Silent Partner (5 page)

Down forty million.
The amount was mind-boggling.

“I don’t like losses, Ms. Day. In fact, I
hate
them. Even small ones like forty million.”

“Do you mind if I ask why you’re so interested in Sumter Bank?”

“Not at all. Sumter has a strong market position in the Southeast, and the Southeast is one of the fastest-growing regions of the country. Its earnings, and therefore its share price, have a lot of room on the upside.”

“But Sumter’s shares already trade at almost two times book value, even with the recent decline in the stock price you mentioned. Isn’t that pretty good for a bank? I mean, it’s not as if we’re going to discover a cure for cancer or invent the next white-hot wireless device. When you get right down to it, bank stocks are pretty boring.”

“You have your opinion,” he replied stonily, “and I have mine.”

Angela cleared her throat, realizing how arrogant she must have sounded. Jake Lawrence and his people were probably in and out of world stock markets on a minute-by-minute basis, trading millions of dollars worth of securities every day. She executed a couple of transactions a year in her tiny portfolio. “I’m sorry, Mr. Lawrence. I—”

“Don’t ever be sorry, Ms. Day. It’s a certain sign of weakness.”

She looked up and saw that he was smiling.

“By the way, do you mind if I call you Angela?”

“Of course not.”

“Good. And I want you to call me Jake. All right?”

“Sure.” But she wasn’t. “Mr. Lawrence” seemed more appropriate, and she didn’t want him thinking she was getting comfortable.

“So, Angela, where did you grow up?”

“Asheville, North Carolina.”

Lawrence snapped his fingers. “I remember now. And you are the product of an Italian-Irish marriage, correct?”

Angela bit her lip. “The product.” He made it sound so clinical, as if she’d been born on an assembly line. “That’s right.”

“It seems like there are so many of those marriages,” Lawrence observed, as if he found the combination odd.

“It’s the Catholic commonality.”

“You’re probably right, but I—”

“And the overpowering sex appeal of the Italian woman,” she continued. “The poor Irish guys don’t stand a chance when they see a woman as beautiful as my mother.”

Lawrence chuckled. “Yes, I can see how that might happen.” He paused. “You were . . .
poor
growing up.”

“We were.” Her gaze dropped into her lap. “We didn’t have many extras, but we had each other. And that was enough.”

“Your father couldn’t hold a job for very long.”

“My father was a decent man.”

“He was an alcoholic.”

“Mr. Lawrence, I don’t think you have the right to—”

“You earned your undergraduate degree in political science,” he continued quickly, not giving her a chance to object. “Yes?”

“Yes.”

“And I think I remember from my information that you worked two jobs while you were in college. Night shift during the week at a convenience store near the dorms and as a counselor at a school for underprivileged kids on weekends. Very impressive. From what I understand, you’ve carried that solid work ethic with you into the business world. You are proof of what can be achieved with hard work and determination, even without a slew of high-level, blue-blooded connections.”

Her annual salary at Sumter was forty-eight thousand dollars. Decent, but hardly worth jumping up and down about. So she wasn’t certain she was proof of any great achievement. However, there weren’t many employment options in Richmond, Virginia, and she
had
to be in Richmond. “The woman on your staff did her research very well, but my world must seem pretty unexciting to a man like you, Mr. Lawrence.”

“Please, Angela. Call me
Jake
.”

“Okay.”

“Were you ever robbed while you were working at the convenience store?” he wanted to know.

They were thorough,
she thought to herself.
They must have found the police report.
“Yes. Once.”

“What happened?”

She hesitated, replaying the horrible events of that night in her mind. “It’s three in the morning and there’s no one in the store except me and a stock boy. I’m sitting behind the cash register reading a book and he’s in the back. I come to the end of a chapter, look up, and I’m staring down the barrel of a .357 Magnum. On the other side of the gun is a green ski mask. The guy inside the mask grabs the cash from the register, then he forces me into the back behind the cold drinks and ties me up.” She shut her eyes, remembering those awful seconds. “While I’m lying there on the floor with my wrists tied to my ankles, he makes the stock boy, who’s black, get down on his knees and beg for his life, yells at the kid that ‘every nigger ought to beg for his life at least once.’ When the kid refuses, the guy in the ski mask shoots him in the face. Kills him instantly. Then he kneels down next to me, puts the gun to my head, and tells me he’s gonna kill me ‘just for working with a nigger.’ ” She swallowed hard. “He pulls the trigger, but it only clicks. I guess the chamber was empty, or the gun misfired.”

