Need You Now

by James Grippando

  I didn’t answer. This one was taking a while to sink in.

  Evan looked away. “Okay, fine. Now you’re exactly like everyone else. You think Evan Hunt is some kind of crackpot who sees a conspiracy brewing in every government office.”

  I was still thinking, still trying to wrap my mind around the full implications of what Evan was saying.

  Evan got up from the computer, walked to the refrigerator, and got a soda. “I should have kept my mouth shut,” he said, grumbling.

  “No,” I said, “I don’t think you’re a crackpot.”

  “You don’t?”

  “Not at all.”

  “Then what do you think?”

  I didn’t view the world entirely through the prism of old movies, but sometimes the fit was too perfect.

  “Evan,” I said, “I think this could be the start of a beautiful friendship.”

  29

  B y eight P.M. it had been dark in the Boston area for over three hours, and Tony Mandretti was fading in and out of sleep.

  Lemuel Shattuck Hospital Correctional Unit is a medium-security facility in Jamaica Plain. Twenty-three acute-care beds serve inmates from across Massachusetts-and, in the case of Tony Mandretti, from North Carolina.

  Tony’s treatment for non-Hodgkins lymphoma was an uphill battle. Unfortunately, his participation in a clinical trial at the Duke University Medical Center had proved that, at least for Tony, monoclonal antibodies were not the answer. Since then, he’d received chemotherapy and radiation, which was debilitating enough even under ideal circumstances. He was in a rest phase of the treatment cycle, and the trip from North Carolina to Massachusetts had completely worn him out. Hospitalization wasn’t essential, but the plan was to keep him at Lemuel Shattuck for a week or so, until permanent reassignment to a correctional facility.

  “Wake up, Carlson,” the guard said.

  It took a full minute to recall where he was, and only then did he remember that he was Carlson. Sam Carlson, to be exact. Tony Martin was no more, having gone the way of Tony Mandretti.

  “Let me sleep,” he said.

  The guard switched on the fluorescent light, brightening a small room that was about as homey as a prison cell-no more, no less. A bed, tray table, and a chair were the only furnishings. No rug on the gray tile floor, no pictures on the beige walls. There was a small mirror over the sink, but as a rule he avoided mirrors. A kindly nurse had told him that the hair loss made him look like Bruce Willis, but he didn’t feel remotely like a movie star. The bars on the window were definite overkill; it was highly unlikely that an inmate undergoing cancer treatment would escape from an eighth-floor unit.

  “You have a visitor,” the guard said.

  “Who?”

  “The FBI.”

  Tony wasn’t expecting anyone, let alone an FBI agent. He realized, however, that Sam Carlson hadn’t been in existence long enough for the visit to be for him. The FBI had come to see Tony Martin-or, more likely, Tony Mandretti. He didn’t bother asking the guard what this was about; a corrections officer would have no idea.

  “All right, I’m awake,” said Tony.

  With the push of a button, he raised the mattress to an upright position. The guard told him to sit tight for a few minutes-Tony didn’t bother to tell him that he wasn’t going anywhere-and then he stepped out, leaving the door open. Tony heard voices in the hallway, but he couldn’t make out the conversation. He was still shaking off sleep, and as his mind cleared, it occurred to him that he hadn’t asked for the agent’s name. A visit from the FBI raised several possibilities, some better than others.

  There was only one that he considered friendly-only one agent who had earned his trust.

  Tony had first met Agent Scully in Operation Clean House, the undercover sting that had sent eleven members of the Santucci organized crime family to prison. Scully had been Tony’s contact throughout the assignment, and the relationship had continued after the trial, in witness protection, when Tony Mandretti became Tony Martin. Years later, Scully again had been Tony’s chosen contact-when Tony had the goods on Abe Cushman.

  Evan Hunt had been trying to pay back Tony Mandretti for years, ever since Mandretti had spared his life. Tony had explained many times that his refusal to carry out the hit was based on personal principle, devoid of any consideration of who Evan was or whether he deserved mercy. Evan could have just left him alone, and Tony would have called it even. Then Evan had shown him the Cushman red flags-and he had explained the whistle-blower program. He’d promised a fifty-fifty split of the bounty if Tony would present his analysis to the feds. After a visit to Scully, all indications were that Tony and Evan would be two very rich men. Then something had changed. Something on the government’s end had changed radically. It had left Tony dumbfounded. He’d asked Scully to explain it, and Scully had stumbled through an apology for his complete inability to do so.

  Not even the side effects of chemotherapy could erase the memory of that conversation. Scully’s words came back to him as he lay there, waiting. He wondered if the only FBI agent he’d every really trusted had finally come back to tell him what in the world had gone wrong-before his cancer made it too late.

  “I ’m sorry,” said Scully. “It’s absolutely mind-boggling to me. I can’t get anyone to bite on this.”

  They were in a dark booth, practically alone in a bar in Soho. Tony took a long pull from a bottled beer, then scratched his head.

  “You realize it’s all there in the report, right?” said Tony. “Everything you need to bring Cushman down is laid out on a silver platter. I didn’t write it, but I didn’t make this shit up. It’s all true.”

