The Book of Fate

by Brad Meltzer

  “He’s going to Manning?” Dreidel asks in the background.

  “Rogo, you don’t understand—”

  “I do understand. Lisbeth made you sad . . . The Three got you scared . . . and as always, you’re running for your favorite presidential pacifier.”

  “Actually, I’m trying to do the one thing we should’ve done the first moment I saw Boyle alive: go to the source and find out what the hell actually happened that day.”

  Rogo’s silent, which tells me he’s seething. “Wes, let me ask you something,” he finally says. “That first night you saw Boyle, why didn’t you go to Manning and tell him the truth? Because you were in shock? Because it seemed that Boyle was somehow invited to that hotel by his old best friend? Or because deep in the pit of your chest, no matter how much you’ve rationalized it over the years, you know that before he’s a father, a mentor, or even a husband, Leland F. Manning is a politician—one of the world’s greatest politicians—and for that alone, he’s fully capable of lying to your face for eight years without you ever knowing it.”

  “But that’s what you’re missing, Rogo—what if he didn’t lie? What if he’s just as clueless as we are? I mean, if O’Shea and Micah and whoever this Roman guy is—if they’re the ones who sent Nico to shoot Boyle—maybe Manning and Boyle aren’t the villains in all this.”

  “What, so now they’re victims?”

  “Why not?”

  “Please, he’s the—” Catching himself and knowing I won’t listen if he yells, Rogo adds, “If Boyle and Manning were complete angels—if they had nothing to hide and were only doing good—why didn’t they just take Boyle to the hospital and let the authorities investigate? C’mon, Wes, these two guys lied to the entire world—and the only reason people lie is because they have something to hide. Now, I’m not saying I have all the pieces, but just by the lie alone, there’s no way Manning and Boyle are just helpless victims.”

  “That still doesn’t mean they’re the enemy.”

  “And you really believe that?”

  “What I believe is that Ron Boyle’s alive. That The Three, with all their connections, helped Nico sneak into the racetrack that day. That O’Shea, Micah, and this Roman, as members of The Three, clearly have some grudge against Boyle. And for that reason, they’re now doing anything in their power to find out where he is. As for how Manning fits into this, I’ve got no idea.”

  “Then why race to him like a battered wife back to her abuser?”

  “What’re my other choices, Rogo? Go to the FBI, where O’Shea works? Or the Service, where The Roman is? Or better yet, I can go to the local authorities and tell them I saw dead man walking. Ten minutes after that happens, you think O’Shea and his little posse won’t show up with their federal badges, take me into private custody, and put a bullet in the back of my head claiming I was trying to escape?”

  “That’s not even—”

  “It is true and you know it’s true, Rogo! These guys went after one of the most powerful men in the White House at a stadium filled with 200,000 people. You think they won’t slice my neck open on some deserted road in Palm Beach?”

  “Tell him not to mention my name to Manning,” Dreidel calls out in the background.

  “Dreidel wants you to—”

  “I heard him,” I interrupt, twisting the steering wheel into a sharp left on Via Las Brisas. As I curve around a well-manicured divider, the street narrows, and the privacy hedges rise, stretching as tall as twenty feet and blocking my view of all the multimillion-dollar homes hidden behind them. “Rogo, I know you don’t agree, but for the past two days, the only reason I stayed away from Manning is because O’Shea and Micah convinced me to. D’you understand? The man’s been by my side for eight years, and the only reason I doubted him is because they—two strangers with badges—told me to. No offense, but after all our time together, Manning deserves better than that.”

  “That’s fine, Wes, but let’s be clear about one thing: Manning hasn’t been by your side for eight years. You’ve been by his.”

  I shake my head and pull up to the last house on my right. For security reasons, they don’t allow parking in the driveway, so I head for the shoulder of the grassy divider and park directly behind a navy-blue rental car that’s already there. His guests are early—which means, as I hop out and rush across the street, I’m officially late.

  Even before I stop at the ten-foot-high, double-planked wooden fence, the intercom that’s hidden in the shrubs crackles. “Can I help you?” a deep voice asks.

