Naked Ambition

by Rick Pullen

  “Seems so. I guess they just needed some insurance. Nancy, think about what Fahy accomplished. It’s breathtaking. He’s the ultimate inside player. He not only had me take down Bayard, but then used McCauley to assure I got rid of Patten as well. And look who’s left standing—Geneva’s ex-husband, Michael Harvey.”

  Beck paused to consider all of this. What he left unsaid was that it was Harvey who took him down. Every last move was precise, and in twenty-twenty hindsight, totally predictable. Beck just had been too narrowly focused on his own story instead of the bigger narrative unfolding all around him. He had to give them credit. They were the best political chess players he had ever come across. Now, Beck knew exactly what their next move would be, yet he was in no position to do a thing about it.

  “Beck? You there?” asked Nancy.

  “Sorry. I’m still putting this together in my head. Despite everything, I’ve still got to protect that bastard Fahy as my source. How’s that for irony? I have to protect him, yet now that he has no further need for me, he could let his drug lord buddies do with me as they please.” “Beck, you’re scaring me.”

  Beck kept talking as if he hadn’t heard her. “He would then be rid of the one person with knowledge of how he orchestrated the election to get his man in the Oval Office.”

  “Beck, you really are scaring me,” she repeated. He could hear a tremor in her voice.

  “Yeah, I’m starting to scare myself thinking about it. But early on, Fahy gave me one piece of good advice: protect myself. Have some insurance, he said. Back then, he was talking about protecting my skin from the drug bosses, which come to think of it, was in his best interest. My insurance policy was simple—just have you and the other editors at the paper know the details of my story to assure publication should something ever happen to me.”

  “Duh. So what do you propose now?”

  “I need another insurance policy.” “Tell me what you need. What can I do?”

  Her voice sounded stronger, like the old Nancy. Even when he was in exile, Nancy still had his back. It was hitting him now how much he would miss working with her.

  “Would you be willing to hold a story—forever if need be—about our friend Daniel Fahy? Could you guarantee publication if something ever happened to me?”

  “I think that could be easily arranged. What exactly are you talking about?”

  “I’m going to write about my entire relationship with him from the very first day. If he harms me in any way, I’m certainly under no obligation to protect him then.”

  “I get it.”

  “You’ll have the story later today.”

  “But, Beck, we’ve got to stay in touch. I need to know you’re still okay. If I don’t hear from you at least once a month, the story goes to press. Deal?”

  “Fair enough. I’ll e-mail you a draft shortly.”

  What a woman, he thought. He hung up, paid his tab, and headed back to his hotel. Red wasn’t anywhere around, but Beck had no problem writing this story. He had lived it.

  When he was done with the final paragraph and tapped a few keys on his laptop to send his story to Nancy, he felt elated and decided to celebrate with a few more beers back at the pier.

  The bartender recognized him before he sat down and slid a Corona Light across the bar as Beck straddled a stool. Beck immediately took a swig. It was especially cold, like it had been on ice, and the crisp taste satisfied his thirst. He then pulled the new burner phone from his pocket and studied it. It matched Fahy’s perfectly, except this one contained no hidden listening device. He glanced up to make sure the bartender was at the other end of the bar. He was tending to a beefy retired couple.

  Beck quickly dialed a number he knew by heart. After five rings, voice mail kicked in.

  “Danny boy. It’s your good buddy, Beck. I wanted to talk with you about the Irish mafia. I guess you’re not answering your cell phone anymore. But sooner or later, you’ll check your messages. So here goes. Your guy McCauley makes a pretty good Latino. The accent, the makeup—was pretty realistic.” Beck paused, giving Fahy a moment to let that sink in.

  “You slipped up though, using the FBI to follow me. Very Nixonian, don’t you think? Not your smartest move. I suspect a front-page story in the Post-Examiner would cause a furor on Capitol Hill and would put you and our new president in a very precarious position.”

