Flash Crash

by Denison Hatch

  “How come?” Dubbiono asked.

  “Because I asked you to?” Jake said with a shrug.

  “Sure. Like I said, I wanna cooperate. I have done absolutely nuttin’ wrong, sir.” Dubbiono leaned over the paper and signed his name quickly. He pushed the signature back towards Jake and Tony, who examined it silently. Dubbiono’s John Hancock was an exact match to the scrawl on the corporation documents. There was a long pause. Jake decided to pounce.

  “You told me earlier that you’d never heard of a Forest Green LLC, or Tsunami LLC. Right?”

  “Not once in my life.”

  “Then why am I looking at the exact same signature that created Forest Green LLC approximately eight months ago—with not only your signature, but also your social security number and your home address?”

  “Can I see it?”

  “No,” Jake replied.

  Dubbiono lit up his eleventh cigarette. He took a long pull. “I have no idea. I get a W-2. I don’t open businesses. I just drive businessmen around.”

  “Want to think about that answer? We’ll give you one more chance,” Villalon prodded.

  “There’s nothing to think about.”

  Tony kept going, trying to channel Jake as best he could. “Lying to us. That’s aiding and abetting. Maybe you didn’t do this, but you still know something about it. You tell us—you tell us everything—it’ll release your soul. You can get on with your life. We’re your way out. We’re a lifeline. Why don’t you grab it while you can?”

  Dubbiono’s eyes were clouding over from the questioning. He had nothing else to say, but especially nothing else to give. Jake remained glued to the driver. Something about Dubbiono told Jake that he was on the right track. He could feel it tingling through the pores of his skin, unless that was just the cigarette smoke. He could smell the path ahead, but he definitely couldn’t see it yet.

  ■

  On the way out, Jake stopped in the manager’s office to verify what Dubbiono had told them. Not only did Dubbiono’s alibi seem legitimate, it was actually backed up by data. It turned out that the company attached a GPS to each one of its vehicles. The detectives were able to double-check Dubbiono’s story against data from the GPS company’s central server. It all matched. When Dubbiono said he was working, there were paid invoices for the jobs. When he said he was at home with his family, his car was parked outside his house.

  Jake stood outside the office and examined the passenger lists and trips that Dubbiono had gone on over the last six months. As he flipped through the pages, he became extremely excited. Dubbiono had a regular client—a man whom Jake was well acquainted with. A few times a month, Dubbiono picked up none other than Howard Bergensen and drove him for two hours out to the Hamptons.

  “Do you see this?” Jake pointed out the series of pickups to Tony. “He drives Howard Bergensen.”

  “Unbelievable,” said Villalon.

  “This isn’t random. That’s our connection. Maybe the quant is actually onto something.”

  “But what, exactly? There was nothing in Port Newark. Fuckin’ zilch. We need a chain of evidence . . .”

  “You’re very right, my lovely Anthony. And I’m not quite sure about that part. But I’m telling you that Stefano Dubbiono knows a lot more than he’s saying. He knows he started that company. He knows Howard Bergensen. He lied to our faces, point blank—even after he’d signed his name. That’s risky. What’s he thinking?”

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  BUILT IN THE NINETEEN twenties, Howard Bergensen’s weekend house was one of the rare homes along the elite five-mile Meadow Lane in Southampton that hadn’t been completely razed and replaced with a megamansion. That placed it squarely at a ten-million-dollar value instead of forty. Having been built during the roaring years, the house had been updated and expanded and remodeled many times, to the point where it didn’t reflect its ancestor in any way. However, the mansion still maintained its original gate columns, re-mortared, through which one was led down a long lane of towering purple bougainvillea into the grand driveway and motor court in front of the house. Inscribed into the stone in the driveway was the house’s original name: Windswept. When Howard had purchased the property, the seller’s real estate agent had told him that the name was meant to be an oxymoron. For years Howard had relished in the fact that absolutely nothing could blow the manor and its bedrock foundations away. No amount of wind, water, or other natural cause had managed to do so yet. But Howard was starting to realize that the house might outlast him. He wasn’t feeling as powerful as Windswept any longer. As he sat in his grand office and listened to an irate voicemail, he gazed through a floor-to-ceiling bay window towards the infinite horizon of the Atlantic Ocean.

