by Holly Hart
146
53. INTERLUDE: QUENTIN PEARCE
“Nice little office, Mr. Carter,” Pearce says as the receptionist ushers him into the room.
“It does the job,” Tre says politely. “Thank you for coming on such short notice.”
Pearce shrugs. “My ears are always open. Although I very much hope this isn’t just a rehash of Mr. Talbot’s speech against the sale, only coming from your mouth this time.”
Tre motions for him to take a seat, then takes his own.
“Definitely not,” he says. “In fact, I was hoping to talk to you about what might occur after the sale.”
Pearce raises an eyebrow. “After? So you believe the Sullivans will sell?”
“Let’s just say it’s in my best interests to be prepared for every eventuality.”
“Forgive me if I’m a bit confused – aren’t you the head cheerleader on Team Talbot?”
Tre flashes an annoyed look. It’s enough to make Pearce sit forward in his chair.
“We haven’t been seeing eye to eye lately on the future of the company,” he says. “Chance has made some… questionable decisions.”
“Marrying Sara Bishop for one, I assume,” Pearce says, standing to peruse the various certificates on the wall beside Tre’s desk. “Hm. Harvard. Good for you.”
“Thanks. As for Sara, it’s their personal decision to make. That said, it has definitely taken Chance’s head out of the game for several days now.”
“Leaving you as president to run things in his absence,” Pearce says. “But I imagine you’re used to that, with him flying around the world and parachuting into war zones and all that.”
“I keep the lights on, yes. I’m quite good at it.”
“Mr. Carter, let’s cut to the chase, if you’ll pardon the expression. You’re hoping that, in the event of a change of ownership, you’ll still have a role in the company.”
Tre shrugs. “In a nutshell, yes. I have no stock in Atlas, so I rely on my salary to pay my bills. And please, call me Tre.”
Pearce turns to face him, hands clasped behind his back. He attempt a sincere smile, and almost pulls it off.
“Well, Tre, I for one appreciate your business acumen. In fact, from what I’ve been able to glean, Atlas owes a great deal of the success of its expansion to your shrewd mind.”
“I could bring that same mind to the new owners, if they’ll have me. Assuming it comes to that.”
“Oh, it will come to that, I assure you.”
“How can you know for sure?”
Pearce pulls the chair closer to Tre’s desk and sits again. When he speaks, he leans forward on his elbows on the edge of the desk and lowers his voice.
“I’ll tell you what I told the Sullivans at a meeting in my office earlier today,” he says.
“The Sullivans were at Empire?” Tre asks, eyes narrowing. “For what reason?”
“Therein lies a tale,” says Pearce, smiling genuinely for the second time in a day.
147
54. CHANCE
“Ta da!” I say as I pull the cloche off the china dish. “Lunch is served.”
Sara’s grin lights me up inside. It’s exactly the reaction I was hoping for.
“You did not,” she says. “Seriously? Is this the real thing?”
“I can show you the blue box in the recycling, if you want.”
I pull a wooden spoon from behind my back and hand it to her, prompting a giggle.
“You thought of everything,” she says, pretending to swoon. “Be still my heart.”
I take my own spoon and dig into my mac and cheese. The taste hasn’t changed one iota since the last time I had it as a kid.
“I should buy stock in Kraft,” I say, savoring the sharp taste of it.
“Mmmm,” Sara moans though a mouthful of macaroni. “So good.”
“So,” I say. “Any luck convincing Grace we don’t need a party?”
“I at least got her to scale it back. Just us, Tre and the Sullivans. Kelsey, I guess.”
“Don’t forget Tre’s mom.”
She snaps her fingers. “Right! I’ll have to get her number from you.”
I pull out my phone to look it up just in time for it to ring in my hand. The caller ID shows Agnes’s contact info.
“Speak of the devil,” I say by way of greeting. “We were just talking about inviting you and the family to a party.”
“Chance, we need to talk,” she says gravely.
What’s this about? I’ve never known Agnes to skip the pleasantries – she’s too much of a lady for that.
“Of course,” I say. “What’s up?”
She recounts her meeting with Quentin Pearce earlier in the day. My blood temperature goes up one degree for every word, until I’m boiling over by the end of it. Sara’s eyebrows go up as she looks over at the expression on my face.
“You don’t believe it, do you?” I ask.
“I don’t know what to believe, Chance. I mean, your sudden wedding, the questions I’ve always had about the expansion capital…”
“Agnes, I don’t want to go into this on the phone, but believe this much right now: Patrick was the greatest man I’ve ever known. I consider him my father. He wasn’t a criminal and I would never have betrayed him.”
“I just… I just don’t know. Pearce started talking about the Department of Defense. Would he really call them in?”
The DoD. Jesus, just like I feared.
“Can you give me a day?” I ask. “Two at most. I need to get some things taken care of, and then we can meet.”
“I don’t know…”
“Agnes, I can explain it all. But not right now, not on the phone.”
She sighs. “All right, Chance. Two days, no longer. That only leaves a handful of days until the sale. One way or the other, the board will have an answer for Pearce on that day.”
“That’s all I ask,” I say.
“Good luck, Chance,” she says.
