by Ray Flynt
Andy’s cell phone let out a muffled ring. He reached under his newspaper and fumbled for the phone, finally grabbing it. Andy picked up his glasses from where he’d thrown them and studied the phone’s display screen before answering. “Yes, Doris.” His tone was all business, Brad noted, with no hint of family turmoil. “I should be back in the office on Friday. No, don’t reschedule the meeting. I’ll see Gordon at 10:30 before the others... Just have Ken send me an e-mail. I’ll review it this afternoon and get right back to him. Anything else? Okay, good. Oh, tell Hank he better stick around Friday night, and not to make any early weekend plans. Thanks, Doris.”
Andy laid his phone back on the table, then jumped back into their discussion. “If everything you said is true, it still doesn’t explain Dad cutting me out of his Will.”
“I think I know,” Brad said.
“I’m sure you do,” Andrew said derisively. “I don’t want to hear anything from you other than your plans to run the company. You’ll control about 35% of the stock after the Will is probated. It’ll be a damn shame when it loses 40% of its value.”
“What are you talking about?” Brad asked. “Why should the stock’s value drop?”
“Because people don’t invest in earthquakes. If they did, the Red Cross would sell stock.” Andy’s arms flailed as he paced and talked. “Investors don’t like uncertainty. When a Fortune 100 company loses a CEO with a proven track record, the stock will naturally drop in value—five, ten, maybe as much as twenty percent—until investors feel confident with new management. But when they hear that a guy who’s been playing cops and robbers for the last ten years is taking over the company, the stock’s gonna go straight through the crust of the earth. No telling where it’s gonna land. Hell, maybe some Aussie’ll find cheap stock in his backyard.”
“It’s a solid company, and I expect it to stay that way,” Brad said.
Harriet nodded, while wringing her hands.
“And who made it solid?” Andrew tapped his own chest with his finger. “But it’s only solid as long as the public thinks its solid. Christ!” He brought his fist down on the table, rattling the cups, plates, and Aunt Harriet, who jumped in fear. “When Mom and Lucy were kidnapped Joedco stock dropped more than 50%. It was selling at 12 3/4 before the news broke, and hit bottom at 5 1/2 in less than two weeks. We’ve had three stock splits since then. You know what a share is selling for today—eighty-seven goddamn dollars. When you’re done, buddy, we’ll be lucky if it’s at 50. Give me a fu…” Andy eyed his aunt. “…break!”
Harriet glared at him.
“And don’t give me any prudish looks, like you’re gonna wash my mouth out with soap! It wasn’t me that announced to a whole church full of people that Diane’s a bitch.”
Harriet blushed and tugged at the cowl neck of her sweater. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize I’d be overheard. The organ music was a lot louder just before I said it.”
Andy snickered. “It was kind of funny though. Dad would have laughed if he could’ve heard it.” He walked over to the sideboard and tried to fill his juice glass from a now empty pitcher. “Shit,” he muttered.
Brad stood and walked over to his brother, grasping his shoulder. “Andy, I’ve been the Chair of the Board for the last ten years. I see no reason to make a management change. You’re still the President and CEO as far as I’m concerned.”
“Apparently, Dad thought differently.”
The phone rang, echoing from its table in the foyer.
“If that’s my stockbroker,” Harriet said with a straight face, “I think I’d like to sell some stock.”
Brad laughed.
“Go ahead and laugh, smart-ass,” Andrew said. “I’ll probably be cashing in my stock options by the end of the week. Before any news of this gets out.”
“Andy, I know why he cut you out of the Will,” Brad said before picking up a portable phone extension from the top of the mahogany silver caddy in the dining room. “Hello.”
“I’m glad somebody does,” Andrew responded at full voice.
Brad thought he heard Paula Thompson’s voice on the phone, as he covered the receiver and gestured for his brother to be quiet.
Andy plopped back into his seat, and stretched his legs.
