Money to Burn

by James Grippando

  “Good evening, and welcome,” he said.

  The host of FNN’s hit show Bell Ringer-he mentioned it twice in thirty seconds-was grinning widely as he introduced his panel of experts: a hedge-fund manager, a retired member of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, a reporter from the Wall Street Journal, and two other “experts” for whom Andrea had missed the introductions while struggling with a too-short strand of dental floss. This wasn’t FNN-not the usual shouting on the set-so she increased the volume and listened to Bell “get the ball rolling” with the latest revelation from his source.

  “It seems that Michael Cantella didn’t just unload his holdings in Saxton Silvers the night before the stock dropped through the floor,” said Bell. “My source tells me that Cantella was actually betting against his company with short sales that could net him eight figures-literally overnight. And the number just keeps getting bigger as the stock continues to drop.

  “It’s a short-selling frenzy,” said the hedge-fund hotshot. “All it takes is one or two multibillion-dollar hedge funds to jump on the short-selling bandwagon of a failing investment bank worth seventy-five billion, and Cantella’s personal profit is going to look like peanuts.”

  Bell said, “That’s precisely the reason I have been so careful with my reporting. I trust my source.”

  The print journalist jumped in. “There are those who would say that Michael Cantella is your source.”

  Bell smiled and shrugged coyly, saying nothing.

  Another chimed in. “Come on, Chuck. Give us a clue.”

  Andrea kept watching as she reached for the telephone.

  Bell continued, “All I have to say on this subject is maybe it is, and maybe it isn’t Michael Cantella. This journalist will never reveal his source.”

  Andrea smiled flatly and said, “We’ll see about that.”

  She dialed from memory the number she could never write down anywhere, then bounced an idea off someone much smarter than Phil the phony fiancé.

  23

  I COULD HAVE THROWN THE TELEVISION SET OUT THE WINDOW. Except my tiny hotel room didn’t have a window. And it smelled like mildew. Still, the accommodations were the least of my worries. This time Bell had pushed it too far:

  Maybe it is, and maybe it isn’t Michael Cantella.

  I found his business card in my wallet and dialed his cell. The call went straight to his voice mail. If the last twenty-four hours had not been the nightmare from hell, I probably would have stopped myself from leaving such an angry message. But at this point I didn’t care.

  “Bell, this is Michael Cantella. I saw your show. I want a retraction, and I want it tonight. If I don’t get it, you had better hope that you hear from my lawyers. Because you won’t want to hear from me.”

  The instant I hit End, the phone rang on the nightstand. It was the front desk telling me that there was no other room I could switch to. The Saxton Silvers go-to hotels on the West Side had been no help, and the dozen other hotels I’d tried in Midtown were also fully booked. Apparently the entire world had followed up April in Paris with May in New York.

  “One other thing,” said the night manager. “Your credit card was declined.”

  I was sure it had something to do with the fraud alert sent out today on my credit report. I offered up another card, but after hearing the words “fraud alert,” the manager insisted on cash in advance.

  “Do you have an ATM in the hotel?”

  “It’s broken.”

  He agreed to hold the room for thirty minutes while I went out and searched for an ATM-provided that I leave him the last two hundred dollars in my wallet as a nonrefundable cash deposit. What a guy. I was crossing Third Avenue, walking through a cloud of steam rising up from a manhole cover, when Eric Volke rang my cell. He’d watched Bell’s round-table discussion.

  “Michael, I want a straight answer: Are you Chuck Bell’s source?”

  “No way, no how.”

  “The FBI found a bug in Sonya’s car.”

  “I told you they would.”

  “Which has the FBI wondering how you knew it was there.”

  That one had me reeling. “What? Did you show the FBI the text message? That’s how I knew.”

  “That may be. But I’m telling you there’s a black cloud over you right now, and you just keep making it darker.”

  “Eric, for the last time: I am not Bell’s source.”

  “Are you denying that you met with him tonight in the lobby of his building?”