  “Okay,” Beck continued on Fahy’s voice mail, “so you used me. I guess in reality, we used each other. I got my stories. You got your man in the White House. Just who played whom? I’ll leave that up to you to decide. But to quote your favorite president, let me make one thing perfectly clear: Red has everything. And I do mean everything. If anything happens to me—anything—the complete story, with you smack-dab in the middle of it, goes public. Now I’m done. I’m walking away. But if I should suddenly disappear in a few years—hell, if I should stub my toe or get an unexpected nosebleed—everything goes public without any help from me. It’s all on autopilot. So my health is now your number one concern. Are we clear?”

  Beck hung up, paid his tab, and meandered out onto the pier, donning his yellow shades and blue Kalik beer baseball cap to shield his eyes from a blazing sun. He noticed the pelicans swooping low overhead as the tourists and fishermen leaned against the pocked concrete sides of the structure and baited their hooks. The faint stench of dead baitfish mixed with the gentle salt air breeze.

  His phone rang. He grabbed the burner from his pocket and punched “Talk.” But the ringing persisted. Shit, it was his own cell phone. He reached into the other pocket of his cargo shorts and checked the number. It was his agent.

  “Judy, how are you?” “Not good, Beck.” “Oh. What’s up?”

  “Your book. The publisher backed out of the deal. He said your firing and the controversy around your affair made it a hard sell.”

  “Shit.” Beck turned, looking back to shore. “Wouldn’t all the publicity about me make it easier to sell?”

  “It would if you were willing to write about your affair.”

  Beck cringed. He knew that wasn’t going to happen.

  “The publisher said he’s worried about your credibility.”

  “My credibility? Not one word in my story has ever been challenged.”

  “I know. I know. But we’re talking about a publisher, and he thinks you’re tainted goods and a bad financial risk.”

  “I’ve got two best sellers for crying out loud.”

  “I’m sorry, Beck. There’s nothing I can do. Frankly, I wouldn’t be surprised if he got a call from Washington that spooked him. Publishers are big conglomerates these days, and they are players in Washington just like every other big business. I’ll try to sell it elsewhere, but it might be difficult in light of what’s happened. Once one publisher turns down a book like this, the others tend to get skittish—especially if they think they can’t trust the writer.”

  “Sheep. The publishing world is a bunch of fuckin’ sheep.” Beck watched a pelican swoop down to the water, scoop up a fish, and swallow it whole.

  “Well, it gets worse. They want their advance back.”

  “All hundred thousand?”

  “All hundred thousand.”

  “Well, there goes the Rolls-Royce.”

  “I’m glad you can see the humor in this, but there goes my commission as well.”

  “Sorry, Judy.” Jeez. What else could go wrong? Beck bent over the side of the pier, looking out into the gulf.

  “I’m sorry too, Beck.” The phone went dead.

  It was a beautiful day, but the bright blue sky, with only a wisp of clouds, didn’t help his mood. How could things get worse? His career, his woman, his book, his financial security, and now his credibility—the only thing a reporter had going for him. All gone. All of it. And yet it was all based on a story that was rock solid. He didn’t get one damned fact wrong. Not one. How can you write a great story that brings down a future president, and it destroy your own career as well? It made no se
nse to him.

  He’d always felt so confident he was doing the right thing. Journalism—finding the truth—was his calling. But now he was not so sure. What difference did all of his work really make? It didn’t change Washington. And now he was just another nobody who others found convenient to exploit.

  Beck pulled the back off the cheap burner phone, yanked out the battery, and dropped it into the sea. It hardly made a splatter. He wanted nothing to do with it anymore. He glanced around. The tourists and the fishermen with their lines in the water were as preoccupied as the circling pelicans with their wings spread, gliding just feet above all of them, always eager to snatch their catch in their flabby gray bills.

