The Ambition

by Lee Strobel

  Snow was following her so far, but he didn’t understand the full implications yet. “How does this help us? She still files the suit, the charges are reported on the front page, and — poof! — there goes my appointment.”

  “What if we beat her to the courthouse? What if we establish in the public’s eye that she’s the villain and you’re the victim? In other words, what if we sue her before she sues us?”

  “We sue her? On what grounds?”

  “Vandervoort admitted that she told Strider you assaulted her. We both know she’s lying. Therefore, she’s clearly slandered you.”

  “I don’t understand. Doesn’t slander have to involve something that’s spread publicly? Broadcast on TV or in print or something?”

  “That’s a misconception. Under the law, a person commits slander if he falsely defames another person in a conversation with just one other individual.”

  Snow cocked his head in thought. “So we beat her to the punch.”

  “Exactly. We seize the high ground. To the public, you’re so concerned about protecting your good name that you’ve taken this unprecedented step. Maybe you could take a lie detector test and we’ll put the results in the suit. Who cares if it’s not admissible in court; we’re appealing to the court of public opinion. And I’ll get a private detective to dig up dirt on her and we’ll throw that in as well. By the time we’re done, she’ll have zero credibility. She’ll be branded a liar and an extortionist.”

  Snow was hesitant. “This sounds pretty aggressive,” he said. “Isn’t there some other way to handle this?”

  “Not if you want to become a U.S. Senator.”

  III

  Tom O’Sullivan didn’t know much about the arts, or architecture, or fashion — but when it comes to Chicago–style hot dogs, he was as snobbish as the curator of an art museum and as exacting as the finest chef of haute cuisine.

  And in a city where every self–respecting neighborhood boasted several competing hot dog stands, springing up faster than weeds through a sidewalk crack, he was not alone.

  For Tom, the recipe must be precise. Start with an all–beef wiener, one–eighth of a pound in weight and always in its natural casing to ensure that snap when it’s bitten, either steamed or boiled, never sliced lengthwise and grilled like those heretics practiced in the Northeast. The fresh poppy–seed bun had to be carefully steamed until tantalizingly soft, never doughy or soggy.

  The dog must then be topped with the right ingredients of exceptional quality in the right order: yellow mustard (not brown or Dijon, please!), always zigzagged across the hot dog (c’mon — not on the bun!); minced green pickle relish (often called nuclear relish because of its unnatural green hue); raw chopped white onions, preferably Vidalias; two wedges — not slices — of ripe tomato; a kosher dill pickle spear artfully nestled between the bottom of the dog and the bun; two or three sport peppers; and a flourish of celery salt.

  Adding a slice or two of cucumber was perfectly acceptable — in fact, Tom’s personal preference. “But the use of ketchup,” as he was quick to tell anyone who happened to be in line next to him, “should be a misdemeanor, if not a class–three felony.”

  The concoction — snugly rolled with salty french fries in butcher paper — married the best of heaven and earth, at once hot and cold, soft and crispy, spicy and sweet, biting and smooth, a hefty handful of meat and salad impossible to consume with even a modicum of grace.

  And the best place in the Chicago area to get one — at least in Tom’s considered opinion — was Nikki’s, a stand that graduated into a permanent shop, conveniently located half a mile down the highway from Diamond Point Fellowship.

  Cholesterol–conscious, he’d only permit himself this culinary indulgence once a week. He would stop in at Nikki’s on the way to his Friday night gambling recovery group, strip off his suit coat, flip his tie over his shoulder, settle into a plastic chair at a plastic table, and heartily consume two or three of the perfect gems. He would offset the damage by limiting the number of accompanying french fries and by sipping a diet soda.

  Tom was especially looking forward to his indulgent ritual this particular Friday as he drove out of the city toward one of the suburban Cook County courthouses, this one located in Rolling Meadows, almost thirty miles Northwest of the Loop. One of his long–time clients, discovered loitering after midnight in a pricey neighborhood, had gotten arrested on a charge of possessing burglary tools, and with his extensive rap sheet prosecutors were playing hardball, refusing to offer a reasonable plea bargain. The client wanted a jury trial — and he was paying in cash.

