The Vulture Fund

by Stephen W. Frey

  Mace gazed into Leeny’s eyes. He had almost forgotten how intoxicating this could be. “Leeny, I can’t give you any kind of commitment.”

  She gazed back at him, running her ankles slowly against the backs of his calves, then up to his thighs. The action caused him to enter her partially and automatically her back arched, thrusting her breasts up against Mace’s broad chest. “Don’t talk,” she whispered. “I don’t want to talk right now. I just want to enjoy you.”

  * * *

  —

  “Webster, is Ms. Hunt keeping a close eye on Mr. McLain?”

  “Very close,” Webster whispered into the phone. He hated these calls, which were coming much more often now as the deadline approached.

  “I’m worried about McLain. From everything I’ve been able to learn, he’s a very bright man. He could uncover what is going on.”

  “I would know if he were aware of anything and would tell you immediately. And I presume you would take the necessary action.”

  “I would,” the other man said. “But the problem is that your main source of information is Ms. Hunt. And we cannot have full faith that she will remain impartial.”

  “You think she might tell him what she knows?” Webster was incredulous. “Surely she would realize that she was signing both their death warrants.”

  “I think she might come to find him attractive and be swayed by that.”

  Webster hesitated. He thought back to the day in his office when she had alluded to the fact that Mace was an attractive man. “I don’t think she would be that stupid.”

  “Just the same, I don’t want Mace McLain around any longer than he needs to be. When will he have things in place with the banks, the target properties, and the stocks such that we won’t need him anymore? When will he become expendable?”

  “Not much longer. A few weeks at most.”

  “Good.”

  Webster could hear the other man’s satisfaction through the phone. “I really don’t think there is any need to worry. But if it makes you feel better, have someone follow him for the last couple of weeks.”

  “I might. Still, I don’t want to risk making him suspicious.”

  “No, you don’t.” Webster took a deep breath.

  “There is one more thing before I let you go.” The man changed the subject.

  “Yes?”

  “They will need more money in West Virginia soon.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yes. Next week all of the money from here will have made it to the account at Chase. When all nine hundred million dollars has gotten there, I want you to put in the fifty from Walker Pryce, then send a million down to the people in West Virginia at the Charleston National branch in Sugar Grove. Don’t wait for Ms. Hunt to close out the fifty million from the third-party investors.”

  “All right.”

  “It should be the last time we need to send them anything. Do you understand?”

  “Of course.” Webster wanted the conversation to be over.

  The other man coughed into the phone. “When will Ms. Hunt have the other money? The fifty million.”

  “She tells me that should be closed out very soon, within two weeks.”

  “Good.”

  Webster hesitated. “Will you tell me before you sic the dogs on McLain?”

  “Why would you want to know?”

  Webster swallowed. It wasn’t that he cared about Mace. For all he cared they could chop Mace up and feed him to the sharks when this was all over. He just wanted an early-warning system for himself. He didn’t trust them at all. Why should he? “So that I can tell you whether or not he really is expendable.”

  “I’ll make sure to ask.” The voice was defiant.

  “All right.” Webster could only imagine that this was what it must be like to deal with the Mafia. You never felt comfortable. You never felt anything that even came close to comfortable. You just felt fear.

  “Good-bye, Lewis.”

  “Good-bye.” Webster’s hand shook as he hung up the phone.

  * * *

  —

  Slowly Mace came out of a deep sleep and toward consciousness. He was still groggy, but somehow he had an eerie sense that something wasn’t quite right. He rubbed his eyes for several moments, then opened them. In the gray morning light seeping through the thin slit between the drawn curtains, Leeny’s face began to come into focus. She was kneeling beside him on the bed, her face just inches from his, staring intently down into his eyes. She did not blink. She did not move at all. She simply stared at him.

  “Leeny?” Mace quickly gained full consciousness. “Are you all right?”

  She did not respond, nor did she move, remaining statue-still as she continued to stare into his eyes.

  “Leeny!” His voice rose, and he brought a hand to her cheek.

  Instantly her face moved away from his hand. For several more seconds Leeny stared at him. Then she rose from the bed and slowly walked to the bathroom without a word.

  Mouth agape, Mace watched as the bathroom door closed behind her.

  Leeny flipped on the light, then leaned over the sink and stared into the mirror. She was a high-priced whore. That was what this amounted to. Nothing more, nothing less. That was what she had become.

  Without removing her gaze from the mirror, she reached for the small makeup bag lying on one side of the sink. Her hands shook violently as she dug through the bag’s contents until she found the prescription. She withdrew the small vial from the bag, removed five of the tiny green pills, and popped them in her mouth. It wasn’t fair what they were making her do. It was hell what they were making her do. How could she have fallen so far so fast?

