by Dale Mayer
“That’s got to be hard to work under those circumstances,” Anders said.
She nodded. “Yes. It’s extremely uncomfortable.”
“We can go now if you want,” North said.
She looked at him in surprise. “How long will the MI6 men be here for?”
“Probably another few hours, but your vehicle is free and clear. We can go if you’d like.”
She stood. “I do like. That would help a lot if I could at least clear some of this off, and I can reassure myself I have a job to go to come Monday.” She leaned over, kissed her granddad on the temple and said, “Now you look after yourself. Anders will keep watch for you.”
Her grandfather chuckled. “That’s fine. I’ll look after Anders.”
Anders threw himself into the chair she had vacated and said, “He’s looking after me just fine.” He reached across the small table for a large scone. He held it up and then took a bite.
Nikki sighed. “You know you’re supposed to open them, and put butter and jam on the halves, right?”
He looked at her in surprise and then took the knife, opened his scone and proceeded to cover both sides with a thick layer of butter.
She watched in fascination. “You don’t do anything in half measures, do you?”
He shrugged and then protested, “First you don’t like that I eat it without butter. Then you don’t like the amount of butter I put on it.”
She groaned, turned around, grabbed North’s arm and said, “Let’s go.” Over her shoulder, she called out, “We won’t be long.”
He wrapped an arm around her as they walked to the front door. When they stepped out, Jonas was on the sidewalk, talking to another man. Jonas looked up at the two of them. North directed her down the steps and toward Jonas’s side. “We want to head up to her corporate office. She has some paperwork and whatnot she needs to take in.”
Jonas considered it for a moment, his foot tapping the cement. “Fine. But, if you see anything unusual, you call me directly. You hear me?”
“Sure. But what do you expect us to find?” she asked in confusion.
“Considering it’s your company that brought in these vials, I can’t say what we’re expecting to find. Just anything out of the ordinary.”
She gave a light shrug and nodded. “I can do that.”
As they walked away, Jonas called out, “Never mind. I’ll send a man with you.” He spun around and said, “Dan, I want you to go with these two to her office. Take a look around, get some photos, and, if anything is unusual, report back to me.”
A tall lanky man walked to where they stood and asked, “What vehicle are we going in?”
She pointed to her small car.
He nodded. The three of them got in, and she slowly drove through town to where the offices were.
She parked on the street and said, “Nobody will be here because it’s a Saturday.” She walked into the main lobby and used her key to get in the office door. “We used to have a big office, but now we’re down to just a few of us. And, of course, with the owner being sick, if the business doesn’t get sold, chances are it’ll just fade away into nothing soon.”
“For that to happen, you have to stop taking orders and shipping and receiving them.”
She nodded. “I suspect that’s what the office staff has been doing, shutting things down.” She walked into a small room and stopped, studying it. “It still looks the same, just two desks, two computers, both laptops, chairs. Not a whole lot else.”
Dan stepped forward and asked, “Is this normal?”
“It is, considering we’re eking out an existence,” she said with a fatalistic tone. “It’s all over with but locking the door.”
“I need the owner’s address,” Dan said. He pulled out a notepad. “How can we reach him?”
She gave Dan the admin’s name and number. “She works at his house with him, and we communicate back and forth.”
“Is this office even needed?”
North spoke up. “I don’t see how it could be. No paperwork is on their desks. What do they do all day?” He turned one laptop around, lifted the lid and turned it on. As soon as it loaded, there was no login, nothing. It just popped up with the desktop, and he checked some documents there and any history of use. “They’ve logged in like hundreds of hours of solitaire.”
“And probably playing games online,” she admitted. “The last time I was in here, they said they were running out of work and didn’t know how much longer they would keep this job.”
“Nobody has logged in since Wednesday on this one. There have been no users since Wednesday,” he corrected.
“They might have taken Thursday and Friday off,” she said. “I don’t know. Things have been a little crazy for me for the last few days.”
He nodded. “That’s true enough, but we need to talk to them ourselves.” He turned to look at her. “What number do you call to talk to them?”
She pulled out her phone, hit a few buttons and a small phone sitting off to the side rang.
“So you’re still using landlines instead of cell phones for each of them?” North asked.
Nikki nodded.
“When did you last call here?” Dan asked.
She stopped and thought about it. “I think it was just in the last couple days.” With her phone out, she checked through for the admin’s name. She hit Dial. When a woman answered on the other end, Nikki said, “Hey, it’s me. I wonder if the guys are in the office these days.”
Hannah laughed on the other end of the phone. “There’s only one now. The other one got another job a week ago, and I don’t know when Tyler was in last.”
“Are we still functioning as a business?” Nikki asked in surprise. “Are they taking orders, or are we only completing the ones we have?”
“They’ve been completing the ones we have, and most of those are done now. Just the last couple coming in.”
“So how much longer do we have?” Nikki turned to look around the office in confusion.