  “Are you having me followed?”

  “Are you going to answer my question?”

  Shit. I should have realized that a face-to-face meeting with Bell might look bad. One crisis piling up after another was clearly clouding my judgment.

  “I was trying to get him to admit on the air that I wasn’t his source. And then he pulled this stunt. The guy’s a sleazebag, and one way or another, I’m going to get a retraction out of that son of a bitch.”

  “You’re playing with fire, Michael.”

  “You can say that again,” I said, thinking of yesterday’s flaming package.

  “And I can’t stand by and watch this whole thing blow up in your face and mine. You have confidentiality obligations to this firm. If you breach them, you will be fired, and you will be sued. Do you understand?”

  Never before had Eric used that tone with me. He was obviously still steaming over my Bell Ringer debacle. “I would never betray you or the firm.”

  “Then don’t make me have another conversation with you about this. Because there are people here who want you gone. Saxton Silvers will go down if I have to waste another minute going to bat for you. I’ve always been your biggest supporter, and I hate having to talk to you like this. But we’re in crisis mode. I can’t defend people who fan the flames.”

  He hung up after a clipped “good night.”

  I tucked away my phone and took a deep breath. It was after midnight, and the night was turning cooler, downright cold. My sport coat wasn’t enough to keep me warm, but the only clothes I had were those I’d worn to dinner with Papa. I didn’t even have a toothbrush, and the last two drugstores I’d passed were closed. I spotted a bank marquee on the next corner: Forty-two degrees. Chilly for early May, but not unheard of at this hour. I buried my hands in my pockets and walked into the wind until I reached the bank’s ATM. I looked around quickly to make sure I wasn’t going to be mugged; that would have been all I needed. With the two-hundred-dollar deposit I’d given the hotel manager, I needed another three hundred to pay for that ridiculously overpriced room. The machine churned and clattered, then spit out a receipt.

  Non-sufficient Funds, it read.

  I tried two hundred, one hundred, and then twenty fucking dollars.

  Non-sufficient funds.

  This was my joint account with Mallory at a bank wholly unrelated to Saxton Silvers. Even though we had taken steps to protect it this morning, I had the sinking feeling that Mallory might be at risk, too. I dialed her cell. No answer. I dialed the landline, and it kept ringing.

  “Come on, pick up.”

  I knew the message I’d left earlier-“I just wanted to let you know that I love you”-had been too much and was probably keeping her from picking up now. I had originally resolved to leave her alone until the morning, but now I needed to get past the answering machine.

  “Mallory, I’m standing on the street at the bank trying to get cash. If you can hear this message, please pick up. It’s an emergency.”

  She picked up, startling me.

  “What is it, Michael?”

  It was the same cold tone she’d used when telling me to find somewhere else to sleep tonight. I quickly told her about the nonsufficient funds notice from our checking account.

  “I withdrew everything this afternoon,” she said.

  My response caught in my throat. “You what?”

  “It’s what my lawyer told me to do, Michael.”

  Her friend Andrea hadn’
t lied: Mallory had a lawyer, and her lawyer already had a plan.

  “Can we slow down a little?” I said. “This isn’t necessary.”

  “If you didn’t see it coming, I’m sorry, but you should have. I’ll e-mail you my lawyer’s phone number. Please don’t call here again.”

  She hung up, and I was standing alone on the sidewalk. But not for long.

  “Hey, pal.”

  I turned and saw a man wearing a camouflage jacket, torn blue jeans, and old tennis shoes. The thing on his head threw me, but finally I realized it was a metal colander that he’d strapped on like a helmet and fastened beneath his chin with a pink-and-purple bungee cord. He held out his hand.

  “Dude, you got a dollar?”

  I looked at him and a pathetic smile creased my lips. I couldn’t help laughing as I answered.

  “No,” I said. “I really don’t.”

