1 To Catch a Bad Guy

by Marie Astor

  “We have to talk, Candy.” Jon squeezed her hand. “I’ve done some things that I’m not proud of.”

  “Jon, you know that there’s nothing you could tell me that would turn me away from you. I’m your wife, and I’ll stand by you, no matter what.”

  “I am afraid you will change your mind once you hear what I’ve done,” Jon muttered. “I am so ashamed.” Jon pressed his hand against his eyes.

  Candace felt shivers running down her back. For the first time in her life she saw her husband cry.

  “You can tell me anything Jon – I will always stand by you,” she repeated firmly. “What is it?”

  Over the next hour, Candace listened to the story of her husband’s entanglement in the net of his own creation. He had wanted to succeed; he had longed to make her proud. She wanted to scream at his foolishness. He had always been successful, and she had always been proud of him. Nothing would ever change that. Everyone could make a mistake: it was only too easy to stray off the right path. The difficult part was to find one’s way back to it. She would never let go of her husband’s hand – together, they would overcome their current predicament.

  “Jon, you know what we have to do, don’t you?” Candace looked into her husband’s eyes.

  “Yes. I will call Wyman to start the defense proceeding; he’ll get those jackals off my back.”

  Candace laid her hand on Jon’s arm. “You have to come clean, Jon. If you cooperate with the investigation, they’ll lessen the charges.”

  “Admit my guilt? Never. Let them prove their accusations first.”

  “Jon, they could keep digging for years. Muller arranged it so that all the blame would be placed on you: you own Impala group, not Muller. With a lack of evidence, the entire case could be hung on you. But if you come forward and give valuable information to the investigation, the regulators will cut you a deal. They would much rather go after Muller and his friends: an organized string of corrupt hedge funds would make for a juicy case.”

  “What about Date Magic - can you believe this stupid name? The minute they hear that I admitted my involvement, they’ll fleece me.”

  “You can offer them a settlement; besides, once they know about the hedge funds involved, they’ll go after them instead.”

  Jon clasped his head with his hands. “If I admit my guilt, I will have to forfeit all the profits that I’ve made in the past three years. It will ruin us.”

  “It will not ruin us. I have my inheritance. You never let me spend a penny of it. I’ve invested it, and it has grown over the years. It will cover the legal fees.”

  “Candace,” Jon halted, “I could be barred from the industry. How will I make a living and provide for you and the kids?”

  “We’ll figure it out, Jon,” Candace paused, determined to be strong enough for Jon to lean on her. “You seemed so preoccupied with your work that I didn’t get a chance to tell you - I’ve started my own antiques business. The profits have really started to pick up… It began as a hobby, but now, I think it could grow into something real. It could be a new life for us, Jon. I’d love to have you as my partner.”

  Jon’s eyes brimmed with tears. “You are incredible, Candace. I’m so lucky to have you as my wife. Will you ever forgive me for letting you down like this?”

  “There’s nothing to forgive, Jon. You got mixed up with unscrupulous people, and you made some bad decisions. Now, everything will depend on what you’ll do to remedy your mistakes.”

  Jon sighed. “Are you sure about this? Is this what you want me to do?”

  “Yes.”

  “All right. I’ll call Wyman right now.”

  “Not that thug.” Candace felt a wave of nausea at the memory of Jon’s weasel-like attorney. She had met Wyman when he came over to the house for dinner once, and she did not like the man one bit. “We’re going to use my family lawyer for this. His firm does litigation. I’m sure he’ll be able to help us.”

  “Your family lawyer?”

  “Yes, but don’t forget that even family lawyers have to abide by attorney/client confidentiality.”

  “I have to make sure that my brother and father will not be implicated. They knew nothing about any of this – it was all my own doing. Oh, God, my father – I’m so ashamed…”

  “We’ll talk to them together, Jon. I’ll be right by your side.”

  “Candace, I’ve been such an ungrateful fool. I threw away my own happiness.”

  “No, Jon, you didn’t. I would never let you do anything like that.”

  “I love you.”

