Chapter 5 - The Man Named Pierce
The council vote was suspended at 9:03 p.m.
Not canceled.
Suspended.
Forty-eight hours.
That was the compromise Viktor forced through after threatening to challenge every decision made under the disputed translation.
It was also, Mara suspected, the first time a Manhattan waitress had interrupted an international corporate council and accidentally postponed a multimillion-dollar transfer of power.
By 9:20, she sat in Viktor’s private office holding a cup of coffee she had no intention of drinking.
“Start from the beginning.”
Viktor stood at the window overlooking Manhattan.
“The beginning is complicated.”
“I have time.”
“You are facing eviction in five days.”
Mara’s expression hardened.
“That subject remains none of your business.”
He turned.
“Yes.”
No argument.
No justification.
Again, it disarmed her.
She crossed one leg over the other.
“Then talk.”
Viktor returned to the table.
“My father was Miklos Kovacs.”
“I’ve heard the name.”
“Most people have.”
Miklos had been more feared than his son. Even Mara remembered newspaper photographs: an older, heavier man in dark coats stepping from armored cars outside federal courthouses.
“He built the companies?”
“Some. Acquired others. Created alliances with people he should never have trusted.”
“Pierce?”
“Sebastian’s father.”
Viktor opened a drawer and removed an old photograph.
Two men stood beside a shipyard.
One was Miklos Kovacs.
The other was an American Mara did not recognize.
“Robert Pierce,” Viktor said. “Sebastian’s father.”
“What happened?”
“They built Danubia Maritime together. Later, my father discovered Robert was using the company to hide financial misconduct.”
Mara watched Viktor carefully.
“Was your father innocent?”
“No.”
The answer came instantly.
That mattered.
“My father did many things I will not defend. But there were lines even he would not cross.”
“And Robert did?”
“Yes.”
“What does that have to do with my grandmother?”
Viktor flipped the photograph.
A date had been written on the back.
October 17, twelve years earlier.
“After Robert Pierce died, Sebastian challenged the division of company assets. My father relied on an old Hungarian covenant written by my grandfather. His attorneys needed a translator who understood pre-reform legal Hungarian.”
“Ilona.”
“Yes.”
“How did they find her?”
“Andras.”
Mara’s jaw tightened.
“So your uncle knew her.”
“He recommended her.”
“And lied when he acted as though he merely knew of her.”
“Yes.”
She stood.
“I’m calling the police.”
Viktor did not stop her.
That stopped Mara more effectively than resistance would have.
“You think I shouldn’t?”
“I think you should make whatever choice allows you to sleep tomorrow.”
“That is a very polished answer.”
“It is also true.”
“Would the police help?”
“I don’t know.”
“Would your people?”
“More quickly.”
“Which is not the same thing.”
“No.”
Mara paced.
“What did my grandmother translate?”
“A covenant limiting the council’s authority to transfer control of the company if certain conditions existed.”
“What conditions?”
“I never saw the complete document.”
“Why?”
“My father hid part of it.”
“Convenient.”
“For Pierce, yes.”
Mara stopped.
“What happened to my grandmother after she translated it?”
“She went home.”
“You’re certain?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
Viktor hesitated.
“Because my father had her followed.”
Mara’s face changed.
“He what?”
“To ensure she did not contact Pierce.”
“You people are unbelievable.”
“He was wrong.”
“That does not make it less disturbing.”
“No.”
“And my mother?”
“I never knew she was involved.”
“Andras did.”
“Apparently.”
Mara pressed both hands against the desk.
Her mother, Elaine Ellis, had worked twenty-nine years as a public school librarian.
She made tea when worried.
Collected ceramic birds.
Cried at insurance commercials.
The idea that she had possessed a corporate document linked to Viktor Kovacs was absurd.
And yet Ilona had trusted Elaine with everything.
“If my mother had something valuable,” Mara said, “why didn’t she tell me?”
“Perhaps she wanted to protect you.”
“From what?”
A voice came from the doorway.
“From me.”