“I’m sorry,” Brad said, avoiding saying her name within earshot of his family. “It was a little noisy here, and I didn’t catch what you said.” Brad turned and walked over to the window, where he continued his conversation.
“Could we get together for a follow-up meeting?” Thompson asked. “I’d like an update on what you’ve learned.”
“Sure,” he said hesitantly. “I’ve got a nine o’clock meeting, but we could meet for lunch downtown by twelve-thirty.”
“Did you have a place in mind?” she asked.
“How about Susannah Foo’s?”
“Sounds good. I’ll meet you there—twelve-thirty.” He imagined the reporter scribbling the location and time in the notebook she always carried with her.
Brad replaced the portable phone in its cradle. Thompson’s call prompted him to wonder how much he should share with his aunt and Andy about Wilkie’s message and its implications. Andy already had dismissed Brad’s skills as a detective, so he would barely listen, while telling his aunt would give her another family detail to fret about. He decided to wait until he had more information. Besides, he thought, neither of them would have paid Wilkie and Baker to kill his mother and sister.
“Everything all right?” Harriet asked.
Brad realized a worried expression had crept onto his face. He smiled and said, “Yeah, I’m fine.”
Andrew said, “We’re still waiting for your theory about why Dad cut me out of his Will.”
“It’s not a theory,” Brad said. “I talked to Hiram after you ran out yesterday.”
“Oh, I’m sure Hiram had great things to say about me,” Andrew said snidely.
“What are you talking about?” Brad asked.
“Skip it.” Andrew batted the air with his hand. “Hiram’s not one of my favorite people and I’m sure he feels the same way about me.”
“Why?” Brad inquired.
“I pay lawyers to figure out how I can do what I want to do without landing in jail. Hiram was too conservative for me, always telling me what we couldn’t do. I tried for years to get Dad to change law firms.”
“I see.” Brad sighed. “Hiram said Dad changed his Will seven years ago, right after you moved the corporate headquarters to Houston. According to Hiram, Dad wasn’t happy with your decision to move the company out of Philadelphia. It was an emotional issue for him. He summoned Hiram to the nursing home and told him he wanted to change his Will.”
Andrew glared at Brad in disbelief.
“I remember the move upset your father,” Harriet offered. “But he never said anything to me about changing his Will because of it. His roots were here in Philadelphia and the city was very important to him—just like his business. You know how the people around here are about this city; you could live here forty years but unless you were born here you aren’t considered a Philadelphian. Joe got angry with me fifty years ago when I first moved to New York. I told him I could stay here and be an old maid, or move to New York and have a life.”
Once again, Andy looked ready to explode. “I bet Hiram didn’t mention that Dad’s Will was changed at about the same time that I yanked his $80,000 retainer as the corporation’s legal counsel?”
“No… he didn’t.” Brad quickly replayed his conversation with Hiram in his mind, seeing if what Andy said about the yanked retainer were true, would it alter his impressions. He decided not. “Hiram said he tried to talk Dad out of changing his will,” Brad explained, “and even threatened to contact the family, but Dad swore him to secrecy. I asked Hiram if there was anything we could do to contest the Will. He said that anyone can contest a Will, but it would be difficult to make a successful case in these circumstances. I reminded him that Dad was almost seventy-one w
hen he changed his Will and had had a paralyzing stroke. Hiram said the overwhelming medical evidence at the time documented that he was still of sound mind. The stroke paralyzing his speech happened two years later.”
Brad’s explanation was met with silence.
“I’d be happy to get a second legal opinion,” Brad offered. “I didn’t know you had personal run-ins with him.”
“Hiram’s right,” Andy said. “I never said he wasn’t an honest lawyer, just too damned cautious. Besides, there’s another downside. It’d be a very public fight. I’d get a reputation as litigious and lose out on eight-figure salary opportunities.”
“I have no interest in losing you as the CEO of Joedco,” Brad said. “What can we do to keep you?”
Andy propped his elbows on the table.
