Chapter 55: Trial Separation

April 19, 1993, Chicago, Illinois

“Do you need any help?” I asked Jessica on Monday morning.

“No. I’ll just take enough things for a few days and figure things out from there.”

“I want you to come back home,” I said. “But those conditions aren’t negotiable. They can’t be.”

“I know. You’re OK with my plan to see the kids each morning?”

I’d been very happy when she’d made that request, rather than me suggesting it, because it seemed to indicate that I was right that she did love them, and that there might be a glimmer of hope. Might.

“Yes, of course. I’d never keep your kids from you. And I want you to remember one very, very important thing. I love you and I will always love you. No matter what.”

And I would do my best to bring her home again, if only she could find it in herself to make ‘adjustments’, as Al had called them.

“I’m sorry,” Jessica said.

I nodded and got up from the kitchen table and went to find Kara, who was with the kids. I kissed the kids goodbye and Kara followed me out of the sunroom.

“Are you OK, Honey?” I asked.

“I suppose so,” Kara sighed. “I feel terrible, but I don’t know any other solution. I’m sorry I made you send her away.”

“You didn’t,” I said. “This should have happened weeks ago. She was only here, and only in our bed, because I turned myself into a doormat for her. When she decided to sleep in the guest room last month, that’s when the decision was made. Even after she moved upstairs again, she wasn’t REALLY there.”

“Are YOU going to be OK?” Kara asked.

“I have to be. For you. For the kids. For everyone I’m responsible for.”

“You think she’s going to come back, don’t you?”

“It’s my fervent hope. But for that to happen, you would have to agree. I will never again make the mistake I did for the past month where I put you in second place and basically ignored your needs.”

“You did what you thought was best. Nobody can accuse you of not trying.”

“No, but I did fail.”

“Do you want me to go with you on Friday to the Gala?”

“I think under the circumstances, I’m going to pass. Samantha wasn’t thrilled with the idea of going because of what happened with her dad, and her mom certainly won’t be there. I’ll explain to Jeri today. I’m sure she’ll understand.”

“Are you still going to Japan?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t want to leave you alone.”

“When do you have to make your final decision?”

“Right before I get on the plane! But practically, by May 15th.”

“Then we can see how things go. I need to get to school and you need to get to work.”

We hugged and kissed, and Elyse joined me for the drive to the office.

“I don’t want to hear it,” I said to Elyse before she could say anything.

“You did the...”

“Stop! I do NOT want to hear it, I said.”

“What’s wrong?”

“My marriage failed and you’re asking what’s wrong? Seriously?”

“It wasn’t your...”

“Will you stop, please? It WAS my fault. I failed. And yes, Jessica failed. Kara and the kids are the innocent parties here. I do NOT want you trying to justify what happened in any way, shape, or form. Got it?”

“Yes,” Elyse said, turning to stare out the window.

I drove silently to the office and parked in my reserved spot.

“I’m sorry I snapped at you,” I said.

“No, I was wrong,” Elyse said. “If you had been unemotional about the break up, I would have been worried.”

“The entire family dynamic is going to change. I suspect things with Samantha are going to change pretty radically as well.”

“Did she name an interim head of the company?”

“The press release will go out today. It’s the most senior fund manager. He doesn’t want the job long-term, but he sees the need for continuity, and putting him there should reassure the investors. It’s really the fund managers who make or break the investments. Noel was important, yes, but it’s more complicated than that.”

“What are you going to say to everyone?”

“Nothing right now,” I said. “I’ll tell Penny because I have to. I told Samantha and Abbie this morning. I’ll call Kathy and Kurt tonight, and tell Jennifer and Josie. We’ll take it from there.”

“What about your parents?”

“Give everything a few days to settle down.”

“You think she’s coming back!” Elyse said.

“What I think is unimportant. I want things to settle a bit before I talk to my dad.”

“Because your mom is going to be a complete bitch about it.”

“Yes.”

We got out of the car and went into the office. After greeting Lucas, we went up to our offices. Penny arrived a few minutes later.

“Jess and I separated last night,” I said.

“I knew that was coming,” Penny said. “Are you OK?”

“I guess I knew it was coming, too. I’ll be fine. I have Kara and the kids.”

“Where did she go?”

“For now, the NIKA apartment. It was empty and close to the hospital. That gives her some time to figure out what to do.”

“Divorce?”

“Only if she wants it,” I said. “You know me.”

“I do. And that’s what worries me. You let her walk all over you and I think you’ll do it again.”

I shook my head, “No. I promised Kara I would never put her second to Jessica again. They can be equal, but Kara can’t be second.”

“If you need cheering up...” she smirked.

“No way, Pretty Penny! You know better!”

“A girl can dream, can’t she?”

“So long as she keeps those fantasies safely locked in her mind where they belong!”

“Spoilsport!” Penny teased.

“Don’t you have work to do? I know I do!”

Penny laughed and sat down at her workstation. I had work from Friday to catch up on and after the staff meeting, a string of phone calls and emails, and a pile of paperwork, I was ready for lunch. I was just about to leave my desk when Lucas buzzed me to say that Valerie Spurgeon was on the line.