  “No one’s saying you made it up,” said Scully.

  “You need to make them understand it.”

  “It’s not a lack of understanding,” said Scully.

  “What is it then? They choose to ignore it?”

  Scully didn’t answer.

  Tony said, “The fucking regulators choose to ignore the biggest Ponzi scheme in the history of the world?”

  Scully looked around, uneasy. “Lower your voice, dude.”

  Tony breathed in and out. He needed a cigarette.

  Scully said, “I told you all I know, Tony.”

  “You told me they aren’t listening. You’re not telling me why.”

  “I don’t know why.”

  “Then find out.”

  “I tried.”

  “Try harder,” said Tony. “You owe me that much. Without me, you had no case against the Santucci family. I gave up everything-my name, my family, my existence. I’ve never asked for nothing in return.”

  “Don’t ask for this,” said Scully.

  “I’m asking. What’s the deal?”

  Scully looked away, then back. “It’s classified.”

  “What’s classified?”

  Scully’s expression turned very serious. “There’s something else going on with Cushman. Something that has me beating my head up against the wall trying to get the regulators’ attention.”

  “Are they embarrassed that they weren’t the ones to figure it out? Is that it?”

  “No, these guys have no shame. They’d figure out a way to take credit.”

  “Well, whatever their reason is, they can’t make me go away by ignoring me. If they won’t pay me a bounty, I’ll sell the report to the Wall Street Journal .”

  “The Journal isn’t into checkbook journalism.”

  “Then I’ll find someone who is.”

  “No rag sheet is going to pay you a million dollars for a financial story.”

  “I don’t need a million. All I want is my money back from Gerry Collins. Two hundred fifty grand.”

  Scully shook his head. “Tony, I tell you this for your own good: the chances of getting back the money you invested with Cushman are slim to none. Let it go.”

  “Let it go? That son of a bitch Collins has my life savings and won’t give it back. Says he can’t honor any more redemptions. What
kind of crap is that?”

  “Tony, I’m sorry, but-”

  “This is for my kids,” said Tony, “something from me to them, finally, for the way I screwed up their lives. It’s all I got to make it good.”

  “I understand.”

  “I laid out everything the SEC needs to know, and you’re telling me that you can’t even get their attention? I expected you to come back and say there’s some haggling over the amount of the bounty. I never expected this. What the hell’s wrong with you?”

  “Listen to me,” said Scully.

  “No, you listen. I couldn’t care less about your government classified bullshit. I’m not going to let this die.”

  “Take it down a notch,” said Scully, his tone ominous. “You need to be very careful with this.”

  “Are you threatening me?”

  “Consider it friendly advice. This report of yours-it’s like a financial weapon of mass destruction.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means that Cushman and his feeders, guys like Gerry Collins, have been making a lot of people very rich. Those people are going to be very upset to find out that Cushman is a fraud. Some of those people would be very angry at anyone who says it’s time to get off the merry-go-round. If I were you, I’d be very concerned about how those folks might express their anger.”

  “I’m not in this to win a popularity contest.”

  “I’m not talking about the typical whistle-blower backlash, Tony. Between you and me, Gerry Collins has some, shall we say, ‘questionable’ clients.”

  “I don’t scare easily.”

  “It’s not a question of scared. It’s about smart versus stupid. Let me be clear: Gerry Collins has clients who would kill you if they thought you were trying to destroy the goose that lays the golden egg.”

  Tony considered the possibilities, and one of them brought a thin smile to his face. “Or they might take it out on Gerry Collins.”

  “What?”

  “Say, for example, that this report landed in the lap of one of those ‘questionable’ clients-from an anonymous source, of course. I could see one of those clients going straight to Gerry Collins and giving him one fine ass kicking.”

  Scully smiled back. “Wouldn’t that be sweet? Too bad that we can’t-”

  “Give me a name,” said Tony, his expression very serious.

  “What?”

  “I want the name of one of those clients who would kick Gerry Collins’ ass if he knew Collins was a fraud.”

  “Tony, I can’t do that.”

  “I’m asking you this one favor: give me a name.”

  Scully struggled with it. Tony’s stare only tightened.

  “I lost my kids,” said Tony. “My wife is dead. I lost my life. You owe me.”

  Tony hadn’t come to the table with plans to play the payback mantra, but he could see in Scully’s expression that it was working. Finally, Scully blinked.

  “All right,” he said. “But you didn’t hear it from me. I’ll get you a name. Just don’t blame me if they do more than kick his ass.”

  Tony took another pull from his beer, then said, “I can live with it.”

  A gust of winter wind rattled the hospital window, startling him. The voices in the hallway grew louder, and Tony could count the footfalls in the tiled corridor as the guard approached with his visitor.

  The thought of seeing Scully again presented a mixed bag. On some level Tony thought of him as a friend; but, at bottom, he was FBI. With all that had gone down in the past few weeks, Scully was probably coming to remind Tony of their agreement-the condition under which he had given Tony the name “Manu Robledo.”

  You didn’t hear it from me.

  “I’ll be back in twenty minutes,” the guard said. “Behave yourself, Carlson.”

