The Power Broker

by Stephen Frey

  Galloway had known this day would come sooner or later, but he’d been planning for it. Still, that didn’t make it any easier.

  In the divorce he’d given everything to his wife and made certain that no one could pierce the agreement. Made certain no one could go after her for the money and the property for any reason once the state of Illinois finalized and made official their split.

  He looked out over the lake from the second floor deck of the Michigan summerhouse. He still loved his wife dearly, but this was the only way. It had taken her a while to see that, but she’d finally come around. His lawyer had called him at the office yesterday to tell him the divorce had come through. He’d left right after hanging up and driven straight here.

  Galloway picked up the vial of pills. They’d kept the Alzheimer’s at bay for the last two years. He’d had bad days when his memory went in and out—more so lately—but, miraculously, he’d been able to keep up his job and perpetrate the fraud without anyone finding out. With a little help from the outside, of course. He didn’t know what their motives were—he’d never asked, didn’t care. Just accepted their cash so he could keep the company afloat until the IPO went through. Now his wife and their children would never want for anything again. They were set for the rest of their lives.

  If he hadn’t committed the fraud, Everest Capital wouldn’t have been able to take CST public so quickly and for such a huge profit. And, if Everest hadn’t been able to do that, he wouldn’t have been able to cash out. The Alzheimer’s would have caught up with him before the company was ready for the IPO, and he would have been replaced by someone else who would have ended up getting his options, getting what he deserved after toiling at the company for so many years. But it had all worked out, apparently for everyone—for the people from the outside who’d helped him, too. They wouldn’t tell him why, but they were satisfied.

  Galloway leaned back in his chair and reread the note. The answer to why those people were so happy was probably here. In the note he admitted to the CST fraud and said that he’d done it specifically at the direction of Christian Gillette, chairman of CST and Everest Capital. He picked up a pen and slowly signed the bottom. Christian had been nothing but supportive ever since they’d first met, when Everest had bought CST three and a half years ago. Galloway felt bad for him—but not that bad. Life was hard. You did what you had to do to take care of the people you loved most. And you didn’t need to worry about being accused of accounting fraud from the grave.

  He put the note down, drained what was left of his bourbon and soda, picked up the pistol, pressed it to his temple, and fired.

  20

  “QUENTIN, I need something on Samuel Hewitt and I need it fast.”

  “What do you mean by something?”

  “Some way to manipulate him. I know that’s a lot to ask, but I’ve gotta have it.”

  Christian was on his way into Manhattan from LaGuardia airport after taking the red-eye back from San Francisco. He’d been there with Allison and Quentin working on the Aero Systems deal. The family had finally agreed to sell last night after dinner when, in a lighthearted moment around the negotiating table, he’d thrown in five years’ worth of free skybox season tickets to Dice games along with a free stay in one of the casino’s suites the night before any game. The sixty-year-old matriarch who controlled Aero’s stock had slammed her fist on the table and accepted right away. Turned out she spent most of her time in Los Angeles and had been a huge Rams fan until the team moved to St. Louis and she’d desperately wanted a new one to root for. So often it was the little things that made the world go around.

  “The grandson,” Quentin answered after a few moments. “That’s the only way I can think of. From what I keep hearing, Hewitt adores the kid. Really doesn’t care much about anybody else. Remember I told you he was close to ex-senator Stewart Massey?”

  “The guy who drowned in Oklahoma?”

  “Yeah.”

  “So?”

  “Hewitt didn’t even show up at the funeral. They asked him to say a few words, and he didn’t even show up, didn’t even respond.”

  “Jesus.”

  Christian was going to drop off Quentin at Everest Capital and pick up Nigel. Then Nigel and he were going to review a couple of company reports together during the drive from Everest to Jesse Wood’s headquarters in Brooklyn, where Christian was going to spend the day with Jesse going over the platform. They were supposed to have met last week, but Jesse had put off the meeting for a few days, making the rounds of the news shows instead, to take advantage of the free publicity from the assassination attempt. Christian glanced out the window. They were almost at Everest.