“Valerie? It’s Steve. What’s up?”

“Noel won his appeal about bail. He’ll be free by the end of the day on $10 million cash bail. He has to surrender his passport, and he’ll have some kind of supervision from the Marshals Service and some kind of monitoring. I’m guessing he’ll go back to the house.”

“Does Samantha know?” I asked.

“No. I have no way of reaching her. Do you?”

“She has a cell phone that she bought on Friday. I’m not sure if she keeps it powered on while she’s in school. Let me give you the number.”

I gave her the number and asked her to have Samantha call me as soon as they spoke. I didn’t want to leave my desk, so I buzzed Kimmy and asked her to get me a salad which she happily did.

“I swear, she’d fuck you on your desk if you asked,” Penny teased after Kimmy brought me my lunch.

“So would you!” I chuckled.

“Are you asking?” she asked hopefully.

“NO!” I said with a grin.

I was about halfway finished with my salad when Elyse came to the door.

“The government attacked the Branch Davidian compound. It’s on fire. Nobody is coming out.”

“Son of a bitch!” I swore. “Is it on CNN?”

“Yes. In the main conference room.”

I took my salad and water into the conference room to watch the news, with several others joining us. CNN showed fire trucks arriving, but the FBI, or whomever, refused to let them through. A short time after that, there was a series of explosions and the building began to collapse.

“I guess you were right,” Elyse said. “They’re all going to die.”

“Told you. Not letting the fire trucks in seems to prove my point.”

They finally allowed the fire trucks in about twenty minutes after they had arrived, but it was clearly too late. I shook my head and went back to my desk. I’d just sat down when Samantha called.

“So now what?” I asked her.

“No problem, really,” Samantha said. “I didn’t do anything with which my dad won’t agree, and he doesn’t know I turned him in, and doesn’t know about my deal with my mom. She’s going to file for divorce and stick to the prenup in those procedings. My deal with her still stands. He’s going to jail for a long time. There’s no way around it.”

“Did you talk to Melanie?” I asked.

“Yes. Even if the tapes were somehow suppressed, the girls know about the other girls and the police could follow the chain. They might not get him on child porn, but they’d get him on scores of underage girls. Based on everything we discussed, she thinks he’ll be lucky to get out in less than 25 years, and that’s if the tapes are suppressed. He’ll try to cut a deal, but Melanie says it’s difficult to cut deals when you’re caught with a library of child porn and the victims can be identified. But that creates a problem, too.”

“Restitution?” I asked.

“Yes. We’ll have to see how it plays out, but even a million bucks per girl only works out to between fifty and a hundred million.”

“These numbers are mind-boggling,” I said.

“I need to get back to class. Don’t worry about this. So long as my dad doesn’t know HOW they found it, I’ll be fine. He’ll suspect Les. And that’s fine.”

“See you at home,” I said.

Around 2:00pm, Cindi came to the office and tossed a stack of tri-folded papers onto my desk.

“Free at last, Free at last, Thank God almighty I am free at last!”

“You don’t believe in God!” I countered.

“Fuck you, Adams!” Cindi laughed. “And speaking of which...”

“Jess and I separated last night,” I said without any preface.

“Holy shit! No!”

“Yeah. It’s been building for a time and it’s amicable.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“Thanks.”

“What about Kara? What about the kids?”

“Kara is OK. Right now, we’re kind of finessing the issue with the kids. Jessica is going to come see the kids every morning. On Friday she’ll tell them.”

“Shit! Let me know if I can do anything for you.”

“Right now, I just need friends.”

“You got it!”

“You’re one of the first to know. Please don’t say anything to anyone. I need to call Kurt and Kathy when I get home, and talk to some other people.”

“I’ll keep quiet. I don’t even know what to say.”

“Thanks.”

Late in the afternoon, Elyse came to tell me that the FBI confirmed that David Koresh and dozens of his followers were dead. It didn’t surprise me. That had seemed to be the government’s desired result from the beginning.

The evening at home was quiet. I called Kurt and Kathy and let them know. Both expressed their concern, but neither of them was really surprised. The same was true for Jennifer and Josie. Just before bed Samantha pulled me aside to let me know she’d spoken to her dad.

“He was pretty contrite, which is something I’ve never seen before. He’s staying away from the office, with good reason. He confirmed the appointment of the interim president. He’s going to help me find someone to run it at least until I graduate from UofC. I’m certainly not marrying before then and he’s certainly going to jail for a very long time.”

“He apologized to you?”

“For the trouble it caused, not for what he did. That’s what I expected from him.”

“OK. Remember, I’ll be in Pittsburgh tomorrow.”

“I wish you would let me send you on the Gulfstream.”

I shook my head, “No. You know my feeling about that. For something like what happened with Jason and Abbie, I can see it. But for this? No.”

“Well, have a good time at the game, and forget everything here for the next twenty-four hours. Pretend like none of this exists and have a good time.”

“I’ll do my best,” I said.

