Echoes of Titanic (20 page)

“All right, got it,” Walter said through the phone. “In his will, Sean left everything, quote, ‘to my living descendants, and if I have no living descendants, to my brother, Rowan, or, if he is no longer living, to Rowan's descendants.'”

Kelsey had him read it again, only this time she traced her finger along the family tree as he spoke. She still didn't understand how Adele's true identity could have made any difference, but then she traced it out again, this time pretending that Adele had died on
Titanic
and Jocelyn was the one who lived. In that case, Sean would not have had any living descendants, so everything would have gone to Rowan's descendants instead. “Walter, was Oona still alive by the time Sean died?”

“Uh…let me see…no. Oona died in nineteen twenty-three.”

“Okay. So if we know Oona was no longer living and we pretend that Adele was no longer living, then according to Sean's will, everything would have gone to Rowan and Oona's descendants. That would mean half to Jocelyn and half to Quincy, right?”

“Correct.”

Kelsey closed her eyes. “So if Adele was not really Adele but was instead Jocelyn, she would have received only half of Sean's estate, not the whole thing. When she died and her fortune passed down from her to Grandpa Jonah, he should have received only her half, not the whole thing. Right?”

“Yes,” Walter replied, “Half was definitely hers to give. But if she was Jocelyn pretending to be Adele, then the other half should not have gone to her. It should have gone to Quincy, and from Quincy down to Ian, and from Ian down to Rupert and Rhonda. That's the money they want, the money they say is owed them. If Adele died on that ship on April fifteenth, nineteen twelve, then they are correct. They should have received half of Sean's estate when he died. If Adele—the real Adele—lived to the ripe old age of ninety-six and died in her sleep of natural causes, which is what you and I believe happened, then they are incorrect and are not owed a penny. Does it make sense now?”

“It does.” She took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. “I appreciate your taking the time to explain all this to me. It's complicated, but I think I get it.”

“Good.”

“Just one more question, and then I have something to tell you about.”

“All right, but we need to wrap this up. I have a meeting in a few minutes.”

“Sure. I'm just wondering where DNA fits in with all of this. Aren't there
ways now to test different descendants from the same family line and figure out if and how they are related? Seems to me we should be able to test Rupert and test me and then from that information know if his claims are true or not.”

“I asked one of the lawyers about DNA testing last night. According to him, it wouldn't help in this case because of the way DNA is passed down through the sexes from one generation to the next. In this situation, he said the most DNA would be able to prove is whether or not you and Rupert share a common ancestor—which we already know you do. The specifics of who that common ancestor is can't be determined. That would take an unbroken female line or an unbroken male line, such as mother to daughter to daughter or father to son to son, but you don't have that. Jocelyn had no sisters to trace through.”

Kelsey exhaled slowly, her shoulders sagging. Walter asked her to hold on for a moment, and when he came back on the line he apologized but said that the people had arrived for his meeting and he needed to go.

“I understand, but I just have one more thing, real quick, about the bonds.”

“The bonds Rupert referred to yesterday?”

“Yes. You and Lou told me that the bonds were just a myth, but I asked my dad point-blank if they ever actually existed and he said yes, they did. Better than that, I asked him if there are still any left, and again he said yes.”

She expected Walter to express shock or elation at that news, but instead he merely gave a soft grunt so she continued, explaining that according to her father, Gloria had been the caretaker of the bonds. “I asked him where they were stored, and he kept saying something that sounded like ‘the wonder.' Do have any idea what he meant?”

“‘The wonder'? Never heard of it.”

“He repeated it several times. I'm almost certain that's what he was saying. The wonder.”

Walter was silent for a long moment. “Listen, Kelsey, I don't mean to be hurtful, but I know it hasn't been easy for you to accept the, uh, reality of your father's condition. He says a lot of odd things, most of them nonsense. From what I understand, that's part and parcel with a stroke.”

Kelsey clenched her teeth. She knew what Walter was saying, but she also knew her father well enough to know when he was spouting nonsense and when he was fully lucid. Just a little while ago, in the living room, he had been utterly, completely lucid.

“Anyway,” Walter said, “thanks for calling in, and I'm glad to know you're doing okay. The PR team is here now, so I really do need to go.”

Just the mention of public relations made her want to shudder.“I hate to ask this, but do you need me in that meeting?”

“No, though I appreciate the offer. As you can imagine, our PR strategy now has to do a complete one eighty. Just yesterday we were beating the drums far and wide to proclaim the name of ‘Tate' from the rooftops. Now, the
last
thing we need is to reinforce the connection between you and your great-grandmother and this company. I'm sorry, but you're going to have to stay away completely. I don't see what choice we have right now.”

Though Kelsey didn't exactly appreciate the way he'd phrased it, she knew what he was saying. It was the same issue she'd had to explain to her brother last night, that the fallout from Rupert's public outcry was going to have a huge impact on the company's bottom line. A besmirching of the good name of Adele Brennan Tate, even if unfounded, was the same thing as a besmirching of the company that carried her name. And the more the name of Kelsey Tate was promoted, the more people were reminded of that connection.

They ended their call, and then Kelsey went in search of her mother. She found her in the living room, seated beside Nolan's wheelchair, almost as if they were sitting together on the couch the way they used to. When Kelsey entered the room, her mother was reading to her dad from a book, an old favorite of his that Kelsey quickly recognized.

She told her parents that she needed to go but for her mom not to get up, she would see herself out. Crossing the room, she gave them each a peck on the cheek, but then, as she was standing there chatting with her mother for just a moment longer, her father suddenly spoke.

