Page 22 of The List
On the collective bargaining session just around the corner, per our meeting of last week, I wanted to confirm our position about five-year contract deals.
During the last negotiations an effort was made to secure a five-year duration on the labor contracts.
But costs associated with that, particularly with reference to IBEW where a percentage increase in wages was conceded, were high.
Such efforts are not necessary this time.
Of course, request five years in our initial offer but bargain that away in return for concessions.
Each union will surely not want to agree to any long-term deal.
It should be easy to secure three years in duration without any major concessions on our part.
I wanted you to know that you have the board’s authorization to negotiate in this manner. Please keep me informed.
Greene held up Lee’s email. “Seems the company isn’t interested in five years this time.”
“And that could be a problem. Those two years were my only bargaining chip. Without ’em, all I can hope is just to keep what I already have.”
“You think they’re going to want takebacks?” Greene asked.
That was a dreaded word, one that required him to return benefits he’d sweated to acquire in years past. Like a slap in the face, where the company reacquired what it had never wanted to give in the first place.
Talk about murdering his image.
“They sure look like a possibility,” he said. “What else do I have to offer them?”
“Not a whole lot. These negotiations might be a disaster.”
He didn’t want to hear that.
“On a brighter note,” Greene said, “I met Brent Walker this morning. In court.”
“You be good to him, Lou.”
“Is he going to help you with the negotiations?”
“Brent won’t let ’em blindside me.”
“He may not be involved in the negotiations. New kid on the block and all. He told me today he’s got three filing cabinets full of workers’ comp cases.”
“He’s still on the inside. So you never know what he might come across. What do you think about those health care costs mentioned in the stuff I left with you?”
“That’s the company’s number one expense, bar none, growing every year by the millions of dollars.
They’re self-insured, which comes with good and bad.
If I were you, Hank, I’d expect proposals upping the yearly deductibles, raising the employee premium contribution, cutting some benefits, that sort of thing. ”
He shook his head. “That’ll go over real big with the membership.”
“And it won’t help your image as a hard-nosed negotiator.”
No, it would not. “I’ve got to at least hold on to what I have—and try to get a little more.”
“And what do you have to offer in return?”
He thought about the two extra years he once believed his ace in the hole.
“Looks like not a damn thing… right now.”
12:17 P.M.
M OODY’S B ARBECUE WAS B RENT’S FAVORITE PLACE TO EAT.
I T WAS located east of town on Old Post Road, right outside Concord’s city limits, a wooden farmhouse hauled across the county years ago just before Eagle Lake was flooded.
For the past fifteen years it had housed a restaurant, owned and operated by a retired paperworker, its rustic feel and down-home quality intentional.
The menu varied, a choice among beef, pork, or chicken, all served on paper plates wrapped in tinfoil, with two slices of fresh white bread.
The sauce, a mustard-based spicy mixture, was what made the place extra special.
Just the right blend of sweet and sour. People traveled all the way from Savannah sometimes just for lunch, the mouthwatering aromas strong from the instant customers parked outside.
He met Ashley there a little before noon.
She was on her thirty-minute lunch break before beginning afternoon deliveries.
He bought them each a quarter-pound plate with mild sauce and RC Colas and they took a seat at one of the picnic tables inside.
Each was encrusted with etched carvings and initials, the tabletops long ago evolving into works of art.
All part of the charm, like barbecuing in your backyard without the gnats.
“You took your time texting,” she said.
He’d waited until nearly ten last night before confirming their date. “I figured you were still at the funeral.”
“I left there around eight. It was all so sad. A lot of people came. Papa Evans was well liked. The whole family’s pretty ripped up.” She spoke with surprising emotion for an ex-wife and ex-daughter-in-law.
He could sympathize with the Evanses. He knew how it was to suddenly lose a father. They ate a few moments in silence.
“You know,” Ashley said, “no matter how hard you try, you can’t keep avoiding it.”
He stared at her as a memory returned.
Those same words, but a different voice.
“You can’t keep avoiding it,” Paula said again.
He’d driven over to tell her the wedding was off.
They were sitting on her parents’ front porch, a waft of honeysuckle in the air.
Paula looked her usual perfect self. Slacks and blouse.
Hair combed and sprayed. Nails lacquered pink.
Earrings. A single brooch. The invitations had all been sent, the ceremony scheduled for three Saturdays away.
A modest affair with a reception afterward.
But he was having second and third thoughts.
Ashley Reed the main source of his confusion.
“I assume you’re in love again with Annie Oakley,” Paula said, like a parent scolding a naughty child.
“Does it really matter how I feel?”
She angled her head toward him. No reverse gear for her, just barrel straight ahead. “It doesn’t matter one bit. What matters is here.” She pointed to her washboard tummy. “You should have thought about that before you decided to get me pregnant.”
But he doubted that had been his call.
Their relationship had dragged on two years.
They met right after he returned home from law school and opened his practice.
A local girl, born and raised, who taught third grade.
Ashley had been a continual presence, but her inability to commit never allowed her to be anything more than a momentary diversion.
He’d delayed things as long as he could.
Finally, two months ago, Paula told him he could stall no more.
A child was on the way.
“We’re going to have a family, Brent. And isn’t that more important than Annie Oakley?”
She was taunting. Seeing how he’d react.
