CHAPTER NINE

 

“So, what are we saying here?” I said. “Are we saying that his father killed him?”

“I’m not saying that,” said Brigit. “Well, maybe I am.”

I got up, abandoning my unfinished Thai food. “Fuck, it all fits.”

“How do you mean?”

“The gun?” I said. “That’s how the dealer had the gun. Because Gilbert’s father gave it to him.”

“Oh whoa, I guess you’re right. That does make sense. So, do you think that the father wanted it to look like a school shooting? Do you think he framed his own son?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Does that make any sense? I mean, why would he want his family name besmirched?”

“Well, if the news got out about the ephedra, his family name would be besmirched anyway. Maybe this was better,” she said.

“Right,” I said. “Because this was the son who went wrong, who left the family. So this would illustrate what happened if you didn’t tow the party line and get on board with the family business.”

“What do you mean? No one else knew that Gilbert was going to blow the whistle.”

“No, I know that. I just mean that he could say that Gilbert brought this on himself. That cutting the family out of his life led him down the wrong path. That way, it wasn’t his fault that his son did what he did. Instead, Gilbert was a bad apple.”

“Oh, I see,” she said. “Yeah, maybe.”

I paced. “But a father murdering his own son…”

“I know,” said Brigit. “That’s horrible. That’s too horrible. Isn’t it too horrible? Would anyone prize their company, their reputation, over their own child?”

“Oh, lots of people,” I said bitterly. “The world is full of monsters, Brigit.”

“Do you think he is a monster?” she said. “You met him. What was he like?”

“He wasn’t a very nice person,” I said, “but of course, that doesn’t mean anything. But he did seem very cold and very concerned with appearances. He told Miles that he got the time for dinner wrong, and he was really upset about that. And when he found Miles at my apartment, he was horrified that Miles would be seen with me. I guess I’m not really the kind of person they want him to associate with.”

“None of that proves anything,”

“No.”

“But it doesn’t sound good,” she said.

“So, we should proceed?” I said. “We should dig into this further?”

“We have to, don’t you think? This is the most solid lead we’ve found thus far. We need to know if Mr. Pike had his own son killed to save his business.”

“Yes,” I said. “We have to know. So, we’ll need to find out more about his character. What he values, and how far he’d go for his reputation and money.”

* * *

“Ivy!” said Calloway Pike, grinning and holding out his hand to shake. “I have to admit that I was happy when I got the call from you. This might not be appropriate, but I gotta say that you are way too sexy to be dating my brother.”

I shook his hand. I wasn’t sure how to take that greeting.

He flinched. “Oh, I shouldn’t have led with that, huh?”

“You’re fine,” I said, composing myself. “You’re very flattering.” I needed this to go smoothly. I’d used Cal to get into the building. Once I asked him a few questions about his father, I’d try to get an audience with Louis Pike himself.

“You’re a beautiful woman, that’s all I’m saying,” he said. “And you’re talented and accomplished as well. I remember seeing the news that you took down that serial killer.”

“Thanks, that’s very kind,” I said.

“Anyway, sorry,” he said. “I’ve made it awkward.”

“You haven’t,” I said, giving him my best smile. I was a detective, and I could handle people if I needed to. If Cal wanted to be flirty, I could be flirty. “Really, you’re fine. You’re not exactly a bad-looking man yourself, you know.”

He laughed. “Well, thank you, Ivy.”

I slid into his office, and he shut the door after both of us.

“So, how can I help you today?” He gestured to a seat in front of his desk.

I sat down, surveying both him and the office. It was large and modern, nicely decorated with tasteful accents—a potted palm in the corner, a framed photo of the beach on the wall. The back wall was made entirely of glass. It was an enormous window that overlooked the surrounding area. The light streamed in through the glass, surrounding him in brightness. He seemed warm and open, so different than his brother. He was probably the kind of man who was used to pouring on the charm when he spoke to women. I knew the type. He wasn’t serious about any of the things he said, and I shouldn’t be alarmed when he said them.

