by Steven Gore
“When I met him at the country club two days later, I came ready to pitch the hell out of SatTek, but he was already a step ahead of me.
“Granger was sitting at the bar when I walked in. We started with a little small talk. Golf handicaps, that kind of thing, until my drink arrived. Then he eased into the subject, casual-like, and told me that he’d done a little research on SatTek’s financials.
“I froze up. Panicked because he might’ve figured out that SatTek was just treading water. The Grangers of the world don’t invest in swimming holes. They want to ride the raging river. They’re chasing new technology, not the old, even if it’s the best in its market.
“I gave him the pitch anyway because that was all I had. I ran through the whole product line: everything from how our acoustic detectors can pick up a terrorist sneaking across the desert ten miles away, to how our video amplifiers can drop an air-to-ground missile into a coffee cup. I really pounded it. It was the best presentation I ever made.
“After I’m done, Granger smiled at me and gave me a fatherly pat on the shoulder, and said, ‘You don’t need to sell me, I’m already sold.’
“I felt like an idiot. Granger is a guy with a reputation for knowing everything, and I just pointed at the sun and told him it was daylight.
“I got flustered. I think I even turned red. But he ignored it and said, ‘Have you thought about bypassing the venture capital route altogether, and taking SatTek public?’
“For a second, I thought maybe he got dumped from Westbrae for senility. What the hell do you think guys like me daydream about? I’ll tell you what. It’s standing on the podium at the New York Stock Exchange, ringing the bell, and then watching your share price explode through the roof.
“But I had no reason to think that would ever happen with SatTek and I admitted it. I told him that there was too much pink on our balance sheet and that the SEC would just laugh at us.
“Granger stared down at his bourbon for a while, took a sip, and then looked back at me and said, ‘I guess we’ll just have to wipe the smiles off their faces.’
“Man, what a rush. At the time, it felt like he was putting his arm around me, including me in something. But looking back now, I realize it was just him setting the hook.
“Then he swiveled his stool toward me. I remember his exact words:
“‘What you’ve got to understand, Scoob, is that success in business has very little to do with whether you’re in the red or in the black. It’s about how aggressive you’re willing to be.’ He paused and stared me right in the eyes, then he said, ‘You know what that means, right? Aggressive.’
“I really wasn’t sure what he meant, but I nodded anyway and asked him what he had in mind. But he didn’t tell me. Not right then, anyway. He just pointed at my chest and said, ‘Whatever it is, Scoob, don’t waste my time. You’re either going to be in or you’re going to be out.’
“The fact is, I was in even before I walked through the door.”
CHAPTER 6
A t seven on the morning following Burch’s shooting, Gage displayed his identification to the security guard stationed behind the counter in the glass and steel lobby of the financial district tower housing Burch’s top floor office. The balding man in the gray uniform waved it away and offered Gage a toothy grin.
“Don’t you remember me?” the guard asked.
Gage inspected the man. There was something familiar about the Howdy Doody cheeks, but Gage couldn’t connect the face with anything in his past. He shook his head.
“I’m Sonny Powers. I was a bailiff when you were with SFPD.”
Gage smiled and stuck out his hand. “D Day.”
The courtroom riot in 1982 known as D Day had ended the career of the then-twenty-six-year-old Powers with a crushed knee. Gage was testifying in the homicide trial of three members of the D Block Boys, when four gang members in the gallery jumped the barrier to overpower the bailiffs. The clerk remotely locked the door, and the escape attempt devolved into a pointless melee. Gage shoved the judge under the bench, then weighed into the mix. He last saw Powers writhing on the marble floor while the paramedics tried to stabilize his leg.
Powers struggled to his feet to shake Gage’s hand, then held up the day’s authorized visitors sheet. He pointed at Gage’s name and the suite number. “You here about Jack Burch?”
“His secretary came in early to gather up some files for me before the press showed up. I didn’t want to become part of the story.”
“How’s he doing?”