  “Hey there, Ray,” I call out to the agent on duty. “It’s Wes.”

  “You don’t have to do this,” Rogo pleads through my phone.

  He’s never been more wrong. This is exactly what I need to do. Not for Manning. For me. I need to know.

  A metallic thunk unlocks the wooden gate, which slowly yawns open.

  “Wes, at least just wait until we get through Boyle’s personnel file,” Rogo begs.

  “You’ve been searching for four hours already—it’s enough. I’ll call you when I’m done.”

  “Don’t be so stubborn.”

  “Good-bye, Rogo,” I say, hanging up the phone. It’s so easy for someone outside the ring to tell a fighter how to fight his fight. But this is my fight. I just never realized it.

  As I walk up the driveway, there’s no house number on the front door, and no mailbox to identify the occupants. But the four suit-and-tie Secret Service agents standing outside the garage are quite a giveaway. With Nico on the loose, they kept Manning at home. Fortunately, as I lift my chin and stare up at the pale blue British Colonial, I know where the former President lives.

  73

  And how’d you meet him again?” Lisbeth asked, holding her cell phone with one hand and taking notes with the other.

  “Mutual friend,” Violet replied, her voice already shaking. “It was years ago. At that point on the job, it was personal introductions only.”

  “Introductions?”

  “You have to understand, with a man like him, you don’t just walk up and swing your tail. In this town—with all the money . . . with everything these guys have to lose—the only thing they care about is discretion, okay? That’s why they sent him to me.”

  “Of course,” Lisbeth said as she scribbled the word Hooker in her notepad. “So you were . . .”

  “I was twenty, is what I was,” Violet said with a verbal shove. She didn’t like being judged. “But lucky me, I could keep a secret. That’s why I got the work. And with him . . . our first two appointments, I didn’t even say his name. That alone guaranteed he’d invite me back. Gladiators need to conquer, right?” she asked, her laughter soft and hollow.

  Lisbeth didn’t laugh back. There was no pleasure in someone else’s pain.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” Violet added, “but it was nice in the beginning. He was, honestly . . . he was tender—always asking if I was okay . . . he knew my mother was sick, so he’d ask about her. I know, I know—he’s a politician, but I was twenty and he was . . .” Her voice trailed off.

  Lisbeth didn’t say anything. But as the silence wore on . . . “Violet, are you—?”

  “It sounds so damn stupid, but I was just thrilled he liked me,” she blurted, clearly trying to stifle a sob. From the sound of it, the flush of emotion surprised even her. “I’m sorry—let me just . . . I’m sorry . . .”

  “You have no reason to be sorry.”

  “I know—I just . . . it mattered that he liked me . . . that he kept coming back,” she explained, sniffling it all back in. “I wouldn’t see him for a while, then the phone would ring, and I’d be jumping up and down, like I’d been asked to the prom. And that’s how it was until . . . until he left one night and I didn’t hear from him for almost three months. I was . . . to be honest, at first, I was worried. Maybe I did something wrong. Or he was mad. And then, when I heard he was in town, I did the one thing I never should’ve done—the dumbest thing I could possibly do, ag
ainst every rule,” Violet explained, her voice barely a whisper. “I called him.”

  Right then Lisbeth stopped writing.

  “He was at my place in ten minutes,” Violet said, another sob clogging her throat. “Wh-When I opened the door, he stepped inside without a word . . . made sure he was out of view . . . and then he just—I swear to you, he never did it before . . .”

  “Violet, it’s okay to—”

  “I didn’t even see the first punch coming,” she said as the tears flooded forward. “He just kept screaming at me, ‘How dare you! How dare you!’ I tried fighting back—I did . . . I’m . . . I’ve never been weak—but he grabbed the back of my hair and he . . . he sent me straight for . . . there was a mirror above my dresser.”

  Staring at her own rounded reflection in her computer screen, Lisbeth didn’t move.