“I’m just here to ask you a few questions,” I said.

“Oh, it sounds like you’re here on business,” he said.

“Well, yes. I think you’re a nice guy, Cal, but I wouldn’t be here for any other reason.” I winked at him.

He settled down on the edge of his desk and leaned forward. “Please, don’t take offense. I shouldn’t have said what I said. Honestly, I’m not the kind of man who’d move in on his brother’s girl.”

I chuckled. “Oh, I understand. You were just being friendly.”

“Exactly,” he said. “But, you know, if you and Miles don’t work out, you’ve got my number, so just give me a call.”

I feigned shock. “Cal!” I said in a teasing voice.

He stood up. “I know, I know. I shouldn’t have said that either.” He gave me a mischievous grin.

I grinned back, as if we were in on a little secret together.

“So, it’s business, then. But what kind of business could you have with Quikslim?”

“Oh, not the corporation itself,” I said. “Not really. Just something I’m working on for Miles. It’s about Gilbert.”

Cal’s expression changed immediately. He sat down behind his desk, no longer playing games. “What about Gil?”

“Miles just wants to know what happened. I’m trying to figure out why Gilbert would have done what he did. I wanted to ask about… your father.”

“Oh,” said Cal, nodding. “Yeah… good old Dad.” He swung his chair around to look out the glass panes behind his desk. Even though I could only see his back, I could see that his demeanor had completely changed. He wasn’t happy and joking anymore.

“What kind of a relationship did Gilbert have with your father?” I said. “Miles has indicated that it was, um, difficult.”

“You could say that.” Cal turned back around, and there was a smile on his face again. “Really, though, does Miles want to blame this on Father? Because I don’t think that’s quite fair. Gil did this himself.”

“I’m not casting blame,” I said. “Really, I’m just trying to understand where Gilbert’s head was at the time of the shooting. He came home for the weekend before it happened, and I understand that was rare. I just don’t know if it was connected or not.”

“What do you want me to say?” said Cal. “Yes, my father is a giant jackass.” He spread his hands, giving me that mischievous smile of his again. “He’s manipulative and demanding, and nothing’s ever good enough for him. You’d think that he’d appreciate the fact that I followed in his footsteps and work here at Quikslim, when neither of his other sons did that. But does he? Not in the slightest. Whenever he talks to me, he criticizes me and makes me feel about two inches tall. Thing is, Ivy, I’ve never shot anyone.”

“Like I said, I’m not casting blame.”

“We’ll probably never know what was going on in Gil’s head that afternoon,” he said. “Miles is going to have to come to terms with that.”

“Oh, undoubtedly,” I said. “And there’s no excuse for murdering five people in cold blood. No matter what his reasoning for doing so, nothing will wipe that slate clean. But I do think if I could try to understand a little bit of what he was thinking, then maybe that would be helpful to Miles. To you too. To your whole family.”

He shook his head, still smiling at me. “I don’t think it’s possible to know that, I’m afraid. But I can see why Miles is so taken with you. You’re very convincing.”

“Would you say that it was important to Gilbert to get your father’s approval?”

“Not really,” said Cal. “He and Miles were the same that way. Just jumped ship and did their own thing.”

“And your father was angry about that?”

“In the case of Miles, he was livid. Miles was the oldest. His heir, you know? His golden boy. So, when Miles wouldn’t take the keys to the kingdom, my father was frothing at the mouth. But with Gil, I don’t think my father thought it would last. He thought it was a passing phase. You know Miles. He’s so serious. Everything he wants, he goes after with a single purpose. Gil wasn’t that way. He was a fun loving kid. He liked to take risks and live on the wild side. I think he got a charge out of making Father angry, but he liked the money too much to turn his back on it completely.”

“Fun loving?” I said. “A guy who kills five other people doesn’t sound fun loving.”

“Well, he had a dark side we didn’t know about.”

