She raised her head and sniffled, fumbling in her Prada handbag for yet another tissue. Not that she’d been serious about Milo, not really, but nevertheless she was astounded by his behavior. Just who did Milo Pappas think he was? Certainly if any dumping was going to occur, it should have been her unloading him, like last time. Her initial instinct that his network-news success might lead him to misunderstand his place relative to hers had been quite on point.
She had been so deliciously angry at Joe Rombi’s, so powerful giving him the plain truth about Alicia Maldonado, another presumptuous no-name who had to be taught just where in the great wide world she stood.
Joan was seriously undone. There was nothing for it but to take one of the Xanax Dr. Finch had given her. She’d been very careful how she took them, but there were moments when she just couldn’t get by without their help.
She fished the amber prescription bottle out of her handbag and jiggled one out, washing it down with her now cold Darjeeling tea. It was such a shame she wasn’t angry anymore. Anger had felt so much better than sadness. She hated to admit it but this could be yet another case of her mother being right all along. Right about Daniel and right about Milo. Her mother had warned her that she should stick to men who shared her background and breeding. Well, neither of these specimens had stood up under the test. Milo had revealed himself to be a lowborn cad: using a woman still reeling from grief for his own sexual pleasure, then tossing her aside. Using her, a Hudson! He should have been tremendously grateful she allowed him into her bed in the first place. It might be appropriate behavior among Greeks, but among Episcopalians it was appalling.
Joan took several deep breaths. She had to stop thinking about it, at least for now. She had to gather her wits. The conference call was in five minutes. And besides, one day very soon she would think of a way to give Milo Pappas his comeuppance, the way she’d given it to Alicia Maldonado.
Joan had just finished repowdering her face, though she was still lamenting her puffy eyes, when Frederick Whipple’s sidekick, the gray-suited male twenty-five years his junior knocked on Daniel’s door to summon her to the call. She followed him downstairs to the first-floor conference room.
Joan assumed her rightful place at the head of the table. “Craig, good to see you.”
From his post at her left, Craig Barlowe nodded back. “Hello, Joan.” She noted that his demeanor had not improved. Ever since she’d told him she was selling Headwaters, he had been positively sullen. Probably he thought he’d end up out of a job. She thought he’d been lucky to hold on to this one as long as he had.
The gray suit sat at her right and one of the minions fussed with what they all insisted on calling the “squawk box,” which perched like a high-tech centerpiece on the conference table’s gleaming mahogany surface. Frederick Whipple, from his office in San Francisco, was soon telephonically connected.
Greetings were exchanged. Less important business was dispensed with. Frederick rapidly got to the point.
“As you know, Joan, my associates have spent the greater part of the week analyzing the viability of an initial public offering of Headwaters Resources. I must tell you there is some difficulty with that approach.”
Joan’s heart sank. Frederick embarked on a dissertation about debt loads and regulatory constraints and stagnating economic conditions, but it all added up to one thing: she’d have to settle for just selling the company, which would mean less money than an IPO.
Whipple paused to sip something, apparently. Outside the conference room’s three small windows, set deep into the whitewashed adobe, it was already dark. Joan wanted to scream. It was Friday night and what did she have to look forward to? Nothing. No dinner date, no rendezvous, no party, no nothing. And now no IPO either.
“However,” Whipple’s voice intoned from the squawk box, “Headwaters Resources does possess some unique attributes that our institutional clients are finding quite attractive.”
Her ears perked up.
“For example, Headwaters owns thousands of acres of old-growth forest, which are increasingly rare and hence quite valuable. In addition, in the wake of the dot com bubble, there is a renewed interest in the basic industries, which can produce solid and predictable returns.”
Joan glanced at the gray suit. He caught her eye and smiled.
Could it be a go?
“Investors have renewed interest in established companies in this uncertain market,” Whipple droned on. “The technology companies that were in such demand in years past are not luring investors at this point in time.”
Frederick Whipple kept her in suspense for a while longer, enumerating Headwaters’ good points, then said, “In short, Joan, I believe that Whipple Canaday can position Headwaters Resources in such a way that it will generate enthusiasm in the public marketplace. Therefore I recommend that we bring the company to market and give all Americans an opportunity to participate in what I’m sure will be its great future success.”
Everyone broke into raucous applause—everyone except Craig Barlowe, that is—and all the minions came around the conference table to shake Joan’s hand. The gray suit broke out a few bottles of Dom Perignon. Frederick Whipple sounded a cautionary note or two, as was his wont as Whipple Canaday’s most senior partner, but Joan tuned out and took a token sip of champagne. She couldn’t have more, not after the Xanax, which apparently was already starting to work. She felt quite serene about everything she’d have to think about next, investor presentations and S-ls and research analyst briefings. She’d think about those tomorrow. Or maybe Monday.
As she began the fifteen-minute drive back to Pebble Beach, she made the mistake of answering her cell phone.
“Mother, I thought you were still in Marblehead!” The Storrow family seat, on Boston’s North Shore, where her mother had spent New Year’s. Joan had hoped she’d be so overcome by the native puritanism that she’d stay till spring.
