USA, Inc. (A Mike Wardman Novel: Book 1)

by Larry Kahaner

  Hicks smirked. “They always say that successful negotiations start with two people agreeing on something, anything. Even the weather. So we got that going for us. Before we go further, let me show you something else.” He grabbed Evelyn by her arm and forced her to stand. Then he lugged her to a far wall, where a full-length mirror leaned. Hicks settled her in front so she could see her reflection.

  Evelyn winced when she saw her bruised face and split lip. Blood was caked on her chin. She raised her hands to touch her hair, but Hicks pushed them down. The handcuffs banged together.

  Without saying a word, he shoved her every few steps, until he finally walked her back to the bed and positioned her in an upright sitting position.

  “So, let’s see here. You’re in a room few people know about. You’ll have to take my word for that. You’re in handcuffs. Your face is … well, you saw for yourself.” He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and stuffed it in Evelyn’s mouth. She worked her tongue and spat it out. Hicks picked it up and jammed it into her mouth again. Evelyn heaved a dry retch as the cloth tickled the back of her throat. “Do that again and I will break your beautiful nose.”

  Hicks stepped to a wall and put his ear to it. Evelyn’s eyes blinked as she looked around the room, taking in every piece of it, searching for any means of escape. She watched Hicks as he returned and pulled on the handkerchief, then stopped before it was completely removed.

  He sat back and looked at her eyes, now larger than ever. The tendons in her neck pulsed. Her full body now shivered.

  “There are other people here,” he said. “But they won’t bother us.” He looked at his watch and nodded. “In fact, they’re leaving now. It will be just you and me together for at least, I’d say, three hours. We can cover a lot of ground in that time.”

  He picked up the book and stared at the glossy photo of the statue. He turned it toward Evelyn, then back again. “For the life of me, I still don’t get it. Oh, well.”

  He snapped the book shut. Evelyn jumped.

  “Like I was saying, you and I have three hours to get ourselves squared away on this matter.” He smiled. “I know that I’m going to sound like a cliché, but we can make this easy, or we can make it hard.” He laughed. “I’ve always wanted to say that.”

  His smile turned flat, his face like stone. “I can tell you right now that I’m going to get the statue, because you’re going to tell me where it is. You can tell me now, or you can tell me after I’ve burned one of your pretty blue eyes.” He cupped his hand softly around her neck. Evelyn jerked away.

  Hicks reached into his pocket and removed another pair of handcuffs. He clamped one cuff around Evelyn’s left ankle, dragged her across the floor to a radiator, and snapped the other cuff onto a pipe. He freed one of arms, forced her hands behind her back, and cuffed them there.

  He surveyed Evelyn in this position and smiled. He knelt beside her, yanked the handkerchief from her mouth, and threw it away.

  “Scream all you want,” he said as he slid the moveable wall to the right and disappeared through the opening.

  Chapter 54

  On his car ride to the bank, Richard Kane read the front page of the Wall Street Journal. He grinned when he learned that two states, Texas and California, had broken speed records in placing referenda before voters and tabulating the results. The governors were putting together interim boards pending full elections for their states’ boards of directors. It was all moving faster than Kane had imagined.

  When he reached the page jump, he put the paper down for a minute and thought how blessed he was to be the catalyst for such dynamic change. It didn’t matter to him that only a handful of people knew he was the driving force. What mattered most was that the country was finally on the right path.

  “I did it,” he said loudly.

  “Pardon, sir?” the driver said.

  “Nothing, Bobby. Just talking to myself.”

  The driver smiled. “We’ll be at the bank in about ten minutes, sir.”

  “Very well.”

  Kane pulled out his phone and was just about to dial several other governors, but changed his mind. “California and Texas should be enough for right now,” he said to himself.

  He finished reading the story as his car pulled up to the bank. Kane opened the door himself and leaned into the front window. “You don’t have to wait for me, Bobby. Get yourself a cup of coffee. I’ll call you when I’m done.”

  The driver nodded and pulled away from the curb as soon as his boss entered the bank.

  The First Bank of Easton was a regional bank, small by national standards, which was how Kane liked it. He was the largest depositor by far, even though he’d spread his accounts to other banks and institutions throughout the world. In its early years, the bank was called the First Farmers Bank of Easton, but the name was changed as the number of area farms dwindled and more retired Washingtonians carved the land into estates.