“Not good.” Gage glanced back toward the storm-soaked street where a television truck pulled to a stop to feed a story to the early morning news. “Looks like I’m too late. I better get upstairs.”
Gage started toward the elevators.
“Don’t worry,” Powers called after him, “they won’t get by me. I’ve had enough of those assholes trying to sneak in and out of here.”
Gage spun back. “What do you mean?”
“A janitor popped the back door to let one in a while ago. Said he was a producer from ABC News, that 20/20 show, and wanted to use the freight elevator to bring up equipment.” Powers gestured toward the monitors on his desk. “I saw him come in.” He adopted an authoritative tone. “I read the janitor the riot act and told her to go find the guy and bring him down here.”
A rush of anger followed Gage’s recollection of the only other thing he knew about Powers: He’d ended up as a court bailiff because he was incompetent as a street cop. Gage cringed at the thought of Burch’s secretary, Anne-Marie, already at her desk organizing the SatTek and Moscow files: distraught, preoccupied, and vulnerable.
“How do you know he was with ABC?”
“The janitor said he showed an ID, just like all of them.” Powers reddened, then limped toward the end of the counter, as if abandoning his post to look for the man. “You don’t think he’s the guy who shot-”
“What did he look like?”
“Dark windbreaker. Black hair.”
Gage tossed Powers a business card. “Call my cell so I’ll have your number.” He then pointed at the entrance. “Lock the front door and block the back exit.” He sprinted toward the elevators and into an express toward the forty-third floor. His phone rang as the doors closed. He verified that Powers’s number showed on the screen, then punched the end button.
The elevator seemed to rise in slow motion. The annoying pinging seemed to be counting down rather than up. A final ping signaled the door opening in the empty lobby of Burch’s firm, lit only by the storm-muted sunrise. He listened for a moment, then headed down the long carpeted hallway toward Burch’s office in the opposite corner of the building.
As he crept along the wall, the snap of metal on metal broke the silence. It sounded to Gage like a file cabinet or a desk drawer. He edged toward the hallway corner and looked around it. Sharp fluorescent light emerging from a small storage room striped the gray carpet thirty feet away. Burch’s office door was open fifteen feet farther down.
Another snap, then the slap of a file and the shuffling of papers. The noises seemed to come from the storage room. Gage imagined the layout. Banks of file cabinets on the right and left walls. Copier at the back. Table centered in the middle.
Gage heard a groan as he approached the threshold. He balanced on the balls of his feet, and then peeked into the room. Anne-Marie lay on her side in front of the copier, hands and feet bound, packing tape over her mouth. She flinched at the motion in the doorway-
A fist shot toward him from around the doorjamb. It rocked him with a punch to the stomach. The burglar surged forward, jamming his shoulder into Gage’s chest, and ramming him into the opposite wall. Gage slumped to the floor as the man fled down the hallway.
Fighting for breath, he crawled toward Anne-Marie to untape her mouth, but she shook her head as if to say, Go after him.
Gage pushed himself to his feet and reached for his cell phone.
“He’s coming down,” Gage gasped
to Powers as he staggered down the hallway.
A scream sliced through the still air as Gage took the turn into the reception area. The just-arrived janitor stood flush against the wall behind the desk as Gage ran by, her face red, her eyes still wide as she pointed toward the closing elevator. Gage yelled for her to untie Anne-Marie, then pushed open the door to the stairs.
Leaping more than running, Gage grabbed the steel railings and swung himself around each turn. He imagined the burglar arriving at the first floor and running toward the entrance, bouncing off the locked doors, then searching for the stairway to the underground garage and the rear exit. Gage guessed that Powers would only have to fight the man a minute or two to give him time to catch up.
But the sound of the rear door slamming as he ran down the last flight into the garage told Gage that Powers hadn’t been up to it. When he burst through the back door into the alley, he spotted a bulldog of a man shielding himself with Powers and dragging him toward the intersection a hundred feet away. Gage ran toward them, arriving at the cross street just after the burglar pushed Powers into the path of a garbage truck and then jumped into the back of an already moving van.