  “I love you too. But there’s no time to waste. Every minute counts. We should call the lawyer now.”

  “First, I have to speak with my father and my brother.”

  “Of course.” Candace nodded. It was going to be a long, tough road, but she would follow her husband every step of the way.

  Lisa Foley checked her watch. It was twelve o’clock on a Friday afternoon. She had a manicure appointment at twelve-thirty, and most likely, she would just go home from there. Janet could hold down the fort for her. There were much more important things on Lisa’s mind than work. This whole thing was a sham anyway. Tom Wyman handled all the matters of substance, and he never bothered to include Lisa in any of them, which was just as well with her. And once Lisa would finally become Mrs. Paul Bostoff, she would put in her resignation. Being Mrs. Bostoff would be a full-time job. Lisa bit her lip; the wedding was still ten months away, almost a year. If it were up to her, she would elope with Paul tomorrow, but Jon had insisted that they plan a big ceremony, and one could not have a big ceremony on the fly. No doubt Jon wanted to use the wedding as another opportunity for business promotion. He had already given Lisa a list of guests. Most of them were hedge fund managers, executives from broker dealers, and mutual funds, with a few low-level politicians rounding off the list. Oh, well, on the bright side, Lisa would have that many more guests to admire her wedding dress, and she would make sure that Jon Bostoff paid for his guests. That reminded her: she still had not heard from Janet about the rest of the wedding party. Lisa hoped that that snob Katie would say yes, and she was fairly certain that Joe O’Connor’s girlfriend, Daphne, would agree as well. The two should consider themselves lucky to be in her wedding party.

  There was a knock on the door of her office.

  “Yes?” Lisa shifted in her chair with annoyance; she did not want to be disturbed.

  “Ms. Foley?” Lisa’s paralegal, Meredith Crooner, poked her head through the door.

  “Hi, Meredith,” Lisa suppressed impatience in her voice. What did her paralegal want now? It was not as if she had very complicated tasks to perform.

  “Ms. Foley, I thought you might want to see this.” Meredith placed a copy of the New York Post on Lisa’s desk.

  Lisa resisted the urge to grimace. It was just like Meredith to read the New York Post. She was about to ask what Meredith’s point was when the headline hit her: Company CEO Sues Broker Dealer for Stock Manipulation. Lisa frowned, her eyes fixed on the article.

  Andrew Foley, founder and CEO of Date Magic dot com, Inc., is suing Bostoff Securities for market manipulation of the company stock. Date Magic was initially a private company, but had recently gone public. Subsequent to the IPO, shares of Date Magic experienced a steady decline in price, which Foley attributes to manipulative trading tactics conducted by Bostoff Securities. Date Magic’s attorneys filed the lawsuit this morning. Bostoff Securities were served with the summons, but no comment had been made by the defendant.

  Lisa looked up at Meredith, who was nervously hovering over her desk. “Thank you, Meredith; I’ll get right on it.”

  Despite Lisa’s tone making it clear that Meredith’s presence was no longer required, Meredith remained by her desk.

  “Am I going to lose my job?” Meredith asked, wringing her hands. “I’ve got two kids going to college next year. I can’t afford to be unemployed.”

  Lisa pursed her lips. If the article’s allegatio
ns were even remotely true, Bostoff’s employees would all be facing much bigger problems than being unemployed. For now, saving face was the name of the game; she must not let the others see her panic.

  “Meredith, that’s utter nonsense. You are smarter than that. Bostoff Securities is a reputable firm with stellar track record in the financial industry. Its standing will not be affected by baseless accusations and frivolous lawsuits.” Lisa’s voice sounded so convincing that for a moment, she almost believed her own words.

  “Thank you, Ms. Foley. I was really worried there for a while. Well, I’ll leave you to it; let me know if you need any help.”

  Once the door of her office was closed again, Lisa succumbed to her panic, staring at the newspaper in terrified incomprehension. How could a disaster like that have happened? And worst of all, what on earth was she going to do if the article’s accusations were indeed true? The fact that the plaintiff was her own cousin did not make matters any easier. Now, she felt like twice the fool: not only did she have no idea about the affairs of Bostoff, she was clueless about her own family members.

