Terminal Reaction

by Dawn Marsanne

  He found a parking place near to the river and walked down to their arranged meeting spot. He selected a bench and took a draught of his bottled water. Despite not eating anything all day he couldn’t fancy any food, his anxiety had taken his appetite. His guts were churning and before leaving work he’d had to visit to the toilet to evacuate his bowels, such had been the shock. He checked his phone for messages from Annabelle but there were none, all he could do was wait and hope she wouldn’t be a long time. He needed her comforting presence.

  After what seemed ages but was in fact only just over five minutes he spotted Annabelle walking swiftly towards him. She was dressed smartly in a dark suit with a brightly coloured blue and black patterned blouse. He raised his hand in greeting as soon as he spotted her in the distance and the gesture was returned. As she approached the bench he stood to embrace her. Annabelle kissed him but he felt a slight stiffening in her body, he received a hug but it was much more reserved than usual.

  ‘Annabelle, how glad I am to see you,’ said Brett, sounding fraught reaching for her hand as they sat on the bench, his body turned at an angle towards her.

  ‘Tell me what happened right from the start,’ she said, ‘I had trouble getting my head round what you said you were speaking so hurriedly and so clearly agitated.’

  ‘Agitated, I was completely ballistic,’ shouted Brett, ‘I’ve been completely shafted by some fucking bastard and when I find out who it is I’m going to personally kill him with my bare hands!’

  ‘Look, let’s just hear what’s been happening, you’re going to have a stroke at this rate. I don’t want to say calm down as that will only annoy you more but we need to keep our heads. We need to work on what we can do and come up with a plan,’ advised Annabelle assuming a professional level headed air.

  ‘Yes, yes, sorry, it’s just been a shock,’ and Brett proceeded to give Annabelle an account of the meeting of the FCA with the senior team and then his individual interview with them when they dropped their bombshell.

  Annabelle was cool and collected throughout but he could tell from subtle changes in her body language that the charges were serious and that she was shocked by what he was telling her. After speaking for what must have been an uninterrupted five minutes he finally paused. ‘I’m really up shit creek with this one. I need to prove my innocence otherwise I’m going to be charged and face a court case. Insider dealing can result in a custodial sentence!’

  ‘Listen, listen, you’ve had an initial interview. You’re not guilty and you’ve been the victim of identity theft. Try not to think that you’re going to be locked up without a trial. You’re in shock and you need to go through all the details with a good lawyer so that together they can create a defence. You told me that someone had been using your credit card. It’s obviously not the postman who’s been up to no good. It’s someone far more professional and once you’ve calmed down you need to work out who it was and how it happened.’

  ‘I’ve already thought about it and haven’t come to any conclusion. I just don’t get it,’ and Brett leaned forward with his head in his hands. ‘I just feel at breaking point. There’s so much going on at the company to keep on top of, and now this. I’m going to have a nervous breakdown.’

  Annabelle stroked his back through his jacket and they sat in silence.

  ‘So can you represent me?’ asked Brett.

  ‘Look, don’t be angry but that’s just not possible, I’m sorry. It wouldn’t be professional. We’re in a relationship. But I can certainly see if I can recommend anyone.’

  ‘Oh, I see,’ said Brett, tersely.

  ‘Look, it’s not because I don’t want to, it’s not really my area after all. But I’ll give it some thought and get back to you later.’

  ‘Wait a minute!’ shouted Brett. ‘Have you heard of Emma Pearson?’

  ‘Er, vaguely, but I can’t quite place the name, why who is she?’

  ‘She’s the wife of someone I used to know, he was my predecessor at BioQex, but I’ve known him personally for a long time, it’s a bit of a long story. But his wife’s a solicitor, she works at, oh, I don’t know, something like Brigg something.’

  ‘ You mean Brigstock and Wellman, yes, I’ve heard of them, they specialise in corporate and company law, employment law that sort of thing. They’ve taken on some high profile cases recently although I doubt in the actual field of insider dealing, I don’t think it’s that common here, probably concentrated in the city.’