“Thanks, Agnes. I’ll talk to you soon.”
Sara’s bursting to talk as I click off the phone.
“What’s going on?” she asks, eyes wide. “Why were you talking about Sully being a criminal? And you betraying him?
I bring her up to speed on Pearce’s twisted narrative.
“Shit,” she breathes. “He really will resort to anything to push this deal through.”
“And I still don’t know why!” I say, exasperated.
“You said you think he’s going to flip Atlas to someone who wants to buy influence. I think I can confirm that theory – when I listened in on his call that day, he was talking to someone about getting dirt on you.”
“You think it was the buyer?”
“Not the buyer,” she says. “At least, not by the way he was talking to the guy, like he was a piece of shit on his shoe. He mentioned the guy’s uncle being involved.”
I nod. That would explain quite a bit. But what Sara hasn’t asked yet is how someone could have come up with that story that Pearce is spinning. It’s just close enough to the truth to cast doubt on everything. Where did it come from?
“All right,” I say. “Can you give me any more detail? Did Pearce use a name?”
“No, they just used the term ‘partner.’ But I’ll never forget the guy’s voice: he had a New Jersey accent so thick, he could have been Snooki’s boyfriend.”
New Jersey? Why does that spark an itch in the back of my mind?
Sara sighs. “This is a nightmare. I was already jumpy enough as it was. When I was walking home before lunch, I thought a guy walking his dog was actually following me.”
I arch an eyebrow. “Why’s that?”
"He kept ending up behind me somehow, even after he’d passed me. Happened twice.”
“Stay here,” I say. It sounds like an order – I should probably work on that if I’m going to be a married man.
“What are you doing?” she asks as I stalk toward the front of the house. The blinds are closed in
the huge living room window, so I drop to the floor and open them a crack at the bottom corner.
Sure enough, there’s a black car across the street with two guys in dark suits.
“Shit,” I mutter.
“What?”
“There’s a car across the street. Department of Defense is watching the house. That crazy bastard actually looped them into this.”
Sara blinks for a few moments. “Are you sure there’s not another explanation? Maybe they’re just regular people.”
“In a government issue Chev and black suits with sunglasses?”
“Oh. Shit.”
“We have to get out of here. I can’t do anything to figure this out if I’m in a holding cell.”
She bites her lip. “Do you really think it’ll come to that?”
“I don’t know,” I say. “And I really don’t want to find out.”
148
55. SARA
This is literally the craziest thing I’ve ever done, and I’ve done plenty of crazy things.
“You expect me to jump to your neighbor’s roof from here?”
“Front and back doors aren’t an option, and we can’t tunnel out,” Chance says. “I’m open to other options, if you’ve got any.”
We’re both hunkered below the low wall that surrounds the greystone’s rooftop patio. There’s a little more cover from the trees, but we probably have only a couple of seconds once we stand up. We have to sprint and then leap the ten feet or so between us and the house next door.
“Have faith in yourself,” he says. “I’m sure Kelsey trained you well.”
“Yeah, and what if she didn’t? I drop three stories to the ground and then the DoD hauls what’s left of me away, that’s what.”
He puts a hand on my shoulder. “Which leg is your strongest?”
“I don’t know!” I whisper-shout. “I’ve never tested them against each other!”
“You’re left-handed, so it’s likely your left.”
“Wait, what if it’s not?”
He smiles. “Have some faith in yourself.”
“Okay, but you go first. I need you there to catch me if I don’t make it.”
He frowns, thinking it over.
“All right,” he says. “It’s time.”
I take a deep breath. He knows damn well I’m afraid of heights. He took me to a train bridge in Philly once and tried to get me to climb up. I told him to kiss my ass.
Now he’s my husband. Go figure.
He points to the area where we’re going to launch from. It’s a drain well, so we won’t have to step up onto the wall in order to get across. He shoulders the pack he brought with him onto his back.
He nods. I nod.
Next thing I know, my hand is gripped in his and he’s pulling me forward. My heart races as my pupils dilate – he’s taking me with him! I pump my knees to match his speed as we cross the space to the edge in under two seconds. I make sure to push off with my left leg.
“You asshole!” I hiss as we launch across the divide between houses, trying to position our legs in front of us for the landing. We hit the gravel with our heels as the momentum pitches us forward into a barrel roll.
We lie there on our backs, looking up at the sky and panting.
“Sorry,” he says before I can scream at him. “But we both know I would’ve jumped and you wouldn’t have. Besides, that was romantic.”
“You can forget everything I said about post-wedding blowjobs,” I say. “Starting right now.”
We manage to shimmy down a tree and reach the backyard gate. Chance double-checks the coast is clear before he pulls a key from behind a false brick on the façade of the neighbor’s garage.
“How did you know that was there?” I ask.
“People tend to tell me things when they find out what I do for a living,” he says, opening the door. “Like they feel the need to brag about their own security to me.”
There’s a late-model Range Rover and Toyota Rav-4 parked inside. Chance opens the driver’s door on the Toyota.
“Get in,” he says.
“Not the Range Rover?” I ask, doing as I’m told. “But you’re rich.”