Gage ran forward and reached down for Powers as thirty-five thousand pounds of steel squealed and skidded sideways into the slick intersection. He yanked hard on the front of Powers’s jacket, dived over him, and rolled with him into the next lane.
He didn’t hear the truck shudder to a stop. He felt only the heat and smelled the burned rubber of the tire next to his head. And the only sounds were his pounding heart and exploding breath, and the sobbing of Powers lying next to him on the rain-soaked blacktop.
CHAPTER 7
A ssistant U.S. Attorney William Peterson opened an FBI evidence envelope and removed a packet of incorporation papers for companies in Vietnam and China.
“We ended yesterday afternoon with Granger suggesting you set up offshore,” Peterson said, sliding the documents across the conference table to Matson. “Have you ever seen these?”
Matson flipped through the pages. “These are the companies Jack Burch set up.”
“Then let’s talk about Burch-and say whatever you would’ve said before he got shot. Road rage is SFPD’s problem, not ours.”
Matson’s eyes widened. “You didn’t let on-”
“Don’t worry. We didn’t tell them you’re cooperating.”
Matson nodded and opened his mouth to speak, then hesitated, unsure what to say or how to say it. “Can I talk to Mr. Hackett for a minute?”
“Sure.” Peterson looked at his watch. “Take all the time you need. Agent Zink can show you to an empty office.”
Matson looked at Zink, his face registering for the first time. A chinless rodent. Matson imagined himself slogging through a dark, cavernous sewer, swarmed by miniature Zinks, crawling up his pant legs, nipping at his balls.
“I think Scoob and I’ll go downstairs,” Hackett told Peterson. “We’ll grab a cup of coffee. Talk down there.”
Zink escorted them out of the U.S. Attorney’s Office and into the hallway by the elevators. Matson started to speak, but Hackett hushed him with a raised finger. They rode in silence down to the second floor restaurant and took a table in the far corner, away from other attorneys and their clients strategizing before court or commiserating afterward.
“Can’t we just give them Granger and maybe the accountant?” Matson whispered, eyes darting around the dining room as if he was afraid he might be recognized.
“No. The deal is for Burch. He’s the prize they want.”
Matson flared and fixed his eyes on Hackett. “And I’m gonna look like a scumbag snitching off a road-rage victim.” His voice rose. “You see what the press is saying about him?”
“Not so loud.” Hackett reached over and grabbed Matson’s arm. “Not so loud.”
Matson leaned in and lowered his voice. “They’re making him into a fucking saint. Charity-this and charity-that. His wife’s heroic battle against cancer. Immigrant success story-like fucking Australians don’t grow up speaking English.”
“Keep your eye on the ball, Scoob. You’re only worth something to the government if you can give them somebody they want. That’s the reason they’re willing to take the heat in the press for letting you walk. They think Burch was in on it and they’ve got a paper trail right to his desk. They think every lawyer who deals offshore is a crook or money launderer. So you’re just telling them what they already believe.”
Hackett pointed at Matson, his voice insistent. “And there’s something else. Peterson is aiming at SatTek because it’s a hard target that the public can comprehend, not like some squishy securitized loan scam. People can’t make sense of that shit. But SatTek they can, and they need a face to go with it. So far, that face is yours, but Peterson wants it to be Burch’s. Don’t give him time to go weak-kneed and decide it’ll look better to use Burch to roll on you. Because I’ll tell you what’ll happen: Burch’ll go in and say, ‘My wife was sick. I wasn’t thinking straight. Mea culpa. Mea culpa.’ Pretty soon everybody’s thinking he’s your victim instead of you being his. And trust me, nobody’s going to be calling him a snitch. They’re going to say he’s a fucking hero for turning you in-so you better get him before he gets you. Understand?”
Matson felt like a school kid just sent to the corner. “Yeah, I understand.”