  “I could see him behind me in the mirror . . . just as I hit it . . . I could see him behind me . . . his face . . . the red in his eyes. It was like he pulled off a mask and let out . . . like he freed something underneath,” Violet cried. “And—and—and when he was gone . . . when the door slammed and the blood was pouring from my nose, I still—I know it’s—can you believe I still missed him?” she asked, weeping uncontrollably. “I-I mean, could I possibly be more pathetic than that?”

  Lisbeth shook her head to herself, trying hard to stay focused. “Violet, I know this is hard for you—I know what it takes to tell the story—but I just need— Before we do anything, I need to ask: Do you have any way of proving this . . . anything at all . . . videotapes, physical proof . . . ?”

  “You don’t believe me,” she insisted.

  “No, no, no . . . it’s just, look who you’re fighting with here. Without a way of verifying—”

  “I have proof,” Violet said, clearly annoyed as she caught her breath. “I’ve got it right here. If you don’t believe me, come get it.”

  “I will, I’ll come right now. Lemme just . . . hold on one second . . .” Pressing her cell phone to her chest and hopping out of her seat, Lisbeth grabbed the uncrumpled art award notes, darted out of her cubicle, and ducked into a blond reporter’s cubicle directly across the hall. “Eve, can I borrow your car?” Lisbeth asked.

  “First my phone—which I still haven’t gotten back—now my car—”

  “Eve!”

  Eve studied her friend, reading her expression. “This’s the one, isn’t it?”

  “Column’s on my computer. Here’s the last item,” Lisbeth said, tossing her the art award notes. “Can you—?”

  “On it,” Eve said as Lisbeth said thank you, took off up the hallway, and pressed her cell to her ear. “Violet, I’m on my way,” she said, doing her best to keep her talking. Sacred Rule #9: Never let go of the big fish. “So . . . how long were you two actually together?”

  “A year and two months,” Violet replied, still sounding angry. “Right before the shooting.”

  Lisbeth stopped running. “Wait, this was when he was still in the White House?”

  “Of course. Every President goes home for vacation. Besides, he couldn’t pull this off in Washington. But down here . . . I’d get the phone call and he could—”

  “Violet, no bullshitting anymore—you’re trying to tell me that despite all the security—despite dozens of Secret Service agents—you were sleeping with and got beat up by the President of the United States while he was still in office?”

  “President?” Violet asked. “You think I was sleeping with Manning? No, no, no . . . the other mention—about running for Senate . . .”

  “You mean—”

  “The little animal who mauled me. I was talking about Dreidel.”

  74

  Think he’ll go through with it?” Dreidel asked, readjusting his wire-rim glasses as he read from Boyle’s personnel file.

  “Who, Wes? Hard to say,” Rogo replied, still sitting on the floor and flipping through the documents in Boyle’s requests. “He was talking a tough game, but you know how he gets with Manning.”

  “You’ve obviously never been on the receiving end of Manning.” Looking down at the file, Dreidel added, “Y’know Boyle spoke Hebrew and Arabic?”

  “Says who?”

  “Says here: Hebrew, Arabic, and American Sign Language. Apparently, his sister was deaf. That’s why they moved to Jersey—had one of the early schools for the hearing impaired. God, I remember filling this out,” he added, reading from Boyle’s National Security Questionnaire. “According to this, he won a Westinghouse prize when he was in high school—plus a Marshall Scholarship at Oxford. Guy was scary smart, especially when it came t— Hold on,” Dreidel said. “Have you been over 180 days delinquent on any debts? Yes. If yes, explain below . . .” Flipping to the next page, Dreidel read the single-spaced page that was stapled to the application. “. . . to a total debt of $230,000 . . .”

  “Two hundred and thirty thousand? What’d he buy? Italy?”

  “I don’t think he bought anything,” Dreidel said. “From what it says here, it was his father’s debt. Apparently, Boyle volunteered to take it over so his dad wouldn’t have to declare bankruptcy.”

  “Boy loves his daddy.”

  “Actually, hates his daddy. But loves his mom,” Dreidel said, reading even further. “If Dad declared bankruptcy and the creditors swooped in, Mom would’ve been kicked out of the family restaurant that she’d worked in and run since Boyle was a kid.”