“I returned yesterday.”
Small talk ensued. Joan marveled how little detail about her life she cared to share with her mother. Theirs was an arm’s-length intimacy, with no sign of rapprochement on the horizon. That suited her just fine.
“What have you been occupying yourself with, dear?” her mother asked.
“Oh, this and that.” What had she been doing that she could tell Libby Storrow Hudson about? She couldn’t go into all her treatments at the Lodge’s spa. Or her efforts to ensure that a local D.A. lost her job. Certainly she should stay mute about having sex with Milo and then getting dumped by him. “I’ve been spending a great deal of time at Headwaters,” she offered.
Silence. Joan could imagine her mother’s wrinkle-lined mouth puckering into a frown. Then, “I would have thought you’d be done with that by now.”
An oblique reference to Joan’s supposed flitting from project to project. She swiftly decided this was not the time to mention that Whipple Canaday was taking the company public.
Though she couldn’t put it off for long. Very soon it would hit the financial pages. Her mother was no longer a shareholder in Headwaters, since Daniel had bought out her father’s stake, but her interest in the company could safely be described as very high.
Her mother was speaking again. Joan detected a slight change in her tone, as if they were moving from inconsequential matters to the heart of the conversation. “I met with Henry Gossett this morning,” she said.
That wasn’t good. “How is Henry?”
“We reviewed some matters having to do with the trust.”
That was really not good. “Was this in your new capacity as trustee?” Joan couldn’t help but sound snide.
“As a matter of fact, it was. Joan, I’m afraid I must ask you to make a change in your living arrangements.”
Ahead of her on Highway 1, brake lights flared bright red. “What are you talking about?”
“It has come to my attention that you are still residing at the Lodge. You have been there for nearly three weeks now. The bill, I mus
t say, is imposing. On top of which I note that you spent three nights this week in a suite at the Ritz-Carlton in San Francisco.”
She resisted saying, So what? “I had business in the city.”
“Business.” Her mother enunciated the word as if it were impossible that Joan could ever engage in such a thing. “Be that as it may, our cash-flow situation is such that we must exercise some restraint. Double-booking suites at two luxury hotels is no longer permissible, at least not at present.”
Permissible? “Are you telling me to move out of the Lodge?”
“Joan, Henry and I have had your home thoroughly cleaned, from top to bottom. It is absolutely pristine. Still, if you are not comfortable returning there, you are always welcome to stay with me here on 17 Mile Drive.”
Joan narrowly avoided rear-ending a black Mercedes sedan. I would rather die than live with you! “I don’t want to move out of the Lodge,” she said, but somehow it came out wrong, making her sound like a petulant child stomping her foot.
Her mother was silent but Joan got the message loud and clear through the humming airwaves: You don’t have a choice. Libby Hudson was trustee. Joan merely received an allowance. She might as well be six years old getting her coins doled out on Saturday morning.
“Oh, dear, I’m going through a bad patch,” Joan lied. “I can’t hear you. ‘Bye.” Then she pressed the end button, opened the Jag’s passenger-side window, and with all her arm’s strength flung the cell phone into the foliage that lined Highway 1. That was the end of that conversation.
Chapter 19
Alicia couldn’t believe how busy a nominally unemployed person could be.
She opened a package of ramen into boiling water, then sprinkled dried basil and oregano on top and set it on medium heat. Lunch would have to be a twenty-minute affair given her 12:30 PM telephone appointment with Franklin Houser, the scion of the Idaho family that had sold Headwaters to Daniel Gaines and Web Hudson two and a half years before.
She was starving. She’d spent the morning, in fact most of the week, at the public library, poring over microfiche news stories on the transaction. There wasn’t much to be found, since the company was privately held, and the grunt work of digging up what did exist was laborious. But Alicia guessed it was a far sight better than bouncing off the walls of her house.
Besides, what else could she possibly be doing? She had filed her suit for wrongful termination. Louella was pursuing the case file from Massachusetts on Theodore Owens’ felony conviction. How could she not keep trying to nail Joan Gaines?
Milo Pappas had been completely on target not to believe she’d lost interest in the case. In fact, interest didn’t nearly describe how she felt. Obsession came closer. And the notion of vindication that he’d kept throwing around had begun to sound pretty good, too.
Not like any of this was easy. She was on her own now. Gone were the D.A. office benefits of free phone and fax and photocopier. Gone were the cops and the D.A.’s investigative arm. Whatever help she could get from anybody now would come by way of favors, which she’d never been good at asking for. And she was up against a suspect who had all the world’s power and money at her disposal.
Safe to call it an uphill battle.
Alicia grabbed a box of Triscuits from the cupboard and turned on her kitchen TV for the noon news. News watching was another big unemployment activity. On Tuesday she’d been forced to suffer through endless coverage of Treebeard’s probable-cause hearing, complete with Kip Penrose and Rocco Messina out on the courthouse steps in full strut. Of course, with all the evidence against Treebeard, which she’d lined up so neatly, he was bound over for trial. Yet Penrose looked as if he’d just outdone Mark Spitz and won nine gold medals in the Summer Olympics.