“Or he was just trying to scare you.”

“Maybe. But I’ll remember that sound for the rest of my life. And I’ll remember what he said to the kid before he killed him.”

“Did the police find the guy?”

“Of course not.”

“Did you show up for your next shift?”

“I was there the next night,” she said. “I needed to buy textbooks. I needed to live.” It had been the longest night of her life. She hadn’t taken her eye off the door the entire time.

Lawrence took another sip of his drink. “You graduated cum laude from college, yes?”

“Yes.”

“Then you got your M.B.A. from Duke.”

“That’s right.”

“Which is where you met Samuel Reese, your then
future
and now
former
husband. You were divorced from him six years ago after only a year of marriage.” He hesitated. “What happened?”

“Mr. Lawrence, that’s a very personal question, and I don’t—”

“Angela, if you help me, I’ll help you.”

She glanced over at him, trying again to see beneath the brim of the Stetson. But he tilted his head forward slightly, blocking her view. “What does that mean?”

“I told you. We’ll get to that,” Lawrence said, standing up. “Your ex-husband is from a wealthy family?”

“Yes,” she replied uneasily as Lawrence walked around the table and sat down on the couch beside her. She was relieved when he kept his distance. He had turned toward her, putting his right arm on the back of the couch and resting his right ankle on his left knee. He was several feet away, but her entire body was tense. It had not occurred to her when her boss had told her to make this trip that Lawrence might want something not of a business nature, that in some way she was a pawn in a $500 million investment. “Based on their lifestyle, I believe my husband’s family had a great deal of money, but I was never allowed to know how much.” If Lawrence did make a move, what was she supposed to do? Scream? Tucker was out there, but he’d worked for Lawrence for twenty years. What was his incentive to help
her
? Besides, the men with the guns would keep him at bay, even if he did try to come to her aid.

“His last name is Reese, but yours is—”

“I retook my maiden name after the divorce was final,” she explained, anticipating his question again.

“I see.” Lawrence hesitated. “Are you okay, Angela?” he asked, reaching over and patting her hand.

“I’m fine.” They stared at each other for the first time at close range, but he didn’t dwell on her eyes as most men did. There hadn’t been that subtle double take. And she realized that Jake Lawrence wasn’t impressed as easily as most men. Attractive women didn’t faze him, probably because he rarely dealt with any who weren’t. “Why?”

“You seem a little nervous.”

“Not at all,” she lied, uncertain of whether or not to insist that he take his hand from hers. He could say it was simply a friendly gesture, and then she’d look foolish. She let out a low breath when he removed it from her lap.

“I like your accent.” He took another sip from his glass. “I’ve always enjoyed a slight Southern drawl. It sounds so nice. Especially in a woman.”

“Thank you.”

Lawrence stroked his chin with his thumb and forefinger. “So you want to know why you’re here.”

“I am curious,” she admitted. “It seems odd to be whisked all the way out here to Wyoming in a private jet without any explanation. Don’t you agree?”

He smiled at her through the dim light. “I like a little mystery. Don’t you?”

“Not necessarily.”

“So you’re one of those people who doesn’t like surprises.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to.” His smile turned smug. “You probably wondered if I was going to make a pass at you.”

“No, I didn’t,” she replied, trying to act as though his suggestion was silly. “That thought never crossed my mind. My boss said this was a legitimate business meeting, but that the subject matter had to remain confidential so he couldn’t tell me anything. My boss and I have a good relationship. I trust him.”

“Do you now?”

Angela glanced up. “Yes. Why?”

“Just wondered.” Lawrence tapped the back of the sofa. “Well, here’s the deal. I’m working on a project and I want your help.”

