Lois looked up and saw Perry in his office. She needed to talk to him about the truck. She took a deep breath and crossed the newsroom, then stood in his doorway and tapped on the doorframe.
“I thought you weren’t coming back until tomorrow,” he said without looking up.
She shrugged.
Perry looked up. “He go home?”
She nodded, unable to speak without crying.
“Aw, darlin’....”
She put up a hand to stop him. She was perilously close to crying again. If he said anything else, she wouldn’t be able to stop the tears.
She took a slow, steadying breath. “I talked to Henderson a little bit ago. He said there’s going to be a press conference tonight.”
Perry nodded. “They didn’t say what it was about. I gave it to Johnson.”
“They found the truck,” she said. “The food service truck from the prison. Burned out, abandoned in Marysville. CSI is looking for trace, but Henderson says off the record they aren’t going to find anything. Sounds like it was pretty destroyed.”
Perry raised an eyebrow and nodded. “You want me to pull Johnson? So you can write it?”
She thought about it for a second. “No, that’s okay. The press conference is going to be pretty straightforward. Everyone’s going to have it before long. I’ve got some other leads to work on.”
“Henderson say anything else off the record?”
“FBI’s looking at commercial flights. He thinks they’re using facial recognition software. Looking for Luthor in disguise. That’s what I’m going to look into next. See if I can get anyone to confirm that on the record. Other than that, no. Just that they don’t have any leads on the driver. I’ve got his ID. That will be in the press conference, but I’ll give it to Johnson now so he can get a head start. Guy’s a former Luthor Tower employee.”
Perry whistled, long and low. “That makes sense.”
Lois nodded, then turned to leave.
“You have a good weekend?” he asked quietly.
She turned back and nodded. “Yeah, it was…wonderful.”
“Good,” he said, turning back to his screen. Lois smiled and turned to go again.
She stopped by Johnson’s desk and gave him all the information she had gleaned from her conversation with Henderson, then made her way to her desk. She spent a half-hour making phone calls and leaving messages, then sat back in her chair trying to decide what to do next.
She pulled out the files on the arson victims. If she could figure out his motivation for the arsons, maybe she could figure out his next step and get ahead of him. Or maybe he was finished exacting his revenge via arson and now he was gone. Maybe there was no next move except to stay gone and enjoy his freedom.
Lois sighed and flipped open the last file. Every other company was making payments to Beece, Inc. She had proof now that it was a subsidiary of CostMart, and she was certain, even if she couldn’t prove it, that this was the protection arm of Intergang.
So why wasn’t there any record of TeleCorp making those payments? Surely that had to be the connection between these seven companies. All of them had owners or CEOs who had once been under Luthor’s thumb and were now paying protection money to Intergang. Why couldn’t she find the payments for TeleCorp? Were they being made from another account? Under the table?
She spread the contents of the file over her desk, setting aside the financials since she had already gone over them with a fine-toothed comb more times than she could count. If they were making payments, they weren’t in those records. She was looking over the corporate structure, looking for subsidiaries or holdings that might be funneling the money to Intergang when Cat slid into her chair.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Cat look her up and down and raise an eyebrow. “You okay?”
Lois looked up, scowling, not in the mood for one of Cat’s critiques of her wardrobe or makeup. “I’m fine.”
Cat held her gaze and raised an eyebrow.
Lois sighed. “He just left. I won’t see him for a month. I’m sad.”
She turned back to her desk and reached for her necklace mindlessly, rubbing the pendant between her fingers as she read.
“Is that a new necklace?” Cat asked.
Lois looked up, startled out of her stupor, and nodded.
“From him?”
“For my birthday,” Lois confirmed. Her mind drifted back to Friday night, when he had given her the necklace, and she couldn’t help smiling.
Cat stood and walked over to her desk. She bent down for a better look, and Lois withdrew her hand, allowing Cat to examine the pendant.
Lois watched Cat’s brow furrowed and then her eyebrows raise. “Not the cliched chain jeweler heart necklace I was expecting,” she said with grudging respect.
Her head cocked to the side, and she drew back, clearly surprised or unsure of something. “Is that…a gold pearl?” she asked.
Lois nodded, her smile morphing into a satisfied smirk.