  14

  Vice President Andrews gazed out into the gathering darkness from the thirty-sixth floor of the downtown Detroit office building that served as the headquarters for Andrews Industries. He exhaled slowly as he looked over Lake St. Clair, a huge black shape far below him. Things were bad. Andrews Industries—the firm his great-grandfather had founded eighty years ago to supply component parts to the budding auto-manufacturing industry, a firm that had grown in the intervening years to its present five billion dollars in annual revenues, a firm that had enabled the family to live an idyllic lifestyle for eight decades—was in dire need of a large cash infusion. And so was he. He had already spent every penny in his personal accounts on the election campaign. He had planned simply to pull cash out of the company at this stage to fund his bitter battle against Malcolm Becker, as his 30 percent ownership stake allowed him to do. But now he couldn’t because the firm was bleeding red ink everywhere. The corporate coffers, which for years had been so full of money that the dividends seemed endless, were suddenly bone dry. This disaster could not have happened at a worse time.

  Andrews sneered. Becker. He detested the man. Becker was an opportunist, nothing more. An egomaniac who had gotten lucky with the Wolverine Project and taken advantage of the instant fame that came with its successes to lay claim to the highest office in the land, the office of the president.

  Becker didn’t know how to run a country, especially one as complicated as the United States of America. Becker knew how to run an army, how to obtain sensitive information, how to be director of the CIA. That was where he should stay: across the Potomac River at the CIA. Andrews chuckled as he thought of Becker hosting a dinner for another country’s head of state. It would be ghastly. The man would probably belch and unhitch his belt over dessert.

  How in the world was Becker funding his own campaign? Becker’s family had limited financial resources. They were blue-collar types, people who might have even worked on the assembly line at one of the seventeen Andrews Industries manufacturing plants around the United States. They couldn’t be providing the money. The CIA job certainly didn’t pay very much, even at the director level—nowhere near what he needed to fund
a national campaign. And Becker had not yet raised a huge pot of cash from backers. That was clear from the digging Andrews’ people had done.

  So where was Becker coming up with the money to pay for all that television advertising that depicted him as the tough American, the man other governments would cower before? Andrews’ eyes narrowed. He was fairly certain he knew. The money was coming from CIA accounts. It was the only answer. This use of government money was completely illegal, but Becker’s assistant, the Rat Man Ferris, guarded those accounts so carefully that it was impossible to find out what was going on in them. Still, Andrews was going to find out. He had finally convinced the one man who had the power to unlock them, the one man who could run roughshod over Ferris, to do so: Bob Whitman, president of the United States.

  After months of discussion Andrews had finally convinced Whitman that to judge from the size of the Wolverine force and the type and number of weapons purchased for it, Becker must have far outspent the budget he had agreed to for the project at its outset. If that was the case, if Becker had overspent on the Wolverines, he was using money budgeted for other CIA initiatives to fund the Wolverines. Not that Andrews really cared if in fact that was what Becker was doing. All he really cared about was that if initial irregularities were uncovered, the audit of CIA accounts would increase in scope, and the government accountants might discover that Becker was using CIA money to fund his presidential campaign—and probably for a host of other personal reasons as well. If that were uncovered, Becker would be gone from the presidential race, and he, Preston Andrews, would sweep to victory because there was no one else to challenge him.

  After all the discussion the president had finally sent over a request for accountability to Becker, along with a serious reduction in the CIA budget. Andrews tried to hold back a smile as he gazed into the Michigan night. He only wished he could have seen Becker’s reaction to the memorandum. It would take some time to get into the accounts. Becker and Ferris would stall. But they could hold out for only a few months as long as he and Robin could convince the president to keep pushing. The election was nine months away. That was too much time for Becker to hold out against a president pushing for answers.

  He would get Becker. He would continue closing in on Becker until he exposed what he strongly believed was going on across the Potomac at the CIA. Unless Becker somehow found a way to cover up the overspending on the Wolverines. Andrews pressed his hand against the window. Never underestimate Malcolm Becker. The cardinal rule.

  “Nice night, isn’t it?” Robin Carruthers stood next to Andrews, looking down on the city lights with him. She smiled, then turned from the window and took a seat at the conference room table.

  Robin was a wonderful woman, as loyal as they came. Bright, capable, and fairly attractive. She should have settled down with someone long ago, but she had sacrificed everything for him instead. “Yes, it is,” he said softly. He moved away from the window and to the seat next to her.

  She nodded. “So how are you, Preston?”

  “All right, I suppose.”

  “You seem lost in thought.”

  Andrews took her hand and patted it gently. He gave her the huge friendly grin that could light up a room. She called it his candidate smile. “I’m fine,” he said smoothly. “I’m just a little worried about Andrews Industries. And I’m worried that Becker might find out about the problems here.” He smiled again. “But I’ll be fine.”

  Robin took his hand in hers as she had done many times before and began massaging it. The rubbing motion relaxed him. “Do you really think Becker could find out about the problems here? After all, it’s a private company.”

  “He’s a spy, isn’t he? Supposedly the country’s best. He’s paid to get information on people like me for the country. There’s no reason he can’t do it for himself every once in a while. I bet he’s already had people through here and the accountants’ offices. Or he’s going to have people go through them. He’s very thorough, our friend Mr. Becker.”