  “Nice work by Dad—put the family business at risk, boot your wife out on the street, and stick your kid with all the leftover debt.”

  “Wait, that’s the good part,” Dreidel said, turning to the last few pages of the application. Here: Is there anything in your personal life that could be used by someone to embarrass the President or the White House? Please provide full details.” Flipping the page and revealing another single-spaced typed document, Dreidel shook his head, remembering the stories that Boyle had disclosed early in the campaign. Even at the beginning, Manning stood by his friend. “Most of this we know: Dad was first arrested before Boyle was born. Then arrested again when Boyle was six, then again when he was thirteen—the last time for assault and battery on the owner of a Chinese laundry in Staten Island. Then he actually wound up staying out of trouble until just after Boyle left for college. That’s when the FBI picked him up for selling fake insurance policies in a New Brunswick nursing home. The list keeps going . . . importing stolen scooters, check kiting for a few thousand bucks, but somehow, barely serving any time.”

  “It’s a Freudian field day, isn’t it? Dad breaking all the rules with the con man shtick, while Boyle throws himself into the preciseness of accounting. What was that Time story when Dad got arrested for shoplifting? Black eye . . .”

  “. . . on the White House. Yeah, clever. That’s almost as good as that political cartoon where they had him robbing Toys for Tots.”

  “I still can’t—” Rogo cut himself off, shaking his head. “All this time, we’re hunting for Boyle like he’s the great white evil, but when you hear all the details: miserable childhood, deaf sister, working-class Italian mom . . . and yet he still manages to claw his way out and make his way to the White House . . .”

  “Oh, please, Rogo—don’t tell me you’re feeling bad for him.”

  “. . . and then his dad lies, cheats, steals, and on top of it all, leaves Boyle holding the bill. I mean, just think about it—how does a father do that to his own son?”

  “Same way Boyle did it to his own wife and daughter when he disappeared from their lives and turned them into mourners. People are scumbags, Rogo—especially when they’re desperate.”

  “Yeah, but that’s the thing. If Boyle were really that bad, why’d they even let him work in the White House? Isn’t that the purpose of all these forms—to screen people like him out?”

  “In theory, that’s the goal, but it’s not like it was some uncovered secret. Everyone knew his dad was trash. He used to talk about it—use it for sympathy in the press
. It only became a problem when we won. But when your best friend is President of the United States, oh, what a surprise, the FBI can be convinced to make exceptions. In fact, let me show you how they . . . here . . .” Dreidel said, once again thumbing through the folder. “Okay, here,” he added, unclipping a sheet of stationery-sized paper as Rogo took a seat on the edge of the desk and started flipping through the rest of the file.

  “Boyle had codeword clearance. Before they dole that out, they need to know what side you’re on. FBI . . . Secret Service . . . they all take a look. Then Manning gets to see the results . . .” On the small sheet of paper was a list of typed letters lined up in a single column, each one with a check mark next to it:

  BKD √

  MH √

  WEX √

  ED √

  REF √

  AC

  PRL √

  FB √

  PUB √

  “Is that the same as this?” Rogo asked as he turned a page in the file and revealed a near-identical sheet.

  “Exactly—that’s the same report.”

  “So why’s Boyle have two?”

  “One’s from when he started, the other’s probably from when they renewed his clearance. It’s the same. BKD is background—your general background check. MH is your military history. WEX is work experience . . .”

  “So this is all the dirt on Boyle?” Rogo asked, staring down at the sparsely covered page.

  “No, this is the dirt—everything below here,” Dreidel said, pointing to the underlined letters AC halfway down the page.

  “AC?”

  “Areas of concern.”

  “And all these letters below it: PRL . . . FB . . . PUB . . .”

  “PRL is Boyle’s personal history, which I’ll wager refers to all the crap with his father. FB is his financial background; thanks again, Dad. And PUB . . .” Dreidel paused a moment, reading from his sheet as Rogo followed on his own copy. “PUB is the public perception issues if Boyle’s background gets out, which in this case, it already was.”