Chapter 62

Lucy Bonacre was half asleep and half awake. She was in a state of post sexual stupor lying on her stomach at the edge of her bed looking blankly out the window as Jeromy's breathing began to return to normal in her ear. He was half draped over her, his cock lying on the back of the right thigh of her scissored legs. The buzz in her ear told her Jerr had dozed off after their early morning romp. She was half awake, half in dreamland thinking about Selena. They hadn't seen each other in a long while and she truly missed the woman she considered, as Selena did too, her sister.

Although she hated herself at times for doing it, she couldn't help but relive the time she had kissed Selena on her pussy, or of the time she had taken advantage of her by wearing a strap-on penis and screwing her drunken friend and made her believe it was all a fantasy. They may have been forbidden moments that she was even ashamed of now, but they were two of the things that helped cement their relationship to the special level it was now. She no longer was inquisitive about her sexuality, nor had doubts that she was a straight woman. She also knew those special moments with Selena had become the communion of their friendship. She saw the passion Selena had for her well-being when she tracked down her rapist and stopped him cold and made sure he paid. She felt guilt but no remorse over their lusty afternoon of closure. It just made their love and friendship deeper. They were the sisters they each never had.

She pulled herself out from under Jeromy's drape and went to their living room and checked clock on the fireplace mantel. It was 8:45, Selena must be at work!

Lucy went to the phone and dialed her private number.

"How's my little sister?" Lucy asked with a mischievous chuckle when Selena picked up.

"I'll accept younger, but not little." Selena replied straightforward, before busting out a laugh.

"God, I've missed you so much this morning I caught myself zoning out thinking about you. When are you coming back home again?" Lucy asked anxiously.

"Funny you say that, I was zoned on you last night, thinking the same thing. If all goes well, Joe and I are driving up Friday night. You're going to be around this weekend, right?" Selena wondered.

"Yes, yes, yes. We HAVE to go shopping and go to lunch, just me and you on Saturday." Lucy said excitedly.

"That sounds like a plan. Then we meet the boys back at our place with lots of wine and good food?" Selena asked like an excited high-schooler.

"Listen to us!" Lucy giggled. "If our men heard us they would think we were 16."

"That's one of the things I love about being with you, I can go back to being a kid again. I mean I love my job and my life, but there are things I missed. When girls my age were supposed to be giggling about guys and proms I was being an adult. You make me feel like I'm catching up." Selena said happily.

"We've been special to each other." Lucy said suddenly sobering the mood.

Selena knew the great depth of her friend's words and sobered as well.

"We have," She said quietly, "and don't think any moment of it has been forgotten or lost on me. You fast forwarded me through years I would never have known. I don't regret a thing between us. You are my sister."

"And, I'm yours. I have to run and get Jeromy up. Call me as soon as you get to town on Friday." Lucy said as she hung up.

Selena sat and thought for a moment about her weekend coming up. Yes, she had friends in Manhattan, but none like Lucy where she could just be herself and enjoy being young and blessed with the things that made her happy.

Getting back into the swing of things at work after a distraction was always easy for her, but today Selena mulled for more than a few moments over Lucy, the weekend and the need to center herself where she called home. Yes she had every luxury she wanted as well as the thing she loved most in the world, Joe, here BUT... home was home and the day when tomorrow's commitment became loving Joe and raising her child was always one day closer each morning she woke. That was when time would stand still for her. Even now if she had a vacation of 3,4 or even 14 days, she woke each morning and her first thought was, only 2 days left or only 8 days left. Work was time structured. Retirement with Joe and her baby would be blissful where today, tomorrow and yesterday would all be the same.

Her reverie was broken by the buzz of her phone page and blare from the speaker.

"Two minutes in The Great Hall please!"

It was Trace Fountain. He always referred to the meeting room as The Great Hall, and that seemed a fitting name for it. Its long shiny oak table seemed majestic as it seemingly half filled the floor space of the long room. Six armed leather and oak chairs sat well spaced around it with 4 more identical placed in between the office doors ready for new partners or guests to fill. Despite the size of the room, the length of the table or the age of the partners, no one had to shout in the acoustically tuned room. A normal speaking voice filled the room without echo or reverberation. If you didn't stop to think about the gravity decisions made in the room had in lives of the people who paid to subscribe, the way voices sounded in the room reminded you that you and your thoughts and ideas were special and weight bearing.

