torn from his throat.

  “How can I leave your father all alone?” Phoebe choked out the words.

  Kate tipped her head. “Did you know about this?” she asked Phoebe.

  Phoebe touched her chest. “Oh my God, of course not.”

  “How could you think that?” Jake said.

  “How could I think it of you, Dad?” Kate put her arms around Phoebe and whispered, “Don’t take his side. Please.”

  “Oh, baby,” she murmured, “there are no sides.”

  Kate drew back. “There are only sides now.”

  Noah seemed lost. “This isn’t possible. How could you do this?”

  “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

  Noah went to Jake and took his hands. “Dad . . . Oh, Dad.”

  “Noah. We’re leaving now.”

  Tears ran down her son’s cheeks.

  Kate’s voice softened. “Come on, baby brother. Let’s go.”

  “Kate,” Jake said. “Please. Wait. Phoebe, talk to them.”

  “There’s a hurricane on the way.” Kate tugged Noah’s arm. “And we’re getting out of the path.”

  Phoebe didn’t move. Didn’t say a word. Kate was smart—smarter than any of them.

  Jake rose and came to the rocking chair. He clamped a hand on Phoebe’s shoulder, linking them, revolting her. His hand anchored her to horror.

  “I need a few days, that’s all. Just a few days,” Jake insisted. “I already called Gideon and made an appointment,” he repeated.

  He called a lawyer before he told us. Before he told me.

  As though reading her mind, Jake squeezed her shoulder. “I couldn’t tell you until it was under control. If Theo hadn’t brought the kids in, I wouldn’t have said anything.”

  “Theo knew?”

  “I told him yesterday. He said he’d wait until Monday.”

  “Wait until Monday?” Kate asked. “That’s what you told Uncle Theo? Might as well get him his own lawyer right now.”

  Phoebe began to speak and then pressed her mouth shut. She didn’t want to understand any more.

  “We’re leaving,” Kate said.

  Jake continued to press her into the chair. She shrugged his hand away and went to her children. Kate raked furrows through her hair in harsh wounding movements. Phoebe reached up and pulled down her girl’s arm. She wiped Noah’s tears. “Shah, shah,” she said as though speaking to an injured toddler.

  “This is a crucial moment, Mom.” Kate’s voice cracked. “Don’t put your head in the sand.”

  Her savvy daughter would protect Noah. Zach would watch out for Kate—her son-in-law would never abandon his wife.

  Jake slumped on the couch, a million years old.

  How could he do this? Who would take care of him?

  She stared at her husband. They’d been together since she was practically a child. She’d married as a girl. For better or worse.

  “I’ll call you later,” Phoebe said. “You’ll bring the girls for dinner.”

  “Mom, listen to what I’m saying. We’re never coming back.�
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  Phoebe hugged her rigid daughter. “No. You can’t make such a decision just like that.” She tried to gather Noah in her arms, but he backed away to his sister, and together they walked out.

  The front door closed.

  She turned to Jake. “What did you do? God in heaven, what did you do to us?”

  CHAPTER 26

  Phoebe

  Jake left the room without a word.

  Phoebe wandered through the ornate rooms, trying to think. She folded and refolded stacks of sweaters, her hands buried in drifts of soft cashmere. She cleared coffee cups and scrubbed the stain of Kate’s red lipstick from the china. On the terrace, she lifted her face to the stinging wind.

  Next came bourbon. For courage. For deadening. To face the next minute of her life.

  When Phoebe had finished the drink, and another, she found Jake. “You stole it all?” She hovered at the entrance to his study, gripping the edge of the ivory-colored doorjamb.

  Boxers sparred on the screen. Jake lay on the leather sofa, arms dangling, his fingers scraping the rug. He kept his eyes on the television, watching sweat-oiled men pound each other, and answered without looking at her. “The money you took out this morning was to cover all the checks I wrote. There’s almost nothing left after that.”

  “Checks? To whom?” She tightened her fingers around the crystal glass filled with ice and bourbon. Thin crystal. Expensive. Baccarat. Simply squeezing too hard might shatter it. Yesterday, if she so wished, just for fun, she could have thrown the entire set against the wall. Just to hear the crash of splintering glass could have been her pleasure for the day. Replacements were always available.

  What had she paid for this one glass? Two hundred? Three?

  “Checks for the people that matter,” Jake said.

  “Don’t they all matter?”

  “Sure. Everyone,” he muttered.

  Lies. All he told were lies.

  “What am I supposed to do?” He still spoke without looking at her. “Should I write a check to the richest clients, like Louis Klein, or your sister and Ben?”

  Her sister. She lowered herself to the edge of the leather chair with shaking legs.