  Tony turned his head toward the door as it closed. His visitor approached. It wasn’t Scully. Not by a long shot.

  “Special Agent Andie Henning,” she said as she extended her hand over the bed rail. “I’ve come to talk to Tony Mandretti about his son.”

  30

  C onnie’s regular Wednesday-evening scout meeting ran from seven to nine P.M., and right after it ended, she caught up with me at Evan’s apartment. His 360-degree mural of Cushman’s fraud blew her away, but Evan was far more interested in hearing how her troop was ready to smash the competition in the upcoming Pinewood Derby. By ten P.M. I’d heard enough about graphite axles and other ways to make a five-ounce block of wood zip down an eight-lane track in record time. If I hadn’t cut her short and put Evan back to work, he might never have cracked the code on the BOS data files.

  “Almost there,” said Evan.

  He was still in the center of the room, keyboard clacking, matching wits with some other computer genius who had encrypted the BOS files from Lilly’s computer.

  “How much longer?” I asked.

  “He just said he was almost there,” Connie snapped.

  Evan smiled at the way she’d come to his defense. Yet again, I had to wonder if poor Tom, her fiancé, was destined to run last in the proverbial Pinewood Derby of egghead romance.

  Evan said, “The bank has different levels of security attached to different files. Lilly’s e-mails were relatively simple. You can review those on my laptop while I keep working on the tougher codes.”

  Connie and I spent the next ninety minutes doing just that. The vast majority of e-mails were worthless or, worse, distracting. Our task was to unravel the trail of money from Gerry Collins through BOS/Singapore. Instead, I found myself reliving my relationship with Lilly through e-mails. It was funny to see how cautious the early communications had been.

  How about lunch?

  Coffee?

  What Lilly didn’t know was how many drafts it had taken to come up with such brilliance and finally hit Send. If I wrote Starbucks instead of coffee , would she think it was a hot stock tip? If I wrote buy you a coffee , would she think I was cheap and limiting her to just one? If I wrote buy you coffee , would she think I was making a run over to the Food Stop and offering to bring her back a bag of beans? I could have written buy you a latte . But maybe she hated lattes-or, more likely, pretentious men who drank them. Coffee. That was perfect.

  Too bad she was in bed by the time you finally sent it.

  “Aw, this is so sweet,” said Connie. She was reviewing another group of Lilly’s e-mails on her smartphone, and apparently she, too, had found the personal stuff. “I didn’t know you had such a sensitive side, little brother.”

  I approached Evan and quickly changed the subject. “Are we there yet?”

  “Don’t rush me.”

  “I’m not rushing you. Just wondering when you think you’ll be finished.”

  Evan’s hair was standing straight up, shaped by the number of times he’d run his hands through it in frustration. “With this last group of files, it may not be a question of when,” he said.

  “Are you serious?” I asked.

  He wiped the sweat from his brow, then ran his hands through his hair once more. “I hate to admit it, but I’m not sure I can break this.”

  I glanced at Connie, whose mouth was agape. It was as if Evan had just confessed that he’d never actually seen an episode of Star Trek .

  Connie pulled herself together and said, “I’ll get Tom to look at it.”

  “Who’s Tom?” asked Evan.

  “My fiancé. He’s a genius. Would have graduated from MIT with a degree in engineering if he hadn’t skipped art class his last semester.”

  “No offense,” said Evan, “but they don’t kick people out of MIT for skipping art.”

  “Oh, yes, they do,” said Connie.

  “Whatever,” said Evan. “The entire engineering department probably couldn’t crack this code.”

  “Folks, can we focus?” I said. “It can’t be that tough.”

  “Easy for you to say,” said Evan. “So far the only thing I’ve been able to determine is that the sequence of let
ters B-A-Q occurs with unusually high frequency in the encrypted data, which, of course, doesn’t mean anything.”

  “That could be a code for something else.”

  “Or it could reflect an error in my own mathematical computations,” said Evan.

  A quick run of “BAQ” through a search engine on Evan’s laptop turned up a handful of hits, from trade names for pool-cleaning products to a Puerto Rican folk dance called el baquiné . Nothing meaningful.

  Evan said, “I’m telling you, this last phase of encryption is of the highest order.”

  “Meaning what?” I asked.

  Evan cleared his throat, and I had a feeling he was about to get professorial on me. “Well,” he said, “the actual cryptographic process is generally a complicated mathematical formulation-the more complex, the more difficult it is to break. A key is supplied to the recipient so that he can then decipher the message. Keys for encryption algorithms are described in terms of the number of bits. The higher the number of bits, the more difficult that cryptosystem would be to break.”

  It was late, and my head was starting to throb. “Sorry, I wasn’t asking for a technical explanation of encryption. What I want to know is, when you say ‘highest order,’ what does that mean?”

  “That’s what I’m getting at,” said Evan. “The one file that has me stumped involves a level of encryption that is on an entirely different order than anything else here. It’s as if it doesn’t even belong on the same computer as the BOS data.”

  “Where would you expect to find it?”

  Evan sat back in his chair, glanced at Connie, and then looked at me. “If you didn’t think I was a conspiracy nut job before, you will now.”

  “I didn’t think it before,” I said.