“Right,” I said.

“What, don’t you think he had a dark side?” said Cal.

“I didn’t know him.”

Cal narrowed his eyes. “Is this about something else? Why are you really here, asking me questions?”

“It’s not about anything other than your opinion of your father’s character. What do you think your father values more than anything on earth? Was it his sons? His family?”

Cal snorted. “Oh, no way. Father cares way more about his status than anything else.”

* * *

Talking to Cal had gotten me inside the Quikslim building, no mean feat. The place had a lot of security, and I couldn’t have just walked in. I’d needed the invite from Cal to get up into the main offices. But once I was in, there wasn’t anyone watching my every move, so I thought that I’d try to snoop around a little bit, maybe even talk to Gilbert’s father myself.

I asked someone in the hallway where the CEO’s office was, and, after being pointing in the right direction, headed up the elevator. The top floor was apparently all relegated to Louis Pike and his parter. Both the CEOs had an office there—Miles’s father, and his partner Julius Milton.

There was a secretary sitting behind a long, long desk. She had a phone headset with a microphone and was chattering into it as I emerged from the elevator.

In situations like this, it’s always best to act as if you know what you’re doing. Confidence in yourself means other people will have confidence in you. So, instead of waiting to talk to her, I just turned and strolled down the hallway as if I knew exactly where I was going.

I got to a door marked Louis Pike, CEO, and I opened it.

It opened into a small antechamber. There was another secretary there, furiously typing at her computer. She looked up. “Can I help you?”

“Are you Mr. Pike’s secretary?” I said.

“Administrative assistant,” she said.

Right, I was always forgetting that. I’d hired Brigit to be my administrative assistant, not my secretary, after all. You’d think I’d be familiar with the term. It did sound nicer than secretary, of course, but that was only because people associated the word secretary with all kinds of stupid things. They thought that secretaries were young attractive women who slept with their bosses. No one thought that about administrative assistants.

It was like changing the title of stewardess to flight attendant.

It worked for a while, made flight attendants sound so much more official. But after a while, people just started associating that term with all the negative stereotypes of flight attendants. So, in the end, it really didn’t do anything. Renaming stuff was a vain attempt to change the ugliness in the world, if you asked me.

But it was an attempt, and that was better than nothing,

So, administrative assistant it was. “I’m so sorry, of course,” I said. “You’re Mr. Pike’s assistant, then.”

“That’s right. Do you have an appointment?”

I decided to try to be tricky here and pretend that I did without being overly committal. I wasn’t sure if it would work. “Am I early or something? Can you check the schedule?”

She picked up a cell phone and clicked around on the screen. “He actually doesn’t have anyone on his schedule this afternoon. Since the death of his son, he’s been really dialing down his workload, I’m sure you understand. Most everything has been kicked over to Mr. Milton. Maybe your appointment was rescheduled with him?”

Well, that was better than nothing. “It’s really important that I talk directly to Mr. Pike,” I said. “Is he in?”

“Actually, he’s not,” she said. “He’s having a long lunch. He may be back in a hour or so, or he might not come back at all. Like I said, he’s still reeling from a terrible loss.”

“I see,” I said.

“Why don’t you go see Mr. Milton?” she said.

“The thing is—”

“Don’t ask me to call Mr. Pike,” she said. “He left me his cell.” She waved the phone at me.

That was his phone? Damn it, what I wouldn’t give to look at that. But I was running out of excuses to stay in this room, and it didn’t look like I was going to get a chance to talk to Louis Pike today.

“How about I page Mr. Milton’s assistant to come and get you?” she said. “Even if you didn’t wind up on his schedule, I’m sure they’ll squeeze you in. We’re used to the chaos around here right now.”

“That’s not necessary,” I said, but she was already doing it.

Before I knew it, another administrative assistant was escorting me back down the hallway to Julius Milton’s office.