Selena felt out of the loop on this one. She hadn't seen a marker or news story that would spark a gathering of minds. Her time on the phone with Lucy and her pleasant contemplation of thoughts afterward was not that long of a mental get-away.

She stood and brushed the wrinkle from the front of her skirt and checked her reflection for her hair and turned the handle to her door to open into The Great Hall. Other doors opened and the rest of The Six were all gathered within moments. J. Trace Fountain stood at the first seat to the right of Ross Curran at the head. Deneigh Myerson and Chielm Beupour were huddled tightly to his side like he was giving them a preview of his reasoning for calling to group. They were ahead of the other 5 including Selena as they each looked at each other quizzically.

Ross had a gavel to call order as he sat at the head but he hadn't used it in quite a time. Once when the cleaners were dusting they forgot to return the gavel and sound block to the table and it remained on the side table since. With 8 people around the table now he wished he had it to call order, but a simple clearing of his throat quickly restored decorum.

"Good morning ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Fountain has words for us." Ross said with a nod as Trace stood up.

"As you know, derivatives are a tradable financial product whose value depends on the value of some other asset or combination of assets. Because of this they are watched by those who invest in them, and by those who oversee the buying of them. Unfortunately a lot of big world investors deal with and buy them, and some high rollers, including clients of ours, have money in them unbeknownst to them because they've bought trusted holdings not knowing where the money may actually lie. We obviously look out for them so to avoid them being caught in a domino effect. There's that word again, domino. We all use that word here a lot, and we all hate the word because we know that if all is in place dominoes fall before anyone can find the source to stop them. I've found something within the Union Bank of Scotland that is going to hurt some of our subscribers dearly unless we can get them out by days end. I feel we should screen all portfolios and move quickly to fill them in on what I'm about to tell you, before me make it public to avoid any new investment. Knowing what I think we should do before I tell you the problem will help you in helping me, and this group, make the right decision. Auley Cairns is a brilliant and aggressive equity derivatives maven who works for UBScots. I have no reason to question any move he has made, per se, but I saw something in reviewing a simple P and L statement that set off a bell and I dug to get an answer and I kept digging while each answer I had was plausible, one little aspect always bothered me. I began to plot out these things on yellow pad sheets until I came upon something that I have back checked and done history on. Cairns set up a global equity derivatives group within UBScots as a world unto itself—outside UBScots risk management controls. He earned huge profits for the bank, and multimillion-dollar bonuses for himself. He created two distinctive and overlapping risk control functions within UBScots, both of which reported to the heads of the business units and not to the bank's senior management or CEO. Auley Cairns success and the inherent conflicts of interest within the bank insulated him from efforts to automatically control his little trading world. The risky trades and lack of controls are about to catch up to him though, and he may not even know it. I spoke with a contact I have at the board of ScotBanco and when I mentioned Auley Cairns he hung up. He called me five minutes later from outside the building on a cell phone. What he told me I am not supposed to know, but he found it much the same way, by turning the sides of the Rubiks cube of this until it all fell together. UBScots is going to be forced to merge with ScotBanco to save the Scotlands economy from dissipating. The recent invasion of Kuwait will domino UBScots oil derivatives to nearly nothing for a good long time as their major oil wells are burning out of control right now and will stand to continue to burn until all conflict is settled. That could be 6 months, or longer with no money coming in or out from their wells. UBScots could tumble within days because they are so heavily laden with investment in Kuwaiti oil AND in seeming safe markets that use and need the oil by-products. This is all going to roll downhill fast, it's already started. When it hits the breaking point the government will declare the merger and lots of money will be lost. That decision is not cast in stone, but it seems the only likely way the country's economy can survive. If they let UBScots go down the drain a good portion of the country will bankrupt and new investment inside their borders will be frightened away for a long time.