Before I went to bed, I saw a brief news item on CNN, barely noticeable due to the events in Waco, that the Governor of South Dakota, George Mickelson, had died in a plane crash near Dubuque, Iowa. He had been returning from a meeting in Cincinnati, and the pilot of his Mitsubishi MU-2 turboprop had reported engine trouble before the crash.

April 20, 1993, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

“Mario, I need to tell you something in confidence. It’ll get out, but right now, it’s closely held.”

“What’s up? Are you OK?”

“Jessica and I separated yesterday morning. Kara and I are still together, but Jessica moved out.”

“Well, shit. Are you doing OK?”

“I’m hanging in there. I’m hoping the Penguins game will take my mind off my troubles for a few hours.”

“Let’s go see Ned Jenkins. He’s expecting us. I want to make sure this is a legitimate business trip! I also have a meet and greet for you at one of the BLS clients I think you should get to know.”

We left the office and had a good meeting with Ned, as well as with the partners from Albright, Davis, and Moore, a former BLS customer. When we finished, we went back to the office. I went to the Marriott and checked in, changed out of my suit into comfortable clothes, grabbed my Penguins jersey, and went back to the office to meet John.

“I see you’re ready!” he said, seeing my jersey in my hands.

“Absolutely! That 6-3 win the other night was awesome. Let’s go see them win again!”

On our way to the Igloo, we stopped for dinner at a diner. We scarfed down our burgers and then quickly walked the rest of the way to the stadium. The game was a blowout with six different Penguins scoring. Both Lemieux and Jágr had a goal, as did Joe Mullen, Kevin Stevens, and Rick Tocchet. Shawn McEachern had two, which gave the Penguins seven total. Tom Barrasso shut out the Devils, and the final score was 7-0.

“Up two games to none!” I shouted as the buzzer sounded ending the game.

“They are crazy good!” John said. “7 goals on 27 shots while giving up no goals on 36 shots? Look out Lord Stanley!”

“We’ll have to go some to beat the Islanders’ four straight Cups from ‘80 to ‘83, or the Canadiens’ five in a row from ‘56-60, but it looks like we’re on our way to a three-peat!”

“The Islanders, sure, but the Canadiens only had six teams to deal with! Buy you a drink?”

“Sure!”

We left the Igloo and walked back towards the office. We stopped in a bar and I had a bourbon and John had a beer. I wasn’t going to the office in the morning, so we said ‘goodbye’ at the bar.

“See you in about two weeks, I bet!” John said.

“Thanks for the invite and the ticket. Tell your girlfriend I appreciate it!”

He laughed, “She only goes to about a third of the games with me. She’s not that big of a fan. I have a buddy who goes to most games with me. That’s who would have used the ticket if you weren’t here. But he got to see Game 1. If there’s a Game 5, he’ll get that one. Plus at least one in the next round.”

“Well, thank him then!”

We shook hands and I headed towards the hotel. When I walked into the lobby, I saw Tara. I had no idea how she knew I was in town, because I’d specifically asked Mario not to tell Marie I was coming to town. It was possible she’d simply staked out the hotel both nights, and if that were true, I’d feel like she was stalking me. I walked over to her.

“Hi, Tara.”

“Hi! You don’t seem excited even though the Penguins won.”

“Things at home aren’t so hot right now. And I honestly didn’t expect to see you here. I hope you aren’t stalking me!”

“No! I got a call from your assistant saying you would be in town!”

My assistant? There was no way Kimmy had called her because Kimmy didn’t know about her. Well, unless Mario had talked and there was no way THAT had happened. Elyse or Penny? Penny didn’t know about Tara. I could see Elyse doing it, and she would have had access to my address book at home or Rolodex at work. But she knew about my agreement with Samantha, and I’d made it clear I didn’t want any teasing or pushing. I’d said the same to Kara. Cindi? I tried to remember if she knew about Tara. I didn’t think so. I also didn’t see Kara doing something like this without talking to me. It didn’t make sense.

“When did you get the call?” I asked.

Tara cocked her head, “Uh-oh. You didn’t ask her to call, did you?”

“No. Who called you?”

“I don’t want to get anyone in trouble,” Tara said.

“You won’t. I promise. Who called you?”

“A girl named Samantha. She said she was your new assistant.”

I almost laughed out loud, but just barely managed to stop myself. ‘Well, have a good time at the game, and forget everything here for the next twenty-four hours. Pretend like none of this exists and have a good time.‘

“I hate to say this, but we were both set up.”

“You don’t have your CFO with you, do you?”

“No. Let’s go have a drink and I’ll give you the short version of what’s going on.”

We went to the bar, and instead of sitting at the bar we sat in a private booth in the corner.

“You know about my non-traditional situation, so I’ll just say this straight up. Kara and I are still together, but Jessica moved out on Monday. We’re separated. Call it a trial separation, I guess. I’m hoping she comes back, but I’m not sure she will.”

“Ouch. Sorry to hear that,” then she smiled, “Are you taking applications?”

I laughed, “No. But I’ll keep it on file.”

“I’m glad I could make you laugh. You seemed a bit down even after the Pens blew out the Devils. And with good cause, now that I know why.”