  “By the way,” Quentin spoke up, checking his BlackBerry, “Allison’s been talking to Chicago a lot lately, a lot more than usual. I had our internal network guy track her chatter for me,” he explained, anticipating Christian’s question. “Phone and e-mail.”

  Christian rubbed his eyes. He was tired, hadn’t slept well on the plane, and he was going to have to be on his game all day. Obviously, there was a tremendous amount to cover with Jesse. “Do you really think Allison and Gordon Meade are setting me up at CST?”

  “Maybe.”

  “But why? What’s the endgame?”

  “So the Wallaces can control Everest. Maybe they think if you’re indicted because of CST, they can kick you out and put her in as chairman. You told me how Meade knows a lot of your other investors, and they are twenty-five percent of the fund. He buddies up with them to force you out and makes Allison chairman.”

  “Why go through the trouble?” Christian asked, trying to see the benefit.

  “They control that much more money.”

  “Five billion of it’s already theirs.”

  “Yeah, but then they get the other fifteen.”

  Christian shook his head. It didn’t seem right. Besides, at dinner it had sure as hell seemed like Gordon Meade wanted Allison back in Chicago after the fund was fully invested. Not staying in New York to run Everest. Of course, maybe that was all an act, all part of a carefully conceived plan to throw him off. He hated always wondering about people’s motivations. It made you unable to completely trust anyone. “Is this the calm, cool, analytical Quentin Stiles I’ve come to know or somebody else? Somebody with another agenda? Somebody who doesn’t want me to be a vice presidential candidate?”

  Quentin glanced down. “Well, what are you going to do with me if you and Jesse win the election?”

  “You’re jumping the gun, pal. I haven’t even committed to Jesse yet.”

  “You will.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I just know.” Quentin looked up. “What are you going to do with me, Chris? Seriously.”

  “What do you want to do?”

  “Exactly what I’m doing now.”

  “Okay, fine.”

  Quentin went back to scrolling through messages. “That’ll be tough if you’re not around. It wouldn’t be the same with Allison or Nigel running Everest.”

  Even if it was true, he couldn’t let Quentin think that. “I don’t understand that because—”

  “Uh-oh.”

  “What?”

  Quentin handed his BlackBerry to Christian. “One of our associates just sent me this. Better read it.”

  Christian scanned the small screen quickly, reading the news article the young woman had downloaded off the Internet, then sent to Quentin. Bob Galloway, the chief financial officer of CST, had been found dead at his summer home in northern Michigan. The cause of death was a single gunshot wound to the head—self-inflicted, the police had determined. Christian took a deep breath. So, one of CST’s most senior executives—the man in charge of all the numbers—had committed suicide. He felt sorry for the man, but it sure hung a guilty sign around the necks of everyone in charge at CST who was left. Merry Christmas, Vivian Davis.

  “That’s not good,” said Quentin quietly.

  “No, it’s not,” Christian agr
eed, handing the BlackBerry back to him as the limousine came to a stop in front of the Everest Capital building. Maybe he needed to tell Jesse to forget everything. He could feel the walls closing in, and he didn’t want to put Jesse in a bad position. That wasn’t fair. Of course, the SEC coming after him wasn’t fair, either, but the public wasn’t going to have much sympathy for the chairman of Everest Capital. “See you.”

  Christian watched Quentin clamber out of the car and Nigel get in.

  “Hi, chap,” said Nigel, putting his briefcase down on the seat. “How are you?”

  “All right.”

  Nigel looked up. “What’s wrong?” he asked as the limousine moved back into Park Avenue traffic. “I’ve known you long enough to recognize that tone.”

  “Bob Galloway committed suicide.”

  Nigel’s face went white. “Oh no.”

  “Shot himself in the head. I just found out.”

  Nigel glanced out the window. “Bob was a good man. You didn’t know him very well. You only saw him at the quarterly board meetings. But he really was a good man.”

  “Was he married?” Christian asked, his voice dropping. “Did he have kids?”

  “Yes on both counts. Three kids, I think.”

