51
Ben had been working on the blueprints with Chip when Cassy’s call came in. She’d been abducted. But the man who had taken her had not been smart enough to disable her cell phone and to this point he was hearing everything: her screaming, his impersonating a cop, the traffic noises, and the ambulance. He’d jotted down the time it had passed Cassy’s position.
Chip, knowing that something was happening, had looked up from the drawings but said nothing.
“Donni doesn’t have anything to do with this, and Hardy and Masters both know it,” Cassy shouted.
Ben put his hand over the phone’s mouthpiece. “I need a jet up to LaGuardia ASAP, and a chopper standing by to get me over to the Hudson Yard heliport.”
“You’ll need a car,” Faircloth said, as he made a call.
“Yes.”
“A driver?”
“No, but I’ll need a Beretta and a couple of mags.” The 9mm Beretta 92F was the old standard-issue military pistol. It wasn’t sophisticated, but it was reliable out to around ten feet, the range of most successful sidearm gun battles.
“On it,” Faircloth said.
Ben heard something that sounded like a car door opening, then Cassy’s voice, much calmer now.
“Where are you guys taking me?”
“We mean you no harm, Ms. Levin,” the man said. “Trust me.”
“You’re not cops,” Cassy said. “You’re goddamn Russians.”
“If you don’t start cooperating, I’ll have to hurt you. Do you understand this?”
“I understand that you’re kidnapping me. But why, for Christ’s sake? I don’t have any money.”
The sounds changed, and Ben realized that she was inside the car now.
“But if you guys are spies for the KGB or something, I don’t have the flash drive. I gave it to my boss.”
The Russian said nothing, but the car door was shut.
“You might as well let me go, and you can tell Butch Hardy for me that he’s a fucking idiot, and I quit as of right now.”
“Yeb vas! Det telefon!” Fuck off! The telephone! another man said.
“A car is coming to get you to Andrews,” Faircloth said. “A crew is scrambling a V-SP, it’s the best we can do on such short notice.” The aircraft was an older Gulfstream designated a C-37A/V that was used for VIP transport. Cruising at nearly five hundred miles per hour, the flight time to LaGuardia would be around a half hour, including takeoff and landing.
“Bastard!” Cassy shouted, and the signal from her phone ceased.
52
The Russian in the backseat with her had used a penknife to pry off the protective case on Cassy’s phone, then the rear cover. He took out the SIM card and battery, both of which he tossed out the window.
“Letat”—fly—he told the driver, who immediately pulled away from the curb and merged with traffic.
“Do we need the kid who was with her?”
“Da. He went around the corner on Maiden Lane.”
Panov glanced in the rearview mirror then suddenly made a left at the next side street, angry drivers honking their horns.
Cassy was thrown against Anosov. She reared back and slammed her fist into his cheek. He hit her with his fist on the side of her head, and she momentarily fuzzed out.
“Suka!” Bitch!
Panov laughed. “Do you need some help back there?”
“Drive!”
53
Donni had never been so frightened in his entire life, not even in Montana when he was in high school and three of the jocks from the football team cornered him beneath the bleachers and were going to beat him up because he had mouthed off. A janitor had come along and the boys had left, but for the rest of that year the pressure on him had been nearly unbearable.
It wasn’t until college at Stanford when he was fifteen and realized that he was very smart, and that there were others just like him in California, that he had come out of his shell.
But at this moment he knew that he was running for his life, and that the only way he could ever help Cassy was to get the flash drive over to Betty Ladd at the NYSE.
He was just a block away when he looked over his shoulder and spotted the white Caddy coming around the corner practically on top of him. He couldn’t believe how fast it was happening. He’d never been much of an athlete, and right now he was running like a cripple.
The light was changing against him, and he doubled his efforts to get to the other side, his only concern the Caddy behind him.
At the last moment, in the middle of the street, he looked up in time to see a garbage truck, racing to beat the light, right there.
Then nothing.
54
Panov pulled up at the red light just as Donni ran into the street and was struck full-on by the garbage truck, going way over the speed limit. His body was knocked to the street, and before the driver could react, one of the massive front wheels ran over Donni’s body, crushing the skull.
Cassy watched it happen, all the air emptying out of the world, all of her emotions completely gone, so that she could only sit open-mouthed in disbelief.
“My fault,” she mumbled. “My God.”
“He shouldn’t have run,” Anosov said. “And there is no God.”
Cassy turned to him. “You unutterable bastard,” she said softly.
The light changed, and Panov had to maneuver around the truck and the body. There were no sirens yet.
“What’s so fucking important that he had to die? He never hurt anyone in his life.”
“I don’t care,” Anosov said. “You took something from your company that wasn’t yours to take.”
“I gave it to my boss, you fucking freak!” Cassy shrieked, and she turned away.
Anosov grabbed her by the base of her skull and forced her to face him. “I’ll only tell you this one time, little girl. If you ever raise your hand or your voice to me again, I will make you wish that you’d never been born.”
Cassy stared at him.
“Do you understand me?”
She said nothing.