  He took one last look at the now useless phone and dropped it into the surf, watching it quickly disappear. Like his life, no one noticed. His concerns were not theirs. His world had come to a halt while the rest of the world kept spinning. He couldn’t stop Fahy without revealing him as his source, and he couldn’t ethically do that—not as long as Fahy continued to play by the rules. Even if he never wrote for another newspaper, in his heart Beck would always be a journalist and play by its rules—well, most of its rules anyway.

  But now he had to move on. He needed to get over his pity party and get to that special place in his head again—where he felt jazzed—and his brain was on fire. That left him with only one option.

  69

  Keith Crocker looked at rows of suits talking loudly on their cell phones, seated on the morning shuttle leaving New York’s LaGuardia Airport. Their destination was Reagan National Airport in Washington, and the ten o’clock flight was crowded for a Friday morning.

  What were they worth? Not as much as he was. Keith smiled, thinking about Geneva and what they had done together. Even though he was much younger than her, they had this incredible connection. Well, she had twenty years with an older guy. Now she would have her chance with a much younger one.

  He had never dated an older woman before. She made him realize just how much he had missed. Geneva opened up a whole new world. Okay, so they hadn’t done it yet. So what? She said their timing wasn’t right. Her life, she told him, needed to be less complicated. At first he thought she was blowing him off, but now he understood. Sex with the Secret Service in tow would have been a bit impractical. Now their timing was right. He was glad she was always thinking two or three steps ahead. He was richer than many of his firm’s partners because of it. He smiled at the thought.

  And he knew she was worth the wait. Just kissing her was an erotic experience. He never thought making out could be so exciting. She was better than any woman he had ever met, either in college or while living in Manhattan.

  Suddenly, his thoughts were interrupted. The attendant announced they were ready for takeoff, and to fasten their seat belts, turn off all laptops, and set all cell phones in airplane mode.

  He powered down his cell and checked his pocket for his ticket: a first-class seat from Washington, where they would meet up, to Grand Cayman via Charlotte. Geneva had sprung for it. He smiled. They had so much money, it didn’t matter who paid. But she had told him she wanted to do him this one small favor, so she paid for it out of one of their new Grand Cayman bank accounts—the final destination for their fortunes.

  Think of it as her way of saying thank you for everything he had done for her, she had told him. It was a sweet gesture, he thought. And thank you? He should be thanking her for their incredibly profitable relationship. My god, not only was he now rich, but he was about to have the most beautiful belle at the ball. What more could he ask for? Sex? He assured himself that was only a matter of hours away. He could feel his heart pound faster, just thinking of her.

  In a little over an hour, they would be together again. Tonight, they would be having incredible sex on the beach, if he had his way. Tomorrow, they would begin figuring out how to invest their fortune and create a future for themselves.

  Her plan, he recalled, had been so simple. Keith knew Geneva must have had some inside information, and it had been his chance for a huge score. Together, their initial take was nearly $10 million spread across all of their phony accounts. He had been ready to take his shares and go to the islands. But she had stopped him. “Trust me,” she had told him. Now he was glad he had.

  “Why take just a few million for yourself when you can multiply your nest egg many times over?” she’d asked.

  She had instructed him to reinvest all of their funds, but this time, she’d added a twist. Instead of investing in Lamurr Technologies, this time she’d told him to buy options in her company, Serodynne. At first he had been uncertain.

  But whatever Geneva knew, she had already proven to be a superior risk. It was so simple, yet so clever, Keith thought. He should have thought of it, but he realized he would have needed Geneva’s insider knowledge. And none of that mattered when he started to figure their gain. It was a gargantuan fortune—nearly $77 million. His share was somewhere around $12 million.

  Then when Robert Gettlin showed up asking questions about Geneva’s account, he’d thought the roof had caved in. But without really thinking, he’d managed to embarrass Gettlin, and thank god the man cared more about his golf game than his clients. He’d never followed up. Keith had actually intimidated him. He couldn’t believe it.

  But that experience and the time Bernstein had recognized a name on one of Keith’s phony accounts had spooked him. He needed protection. So Keith had changed the information on two of his phony accounts—naming both Gettlin and Bernstein as owners—and never cashed them in.