  “Do you realize the position this guy’s in? He’s taken two hundred million of our money, Howard, and he still says he can’t finish the remodel. It was supposed to be open for guests next weekend. But he’s going to need another year and sixty million more dollars in debt with, like, ten in equity. I’m not going to be on the hook for that shit,” the voice on the speakerphone blasted out. The angry man was one of Howard’s partners in the Taos hotel deal, a money and time suck that no one had any more money or time for. The investor continued, “I called up your commercial property guy, like you said. Mackenzie? Right? He tells me that Montgomery will give us a loan at LIBOR plus seven. Seven! I may as well kill myself, sell all my organs to Planned Parenthood, and then auction my soul to the devil for that. We can’t make money at L plus seven. We can’t make money at two and a half! But that’s not even the worst damn part! Mackenzie ran a background check on the guy back in Minnesota, which I guess your counsel forgot to do. Our proprietor has thirty moving violations in the last four years. Who the hell gets thirty speeding tickets? Who is this guy, Howard? I trusted you and I’m fucking pissed. The home office wants my head on a platter. You got me into this. Now you gotta get us out. You need to—”

  Beep. Howard stopped the voicemail. It was stressing him out and he couldn’t listen to a second more. He’d call his lawyer tomorrow and threaten to sue the shit out of them for the background-check mishap. Then he’d talk to Mackenzie next week—get a lower rate. This would pass in time. Time was all he needed to solve his problems. Real estate was going up. They could offload the whole project and leave someone else high and dry when the ball dropped again. He didn’t like to think about work when he was at Windswept, anyway. Windswept was for his family. The majority of them were back for Thanksgiving, and he was ready to sit down and enjoy his damn meal.

  ■

  Howard’s son Sebastian sat in the living room engrossed in his phone. Sebastian also lived in the city. He was nineteen years old and a first year at Columbia, but they only saw each other at Windswept. Even though he was a freshman in college, this wasn’t his first year of freedom. Sebastian had been doing whatever he wanted since he was fifteen years old. As much as they loved each other, they didn’t want to waste their time hanging out. A meal with his father would take Sebastian away from whatever social event was around the corner. At this point in his life, he could go to any lounge or club in the entire city with a five minutes’ notice via text to one of ten rotating club promoters in his cell phone. That’s not to mention the stunning babes that he was involved with—sourced from school and Tinder and stepping at the club—or the drugs, or the lack of schoolwork that was getting done.

  Howard knew what Sebastian’s life was like because his own had been similar, minus all the technology. But he knew that Sebastian would figure it out. They’d set him up to succeed, and he was doing that, wasn’t he? Ivy League ain’t too shabby. With the politically correct ideals of meritocracy that were creeping into high society, Ivy wasn’t even a guarantee any longer. Howard had some friends at the bank, SVPs even, whose kids were going to places like Hobart and Trinity. Not that there was anything wrong with those schools—not at all. But Columbia looked good on the résumé. Maybe Sebastian didn’t take life as seriously as he should, b
ut he wasn’t falling behind. He was failing upwards.

  “Hey bud,” Howard started up.

  “Pops . . . What’s up?” Sebastian responded.

  “Not much. What’re you doing?”

  “Browsing.”

  “You’re being careful with that social media stuff, right?”

  “How come?” Sebastian asked.

  “We’ve been through this. The Rich Kids of Instagram . . . I don’t need my face on the top of Daily Mail at any point. You saw that RBS guy who got fired for it . . .”

  “There’s a new world order, Dad. Visibility is everything. I don’t expect you to understand.”

  “Don’t be an ingrate. The life you live isn’t a right. It’s a privilege,” Howard replied hastily.

  “Are you pissed, Dad? What’s wrong?”