  24

  CHUCK BELL SIGNED OFF THE AIR AT MIDNIGHT. TONIGHT’S ROUND-TABLE discussion was his first appearance on one of the big four networks, and he was riding high.

  “Great show, Chuck,” said the producer.

  “I know,” he said. “And this is only the beginning.”

  Ratings for Bell Ringer were off the charts, and Bell was clobbering every other financial show on television. Going on a much bigger network only confirmed that his broadcast persona was growing. Everyone wanted to know what his confidential source was going to reveal next about the impending demise of one of Wall Street’s premiere investment banks.

  Bell didn’t want to go home. He was too excited, and too many ideas were percolating in his head as he walked out of the NASDAQ building. The glow of a billion colored lights had him soaring. The north face of One Times Square was behind him, the building famous for the dropping of the New Year’s Eve ball, and Bell glanced over his shoulder to see nine hundred square feet of Bill O’Reilly on the Fox News Astrovision Screen. Charlie Gibson and Diane Sawyer were on the even larger ABC SuperSign at Forty-fourth Street. Chuck Bell was on his way.

  His cell rang as he passed a guitar-pickin’ cowboy wearing only a Stetson, snakeskin boots, and Calvin Klein underwear. Bell pulled the spent chewing gum from his mouth and dropped it into the singing cowboy’s open guitar case on the sidewalk.

  “Chuck Bell,” he said into his phone.

  “I want to meet,” the man on the line said.

  Bell stopped and pressed a finger to his left ear to drown out the sounds of the city. “What?”

  “Listen to me,” the man said. “I’m telling you that I want to meet.”

  The strange voice was distorted by an electronic device, sounding like one of those anonymous informants on TV who talked from behind screens that concealed their identity.

  Bell’s pulse quickened. “Who is this?”

  “Someone who knows the real Saxton Silvers story. Meet me outside the FNN Studio. I’ll tell you what I know as soon as you get there.”

  The call ended.

  Bell looked at his phone in disbelief, hardly able to comprehend his good fortune. He thrust a fist into the air, nearly airborne, he was so excited. This was getting so cool-midnight phone calls, disguised voices, the stuff of big-screen movies.

  He was sure it was Cantella. Leaving him a business card with his cell number had been a smart move. Going on the air tonight and being cryptic about his source-Maybe it is, and maybe it isn’t Michael Cantella-had been a stroke of genius. The clear implication to all of Wall Street was that it was Cantella, and Cantella had too much of an ego not to control a story that had his fingerprints on it.

  Bell spotted a cab, pushed aside a couple of Japanese tourists who were trying to get both a picture and a video of themselves climbing into a real New York taxi, and jumped into the backseat.

  “Jersey,” he said, and he gave the driver the studio address.

  On the ride across town to the tunnel he checked his smart phone for e-mail. One that immediately caught his eye was from the Legal Department at FNN.

  Heads up, it read. I just received word that the U.S. Attorney’s Office plans to hit you with a grand jury subpoena tomorrow morning to force you to disclose the identity of your confidential source. Not sure what the basis for this is. But don’t be alarmed when a federal marshal shows up at the studio.

  Bell sat back, closed his eyes, and smiled. Tomorrow was already playing out in his head. First, he would bump Money Honey again at nine A.M. to announce his refusal to comply with the subpoena. Maybe his publicist could book him on The View, where he could take the journalistic high road and proclaim his determination to do whatever it takes to protect his source and the First Amendment. Then, to cap it off, on tomorrow evening’s edition of Bell Ringer he would put on his boxing gloves, literally wrap himself in the American flag like Sylvester Stalone in Rocky, and pulverize two bears dressed in lawyerly pinstripes. No, not bears. Kangaroos-as in a kangaroo court. And he’d name them “Legal” and “Evil.” With any luck, a federal judge would hold him in contempt of court for failure to comply with the subpoena, maybe even throw him in jail overnight. Only then-“under relentless government pressure”-would he capitulate and reveal his source on Larry King Live. If he played this right, he’d be on all the top morning shows and every nightly news broadcast, speeding down the fast track toward the mainstream media and life beyond FNN.

