Tommy checked his phone and was happy to see that there was already a text waiting for him from Jenny. It read, Do you want to take me to breakfast? I can meet you at the diner. Tommy responded Yes immediately and readied himself for the day.
Tommy arrived first but didn’t even open the menu. He knew only the prices had changed since college. Jenny bustled in right on time, greeted Tommy with a kiss on the check from behind, then sat and stared tentatively at the menu. Tommy watched Jenny and thought about how he had been immediately attracted to her from the moment he saw her again, and it had only deepened. The way she handled herself, the impact her life was having. Tommy had impulsively said the words before, but he said them again with deep and thoughtful conviction. “I loved you then, I love you now.”
Jenny seemed unfazed, but she paused before answering. “I loved you then, and I’m still not sure about now.” Tommy felt sick as he waited those few seconds for Jenny’s answer, but actually then felt relieved.
Jenny reached across the table, grabbed his hand and looked him in the eye. “We’ll see. Like we talked about in Chicago, I’m still not sure you know how to do that.”
They spent almost all of their waking hours together the rest of the weekend, except for a few times when Jenny went to check on her dad.
No drugs, drinking, or sex. Just a real effort on both of their parts to get to know each other better. Tommy headed back to Chicago on Sunday evening feeling good, maybe better than he had, ever. He had clarity as to what needed to be done, and the market was in the right spot to make it happen.
40
Pat spent the weekend in Chicago with Mary, and it was just as enjoyable as the one Tommy and Jenny had. They splurged on high-end dinners and a show, living like they were millionaires because, at least for now, they were. Pat had learned over his three months in Chicago to appreciate what it had to offer—the skyline, the energy, and the choices regarding just about anything that could be eaten, drank, or purchased.
Pat walked Mary over to Union Station on Monday morning and then headed south and east wherever he could catch a walk light until he was at his office. He walked past the elevator and took the stairs at the end of a long hallway since his office was only up one flight.
Tommy arrived at the building less than a minute after Pat did, and as he strolled toward the stairs he was hit by a unique and all too familiar odor wafting from the open elevator. It was Doug’s signature mixture of booze, cigarettes, and coffee with a spearmint gum cover-up. Tommy sprinted down the long first floor hallway and up the stairs, getting to Pat as he unlocked his office door which was just around the corner from the long second floor hallway that led back to the elevators.
“What are you doing here?” Pat asked, a bit surprised by both Tommy’s presence and breathless demeanor.
“Just came by to say hello to an old friend and see how you’re doing,” Tommy said as he reached out his hand to shake Pat’s. As they released their handshake, Doug rushed around the corner and said, “Thomas Gardner, you are under arrest on charges of commodity market tampering. Under authorization of the federal government, I will be delivering you to the Federal District Courthouse for processing and arraignment.”
Pat was stunned, but Tommy looked confidently into Pat’s eyes as Doug handcuffed him, pulled him away, and escorted him down the stairs. Pat went into his office and watched from his window as Tommy was loaded into the back seat of Doug’s unmarked police car.
As he turned from the window, Pat unfolded the paper that Tommy had passed to him during their handshake. It read, “Cover shorts, buy, go all in, including margin. The squeeze is on!” Pat quickly got on the line with a couple of market-makers, brokers, and his banker, giving them instructions to be carried out until he said stop or until the banks ran out of money that they were willing to loan him. He sensed a need for urgency, and he was right. As he finished up his last call and sat thinking of Tommy, there was a knock at his office door. He opened it to find Kyle, who was accompanied by another federal agent.
“Mr. Patrick Marcum?” Kyle asked.
“Yes, that’s me,” Pat answered.
Kyle and the other agent displayed their credentials and asked, “Would you accompany us to our offices for some questions?”
“Regarding what, if I may ask?”
“Just some questions about your firm’s trading activity,” Kyle said.
“Am I under arrest?” Pat asked.
“No sir, but we really would appreciate your cooperation.” Kyle enjoyed his authority, which annoyed Pat.