“And, as your lawyer, I have to tell you one more thing. You need to tell the truth. One lie and this proffer evaporates. You won’t be able to get it back. DOJ policy.”
Another lawyer covering his ass, Matson thought. He’s supposed to be covering mine.
Matson and Hackett rode the elevator in silence back to the eleventh floor. The receptionist guided them through the bullet-and bomb-proof glass security doors and down the long hallway to the conference room. They found that Peterson and the agents had removed their jackets and loosened their ties. There were bottles of water and sandwiches collected on a side table. It seemed to Matson that the only thing missing was a picnic bench and a red-checkered tablecloth.
“Ready, Scoob?” Peterson asked after they returned to their seats.
“Yeah, I just needed to make sure I was on the right track. I don’t want to blow this.”
“We were talking about Jack Burch.”
Matson looked dead straight at Peterson. “Burch was in on it from the beginning. We couldn’t have done anything without him. No way. We didn’t know diddly about the offshore world. We were novices, he was the pro-as slick as they come and looking to make a killing. And I felt like a fucking rabbit in his crosshairs.
“I’ll admit that I was nervous driving up from San Jose to meet Burch. Granger wanted me to do it alone even though it was new territory for me. I’d spent my life in manufacturing and sales. You make something solid, something real, and sell it. But the meeting with Burch was something I had trouble wrapping my mind around. It was only about air and paper.
“Sure, SatTek had hired lots of lawyers. Contracts. Real estate. Intellectual property. But Burch was in a different league from them. It hit me how different when I got off the elevator on the forty-third floor. The views from up there are more than amazing. They’re unnerving. The whole financial district. The Golden Gate. Blue sky all the way to the horizon.
“I gave my name to the receptionist and took a seat on the couch. Plush. Soft leather-and I got sucked into the damn thing. My suit jacket got all bunched up. My briefcase was dangling over the edge. Before I had a chance to recover, Burch walked in. Tall. Intense. Almost senatorial-and I’m sitting there like the village idiot.
“First I got embarrassed, and then pissed, thinking that the couch was set up as booby-trap to put outsiders at a disadvantage.
“As we walked down the hallway toward his office, I told myself that I needed to get focused and get my head in the game. One amateurish screwup and Burch might drop-kick me out of there. Then a warning from Granger came back to me. ‘Self-control is key,’ he’d said. ‘
Be careful what you say and how you say it. The rules are different from what you’re used to and the most important one is this: No one says exactly what he means if he wants to get what he came for.’
“I hadn’t grasped what Granger meant at the time, but two minutes after I sat down in Burch’s office, I understood exactly.
“Burch read over some notes on a legal pad, then looked up and said, ‘Ed Granger hasn’t told me the details of what you want to do, other than it somehow involves selling nonmilitary-grade sound and video detectors in Asia.’
“Even though it must’ve sounded like I was reading from a script, I answered him the way Granger told me to: ‘The plan is to give ourselves an international presence in anticipation of going public.’
“I waited for Burch to nod like Granger said he would, then I looked him straight on and said: ‘We’re looking to create a flexible structure, one that you might even call aggressive.’
“Burch’s eyebrows went up a little and he got a half smile on his face, and right then I knew that I’d hit just the way Granger had trained me. Crushed it three hundred yards down the fairway.
“Hell, when I look back on it now, I think Burch understood where Granger was headed with this thing long before I did.”
CHAPTER 8
A t 9:30 A. M. Gage pulled into a parking space behind his redbrick converted warehouse office along the Embarcadero. The weather had gone sideways, rain pounding the driver’s side window and sending rivulets streaming across the windshield. He decided to wait it out, for San Francisco storms squalled, rather than swept, their way across the city, cresting and troughing like surging waves.
Gage’s head and ribs had merely felt stunned and bruised during his meeting with the senior partners of Burch’s firm after the burglary, but were now stiff and throbbing. Since no bones had been broken, he was certain that by the end of the day nothing would be left but aches and twinges.
