Echoes of Titanic (40 page)

“Yes, sir,” she said, pulse surging. Cole wouldn't be smiling like that unless he'd found something good.

She dressed quickly, donning her own all-black outfit, nearly identical to Cole's, except that he wore black loafers while she was in black sneakers. When she reached the conference room, she saw that both Thriller and Flash were in dark clothes as well.

“Look at us,” she quipped as she came into the room and set her purse aside. “Throw in a couple of wigs, and we could be an eighties hair band.”

They laughed.

“Personally, I'd rather be the Man in Black,” Thriller said.

“You mean like Will Smith?” Flash asked. “Tommy Lee Jones?”

“No. Johnny Cash,” Thriller replied, shaking his head.

“You need a better belt buckle if you want to be Johnny Cash,” Cole said, carrying a cup of coffee over to the table. Seeing that, Kelsey headed for the pot at the end of the room and poured one for herself as well.

“Oh, I got the belt buckles for it, don't you worry,” Thriller replied. “I just can't wear 'em on surveillance. They might draw too much attention, not to mention blind somebody with their silver brilliance.”

Cole and Flash both laughed heartily, and Kelsey smiled as she carried her coffee to the table and took the same chair she'd used earlier.

“All right, gang, let's get down to work,” Cole said, placing both hands on the table and looking at the others assembled there. As he did, Kelsey couldn't help but notice the solid biceps under the taut, dark fabric of his sleeves. Obviously, he'd kept up with his workouts since their breakup. Good for him.

Turning to her, Cole explained the order of events for the evening. First, they would go around the table and quickly share the information they had each managed to gather since their meeting that morning. Then they would
wire her up, give her instructions, and head out. Once the mission was complete, their evening would be over and they could even drop her at her place if she wanted, since it wasn't too far from where they would be.

“Wire me up?”

“You'll see,” he replied. “Okay, since my info is the most depressing part of the agenda, I'll go first to get it out of the way.” In front of him was a neatly typed page of columns and numbers, a copy of which he slid over to Kelsey.

She picked it up and studied it, noting that the page was in three sections divided by horizontal lines.

“My job was to check out all of the financials. At the top is a profile of Queen's Fleet Management Group. As you can see, they're quite liquid and fully capable of affording this acquisition.”

Kelsey nodded, scanning the numbers. She was stunned by the size of their retained earnings. She'd known it was a big company, but this was impressive.

“Below that,” he continued, “in the middle section, is a breakdown of B & T. As you know, it's a lot harder to come up with a specific value for a privately owned company, even one with shares and stockholders. But your father has always obtained an annual estimate, and fortunately Walter has continued the practice in his stead. You're right that the company's value peaked shortly before Nolan's stroke and then dipped the following year.”

Kelsey scanned the numbers, seeing that in December 2010—just two months before her dad's stroke—B & T had been valued at $70 million. By December 2011, that figure had dropped to $36 million. She'd already known this, of course, but it still hurt to see it spelled out in black and white.

“There have been no official numbers compiled since December,” Cole continued, “but I did find a report done just last Friday that estimated a nice rebound back up to around fifty-eight million. In other words, Kelsey, your PR campaign was working.”

She nodded, waiting to hear his opinion as to the impact the past week might have had on that number.

“Of course, it's hard to say what
today's
exact value would be, given what has happened, but we can look at the offer given by Queen's Fleet to get an idea of what their estimate is.” Looking directly at Kelsey, he said, “If you've received your stockholder's letter and done the math, you already know what Queen's Fleet thinks you're worth.”

Nodding somberly, she replied, “Yeah. About twenty-two million. That's
why my coffee table is upside down and coasters and magazines are all over my floor.”

Cole gave her a sympathetic smile as Thriller let out a low whistle.

“Are you saying that in less than a year and a half, the value of the company went from seventy million down to twenty-two million?”

Kelsey looked to Cole, who shook his head. “No. It didn't really—at least, not yet. That may be what Queen's Fleet wants to think, but it won't be true unless the stockholders vote to sell at that price. In my opinion, I believe a more accurate figure would be right around the previous low of thirty-six. That's not great, but it's a lot better than twenty-two. Which brings us to the bottom section of my report.”

Kelsey returned her attention to the page in front of her and felt a tiny surge of hope at the heading he'd put there,
Recommended Recourse
.

“As you can see,” he said, “I came up with three scenarios that your board could try in order to circumvent this hostile takeover. Scenario one would be to do nothing. Reject the offer and ride out the current troubles until things are back on track.”

“Nice dream,” Kelsey replied, “but the board has no control over that. It's up to the stockholders now.”

“Which is why I included more than one option. Scenario two would be a friendly merger with another company. By combining forces with someone of equivalent or slightly lesser value, you might not see an immediate return, but at least you could stave off the hostile takeover—and if you play your cards right, retain all current positions and complete control of operations. Choose well, and their good will could also help B & T overcome the current publicity issues.”

Kelsey nodded. “This is exactly what I told Walter last night, that a friendly merger with a smaller company had to be preferable to a hostile takeover by a mammoth one.” Kelsey leaned forward, looking at Cole. “Lou Strahan has been wanting to merge with us for a long time. I don't know the specifics of his current offer, but I have to believe he could beat Clean Sweep's paltry twenty-two million.”

Cole's eyes narrowed, and after a moment Kelsey remembered what a touchy topic this was for them both. “Lou's only been at it for five years, Kels. Is he really all that big yet? Big enough for something like this, I mean?”

