5

The trading floor’s southern exit led to a hallway and the glass bridge passing over Seventh Street. The bank’s satellite building was an older structure that had once contained a textile warehouse. Esther’s division had been relocated here in the early days of Jason’s reign. She minded, but only a little. Jason’s attitude toward his analyst team was guarded and mostly hostile. He did not want them telling him what the risks were. He liked to think he already knew everything he needed about such threats. What Jason wanted from his analysts were two things, and two only. Where the next opportunity for profits lay. And how to increase his division’s gain while remaining legal. And if not legal, how to keep his actions under the SEC’s radar.

The majority of Esther’s team were typical geeks—too fat or too thin, sallow-faced, and scraggly-haired. They were also astonishingly brilliant, excellent at their jobs, and intensely loyal to both her and the bank.

They did their best to fit into some version of banker attire. But Esther doubted if her four males had ever spent more than ten dollars on a tie. Or if any of the women besides Jasmine fully understood the art of applying cosmetics.

When Esther returned to her division, she was greeted by sixteen very tense and worried faces. They all knew what the day’s trading success really meant. And there was nothing she could say to reassure them that was not a lie.

Jasmine reported, “Some hack from the executive floor was in here looking for you. Apparently Reynolds Thane wants to have a word.”

“When was this?”

“About five minutes after you left. What was Jason after?”

“I have no idea. He . . .” Esther stopped in mid-flow.

“What is it?”

“Nothing. I’d better go see what our chief wants.”

Esther returned to the main bank building and took the elevator the traders referred to as the Boss Rocket. Previously it had halted only at the lobby and penthouse levels, but then Jason insisted a new stop be inserted for his floor. Esther considered this a very strategic move. Every board member was suddenly made aware of the tectonic shift of power. For the nine quarters since Jason’s promotion to division chief, investment banking had generated more profit than the rest of the bank’s activities combined.

As the elevator shot her up to the thirty-fifth floor, Esther tried to formulate a response to what the CEO was bound to ask: What was her take on the risks embedded in Jason’s trade? Esther still felt caught by Jason’s silent warning and had no idea what to say. Which was hardly the mind-set to carry into a meeting with the bank’s president. But when the doors opened on the board level, Esther realized it no longer mattered.

Reynolds Thane stood in the elevator’s lobby with another gentleman in his late sixties. Both men possessed the ruddy sheen of out-of-season tans. Reynolds gripped an imaginary putter while the other man smiled indulgently. Sir Trevor Stanstead was CEO of a British conglomerate that owned the third largest bank in Europe. The group had recently acquired four percent of CFM’s shares. The following month, Sir Trevor had been named to CFM’s board.

Sir Trevor had snow-white hair and a genteel manner that most people found charming. He dressed in tailored clothes even when headed for the golf course, like now. Sir Trevor wielded ultimate power with refined grace. She was certain Trevor Stanstead eviscerated his enemies with polished charm.

Reynolds smiled benignly. “Ah, Ms. Larsen, they found you. Excellent. Sir Trevor, this is Jason’s top analyst.”

Trevor Stanstead had a piercing gray gaze the color of a polished blade. “I say, well done, Ms. Larsen.”

Reynolds held the private elevator doors open for his guest. He clearly had no interest in Esther joining them. “We’ll need to reschedule our chat, Ms. Larsen. Perhaps early next week. Speak with Grace and set it up.”

Esther waited for the doors to shut, then moved over to hit the button for the slower-moving elevator. When she stepped inside, she felt as if the bronze walls were closing in on her.

As the floors pinged past, Esther said to her fractured image, “They are already celebrating.”

When she exited on the seventeenth floor, her phone chimed. Esther had downloaded a special ringtone for Jason’s calls and messages, the opening bars of Wagner’s “Flight of the Valkyries.”

The message from Jason was five words long.

Find me the next one.