  Tom had purposely scheduled the arguments on pretrial motions for 2:00 p.m., leaving enough time for a stopover at Nikki’s prior to his group meeting at the church. With the temperature teasing eighty degrees on one of the few balmy days in what had otherwise been a soggy and gray spring, Tom slipped down the top of his five–year–old convertible. It was refreshing to have the wind play with his hair while the sun soothed his face. Finally, spring — almost a religious experience in Chicago.

  Exiting Route 53, he turned east down Euclid Avenue and was soon passing the landmark Arlington Park Race Track on his left. The track was dark during the off–season, but he caught a peek of the majestic grandstands through the thick roadside foliage and felt the itch stir inside him. After all, this was the place where he first felt the rush of picking a winner, even if robbed of the payoff by the Wee Tyree debacle.

  Tom turned right and pulled into the underground parking garage of the courthouse. He combed his windblown hair with his fingers and grabbed his attaché case from the passenger seat. Funny, the way a place like Arlington can pull at you, he thought.

  By the time he arrived on the third–floor, his thoughts had shifted to the business at hand, although the corridor was eerily empty. His footfalls echoed down the hall to Room 315, and he tugged on each of the two heavy oak doors — both locked. Peering through the crack between them, he could tell it was dark inside. Great.

  A bailiff, toting a gym bag, turned the corner and started walking in his direction. “Hey,” Tom called to him. “Why’s Judge Carter’s courtroom locked?”

  The bailiff looked startled. “Are you O’Sullivan?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Didn’t you get the voicemail? The clerk tried calling you.”

  Tom fished in his pocket and pulled out his cell phone; sure enough, he had the ringer switched off.

  “Spring fever; the judge took off early for the weekend. Sorry you didn’t get the message in time.”

  “No problem,” he lied and leaned back against the courtroom doors. He glanced at his watch. He had wasted nearly an hour driving out there. There wasn’t enough time to go back to the office, and it was still too early to head off to Nikki’s. Maybe, he thought, the judge got it right. Maybe the most productive use of the rest of the afternoon would be to simply waste it.

  He got into his car, dabbed sunscreen on his nose, and set off for a leisurely drive. He looped lazily through the streets of the Northwest suburbs, his radio blaring an old Bruce Springsteen CD, his mind unfocused and wandering. Given the stress of recent weeks, it was a relief just to let his mind wander with no destination in mind, no appointment for which he was late, no hearing for which he felt unprepared.

  He pulled onto an asphalt road that led to the Deer Grove Forest Preserve and claimed a parking place facing a green field guarded by a thicket of oak and pine trees. He’d felt lighter since talking to Phillip’s pastor friend, Bullock. Maybe their King David character had it right — confession was good for the soul.

  Still, every time he heard a news report mention Reese McKelvie as a potential appointee to the Senate, his stomach churned. Once again he’d find himself clicking through his options, one by one, only to settle once more on the safest path: keeping quiet.

  It was really the only rational choice, he would tell himself. After all, he committed a felony when he passed the bribe to McKelvie. There’
s no reason to expose himself to possible prosecution.

  He sat in the afternoon sun for a while, basking in the warmth, and then had an idea. He’d never updated Phillip after his session with Bullock. Although he couldn’t tell Phillip the substance of what they’d discussed, he figured he did owe him a briefing.

  He punched Phillip’s number into his cell phone. “Did I catch you at work?”

  “Trying to finish up early so I can get out and enjoy the weather for a while.”

  “That’s what I’m doing. Hey, how about meeting me for dinner over at Nikki’s before the meeting tonight?”

  “If you’re buying,” said Phillip, “I’ll show up.”

  IV

  “What do you mean — hold the onions? You planning to kiss somebody tonight?”

  “What’s it to you? You jealous?”

  Tom O’Sullivan and Phillip Taylor were kibitzing at the counter of Nikki’s Hot Dog Stand as they placed their order shortly before 5:00 p.m. Having shed his suit coat and tie, Tom rolled up the sleeves on a blue shirt purchased recently enough to still be considered new, and stocked up on extra napkins from the dispenser just in case.