“Absolutely. As predicted, he's been extremely successful. He also knows that the realty trust area is a good fit and something we currently lack at
B & T. From what he's told me, his long-range goal has always been to grow big enough to buy back in. In the beginning, even I thought that was a tad optimistic, but given how low our value has fallen, at this point it actually seems plausible.”

Cole nodded, avoiding her eyes. Once again, they were in tricky emotional territory. “And what was Walter's response to that suggestion?”

“He told me he would look into it, but I don't know how aggressively he's going to move on it.”

Leaning back in his chair, Cole finally focused his gaze on Kelsey. “You know what, Kels? Depending on how things work out tonight, you might consider going over Walter's head and convening an emergency meeting with the board of directors yourself.” Glancing toward Flash, he added, “In our research, we turned up a rather…uh…troubling fact.”

“What's that?”

Cole hesitated, so Flash jumped in and spoke.

“Fifteen years ago, Walter Hallerman was working as a consultant, and his biggest client was none other than Queen's Fleet Management Group.”

Kelsey's eyes widened. “Wait a minute. You're telling me the man at the helm of Brennan & Tate used to be aligned with Queen's Fleet?”

“That's what we found out,” Cole replied. “He may be completely on the up-and-up. But for all we know, he could have been working this from the inside all along, trying to bring everything at B & T to this point.”

Kelsey shook her head, refusing to believe it. She had never been crazy about the man, and she'd been especially frustrated by the choices he'd made in the last week, but she also knew that her father was a tremendously gifted judge of character. Nolan Tate had believed in Walter one hundred percent. Thus, she had always believed in him as well. She said as much now.

“We have no proof of any wrongdoing,” Flash said. “We just thought we would bring the matter to your attention.”

They were all quiet for a long moment, and then Cole returned to the financial report.

“Anyway,” he said, “the third scenario I'm recommending is to secure a significant cash infusion and buy out any stockholders who would otherwise force the sale of the company. Buy enough shares, and the Tate family could even regain control of B & T for the first time in decades.”

Kelsey liked the sound of that. “Have you done the math? Exactly how much money would it take?”

“It's hard to come up with an exact figure, but if I had to guess I'd say somewhere between seven and ten million dollars—seven to stave off the takeover and ten to get your family at fifty-one percent. Then you reject Pamela's offer and do your best to ride out the storm until the publicity crisis is past and the value recovers.”

“Obviously, this would be my choice,” Kelsey said. “But a cash infusion from where? Are you recommending that we acquire some sort of debt? Or maybe a liquidation of some kind?”

Looking to the two men at the table, Cole shook his head. “No, I was thinking more along the lines of cashing in some bonds.”

It took a moment for Kelsey to understand. She was about to give a sarcastic reply, like, “Bonds? Sure. No problem. Let me get my purse,” when she realized that all three men were smiling at her.

“What?” she asked warily, not daring to hope.

“Got something to show you,” Thriller said, turning to pick up a large, heavy book from the chair beside him. Standing, he opened it and began flipping through the pages. She tilted her head, trying to read the spine. She couldn't quite make it out, but from the cover photo it looked to her like some sort of antiquing catalog.

Thriller found the page he wanted, flipped the book around, and slapped it down on the table in front of Kelsey. Leaning forward, he pointed toward an old black-and-white photograph.

She sat up straight and took a look. Sure enough, it was a catalog of antiquities with photos and descriptions of various items. The photograph to which Thriller was pointing was of an old black safe. There didn't seem to be anything special about it that she could see. Its door was outlined with a decorative square of shiny metal, and inside that square was some writing, a combination lock, and a wide handle.

Peering more closely, she read the decorative script on the door, which said,
Cramer Bros. Safe Co
., and under that,
Kansas City, MO
. Still not sure what she was looking for, her eyes went to the only other writing on the safe. Those letters had faded, but she squinted at them until she could make out what they said. Then she gasped.

In big block letters across the top, over the door, were two words, the best two words she'd seen in a long time.

THE WONDER.

April 13, 1912

J
OCELYN

J
ocelyn was feeling quite melancholy as the final song of the concert came to a close. How would she ever make her decision? Why was God being so silent in this matter?

As sounds of applause drifted up from the audience below, the doors to the outside burst open and several men entered, laughing and talking loudly.

“Ladies!” one of them cried, and Jocelyn realized it was the voice of Tad.

The three men stumbled toward the couch, arms around each other, and for a moment she feared they were drunk. Then she realized that while the one in the middle was indeed inebriated, the other two were sober and simply holding him up so he wouldn't fall.

“Hey, Clancy,” Tad said, turning to the fellow on the other end, “this is the girl I was talking about. Why don't you stay here and chat with her for a few minutes while I get our friend here tucked into bed and then come back and join you?” Turning to Adele, he said, “You don't mind, do you?”

Adele seemed to recoil. “I don't—”

“Oh, wait,” Tad said with a laugh, “I guess I should tell you what I'm talking about. My friend Clancy here needs some business advice, and I thought you might be the one to help him.”

“Advice?”

“He'll explain. His company has run into some troubles. See what you can do. I'll be back in just a bit.”

With that Tad was heading off down the stairs, one arm supporting his friend and the other firmly gripping the rail. Clancy was left standing there, looking embarrassed and nervous, clutching the brim of his hat and focusing his eyes on the floor in front of him.