“Oh, oh, o-o-oh,” Ophelia wailed from the hallway.
Marissa crossed to the file drawers built into the paneled wall. Every single one was locked.
“You’d think he had something to hide,” she muttered.
She opened the coat closet, similar to her own. Inside was a pair of polished wingtips, a rack of spare ties, a gray cashmere scarf. On the built-in shelf were two dress shirts, still in the Bergdorf’s store wrapping.
Yep. All surface. No soul.
She turned away, her gaze falling on the telephone. Why not take a shot?
“I do believe I’m feeling better,” Ophelia boomed from outside. Closer now. “If you’d just help me back to my desk, Jodi.”
Panic spurted in Marissa. “Feeling better” was their code for Beware of Approaching Danger. Marissa had only seconds to spare. She could either get out of the office or pick up the phone.
She picked up the phone and hit the redial button.
After one ring, a male voice said, “McArdle.”
She clamped her lips together, afraid that he’d hear her breathing.
“Beckwith?” the man asked with some suspicion. “You there?”
Marissa replaced the phone. She heard Jodi’s lilting little-girl voice outside, answered by Paul’s baritone.
Damn! She was stuck. The closet was too small, not to mention undignified. There was a couch, but it was backless, offering no possible hiding place.
With no choice but to brazen it out, Marissa darted across the room. She was standing by the window, admiring the view, when Paul entered. His face showed an instant of shock before he recovered and offered her a warm smile. “Hello, Marissa. How did you get past Jodi?”
“She wasn’t at her desk.”
He walked slowly around the room, his eyes sweeping the space, but she’d been meticulous in her search. Not a speck was out of place.
He sat, the smile almost gloating. “You’ve reconsidered.”
“Reconsidered what?”
“Becoming a power couple. Ruling this firm.”
“No.”
His eyes narrowed. “Then what is it?”
She intended to go on the aggressive, but the phone rang before she could begin. Paul raised a finger to her and picked up.
A private line, she noticed, one that apparently bypassed Jodi’s desk.
Paul watched Marissa coldly as his caller spoke. “Let me get back to you,” he said, and hung up.
Her skin crawled. Was McArdle calling back after she hung up? She’d hoped he’d think Paul’s phone had simply cut out.
She lengthened her neck, looking down on Paul with regal hauteur. “I came to ask if Mr. Howard had spoken to you.”
Paul laughed without mirth, idly swinging from side to side in his swivel desk chair. “You thought you’d get a little revenge, is that it? Sorry to disappoint. Thomas saw your ploy for what it was, especially after I explained what a jealous lover you are.”
She sucked in a cutting breath. “Do not think that I am as easy to fool,” she seethed. “I know the woman from the beach has nothing to do with this.”
Paul blinked. “With what?”
“The break-ins. The threats. The man you have spying on me.”
“You’ve become paranoid. I have no one spying on you, Marissa.”
Sure. “And the break-in? That wasn’t an attempt to get the photos?”
Paul was so confident of his position that her accusations merely made him smile. “The photos have been destroyed.”
She nodded as she edged toward the door. “So that’s how it is.”
Suddenly, Paul was up and across the room, pinching her by the shoulders, breathing hotly in her face. “You could have been a partner. You could have been with me.”
She wrenched away. “Hard to decide which I want less,” she snapped, and walked out of his office, thinking, McArdle, McArdle. She knew that name.
Ophelia was at her desk, chewing on a licorice stick when Marissa’s memory banks kicked in. “Isn’t one of the private investigators that the firm has on retainer named McArdle?”
“Ed McArdle,” Ophelia said instantly. “You got a job for him? Are we hunting down Belbano?”
“Forget Belbano for now. Tell me what you know about McArdle.”
“He’s a tough customer. Ex-Marine, dishonorable discharge. The rumor around the lunchroom is that McArdle’s the guy they call to handle touchy situations. Some say he’s even known to lean on reluctant witnesses.”
