Twenty-one million dollars,I tell myself.Twenty-one million dollars.
—
“What’s up?” Emily says, peeking her head into my office on Thursday afternoon. “You need me?”
“Yeah, come in a second, Em. Sit down.”
She’s probably wondering what I could possibly want. I’ve asked so little of her. She answers a phone that hardly ever rings. She’s been here for a grand total of five meetings I’ve had with potential investors, two of which were Vicky. I told the others, who came after Vicky, that my current fund was closed, but I’d be happy to talk with them when I open my next round of financing.
She hasn’t taken dictation—if that’s even still a thing. She hasn’t written a letter or even made a pot of coffee. Most days, I’ve been paying this nineteen-year-old twenty dollars an hour, four hours a day, to do her homework.
She sits down, wondering if she should have a pad of paper with her, her dirty-blond ponytail bobbing as she searches for a pen.
“This won’t take long,” I say. “Listen, Em, I’ve decided to relocate. I think I’m going to go to Paris for a while. I’m going to fly out there today.”
“Oh, okay.” She takes it pretty well, though I’m sure she likes this job.
“So I’d say you can pack up now and go.” I hand her cash, two thousand dollars. “Think of this as severance.”
“I’m just a temp, Mr. Newsome. You don’t have to pay me severance.”
“Well, then a bonus,” I say. “A contribution to Emily’s college fund.”
She counts it out, her mouth opening in a wow. This is more than a month’s pay all in one shot. “Yeah?” she says.
“Yeah. Good luck to you, Emily. I hope to be reading great things about you someday.”
—
When Emily’s gone, I remove the sleek desktop computer from the reception desk and smash it into pieces. I take a hammer to the mainframe as well. The busted computers are too heavy for garbage bags, so I put them in duffel bags.
I go through Emily’s drawers, including an appointment pad with carbon pages. Vicky’s name is on them. I rip every page to shreds and throw them in a garbage bag.
The office looks ransacked, stripped naked. But appearances don’t matter anymore. Newsome Capital Growth is looking at its final days in business.
And there is not a single trace of Vicky Lanier to be found.
63
Vicky
Friday morning, a quarter past seven. Conrad Betancourt walks out of the condo building on Michigan Avenue. He is wearing an expensive, long wool coat and carrying nothing, but the bellman behind him is lugging a suitcase and a long piece of luggage that looks like golf clubs.
That confirms it—Conrad’s been staying at the downtown condo, not his house in Grace Village.
Conrad gets into the back of the black town car while the bellman loads the luggage into the trunk.
When the car drives off, but just before the bellman has returned into the building, I hurry forward and call out, “Excuse me! Did I just miss Mr. Betancourt?”
The man, tall and gray with a kind face, smiles. “Afraid so, miss. Just left for O’Hare.”
“Shoot. I’m with theTribune, I had a couple questions for him. You said the airport?”
“Yes, ma’am. You can leave a message at the lobby desk for him.”
“Oh, that’s okay, I have his cell phone. I just wanted a photo to go with the article.”
“Well, he’ll be gone ’til Tuesday night, miss. Golf trip.”