My finger lingered over the mouse, deciding whether I wanted to open, leave as unread, or delete.
I hadn’t spoken to my father since I’d called off the wedding, only my mother.
Holding my breath, I opened the email. On the screen was the place to enter a pin.
This formality made me smile. The encoded email was something between me and my father.
We started our secret system when I was still in high school. We’d use our clandestine messages to plan surprises for my mother or to invite one another on special father-daughter dates. As an only child, I loved the times I’d get one parent to themselves. I’d dress up and Dad would take me to one of the restaurants downtown. Sometimes my mother and I would dress up and go to tea at the Drake Hotel.
The encoded lock on the email made it impossible for anyone else to come upon our correspondence and access what was written.
I entered the four numbers that were special to us.
The email opened.
Julia,
Please call me. I want to talk to my little girl.
Dad
“I’m not a little girl,” I whispered, but his reference didn’t upset me. It added to my guilt. Maybe I’d been selfish. Maybe my father would have more understanding for my situation. Then again, he was Marlin Butler’s best friend, or he thought he was. If I called, I could warn him.
I took a deep breath as I looked at my phone. The signal was currently good with five bars and the battery charged.
Leaving both the information Van had left me and my laptop in the library, I stepped out into the main level. In the distance, I heard sounds as well as pots and pans and smelled the aromas of more and different foods. As I climbed the steps, I heard Margaret’s vacuum in what I’d been told was Van’s suite.
Curiosity pulled me toward her.
I made it to the hallway. Unlike the one containing my suite, there was only one option in this hallway, double doors at the end, currently ajar. All I’d have to do was take a few more steps to be at the threshold.
It was as if there was an invisible tug-of-war occurring in the realm beyond my ability to see. I was pulled toward the doorway, hoping for more personal touches to Van’s life and history. Surely a man as passionate as Van Sherman had mementos to remind him of others. And at the same time, there was a wall. It wasn’t as if I could touch it, but it was there nonetheless. It was a barrier that I didn’t want to cross.
It was as if I were on a precipice.
Will I learn more about the man I am attracted to or will I lose his trust?
Julia
One more step toward his suite and I changed my mind, quickly redirecting my destination. I’d enter Van’s suite if and when he invited me. Van had opened his home to me. I wasn’t going to snoop where I wasn’t invited.
For some reason, as I passed the other door in the hallway to my suite, I twisted the handle. It didn’t move. The door was locked. A locked door was not an invitation. When I stepped through the threshold to my suite, I found all the rooms exactly as I’d left them. My clothes from last night were still strewn on a chair in the sitting room. The large bed was unmade. The towel from my shower was hanging haphazardly from the towel bar.
It wasn’t my lack of tidiness that made me smile but that Margaret respected my wishes—the boundary that I’d set. At least one person in my new life could do that.
Sitting in a large chair near the fireplace, I pulled my feet up into the chair, wrapped one arm around my knees, and touched the screen, calling my father’s private phone. The sound of a ring was quickly replaced with my father’s voice.
“Julia, tell me this is you.”
The desperation in his tone added to my newfound remorse at not calling him earlier. “It’s me, Dad. I’ve spoken to Mom. Didn’t she tell you?”
“Where are you?”
“I took a job in Ashland.”
The noise behind Dad’s voice went away as if he’d left a busy room. He didn’t address my answer, instead asking more questions. “Have you looked at your emails? Tell me you care. Tell me you’re not simply hiding when you could help.”
I put my sock-covered feet back on the large rug and paced back and forth before the fireplace, my stomach twisting with each step. I hadn’t read the emails. Each turn had me facing the beautiful snow-ladened bay and then away. “Dad, I’m not caught up. What’s happening?”
He let out an exasperated sigh. “In the last week, the perceived value of Wade has dropped.”
“I’m sorry. I’ve been a bit preoccupied by what happened with Skylar and now with me.”
“Julia, you must come home. Christmas is in two days. Come home and let me explain what has happened since you left.”
“What does it matter what the perceived value of Wade Pharmaceutical is? There is real value.”
“Julia, we haven’t been as forthcoming as we should, given you’re about to be more involved. The truth is that Wade has been having financial problems during the last few years. We’ve relied on loans to keep us going. The banks allowed us to borrow and borrow some more because the bank officials believed we could pay it back. With the new belief that we’re sinking, the largest loan has called a balloon payment due by January 3rd. Our options are to make the payment or accept an astronomical increase in interest.”
“How would combining McGrath stock with Butler have stopped that?” I asked, trying to understand.
“That union was a show of strength. Now, it’s even worse. We’re under attack.”
“What do you mean?” I asked. “Attack, attack from whom?”
“We don’t know. Marlin brought it to me yesterday. Someone has orchestrated a calculated effort to accumulate Wade stock.”
I knew who that someone was.
“In less than twenty-four hours, twenty-one percent was sold and purchased. That’s a huge amount. While this could be a coincidence brought on by the cancellation of your wedding, we believe that the move was too coordinated. Marlin and I believe it has all been done by one entity. Right now, the buyer has hidden their identity under layers of shell companies.”
“Was the cancellation of our wedding announced?” I hadn’t heard that either.
“Julia, are you trying to keep up with the world at all?” He didn’t let me answer. “The business news outlets blasted your and Skylar’s picture all over their networks. As soon as they did, the perceived value of Wade began to drop. It had steadied with word of your reconciliation.”
What reconciliation?
Before I could ask, Dad went on, “Then this large accumulation of stock by an unknown buyer combined with the loan issues is making the other stockholders nervous. We’re back to bleeding capital and we can’t hide that. The fifteen percent of stock that’s currently held by single and conglomerate investors is vulnerable. If the bastard who rounded up twenty-one percent found a way to get that fifteen...”
He’s not a bastard. I didn’t lead with that. “If he or they did, they still wouldn’t have the majority, Dad. That would only be thirty-six percent.”
“Marlin is worried and so am I.”
I took a deep breath. “Dad, don’t trust Marlin. He was trying to get that twenty-one percent. He had a line set for sales on the thirtieth of this month. That would have taken him to forty-six percent—seven percent more than us. We would have had no choice but to go along with him on whatever deal he wanted us to take, including selling to Big Pharma. Seeing as Skylar would have voting rights to my shares after marriage, the plan was to screw us.”