Echoes of Titanic (27 page)

After hanging up with Sharon, she called her mother to ask for the whereabouts of Adele's old handwritten diary. Doreen didn't even know such a thing had ever existed, but she promised to ask Kelsey's dad.

“Don't expect much, though,” she added. “He's not having a good day.”

Kelsey's heart sank, both for her sake and his. “No?”

“I think the events of the last two days have finally caught up with him. He hasn't said a word all morning. He just keeps dozing off to sleep. But I'll ask him your question just the same. You never know. He might feel better this afternoon.”

Once that call was over, Kelsey found her fingers dialing the cell number
Cole had left for her in his message earlier. This wasn't exactly the best time to be reconnecting with an old boyfriend, but he was still enough of an insider in the New York financial scene that talking to him might be helpful.

That's all this was, her calling Cole to get some input on her situation.

A strange feeling swept over her as she listened for the ring, and she realized she was bracing herself. She anticipated a surge of emotion, and she didn't want that. She liked to stay in control, especially in business conversations. And that's what this would be. That's all this would be, a business conversation between old colleagues.

“Kelsey?”

Her heart lurched. “Hey.”

“Wow. Hi. Thanks for calling back. Are you okay?”

She put a hand up to the ear she wasn't using to block out the rumbling of wheels on the track. “Yes, thanks. Sorry for the noise. I'm on a train, heading into the city. I spent last night down in Jersey, at my grandfather's. I…I just wanted to tell you I appreciated your call.”

“No problem. I wasn't sure if I should contact you or not, but after this last development, I couldn't help myself. Sounds to me like you've been hit with a triple whammy. First was that bizarre scene at your Quarter Club ceremony, then Gloria's death, and now a hostile takeover attempt? Good grief, you must feel as though the sky is falling.”

“Just call me Chicken Little.”

He chuckled. “Well, Miss Little, I meant what I said in my message. If there's anything I can do for you…”

“Thanks, Cole. I'm just trying to get a handle on the situation and go from there. I'm not really sure what we're up against yet. I was hoping you might be able to give me some insight as to the word on the street.”

“Ah,” he said, and she could almost picture him at his desk, leaning back, stretching out, propping one leg over the other. “To be honest, now that I'm working out of Chelsea I'm not all that in sync with you Wall Streeters anymore.”

Kelsey was disappointed. It would have been nice to get a little perspective from someone outside the company.

“In fact,” he continued, “the only reason I knew about all this was because my sister saw it on the news Tuesday night and called me. When I looked into it the next day, I found out about the hostile takeover too. Man, when it rains, it pours, huh?”

Kelsey smiled to herself, glad to know that Cole's sister still thought information about her was worth sharing with her brother.

“Seems I'm not exactly in sync these days either,” Kelsey admitted. “And I'm definitely not in the inner circle of B & T. Frankly, I'm kind of working from the outside in.”

“What do you mean not in the inner circle? You
are
the inner circle. And not just because you're a Tate. You're the rising star there, Kels. Don't let all this recent stuff make you feel otherwise.”

She sighed. “Oh, Cole, that was just media hype, designed to compensate for my father's absence from the firm.”

“Don't sell yourself short.” Cole's vehemence surprised her. “Look, when your father had his stroke, Brennan & Tate would have sunk if it weren't for you. From what I understand, your presence and performance and demeanor in the past year have given everyone hope. It's not just about your name. You have Adele's gift—and everyone in town knows it. Once all of this mess is behind you, you're going to take the company to new heights, I have no doubt.”

Kelsey closed her eyes. If someone like Cole could have such high expectations of her, what were the employees and stockholders feeling now that she'd been ousted from her family's firm?

“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Cole, but at the moment I'm feeling pretty low and insignificant.”

“Well, quit that.” His half-teasing tone made her smile. “Listen to me. A lot of people thought that once Nolan stepped down, the company would falter. But instead you rose up as the new star. You may be young, Kels, but you're already the lifeblood of that place.”

“Thank you. That means a lot, especially coming from you.” Unexpected tears filled Kelsey's eyes, and she wiped them away. “But with this hostile takeover on the horizon, I surely haven't managed to save the day this time. I don't even know much about what's going on, and it feels crummy.”

“Well, if you think we can help with that, give me a call. Like I said, I have a top-notch team at your disposal. We can dig up anything on anybody.”

She smiled. “Oh, yeah? What color blouse am I wearing right now?”

Without missing a beat, he replied, “Chermouse silk with dark pants.”

Kelsey laughed. “Chermouse? What's that?”

“A really good fake name for a color. Thought I might just slip that one by you.” They shared a chuckle.

“Good try. You got the dark pants right but my top is maroon.”

“Oh, yeah? I bet it looks great on you too.”

There was a long silence, and Kelsey wondered if he was flirting with her or if that had just slipped out by accident.

“Anyway,” he said, clearing his throat, “you hang in there. In the long run, this current mess will end up being a little blip on your otherwise upward arc.”

“Your mouth to God's ear.”

She smiled, but she realized there was a measure of truth to what he was saying. She had been on an upward arc—at least until Rupert's scene at the ceremony had broken it in half and sent her tumbling to the ground. Given that Gloria had engineered the man's appearance there, had that been her intention, to break the upward arc Kelsey was on? But why?

Who would mentor someone for all these years and then turn around one day and cut them off at the knees?