* * *

“Well, of course Louis values his reputation,” said Julius Milton. “But I think you’ll find that his foremost priority is his family, and it always has been. That’s why he’s not in the office today. I’m sorry, who did you say you were?”

“I’m Ivy Stern,” I said, scribbling on my notepad.

“And what are these questions pertaining to?”

“The Gilbert Pike incident, of course,” I said.

“Yes, but are you with law enforcement? Why are you asking these questions?”

“I’m looking into the matter privately,” I said. “What about the energy shakes you sell here? The ones that contain dangerous, illegal ingredients?”

“What?” Julius got up out of his desk. “What are you talking about?”

“The energy shakes. You make energy shakes here, don’t you?”

“Yes, it’s a new product line, but that doesn’t mean that what you’re saying about it is true. It’s not.” He looked nervous.

“Not true,” I said. “I see.” I waited. Something about the way he was standing there, his jaw twitching made me think that waiting was the right strategy.

“Even if something like that had been true,” said Julius, “when it was brought to our attention, to Louis’s and mine, we dealt with it. So there’s nothing like that happening anymore, are we clear?”

“So, there were illegal ingredients in the shakes?”

“I think it’s time for you to leave,” said Julius.

* * *

I went to the Pike mansion after that. If Louis Pike wasn’t at work, maybe he was at home.

I arrived at the house unannounced, which clearly made the maid nervous. “Um, can I take your coat?” she said.

“I don’t have a coat,” I said. “I’m here to see Louis Pike.”

“He’s at work,” she said.

“No, I was just there, and he’s not there.”

But just then, Miles entered the room, striding toward the door while scrolling through his phone. When he saw me, he did a double take. “Ivy? What are you doing here?”

“Um, what are you doing here?”

“This is my family’s house,” he said. “And you’re working for me. So, tell me what’s going on.”

“I want to talk to your father.”

He took me by the arm and walked me back out of the house. Once the door was closed behind us, he said, “What’s going on?”

I took a deep breath. “Are you sure you want to hear this?”

“Yes, I hired you to get to the bottom of what was going on with Gil. I want to know everything.”

“Well, Gilbert knew that your father and his company were putting an illegal ingredient in their new line of energy shakes. We found a letter on his computer to your father, saying that he was going to tell the world what Quikslim was up to.”

Miles drew back. “You’re not saying…”

I spread my hands. “I want to talk to him.”

“Ivy, he’s my father. He’s Gilbert’s father. He would never—” Miles broke off. He studied his hands. When he spoke again, his voice was quieter. “Well, you know, I don’t know what he would have done.”

“Is he at home?”

“No, he’s not.” Miles sighed. “My father started this company years ago, when he was a young man. He had money from his father to invest, but he turned a profit on Quikslim the first year. Doubled his money. And the company kept growing, year after year. My grandfather was a self-made man, and he put a lot of pressure on my father to make sure that he didn’t feel as if everything was handed to him. My grandfather believed in hard work, and my father is obsessed with the idea of proving that he deserves what he got, that he didn’t have help to get him where he was. Of everything in his life, the thing that he’s most proud of is that company. He would do anything to protect it. And I honestly don’t know if he values his children more than he values Quikslim. I wish I could say that I knew that he loved me, and I knew that he loved Gil, and that he would never…” He pressed a fist to his lips.

I reached out to comfort him but stopped myself just in time. One would think, after all the time I’d known him, that I wouldn’t even bother to think about touching him anymore. But apparently, my impulses ran deep, making it hard to stop what I would do with any other person. “I’m sorry,” I said instead.

He nodded.

“Well, if your father isn’t at work, and he isn’t at home, do you know where he is?” I said.

“I’m sorry, I have no idea,” said Miles. “But he does reliably show up at the office, I swear. So, your best bet would probably be to try to catch him there at some point.”

“Okay,” I said.

We were quiet for a minute.

Miles rocked back and forth on his heels.

I fingered my keys in my pocket.

“Well,” I said, “I guess there’s no reason for me to stay here.”

