Chapter 27
CHAPTER 27
F or a while, Tristan feared he’d have to go to Manitoba. He needed to know how Asher was able to secure the contract for his company, and he also knew no one would tell him that sort of information over the phone. If he had any chance of solving that mystery, it would have to be in person. He went so far as to check flight times before a little bit of serendipity occurred, via Elyse.
Elyse was one of the only people who ranked as an automatic answer, whenever she called, because she hated talking on the phone almost as much as he did. Generally, when they needed to touch base, it was through email or text. So when he glanced down and saw her name on his phone, he knew it was important.
“I was hacking that Canadian company you wanted me to look into,” she began with no preamble. Another thing he liked about Elyse was that she cut to the chase. Really, it was a shame she was in Maine and not in the office more because they worked together fabulously. It was nice to have another misanthrope around to counter Josie and Gaines, who saw the entire world through childish delight. Josie he could excuse for this, because she taught kindergarten. No one wanted a goth princess to teach their five year old. But Gaines? The guy had been a SEAL and spy, had gotten half his body bitten off by a great white shark, and still managed to be one of the most cheerful people Tristan had ever met. It was disturbing how committed he was to staving off reality.
Tristan gave a grunt, encouraging Elyse to continue.
“One of the execs is in DC for meetings, for three more days,” she declared.
“Huh,” he said.
“You’re welcome,” she said and hung up, knowing those would probably be the only live words they would exchange in the next eight months or so.
Tristan clicked on the information she’d forwarded him, deciding to bypass an attempt to make an appointment. In person is always better, he thought, tucking his chair into his desk as he stood.
Thanks to Elyse, he had the guy’s itinerary. Of course that didn’t mean he’d stick to it, but it was a place to start. Tristan found the conference center where his meetings were supposed to take place and did a bit of recon. He was the type of guy who blended in at professional settings, as if he were a serious businessman who liked to work out a little more than average. He eased into the back room of a presentation on increasing margins, feigning interest until he located his subject, who was in attendance like a good junior executive.
Unable to stomach the entire meeting, he eased back to his car to wait. He had to circle the block for forty minutes before he found street parking with a view of the conference center, but he had nothing else to do but wait. In the meantime he chose to be thankful for his job, which was well-suited to his ability and desire to manage his own life. He could never stomach the sort of career where he worked in an office, under the management of someone who tracked his hours and performance. Gaines was his boss, obviously, the one who paid the bills and ultimately approved Tristan’s expenses, but he was not a micromanager, and he trusted Tristan to keep his own hours and get the job done, which Tristan always did, probably with more hours than a true manager would have assigned to him. He tended to live, eat, and breathe a job until it was finished, because he had the type of brain that immersed itself in a mystery and couldn’t let go, like a honey badger. But he also had the sort of brain that, if explicitly told to do something, would explicitly rebel. So he was glad he was the one in the car, and not the one in the meeting, even if it meant he had to stay in that car for three hours, waiting on the one in the meeting to be done.
When the meeting was over, the guy—Steve Stover—walked the six blocks to his hotel. Tristan knew, because he followed him. It was highly possible the man was peopled out and would order takeout in his room, but Tristan found that people who went on business trips were often the type of people who also sought society while eating or drinking, and he was proved correct. Instead of heading straight for his room, as Tristan would have, he stopped at the hotel’s bar and ordered a drink, tossing Tristan a curious glance when he slid onto the stool beside him and gave him a heads up nod.
“What’s up?” Tristan said, which was actually a lot for him to say to a stranger and seemed like a waste of words, because the man wouldn’t understand how much it robbed his daily allotment of expendable vocabulary. But Tristan knew people, however much he didn’t like them, and he knew this guy needed an opening, was probably hungry for a friendly ear, after his long day of boring meetings.
“Hey,” the guy said, giving him a friendly nod in return. “You here for a meeting?”
“Nah, I’m local, but I like this bar. It’s quiet.” That part was true, it was pleasantly quiet and uncrowded. “How about you?”
“Yeah, here for a few days on business.” He sighed the weary sigh of a man who spent his life in a cubicle.
“Where you from?” Tristan asked.
“Canada,” the man said, which would have been obvious to Tristan from the accent, but he nodded again, as if it were new information.
“What part?”
“Manitoba.”
Tristan’s eyes brightened. “I had a buddy who used to head up there on business.” He gave his head a self-deprecating shake. “Of course, it probably wasn’t where you’re from. Canada’s huge, Manitoba especially.”
“Where did your buddy go?” Good old Steve. It was hard not to picture him as a fish, with a hook and bait dangling from his mouth.
“Corona.”
Steve’s eyes bugged. “That’s where I’m from. What’s your buddy’s name?”
“Asher Cline.”
This time Steve’s eyes almost popped out of his head. “You know Asher? I know Asher.”