So much for the law firm’s sterling reputation. Marissa’s idols were crashing off pedestals all around her. She was rapidly reaching the point where if she could get out with an uncracked head, she’d count herself lucky.
Ophelia was watching Marissa’s face. “You planning to clue me in?”
“You’ll be the first to know, after Jamie.” Marissa got a whiff of a strongly acrid scent as she walked by. “O, are you smoking again?”
The assistant made a guilty face. “I just sneaked one. All that moaning and wailing took it out of me. I don’t know how Meryl Streep does it.”
Marissa sniffed. Her senses were popping. “What kind of cigarettes do you smoke?”
“Newport. But I crushed all of mine during the big purge. I had to bum a ciggie from one of the paralegals. Terrible taste. Some pretentious brand she picked up when she went to Paris a month ago. Gauloises Blondes, I think she said. They’re very strong.”
“Paris.” Marissa contemplated that, then shook her head. “The smell is naggingly familiar.”
“Don’t you mean gaggingly?” Ophelia shrugged. “Someone you know must smoke them.”
“Must be,” she mused, thinking of her tobacco-addicted stalker. The smell was the same, but why French cigarettes?
“I’m going back on the patch tomorrow,” Ophelia promised.
“Good for you.” Marissa meant that, but she was distracted by the latest piece of the puzzle. She suspected that if just one fell in place, the rest would follow. Jamie would say she should take her time, look over the entire picture before making the next move.
But that wasn’t her way.
“WHAT’S UP?” Shandi said, throwing down her bag and dropping into the molded plastic chair opposite Jamie. He’d arranged to meet her at a coffee shop near his office, one that catered to a local clientele that ran in and out for coffee and sweets during the workday. Sisman was at the counter, hovering over the glass case of pastries as he selected his post-work doughnuts.
Shandi wrinkled her nose. “You said you need to interview me for an article?”
“I lied. That was just to get you here.” He grabbed her wrist in case she tried to flee. “You’re a hard person to get hold of.”
“I’m busy. I’ve got stuff going on.”
“What kind of stuff? Conspiring with Paul Beckwith perhaps?”
“Shit.” She jerked her hand away. “You still on that? I haven’t seen Paul in weeks and weeks.”
Jamie went for shock tactics, to see how she’d react. “I know you slept with him.”
“Oh, yeah? How do you know that?”
“I saw you two leave Mac’s together, once upon a time.”
She leaned her elbows on the table. “Guess what? You’re not as smart as you think you are. Yeah, I talked to Paul. I even walked out with him. But I didn’t go home with him. He tried for a piece, but I didn’t go for it.”
“I’m supposed to believe that?” Jamie searched Shandi’s face, trying to look beneath the bravado and purple eye shadow.
“Believe me or not, I don’t care.” Her expression was pouty. She’d put a hand up to her hair and was twisting her corkscrew curls tighter and tighter around her fingers.
He shook his head, sure there was something she wasn’t saying even if his assumptions about her hooking up with Paul had been wrong. “I’m sorry. I still don’t think you’re telling me everything.”
She ran her teeth over her bottom lip. “It was always Marissa for you, wasn’t it
?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. I’ll lay it out for you.” Shandi inhaled. “Never say I didn’t do my bit for true love.” She exhaled. “It’s like this. When I was sleeping at Marissa’s, y’know, right after she came home, I answered her cell and it was Paul. He tried to give me a line of crap, but the upshot was that he asked me to snoop around Marissa’s place for some vacation photos she supposedly took. He said he’d pay me a couple of hundred bucks if I found them.”
Shandi shifted nervously, avoiding Jamie’s eyes. “I know it was a rotten thing to do, but I kinda needed the money, so I snooped. But I didn’t find anything, and Paul had a screaming fit when I told him.” She made a face. “There’s something really wrong with that guy, if ya ask me.”
“You should have told Marissa all of that as soon as you heard about the break-in.”
“How was I supposed to know—”
“You knew. Guilt was all over your face.”