A game they played more and more. Paula pushing, he absorbing.
Surely, she had it all figured out. The announcement would come after their honeymoon in Cancun.
Returning hardly tanned from a week in the Mexican sun, she predicting for her family and friends, with a smile, that the trip may have been productive.
It would be her parents’ first grandchild, another honor he knew she was intent on snaring from her younger sister who’d just recently married.
“You can’t keep avoiding it,” she said.
“No, I can’t.”
“Oh, come on, Brent. It’s not a prison sentence. I’m not so bad. You enjoy yourself when we’re together.”
“I never said I didn’t.”
“You just want her more.”
He caught the edge in her voice. “I never said that either.”
“You didn’t have to.” Then she added, “From what I hear your little pistol is hot after a new husband anyway. And it’s not you.”
He’d heard that too. One source of gossip confirming they intended to marry. Characteristically, Ashley had said nothing. She never did. Probably because she really didn’t know herself.
“That’d certainly solve your problem,” he said.
“I don’t have a problem. I’ll soon have a loving husband and a baby on the way. We have a beautiful wedding planned and we’re going to have a wonderful time in Mexico. What more could a girl want?”
He wanted to say, How about a husband who loves you? But decided silence was better. His choices were limited. And it was his own fault. They weren’t kids anymore. Maybe it was time he faced reality. No child of his was going to grow up fatherless.
For once Paula might be right.
He couldn’t keep avoiding it.
“I’m not avoiding it,” he told Ashley, not exactly sure whom he was answering.
“Then what are you doing?”
“I’m trying to readjust to being back home. To giving up a good job. To pleasing a new employer. To—”
He caught himself. That last one—about helping his mother—he could not talk about.
“To making up for what happened with Paula?” she asked.
He said nothing.
“It can’t be done, you know.”
He wasn’t so sure. But he reminded himself that one of the reasons he’d returned was to give it a try. While in Atlanta he’d thought about Ashley. A lot. That he could not deny. No more obstacles existed between them. If it was going to work, this might be their last chance to try.
“So where are we going Saturday night?” she said.
He swallowed a mouthful of sandwich. “I didn’t know we were going anywhere.”
She gave him a mischievous smile. “Lori Anne’s going to be with her granddaddy. I have the night free.”
Why run anymore? He wanted her. She wanted him. Perhaps the debilitating effects of guilt passed with time?
“Then I guess we’ll be at your place.”
Another smile from her. “My thoughts exactly.”
2:15 P.M.
V ICTOR J ACKS GAZED AT THE CORPSE SLUMPED ON THE WOOL SOFA. His first assignment in his new job as an associate had brought him to rural southwest Georgia and a double-wide belonging to Michael Ottman.
Priority Number 8 from May’s list.
He’d read the file yesterday. Ottman, a seventy-one-year-old widower, had both a diseased heart and terminal cancer.
After retiring from Southern Republic he’d moved two hundred miles away from Concord to be closer to his daughter, who lived down the dirt road in another double-wide.
His retirement benefits were meager but, coupled with Social Security, were enough to allow a solitary life in relative comfort.
Number 8 drew the attention of the board because of an extraordinary number of medical expenses looming on the horizon.
During orientation De Florio had explained that retiree health benefits were the most troublesome area for the board to manage.
There was literally no way to predict them.
Pay-as-you-go was the only course for handling them, and that amounted to financial Russian roulette.
Terminal care was particularly expensive.
An almost bottomless pit. And Number 8 hadn’t helped matters by telling his doctors that he intended to take advantage of every single benefit available.
De Florio had explained about the nearly constant battle that ensued to provide adequate benefits while at the same time ensuring the company’s insurance reserve fund remained solvent.
There was only one way to succeed. Costs had to be controlled.
And in the case of Michael Ottman, a Priority decision seemed the easiest way to avoid the massive out-of-pocket expenditures sure to come, while simultaneously generating savings that could be used on other, less costly, claimants.
Pretty clever, he thought.
He’d fit right into the Priority program.
Killing was his profession and De Florio had offered more than enough money to make his devotion to a single employer profitable.
Yet that wasn’t the only lure. Finally, no more worrying about the next job, concerned whether a client was legitimate or a setup.
No more looking over his shoulder, protecting himself from retaliation or retribution.
Now he could simply kill.
But he remembered the lesson De Florio had graphically illustrated yesterday with that bullet to the head of Milo Richey. No mistakes. Everything had to be done precisely according to Rule.
His first assignment had been easy.
A knock on the door, then a squirt of gas for instant unconsciousness.
He’d cushioned Ottman’s fall to avoid any bruising.
A single injection and the heart failed.
With Number 8’s history no one would think twice about the cause of death.
The injection point, deep in the ear canal, would never be noticed by any medical examiner.
De Florio’s array of toxins was impressive.
The one he’d just used an excellent example.
Odorless and tasteless, producing a fatal heart fibrillation in nearly an instant, leaving nothing in plasma or tissue other than a whiff of fluoride that would be attributed to either the local water supply or the last time the decedent brushed his teeth.
Nothing for any toxicology tests to discover.
And that was assuming any tests would be run, which was unlikely.
Older people just died.
He checked for a pulse through a gloved hand.
None.
The settling of the body and rapid color change provided further corroboration.
Death was verified.