“On a teacher’s salary? Damn…” Cat said appreciatively, examining the pendant closely.
Lois rolled her eyes.
“I wouldn’t have even thought they knew what gold pearls were in Kansas.”
“He had it custom made,” Lois said.
Cat dropped the necklace and straightened. She nodded appreciatively, and Lois felt her sadness lift as she thought back to Friday night, suddenly desperate to gush about him.
“This summer? When he was traveling?” she said, gesturing to the postcards that still lined her cubicle. Cat nodded, clearly intrigued. “He went scuba diving and found a golden oyster. Apparently they’re really rare, and he’d been looking for one for years. It was the first thing he told me about when he got back. He was so excited about it. But he didn’t tell me the oyster had a pearl in it…that he harvested that pearl…because he said he already knew he wanted to give it to me, and he wanted it to be a surprise. He had this necklace made for it. And he said….” She stopped, not sure she wanted to share the rest of what he had said. His gift had meant so much to her, and she couldn’t bear it if Cat mocked it or dismissed its significance.
“What?” Cat said gently. “What did he say?”
Her tone was enough to ease Lois’ concerns. She pressed her fist to her mouth, half hiding her giddy grin. Then she dropped her hand and rolled her eyes at herself, laughing at her own delight. “He said he spent years searching for this oyster, for this pearl…just like he spent years searching for me. He said it was a symbol of how precious I am to him.”
Cat didn’t respond immediately, and Lois felt a twist of nerves, wondering if she had misjudged in her eagerness to share her good news with someone. And then Cat let out a long woosh of air. “Damn,” she said softly. “Does this guy have a brother?”
Lois cracked up and shook her head. “Sorry, he’s an only child.”
Cat sighed dramatically, then smiled one of her feline grins. “Please at least tell me you thanked him appropriately and did not send that man home…frustrated.” She waggled her eyebrows suggestively and waited expectantly for Lois’ response.
Lois’ mind went immediately and unbidden back to Friday night, and then to that morning. His hands. His mouth. Her hands.
Her cheeks were on fire, and Cat’s grin became something more congratulatory.
“Let’s just say, it was….a memorable weekend. And…no one was left frustrated.” She tried and failed to keep the self-satisfied grin from her face, then turned back to her work.
Cat laughed with approval. “About damn time.”
She started to walk back to her desk, then did a double take and stopped. “Is that Josh Lambeth?” she asked, nodding at the professional headshot of the TeleCorp CEO on top of a stack of background research.
Lois turned to face Cat, and nodded. Cat grinned and reached for the photo, shaking her head. “This guy.”
She laughed and shook her head again, and Lois decided to indulge Cat’s obvious desire to gossip. She raised her eyebrows and waited, and Cat’s smile became gleeful.
“This guy lucks into marrying a woman way too good for him. She’s smoking hot, half his age, and twice as smart. And it’s still not enough for him. He’s convinced he’s missing out on all sorts of action by being a dutiful husband. But rather than just cheating on her and keeping it hush hush, he convinces her to have an open marriage. But she’s smart, right – so she insists that she’ll only agree to it if they tear up the pre-nup. He does it, and…turns out, he wasn’t missing out on any action. All those women he thought were secretly dying to hook up with him still don’t want anything to do with him. But her? She’s got a different guy every week – the pool boy and her personal assistant and her old college boyfriend and…the list goes on. She’s never been happier.”
Lois laughed. It wasn’t a life she wanted, but she was happy this woman was living her best life. “And now he can’t divorce her because….”
“Because there’s no pre-nup and she’ll get half of everything,” Cat confirmed, laughing.
“Does he hate her?” Lois asked, imagining his jealousy.
Cat shook her head. “If he does, he hides it well. I think in some way it makes him feel flattered that she can have all these guys but still chooses to stay married to him. They were all over each other at that CostMart ball a few months ago.”
“CostMart?” Lois said, perking up. That ball had been a major social event – everyone who was anyone in Metropolis was there – so there wasn’t necessarily a personal connection, but it seemed awfully coincidental.
Cat nodded. “Yeah, she’s on the board. I told you, she’s twice as smart as he is. She’s no trophy wife.”
“His wife is on the board at CostMart?” Lois said, her voice nearly a shout. “Why is that not in my research?”