  “No.”

  “Business?”

  “Business is wonderful. Thanks,” Howard said.

  “I heard that call in there. What’s up with Taos?”

  “Why don’t you go swipe for mail-order brides or something,” Howard said as he hurried out of the living room and into the kitchen.

  “Thanks. I thought so,” Sebastian said.

  ■

  Marjorie pulled the turkey out of the oven with the stuffing already inside. Howard had heard the old wives’ tale saying it was a little risky to do that, but he didn’t care. He loved the way it tasted, and he’d lived long enough on the edge. He could smell the wonderful aroma of Thanksgiving all around him, punctuated by the excited chatter of his oldest daughter from his first marriage—Caroline. He wasn’t great at saying no to his family, but Caroline was the one who really had Howard wrapped around her finger. She sat at the island, going over plans for a kitchen remodel at her new house outside of Chicago.

  “Can you look at these, Daddy?” she implored.

  Howard quickly scanned the diagrams, not quite sure what he was seeing. He wasn’t an engineer and didn’t have much skill when it came to aesthetics. He generally left that to the women in his life. But he knew that she wasn’t really asking him to decide if the plans looked good or not. “Great. What do you think? And Richard . . . He’s onboard?” Howard said.

  “Richard does what I want. You know that. And yes, I love it. We had to make room for the Aga in the island. You know Aga?”

  “No.” Howard shook his head as he sat down on a stool.

  “Well, they’re the best ovens you can possibly buy. They stay on twenty-four seven, with eight different heat sources—three stoves, four burners, and a hot plate. It just makes sense, you know? They’re only a few thousand more than a Viking, but you always taught me that you need to spend money to make money.” Caroline dipped her head back down to the plans, studiously examining a tile pattern.

  Howard knew it was his time to speak. “So how much are we talking for the remodel now?”

  “I don’t know, exactly. Our designer is still putting the number together. But you know how I said two hundred before?”

  “Yes . . .”

  “I mean, we might be closer to four or four-fifty. Would that be okay, Daddy?”

  “Money doesn’t grow on trees,” Howard said.

  “I know that.”

  “But it’s no problem, honey,” Howard said. “Just tell me when you need the check.”

  Behind Howard, Marjorie picked up a small bell that sat on the counter in the kitchen. She stepped towards the foyer and rang the bell vigorously. At the sound of the cattle call, the thundering herd of Bergensen family members began to echo throughout the enormous house. A dozen sets of feet pounded down the elegant, three-story staircase in the center of the house, pulled from the ten bedrooms and multiple living spaces of the place. The complicated lives of the Bergensens collided in the dining room. And just as the turkey hit the eighteenth-century French table and its elaborate inlaid gold patterns, the front doorbell to Windswept rang out loudly.

  ■

  Howard answered the door to find Jake Rivett and Tony Villalon standing on his front steps.

  “Hello, Mr. Bergensen. Really sorry to bother you. Can you chat for a few?” Jake asked.

  “It’s Thanksgiving.”

  “I . . . didn’t realize that. But we need to shine a light on something,” Jake replied.

  “Food just hit the table. Don’t you guys have families?” Howard asked as he glanced back into the dining room. Everyone inside was staring at him.

  “My turkey doesn’t come out till six,” Tony replied.

  Howard ducked back out onto the front steps, closing the door behind him. “Okay. What’s up?” he asked.

  “How many times has Stefano Dubbiono driven you?” Jake asked.

  “Who’s that?” Howard replied.

  “Your chauffeur for the Hamptons hauls—Stefano Dubbiono.”

  “You mean Steve?” Howard said incredulously.

  “Is that what he goes by?”

  “Are we talking about Steve? Honestly? He’s driven me hundreds of times. He’s one of my favorites. Guy has stories for days . . .”

  “When you’re taking those rides, do you talk about business in the car?” Jake inquired.

  “Not with him. But on the phone? Absolutely. That’s the whole point,” Howard said. “What’s this all about? What did Steve do?”