  ‘Well Matt, Emma’s husband asked me for a drink on Friday, that’s who I was meeting up with and he mentioned that he’d spotted something odd in the share price movements.’

  ‘What, he’d noticed it, and you didn’t?’ asked Annabelle.

  ‘Well he’s doing an MBA and interested in things like that, after all, I am trying to direct the science at the BioQex, you know, it’s not exactly an easy job,’ he said sarcastically.

  Annabelle raised her eyebrow at this remark rather than rising to the bait.

  ‘Sorry, I’m just upset,’ apologised Brett. ‘I’ll give her a call this afternoon and let’s hope she can get me out of this shit.’ He looked at his watch. ‘Look, I’ll come round this evening, we can chat more, I better get back to work now and see whether I’m being suspended. That would just about put the lid on it,’ he said.

  They kissed briefly and went their separate ways. Despite still feeling very anxious Brett actually felt he now had a plan. He just hoped it was a good one.

  Chapter 26

  Bob McKewan had been asked by Piers to pop in to see him on Monday afternoon. Piers had previously told him that the FCA was due to visit that morning and Bob had seen the two visitors and the extremely stressed senior team buzzing about the building. He himself had been busy that morning finalising the calculations for the clinical trial scheduled for later that week. He’d been struggling that morning due to a pounding headache brought on by a copious consumption of whisky the previous evening. Despite ignoring several calls from his daughter he’d finally answered the phone in the evening. Her repeated entreaties that he should ask for counselling or join a bereavement support group had resulted in him reaching for support in the shape of a twelve-year-old single malt. Generally, he’d been a moderate drinker, he and Joan enjoying wine with a meal at weekends. Once he’d started on the bottle of whisky he’d found the comfort it gave was addictive and when he woke on the sofa after midnight he found that nearly half the bottle had disappeared. After that, sleep had proved fitful and he’d awoken drained and regretful. Breakfast had consisted solely of tea and painkillers and after a slight improvement in his headache mid-morning, it had now returned with increased intensity. The last thing he felt like was listening to Piers’ flowery language but at the same time he wanted to hear directly about the visit of the Financial Conduct Authority and Bob was seriously worried that the company had become embroiled in a potentially damaging situation.

  ‘Come,’ shouted Piers in his usual tone as Bob knocked firmly on his office door.

  ‘Ah, Bob, come in come in,’ and he looked fixedly at Bob’s grey pallor. ‘Do take a pew,’ he said, another of his phrases Bob remarked to himself. Well, whatever had transpired it hadn’t been enough for him to forget his somewhat affected language in Bob’s opinion.

  ‘Are you feeling OK, you look rather, er, peaky?’ said Piers tactfully.

  ‘Fine thank you,’ came the reply, ‘why, do you think otherwise?’

  ‘No, no, just thought you looked a bit pale that’s all,’ and Piers waited for a response which was not forthcoming. ‘Not sure what you’ve heard on the grapevine if anything but the FCA meeting this morning was very serious indeed.’

  ‘I don’t listen to gossip,’ replied Bob in a rather superior manner, ‘how exactly was it serious?’

  ‘It seems, and this must not go any further at all than these four walls,’ and he paused for an acknowledgement from his colleague, ‘that a person has been leaking company information, you know, new
s about milestones reached and so on. And that they’ve done it in order to manipulate the share price, and this is the real shocker, that person is currently employed here.’

  Piers paused so that Bob could absorb his shattering announcement.

  ‘Not that new lass, Melanie?’ asked Bob.

  ‘No, not Melanie, but Brett.’

  ‘Ha! I knew it,’ exclaimed Bob, slapping his leg, ‘always felt that bugger was a wrong un,’ and suddenly Bob’s mood lifted, his headache no longer seemed quite so dominating, ‘well I hope you’ve suspended the bastard?’

  ‘No, and we aren’t going to, it would look like we have lost faith in him and I firmly believe that he’s the victim of some dreadful conspiracy.’

