The Deadliest Option (7 page)

“Boy, are you single-minded. I don’t have to answer any of your questions, but you have to answer mine.”

“He said, after he’s made mad, passionate love to her and cooked her a sumptuous feast and plied her with wine to overcome her natural reticence.”

“Natural reticence. That’s a good one. Talk, lady, or I’ll haul your ass down to the station.” He folded his arms again.

She flushed and kicked him under the table with her bare foot. “I think there’s something terribly wrong with our relationship. You have all the rights.”

“That’s because I’m Italian,” he said. “Besides, it’s my job.” He reached into the inside pocket of his jacket, which was hanging on the back of the chair, and actually pulled out his little black notepad. “What did you say you were doing there?”

“I didn’t say, but if you must know, we do consulting work for Luwisher Brothers.” She made a face at him.

“Did you know Goldie Barnes?”

“Not well. To say hello to, that’s about it.” She looked at him seriously. “Was he murdered?”

“What do you know about the rest of them? Hoffritz and his crew.” He flipped over the pages and reading upside down, she saw he’d written down some familiar names. Hoffritz, Bird, Gorham, Munchen.

“Hey, I think I’m being used here. It’s not fair. Just tell me this. Was Goldie really murdered? I won’t ask any more questions. He looked as if he was choking, as if he were having an asthma attack.”

“‘He looked as if he was choking’?” Silvestri repeated. “What the hell are you saying, Les? Are you telling me that you were
there,
for chrissakes?”

“Well, of course I was there. I told you I was going to a business dinner with a manager. You never listen to me.”

“I don’t believe this.” He smacked the table, rattling the empty plates. “How do you know every—?”

“It’s my business to know everybody on the Street. And anyway, New York is really a small town. I never go anywhere without running into people I know or people who know people I know.”

“Oh, forget it. Who were you there with—not Hoffritz, by any chance?” He was being sarcastic, and she couldn’t control her giggle.

“Chris Gorham.”

“Oh, for shit’s sake.”

“Now do you want to tell me about Goldie?”

“Nope.” He started cleaning up, carrying the dishes into the kitchen.

She followed him and began stacking the dishwasher. “You already told me you were there about a murder.”

“Who, me? I don’t remember saying that.”

“You know, when the elevator door closed.”

“I was talking about the heat.”

She gave him a push. “I hate when you do this.”

“Do what?” He drew her to him and kissed her. He tasted sweet, of wine and tomatoes. “You can be really helpful because you know the players.”

“True,” she mumbled into his shirt. “What’ll you give me if I cooperate, officer?”

He laughed and ran his hands slowly down her back. “God, I hate to tell you anything because you’re going to make sure you get involved.”

“C
OME ON
, S
ILVESTRI
, face it, I am already involved, albeit peripherally.” It was morning and Wetzon was standing in the open door of the bathroom watching him shave.

“Oh, hell,” he said. “Goldie Barnes appears to have been poisoned.”

“What does that mean—appears to have been?”

“That’s it, Les.”

“Don’t I get to know anything else? Quid pro quo and all that?”

“Nope.”

“Why are you on the case?”

“Because it happened on my watch.”

“Oh.” She frowned. “I just love hanging around here getting no information.”

His reflection grinned at her. “I’d like you to fill me in on what
you
know. As far as we’re concerned, everyone is a suspect until we eliminate him. Or her.”

“But don’t get involved, right?” She thought for a moment. “There must have been a hundred people at the dinner, Silvestri. That’s a lot of suspects. And as far as filling you in ...” She stopped, wondering if this was the time to tell him what Smith had done. “I’ve got a bit of a moral problem here.”

He raised a black eyebrow at her and ran a comb through his thinning hair. “I’m listening.”

She backed out of his way, following him into the neatened bedroom; she had made the bed while he showered. He groped under his side of the bed and pulled out his shoulder holster, removed the gun, and laid it gently on the quilt. After shrugging into the leather apparatus, he checked his gun and returned it to its pocket under his right arm.

Wetzon had never gotten used to watching Silvestri dress without feeling this was the same kind of personal ritual as watching a woman putting on her makeup. The gun and his relationship with it held a particular fascination for her. In some peculiar way, he handled his gun the way he handled her.