“Maybe so.” Shandi gulped. “Whatever. I tried to warn her, at least.”
“‘Watch your back,’” he said, repeating her warning. “Big help.”
She scooted her chair back. “Are we through?”
“We’re through.”
“You’ll be watching out for Marissa…?”
He crushed his paper coffee cup against the heel of his palm. Hot drops spattered. “Count on it.”
MARISSA MET WITH a new client, studied an interrogatory pertaining to an ongoing lawsuit and stayed late researching Cayman Islands banking laws. She’d connected the dots between client cases that had required Ed McArdle’s assistance, thanks to Ophelia’s friend in payroll. Attorney of record on a disproportionate number of them: Paul Beckwith.
Interesting, but not totally illuminating.
She phoned Jamie, leaving voice mail when he didn’t pick up. She’d had two messages from him, saying that she shouldn’t go near Paul until they’d talked. Muttering about telephone tag, she reached under her desk to retrieve the pumps she’d kicked off an hour before. Her toes protested being stuffed back inside them, so she carried them in her hand as she picked up her Italian leather brief-bag and shut off the lights.
The offices were quiet, but not deserted. Too many of the lawyers worked late. The hum of vacuum cleaners testified to the cleaning staff’s diligence.
Marissa walked on bare feet to the law library, where she dropped off a book on the librarian’s desk. He got snippy if the lawyers didn’t follow protocol about requesting and returning the volumes. She was heading out when she recognized two hushed voices.
Paul Beckwith and Thomas Howard. Coming in her direction.
She ducked back into the vast space of the law library, hurrying past the stately bookcases and threading through the more utilitarian banks of file cabinets without actually thinking where she was going.
The men had stopped directly outside the doorway. “I’m sure she was searching my office,” Paul said. “She also called McArdle from my phone. He rang back when he got a hang-up from my number.”
Marissa crouched, even though she was well hidden among the rows of cabinets that stretched to the ceiling. Her ears pricked as the conversation continued.
“What’s she looking for?” Howard was clearly disgruntled. “You said you had her under your control, but first she sashays into my office with those damn photographs and now she’s playing Nancy Drew. This is becoming more than an annoyance.”
“She’s nothing. She knows nothing.”
Not wanting to miss a word, Marissa moved closer on silent feet, hugging her bag against her chest.
“Seems to me that she figured out that you had McArdle send that punk after her.”
“But she doesn’t know who Belbano is. That’s what’s important.”
So tell me, she pleaded, but they weren’t that stupid.
“She did surrender the photos without a fight,” Howard said grudgingly.
“You’ll have to give her a line about how you spoke to me.”
“I’m the senior partner. I don’t answer to her.”
“No, sir.” Marissa heard a shuffling sound. Paul must have moved because his voice lost volume. She inched closer, straining to hear. “We only have to placate her for the time being.”
Howard grumbled.
“I know Marissa,” Paul said. “She wants to keep her job a lot more than she wants to stick it to me. She’s only being difficult because of her hurt pride.”
Marissa’s face grew hot. As much as she hated to admit it, there was a grain of truth in Paul’s statement. The woman she’d been a few weeks ago might have been persuaded to put ambition above her ethics, if that only meant looking the other way.
But she’d changed.
She closed her eyes, silently thanking Jamie for widening her focus beyond her job and helping her to understand the value of keeping a good character. She’d do the right thing, but she wouldn’t end up in a Miami storefront either.
“Then you should be the one to handle her. Either you make nice—” Howard’s pause was punctuated by a thump against the door frame “—or you see that she stays out of our business. Permanently.”
The ruthlessness from a man she’d trusted was too much. With a gasp, Marissa bolted upright. The instinctive reaction almost made her drop her shoes and bag. She clutched at them, biting down on her tongue to keep from making another sound.
Thankfully, the men hadn’t heard her. They moved away, breaking off the conversation and going in separate directions. After several minutes she crept to the doorway and peered along the corridor. Her heart was still pounding. Her mouth tasted like cotton.