“Cole, can I ask you something?”

“Sure. Anything.”

Kelsey shifted in her seat to get more comfortable. “I was talking to Lou Strahan yesterday, and he said that when my father passed Gloria over for promotion five years ago, she was absolutely devastated and has probably been smoldering with bitterness ever since. Do you think he could be right about that? I always thought she took it in stride. At least, that's how it looked from where I was sitting. But now I'm wondering if all that mess back then really did hit her harder than I realized.”

He was silent for a long moment.

“Gloria
was
really shocked back then,” he said. “And deeply hurt. I guess it's possible that she may have held on to her bitterness about it. Lou was passed over too—and just as devastated—so he probably knows what he's talking about.”

Kelsey watched out the window as the train slowed down for a brief stop at the Spring Lake station. “Yeah, but he says the problem was that she stayed on at the company, which kind of forced her to stew in her own juices. The only way he was able to get over it was by leaving completely and starting fresh somewhere else.”

“Yeah, I remember,” Cole said softly. “You had a big part in helping him get that fresh start.”

Kelsey was mortified she had brought that up. For a moment she couldn't think of what to say. She didn't know how to break the long silence.

At last Cole spoke, addressing the matter head-on. “Hey, that's water
under the bridge, Kelsey. And you know things worked out great in the end—for him and for me. I might never have made the jump to start my own business if things had gone the way I thought they should. And I
really
love what I'm doing now.”

“I'm happy for you, Cole. I truly am.”

The train started up again as their call was winding down.

“Well, like I said, I just wanted to make sure you were okay. You hang in there, and if you think you can use my team's services, we're here for you. Don't hesitate to call.”

Kelsey smiled. Cole would surround himself with the smartest and the best, she was sure of that, but she already had a great team of her own.

She thanked him one last time and then they hung up. For a while she allowed herself to sit back and stare out the window and bask in the memories of the man. Rattling along toward the next stop, her mind went back to the day she and Cole had met, at that first church youth retreat back in high school.

The two of them had ended up on the same team during recreation time and had instantly hit it off, their game-playing strategies merging perfectly and resulting in the winning capture of the other team's flag. After that they had become “youth group buddies,” but never anything more. Cole had been really cute, but he was shorter than her by half a head and his voice tended to squeak at all the wrong moments.

They went away to different colleges, but through letters and emails and the occasional call stayed in touch over the years, just as friends. Cole had always been super smart, a real numbers guy, and when he graduated with a Wharton MBA in 2004, it wasn't hard for Kelsey to get him an interview at the family firm.

What a shock that had been, the day he came walking into Brennan & Tate for his meeting. Gone was the little boy with the pretty eyes and the squeaky voice. In his place was a
man
, six foot plus, nice build, incredibly handsome. Truly, the sight of him had knocked her breathless.

He'd seemed equally taken by her, and once they were reunited and working together, their friendship deepened and eventually turned to romance. That romance had come to an end a year later, thanks to her thoughtless actions and stupid ambition.

Kelsey sat up straight, suddenly remembering that Gloria had been a big part of things back then as well.
Gloria
had been the one who had first
come to Kelsey with Lou's business plan and suggested she work something up despite the fact that Cole was already on it.
Gloria
had been the one who had told Kelsey the details of the miniscule offer Cole had made to Lou and laughed with her at how ridiculous it was.
Gloria
had been the one who had assured Kelsey that business was business and personal was personal and that one had nothing to do with the other.

Try telling that to Kelsey's heart after Cole was gone.

Was it possible that Gloria had intentionally sabotaged their relationship back then? Had she
wanted
the two of them to break up?

Suddenly, she found herself looking at all of Gloria's actions in a new light. If the woman was capable of bringing in Rupert Brennan and unleashing him at the ceremony, what else had she been capable of? What else had she done to wreak havoc in Kelsey's world?

More importantly, why had she done it? What had been her motivation?

Kelsey's first, knee-jerk reaction was the thought that this was personal, that underneath that caring exterior, Gloria hadn't liked her at all and had wanted to hurt her out of spite. But was that true? Or had her motivations lain elsewhere and Kelsey was just collateral damage?

She thought about that. If it was personal, maybe she'd done it because she'd been jealous of Kelsey's early success. Maybe she'd even been afraid Kelsey would be promoted ahead of her. That could very well have happened in a few years, as everyone knew that Nolan had always hoped for his daughter to head up the company eventually. Cole's words were some comfort, and yet there was a flip side to his assurance that she was of prime importance to B & T.
Had
this been personal, aimed at Kelsey herself? Was Gloria determined to keep her from ever taking the helm, regardless of what that required?

Shifting in her seat, Kelsey considered the other alternative, that this hadn't been personal at all but rather part of something much bigger, something aimed at the company at large. Could Gloria have been working behind the scenes to sabotage the entire corporation? If Kelsey was as pivotal to B & T as Cole seemed to think, maybe Gloria's actions constituted an act against B & T itself. After all, an attack on Kelsey
was
an attack on B & T.

She took out the battered letter Gloria had sent to Rupert Brennan and read it again, trying to stay calm and objective. When she came to the last paragraph before the postscript, she paused and reread it.

Right there in the letter, she'd said “if Brennan & Tate is sold.” Had that just been a general hint at a future possibility, or did it imply foreknowledge of the impending hostile takeover? Maybe this whole Rupert mess had been all
about
the takeover.