Page 22 of Fool’s Gold

Jack cleared his throat and put a hand on Matt’s shoulder. “That’s why we think it’s more corporate than individual. Someone who stands to lose out on the changes you’re making at Besse.”

Matt considered the possibilities. “I don’t want to be naive, but I’ll admit that one’s kind of a head-scratcher. Sure, shareholders won’t makeas muchmoney from Besse stock as they had before the scandal broke, but the profits were beyond outsized, and they should have been expecting a correction anyway. Besse will still be making a profit, but the profits will be more sustainable and dividends will be more predictable.”

Jack clutched his head. “Oh, Christ, he’s talking about dividends now. Kill me.”

Matt huffed out a little laugh, and even Morales managed a smirk.

“Shop talk,” Morales told him. “Get used to it. You should see some of the crap I had to learn for Organized Crime. Believe it or not, there was alotof white-collar stuff mixed up in there.”

“Oh, I believe it.” Matt grimaced. “I ran into a lot of Russian stuff on some audits. Kind of scary.”

“I’ll bet. But, hey—good preparation for your new life as a restructuring CEO.” Morales brightened. “So anyway—we’re doing this on two fronts, which isn’t ideal but here we are. I want to keep an eye on GBI guy, but for now, it looks like the two investigations are completely separate. I’ll keep you posted on what happens. In the meantime, I really want you to stay out of sight as much as possible. No trips to the cafeteria or anyplace else that’s crowded. No more dropping water off personally, but you can get someone else to do it. Are we clear?”

Matt closed his eyes and reminded himself this was temporary. It was all temporary. “Yeah, I suppose. There might be occasions where I need to be out in public, like that thing for Prince Daniel, but I’ll try to keep it to a minimum.”

“Good man.” Morales patted his shoulder and left.

Jack eyed him carefully. “So. Did you get beat up a lot in your youth?”

Matt chuckled at the non sequitur. “I don’t know about a lot, but often enough. It wasn’t exactly fun, especially when they started showing up at the farm.” He shrugged. “You know how it is in high school. Kids are mean. We put up signs warning about trespassing. When they tried to set the front porch on fire, a few well-placed warning shots ran them off.”

“Yikes.”

“Wasn’t even most of the school. Just the football team and some of the cheerleaders. Most of them were nice enough one-on-one, but when they got together it was like this weird pack mentality took over. I don’t know. I’m not holding any grudges at this point.” He shook his head.

“I guess the whole pack mentality thing is pretty common.” Jack scratched his jaw, right under his ear. “I wonder how many of these folks—the ones who are just out for revenge—are falling victim to the same thing? You know, they’re angry and everything, but they wouldn’t take violent action until they saw violent rhetoric from others in the same boat.”

Matt tilted his head and hummed. “Yeah, probably. And maybe it will get better as time goes on. Another company will put its foot in it, and they’ll shift their focus.”

His phone pinged with an urgent call from Husniya.

“Matt? One of our delivery drivers was bringing a shipment to a pharmacy in Kansas. He was shot and killed by an angry local.”

Matt dropped his phone. His hands had gone numb. He barely heard Jack picking it up and instructing Husniya to send all the details to both of them. All he could do was sit there in shock.

It wasn’t that he was out there looking to martyr himself. He had, however, accepted certain risks that came with the job. It was part of the reason his exit plan came with such a high payment. The rank-and-file employees hadn’t ever signed on for these risks. They looked to Matt to shoulder that risk so they could go about their day and go home safely to their families.

His hands trembled as he thought about that delivery driver’s final moments. How frightened must he have been? He hoped the man had gone quickly and hadn’t had time to feel pain or shock. What was the man’s family enduring right now?

He called Husniya once he found his voice. “I need to know everything about the driver. Tell HR to make sure his family gets every benefit they’re entitled to, as soon as humanly possible. Access to our legal resources too. Company is to pay every cost associated with transportation and any lifesaving measures as well as burial. I want this treated as a workplace death. Send me home address, salary information, everything.”

Husniya paused. “Right away, sir.”

Matt called his bank and had them cut a check for two years of the deliveryman’s salary, from his personal account. Matt hand-delivered it to the widow that day and let her cry against his chest while their three small children watched without truly understanding. He stroked her long brown hair and held her as she cried, and Jack played with the children.

Matt wanted to find the person responsible and make them pay. But right now wasn’t about him. It was about this family right here, and how his predecessors at Besse had hurt so many more people than they knew.

CHAPTERTEN

The next day was Saturday,and Jack was looking forward to a nice day of sleeping in. He didn’t often get to sleep in on these jobs, but the building was well defended and well guarded, and one of the first things Jack had learned in the bad old days was to take sleep when he could get it.

He should have known better. The door buzzer went off at the same time it usually did. The caregiver at the door was different though. Apparently, Samaira had the weekends off—lucky duck—and her cousin Patrice helped Norah out on Saturdays, Sundays, and vacations and holidays.

Jack learned this as he staggered out to enjoy breakfast with Matt and Norah and, apparently, Patrice.

At least the food on this job was decent.

Matt seemed to understand the reason for Jack’s sulking. “You didn’t really think a couple of farm folk would be sleeping in on the weekends, did you?” His dark eyes twinkled merrily in the sunlight.

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