  “Yes, he is.” Robin stared at Andrews as she rubbed the skin between his thumb and forefinger. Preston was movie star handsome: tall, dark blond hair that never seemed out of place, perfect teeth, perfect skin, which seemed permanently bronzed, and many different smiles ranging from sincere to mischievous, a smile for every situation. Quite a package. And he was cool under fire. Those smiles weren’t just a veneer.

  “He’ll leak the information to the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times, and they’ll have a field day with it.” Andrews continued. “He’ll say I can’t run my own business; how can the people elect me to run the country? He’ll probably try to find improprieties here to show that not only can’t I keep my own house in order, but I can’t be trusted either. That I steal from my own family, so certainly I’d steal from the people. Or worse.”

  “But there’s nothing to find.”

  Andrews stared at her for a few moments. Robin was so trustworthy. But she was still a little naive, even after seven years in Washington. However, that naiveté worked to his advantage. He could make her do things other, more cynical people wouldn’t. “No, there isn’t anything to find,” he said firmly. “But Becker might try to manufacture something, to create improprieties out of thin air.”

  “You’ll be fine.” She continued rubbing his hand.

  “I’m glad you have confidence.” He glanced down at her hand. “That feels good.”

  “That’s the idea,” she said softly without looking up. “Perhaps you need to hire some extra security help around here and alert your accountants to increase theirs too.”

  “Perhaps.” Andrews paused. “What I really need is to get hold of the CIA account records on the Wolverines.”

  “So that we can see if he’s using CIA money to fund his campaign.” Robin finished the thought for him. They had been over it many times, and it was almost reflexive for her to say the words.

  Andrews laughed. “I’ve got to stop thinking about that. It’s going to drive me crazy.”

  “Hello, Mr. Vice President.” Bob Howitt, president of Andrews Industries, moved into the room. His eyes focused on Andrews’ hand as it moved stealthily away from Robin’s and then flashed to Andrews’ face. “It always seems a little strange to call you Vice President.” Howitt laughed uncomfortably. He had been running the company for the family over the past six years and was on the hot seat because of its financial difficulties. “Heck, I remember when you were in college. I was just starting out here. The company was barely five hundred million dollars in sales back then.”

  The vice president and Robin rose to meet Howitt. The two men quickly shook hands. “You remember my chief of staff, Robin Carruthers.” Andrews motioned toward Robin, disregarding Howitt’s stab at nostalgia.

  “Of course. Nice to see you again, Robin.” He took her hand quickly, then let it go.

  “Yes.” Robin smiled politely. Howitt was short and thin with few distinguishing physical features. She had met him several times before and remembered that he had looked much younger than his fifty-five years. Now he looked as if he were seventy. The family must be raking him over the coals for what was going on, she thought.

  “Please sit down, Bob.” The vice president’s voice was firm, almost unfriendly as he and Robin retook their seats.

  “Yes, of course,” Howitt whispered as he slid into the chair next to Andrews.

  Andrews wasted no time. “How bad is it, Bob?”

  Howitt smiled nervously. “No small talk, huh?”

  “No.” Andrews crossed his arms over his chest.

  Howitt made a clicking sound with his teeth as he opened a notebook he had brought into the conference room and laid it across his lap. He rubbed his chin as he scanned the pages. “We are bleeding approximately a million and a half dollars a day in cash, Mr. Vice President. We have drawn almost one-point-four billion dollars under our two-billion-dollar ba
nk facility, and by the end of the second quarter, by June 30, we will have broken several covenants in the loan agreement. We’ll also be fully drawn by then unless things get better. All two billion of the bank facility will be outstanding. June is four months away. That seems like a long time, but it will get here faster than we think it will.”

  “Are the bankers asking questions yet?” Andrews asked.

  Howitt shook his head. “Not yet. Not tough questions anyway. They’ve gotten a look at the preliminary numbers for last year. Those numbers aren’t too bad. We sold a couple of small divisions before year-end to raise cash, and we were able to book some capital gains to offset the operating losses as a result. We told the bankers that the operating losses were simply the result of restructurings in several divisions. Bankers seem to buy into the restructuring thing pretty easily as long as it happens only once in a while. But there isn’t anything left to sell now. The numbers for the end of this year’s first quarter will be pretty grim, the bankers probably won’t buy the restructuring thing again, and according to the loan agreement, we have to make those first-quarter numbers available to them by May fifteenth. They’ll start asking the tough questions then. In fact they’ll probably go ballistic. They won’t be able to take any action until we actually break the covenants in June, but they’ll be pretty unhappy. Unless of course the family is willing to put some equity money into the company to pay back their loans. Then they’ll get happy very quickly.”

  “How much would the family have to put in?” The vice president’s eyes narrowed.

  Howitt coughed. “The chief financial officer informs me that the banks will probably require about five hundred million dollars of fresh equity. But they’ll ask for a billion. A billion-dollar repayment would cut our annual interest expense by almost a hundred million dollars a year. With some layoffs we might be able to stop the bleeding and break even by the end of next year.” He said the last sentence quietly.