  His absence from work next week would spark an internal investigation, and eventually, the partners would figure out what he had done. But the investigation would stop there. They would not contact the feds for fear of implicating Gettlin and Bernstein. And would they really want any of this to see the light of day, especially with its close ties to a new president?

  Finally, Keith was free to pursue his dream. No more Gettlin, no more Bernstein, no more Wall Street. He was going to write the great American novel—or at least some pretty lousy detective novels. He needed a lot of practice and experience to get really good. He didn’t really care at this point. He had lots of free time ahead. His lifestyle was now his own, all his, and no one could disrupt it.

  WHEN HE ARRIVED AT REAGAN NATIONAL Airport, Keith switched gates. Fortunately, his connecting gate for Charlotte was nearby. He had only a carry-on bag and his briefcase with his laptop. It was an island, he told himself. He didn’t need much more than shorts, T-shirts, and sandals. And he could afford to buy anything he wanted—from clothes to shelter. Anything he wanted, he told himself, though he still found his newfound wealth hard to grasp.

  At first, he thought of telling his landlord he was leaving for good and to sell off his furniture for the rent. But then he realized he needed to change his way of thinking about money and assets. He could afford to keep the apartment, even if he didn’t live there. He could afford just about anything.

  He glanced around the terminal, looking for Geneva. She hadn’t arrived yet. He had a few minutes before the first-class boarding call. Those needing assistance were already on the Jetway to the plane. Then they called first class. He jumped in line, quickly boarded, and found his seat. The attendant offered him a drink, and he ordered a vodka tonic, then lost himself for a few minutes in a copy of Wine Spectator magazine.

  Ten minutes later, the plane was still boarding, and he began to worry. He signaled the attendant.

  “We have another twenty minutes before we close the door,” she assured him. “We’re actually a little ahead of schedule today.”

  The time ticked by slowly. He looked at his watch. Then looked again. Where was Geneva? Did she get the time right?

  A young woman in a tight, low-cut tank top and designer jeans walked up to his seat. “Excuse me,” she said.

  Her cleavage was at his eye level. He managed to look up into a pair of crystalline green eyes surrounded by soft, smooth skin and thi
ck blonde hair. He smiled at her beauty.

  “Excuse me,” she said again, now glaring at him. “I’m sitting in the window seat next to you.”

  “I believe there’s a mistake. My friend is sitting here.”

  “No, I’ve got seat three-A.” She showed him her ticket.

  He signaled the attendant. “I think there is a mistake with this ticket,” he said.

  The attendant examined the young woman’s ticket. “No, sir. This is correct. Is this not your companion?”

  He was confused. Maybe Geneva couldn’t get two seats together. He stood to let the young woman by, then Keith reached into his pocket for his phone. He’d forgotten to turn it back on after his flight from New

  York.

  Had Geneva called?

  He’d call her.

  He pressed the power switch on his phone. Why had he done that? Why had he turned it off instead of just switching it to airplane mode? Old habits die hard, he thought. Now he’d have to wait for it to power up.

  The screen was black. Then a small image appeared. Come on, he said under his breath. He hated that about cell phones. They always took forever to power up.

  The attendant came over. “I’m sorry, sir, but we are getting ready to close the door. Have you heard from your party?”

  His mind raced trying to figure out what had happened. “Come on, phone,” he said under his breath. Was Geneva going to miss their flight? He looked down at his phone. He was still waiting for it to come to life.

  “Sir?”

  “Just a sec,” he said, waving her off. The phone suddenly exploded with light. He swiped his finger across the screen, entered his pass code, and punched the telephone app icon.

  “Sir, we are getting ready to close the door.”

  He checked his voice mail. Geneva had called about half an hour ago, while he was in flight.

  “Sir, I’m sorry, but you must switch your phone to airplane mode.”

  Then it hit him. Without listening to her message, he knew what had happened. He jumped up, grabbed his briefcase and bag, and ran off the plane.