  “Seriously, Phillip, these are Vidalias — they’re sweet and mild. Grown only in Georgia, where the sun always shines and life is easy and the soil doesn’t have much sulfur. This is a Chicago hot dog, my friend. Ya gotta have onions!”

  Admittedly no purist when it came to the protocol of consuming encased meat, Phillip remained unconvinced by Tom’s appeal. Instead, he replied with a chuckle, “Ever hear that old song — ‘Sweet Vidalia, you always gotta make me cry’?”

  “You’re changing the subject. Nick, tell him he needs onions.”

  Thirty–three–year–old Nick Gamos, who had started this modest glass–walled business at the busy intersection of Hightower and Antonio four years earlier, shrugged and smiled.

  “It’s a free country, right? Didn’t you study the Constitution in law school, Mr. O’Sullivan? If I remember right, it says that onions are always a choice. And this,” he declared with mock pride, his hand sweeping over the eatery, “is a pro–choice diner.”

  “And I choose to exercise my constitutional right to have — no onions,” affirmed Phillip, adding under his breath: “I was going to say ‘no pickle’ too, but I didn’t want to start a fist fight.”

  The dinner crowd hadn’t started arriving yet, and so Nick didn’t mind them loitering at his counter. There were only two patrons sitting among the fifteen plastic tables in the place — a couple of high school girls lounging in the corner, sipping diet sodas and chattering away to each other while simultaneously texting other friends.

  Tom capitulated on the onions — although reluctantly. After all, this is how anarchy starts — first, no onions, and next time maybe it’s no poppy seeds on the bun or no dash of celery salt. And then what — ketchup? Who wanted to live in a world like that?

  Tom and Phillip finalized their orders for two red hots each, plus drinks and fries, which Nick rang up on the register (and which Tom, despite Phillip’s half–hearted protestations, quickly covered with a twenty). Nick picked up his tongs and withdrew the first wiener from an aluminum container of simmering water so he could “drag it through the garden,” as Chicagoans liked to say — that is, quickly, efficiently, and precisely to add all the trimmings.

  Tom and Phillip continued to banter as they watched Nick expertly assemble their dinners. Neither looked up at the sound of the side door opening. They didn’t notice the figure dressed in black, his face shrouded by a ski mask, who sidled up behind Phillip and slowly withdrew a. 38 caliber revolver from the pocket of his windbreaker.

  “Holdup! Holdup!” he shouted so loud that the glass walls seemed to shake. “Hands in the air!” The bandit waved his chrome handgun recklessly around the room. “Hands in the air! Now!”

  The girls shrieked and sprang to their feet, their plastic chairs flying, their beverages spraying across the window. They crouched to the ground, reaching out to hold each other, cowering and trembling as they pushed their full weight against the glass wall, as if hoping they could somehow break through to safety.

  Instinctively, Phillip and Tom both jumped back, raising their hands quickly above their heads. Nick let an expletive fly, dropped his tongs to the floor, and thrust both of his hands in the air, while Alberto — manning the deep fryer in the kitchen — ducked for cover behind a refrigerator.

  “Easy now … easy,” Phillip said, trying to prevent his voice from shaking. “Take it easy … real easy.”

  Tom’s eyes were riveted on the weapon. “Just give him the money!” he called over his shoulder to Nick. But the proprietor stood wide–eyed and open–mouthed, paralyzed with fear.

  The robber furiously swung the gun from person to person to keep them at bay, although nobody was interested in doing anything but staying planted where they were. While pointing the weapon at Phillip, the bandit yelled to Nick: “Put the money in a bag! Now!”

  Nick was visibly in shock: he would start to lower his hands to open the cash register but then think better of it and quickly stick them back straight up in the air, as if he didn’t know which command he should follow.

  “Your money!”

  And with that, the bandit swung the gun to Nick — and the pistol barked, the muzzle flashed, and Nick tumbled backwards with a thud and a groan, sprawling on the floor.

  “Oh, Lord!” Phillip declared.