“We’re taking you someplace where we’re going to fuck you. Me first, and then the others, if I give them the go-ahead, which I may not if you cooperate. Do you also understand this?”
Cassy managed a smile, and she shook her head. “You are so fucked, and you don’t even realize it yet.”
55
Nichols and Miller rode in the backseat of a limousine on the way over from the Federal Reserve to the White House. Traffic was heavy as usual, but not as heavy as the mood of both men.
“I hope he buys what we’re suggesting,” Nichols said.
“I hope he understands it,” Miller replied.
“Spencer will be able to explain it to him,” Nichols said. He leaned forward. “Is anyone following us?” he asked.
The driver, in a black suit and white shirt, glanced at the secretary of the Treasury’s image in the rearview mirror. “Not to this point, Mr. Secretary,” he said.
Nichols sat back, only slightly appeased. It wasn’t every day that the two most powerful men in the nation’s financial apparatus visited the White House at the same time. If the media got wind of it, questions that neither man wanted to answer publicly would be asked.
They were admitted through the west gate, past the Eisenhower Building, well out of sight of the press room. An aide met them at the door and escorted them to the Roosevelt Room, directly across the hall from the Oval Office, where they took their places at the conference table.
“FDR rescued us from chaos,” Miller said. “As bad as the Great Depression was, his New Deal literally saved the day.”
“He didn’t have the same trouble selling T-bonds as we’re having right now,” Nichols shot back. “And this is just the first of our problems.”
“Unless we raise the rates, as you suggested.”
“How high is the question,” Nichols said. He was genuinely worried, more now than any time in the past. “I don’t want us to co
me across as some third-rate Third World country. And our debt load is already so high, adding to it would put our interest repayments higher than our military budget.”
Kolberg hesitated at the open door for just a moment or two before coming in. “For your information, gentlemen, this room is named after both FDR and Teddy,” he said with his usual sour attitude.
“We stand corrected,” Nichols said. “We have a lot to cover this afternoon. Will the president being joining us shortly?”
“He’s on the phone now, but he wants you two to be point men for any crises that might develop. Spencer will call the behind-the-scenes shots.”
“Nast is nothing but a Wall Street shill,” Nichols said, not wanting to believe what he was hearing. He and Miller exchanged a glance.
“Not my decision,” Kolberg said. “He has the president’s complete trust.”
“Everyone on the Hill actively hates him,” Nichols said.
“And his pals at Burnham Pike are going to use him to take advantage of the Chinese problem,” Miller added. “Mark my words.”
Kolberg shook his head. “It may come as a surprise to you that I agree. I heard about the bullshit he pulled at Penn State to get a tenured professorship.”
“And now he advises the president of the United States on economic policy.”
“As I said, it’s not my decision. Nast was suggested by Reid Treadwell, who was, and still is, one of the president’s strongest supporters.”
“Treadwell’s out for only one thing—Treadwell,” Miller said. “You know how he shorted the market in the mortgage meltdown crises in ’08, and BP came out smelling like a rose. It was a wonder he wasn’t indicted for that move.”
“Could be he’s doing the same thing again,” Nichols said. “Or don’t you read between the lines?”
“We’ve heard the rumors that BP has been liquidating its stocks, bonds, anything else they can get rid of, and going to cash,” Kolberg admitted. “Then spreading it around in small amounts so that their deposits are protected by the FDIC. But they’ve broken no laws, right?”
“You’re right,” Miller said. “But as a lawyer you ought to be able to see how close it comes to being outright fraud.”
“Enlighten me, Mr. Chairman,” Kolberg said dryly.
“The FDIC guarantees up to a quarter of a million dollars per account. But it’s not tax money, the funds come from what the banks pay in fees. So if all hell breaks loose the deposits will be safe.”
“I know that,” Kolberg said.
Miller sat forward to emphasize his point. “You have to ask why Treadwell is taking his bank to cash right now. Does he know something the rest of us don’t? Or could it be something else?”
“What are you suggesting?” Kolberg asked, obviously taking care with his words.
“All I’m saying is that Treadwell is a smart man, maybe too smart, and Spencer Nast is his, always has been,” Miller said.
An aide came into the room, said something in Kolberg’s ear, and stepped back.
“Mr. Chairman, the governor of the People’s Bank of China tried to reach you at your office; his call was patched through to here,” Kolberg said. “Would you like to take it in private?”
“No,” Miller said. “Do it here and now with the three of us and the two Roosevelts.”
Kolberg hit the flashing light on the telephone console, and Liu Feng came on the speakerphone.
“My greetings to you, Mr. Chairman,” he said, his English almost without accent. He had studied at Princeton and received his economics Ph.D. from Stanford. “You are at the White House, and I suspect that you are not the only government official present. Am I correct?”
“You are, Governor Liu,” Miller said. “I’m with Secretary of the Treasury Bob Nichols and White House Chief of Staff Sam Kolberg. We have been discussing what is currently happening in Beijing.”
“I would be more concerned about what is happening in your own country. Namely, the failure of your Treasury bond auction. Maybe we talk freely?”