  ‘Conspiracy my elbow, there’s something not right about that bloke,’ contributed Bob, ‘he’s too smarmy for my liking.’

  ‘Bob, Bob, I feel a slight prejudice creeping in now, I know you’ve not seen eye to eye with him always.’

  ‘You can say that again,’ muttered Bob who was still shaking his head in disapproval.

  ‘But the thing is, Brett is in charge of the science and we can’t let things go belly up otherwise the company will be in a real mess. I assume you don’t want to take over in charge of chemistry as well as biology and we don’t have time to appoint anyone else,’ he looked at Bob to check his reaction. ‘No, I didn’t think so. I’ve spoken to our legal representative Marcus, excellent chap, known him for years,’ did Piers detect a slight eye rolling from Bob, ‘and he’s assured me that we don’t legally have to suspend Brett, merely put measures in place to monitor his access to financial documents and so on. After all, he would be a fool to attempt anything else in view of what’s happened, and Brett is no fool I’m sure.’

  ‘Well you’re the boss of course but personally, I wouldn’t trust him with the tea money.’

  Piers knew better than to rise to Bob’s acerbic wit and continued undaunted. ‘Well he won’t have any signing authority, all requests will come directly to me, he will be formally asked to concentrate on the science. He will have no contact with any investors requesting information, no formal association with any press releases, publicity or any communications apart from internal ones. We hope that once he gets his own legal representation he will be able to fully clear his name and we will be able to carry on as normal.’

  ‘Well I wouldn’t put any bets on it if I were you,’ added Bob, with his characteristic sniff.

  ‘Well I don’t want to be rude Bob, but I’m not you and I have made this decision with the appropriate advice and I am asking for your support. We need to carry on as if nothing happened and show solidarity. Do I have your agreement?’

  ‘Hmm, yes, I get the message,’ replied Bob feeling like he’d been summoned to the headmaster’s office and he rose to leave, ‘best get on then,’ he added as usual.

  ‘Oh, before you go, remind me, the trial for 561, all in hand I take it, later this week? Everything is still on course?’

  ‘Certainly is, no participants have cried off sick as far as I know, I’m going to get Pete to check my calculations, just to be on the safe side.’

  ‘Excellent, good chap Pete, he’s got experience in this area hasn’t he?’

  Bob felt that everyone was being described as a good chap this afternoon apart from himself of course, but he did agree with Piers, Pete Silvers was a good biologist with a special interest in drug metabolism, and extremely able. He was the obvious person to check the calculations despite Bob having checked and rechecked them himself.

  ‘I’m emailing them to Pete later and he’ll get back to me tomorrow, it’s all under control. After all, we had all those consultations with the clinicians, I’ve merely got to transfer the figures into the calculations for the model we agreed. No need to worry I’m sure, as we’ve just discussed, you’ve got enough to worry about with Brett at the moment,’ said Bob rather cruelly.

  ‘Thanks for coming by and don’t forget mum’s the word,’ added Piers tapping the side of his nose.

  Bob wandered back to his desk, stopping off at the kitchen to make a cup of tea. Well, it wasn’t good for the company but he felt no sympathy for Brett Chandler. It was also true that every cloud had a silver lining and now that Piers was distracted with the FCA it might stop him banging on about him receiving emotional counselling.

  Chapter 27

  Nick was pleased when 6.30 p.m. finally arrived. Everyone else had left so he decided to finally call it a day. It had been a hopeless day at work as far as productivity was concerned. A late start and a long lunch waiting for his tyre to be fixed, which thankfully they managed to repair rather than bill him for a new one. Then a hopeless afternoon doing searches trying to find other contract companies that might be able to undercut the quote for their key intermediate. He’d managed to send out six enquiries to potential companies, some of which were based in India and China. Due to the time difference, they would have already finished for the day so he hoped that they would read his message during the night and be able to respond in a timely fashion. Nothing more could be done today, he yawned, switched off his PC and put his paperwork away in his drawers. He was in no rush to go get home as Polly was at her Zumba class as it was Monday evening. She’d missed a few recently due to her new role at the university but he’d persuaded her to make sure she carried on with her class as she needed a break from work. She’d been putting in a lot of extra hours recently due to the enormity of the task confronting her. He was worried about Polly, this new job had tremendous opportunities but it had a downside. She was effectively signing up to be a whistle-blower against dishonest practices in the department and from what he could see fraud was rife. It was amazing that some of the things had lain dormant for so long, perhaps it was because her predecessor was also corrupt that it had carried on undetected. Fortunately, she’d not had any intimidating incidents recently.