“Proud.”

Both women turned to look at him.

“What did you say, dear?” Doreen asked.

He didn't reply right away, but then Kelsey realized that his eyes were riveted to the new pin on her lapel, the golden “Q” with the diamond center that had been given to her by Lou.

“Proud,” he said again, the corners of his mouth turning up into a crooked smile.

Fresh tears immediately filled her eyes.

“Thanks, Dad,” she whispered, trying to blink them away. “Lou gave it to me this morning. He said that you gave one to him years ago, so now he
was giving one to me.” She was about to add that she wished her father could have been there at Brennan & Tate for the ceremony, but considering how the whole event had unraveled so disastrously, she realized now it was a good thing he hadn't come after all.

Once the pin had been called to her attention, Doreen complimented it as well, but Kelsey could tell that her mother didn't really get it. She seemed to think that the significant thing here was the pin itself. Only her father understood that what really mattered was what that pin represented.

In the past, Kelsey and her dad had shared many a work-related victory, something they usually met with a high five and a hearty “Way to go!” Missing those moments so badly she could feel an ache deep in her chest, Kelsey knelt down beside his chair and held up her open palm just a few inches away.

“Can you believe it, Dad? I finally made it into the Quarter Club.”

It was a struggle, but finally he managed to raise a trembling hand and press it against hers. “Waaaay,” he said, which was all he could manage to get out. It was enough.

“Yeah, way to go, huh?” she whispered.

Then, with a last goodbye, she stood and walked out of the room as quickly as she could, somehow managing to hold in her sobs until she had gathered her things and made it all the way outside.

K
elsey went to a bench on the corner of the next block, sat down, and allowed herself to cry. Though her sadness was bubbling up from deep inside, hers were silent tears, and not a single person who passed by even noticed. Or perhaps they did but pretended not to.

Once she'd gotten control of herself, Kelsey headed to a deli on Lexington and went into the restroom to put herself back together again as best she could. After that she bought an egg salad sandwich and a bottle of water then made her way to the subway entrance and took it straight down the island, all the way to Wall Street. The subway ride took almost half an hour, but from there it was a quick, two-minute walk to the office.

As she drew closer, she looked up ahead for the sight of any reporters or photographers hovering outside the building, but the coast looked clear. Once inside, she saw that Ephraim was manning the front desk, but at the moment he was busy with someone, so Kelsey just gave him a wave and continued on to the elevator.

Up on the fourth floor, Sharon looked surprised to see her but also somewhat relieved. Kelsey invited her into her office, shut the door, and asked how things were going. Though Kelsey was never one to congregate around the water cooler, she managed to stay up on all the office scuttlebutt via the shrewd eyes and ears of her ever-alert executive assistant.

Sharon shared all that had been happening—the announcement, the dramatics, the shuffling around of office space—but she didn't tell Kelsey anything she hadn't already learned from Walter. When she was finished, they
spent a few minutes going over the calls that had come in during the morning and the various appointments Sharon had managed to shuffle around for the next few days. After that, Kelsey said that she'd be working in her office for a while and that she didn't want to be disturbed.

“You got it, Chief,” Sharon replied, rising to go. “Anybody who tries to get in here will have to go through me.”

Once she was alone, Kelsey turned on her computer, but rather than logging in as herself, she wanted to try going in as Gloria. According to Walter, though the actual hardware of Gloria's computer had been removed by the police, virtually anything of importance would still be on the server. And though she wasn't even sure what she was hoping to find, she just wanted to poke around a little bit to see if anything unusual jumped out at her.

Last month Gloria had been out with a bad cold for almost a week but had called Kelsey repeatedly for help with various matters that required her to sign in under Gloria's name. She still remembered the password, 5tgbNHY6, because of how easily it typed out in a line straight down the keyboard and back up again. Her hope was that it hadn't changed since then. The IT department made everyone on the system go to a new password each month, but perhaps Gloria's reset cycle was different from hers.

No such luck. Kelsey tried it once but her entry was rejected with the dreaded response,
Invalid Password
. She considered trying a few guesses but didn't dare because she knew the system would lock her out completely after two more tries. Instead, she called the extension for Yanni, the EA Gloria shared with Walter, hoping to get the password from her. Yanni didn't answer, however, so rather than leaving a message, Kelsey just hung up and headed upstairs to Gloria's office herself on the off chance she might find it there, scribbled on a piece of paper or something. The woman wasn't big on technology and tended to cling to old habits.

The door to Gloria's office was closed. When Kelsey swung it open, she was startled to see Yanni there, leaning over the desk, her long, black hair hanging in a straight, glossy sheet. She straightened, quickly dropping her hands to her sides.

“Yes?”

Kelsey explained what she needed, but Yanni apologized, saying she wasn't privy to Gloria's password.

“Any idea where I could get it?” Kelsey asked, her eyes taking in the space
where Gloria's computer used to be. The polished desktop was bare now except for the phone, an empty inbox, and a small potted plant.

To her core, Kelsey could feel the void of what was missing from this room—not just the computer, but Gloria herself. Standing there, Kelsey tried to picture her mentor sitting at the desk, inviting her in or offering some advice. But slowly that image began to morph into something else entirely.

Gloria's purple face. Gloria's limp body hanging from a cord.

Dead.

Suddenly dizzy, afraid she might faint, Kelsey gripped the door frame. Yanni must have seen that something was wrong, because she jumped forward to help Kelsey over to Gloria's desk chair, where she sat.