Miller glanced at Nichols and Kolberg. Chinese intel had to be damn good. News of the auction debacle hadn’t broken yet in the U.S. media. “We’ll figure that out. What worries me most is that the PBOC won’t bail out its commercial banks that are teetering on the edge of failure, which puts your economy in grave jeopardy.”
“The banks having trouble are themselves to blame, along with our own—at present—incompetent government planners. We are the People’s Bank of China, serving our population, not the imbeciles who run the commercial banks. Let Mr. Hua’s government repair the problem it has created.”
“Governor Liu, this is Secretary Nichols.”
“Good afternoon, sir.”
“Won’t the PBOC’s noninvolvement not only cause a large number of Chinese commercial banks to fail, but possibly create a panic that would spread worldwide? Perhaps even worse than what happened because of our own poor banking practices in 2008?”
“Mr. Secretary, I believe that your immediate concern is that Hua’s government will unload the two trillion dollars’ worth of your T-bonds we hold. It would give the government immediate cash, but it would severely devalue your bonds even further than is happening at this very moment. The effects of that move would be worse, as you say, than the panic of 2008.”
“We are working the issue, Mr. Chairman,” Nichols said.
“Then we must agree that we have a common problem,” Liu said. “Too much debt. Perhaps, then, it might be a good thing to go through the purgative of a global depression.”
“I’d prefer that we not,” Miller broke in. “Such catastrophes not only lead to much suffering but as a result of the 1929 crash and the depression of the thirties, we were led into World War Two.”
“We may find out, despite our best efforts, Mr. Liu,” Nichols added.
The silence hung heavy until Kolberg spoke up.
“Secretary of State Marcus Conwell has been trying to reach out to you and Mr. Hua without success.”
“Mr. Conwell is a politician. He and Chairman Hua understand each other. But I prefer to speak with economists, who understand that the worldwide debt is out of hand. If we need to go through fire to be rid of it, then so be it.”
Miller had no idea what to say in reply. It sounded to him that the man was talking about war. Nuclear war!
“It is the middle of the night here,” Liu said. “I must get my rest.”
The connection was broken.
“Jesus Christ, did I hear what I thought I just heard?” Miller said.
Kolberg got to his feet. “I’ll brief the president.” He’d brought a file folder with him, and he laid it on the table. “This is Spencer’s plan, and it’s impressive.”
“You can’t be serious,” Nichols said. “The Treasury secretary and the Fed chairman are the ones to make those kinds of plans, the same as they did in ’08. Not some Wall Street puppet like Nast.”
Kolberg left the room without another word.
“We need to go to the Hill,” Miller said. “Get the Speaker’s attention.”
“Speculative disasters have never moved Congress, and you know it,” Nichols said.
“Well, something’s going to give, and when it does, everything will fall into a bucket of shit, and you know that too,” Miller said. “We can kid ourselves that we have the resources to prop up the system like we did in ’08, but we don’t. We simply don’t.”
NINE
THE FLASH DRIVE
56
They got off the Shore Parkway in Brooklyn and went down a street below an elevated railway that was filled with shops like the Taste of Russia, a furrier, and a nail salon. The streets were alive with traffic—every second car, it seemed, was a Mercedes—and the sidewalks were filled with people of all ages and sizes, including grandmothers wearing head scarves.
Normal, everyday families, Cassy thought, and that alone frightened her almost as much as the man sitting next to her. Bad things could actually ha
ppen even in a place like this. And she knew in her heart of hearts that even if she could manage to power down her window, stick her head out, and scream at the top of her lungs, people might look up, but they would do nothing to help her. They would mind their own business.
Come to me, Ben, she almost mouthed the words, I need you.
Panov turned down a broad avenue lined with five- and six-story brownstone apartment buildings, the traffic here much lighter, the sidewalks empty.
Two blocks farther, he turned down a narrower street and stopped at a tall, steel mesh gate. Behind it was the trash-filled backyard of a two-story brick building with long green awnings shading the windows on both floors.
A stocky man in jeans and a tight-fitting light green V-neck sweater, a big pistol stuck in his belt, came out and unlocked the gate, swinging it inward far enough so that they could drive through. He closed and locked it again.
Panov parked next to a low wooden shed that butted up to the back of the building, and Anosov got out on the driver’s side, holding on to Cassy’s arm and dragging her with him.
“So this is the putana?” the man in the green sweater asked, his Russian accent thick. The word meant whore or prostitute.
Anosov laughed, said something in Russian, and Panov and the man in the green sweater grinned and nodded.
“But she’s a handful, Vasili,” Anosov said. “Maybe you’ll need help.”
They went into the house, Anosov’s grip firm enough on Cassy’s arm that it hurt, even though she was not resisting.
They went up two steps and through the back door into a short pantry hall that opened onto a large kitchen. A half dozen men, mostly in jeans and T-shirts, were seated around a large round table, eating what looked like some sort of stew, with several loaves of bread from which large pieces had been torn, and big bottles of beer with porcelain caps.
A man was taking a beer out of a refrigerator, while a large, shirtless man with a huge belly and a massive hairy chest was at the stove stirring something in a big pot.
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