“Haven’t you—haven’t we—done that enough? Besides, there is nothing we can do or change,” Pat said.
“Good point. So, you want to get a beer? Some place outside?”
“Together?” Pat asked.
“Eh, what the hell. It will give Kyle and Doug something to do. Do you see either of them?” Both men looked up and down the street and peered into a small restaurant next door, not seeing either of the two men who had occupied the periphery of their lives for months.
“Maybe they’re giving up on us,” Pat said, somewhat hopefully, but knowing full well that wasn’t reality.
“I doubt that, but who knows? Besides, we won’t be talking about trading,” Tommy said.
The two friends walked less than a block, sat down at the first outdoor table they saw and ordered a beer. They sat there for hours, talking about family, friends, and college. Reminiscing about their youth reinvigorated their bond, and somewhere inside each of them, they realized that loyalty, friendship, and history outweighed all of the recent events. But still, somewhere even deeper within them, they each thought about Jenny and what might have happened with John. But they didn’t talk about it. Neither gave a thought to Mark or carbon markets. That could wait until tomorrow.
48
Tommy’s wait for sleep and for Friday seemed interminable. He went for a run and sat down in his kitchen for the breakfast that he picked up at the corner coffee shop. Trading had opened shortly before he fired up his laptop and Tommy noted the market ended up eight percent for Thursday and was already up in Friday’s early day trading.
Tommy thought about John. He must be out of his mind and maybe just hours away from losing all or most of his money. Tommy wasn’t getting nearly the pleasure from this knowledge that he expected. In fact, he just felt bad. Tommy had spent so much time hating and blaming John that he never fully accepted his responsibility for the mess. He was greedy and selfish. Seeing how badly the relationship with John ended reminded Tommy of him and his step dad. Tommy had originally thought that he could fix him too, just like John. Tommy had let things go to hell before his stepdad died without ever making things right.
Maybe he didn’t need to do that with John, too.
Today was a new day, he thought, and he needed to change, or he would never have a chance with Jenny. She deserved and would demand better than the bitter person Tommy was becoming. Maybe he could convince Mark to somehow ease the pressure off by working out a deal to let Pat sell to John at a discount to the market so John could walk away other than broke. Mark had made his point, the market was stabilizing, and he had won. There was no reason to completely bury John.
Tommy picked up the phone and dialed. The voice on the other end was clear and professional. “Good morning. This is Mark Schmidt’s office. May I help you?”
“Yes, this is Tommy Gardner. Can I speak with Mark?”
“No, he’s not available. You can leave a message . . . wait, I see he can now take your call via his cell phone. Please hold. I will connect you.”
Mark picked up immediately. “Surprised you are calling, but I have something to cover with you, too.”
“Yeah, I’ve been thinking a lot, and I would like to talk, but not over the phone. Can you meet me in the next hour? It’s urgent.”
“Well, I can meet you, but at the University of Chicago Hospital. Evidently there’s been an accident. It’s John,” Mark said.
“What happened?” Tommy asked.
“I’ll find out and tell you when you get here. They just reached John’s brother now. They had contacted me first because they found my business card in his pocket. It was last night. I just arrived at the hospital,” Mark said.
“I’ll meet you there,” Tommy said and hung up. He felt sick. His first thought was suicide. Had he driven John that far? Regardless, it had to be his fault. He went into the bathroom, threw up his breakfast, got dressed, and took a cab to the hospital.
As he exited the cab, he was hopelessly disoriented. The hospital buildings appeared to be shoehorned in one addition after another. After two false starts at reception desks in other buildings, Tommy found the right waiting room. John had been transferred from emergency to ICU.
He scanned the waiting room to see Mark in the corner, facing him, and talking to a woman.
Tommy approached, catching Mark’s eye, and he and the woman both turned to him. Tommy was shocked to see it was George’s widow, Deb. Tommy said, “Oh, hey, uh, I’m surprised to see you here. How are you doing?”
Deb said, “Mark called me. He knew that I wanted to talk to John. I was just waiting for the right time. Now I’m worried that I won’t get that chance.”
Tommy turned to Mark, confused by Deb’s comments. “Is it that bad?”
Mark said, “It appears so. There was a car accident, and his body was crushed. We’ll know soon from what I have been told.” As Mark finished his sentence, Deb turned and slowly shuffled away to stare at the snack vending machine. She was waiting around for something, but Tommy couldn’t tell what.
“So . . . I wasn't aware that you even knew Deb,” Tommy said.
“I’ve been communicating with her a bit since George’s death. I met her a couple of times through George,” Mark explained.
“Oh, um, that’s nice of you,” Tommy said, still slightly confused by the relationship.
Deb returned with a very hard and dry granola bar and asked Mark if he’d take a walk, but in a tone that didn’t sound much like a question. He obliged, leaving Tommy alone. Since he hadn’t even talked to a doctor or nurse, he didn’t know exactly what he was waiting for, but he waited, and waited, and waited until Deb and Mark finally returned.