  Janet had been right. Lisa’s cousin, Andrew, was a scumbag. The least he could have done was to warn Lisa that he was going to sue the company she worked for, the company she happened to be the general counsel of, for manipulating his lame stock. The nerve of the guy – just because the price of his pathetic stock could not hold up did not mean that it was being manipulated, but simply meant that it was a good-for-nothing company.

  Oh, this was exactly what Lisa needed smack in the middle of her wedding plans. She wanted to be picking out flower arrangements and deciding on catering venues, not refuting a lawsuit summons. Not that she could effectively do the latter even if she tried: Tom Wyman would have to step in. Lisa wondered if Paul and Jon knew about this already… They had to. The article said that Bostoff Securities had been served with the summons, but if this were the case, then why hadn’t Lisa heard anything about it? She needed to speak to Paul pronto.

  “Lisa?” Paul stood in the doorway of her office.

  Her fiancé’s timing made Lisa jump in her chair. Normally, Paul avoided seeing her during business hours. On several occasions, she had tried to get him to have sex with her on his desk, but Paul had rejected the idea as inappropriate. He was a stickler for propriety, which was one of the reasons why Lisa thought him to be great husband material – or at least had thought him to be such until a few minutes ago.

  “Honey, did you see this nonsense?” Lisa pointed to the newspaper on her desk. “I’m so embarrassed. The company CEO is my cousin. He dropped the bomb on me. I swear I’m going to do everything I can to convince him to abandon this frivolous lawsuit.”

  “It’s all right. I’m afraid it’s much bigger than this. Jon just called me. He wants us to come over to his place. There are some things that he needs to explain to us.”

  Dennis Walker studied the expression on Hamilton Kirk’s face as he took a seat across from his boss’s desk.

  “Well, Dennis, it looks like you really screwed the pooch on this one.” Ham flung a copy of the New York Post towards Dennis.

  Dennis’s face remained impassive. Did his boss really think that Dennis did not keep up to date with the newspapers?

  “And the SEC has just subpoenaed Bostoff this morning, cutting us off at the onset. Now, all the work we’ve done is going down the drain, and the SEC will have the lead on the case.” Kirk’s face was filled with chagrin. “I knew I should have given the job to Laskin,” Kirk hissed. “There goes that promotion I’ve been hoping for. Thanks for delaying my retirement by another five years.”

  Dennis resisted a smile: he was truly enjoying this.

  “Ham, I think you might change your mind after you read this.” He handed his boss a manila folder containing the documents he had downloaded from Wyman’s laptop yesterday.

  “What is it?” Kirk glanced at the folder as though it were a piece of manure. “Could this be the evidence you failed to procure during your time as undercover investigator at Bostoff? Well, I’ve got news for you – it’s a little too late now.”

  “I’d read it first, sir.”

  “Fine.” Kirk wrung the papers out of the folder. At first, his face was stone cold, but as his eyes read the first few lines, even Hamilton Kirk’s famous poker face failed him, his expression alternating between amazement and delight.

  For several moments Ham Kirk remained silent, while his eyes burrowed hungrily into the papers before him. Dennis steepled his hands and leaned back in his chair, watching his boss devour the information that was bound to get them both promoted.

  “Well, I’ll be damned – you son of a gun.” Kirk raised the papers in his hand. “You’ve done it. Now, we’ll finally be able to nail those hedge fund vultures good.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “I always give praise when praise is due, Dennis, you know that. But first, I’ve got to make a few calls. We’ve got to make sure that the SEC and the FBI understand that we’ll be taking the lead on the case. Without us, they’ve just got a market manipulation against a single broker dealer, but our evidence escalates the case to an organized manipulation scheme. This is big – real big.”

  Dennis nodded. At the moment, he knew better than to point out the fact that it was really his evidence, his and Janet’s, but he was certainly going to make sure that Janet Maple would get the credit that was due to her.