“I’ll walk you to your car,” he said. “I was on my way out too.”

We took off together, and we both walked over to where my car was parked.

I put my hand on the door handle. “Well, thanks. I’ll talk to you later.”

He put his hand against the side of the car and leaned there. “Listen, Ivy, about that apology I tried to give you that got so botched.”

I waved it away. “Don’t worry about it. I think I overreacted. You’re right when you say that things would never work out between us. I think we both know that.”

He took his hand off the car and backed up a step. “Oh,” he said. “Right. Of course.”

“It’s not easy,” I said. “We still have feelings for each other, of course, but that doesn’t mean that we would make a good couple. We know that we wouldn’t.”

He nodded brusquely, backing away. “Yeah. Okay, never mind.”

“Miles, don’t be like that,” I said. “I didn’t mean—”

He turned his back on me, raising a hand. “I’ll talk to you later, when you’ve got some update on the case for me.”

* * *

“I can’t believe you went to Quikslim without me,” said Brigit.

“I’m sorry,” I said, “but it just seemed like something I needed to do on my own. I didn’t know how easy it would be to get into the building, and I wasn’t sure how Cal Pike would have taken two people instead of one. You know I don’t leave you behind very often.”

“But that’s what I wanted to tell you,” she said. “I have a way in to that building. I know Louis Pike’s assistant.”

“You do?” I said.

“Yeah. Before I got the job with you, I took a class on skills for being an administrative assistant, and she was in the class too. We kept in touch a little on Facebook and stuff, and I knew when she got that job. I know she would have let us both in, probably gotten us on the schedule to see Mr. Pike too.”

“Hmm…” I said.

“That’s all you have to say? ‘Hmm?’ You don’t want to say, ‘Brigit, I’m sorry that I didn’t include you,’ or ‘As usual, Brigit, I’d be lost without you, and I’m so sorry that I treated you without respect.’”

I raised my eyebrows. “Well, I would be lost without you, that’s a fact. But I don’t see how not taking you along was disrespectful.”

She sniffed. “You wouldn’t see that.”

I rolled my eyes. “Brigit, seriously, I’m sorry I didn’t take you along. But this is good. Now, we can get in to see Louis.”

“Oh, so now you want me to use my connections to help you out?”

“Or maybe,” I said, considering, “maybe you should do something completely different.” I remembered the assistant. She was tough to forget, the way she’d sort of forced me into a meeting with Julius Milton. But I also remembered that she’d had Louis Pike’s cell phone.

“Oh, fine,” said Brigit. “So now you don’t even want my connection? You think that I’m useless, don’t you?”

“How well do you know this assistant?”

“I told you, we’re friends from that class. What are you even talking about now?”

“Are you good enough friends that you could convince her to break the rules for you?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, she had Louis’s cell phone. She said that he left it with her a lot with he was out of the office, and that she put his schedule into it. But if Louis contracted someone—like Bix Coltrane—to kill his son, then he might have called him on that phone. So, if we could get our hands on it, we might find some evidence.”

“Oh,” said Brigit.

I studied her expression. “What’s that mean?”

“Well…” She tucked her hair behind one of her ears. “I don’t know if she’d go for that or not. I mean, it would probably depend on her relationship with Mr. Pike, right? Either she’d be loyal to the boss that she loved, or she’d hate him because he’s an ass to her, in which case she’d be willing to turn on him. I’d have to feel her out to be sure.”

“Hmm,” I said.

“No, listen,” she said. “Here’s what I’d do. I’d get in touch with her and ask her to come to dinner with me or something, and I’d feel her out on whether I think she’d be likely to help. If she would, great, then I ask her to let me look at the phone. If not, then I figure out some way to look at the phone myself.”

“How would you do that?”

“Oh, I don’t know, maybe I go through her purse while she’s in the bathroom.”

“That’s assuming she’s got it on her.”