Deb, Mark, and Tommy didn’t speak at first. They each stared mindlessly at their phones, moving about the waiting room, avoiding conversation and each other. Finally, an individual who looked surprisingly young for the name tag, “Dr. Montgomery—Surgery” came up to Mark. Clearly, they had spoken previously. The doctor spoke first.
“John’s brother won’t be in town until tonight, and he authorized me to be able to share with you any relevant medical information. He wasn’t close to John and figures that you people are.”
“Well, what can you tell us?” Mark asked.
“Well, I’m afraid to tell you that the timing of his brother’s arrival really won’t matter much. Mr. DeFallo’s injuries are too severe. To tell you the truth I have no idea how his heart is still beating. Pretty much other than his heart and lungs, his organs are mush. He will die soon.”
Mark, Deb, and Tommy were startled by his candor, and they hoped that his bedside manner improved before John’s brother arrived.
“Can we see him?” Deb asked.
“It’s a bit unusual because the family isn’t here, but his brother did send a release, so it clearly shouldn’t be an issue,” the doctor said. “I’ll have a nurse escort you.”
The three entered cautiously. John was unconscious, but looked to be resting comfortably. That is, if comfortable could occur with tubes up one’s nose and mouth and wires extending from all parts. The sucking and clunking of the breathing machine went unnoticed.
Deb went around the far side of the bed. Mark and Tommy watched her attentively from the side nearest the door. The nurse had barely given them a look before moving on. The sun rushed in through the window, making John and Mark look old under the glare and Deb look younger, as the glow from behind her was ethereal. It also drowned out details, including any emotion on her face.
She started to talk to John, keeping her arms folded in front of her. “Well, it looks like I won’t be able to follow through fully on a request George made, but at least one of the two of you will get this message.”
She glanced at Tommy as she ended her sentence, including him in on what was to come next. Deb continued, “George wanted me to relay a simple sentence to you both. He said I would know when the time was right. I’m guessing that time was coming very soon, probably even today
from what Mark has told me.” She appeared calm, and she continued, “A couple of days after George died I received a note in the mail in his handwriting. Among other instructions, he said that he loved me and our children, and he would do anything for us. I never showed the police, and if you push me, I will deny that I ever received it.”
Tommy’s heart was pounding, but he didn’t understand why. Tommy couldn’t wait any longer to speak. “I assume there was also a message for me and John . . .”
“Yes,” Deb said. “The message to both of you was simple, ‘I went to a doctor. I knew.”’
Tommy stepped back from the bed. His eyes darted around the room.
Mark watched him calmly, closely. Deb looked somewhat satisfied by the confusion on Tommy’s face, then nodded to Mark indicating that she was going to leave the room, and for that matter, the hospital. Tommy didn’t even see Deb leave. He was still trying to process that short statement.
Tommy remembered hearing from Doug that George had terminal cancer, but everyone had assumed that George didn’t know. Mark closed the door and took up Deb’s spot on the opposite side of John’s bed from Tommy.
It took only those few more seconds for words to start pouring out of Tommy’s mouth, much more for himself than for Mark. “George went to the doctor . . . so he knew he was dying . . . he wanted to take care of his family . . . my god, the business had a ten-million-dollar policy on George. The business got half and Deb got half. So, George killed himself or had himself killed?! That doesn’t make sense. He could have just waited and gotten the money for his family when he died if he was that sick.” Tommy paused as he continued to process things. “But of course, if we sold before he died, the policy would have ended. And if we did try to sell, he must have known this whole mess would have been uncovered before the sale closed, and he wouldn’t have gotten a dime. Jesus, not only must he have been behind the falsified trades, he set me and John up to go after each other. My god, once he knew we were selling, it was the only way he was going to get any money for his family …” Mark continued to watch Tommy try to make sense of it.
“But you can’t throw yourself into a tree . . .” Tommy finally looked up at Mark. “You helped him, didn’t you? You killed him!”
Mark was still very calm. He had the benefit of time to think this exchange through. “George asked me for a couple of favors, and I obliged. I set up and attended a meeting, but it’s not what you think,” Mark said.
“You had him killed!” Tommy screamed.
“I didn’t say that, and I didn’t do that. I facilitated an introduction or two as a favor to George. Then I get an anonymous call that there is evidence that my facilitation ended up with George being killed, so now I’m an accessory to murder if this thing ever comes to light. Oh, and by the way, if you don’t keep it together, this conversation will end sooner than I’m guessing you want it to.”
“Okay, so he was going to die a slow and painful death. He also most likely would have died when the insurance policy expired, so you helped him kill himself,” Tommy said.
“Not knowingly,” Mark said.
“But why put me and John in the middle of this? The incriminating voicemail message to me? Doing it right in John’s backyard? We took good care of him,” Tommy offered. “That part must have been your idea. You wanted me and John out of your hair. You knew what George had done to our business and set this whole thing up! You knew that we would have to come crawling to you when we found out about the falsified trades. And with the deal you cut for McKinstry stock . . . that will be worth hundreds of millions, you son of a bitch!” Tommy was enraged, but somehow restraining himself. He knew one more blow-up and Mark would just walk out, and then Tommy might never learn more about what happened.