  He put on his jacket and headed out of the office area down the stairs and out of the main entrance. His friend Mark, the security guard, was just coming on shift to man the front entrance until 8 p.m.

  ‘Hi Nick,’ said Mark, taking off his outer jacket and sitting down in the chair occupied by their daytime receptionist, ‘late finish for you mate?’

  ‘Tell me about it, it’s been a crap day, anyway, you don’t need to hear about all my troubles. How’s yourself and your family?’

  ‘Oh, good, good, everything’s ticking over OK at the moment, anyone left up there in the labs tonight?’

  ‘Nobody in chemistry as far as I can see although there are some lights left on in biology at the moment and the senior team seems still hard at it.’

  ‘OK, well I’ll be giving some a reminder in an hours time then. Perhaps you’ll be up for a few beers sometime, it’s a while since we had a get-together, since, well, since that incident.’ Mark suddenly became aware that he was opening old wounds after the unfortunate incident with Zac.

  ‘Yes, sure is, don’t know where the time goes to,’ said Nick, showing no signs of animosity towards Mark. ‘Are you working Wednesday evening, this Wednesday I mean, by any chance?’

  ‘No I don’t think so,’ and Mark checked his calendar on his phone, ‘no Wednesday is fine, are we on for some beers then?’

  ‘Why not, let’s make it a date,’ said Nick, ‘there’s something I want to chat with you about in fact.’

  Mark suddenly had a feeling of apprehension engulf him. He’d heard that phrase of Nick’s before about having something to discuss. The last time it had unleashed a catastrophic chain of events which Mark was still trying to forget and from which Nick was still recovering. He hoped that this time it would be something quite innocuous, maybe Nick had some wedding plans he wanted to chat through, he seriously hoped so, nothing more serious.

  ‘Great, text me a time and a venue, your choice and I’ll be there,’ said Mark cheerfully.

  ‘Later dude,’ said Nick jokingly and headed off home.

  ‘Have a good one,’ s
houted Mark as he settled down with his newspaper.

  Nick approached his car and went to look at the nearside front tyre just to check that it was still inflated after his trip to the garage. Satisfied it still looked OK he unlocked and got into his car. Just at that point, he heard a text on his phone, no doubt Polly checking in. He read the text and typed a quick response that he would see her later after her class and then started the engine. Fastening his seatbelt he was about to draw out of the car park when he heard another car approaching from the rear of the building. The car drove past him quite quickly, presumably as it didn’t expect much traffic at that time of night. It was a twelve-year-old black Ford Focus driven by Kevin the storeman. How odd thought Nick, Kevin usually finished around 4.30 p.m. and it was now 6.45 p.m. Surely he’d not been doing overtime. Not official overtime thought Nick but probably his own sort of overtime. You bastard thought Nick, I bet I know what you’ve been up to this evening. Thieving from BioQex if my suspicions are correct. I wonder what you’ve filled your boot up with this time. He waited a few minutes then started up his car and decided to follow Kevin. Although it was a quieter time of night and there wasn’t so much traffic around the BioQex site it was still quite busy once you joined the main road and fortunately, Kevin was headed that way rather than through the science park. Despite it being a rather circuitous route to his flat, Nick was in no rush and decided to see whether he could tail Kevin. At best he would see where he was headed, at worst it would be a bit of entertainment after a shit day. Nick smiled to himself thinking it was like some detective programme where they decided to tail some criminal. However, it wouldn’t be a thrilling car chase sequence after all, this was Persford not some crime-ridden inner city sink estate.