  “That’s awful. Make sure he had life insurance, will you, Nigel? If he didn’t, we’ll have to do something for them.”

  “Galloway made thirty million bucks on the CST public offering. He’s fine.”

  “The SEC could grab that from his wife in a heartbeat. They won’t give a damn that he’s gone.”

  “It’ll take them forever to prove—”

  “Just do it!” Christian snapped, fatigue and pressure suddenly combining forces. He took a deep breath. “Will you please just do it?”

  Nigel nodded. “Yeah.”

  Christian put his hand on Nigel’s knee. “Sorry, I’m just tired.”

  “Did you guys land the deal in San Francisco?”

  “Yeah.” Christian chuckled. “I offered them a skybox at Dice games and a suite at the casino. The woman who runs the family took it right away.”

  “Guess Allison needed you after all.”

  Christian reached into his jacket for his BlackBerry. “What’s that? What did you say?”

  “Allison kept telling me how she was going to land the Aero Systems deal all by herself. Turns out she needed you in the end. Which is what I’m worried about, Christian. You name her chairman, and it turns out she can’t do anything all by herself. Turns out she’s not a closer. One of those people who can get everyone to the altar but can’t get the ring on the finger. We’ll go from the most powerful private equity firm in the world to a wounded duck so fast. The word will get out that Allison can’t handle the job, and the house of Everest will come tumbling down like it got hit by a category five hurricane. Everything you and I worked so hard to build will be destroyed.”

  “You’re blowing this out of proportion, Nigel. I haven’t even committed to Jesse Wood yet.”

  “You will.”

  Everyone just assumed he was going to make the jump into politics, and he wondered if there was a message in that. If maybe they thought he needed a change. “And I haven’t made a decision on you or Allison yet.”

  “Yes, you have,” he retorted angrily. “Did you sleep with her while you were in San Francisco? She get you to commit to naming her chairman while she was humping your willy?”

  Christian felt his anger flash. “Nigel, you better—”

  “She’s been asking me a lot about CST lately.”

  Christian felt the air rush from his lungs, like he’d been punched in the stomach. “What?”

  “I thought that might interest you.”

  “What’s she been asking?”

  “How much you personally made on the CST public offering. How involved you were with the company day to day. How well you knew Bob Galloway.” Nigel shrugged. “I didn’t think anything of it at first, but she kept asking.”

  And Quentin had mentioned that Allison was talking to Chicago a lot lately. To Gordon Meade, no doubt.

  “Where is Allison?” Nigel asked.

  “She stayed in San Francisco to go over a few details of our letter of intent to purchase Aero Systems with the sellers. She’s coming back this afternoon.” God, he was tired. News like this was the last thing he needed. “Has your contact at CST finished her investigation yet?”

  “Today,” Nigel promised. “Late today. Realistically, probably tonight.”

  “Michelle, right?”

  “Huh?”

  “Michelle Wan. That’s your contact at CST, right?”

  A curious expression crossed Nigel’s face. “Yeah, that’s right, but why do you keep asking?”

  Christian couldn’t hold back any longer. He’d known Nigel a long time, but he had to confront him about the memo in the briefcase. “Who’s Sylvia Brawn?”

  Nigel gazed at Christian hard for a few moments. “Sylvia Brawn is another woman at CST who has no idea what’s going on. Michelle is using Sylvia’s CST e-mail late at night so nobody finds out it’s her who’s helping me. Sylvia’s an administrative assistant in the marketing department. No one would ever believe she was involved in the fraud or believe that she could help me figure out who’s behind the fraud or how it was done. Sylvia doesn’t have the training. She wouldn’t know the first thing about how to track down accounting fraud. Like I said, Michelle uses her e-mail to communicate, then erases the correspondences. You want to tell me why you asked?” Nigel asked, his voice rising.

  Not really, Christian thought to himself, feeling a wave of guilt coming on. “How is CST staying afloat?” he asked, looking away from Nigel’s withering glare. “Where is the cash coming from?”