He straightened up and caught her look, and she felt naked and exposed although she was garbed in full pinstriped armor. “What moral problem?” he asked. He kissed her nose and went down the hall in search of his jacket.

She could tell his mind was on the job and he was not listening, but she followed him down the hall anyway. “What I know about Luwisher Brothers is considered proprietary information.”

“There’s no such thing in a murder investigation.”

“You say.”

“Do you want a ride?” He was impatient, standing at the door.

She shook her head. “I don’t think so. I have some calls to make and I want to go through the papers.”
The Wall Street Journal
and
The Times
lay on the floor near her door, demanding to be read.

He pressed the down button of the elevator and came back to stand in her doorway. “What’s your afternoon like?”

“Don’t know. Fridays are slow when the weather is like this. Everyone takes off early for the Hamptons. Why?”

“I might want you to come over to the precinct and talk to us about these investment bankers of yours.”

“Oh, Silvestri—”

“Don’t oh-Silvestri me. You’ve always wanted to be involved; now I’m involving you.”

“I have to think about this.”

“No, you don’t.” He closed the door on her.

She poured the last dregs of coffee from her Melitta pot and buttered the second half of her bagel, wondering where the borders of confidentiality could be crossed. What was right and what was wrong. Was she obligated to tell her client? She smeared Sarabeth’s wonderful apricot orange marmalade over the bagel and raised the mug to her lips.

What about Smith? She would have to tell her. Damn. Here she was trying to be virtuous and uninvolved, and both Silvestri and Smith kept pushing her into a homicide investigation. She set the cup down on the counter and opened
The Journal
, skimming over the articles on the front page. The headline in the center of the page read “Barnes Death Deemed Murder.” The article quoted John Hoffritz’s statement as she had overheard it, and no new information except that the New York Stock Exchange would observe one minute of silence at twelve noon today in memory of Goldie Barnes.

Under
What’s News—Business and Finance
, Wetzon stopped to read a small item. S&S Sedlet Securities, a small Atlanta-based brokerage house, had made a buy-out offer for L. L. Rosenkind.

“Oh, no!” she said out loud. There went the Howie Minton job search. He’d probably hang in and see what kind of bonus he was going to get to stay. And he’d get a nice one, she was sure, because no firm could afford to lose a big producer. S&S Sedlet would probably follow the Street and offer a contract for two to three years with a bonus on the front end for big producers to keep them stationary and another bonus on the back end based on production at each year end for the length of the contract.

She was just thinking that Smith was right again when her phone rang. She wiped her sticky fingers and answered just before her machine clicked in.

“Wetzon!” It was Smith, breathless, as if she’d been running, which was totally out of character. Smith never exercised, didn’t believe in it, and had the metabolism to reinforce this. “Wetzon?”

“Yes.”

“You saw the item about Sedlet buying Rosenkind?”

“Yes. Don’t say it, please.”

“Say what?”

“I-told-you-so about Howie Minton. Now he’s going to wait and see what he’s offered to stay—”

“Well, of course he’ll be offered a bonus to stay, but he wasn’t going anywhere anyway. I wasn’t calling you about that. I know Seth Sedlet and his brother Sean.”

“You do? How?”

“Don’t ask. They’re
pirates.
They took over the first company I worked for and sold it off piece by piece. There was nothing left that was recognizable. They’ll sell Rosenkind’s assets and wipe out the company—not that it matters, except the Street is getting smaller and smaller. If they dissolve Rosenkind, we’ll have one less place to pull brokers out of.”

“Well, they made an offer, but they may not get Rosenkind.”

“I wouldn’t count on it, sugar. Rosenkind has a cash flow problem.”

“Who doesn’t?”

“Are you on your way down?”

“I just want to finish my coffee and skim through
The Times.”
She heard a phone ring. “Where are you?”

“In the office, of course. Where else would I be? You know Jake, he likes to get up and out early.”

So that’s how Smith had seen the Rosenkind-Sedlet item. She should have known. It was unlike Smith to do much professional reading. She left it for Wetzon to fill her in on what was happening on the Street, while Smith let Wetzon know the social news from
W
, which Wetzon found stupid and frivolous.