  Chapter 29

  Janet stood in front of the Treasury building in downtown Manhattan. The strict, somber atmosphere of the financial district suited her much better than the mayhem of midtown. Not that it mattered. After her experience at Bostoff Securities, she did not see herself working for a financial firm in the near future. In fact, she had no idea what she was going to do after the investigation would be completed. Perhaps she would reconsider her career options entirely. There were more things to life than being a lawyer. She could go back to school for a Master of Laws degree and teach, or she could do something completely different – she just did not know exactly what it would be. She had aspired to bring order to Wall Street, but had failed at that when she got let go from the DA’s office. She had tried her hand at being a legal counsel, but had failed at that as well. Ironically, in her failure, she had succeeded in fulfilling her initial aspiration by helping Dean Snider unravel Emperial’s and Bostoff’s manipulative trading scheme. Still, now that her work was done, her association with Treasury and Dean Snider was over.

  She had resigned from Bostoff Securities shortly after Treasury had launched an official investigation into Bostoff’s trading activity – an announcement that coincided with Jon Bostoff’s reaching out to the SEC and declaring his wish to cooperate with the investigation. Jon Bostoff had admitted to being solely responsible for the manipulative market activities being conducted by Bostoff Securities, stating that his brother, Paul Bostoff, and his father, Hank Bostoff, were completely unaware of the existence of the Impala Group and the relationship that Bostoff Securities had with Emperial, Rigel, Creaton, Sphinx, and Gemini hedge funds. The case promised long and difficult proceedings, but it was already becoming apparent that the investigators’ attention was keenly focused on Emperial, Rigel, Creaton, Sphinx, and Gemini, and that Jon Bostoff would receive credit for his cooperation with the investigation.

  Janet checked her watch. It was time for her meeting. After a long, deep breath, she opened the heavy metal-framed door.

  The security in the building was extremely tight. Janet handed her photo id to the security guard. Then, she was asked to put her bag through the x-ray machine conveyer and walk through a metal detector. It was like boarding an airplane, only she was not going anywhere.

  “Thank you, Miss. Who are you here to meet?” The security guard asked her.

  “Hamilton Kirk.”

  “One moment.” The security guard punched a few keystrokes on his keyboard and dialed a phone number. “Someone will be right down to take you upstairs.”
/>   Janet stood a few steps away from the security desk, waiting for her escort.

  A few minutes later, a trim brunette in her early fifties approached the security desk.

  “Janet?” The woman looked at Janet questioningly.

  “Yes.” Janet nodded.

  “I’m Ann Smith – Ham Kirk’s secretary.”

  “Very nice to meet you.” Janet shook the woman’s hand.

  “It’s this way.” Ann motioned to the elevators.

  Janet followed Ann into the elevator and afterwards into the long, official-looking hallway. They walked past the row of offices until they reached the last office in the corner. There, Ann stopped and knocked on the door.

  “Janet Maple is here.” After motioning for Janet to enter the room, Ann nodded curtly and left.

  Janet lingered in the doorway, taking in the surroundings. A lean middle-aged man with gray mustache sat behind a large wooden computer desk. He must be Dean’s boss, Janet thought. A moment later, her gaze was on Dean, who sat in the chair opposite the desk. He rose from his seat to greet her, but his boss beat him to it.

  “Janet, come in, come in!” the gentleman with the gray mustache stretched out his hand. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you in person – I’m Hamilton Kirk.”

  “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Kirk, I’ve heard so much about you.”

  Dean hurried to greet her, “Hello, Janet.”

  “Hi.” Janet smiled at him. She had not seen much of him since the memorable evening when they had abducted Tom Wyman’s laptop - the evening Dean had spent the night at her place. By the time she had woken up, Dean had already left, and they had not talked about that night since.

  “Please, have a seat,” said Ham.

  Janet sat on the edge of her seat, waiting for the meeting agenda to be revealed. She had no idea why Ham Kirk wanted to meet her, but she suspected that it had something to do with the investigation. Perhaps he wanted her to testify – something that she had hoped would not come to pass, for she had no idea how she would face Lisa or Paul Bostoff during a hearing.