To make matters worse she couldn’t stop herself from watching Milo’s reports on the story. They were good. Quite good. And you couldn’t look away while he was on-screen. At least, she couldn’t.
She gave the ramen one final stir, then transferred it to a bowl and carried it to the kitchen table, a Formica-topped rectangle that would fit right into Dudley’s. She grabbed some crackers and started eating.
Yet however compelling she found Milo Pappas, on and off the air, his “proposition” remained as baffling as it had been when he’d first offered it. Apparently his reporter crony spilled her phone number as well as her address, because Milo Pappas called her at least once a day. His frequency was right up there with Jorge’s. It was, she had to admit, fun. He kept insisting they work together on the Gaines murder; she kept insisting she couldn’t trust him. It bothered her that at some point he’d give up trying to convince her. Probably some point soon. She didn’t like the idea that he’d stop calling, that she’d no longer have something he wanted. It also made her feel like she was still in some sort of cosmic professional loop to know where he was jetting off to to cover his stories. He was in San Francisco now, after getting a break on a banking story he’d been pursuing. Before that he’d been in Seoul, and before that San Diego.
She poured the last of the ramen down her throat and set the dirty bowl in the sink. Unfortunately, the Triscuits box was now empty, as her cupboards would soon be. She would be forced to go grocery shopping and spend money she didn’t have. The only good news was that on sale, ramen went for only a dime a package.
Time for the call. On went her telephone headset, one of the few items she’d taken from her office. Lots of things she’d left, as it felt too much like surrender to empty her desk entirely. She scanned her list of questions, made sure her pen worked, then punched in the Boise area code and number.
A woman answered, presumably a housekeeper. “Houser residence.”
“This is Alicia Maldonado with the Monterey County district attorney’s office. Mr. Houser is expecting my call.”
“Just a moment, please.”
Alicia didn’t mention that at the moment she was persona non grata in the D.A.’s office. Or, for that matter, that she was no longer prosecuting Daniel Gaines’ accused killer. She “withheld” that change in status, as Milo Pappas himself might have done. When she booked the call, she’d wrapped herself in the cloak of the law—which she still felt justified wearing—and spewed forth a litany of arguments that persuaded old man Houser to speak to her.
Of course, it helped that no one else from the Monterey County district attorney’s office had gotten to him first. Not Kip Penrose, certainly; not Rocco Messina; no one. Nor had Milo Pappas. Alicia told herself that no one else was investigating as thoroughly as she was. She preferred that interpretation to the other likely possibility: that it was patently obvious there was nothing to be gained from this line of inquiry.
But who knew? She’d heard of more than one family business that had provided a motive for murder. And while she had found an opportunity for Joan Gaines to have killed her husband, she hadn’t found means or motive. Not yet.
“Ms. Maldonado?” Mr. Houser’s voice was a strong, vital sound, despite his nearly eighty years. Alicia had gathered from their earlier conversation that he was an impressive man. He’d founded Headwaters Resources in the fifties and put his lifeblood into it, intending to pass it on as a family business. But his only child was killed in a skiing accident, leaving Houser no heir to take over. Hence the desire, as he neared the end of his life, to sell.
“I appreciate your taking my call, Mr. Houser.”
“My pleasure. I enjoy speaking about my business successes from the deep, dark past.”
Alicia began with routine questions about how Daniel Gaines had approached him. There was some discussion of the bankers from Whipple Canaday, who were heavily involved in the transaction. Houser took her back to the summer day when Daniel Gaines and Web Hudson had flown up to Boise to finalize the deal.
“What was your reaction to Daniel Gaines when you first met him?” Alicia asked.
“Oh, he was nice enough. Tall, good-looking man, had a kind of movie-star charisma. But it was because the governor was inv
olved that I was interested.”
“Governor Hudson? Why is that?”
“Now, he was one of a kind. Quite a record he had, as governor of California, then U.S. senator. Smart, too, smart as a whip about business, even though he’d spent his whole life in politics. Him I wanted to do business with.”
“So you were much more taken with Mr. Hudson than with Mr. Gaines?”
“No question. Don’t get me wrong, Daniel Gaines seemed pleasant enough. But not really sharp, not in the way Web Hudson was. In fact, I don’t think I would have done the deal if the governor hadn’t been involved.”
Interesting. She arched her brow, scribbling on her legal notepad. This jibed with her own low opinion of Daniel Gaines, whom she’d always suspected of riding his father-in-law’s coattails. Maybe this explained why Web Hudson had been involved in the Headwaters purchase in the first place. It had perplexed her why the former governor would be brought in if he had no business experience and Daniel Gaines was such a high-flying Manhattan financier. But clearly Franklin Houser, and perhaps other people in business, didn’t think Daniel Gaines was such hot shit on his own.
Houser continued speaking. “I have to say I was disappointed to find out that the governor would play only a figurehead role in the company. Once the transaction was completed, that is.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, the governor would be chairman of the board. And Gaines CEO.”
She was confused. “But was the governor’s role bigger while they were actually buying the company?”
To Catch the Moon Page 27