The two men spoke quietly, but intensely, like nothing else in the world existed for those few minutes. Neither thought anything about how strange it might appear to be talking over John’s mangled body.
“George and Deb felt like neither of you ever treated him as your partner. You moved him around, tossing him a few hundred grand each time one of the two of you made tens of millions. He thought it could happen again unless he did something about it. I did figure George was up to something, so I put things in place to own a good chunk of McKinstry if my hunch was right but I didn’t know exactly what he was doing. What he did was his business and his idea, not mine,” Mark said.
“Even if that’s true you still screwed me and John out of our business.”
“George screwed you out of your business. I was just around to benefit,” Mark responded coldly.
If what Mark said was true, Tommy could start to see more of the vindictive genius in George’s plan. He knew given Paul Smith’s death that a second accident would result in Tommy being a suspect. Maybe George was even in on framing Mark. It would be good to have a guy with that kind of power on your side and in a position to clean up any loose ends. George probably wanted that to make sure Deb could hang onto the insurance money.
“So, was George John’s partner in Big Mountain? Was he RD Partners? Did he take this thing that far to pit John and me against each other?!” Tommy asked.
“No. It had to be someone else. George couldn’t afford to have that money traced back to him or Deb. The insurance money was all he could get, but he was clearly behind the falsified trades. Maybe this whole thing was the brain cancer messing with his thinking. I just don’t know,” Mark offered.
“You helped a guy kill himself. You’re a felon, and you should go to prison.”
“Oh, and you’re not?” Mark shot back.
“Murder and finance are two different things,” Tommy reasoned.
“There is more going on here than you can handle. Don’t you get it? With what just happened to John, things have escalated.”
“Is that supposed to scare me away?”
“If you were smart, it would.”
“If I go away now, then you are one of the winners in all this,” Tommy said.
“Well, financially, but someone knows that I helped George and I could have an accessory to murder hanging over my head forever,” Mark explained.
“Who knows?” Tommy asked.
“Who do you think?”
“RD Partners? Tell me who that is,” Tommy demanded.
“Whoever it is was willing to kill John. Do you think they’ll stop short of taking you or me down? Probably the only reason I’m still alive is that I need to clean up this mess, and they have me over a barrel,” Mark said. “Or you are playing me.”
“Do you want to take that chance?” Mark asked.
“Listen, you son of a bitch. You’re not going to get away with this,” Tommy was growing more animated.
“Do you really want to do this again? Go down this path of revenge? Best case scenario is you prove it was suicide, and then the insurance company takes the money away from Deb and her kids. Or if it gets pointed toward me or RD Partners . . .” Mark paused and glared at Tommy. “Might be time for you to let go and move on.”
“I don’t think so. You’ll be hearing from me,” Tommy growled through clenched teeth and stormed towards the door.
“Suit yourself, but that girlfriend of yours isn’t going to wait forever for you to get your head out of your ass. Plus, next time, it might be you or me in this bed,” Mark said.
“Keep with the threats. That will only get me more motivated to follow through.”
“When it turns out that John’s car was tampered with, or that someone ran him off the road, it will be one more strange event in an already bizarre situation. Do you really feel safe? You need to listen to me very closely. I’m sure I can help make this murder thing go away for you and the securities fraud charges too, but you and Pat need to do the right thing to make that happen. Otherwise, it seems like people close to all of this can end up with some bad luck,” Mark said.
“That sounded like a favor, and another threat,” Tommy said.
“I can see you taking it both
ways,” Mark said.
“How can you make this go away, and why should I trust you?”
“I do have a lot to gain financially if this market holds together, and I would like to stay out of prison, too. There are enough guilty looking parties to go around. Some well-placed calls or information leaks could have evidence pointing all over the place. An attorney looking for reasonable doubt could find an unreasonable level of doubt for their client, whoever that client happens to be. Besides, what’s your alternative?”
Tommy glared at Mark for a second, then looked at John and gently closed the door behind him.
49
Doug really didn’t have much of a life outside of work. Like many police officers and investigators before him, the job ate away a lot of who he was, leaving an empty spot Doug chose to fill with beer and more work. He had gotten divorced, and his kids grew up and moved out to the suburbs. Now the job that had cost him so much was the only thing he had left.
The night of John’s car crash, Doug was sitting at his kitchen table with a beer, staring at an array of notes, pictures, and timelines. The pictures of George and of Paul Smith kept getting his attention. He had tried so hard to prove that there was a connection, but now he realized it didn’t likely exist. Thanks to Kyle, he had other suspects. Mark and the two brothers from John's past had to be involved. If John was still tight with those brothers, how could he not know? Then there was John's mystery business partners with the forty million dollars and many other reasons to remain anonymous. He needed, somehow, to sort it out quickly; progress on the cases had bought him some extra time, but his job was still on the line. Doug turned up his police radio as he thought and stared and drank.
It took until the third mention of John DeFallo being transported to the hospital for it to register with Doug. The voice over the radio instructed the accident investigation team to treat it like a death-related accident. That obviously told Doug that John was in really bad shape. Another dead body showing up was more than Doug could chalk up to coincidence.
The Squeeze Page 26