KERRI'S WAR (Volume 3 of The King Trilogy)

CHAPTER 14

New York. Friday, noon.

F.T.D. delivered two dozen red roses to Kerri's apartment, sharp at noon. She hurried to open the small attached envelope, and remove the enclosed card. She read,

"Dear Kerri;

The roses are to thank you for your kindness and sympathy. I can't tell you how much it meant to me that you took the time to attend dad's service. I appreciated it more than you can imagine. I hope some day we can continue our conversation, uninterrupted.

Fondly, Steve Monteith."

She placed the flowers in a crystal vase, filled it with water, then set it on her kitchen counter. She asked herself if the note was just Steve's way of returning her kindness, or if there was something more. She closed her eyes and wondered how she would behave if Steve wasn't engaged to be married. There was something about him that excited her, moved her in a way she had not experienced since she met Louis Visconti. Memories of the consequences of that meeting ignited old and persistent fears. She had vowed never to put herself in a position to be hurt again. The wounds had healed, but the scars were still embedded deep in her heart.

She took a long time to compose a reply to a man who was engaged to another woman, a man who had captured something in her and would not let go.

For days she had been pestered and hounded by members of the media. Any time she left the confines of her apartment she faced an endless and shameless barrage of confrontations and solicitations. Much as she wanted to, she could not turn her cell phone or answering machine off because of her crucial need for constant two way communications. She could have switched to an unlisted number, but that would be hiding, something she did not want to be accused of doing. In the frequent event a reporter succeeded in getting her on the receiving end of a telephone call, she would end it summarily by saying, "I have no comment at this time."

Compounding her communication problems by orders of magnitude were the hundreds of calls she received from family members of deceased employees, attorneys representing their estates, and clients seeking answers to too many questions. While she hated to go public for any reason, she had concluded it was necessary. Doing so would provide her with an opportunity to convey her messages to a large number of people, to answer their questions, and to tell the world of her plan to return Iacardi to its former health.

After weeks of agonizing over how to go public and with whom, she accepted an invitation for an exclusive live television interview from Cathy Simmonds, a close friend and revered in the industry for both accuracy and integrity. Simmonds, an attractive thirty-nine year old redhead, had met Kerri four years earlier at a high profile New York charity function. They discovered that they had a lot in common and liked each other. Lunch or dinner together, at least once a month, was an event both cherished. The interview was set to take place at the Manhattan studio of WKTV, a local broadcaster.

New York. 5:00 P.M.

Dressed in her most conservative black business suit, combined with a white silk blouse and no jewelry, Kerri took a seat facing Simmonds. Both occupied matching white French Provincial chairs. The make up crew had done a superb job of hiding the signs of worry and stress showing on Kerri's face. The lights were painfully bright.

The count down ended and Simmonds, facing the camera with a commercial smile, began, "I'm honored to have with me today, Kerri King, the president of Iacardi & Sons, a company virtually decimated by the terrorist attacks of September eleventh." She turned to face Kerri. "Thank you for agreeing to spend some of your valuable time with us today, Kerri. I can't imagine how difficult it must have been for you in the days following that unspeakable disaster."