by Stephen Frey
“You hired the shooter?” Johnson asked incredulously.
Forte flipped on the car radio. “If that’s what you want to believe, Heath, I’m not going to stop you.”
“My God, boss, what if the guy had hit—”
“Shh,” Forte hissed, holding up his hand as the disc jockey interrupted the song that was playing to make the announcement. Beaming a smile that stretched almost from ear to ear after the DJ announced that there had been an assassination attempt on Senator Jesse Wood’s life. That the leading Democratic presidential candidate was apparently unhurt but that one of his bodyguards had been seriously injured. “Fantastic publicity,” Forte murmured. “The kind of stuff we dream about when we release a big album at the hip-hop label. I can’t wait to see how the cable news stations cover it.”
Johnson shook his head in amazement. “Unbelievable.”
“Thank you.” Forte took out his cell phone and dialed. “Jesse? You all right? Good, I’m glad. What? Really? No, no, don’t change it. You keep it on, you hear me? And take your jacket off when you give your speech. Let people see it. Right. Good luck tonight.”
“What was that all about?” Johnson asked as Forte hung up.
“When the bodyguard was shot, Jesse’s shirt got spattered pretty good with blood. I told him not to change it. It’ll make for great TV tonight.” Forte’s smile grew even wider. “We’re gonna win this thing in November, Heath. I know it now.”
19
“WHERE ARE YOU?”
“Black Brothers Allen,” Christian answered, looking around the conference room as he spoke to Quentin by cell phone. “I’m waiting for Trenton Fleming. I’m here to sign the Laurel Energy engagement agreement. They’re officially taking over the sale process from Morgan Stanley today.”
“That’s good, right?”
“I hope so. I don’t think we have any other choice. I haven’t heard anything more from Samuel Hewitt. He said he was going to talk to his CEO, but that was a few days ago and no word since.”
“Aren’t you going to see Hewitt in Texas at his ranch? The end of this week, right?”
“That was the plan, but his assistant called this afternoon to put it off. Hewitt had to go to China or something.”
“That’s too bad. Did you really have to go all the way down to Wall Street just to sign an engagement agreement?” Quentin asked. “Couldn’t you have sent them a faxed copy of the signature page?”
“Morgan Stanley sent a bunch of information over here to Black Brothers for them to look at. Engineering reports, financial information, that kind of stuff. The people handling the deal for Black Brothers, the day-to-day people, wanted help going through it.”
“Couldn’t one of our young people have done that? One of the associates?”
“It won’t take long. Besides, I was down here on another transaction anyway.”
“Is Allison with you?”
“No.” That faint alarm in the back of Christian’s brain went off. “Why?”
“I just wondered.”
“Need her for something?”
“No. I was just wondering if she was around.”
Quentin was probably trying to see how much time they were spending together, probably all there was to that question. “She’s in San Francisco, working on the Aero Systems deal.” He wouldn’t have even have stopped to think about Quentin’s motive behind asking the question except that Allison had pointed out why Quentin wouldn’t want things to change around Everest Capital. And the more Christian thought about what she’d said, the more he realized she was right. She and Nigel wouldn’t use Quentin like he did. They’d try, at least for a while, but it wouldn’t be the same. She’d just been honest. It was one of the things Christian respected about her.
“If you need her, call her on her cell phone. You got that number?”
“Yeah, yeah. Well, I hope Black Brothers can bring home the bacon on Laurel Energy because—”
Suddenly Quentin stopped talking and for a few moments there was dead air, then Christian heard garbled voices in the background. “Quentin,” he said loudly. “Quentin!”
“Hold on, Chris. Jesus, I—Wow!”
“What is it?” Christian demanded. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s…really? Are you sure?”
Christian couldn’t tell who Quentin was talking to. Him or someone at the other end. “Quentin!”
“Yeah, Chris, I’m back. You gotta turn on CNN.”
“Why?” Christian glanced around the conference room, but there wasn’t a television in sight. From the sound of Quentin’s voice, his first thought was that there had been another major terrorist attack. “What’s going on?”
“It’s Jesse Wood.”
“What about him?”
“Somebody tried to kill him.”
“What?” Suddenly the blood was pounding in Christian’s brain. “When?”
“A few minutes ago,” Quentin answered quickly. “Jesse was on his way to some fund-raiser in Cleveland and somebody took a shot at him while the car he was riding in was stopped at a red light.”
Christian knew about the fund-raiser. They’d spoken yesterday and Jesse had told him about it. “Was he hit? Is he all right?”
“Hold on.”
Christian heard more muffled voices, then Quentin came back on the line.
“Jesse’s fine, at least, according to CNN. One of the men riding in the car with him was hit…may have been killed.”
“Do they know who the guy was?” It could easily have been Clarence Osgood. “Are they saying?”
“No, they’re just reporting it was a bodyguard. No name.”
That didn’t sound like Osgood. Very few people would mistake him for a bodyguard, but you never knew. There was always so much confusion right after something like this happened.
“Aren’t you meeting with Jesse all day tomorrow?” Quentin asked. “To go over his platform?”
“Yeah, here in New York. He’s supposed to be flying back from Cleveland tonight after his dinner. I’m meeting with him at ten o’clock.”