He gives me a sardonic grin. “Good one. There are thousands of Rav-4s in Chicago. Not so many Range Rovers.”
“How are you going to drive it? Something this new can’t be hotwired.”
“With this,” he says, producing a key fob from his pocket. “I ghosted his radio-frequency identification signals the day he brought it home, for just such an occasion.”
I blink at him. “Of course,” I say. “I do that all the time. Twice on Sundays, sometimes.”
He shrugs. “It’s sort of in my job description.”
The garage door whirs behind us and he pulls out into the alley. There aren’t any surveillance vehicles that I can see, but that doesn’t mean they’re not there. Luckily, the brilliant afternoon sun will make seeing through the Rav’s windows difficult for anyone who might be looking in our direction.
“Where are we going?” I ask as we pull into traffic on Southport. “If they’re watching your – our – house, chances are good they’ve got eyes on your bank accounts and the Atlas offices.”
“That’s what the pack is for. Emergency cash and supplies.”
“So you’re whisking us off to your secret billionaire hideaway then?”
“Sorry,” he says. “That only happens in cheesy romance novels.”
“I stand by my earlier blowjob comment,” I say as we drive toward whatever the hell fate has in store for us next.
149
56. SARA
Chance drops a bag of fast food onto the round table with the wobbly leg as I emerge from the musty shower in the bathroom. Turns out fate had a $50-a-night room in the Rest-All Motel near Grant Park in store for us.
“If I didn’t know better, I’d think I was still on my honeymoon,” I say, toweling off my newly-blonde hair. Chance is lucky – he can just wear a ball cap to cover his.
“Nothing but the best for my gal,” he grins as he pulls the burgers and fries out of the bag. “I even got you the supersize fries.”
I fan myself with my hand to show he’s making me hot. It actually feels good against my steaming skin – at least there’s plenty of hot water here. Chance dives into his food as I sort through the clothes we picked up on a Walmart stop before we got here. I choose a tank top and pair of yoga pants before sitting down across from him.
“What’s our next move?” I ask, picking at my fries. I don’t have much of an appetite right now. Too much going on in my head.
“I wish I knew,” he says. “Obviously I have to clear my name, but I’m open to suggestions on how we go about that.”
I frown. Usually I can fake it till I make it, but right now, I got nothing.
“Where do you think Pearce got that story about embezzling and blackmail?” I ask. “It sounds a lot like what you told me, except a lot less flattering to you and Sully. But there’s enough truth to it that he must have gotten it from someone in the know.”
He shakes his head. “There were rumors before the operation about a financier in Mosul. And it wasn’t a secret that Sully and I took out that terrorist cell. But to draw the two together would be a stretch. Unless…”
I raise my eyebrows. “Unless what?”
“Hm?” he says, distracted. “Oh. Nothing. Just eliminating scenarios.”
Why don’t I believe him?
“Just remembered something,” he says, reaching into a white plastic bag. He pulls out a small box and slides it across the table to me.
“What’s this?”
“Burner phone for each of us. I’ve already pulled the SIMs from our mobiles so we can’t be tracked.”
I open the box to see a generic black smartphone. The number is on a white sticker plastered across the front. For some reason, this prompts a little thrill to run through me.
“I feel like Jason Bourne,” I say, grinning in spite
of myself. “Or Janice Bourne. Or whatever. You know what I mean.”
He indulges me with a grin of his own.
“It is kind of cool,” he says. “Knowing we can’t go outside without the possibility of someone catching us. The stakes are high.”
“And hiding out in a sleazy motel is kind of awesome, too. Especially after the Sapphire and Bora Bora.” I shake my head. “God, I’m sick.”
“If you’re sick, then I am, too,” he says. “Your hair looks great, by the way.”
“Would you recognize me if you saw me on the street?”
“Sara, I’d still recognize you if I was blind.”
Awww….
I stand up and move to the queen-sized bed with the royal blue coverlet where I’ve laid out my clothes.
“Remember what I said before?” I say, opening my robe to him. “About rescinding my blowjob comments?”
“Uh-huh,” he says, eyes wide.
“Maybe I was too hasty.”
I take his hands and pull him toward me. He’s under my robe instantly, stroking my damp, naked skin as I unzip his cargo shorts.
150
57. SARA
“That wasn’t exactly keeping a low profile,” Chance sighs.
I nod. “But there was something so… I don’t know, dirty about such a squeaky bed. I mean, knowing that everyone around us could hear us. It was such a turn-on. And, to be honest – it kind of reminded me of the old cot in the rec center storeroom.”
He grins and rolls on his side to face me.
“No wonder you were even more energetic than usual,” he says. “If that’s possible.”
“Like I say, I’ve got a lot of time to make up for.”
I throw on the tank and yoga pants and take a seat at the table. I’ve finally worked up the appetite for my burger.
“I wish this place had a microwave to warm this up in,” I grouse.
“I’ll go get you a fresh one,” says Chance, pulling on his own clothes.
“You don’t have to. It’s fine.”
He holds up a hand. “Not another word. I’ll be back in a couple minutes with a fresh double cheese, hold the tomatoes, extra onion.”