Is it ethical to cherry-pick our investors who own some of the UBScots stock and tell them to get out immediately? We just can't make a general statement; it will ruin and panic that country. I know this all sounds far fetched, but I can show you in minute detail how just the right dominoes have fallen already and the crash is inevitable. The forced government merger is speculation, but in the end it is the only way both banks and the government will be able to prop up its currency."

The whole room stayed silent after Mr. Fountain's spiel, most of them looking at each other in stunned silence.

Deneigh was the first to speak in her naivete.

"At the risk of sounding stupid, if the Pound Sterling takes a hit in Scotland isn't all of Great Britain affected? Their currency can't be insulated, correct?"

"No, you're right," Selena said with a little smile knowing they each probably already had that thought.

"Unless there's some sort of Euro conversion, or something, right?" Deneigh added.

Charley Ford looked off into space for a second and looked at the rest of them.

"She might have something there that they might try if the Scots begin to fail and don't catch it before a merger can be worked out. It was contemplated back in the early '30s when it looked like our failures were going to catch up over there."

"Not that I have a say here," Slim said sitting up and pointing his finger to no one in particular. "But, I don't see a problem with contacting our heavily affected clients... subscribers,... what have you."

"Does anyone think the international banking community, or investment community will come down on us and try to claim some insider trading scandal?" Willis Menard asked the group.

"Just because we did our homework?" John Branniff said, almost insulted.

"No," Selena said, "Because of the phone call."

"Therein lies the rub, ladies and gentlemen. The phone call!" Ross Curran said putting the tips of his fingers to his forehead and looking down to the table for some sort of answer.

"I say it's all smart speculation on our part, that phone call only confirmed something we dug up on our own. We are under no obligation to tell the world until... "

"HOW SOON WILL THE CRAP HIT THE FAN? HOURS?... DAYS?" Menard asked, looking to Trace Fountain.

"In my mind, we have until the end of the day." Trace answered. "That's not official, but it seems to me if I found it, others will too."

"What your friend told you. Is that straight from their board room, or meeting or interoffice memo?" Selena asked.

"No, it was his own speculation and he hadn't brought it to the board's attention yet. But he thinks others are figuring it out as we speak. He agreed with me that it's the only logical and ethical way the government can handle it. He can't fathom them not stepping in. I sure hope Auley Cairns is out of the country when it all hits, they will crucify him and try to grab everything he's got." Fountain said.

"If they find out he has his money protected out of the country, he'll be guilty of everything they may want to charge him with." Slim added.

"SO... Do we move?" Ross Curran asked the group.

"As long as each subscriber has kept their portfolio logs up to date we can search who's going to get hurt." Deneigh said. "Let's set a threshold."

"Do we have the time to look and see who can afford to take the hit, and those who can't? Some high rollers could take a few million dollar hit, and not even blink, it will ruin others." Selena said half standing to enforce her point.

Ross Curran fell forward to the table and put his head in his hands, totally frustrated at the decision at hand. He stood and lashed out at the situation, not the people.

"NO MATTER WHAT WE DO, W E A R E W R O N G! " He cried out before turning around and sitting back towards the table, facing away from the forum.

Charley Ford stood and put a hand to Ross' back.

"Ross, we can only be wrong in our ethical conscience. I don't think we are wrong legally. This is not insider trading. What we found, we found on our own. A member of that firm only confirmed the possibility, and that possibility existed the day before our call and the day after. Let's call legal and get their gut feeling." Charley said.

"If you call legal you've incriminated yourself about doubts. That will tell the courts that we knew we thought we were wrong." Slim said with authority, having dealt with situations like this before.

Curran and Ford sat down and the room became silent until John Branniff stood.

"Why don't we each go back to our lairs, exercise our conscience and call whom we think we must between now and Market close. Tomorrow morning we issue a statement stating what we think might happen, if it already hasn't happened by then. Between now and the statement we each take personal responsibility for who we call and what we say. If you call a hundred clients or if you call none is your own business." Branniff said carefully. "Mr. Beupour, are there any buzz words we should avoid IF we do make any calls. Any wording we should NOT use that could incriminate us?"

Slim seemed very confident and felt very much a part of the group with the question.