“Maybe not now.”
“Maybe not,” Christian agreed grimly. Another call was coming in on his cell phone. “I gotta go, Quentin. I’ll call you later.” Christian switched lines. “Nigel?”
“Yes.”
“Did you hear about Jesse Wood?”
“No. What happened?”
Christian quickly explained what Quentin had relayed.
“My God,” Nigel exclaimed. “I’m turning on the television in my office right now. Are you at Black Brothers yet?”
“Yup. Waiting for Fleming. He should be here in a minute.”
“Okay, I’ll make this quick. Look, the SEC’s been calling over to CST a lot. Four times today and the last time it was Vivian Davis. The only time she called before was to set up the meeting you and I had with her. It’s been the worker bees since.”
Bad news. Christian could feel it. “What did she want?”
“Bob Galloway said she was acting real cagey. No specific questions but a lot of cocky comments. Kinda like she was trying to distract him at the front door while the SWAT team was sneaking in through the back.”
“Jesus. What are the attorneys saying?”
“To sit tight. They’ve called the SEC and demanded that we be kept up-to-date with what’s going on. They said that’s all they can do.”
“What about the woman at CST you’re working with?” Christian asked. He hadn’t confronted Nigel yet about what he’d found in Nigel’s briefcase—the different name—because it was impossible for him to believe that Nigel could be holding back in any way on this, but he wanted to. “Is she finished yet?” Christian could hear the hesitation at the other end of the phone. “Nigel?”
“Almost, almost.”
“What’s her name again?”
“Who?”
“The woman you’re working with at CST.”
“Michelle Wan.”
“Right
, Michelle Wan,” Christian repeated, making certain Nigel knew he’d remember the name. The conference door opened and Fleming and Inkster appeared. He’d been about to ask. Now he couldn’t. “I gotta go, Nigel.”
Christian stood up and shook hands with Fleming and Inkster. “Did you guys hear about Jesse Wood?”
“I did,” Fleming spoke up, sliding several copies of the Laurel Energy engagement letter across the table at Christian. “An awful thing. At least the senator wasn’t hurt.”
“Has that been confirmed?”
“I think so,” Inkster spoke up.
“He wasn’t hit,” Fleming said firmly. “I just saw him on television before I walked in here. They showed him walking into a fund-raiser in Cleveland. He was waving to people.” Fleming chuckled. “He’s got a lot of security people around him now, I’ll tell you that. It’s like a swarm.”
“Thank God he’s all right.”
Fleming looked up, keenly interested all of a sudden. “Is he your candidate, Christian?”
“Maybe.”
A faint smile appeared on Fleming’s lips. “Are you a Democrat?”
“Maybe.” Christian watched Fleming’s smile turn into a smirk. “Why? Would that be a shock?”
“It would be a surprise,” Fleming admitted. “So?”
Fleming was pushing hard. “Why would it surprise you?”
Fleming shrugged. “Your father was a Republican, a very prominent Republican. I wouldn’t think you’d turn on…” Fleming stopped himself. “Well, I just wouldn’t think you’d be a Democrat.” His smirk transformed into a polite smile. “It’s really none of my business.” He glanced at Inkster, then back at Christian. “Can you go ahead and sign the letter? We’ve already executed it.”
Politics and religion. Two subjects you never touched when you didn’t know exactly where the other person stood on each, especially in a business situation. It had been odd for Fleming to press the question when he was on the verge of landing such a huge sell-side deal. Odd that he’d risk pushing a client’s button in such a way that might sour the deal. Maybe Fleming was confident that Everest Capital needed him so badly he felt like he could ask anything. Christian smiled to himself. The real shocker for Fleming would be seeing Christian standing beside Jesse Wood as the vice presidential candidate.
Christian pulled out a pen and signed the engagement letter, then reached into his jacket pocket, pulled out an envelope, and slid it across the table to Inkster. “Ten million dollars.” It was a ton of cash for just a retainer, especially one with a no-refund policy. “I better get my money’s worth.” He watched Inkster look away and Fleming’s face turn to stone.
“You’ll get your money’s worth,” Fleming replied.
After going over a few logistical issues, Fleming bid a curt good-bye and had Inkster lead Christian down a hallway to another, smaller conference room.
“This will be the Laurel Energy war room,” Inkster explained, pointing at the stacks of papers already covering the table. “This is Beverly,” he said, introducing Christian to a young woman standing near the far wall of the room. “She’ll be on the team, managing a lot of the details.”
“Hi, Mr. Gillette,” she said nervously.
Christian could see that she recognized him, probably from the Forbes or Fortune covers. “Call me Christian.”
She nodded. “Okay.”
“I’ve got to go to my office for a second,” Inkster explained. “I’ll be back in a minute. You and Bev can get started.”
“Sure.”
Beverly was short and cute with pretty red hair and freckles. “How long have you been with the firm?” Christian asked.
“About a year,” she answered, moving to the table and starting to go through one of the piles. “I’ve read all about you, Mr., um, Christian. It’s a real honor to work with you.”
“That’s nice,” he said, not wanting to make much of it. He gestured at the table. “This looks like some kind of IQ test. Where do we start?”