“Well, let’s go then, but I won’t be talking to you without my attorney present. So, will you please give me a minute to call him?” Pat was demanding. Not asking.
With an eyebrow raised and a smirk on his face, Kyle responded, “Of course.”
Pat didn't reach his attorney, but he left a message with his assistant who assured Pat that they would meet at the Federal District Court Building a few blocks away.
Pat and Tommy were taken to the same building and put in interrogation rooms across the hall from each other. The plan had been for Tommy and Pat to be taken in simultaneously, but Kyle got caught up waiting for an officer to be available. Pat surmised that Tommy was somewhere in the building.
By the time Kyle arrived with Pat, Tommy had been sitting alone after processing and mugshots. Tommy, although repeatedly warned off by Susan, took one last desperate shot at getting her help by leaving a message saying, “If you can’t help me, can you please call another attorney? Anyone you know will do.”
Doug entered the room, followed closely by Kyle. Tommy had grown accustomed to this routine, but now it was in a Federal District Court building with actual federal securities charges pressed against him, not a Chicago precinct.
Again, Tommy spoke first. “I will not be talking to you today without legal representation. I’ve learned my lesson.”
“As you wish,” Doug said. “Your friend Pat feels the same way. He’s just down the hall.”
Any sign of smugness or control quickly drained out of Tommy’s face and body. He could deal with this, but wasn’t sure about Pat. He thought about the lie detector dry run that Pat’s attorney had done with him. Tommy assumed that Pat was picked up immediately after he was escorted out of the building. “Ah, did you arrest him, too?” Tommy asked.
Doug shifted his weight on the table, poised to pounce. “None of your business. You should be worried about yourself. Things are a little different this time. Did they treat you well in booking?”
“Yes, they did,” Tommy admitted.
Doug strolled over to Tommy's side of the table, getting closer and closer with each cocky step. “You up for talking?”
Tommy leaned back a bit uncomfortably in his chair. Doug was getting so close that Tommy wanted to get as far away from Doug’s natural stench as possible. “As I said, not this time. I already placed my call, but if you want to talk to me, that’s okay,” Tommy said, hoping to find out what was up with Pat. He was planning on keeping his mouth shut for once.
“Well, since we shouldn’t talk about charges that are pending, let’s talk about the other charges we considered filing. Thought we might arrest you for the murder of Paul Smith or George Shannon or both!” Doug knew that he was getting under Tommy’s skin. Tommy was squirming in his chair.
Defeated, Tommy could only hope that there had to be a way out of this mess. “You should just put me in a cell until I’m arraigned,” he said.
“Well, if you had just been a little more patient and let nature take its course, you could have avoided this whole messy murder situation.”
Doug didn’t want Tommy to shut down, so he figured that he’d throw him something to think about.
“What the hell are you talking about?” Tommy asked, agitated, and tapping his fingers on the tabletop.
“Turns out George had stage four or five cancer. Whatever terminal is,” Doug replied.
“I didn’t know that,” Tommy s
aid softly, staring into the corner of the room.
“Apparently, neither did he,” Doug said.
“So, why are you telling me this?” The gravity of this new information weighed heavily on Tommy. He had considered George his friend.
“Thought you might be interested and thought it might tie into the voicemail message and the three calls from Whitefish,” Doug added slyly to keep Tommy engaged.
“Yeah, I know about the call to my office phone before George’s murder. You already told me about it, but that sounded like some work-related thing to me,” Tommy said.
“How do you explain the other three calls from Whitefish?” Doug asked.
“I never heard about them until now,” Tommy said, annoyed.
“Three calls, each longer than the previous call, totaling over a minute,” Doug informed Tommy.
“Wait, now I remember . . . what area code was that?” Tommy asked.
“406,” Doug said.
“Yeah, I got a recording and hung up after a few seconds. Then when I got the call back, I tried to get through to a human being; I figured that otherwise the calls would keep coming. I got called a third time and just kept getting more frustrated and eventually hung up. The calls stopped, and I never gave it another thought,” Tommy explained.