Mara turned.
Sebastian Pierce stood there.
No security alarm.
No shouting.
He simply stood inside Viktor Kovacs’s private office as though arriving for a scheduled meeting.
Tall.
Early forties.
Blond hair silvering at the temples.
Expensive navy suit.
Calm smile.
Anton appeared behind him with two security officers.
“Mr. Pierce was expected,” Anton said tightly.
Viktor did not look surprised.
Mara did.
“You invited him?”
“Yes.”
She stared.
“Could someone please begin telling me things before they happen?”
Pierce smiled.
“I like her.”
Viktor’s expression hardened.
“That makes one of us.”
Pierce entered.
“I heard you postponed the council.”
“Disappointed?”
“Curious.”
His eyes settled on Mara.
“You look like Elaine.”
Mara felt something inside her go still.
“You knew my mother.”
“I met her.”
“When?”
“Once.”
“Why?”
“She asked me to leave her family alone.”
Mara took a step forward.
“Why would she have to ask you that?”
Pierce looked at Viktor.
“He really hasn’t told you.”
“Told me what?”
Pierce’s smile faded.
“Twelve years ago, your grandmother did not merely translate the covenant.”
Mara waited.
“She changed it.”
Viktor spoke sharply.
“That is a lie.”
“Is it?”
Pierce reached into his coat.
Anton’s hand moved.
Pierce stopped.
“Relax.”
He produced a folded photocopy.
Placed it on the desk.
Mara recognized her grandmother’s handwriting in the margins.
Pierce tapped one sentence.
“Ilona discovered Miklos had inserted language after the original signatures. She realized the document was fraudulent.”
Viktor stared at the page.
“No.”
“So she created a second translation—the accurate one—and gave it to her daughter for safekeeping.”
Mara’s mouth went dry.
“Why?”
“Because your grandmother believed eventually someone honest would need it.”
Pierce looked toward Viktor.
“And because she did not believe that person would be a Kovacs.”
Viktor did not flinch.
Mara asked the only question that mattered.
“Then why are you looking for it?”
Pierce’s expression changed.
For the first time, she saw something cold beneath the polish.
“Because honesty can be extraordinarily expensive.”
He stepped closer.
“Find the document, Mara.”
“No.”
Pierce smiled.
“You should reconsider.”
“Was that a threat?”
“No.”
He looked toward Viktor.
“It was advice.”
Then he turned to leave.
At the doorway he stopped.
“One more thing.”
Mara’s heart pounded.
Pierce glanced back.
“Your mother did not die believing the document was still safe.”
Mara stopped breathing.
“She knew someone had begun searching for it.”
Pierce walked away.
Viktor called after him.
“Pierce.”
The man paused.
“If you went near Elaine—”
Pierce turned.
“You should ask Andras who did.”
Then he was gone.
Mara stood motionless.
Her mother’s death had been cancer.
There was no mystery.
No violence.
No conspiracy.
But in the final weeks of her life, Elaine had become anxious.
She had changed the locks.
She had asked Mara twice whether anyone had followed her home.
Mara had blamed medication.
Fear.
Pain.
Now those memories returned with different edges.
She looked at Viktor.
“My mother knew.”
“Yes.”
“And someone was looking for the document before she died.”
“Yes.”
Mara slowly picked up her coat.
“Where are you going?”
“Home.”
“I will send security.”
“No.”
“Mara.”
She turned.
“You don’t understand. If my mother hid something, she didn’t hide it in your tower. She hid it somewhere she trusted.”
“Where?”
Mara thought of ceramic birds.
Old books.
Ilona’s letters.
Her mother’s tiny apartment in Astoria.
And one place Elaine had told Mara never to clean out because, in her words, some things belonged to the dead until the living were ready.
Mara whispered, “My grandmother’s cedar chest.”
Viktor reached for his coat.
This time Mara did not tell him to stay behind.
Because if the second document still existed, somebody had spent twelve years waiting for her to find it.
May you like
And they now had forty-eight hours before the council met again.
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