She laughed. “I’d like to go over the list of companies Morgan Stanley already contacted about Laurel Energy. So Mr. Inkster knows exactly who’s already seen the deal.”
“Okay.” Christian came around to her side of the table.
She pointed down. “This pile has all the comments back from people at the other companies who looked at the deal. It’s arranged alphabetically.”
Christian ran his finger down the tall pile. Near the bottom was a folder marked U.S. Oil. He pulled it out and opened it, interested to see who had turned it down. As he leafed through the pages, his eye caught something beside one of the gas reserve statistics that instantly sucked the breath out of him. A set of initials. SPH. Samuel Prescott Hewitt. In the exact same looping script Hewitt had used to sign his meal tab at Princeton.
Christian gazed at the initials. Samuel Hewitt had been lying to him all along. He’d seen the Laurel Energy deal months ago. Well before they’d met at Princeton.
FORTE KICKED OFF his shoes and relaxed contentedly onto the plush sofa of his hotel suite. It had been a long but successful night. The ten-thousand-dollar-a-plate fund-raiser had just broken up, and they’d raised almost ten million—a good chunk of change he wouldn’t have to fund himself now. More important, the bloodstains on Jesse’s white shirt had made a profound effect on the crowd and the throng of cameramen kneeling in front of the stage. Exactly as Forte had hoped.
In his introduction, the emcee had noted the blood before Jesse had taken the dais to make his speech. Senator Jesse Wood was a man on a mission, the emcee shouted, a man who wouldn’t be denied the presidency. The crowd had roared its approval as Jesse bounded to the podium, fists raised. Forte had almost fallen for the hype himself.
Stephanie Childress sat in a chair across the room. He’d asked her to come back up here after the dinner to talk about the campaign. It wasn’t unusual for them to be alone late like this. “You okay?”
She nodded. “Tired. Worried about Jesse, you know?”
“Of course,” said Forte soothingly. “But there might actually be a silver lining to the assassination attempt.”
“What?”
“Federal protection from now on. An hour ago Heath Johnson heard that Jesse will have full-time Secret Service starting immediately until the convention. For good, really,” he added, “because we all know Jesse’s going to win the nomination. And, Lord, the press coverage he’s gotten from the shooting? Enormous. You can’t begin to put a vote value on that. As his PR person, you’ve got to agree.”
“I’d rather know he’s safe.”
“He’ll be fine from now on, Stephanie.” Forte patted the sofa beside where he was sitting. “Come here.” He saw her hesitate. “I’m not gonna bite.”
She got up slowly from the chair and sat down beside him.
“You’re an incredible woman,” he said, taking her hand.
“Thank you,” she said softly.
“It took a lot of courage to come to me and tell me about Samuel Hewitt.” He squeezed her fingers gently. “To tell me about him approaching you and trying to get you to give him information, to be his spy.”
“I told you from the start, I want the best for Jesse. I’d do almost anything to get him elected.”
Forte felt her squeeze back. She had to be so lonely. She’d carried the torch for Jesse all these years, but she had to see that it wasn’t going to happen for them at this point. “Could you love anyone else?”
Her eyes shot to his. “What do you mean?” she snapped, jerking her hand away.
“Could you love someone besides Jesse?”
“There’s nothing going on between us, Elijah. I love Jesse as a person. For who he is, what he stands for, and what he can do for our country. Not romantically.”
“Hey, hey.” Forte reached for her fingers again, marveling at her loyalty. “Easy. What’s that all about?”
“What did you mean by the question?”
“I know about you and Jesse,” he
said, caressing the back of her hand lightly. “I know a long time ago for a short while there was a romance. Jesse told me that when I first started to back him. How you were there for him when he wasn’t feeling very good about himself, when he realized his tennis days were just about over. He told me you two talked about marriage and children and a lot more, but it never worked out.” Forte saw the emotion building in her expression. Tension lines, a tremor here and there on her face. Almost imperceptible but recognizable to the trained eye.
If there was one thing Forte knew how to do, it was get to and pull on people’s deepest emotions. And really, it wasn’t that hard. Nothing more than having the willingness to go there, to bring it up. Most people weren’t willing to do that. They wanted to live on the surface where it was safer. “You must feel something for Jesse on a deeper level. I don’t think you care about him just because he’s a great man.”
Stephanie’s head tilted forward and a single tear coursed down her cheek.
“Put your head on my shoulder,” Forte urged quietly, slipping his arm around her and pulling her close. “It’s all right.”
She pressed her face into his shirt. “I really thought he’d leave his wife at some point,” she cried.
“I know.”
“We were so right for each other.”
“He told me that, too.”
She sobbed. “But…but…”
“But he didn’t leave his wife,” Forte finished the sentence for her. “You can blame me for that.”
“What?” Stephanie looked up. “Why?”
“I told him if he did, I wouldn’t back him.”
Forte hadn’t actually said that to Jesse, it was just understood. There couldn’t be a divorce in the past of the first black president. He had to be a storybook character, larger than life in a hundred years with no human frailties. A man who didn’t yield to temptation or back out of lifetime commitments.