Brad continued, “Most of Dad’s estate is tied up in the company or in real estate. He owned a couple of office buildings in downtown Philadelphia, and of course this property. It’s valued at just over three and a half million.”
“I have no interest in this old place,” Andy said. “It’s yours. Enjoy. I just built a twelve thousand square foot contemporary house on Clear Lake. There’s a reason I’m not living in Philadelphia. I prefer the smell of new money to old wood, and fresh shrimp on the grill to pretzels from a street vendor.”
Harriet, who had kept her peace for a while, got up from the table and toddled over to the sideboard eyeing a tray of pastries. With her back to them, she said, “You’re not exactly a pauper, Andrew. You’ve still got the trust that your mother set up for you.”
Andy seethed. “And so does he!”
Harriet turned, holding a mini-cheese Danish between her fingers, and floundered for a way to soothe Andrew. “I didn’t mean that. Well, what I’m trying to say… You can’t…” She finally sat back down.
“I thought you had a train to catch,” Andy said contemptuously.
Harriet looked hurt. “I changed my reservation to 12:45 so we’d have more time to visit.”
“You haven’t answered my question yet,” Brad said. “What can we do to keep you as CEO of Joedco?”
Andy drew in a breath. “Make me the Chairman and CEO, and be prepared to offer a salary that puts me in the top 15% of Fortune 100 executives. You’ll remain as Chair of the Executive Committee—it’ll be a nice touch of family unity.” Andy displayed the same take-charge demeanor he had demonstrated on the cell phone. “We’re in talks right now to acquire a competing satellite technology company. I’ll be able to sweeten the deal by offering the presidency to their exec.”
“Done,” Brad said. “I’m sure it’s on my calendar, but remind me when is the next stockholder’s meeting?”
“Next Tuesday, at the Marriott Marquis in midtown-Manhattan. You’ll have to be there to show the flag. But” Andy raised a finger in the air. “We’ll need to issue a press release to signal these developments by Friday at the latest. The Street will be looking for signs of stability at Joedco, and they aren’t going to wait for its founder to get cold. Tokyo investors will start testing the resilience of our stock while we’re sleeping on Sunday night.”
Brad smiled, remembering another reason why he’d enjoy making a trip to New York—a chance to spend more time with Beth Montgomery.
“I’ll be there,” Brad said. “If you send the corporate jet.”
Andrew scoffed. “You just inherited four billion dollars. Go buy an airline.”
Chapter Eighteen
Andy had always intimidated Brad. His brother’s dominant personality had helped shape his own formative years. The five-year difference in their ages provided Andy an advantage in size when they were kids, though Brad grew three inches taller than his brother during high school and had managed to keep the spare tire off his waist in his forties. Part of the cleverness Brad had developed was attributable to observing his brother’s moods and methods and learning to counter his physical advantage. As volatile as his brother had been during the last twenty-four hours, Andy now seemed pleased with the arrangement to become Chairman and CEO of Joedco, and Brad figured it was as good a time as any to pull him aside for a serious chat.
“Let’s take a walk,” Brad said, holding open the front door. The two of them strolled under the portico and down the steps. Morning sun shone through the trees, leaving a dappled light pattern on the cobblestone drive.
“What’s up?” Andy asked.
“Wanna grab your sweat pants or a jacket?” Brad asked, realizing how chilly the morning was compared with what Andy was accustomed to in Houston.
Andy shook his head. “I’m fine.”
Brad turned left, intending to circle around behind the office and into the backyard. “I went to Wilkie’s execution two weeks ago,” he began.
“Yeah, I know.”
“Afterward the prison’s chaplain handed me Wilkie’s Bible—the one he’d carried with him to the execution. He’d written words in the margins.”
“When are you gonna tell me something I can’t read in the papers?” Andy asked.
“There were eighteen words, in no particular order. It seemed like Wilkie was trying to send me a message, but I couldn’t make any sense of it. I contacted the superintendent at the prison and found out that he had a list of scripture references that might act as a key to put Wilkie’s eighteen words in order,” Brad explained. “But someone made a stink—I’m sure you read that in the paper too…”
Andy nodded.
