“You think he would interfere with our return trip to keep this deal from materializing?”
“If I don’t show up at the meeting, the sale won’t go through. We’ve signed a preliminary agreement, but that agreement expires at this meeting. I have the option to renew, but only if I do so in person. Once that’s signed, we’re supposed to set the official date for closing the deal. Deinhart has effectively delayed this again and again. There are no delays left. I know he’s done this in the hopes that the deal will fall through.”
“Why didn’t you mention him before?”
“I didn’t want to worry you or hamper your enjoyment on this trip in any way,” he said with a sheepish grin. “But I’m being silly. I don’t believe Deinhart would stoop so low. It’s beneath his dignity.”
“You think he may be embezzling from WizzyWig?”
He scrunched his face. “Nothing quite so crass. He’s a wily one, that Deinhart. My guess is that he’d be careful to keep his own hands clean. I do, however, suspect he may benefit from his position in the company in ways that—though not illegal—could be construed as inappropriate.”
“For instance?”
He gave me the “No more discussion” face. “I’m certain he’s not behind this. Forget I said anything.”
I swallowed my impatience. Bennett wasn’t giving me the full story and I got the impression there was more menace to this Deinhart character than he was letting on. I’d learned, however, that Bennett wouldn’t share information until he was ready to do so. Even with me. Resigned, I returned to the issue at hand. “The charter company should be able to find us a replacement flight, shouldn’t they?”
“They’re working on it,” he said, “but they warned that the fleet is stretched pretty thin right now. They’ll do their best to get us in the air by this evening.”
I wanted to ask why Bennett had felt the need to wake me up if the end result meant I could sleep later, but he looked so concerned about the situation that I knew there must be more.
“What aren’t you telling me?” I asked.
“There’s nothing wrong with the plane,” he said, “but the pilot is another story. He was arrested last night. For assault.”
“The same guy who flew us out here?”
Bennett nodded.
“No way. We talked with him,” I said, my voice taking on a “this is ridiculous” tone. “That guy is a milquetoast.”
Bennett snickered. “There’s a word I haven’t heard in a long time.”
“The guy had zero personality. When we came aboard and he greeted us, I wondered how he’d ever made it through a job interview in the first place. He was about as passionate as . . . as . . .”—I looked around the room and, coming up without a fitting example, I kicked the nearest thing I could find—“this footstool.”
“I’m only reporting what I was told.”
I rubbed my eyes again, wondering if, perhaps, I was still dreaming. “Sorry for the outburst,” I said, chuckling to myself. “But I can’t imagine our pilot assaulting anyone. You’d find his face in the dictionary under ‘mild-mannered.’ The kind of man who would apologize to the rock he tripped over.”
“It’s always the quiet ones who surprise you.”
“True enough.” I slid a longing glance toward my pillow and wondered how hard it would be to fall back asleep. “How long before we need to be out the door? And is there anything we need to be doing?”