  “We think that he—” Villalon started up but was interrupted by Jake.

  “We’re not sure yet. Just pursuing a lead. Could Steve have reasonably known about Montgomery’s gold position because of what he overheard while driving you?”

  “I guess it’s possible, sure . . . I still say very unlikely. There’s a reason he’s a driver. Right?”

  “What about the vault? Would you have talked about that?”

  “Again, it’s possible. It’s not a secret. But I wouldn’t . . .” Howard trailed off and then concluded, “There is so little likelihood that Steve could have picked that up from me.”

  “What about Belov? Any connection there?” Jake asked.

  “You mean between Steve and David?”

  “Yep.”

  “How would I know?” Howard shrugged.

  “Anything else you can tell me?” Jake asked.

  “Just about as much as you’re telling me, detective, which is zero. I’d appreciate knowing what this is about. My neck’s the one on the line right now. You can’t imagine what the last two weeks have been like.”

  “We’ve just drawn some connections. Dubbiono was doing something shady. He knows you. He might know David. I gotta play it out. What else can you tell me about him?” Jake said.

  “Look. Steve’s a good guy—family man, I think. He tells me stories. I like that stuff. I like hearing about his world. It’s so different from what I know. He used to run with a rough crowd. He’s . . . loquacious. I mean he’d rattle off for the whole two-hour trip about the days when he was a bookie if I didn’t stop him. Who knows? Maybe he does that about me, in reverse, to all his buddies. Maybe the wrong guy heard him. Could be. You know my policy, Jake. If you think Steve knows anything at all about this disaster, I’ll do anything I can to nail him to a fucking cross.”

  “Okay, great. Thanks, Howard,” Jake said. “We’ll be in touch.”

  “Fine. But maybe next time you can schedule it with my assistant,” Howard replied.

  “Will do. And sorry to disrupt your Thanksgiving,” Tony added.

  “That too,” Jake said.

  ■

  While feasting, Howard couldn’t help but think of famine. Luckily his family’s joy masked the tension, and their unspoken fractures kept serious personal discussions from the dinner table. After the meal was over, they all spread back out across the house. Howard sat at the table while Marjorie cleared his plate. Sebastian sat at the other end of the table as well, face glowing from the screen in front of him. Howard realized that in a few hours, all of his progeny would creep back across the nation to their own lives. That’s the way he had designed it, the way he normally liked it, but th
is evening he felt something new: a pang of guilt. As Sebastian stood up, Howard rose with him. He caught up to his son and put his arm over Sebastian’s shoulder.

  “Want to go outside and shoot some bows and arrows?”

  “What?” Sebastian asked, startled.

  “Remember when we used to do that? You loved archery.”

  “I was like, eleven.”

  “I got you all the good stuff—the equipment. Hoyt bows. Easton arrows. Remember? We’d drive up and down the East Coast, go to competitions . . .” Howard reminisced.

  “Yeah. I know, Dad. I remember.”

  “I was just thinking about that. I think we still have at least one of those bows out in the pool house. And we never use the lawn for anything anymore . . .”

  “You’re serious?” Sebastian asked.

  “Sure. Why not?” Howard said.

  “Dad, I can’t.”

  “How come?”

  “Isabelle’s picking me up in twenty minutes. There’s a concert tonight—in the city. We’ve got tickets already,” Sebastian said and then added, “Sorry.”

  “It’s okay. I just . . . I loved those times. Sorry if there wasn’t enough of them. I want you to know that. I love you, too, son,” Howard said.

  Sebastian stared back at his father strangely. “Love you too, Pops.”

  TWENTY-EIGHT

 

  VLAD ZHADANOV AND DAVID Belov drove out to the edge of Staten Island’s Silver Lake Reservoir, six miles south of Manhattan’s southern tip and Wall Street. Rolling through the industrial wasteland, they followed a prompt on Vlad’s phone towards a set of coordinates. Once they had reached their destination, David and Vlad parked underneath a highway overhang built against the side of the reservoir.