“Well, it wasn’t a recording. Turns out there’s at least one public phone left in this country,” Doug said calmly, a smirk on his face, knowing that Tommy would choke a bit on that information.
Tommy’s eyes started to dart around the room. Sweat coated his upper lip and his voice puttered as he spoke. “What? Supposedly I arranged a hit in all of three calls lasting a total of a single minute? Obviously I was being set up. And, besides, why are we talking about murder again? I was arrested by the feds on commodity charges. Why the hell are you even here?”
“Well, we also have physical evidence that George was murdered. We have a cold case in which someone else died, too, when they were between you and money, and we have the incriminating voicemail and other phone activity.” Doug was eager to see what kind of impact his words had on Tommy. Enjoying this little game more and more, Doug’s adrenaline rushed through his veins. Tommy, on the other hand, was ready to run out of the room.
“You don’t have shit. You aren’t even charging me for murder.”
Kyle had been fidgeting and waiting for his opportunity to speak. He saw the nod of approval from Doug and proceeded with his meticulously planned out comments. “We have the market interference charges and the evidence to prove that you have broken your commodities trading ban,” Kyle said.
“I’m not talking,” Tommy said, folding his arms.
Kyle continued anyway. “As you know, we have a phone that you dropped in a dumpster a few weeks ago and even though you smashed it, we know that only two numbers were dialed: the sushi place just around the corner from your condo and Pat’s cell phone,” Kyle said. “Turns out that same day, Pat was involved in some substantial transactions.”
Tommy just stared, and, for once, didn’t say anything.
“What if we have more than that, like a recording?” Kyle asked, trying to bluff Tommy.
“You don’t,” Tommy said, and focused on Kyle’s eyes until he quickly looked away and Tommy spoke again. “No, you don’t have a recording, but nice try, young man.”
“Well, we do have a pattern of you meeting up with Pat several times, followed quickly by high trading activity at his firm. In addition, it doesn’t look good using a throw-away phone for a call to a friend.
Looks more like you’re hiding something.” As Kyle spoke, he slowly laid pictures of Tommy and Pat having several conversations at hotels, coffee shops, and restaurants.
“Please send in my attorney. I assume he or she is here by now; I’m looking forward to meeting them,” Tommy said.
Kyle smiled a little and then continued. “Oh, and by the way, there are some really interesting trading levels developing today, but never mind, you’re not active in the market, so that shouldn’t worry you.”
Doug interrupted, “Say, Kyle, we can’t talk to Tommy anymore, but you and I can talk. I’m guessing it will take nearly forty-eight hours to get him arraigned on the market fraud charges. Does that sound right?”
“About that long,” Kyle replied.
“Maybe we should see if we can get jurisdiction changed on the murder charges while we’re waiting. It's still technically a Montana case, but maybe the charges could be federal given the interstate calls and activity across state lines and that it did happen on federal lands,” Doug reasoned.
“You son of a bitch, you can’t do that!” Tommy blurted out and stood quickly, sending his chair rocketing straight backward into the wall, startling both Doug and Kyle.
“Excuse me, we weren’t talking to you,” Doug said to Tommy.
Tommy picked up his chair, flopped back down in it, folded his arms, and looked down and away to avoid eye contact with Kyle and Doug as they walked out, both quite pleased with themselves. It took every ounce of effort Tommy had to regain his composure as the pair had pushed every button he had. Market charges and possible murder charges? Plus, Tommy knew that Doug and Kyle were about to head down the hall to talk to Pat. Things were only going to get worse. Tommy assumed that Pat couldn’t put in any trade orders before he got picked up and didn’t know how long he would be held.
As Kyle and Doug walked between the interrogations rooms, Doug grabbed Kyle by the arm and said, “Where the hell were you this morning? Why did it take so long to pick up Pat?”