Lois started scrambling through the papers on her desk, looking for confirmation.
Cat shrugged. “She used to work for one of Luthor’s corporations, I think. She’s only been there six or eight months.”
“Oh my god,” Lois said. “I’ve been…. I cannot believe I’ve been looking for this for weeks, and you knew the whole time. Thank you!”
“You’re…welcome?” Cat said, clearly confused about the reason for Lois’ enthusiasm.
“Seven companies whose headquarters or warehouses were burned to the ground. All seven have a connection to Luthor. Six have a connection to CostMart. I’ve been going out of my mind trying to find the link for the seventh. They aren’t making payments because his wife is on the board! I have to go tell Perry.”
Cat shrugged and headed back to her desk, but Lois saw the quirk of a smile at the corners of her mouth and knew Cat enjoyed helping Lois with her “boring” stories more than she would ever let on.
She practically bolted to Perry’s office, filling him in breathlessly. They were discussing the next step in her investigation when she looked up and saw a uniformed police officer step out of the elevator.
Perry followed her gaze and grunted. “What’s this about?” he muttered.
“Uh…actually…” Lois said, hesitantly. “I should have told you. Henderson is putting an officer in the building for a while. Just as a precaution.”
Perry raised his eyebrows. “Is there a reason for extra precautions?”
Lois sighed. He would hear it from Henderson or one of the uniforms eventually. It might as well come from her. “There was…an incident outside my apartment building this weekend. I maintain it was just a car backfiring and nothing to worry about. Clark was sure it was gunshots-”
“Someone shot at you this weekend?” he said abruptly, straightening in his chair.
She rolled her eyes. “Why does everyone immediately take Clark’s side? It was just a car backfiring. He was just being overly cautious. He insisted I call Henderson and tell him, and Henderson added another patrol outside my apartment and is stationing an officer in the lobby.”
The officer reached the door just then, and knocked on the door frame. “Mr. White? Ms. Lane?”
“Hey, Collin,” she said, recognizing the officer immediately. He had been with the force longer than she had been a reporter, and they had worked plenty of cases together. He was a big bear of a man whose intimidating appearance hid a surprisingly gentle and friendly demeanor.
“I hear you’re making enemies again,” he teased.
“Just doing my part to keep the MPD on its toes,” she replied.
“Well, I just wanted to let you both know that I’m here. I’ll spend most of my time in the lobby, but I’ll make some rounds too – check in on you up here, keep an eye on the parking garage. When you’re ready to go out to your car, just call the front desk, and they’ll flag me down and send me up here to walk you out.”
“Thanks,” she said, more serious now. “I appreciate it.”
Perry offered his thanks too, and Collin headed back to the elevator. As soon as he was gone, Perry turned his attention back to her. “I want you to take this seriously,” he said. His voice was quiet, but brooked no argument. “Luthor is a loose canon. Even if there weren’t gunshots, you should be taking precautions. He’s clearly behind these fires. Who knows what else he’s up to.”
“I just need to prove that CostMart is a front for Intergang. It’s obvious these fires are revenge for any of his underlings who defected to Intergang once they thought he was out of the picture. If we can prove those payments to Beece were payments to Intergang, we’ve got them. I’m going to see if I can set up an interview with Joshua Lambeth. Cat seems to think he’s a weak link. And he’s going to know more than any of these other guys if his wife is on the board at CostMart.”
“You really think CostMart is just a front for Intergang? I’ve known Bill Church half my life. And I’ve known his son since he was in diapers. Hard to imagine him a cold-blooded criminal mastermind.”
“That’s where the evidence points,” she said gently. “I’m sure there are CostMart employees who aren’t involved in Intergang. I mean, it’s a huge corporation. But I don’t see how it could be anyone but the Churches running it.”
Perry nodded thoughtfully. “I’ll set up a lunch with Bill. See if can feel him out a little. Maybe get him to talk about Luthor and see if he gives any indication that they are concerned. If Luthor is burning down the businesses that are paying protection money to his organization, it seems likely they are sweating a bit. No one is going to pay them if they can’t deliver on their protection promises.”
“They might be looking at a mutiny,” Lois agreed, nodding. “That’s a great idea. Let me know what you find out.”