“Tell me something, Smith,” she said, “what does Jake really do?”

“Why are you doing this to me, Wetzon? Jake is a wonderful, caring man. He paid a harsh price for what he did. He’ll have his license back in September and he’s—”

“Please don’t tell me that he’s coming back into the business.”

“Sweetie, don’t be naive. He never left.”

Wetzon hung up the phone, finished her bagel in big, angry bites, and put the dishes in the dishwasher. Of course Donahue never left. How
could
she be so naive? It was amazing what the Street sanctioned, even after the Crash, and the insider trading scandals.

Just three months ago, against her better judgment, she had placed Bruce Pecora, a broker with two client complaints and a pending lawsuit, at a major firm after giving the eager manager every caveat she could about the broker. Bruce had, in fact, been turned down by almost every other firm on the Street. Only two years in production and he was grossing $350,000. How could he do it? Indeed. One account of a hundred thousand dollars had generated thirty-six thousand dollars’ worth of commissions in one year. He had a churn ’em and burn ’em mentality.

But the headhunting business had slowed to a crawl because brokers were nervous about moving, and production had fallen off because clients were nervous about the market. Smith was nagging at her to show Pecora, regardless. “Someone will want him,” she said, “and we’ll make ourselves a neat twenty-five thou. And once he’s there, he’s their problem.”

“God, Smith, if something goes wrong, it’ll reflect on us.”

“This kid is a time bomb waiting to go off,” one manager told Wetzon. “We’ll pass on him.”

Mike Norman, who managed the Rockefeller Center branch for Loeb Dawkins, had called her, begging for brokers. “Don’t you have anyone for me? Come on, send me brokers.”

“I have someone, but he’s trouble, Mike. Lawsuit, complaints on his U4. Hotheaded.”

“What are his numbers?”

“Three-fifty, second year.”

“Great. When can I see him?”

“He’s trouble, Mike.”

“I can handle him, Wetzon, just leave him to me.”

Famous last words. The day before the Goldie Barnes banquet, Loeb Dawkins had to tell Bruce Pecora to take a leave of absence, at the suggestion of the New York Stock Exchange. It looked as if the Exchange was going to pull Pecora’s license.

She’d felt terrible, responsible.

And Smith had screamed at her, “Mike’s a big boy. He knew what he was doing. And we have our money.”

The phone rang again just as she was outside her door locking the upper lock, the Medco. She hesitated, then unlocked the door and made a dash for the phone. Too late. The machine clicked on. Oh well, let the machine go ahead and answer it. It was probably a survey taker or some salesman.

The first sound she heard was labored breathing—exactly what she needed right now, a breather—then a voice buried in a bronchial cough. “Ms. Wetzon. I must see you as soon as possible.”

She picked up the phone. “Hold on, Dr. Ash.” She turned her machine off. “Are you still there?”

“I must talk to you about—”

“Let me guess,” she said, impatiently. “You’re going to tell me about the study.”

“I’ll provide you with a copy, but—”

“Oh, good.” How had he gotten her home number? She wasn’t listed ... then she remembered. She must have given him the card with the inkblot, the one she hadn’t given to Ellie.

“But that’s not what I want to talk about.” Ash took a loud gasping breath. “Can you meet me at Luwisher Brothers tomorrow morning early—at seven-thirty?”

“Seven-thirty? Tomorrow’s Saturday.”

“I’m aware of that.”

“Does it have to be downtown?”

“Yes. There’s something I want you to see. I’ll be waiting for you at the elevator bank on the sixty-seventh floor.”

“Why me in particular?”

“Ms. Wetzon, why are you making this so difficult for me? I’d rather not go to the police just yet—”

“The police?”

“I want you to give me your word that you will tell no one about our meeting. No one. “

“My word?” She frowned. “All right. What is all this about?”

“I believe,” his voice almost disappeared into a wheeze, “I know why Goldie Barnes was murdered.”

W
ORRIED
L.L. R
OSENKIND BROKERS
were jamming the phone lines when Wetzon got to the office. B.B. was fielding some, sending a few to Harold, fewer still to Smith—who only deigned to speak to the biggest producers—and holding for Wetzon those who had asked for her specifically.