The door to Paul’s office was closed. She couldn’t see Mr. Howard’s spacious corner office from her vantage point.
She hesitated, contemplating the distance through the reception area and out the doors. Five seconds and she’d be free, if she ran. But strolling would look less suspicious. Either way, if they saw her, she was toast.
The hell with it. She ran.
Smack-dab into Jamie, coming through the doors from the other side.
15
“OH, THANK GOD, Jamie.” Marissa practically collapsed into his arms, although she had enough sense to be sure that they ended up on the exterior side of the doors. “I’ve never been so glad to see you.”
“What’s going on?”
She threw him a quick hug, then pulled away to thrust her brief-bag into his arms. “Elevator first.”
He punched the call button.
While waiting for the elevator to arrive, she hopped from one foot to the other, shoving her feet into her shoes. Jamie kept asking her what was wrong.
“Just hold on.” She threw a nervous glance at the doors, fearing they’d open at any second. “I’ll explain everything as soon as we’re out of here.”
Jamie also looked back. “I was coming to see Paul.”
She blinked. “What for?”
“Uh. I was going to—”
“Beat him up for me?”
“Verbally, maybe. I thought it was time I confronted him head on. Put a stop to his harassment, and a few other things too.”
“And so you made an appointment?” That was Jamie all over.
“Not really an appointment. I called, but he refused. So I came anyway. I figured at the end of the day, with less people around—”
She broke off the explanation. “Listen. After what I just overheard, that might not be a good idea. I’ve had quite an education.”
“What do you mean?” He looked into her eyes and was alarmed by what he saw there. “You’re scared.”
She swallowed, but the words tumbled out anyway. “I made a big mistake going to Thomas Howard with my suspicions. Part of it was that I was trying to save my job, but I also thought that I could trust him to do the right thing. But he’s involved in the scheme—whatever Paul did in the Caymans. I did get confirmation that they hired the burglar.”
The elevator chime went off. The doors slid open. S
he stepped inside. Jamie did not.
“Come on! We have to go now.”
Just then Paul emerged from the office doors, looking pleased with himself until he saw Jamie and Marissa. His face darkened. “I told you I have nothing—”
He never got to finish. Jamie took him down with one well-placed blow to his perfect cleft chin.
Leaving Paul groaning on the floor, Jamie stepped into the elevator car. He shook his hand, as casually as if he played prize fighter every day before dinner. “Where to?”
This time Marissa didn’t hesitate. “Take me to the police.”
The sudden violence had startled her, especially coming from Jamie. But as they descended to safety, she decided that there was a great deal of ironic satisfaction in seeing Paul Beckwith fold like a cheap suit.
MARISSA PUT HER resignation in the mail the following morning. Then she sat on the sofa and looked around her apartment, trying to decide what to do. For the first time in ten—no, almost fifteen years, she had nothing to do.
Searching for another job could wait until Monday.
As much as she itched to call Ophelia to get the gossip from the office, she stopped herself. Guilty conscience, perhaps. Her decision to go to the police might result in innocent employees losing their jobs. O’s position was almost certainly in jeopardy. If at all possible, Marissa would employ her friend in her next position.
If she got one.
She jiggled her foot. Her nails bit into her palms. Future employment was debatable, especially after the word got out that she’d become a whistleblower.
The police hadn’t been overly impressed with either her tale of skullduggery at the law firm or the photographic evidence. A daunting white-collar crime to investigate, they’d said—and off-shore, too—especially when no one knew if there’d really been a crime. Officer O’Connor had promised to notify the proper authorities, which could include the IRS, the New York State bar association, even the Feds, if her suspicions of embezzlement or money laundering were true.
The cops’ first cursory check on Belbano had revealed not only that he had a record of embezzlement, but that he’d made frequent trips to the Caymans in the past two years. Whether he was employed by one of the firm’s clients, or even by the partnership itself, remained a mystery for now.
Hidden Gems Page 18