  “Michelle thinks she’s close to figuring that out. She’s followed the money trail to a couple of banks and it looks like there’s been help from somebody outside. An entity that isn’t associated with any of the company’s current lenders. Michelle thinks she’s almost got the answer. She’s working a couple of friends of hers at two of the big clearing-houses. She’s meeting with them later this afternoon. That’s why I said it’ll probably be tonight.”

  “Uh-huh.” Nigel seemed to have calmed down a little. God, he hated himself for thinking an old friend might be a Judas. What pressure like this did to people. He’d never felt anything to match it. “I need that answer.” If Nigel could find out where the cash was coming from, Christian could take that information to the SEC. It would prove that he and Everest weren’t involved and that he was doing all he could to take care of the problem—short of refunding money to the public. Which he was prepared to do, too. “That’s probably the most important thing you could tell me.”

  “I know, and I’m working my ass off to find the answer.” He cocked his head. “You look rough, Chris. Want some coffee?”

  Christian glanced out the window. They were almost to the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel. Coffee sounded good. “Yeah.”

  “Driver,” Nigel called, “pull over at that corner, will you?”

  A moment later the limousine was idling in front of a coffee shop and Nigel had headed inside.

  Christian put his head back on the seat for a few moments. Finally, he looked out the window. Nigel was still waiting in line. Then his eyes fell to the leather seat and the object lying on it. He focused on it. Nigel’s cell phone. It must have fallen from his pocket. He gazed at it for several moments, wishing the thought hadn’t raced right through his mind. Wishing he didn’t want to pick up the phone to see what calls Nigel had received and what calls he’d made. He tried to resist the temptation, but it was too much.

  He leaned over and grabbed the phone off the seat, first checking the calls Nigel had received. The fifth call was from a 312 area code—Chicago. He checked the shop again and saw Nigel coming out. His eyes flashed back to the screen and he stared at the digits hard, trying to memorize the number, then dropped the phone on the seat just as Nigel opened the door. He wasn’t ab
solutely positive, but he was pretty sure the number he’d been staring at was Gordon Meade’s cell number. Nigel would have been calling CST a lot and CST was in Chicago, so there was a chance it wasn’t Meade’s. He’d call Debbie as soon as he was alone and get her to check the number.

  FROM HIS VANTAGE POINT behind the tree line at the back of the yard, Kohler watched McDonnell and his wife get into the sedan, and the bodyguard close the door and head to the driver’s seat. McDonnell had ignored all of Kohler’s attempts to try to contact him. Or maybe McDonnell had checked, found the messages in the soup section of the grocery store, but decided not to come to the graveyard because he was petrified that the messages would lead to an ambush. McDonnell had good reason to fear that, Kohler thought. Members of the Order were falling like flies—Benson, Laird, Massey, Dahl. Four dead, five left.

  Kohler leaned against a tree as the sedan headed down the driveway. McDonnell had told Hewitt everything that night at Newark Airport, ratted him out like some common street snitch so his tapes would stay put. He was sure that was what had happened now.

  JESSE RELAXED in his big desk chair and took a break from the speech he was drafting—the one he would use to accept the nomination. It would be the most important speech of his life, the most important night of his life. One of the most important nights in all of black history.

  It was almost eleven and Jesse still hadn’t heard back from Christian. They’d finished up an hour ago, after an all-day skull session. He’d expected Christian to officially accept the vice presidential spot on the ticket at that point, as they were headed to the door of the office. He’d expected a shake of the hand, a big smile, and words like, I couldn’t be prouder, Jesse, I accept your kind offer. We’re going to make history together. Something like that.

  Instead, Christian had claimed he still needed a little more time to think about it—the guy was harder to land than a five-hundred-pound marlin on ten-pound test. It was almost as if there was something bothering Christian, or he was actually thinking about not accepting. Which seemed unimaginable to Jesse. Turning down the chance to be the vice president of the United States, maybe the president in eight years. But different things drove different people. Maybe making money was more important than anything else to Christian Gillette. Jesse hoped it was. Then maybe he’d get to pick the candidate he wanted. At least have some input.