  And that didn’t even account for what Cantella was about to tell him.

  Looking good, baby.

  “Fifty-two-fifty,” the cabdriver said. They were already at the studio. Bell typed out a quick response to the lawyer’s e-mail. “Got it,” he wrote. “At studio now to meet higher source.”

  “Now it’s fifty-three-fifty, buddy.”

  Bell hit Send, gave the driver sixty bucks, and watched the taxi pull away. He was behind the studio in the empty parking lot. The lighting wasn’t what it should have been. He’d complained to maintenance many times, mainly because he had to park his Maserati at the far end of the lot to avoid door dings from losers in ten-year-old junks.

  He didn’t see anyone, and it was too cold and too damn dark to wait outside. He started across the lot and headed toward the light at the rear entrance of the building.

  “Hey, Bell,” a voice called out from the shadows.

  As he turned he heard a muffled crack that-even though the parking lot was empty-sounded like a car door slamming. A hammerlike jolt to his forehead sent his head snapping back, and his body collapsed to the pavement.

  His limbs were frozen, and he couldn’t move. The right side of his face was flat on the asphalt, and it was impossible even to turn his mouth and nose away from the expanding pool of hot blood that encircled his head. He heard approaching footsteps, but his vision was gone, and he couldn’t force himself to speak.

  “Yup,” he heard a man say, “that’s a Bell Ringer.”

  Then he heard that sound again-like a car door slamming-and his world fell silent.

  25

  IT WAS ONE A.M., AND IT OCCURRED TO ME THAT I HADN’T SLEPT since I was thirty-four years old. Papa had warned me about the insomnia. Getting old sucks.

  Getting screwed double-sucks.

  Convincing the night manager of Hotel Mildew to return my last two hundred bucks wasn’t going to happen. Nor would he budge on the $500 room rate. We cut a deal that allowed me to stay the night for the cost of my deposit-as long as I was out of the room by six A.M. instead of the usual checkout time of eleven A.M.

  I wasted my first precious hour on the telephone with my credit card company, the first thirty minutes of which was spent trying to get through the phone menu to talk to an actual human being. Finally Anoop Gupta from New Delhi assured me that by morning I would have a working card. I could only hope that he meant my morning, not his. I desperately needed rest, but at 2:35 A.M. I was still wide awake, staring at the ceiling in the dark.

  I can’t believe she’s divorcing me.

  According to Mallory, I should have seen it coming, but I could recall onl
y one major blowup in the last year. We had our favorite charities, but when Papa told me about the volunteer work he was doing for a south Florida organization called “Charlee,” I immediately wrote a ten-thousand-dollar check. Mallory went ballistic-not because of the amount of the donation, and definitely not because she questioned the merits of an organization that helped abused children. She just wished I had made the donation anonymously. She didn’t explain why, and she shut me down the moment I even hinted at anything personal in her past. But it was as if she didn’t want anyone asking questions about her own childhood.

  I was beginning to wonder how well I had really known Mallory in high school-if there was a reason our friendship had never evolved to the next level, if something far more oppressive than twenty-plus hours a week in a dance studio had prevented such a pretty girl from seriously dating anyone, as far as I could remember.

  My mind refused to shut off, but I had major problems to solve, and I needed to focus. The fact that the draining of my portfolio was part of a bigger setup to bring down Saxton Silvers made no difference to Mallory, but Papa’s question was racing through my brain: Who were my enemies? Kent Frost was no fan of mine, but I had battled dozens of guys like him over the years. I was more worried about the enemy I had no memory of ever having met. The more I focused on guys like Frost, the more likely it would turn out to be Colonel Mustard waiting for me in the library with the dagger and the pistol because I had somehow killed his leveraged buyout of a candlestick-holder factory.

  I had officially moved from paranoid to punchy.

  Go to sleep!