“A project?” she asked, leaning forward.

“Yes. I’m considering taking a run at a public company. At acquiring it. And I want your assistance.”

Her anxiety vanished, replaced by a surge of anticipation. It would be a tremendous experience to work directly with a man like Jake Lawrence on the acquisition of a business. It would be something she could tell her son about years from now. Even if she ultimately ended up dealing with one of Lawrence’s aides most of the time, she’d still be the envy of some powerful people on Wall Street. “What kind of help?” John Tucker had been wrong about this meeting after all, and she couldn’t wait to tell him so.

“I want you to perform due diligence on the company before I actually make a public tender offer. I want you to meet with the company’s senior management on my behalf, prior to my making a final decision. I want you to carefully review their financial condition and gather a little market intel so we’ve got information others don’t. See, I always like to have an advantage, Angela. I’ll put you in touch with people who can help you there. Then you report back to me, and we’ll see what’s what.”

Even as the thrill coursed through her body at the prospect of developing a direct business relationship with one of the world’s richest men, she glanced down, disappointed. This was hard to say, but she had to be honest. “I think your staff may have given you misinformation about me. As I told you, I lend money. I’m not a merger and acquisition advisory specialist.”

Lawrence nodded. “I know that.”

“But—”

“Angela, you have a certain way about you I think may influence this company’s CEO to do the right thing. To do what I want him to do, which is to let me acquire his business without a messy public war. That wouldn’t do anyone but the lawyers any good. My aides recommended you for the job, but I wanted to make certain you’re the woman for the job, which is why I flew you all the way out here. If I didn’t make the appropriate advances before announcing the public tender, odds are the company’s CEO would try to repel me. Senior executives always panic when their company is threatened with a takeover. They think the first thing the raider will do is fire their sorry asses for keeping dividends low so they can pay themselves huge salaries and bonuses. And most of the time they’re right. And, if I fire them, then how the hell would they pay for their country club memberships or the love nests they maintain for the trophy girlfriends they hide from their age-spotted wives?”

Having to pay country club dues was something she’d never worried about, but a cheating husband struck a chord. “I don’t know.”

“Besides,” Lawrence continued, “when you make a loan to a company, you have to perform the same kind of due diligence I’m asking you to perform. You have to make certain it’s a solid business, right?”

“Yes.”

“And consider this. I’ll certainly want to borrow a good deal of money to pay for the acquisition.” He pointed at her. “Always use someone else’s money when you can. Even if you do have a lot of your own.”

“I’ve heard that before.”

“I’m sure you have.”

“I’m still curious about why you want me to do these things for you.” Angela had learned that understanding a person’s true motivation—not the one they might be guiding you toward—was vital if you didn’t want to be hurt, if you wanted to correctly assess the risks and returns. “Why not ask one of those Wall Street investment bankers you work with to help you?”

“I want to keep publicity to a minimum,” he explained. “They’d leak it to their friends and the press before I hung up the phone. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about Wall Streeters, they can’t keep a secret.”

“That still doesn’t explain why you want
me
.”

“But your persistence does. Exactly what you’re doing right now is why I want you to work for me. My aides, who analyzed my investment in Sumter, heard about you, and, after they did some background work on you, they recommended you highly.”

She smiled despite herself. Then it hit her, and her enthusiasm faded. “I’m your mole,” she whispered.

“What?”

She grimaced, wishing she hadn’t said anything.

“What did you mean by that?” he demanded.

She glanced up into his eyes. They were burning beneath the brim of the Stetson. “I, I—”

“You think what I’m really planning is the takeover of Sumter? That I want to use you as some kind of undercover agent?”

“I just thought—”

“Well, you thought wrong,” Lawrence snapped. “Although,” he said, his tone turning to one of amusement, “from what I understand, Sumter’s chairman is extremely concerned about my creeping ownership stake in his beloved bank.” He laughed harshly, as if that discomfort gave him a great deal of pleasure. “Hey, if I buy enough shares, I might be able to find out about the girlfriends he’s got stashed away.” He laughed again, even louder this time. “Then what would his wife think?”