They crossed the patio, and Brad stole a glance through the windows into his office before they walked into the backyard.
“And the prison placed a lid on releasing any more information to me,” Brad continued. “Then a couple days after the execution someone set fire to my office and the Bible was stolen.”
“Aunt Harriet told me about the fire,” Andy said.
“What you don’t know is that I copied the pages with words from Wilkie’s Bible, and using a few connections managed to get the list of scripture verses and figured out what Frank Wilkie was trying to tell me.”
Andy’s eyes widened and he stared at his brother waiting for the news.
“Wilkie said he and Baker were paid to kill—paid money kill were his exact words.”
Andy gave a low whistle.
“I knew seeing Wilkie executed wouldn’t give me any closure, but I can’t turn my back on his message.”
Andy grunted. “I moved on a long time ago.”
Brad nodded. “You could. I can’t. With this new information, I’m determined to find out who paid the killers. I could use your help.”
“How?” Andy asked, tentatively.
“The other day Gertrude Lindstrom—”
“Ah, yes, good old Gertie,” Andy interrupted. “I’m her favorite member of the family, maybe that’s why when I saw her after the funeral she just rolled right by me.” He threw his head back yelling, “Ha.”
After Andy’s show of pique had subsided, Brad said, “I asked Gertie about foreign competitors and whether they had any reason to threaten Dad eleven years ago. She said you were responsible for international business and might know.”
Andy rubbed his chin. “Nothing I can recall.”
“And Gertie said Dad received a threatening note about a week before the kidnapping.”
The lines tightened between Andy’s eyebrows. “What kind of a note? I don’t remember any note.”
“She said the message was pasted from letters cut out of newsprint.”
“What did it say?” Andrew asked urgently.
“It said, ‘You can’t get away with it.’”
The two of them had finished walking around the yard on the east side of the mansion and were back on the cobblestone drive. Andy looked off in the distance, as if he hadn’t heard the answer to his question. “What’s wrong?” Brad asked.
“There were other notes.”
“No,” Brad explained. “That’s the only one Gertie talked about.”
“No. No,” Andy repeated, excit
edly. “You don’t understand. There were other notes. But they happened two years before the kidnapping. I never made the connection with Mom or Dad at the time of the kidnapping because the other notes were sent to me.”
“Really? What did they say?”
“I can’t recall the exact wording, but very similar to the note Gertie described. It might have been, ‘you won’t get away with it,’ or ‘you’ll never get away with it.’”
“Did you save any of them?”
Andy shook his head, and Brad eyed him warily. Threatening notes—albeit several years ahead of the kidnapping—could alter his working premise about the motivation for the crime.
“Did you conduct an investigation when you received them?” Brad asked, but he already knew the answer.
“No.”
“I’ll need your help in researching stock transactions from the time of the kidnapping,” Brad said, as they returned to the front portico. “You gave me a good idea earlier when you were talking about the value of the company stock.” It never hurt to flatter his brother, Brad had learned.
Andy smiled. “Sure. Call my office. Whatever you need. But let me give you a bit of advice. Wilkie’s a scumbag. How do you know he isn’t jerking you around with this message? You’re the guy who caught him. Then for eleven years the scumbag waits for his chance to get even. He wants to play your fiddle one last time so he makes up a mysterious note—doo do doo do,” Andy hummed the Twilight Zone theme.
Brad smiled.
“Think about it,” Andy said. “I’m gonna jog for a couple miles. I’ll catch you later.”
Andy took off running, while Brad gazed after him. Andy had always intimidated Brad.
A three-person cleaning crew busily tidied up the mansion as Brad passed through the foyer on the way to his nine o’clock meeting. Rags squeaked on the windows, a heavy-duty vacuum cleaner noisily whirred in the drawing room, and mops renewed the shine on the marble floor of the entry hall.