Tristan schooled his features into what he hoped passed for grief. At the very least, he became more solemn. “Asher, died, did you hear?”
By Steve’s visible flinch, he guessed not. “Are you joking?”
Tristan shook his head.
“What happened? Car accident?”
“Nah.” He forced himself to visibly gulp and let his eyes dart cagily to the bar, as if he were sad to impart such salacious gossip. “He was murdered.”
He took a sip of his seltzer while Steve studied him, open mouthed. “That’s…” he said, but that was all, until, “He…” That thought hung, too. Tristan sipped his seltzer while Steve’s mind attempted to acclimate to the shock.
“Huh,” he said at last. “Huh.” He downed a gulp of his drink. By his full body shudder, Tristan knew it was definitely more than seltzer. After a few seconds of silence, while the drink worked to relax Steve’s body and loosen his tongue, he eventually said, “Can’t say I’m surprised.”
Thank you, alcohol, Tristan thought. A good libation did more to get people to talk than Tristan’s trickery ever could. “Why do you say that?”
“Come on, you know how Asher was,” Steve said, shaking his head.
Tristan gave a dark chuckle. “Yeah, he fancied himself a baller,” Tristan agreed.
“Oh, yeah,” Steve agreed, and did he sound a little bitter about that?
“There was something I never figured out about him,” Tristan said and let it lay, hoping his stupid fish would reach for the bait once more.
“What’s that?” Stupid Fish Steve asked.
Tristan faced him full on, putting all his intensity into his curiosity. I’m dying to know this, and only you can put me out of my misery, my new best friend. You should feel big and important, because you have the power here. “A while back, Asher closed this big business deal. It was astronomical, the kind of thing you’d think he’d lead with at a party. But he remained tight lipped about it, until the day he died. No one ever cracked the code or learned his secret. What did he do?” He shook his head. “Guy was legend.”
Steve took another swallow of his drink, his last, and eyed Tristan, contemplating. How much did he want to unburden himself, to give away this very big secret, to make himself look good, in front of his new friend who was hungry for it? A lot, apparently. He hunched into himself and leaned closer, lowering his voice.
“It was a bet.”
Tristan blinked, processing that, aligning it with the information he already knew. Did it fit? Yes, it did. “A bet?” Tristan echoed.
Steve gave a tight nod. “He made a bet with my boss.” At this point he gave another glance around, leaning in closer, in case anyone around them might be recording or brandishing a microphone. Absolutely no one was around them, they were alone at the bar, but the information must have been precious to him, to inspire that level of paranoia. “You have to understand how my boss is. It’s a family company, and he’s second generation. He’s touchy about the fact that he inherited the company and didn’t grow it from seed, you know? It makes him…avaricious to grow bigger, to prove himself. I don’t know how Asher knew that about him, maybe he’s good at making guesses, or maybe he did his homework. And I also don’t know what collateral Asher offered on his end, but it must have been huge, must have made my boss’s tongue loll, because he was willing to bet a massive contract, on our end.”
“That’s not much of a loss for your company, is it?” Tristan asked. “I mean, you’re still getting work for wages, you’re just committed to using Asher’s company.”
Steve gave his head an impatient shake. “We had other bids for that contract, ones that would have saved the company a bundle. That’s why we were about to terminate with them. My boss left them dangling on purpose, because he likes to think of himself as the bell of the ball. Everyone was courting that contract, and he loved it.” He paused, licked his lips, and stared at his drink. Tristan thought he might be realizing how much he was blurting to a stranger, and he couldn’t have that. He tapped the bar, seizing the bartender’s attention.
“Another for my friend, on my tab.”
Steve watched the bartender refill his drink, with greedy eyes, and then took a sip, setting it down with a satisfied smack of his lips. “So, anyway, that’s it. Asher made some kind of bet with my boss.”
“And your boss lost.”
Steve nodded. “We’re contractually tied to Asher’s company until the end of time.” He gave a little chuckle and shook his head, taking another drink.
“And you have no idea what the bet was?”
“No, but I know they went to a hockey game together. I’m guessing it was tied to that.”
“Huh,” Tristan said, then, “What was your boss’s reaction?”
Steve laughed again and wiped his mouth. “Oh, man. Postal, but he couldn’t let it show, you know? Like it was a gentleman’s agreement, and he had to be above such things. But I do know that he sent out a memo that Asher was never allowed to set foot in our company again, after that, and no one was allowed to email or call him. I think if he had the power, he would have barred him from ever entering Canada again.”
“He really hated the guy,” Tristan elaborated.
“Oh, yeah,” Steve nodded.
“Enough to kill him?”
That gave Steve pause. “Yeah,” he said at last. “But I can tell you for certain it wasn’t my boss.”
“How do you know?”
Steve laughed, this time with full amusement. “Because Asher was better connected than you think. As soon as he won the bet, he had my boss barred from ever entering the US again.” He chuckled to himself and downed the rest of his drink.