“Maybe two weeks max,” Hannah said.
“Is the business that close to being done?” she cried out. “How come nobody told me?”
“We thought you knew,” Hannah said in confusion. “You know the business is ready to shut down.”
“Yes, but, last time we spoke, you said it was for sale.”
“Sure, but it’s been for sale for months now with no interest. Without any orders coming in and no shipments, there is nothing to sell,” she said. “I didn’t speak to anybody in the office the last couple days, so I don’t know who all has been there. Why does it matter?”
“If they’re drawing a paycheck, you would hope they’re showing up to work.”
“Oh, well, Tyler is only drawing a paycheck for next week. We were hoping you could finish the last of the orders.”
“And what about the double shipment I went to check on?”
“Yes, what about it? We do need to get that one sorted out before we shut the doors. We can’t have a big mistake like that hanging over our heads.”
“Good point. And how is Nathan?” Nikki asked suddenly. “I know you’re really close to him.”
Hannah cried lightly. “He is … He is not in a good way. I don’t think he has more than a couple months. If that.”
“Oh, dear. I’m so sorry,” Nikki said. “I gather then I don’t have a job at the end of next week.”
“Yes. Unfortunately that’s the way it looks. I’m trying to shut things down at this end. There is a severance package for you when it’s done,” she rushed to say. “So it’s not like you’ll be completely out in the cold.”
Nikki could hear the loss in Hannah’s voice and realized her relationship with Nathan was much closer than Nikki had first thought. “I’m so sorry. This is obviously a very difficult time for you.”
Hannah rallied slightly. “It’s much harder for Nathan. He’s not ready to go.”
Nikki looked over at Dan and North. North was shaking his he
ad. “Okay. Well, let me see if I can tidy up this final issue, and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.” Leaving Hannah weeping gently, Nikki hung up her phone and groaned. “Apparently the owner is almost gone, and one of the guys working here in the office found another job, left a week ago. The other one, Tyler, is due to work here through the end of next week. Hannah is not sure if he showed up Thursday or Friday, and I don’t think she particularly cares. We have just one or two final shipments. I didn’t even mention the nightmare at the warehouse. What do you want me to do?”
“You might want to consider how the warehouse section that’s yours is still really full. What’s happening with all of that?”
She stared at him in surprise. “You’re right. All of that material needs to be moved out.” She phoned Hannah back, but there was no answer. Frowning, she put away her phone. “She is not answering.”
“We should go back to the warehouse and take a look at what products are still sitting there,” he said slowly. “Maybe somebody else is using that part of the warehouse designated as Emporium’s, or maybe the other company, the subleasee, has sprawled their stuff over on your side.”
She walked to the laptop that was booted up and looked around at its desktop. Then she spun around and pulled out all the drawers to the nearby filing cabinet. “Even the physical files are gone.”
Just then Hannah called her back. “I missed your call. What’s up?”
“When I was in the warehouse last, there was still a lot of product on the shelves.”
“No, no, no,” Hannah said. “None of that is ours. The other company who leases space needed more room temporarily. So I told him that they could sprawl a little bit, until Emporium was sold or the company closed down. The five-year lease on the place is almost up, and they were looking to take the whole thing over.”
“And no files are in the cabinets here anymore.”
“No, I’ve gone through and brought everything back here. Most of the files have been closed. All the suppliers and the vendors were told the company is going out of business.”
“And you did that recently?”
“Last week,” Hannah admitted. “Nathan just wants to find peace by putting it all to rest. It was his company for so long, but, with nobody to pass it on to, I think he wants to know he has cleaned off everything on his plate and has tidied it all up so there’s nothing left in a mess when he goes.”
After saying goodbye to Hannah, Nikki turned and explained to the guys how the business stood.
“In that case, we need to return to the warehouse,” North said. “We have to find out exactly what’s happening there.”
She nodded. “But none of that product is ours legally.”
“Sure,” Dan said. “But, if you think about it, at least three of the men who worked there are now dead. I’ll get clearance, and we’ll go take a look.”
*
North drove from the corporate office to the warehouse. He’d never seen a business slowly run down to nothing, but he could see how it could happen if a vibrant and strong owner suddenly faded with a crippling disease; then everything fell apart. Particularly if the one boss managed everything and if it wasn’t a terribly large enterprise to begin with. Nathan had limped along for a while, but obviously his business was at the end stages of death, like its owner. And it was too easy for others to step in and to take advantage.
North had to admit that he wondered if Hannah had taken advantage of Nathan’s health condition and was doing something on the side herself. He was relieved to consider the fact that it was more than likely the subleasee that had been utilizing some of the warehouse space and was now spreading out, taking over the rest of the warehouse space. If there was nothing left in the warehouse that belonged to Nikki’s company, or very little, then North needed to take a closer look at the rest of the products there. Were they also fake shipments of goods with the real commodities buried underneath?