  Immediately, the bandit turned the weapon in the direction of the two men, extending the gun toward Tom — and pausing for the briefest of moments. Both of them could see his eyes narrow in the slits of his mask.

  Tom swallowed hard and flinched ever so slightly, and the gunman yanked the trigger twice in rapid succession. The first shot passed cleanly through Tom’s right shoulder into the glass wall behind him, a cracked spiderweb instantly forming at the point of impact.

  The second bullet lodged in his heart.

  Tom grunted and clutched his chest with both hands and stumbled a few steps backwards, his expression a mix of horror and disbelief. And then his legs gave out and he twisted as he collapsed to the floor, face up, two pools of maroon expanding on his blue shirt. His eyes slowly closed; the muscles in his face relaxed.

  Phillip gasped. The girls were hysterical now, plugging their ears as they shrieked uncontrollably. Without a word, the bandit turned his pistol toward them, but then he quickly brought it back to Phillip, who had turned from his crumpled friend to face the killer squarely. Phillip stretched out his arms as if for mercy; his eyes were shut tight in anticipation of impact.

  A second passed. Then another. And another. When nothing happened, Phillip hesitantly opened his eyes — just in time to see the back of the gunman as he pushed through the doors and sprinted down the sidewalk, jumping a hedge of bushes before he disappeared.

  The girls were still screaming; Alberto remained huddled in the kitchen, quietly cussing in Spanish under his breath; and Phillip just stood there, his face frozen in horror.

  “Oh, Lord Jesus,” was all he could manage to mutter.

  CHAPTER

  ELEVEN

  I

  Dispatch: 911, what’s your emergency?

  Caller: I’m driving on Antonio and some guy just ran out of Nikki’s with a gun and he was taking off a ski mask.

  Dispatch: Where on Antonio?

  Caller: Uh, northbound, almost to Hightower.

  Dispatch: Where did he go? Do you still see him?

  Caller: He ran across the street, behind my car, through a hedge and into the park. No — he’s gone now.

  Dispatch: Was he alone?

  Caller: I didn’t see anybody after him.

  Dispatch: What was he wearing?

  Caller: Uh, jeans and a jacket maybe. It happened so fast. Dark clothes.

  Dispatch: Did you see his face?

  Caller: Just the back of his head, you know, in my rearview when he ran across the road.

  Dispatch
: Did you hear any shots or see him fire the gun?

  Caller: No, no shots.

  Dispatch: Okay, just pull over at your next opportunity and park. A squad car will be right there.

  Caller: I’ll park along Antonio here.

  As the first squad car came snaking through Antonio Avenue traffic, its blue lights blazing and siren wailing, Phillip Taylor was just emerging from Nikki’s, his white shirt streaked with blood where he had wiped his hands after unsuccessfully trying to resuscitate the two victims.

  The patrolman curbed his car and grabbed the shotgun from its dashboard mount before rushing to intercept Phillip, who was gesturing frantically toward the restaurant.

  “He shot my friend, he shot the cashier,” Phillip was saying, his eyes wild. “There are two girls still inside. A cook too.”

  “Any gunmen in there?”

  “No, he ran out. Just one.”

  As Taylor spoke, two more squads pulled up, snarling the heavy rush hour traffic as they blocked the four–lane highway, with three officers alighting and sprinting toward Nikki’s, unholstering their pistols as they ran.

  “All clear; go in,” the initial officer called out, waving for the others to hustle inside. As they entered Nikki’s, the cop paused to return the shotgun to his car and then continued to quiz Taylor.

  “They’re dead. Both of them,” Phillip was saying. “He shot ‘em point blank. It was crazy … senseless …”

  “What was he wearing?”

  “All black, a ski mask.”

  “Height? Weight?”

  “Uh, five–nine, five–ten. A hundred and eighty, maybe.”

  Suddenly, a gold and white helicopter, emblazed with the name and logo of the Cook County sheriff’s department, came clattering overhead, having been redirected from a traffic accident not more than two miles away. The sun glistened off the bubbled glass of its cockpit as it hovered noisily.