“Well, maybe I invite her for another meeting, and I get the phone at the office somehow. I could figure out a way. I watch you. I know what I’m doing.”

I considered.

“I’d have to do this solo, though,” she said. “You understand that?”

I did. And that was what was giving me pause. Not because I thought Brigit couldn’t handle it, but because I didn’t like being on the sidelines. If I didn’t know what was going on with something important to me, it drove me pretty nuts. If I sent Brigit out to do this, I’d be stuck waiting for the outcome. I’d have no control over it at all. I took a deep breath. “You’ve got to do it.”

“I do? Seriously? You’re going to let me do this on my own?”

“Absolutely. And you’re going to do a fabulous job.” But it was going to kill me waiting around. Kill me.

* * *

As I predicted, the night that Brigit went out to feel out Louis’s assistant, it was rough on me. I peppered her with a zillion questions before she left. I asked her if she was sure she could handle it. I reminded her that she could call me if she needed me or if she had any questions.

I was pretty annoying.

Brigit, for her part, was pretty patient with me. I guess she’d expected that I’d behave the way that I was behaving. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to be a horrible, annoying, nagging person, but I didn’t seem to be able to control myself.

Eventually, Brigit left. I knew that I could have gone home on my own and tried to relax, but I couldn’t. Instead, I stayed in the office.

First, I tried to file, but I couldn’t concentrate on the alphabet to actually know what went where. Then I tried tidying up, but I kept my office pretty clean, so there wasn’t much to do.

Finally, I ended up pacing.

I started from the back of the office and walked all the way to the front. Back and forth, over and over again.

I just wanted to know what was happening. Was Brigit okay? Was the assistant cooperating? What the hell was going on?

I resisted the desire to pick up my phone and text Brigit for a status update. I knew that she needed to focus on what was going on without any interruptions. I needed to let her be.

But I couldn’t help getting out my phone anyway. I stared at the screen, admonishing myself not to call, not to text, not to do anything.

My phone rang.

I jumped.

I didn’t recognize the phone number, which was a little strange, but I decided to pick up anyway.

“Hello?”

“Ivy? This is Calloway Pike,” said the voice on the other end. He sounded like he was grinning, but I didn’t know when that man didn’t smile.

“How did you get my phone number?” I said.

“I, uh, might have pestered it out of Miles,” he said. “Sorry about that. I hope it’s not a problem, me having your number or anything.”

“Miles gave you my number?”

“Oh, yeah, he happened to mention that the two of you weren’t actually together. That’s something you could have told me earlier when you were at the office.”

“I, um…” I didn’t know what to say. Sure, it wasn’t strictly true that Miles and I weren’t together, but I didn’t think that meant that Miles gave my number to his brother. What was I supposed to make of that? Was it some kind of passive-aggressive trap? Was I going to be in trouble no matter what I did? If I shut Cal down, Miles would say I was being too sensitive to a relationship that was clearly over. But if I didn’t… well, Miles couldn’t really want me to start something with his brother.

“So, since you’re single and all,” Cal said, “would you like to go out to dinner with me?”

I opened and closed my mouth, but I didn’t say anything.

“Hello?” he said. “You still there.”

“You mean right now?” I said. “You busy tonight?”

“Well, that’s short notice, but I like getting right down to it, personally. Sure. Tonight it is. That a yes?”

Man, anything beat sitting around this office waiting for Brigit to call me back. “Yes,” I said.

“Excellent.”

“But this doesn’t necessarily mean anything,” I said. “Let’s say this is a friendly dinner, not a romantic one.”

“Well, that’s hardly a date, is it?”

“You want to back out?” I said.

“Give me this dinner to convince you that it should be romantic,” he said. “Or at the very least, more than friendly.”

“To be honest, Cal, I just need a distraction right now. My associate’s out working without me and it makes me crazy not knowing what’s going on. If you’ll distract me, I’ll keep my mind open. But I should warn you that I’m not easy to convince.”

He chuckled. “I like a challenge.”