"Avoid using we, don't mention the firm. It's "I think" and "from what I see"

and "strong possibility, but not definite". Go no further than that. Don't say what you personally are doing if you have a stake, and DO NOT say "if I were you".

Keep it light but be sure to say you think there will be some story coming from it, and soon. If asked if this anything official, give a vehement no. If Mr. Fountain hadn't made the call we could do whatever we want. Even though his friend may never admit he talked to him, let him perjure himself. We have to stay clean."

Willis Menard had stayed quiet reserving his comments and had been simply nodding his agreement to the aspects of the situation, but he finally had to weigh in.

"What a goddam litigious society we're all a part of that we can't tell people who are on the verge of losing millions of their own dollars. This is no more insider trading..." He started to say before becoming frustrated and pushing his chair back and turning his head away before adding, "Wouldn't the media just love to sink our ship, ruin our name for a shot at a Pulitzer, and not a word would be true."

Ross Curran called for order and stood.

"Mr. Menard we all feel your frustrations, but this is our hand for the time being. Let's use our best judgment in whom we call and by morning we should have a brighter picture about where we should go. I don't see how they can open another day of business, their confidence is smashed." He said as he stood and began to move towards his office as each of them followed suit.

Selena went to her office and sat in thought. Yes, she knew a few specific accounts she could call, but the smaller investors who had smaller nest-eggs but still were subscribing members to be at the height of knowledge were the ones she wanted to key on. She looked up at the phone bank and saw no lights lit. The other partners could be calling out on cell phones, but the policy was that no business of any kind should be transacted by cells. They were too easy to corrupt and their business was such, they could be a target.

She opened the whole customer data-base and keyed those who made their investment portfolios available, then pared the list to those with $750K or less, then to those with 25% or more with UBScots funds. That list was short, under 10 and she had spoken to a few of them in the past, which would make them easy. One name stuck out, Shelley McLelligott, her friends Shelley Shadeow's maiden name. The list was obviously old, or at least not updated.

The lights on the other lines began to light up as Selena made her few calls. After 20 minutes or so of courtesy calling she sat back in her leather chair and let it recline. She would liked to have done more for people, but the legal system made it too risky to go any further. The other lights on phone lines began to quiet as well telling her that each partner took a cautious stance as she had. Now they only hoped something official or monetarily obvious would break by morning so they could make a public warning to their clients so they might possibly protect some losses.

She watched the "big board" roll over her screen as it got closer to the bell at 4 o'clock. She was looking for signs or reactions that might tell her that something was happening. She sighed as the little box in the corner of the screen went from a green "open" flash to a red "closed". It had been a tense day and she longed to be home with a glass of wine sitting or preferably laying with her lover. She just began to gather things to put in her brief when her phone rang an interoffice tone. She saw it was Slims light and picked up.

"My source in Japan tells me the shit will be hitting the fan momentarily. They've prepared the financial community for an international bulletin. UBScots trading was suspended at our bell close here. There was a lot of speculative movement so we weren't the only ones who heard the rumble." Slim passed along. "Shelley called me to say she got her trade in, but she didn't have as much as our portfolio track said she did. Do you want to walk as far as your subway station with Deneigh and I? We'll wait for you." Slim offered.

"No, go ahead. I'm getting to NOT like the subway more and more, at least right now. I'll explain later. I'm sharing a car with Alexis from Beane-Wittier. She does a financial minute for Fox Financial Network and they send a car for her everyday. The studio is next to my building." Selena told him.

Alexis Konsantakis was a recognizable face in the financial community from her daily two minute investment wrap up on FNN. Selena met her at a lunch kiosk in the Bergman building where Beane-Wittier does business. They recognized each other from their brief forays into reporting. Since then, on days when Selena left her own building, they might eat a sandwich together on a bench near the kiosk or in front of the building. Alexis had asked her if she might be interested in filling in from time to time doing the investment wrap-up. Her limited exposure to financial market television had already made her subway trips in rush hour uncomfortable. Finger pointing, strangers asking for tips and invitations for drinks began to worry her. Traveling the subways most any other time was OK, but at that time of the day from Manhattan stations she was just too recognizable.