Chapter 13: Not Yet

The elevator doors slid shut on her smile.

Wells didn't put his hand out to stop them.

He stood with his hands in his suit pockets and watched the numbers count down to the lobby.

His phone rang before the light reached one.

He looked at the screen, then at me.

"Stay," he said. "I'd rather have a witness."

He answered it right there in the hallway.

"Yes, sir. I was in the room. Yes, I said it."

The yellow shirts were spilling out of the hearing room behind us, loud and happy.

They saw his face and went quiet one by one.

"I understand," Wells said. "Put it in writing. I'll sign whatever you send."

He hung up.

It rang again before he could put it away.

The bait shop man folded his arms and leaned on the wall to watch.

"Morning," Wells said into the phone. "No, I won't argue. You heard right."

That call was brief.

The third took less.

When he finally lowered the phone, his ears were red and his voice was perfectly calm.

"That was Charlotte," he said. "Then Birmingham. Then a pension fund in Atlanta that I spent two years courting."

"All of it?" I said.

"Forty million. And the riverfront building in Savannah, because it was the same money. It was supposed to close in June."

"So you lost two buildings in a hallway."

"In about six minutes." He looked at the closed elevator. "She's faster than her engineer."

Nobody laughed.

Nana came out of the hearing room on Dale's arm, settling her church hat.

"What did that woman do now?"

"She took his investors, Nana."

Nana let go of Dale and took Wells's arm instead.

"You're riding home with us," she said.

"I've got my truck, ma'am."

"Then I'm riding with you. Somebody has to make sure you don't drive it into the marsh."

She marched him toward the stairs.

He let her.

The Friday fish fry turned into a party.

The surf school couple brought a speaker and a cooler of beer.

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