The vehicle was silent inside the whole way to the warehouse. North could sense Nikki’s fidgety nervousness. Who wanted to consider any of the people you worked with closely were taking advantage of Nathan’s impending death?
“How well did you know the men who worked in the corporate office?” Dan asked.
It was a good question. North didn’t think he himself had asked her that yet.
“I’ve worked with them for five years,” she said. “We’ve been a tight-knit family for all that time. Nathan’s disease was quite shocking. We thought he’d be away just for a few months, and he’d be back strong, running the company again. But instead it appears to have been exactly the opposite,” she said sadly.
She tried to explain the setup and how it had deteriorated for Dan’s sake. North had heard most of it before so wasn’t learning anything new.
“So you really don’t have a job after next Friday?” North asked at one point.
“Apparently not.” Staring out the window, her voice was sad. “Hannah might have said something to me earlier, but I could’ve been just in a state of denial. I don’t know. She seemed to think she had. But then everybody has been slowly disappearing on me, so I wasn’t exactly trying to source out the truth of the matter. I was just hoping it would all go away.”
“How is that working out for you?” North asked with a note of amusement in his voice.
“Obviously not so good,” she snapped. “Hannah did say there was a severance package for me though, that I won’t be completely out in the cold as of Friday.”
“That’s generous.”
“It probably would have been a lot more generous if Nathan had sold the business. As it is, this way there’s nothing but a small package.”
Just then they turned onto the street lining up to the warehouse. “Pull into the same parking lot as before, if that’s okay with you,” he said.
“Yes, that’s fine,” she said. “Hopefully there’ll be lots of room. It is a weekend.”
Some of the parking lot spaces were filled, but there was definitely a spot to pull into. They got out, and he locked up the vehicle, and they strode toward the warehouse. “What do you want to guess,” he said to Dan, “a new welcoming party or the building’s empty?”
“The order was placed through London Emporium, but then, instead of it being delivered to Only the Best’s stores, Booker & Sons took possession and moved it through their own network. At least that’s how I see this going down. Now whether Only the Best was the end destination, I don’t know.” Dan turned to Nikki. “How many men threatened you the first time?”
“Two. Carl and Phillip. I don’t know if anyone else was there in the back of the warehouse though.”
“Willy was.” Dan glanced at North. “And when you came here with Anders?”
“Just the first two men again. At least as far as I could tell.”
“So either new muscle or no muscle,” Dan said smoothly.
They walked up to the side door. Nikki found it wasn’t locked, and she pushed it open, stepping inside. “If it’s not locked, then somebody should be here.” There was a harsh echo to the place, as if it was empty. She walked over to the warehouse office, used her key and unlocked that door. She stepped inside. “Nothing has been disturbed in here.”
Dan walked around and said, “We might take that laptop with us when we go though.”
She shrugged. “I’m not even sure Stan knows he’s got no job.” And then she stopped. “Hey, that makes no sense.” She pulled out her phone and dialed somebody. “Hannah, what about Stan from the warehouse? When is his job ending?”
“Well, the warehouse is empty, so he’s done next Friday too. Honestly he probably won’t even be there all week because, if we don’t have any product, there’s no point.”
“I wonder how often Stan has been here this last week,” she said quietly.
“If there hasn’t been anything for him to do, then there hasn’t really been any reason for him to be there, is there?” Then, all of a sudden, Hannah seemed to clue in. “W
hy? Is there a problem?”
“Maybe,” Nikki said. “I’ll check it out further, then let you know. But maybe you should contact Stan and confirm when and how often he has been in here. And let him know it’s okay if he hasn’t been around very much, just so we get the truth.”
“Stan has worked for the company for twenty years. He was looking forward to retiring, but I knew he would be there right to the bitter end,” Hannah said.
“I’m not implying anything other than that at all,” Nikki said hurriedly.
North listened to the rest of the conversation and realized just how splintered off the company had been as everybody saw the inevitable end come toward them. North walked out of the office, crossed to the other office and checked that it was locked. It was.
Dan looked at him and said, “What do you think?”
“I think we should do a quick search to double-check that we are actually alone, and then I suggest we open that other office.”
Both men splitting up, Dan went left, and North went right, leaving Nikki at the first office.
North slipped along the far right against the wall as he went down row after row after row of goods, watching them all as he passed, going from one to the other. He didn’t walk up and down the aisles but crossed at the end so he could see if anybody was in the aisles. Once he made it to the other side, he came along the edge, noting the multitude of packing crates and boxes. He didn’t take any time to stop and check to see what was in them. That was another issue altogether. Maybe this company was on the up-and-up, and somebody else was just utilizing their facilities as well.
There were so many ways for somebody to take advantage here that North didn’t want to jump to any conclusions. He watched as Dan came around the corner; then they slowly walked toward each other. There didn’t appear to be anybody here, but North didn’t trust that initial conclusion. He frowned, his footsteps slowing as he came to where the crates had been unloaded.