“Got caught up waiting for an officer. Sorry, but I called you, and you should have waited,” Kyle shot back.
“I couldn’t wait. I was following Tommy. How the hell was I supposed to know he would head to Pat’s office?! Well, I actually did figure it out just before arriving at the building and thought I would get to Pat first. Somehow Tommy slipped past me and got to Pat’s office just before me. I couldn’t let the two of them talk, so I arrested Tommy because we actually had a warrant for him,” Doug explained, and then went on, “Well, how late were you?”
“According to your radio dispatch on Tommy’s arrest that I heard, maybe twenty minutes,” Kyle reasoned. “Enough time to put some orders in, I guess, but that only matters if those two had a chance to talk,” Kyle said. “We grabbed Tommy as soon as those two met,” Doug said.
“We should be fine, then,” Kyle said. “Let’s have Pat sit for a while before we head in there. Let the nerves fray a bit more.” Later, Kyle knocked on the door as he entered, followed closely by Doug. “Hello, again,” Kyle said.
“Not very nice of you to keep me waiting. I’ve got business to attend to,” Pat said.
“Sorry about that, but it’s your business that we need to attend to,” Kyle warned.
“Okay, talk,” Pat said, trying to stay calm. “My attorney still hasn't arrived anyway.”
“Well, you see, we have all of this interaction between you and Tommy.” Kyle spoke as he again laid out the same pictures he had shown Tommy. “You do realize that Tommy has a commodities trading ban?”
“Yes, he told me, but we’re just old friends reconnecting,” Pat said, proud of himself for staying composed.
Doug had been standing behind Pat, his frustration with this case growing. His hands were shaking again, and he reached over Pat’s shoulder and slammed his open hand on the table. “You expect us to believe that you just happened to wander into this business by accident? With no experience and make tons of money? And there’s no connection to Tommy? Do you think we’re morons?”
Doug came around the table and sat down next to Kyle so he could look Pat in the eye if he answered. Pat knew with every fiber of his being that he shouldn’t talk, but a strange and unexpected calmness and clarity washed over him. He realized that if he chose his words well he might be out in minutes, not hours or days. Pat proceeded slowly. “It does seem like a pretty big coincidence, I have to admit, but yes, that is what I expect you to be
lieve.”
“Is it the truth?” Doug asked, very loudly and leaning close enough to spray spit on Pat. “It’s what I expect you to believe,” Pat said calmly, his confidence building.
Most people who meet Doug think that they can outsmart him, but it’s harder than it looks, and Pat was playing with fire.
“What the hell kind of answer is that?” Doug said. Given that it was a rhetorical question and Kyle didn’t know what to do, the three sat in silence. Pat knew that he shouldn’t be talking at all in this negotiation-like situation, so he wasn’t about to be the next to speak. The three exchanged glances. Doug rose from the table and turned to leave, but turned back to Pat. “We know you’ve gotten burner cell phone calls from Tommy. When we subpoena your phone records, I’m pretty sure we’re going to see a whole bunch of those calls, and we’ll tie you to Tommy.”
Pat thought for a moment before answering, and then words again came out slowly and with scrutiny. “I do get a lot of calls, and some are from Tommy, but unless you have been following him around as he drops phones all over town . . . or you have recordings of these conversations . . .”
Pat paused, thought further, and decided to continue. “I have also been interfacing with Mark Schmidt and numerous others in the industry. It’s what we do. I may even have a selfie of me and Mark at an industry event on my phone that you might want to check out.”
“What?!” Doug yelled.
“You know. A picture with me and him that I took,” Pat replied.
“I know what a fucking selfie is, you dick,” Doug screamed, obviously shaken by Pat’s brazen attitude.
Doug turned to Kyle and said, “You can deal with him. He’s not my concern. I have a guy in the next room who I’m thinking of charging with murder, but regardless of that decision, he’s going to be tied up here for quite a while.” Doug turned toward Pat to gauge his reaction.
The Squeeze Page 21