  The First Bank’s lobby was a classic affair, with high ceilings and pillars on the sides. Behind the tellers, a wall-length mural portrayed agrarian life—farmers baling hay with pitchforks, and cows being milked by hand, as life here had been more than a hundred years ago.

  Kane found this ambience more to his liking than the sterile furniture and glass offices of modern banks. The tellers even worked behind metal bars, a feature long removed by other banks wanting to exhibit a more friendly atmosphere. Even though the bank had not suffered a holdup since the 1930s, the bars remained a throwback and signaled the bank’s adherence to its old-fashioned ways.

  Several officers rose from their desks in the middle of the lobby as soon as they spotted Kane. They walked en masse to greet their largest depositor, conduct that Kane found unnecessary and too deferential for his tastes.

  They fell away one by one, leaving only Spalding Chapman, the fourth in his family to run the bank. He guided Kane to his private office and closed the door behind them.

  “Something to drink, Richard?”

  “Not today, thanks, Spalding.” The office was small, austere, with barely enough room for a desk and three chairs for visitors. A bookcase filled one wall; the opposite held framed plaques attesting to the bank’s community service. Behind Chapman, a wide picture window looked out at South Washington Street, with its heavy brick buildings, restaurants, and touristy knickknack shops.

  “It’s nice to see you today, Richard. We hardly see you anymore, what with all your traveling. In town for a while?”

  “Yes, I am,” said Kane, tapping his foot and glancing at his watch.

  Chapman cleared his throat. “Well, then, what can I do for you?”

  “First, some additional funds were supposed to be in my account today. Status?”

  Chapman tapped on his keyboard and swiveled the monitor to face Kane. “The latest deposit was this morning,” he said, pointing. “Does it look right to you?”

  Kane studied the screen and nodded.

  “It’s my regulatory duty to tell you, as I always do, that your deposits exceed FDIC insurance limits. We’re not going under, Richard—I can assure you of that—but I am obligated by regulation to say this.”

  “I’m not concerned about the bank’s health. I’m going to deploy the capital anyway by week’s end. I want to initiate several large positions, and I’ll want them scaled in.”

  Chapman nodded. “I understand.”

  “And I want it done under several account names.” Kane handed Chapman a piece of paper. “Here are the names of these new accounts.”

  Chapman pulled a pad toward him and began taking notes as he read the names. “We can set those up for you today.” He displayed no expression as he wrote. “What else?”

  “I must stress how important it is that we scale in. Buy in pieces, not large chunks. I don’t want any price disruptions.”

  Chapman looked again at the screen. “This large amount will take some effort to get filled, but …” He touched his fingertips. “Leave it to us. It shouldn’t
be a problem. I know just the broker to do this.”

  “And no undue scrutiny,” Kane said.

  “I know precisely what you’re after, Richard. We value our clients and pride ourselves on our ability to serve their needs.”

  “Call me when you’re done,” Kane said as they shook hands.

  Chapman felt a slip of paper in his hand when they parted, as if he were a maître d’ receiving a tip.

  “Let me walk you out, Richard,” said Chapman.

  “Not necessary, Spalding. Thank you.”

  Chapman returned to his desk, opened his hand, and unfolded the paper that Kane had slipped him. He dropped the crumpled sheet on his desk, turned around, and looked out the window. After a minute, he picked it up again and reread the instructions.

  “Well, now. This is going to be interesting,” he whispered.

  Chapter 55

  “We’re on our own,” Mike said.

  Al looked out the hotel window at the parking lot. “You don’t see a sixty-seven Mustang very often. Red, at that.”

  “Did you hear me?” Mike repeated. “We got no backup. My boss cut me loose. We can’t call the cops, because we don’t have legal proof that Hicks kidnapped Evelyn. And let’s not forget the forty-million-dollar statue sitting here on the desk.”

  “I get it. I get it,” Al said. “Listen, we broke in once, and we can do it again. Let’s do it.”

  Mike squinted. “Where is this bravado coming from, Al?”

  “I know this is going to sound sappy, but all my life I’ve been a nerd. I was okay with that for a long time. I was scared of doing anything adventurous outside my computer, until I met you. I mean, look at what you’ve made me do. I helped you blow up a car. I scuba-dived into a fortress and got shot in the process—”

  “Now I’m feeling like shit,” Mike interrupted.

  “Don’t. It was all good. I got bar stories that will definitely get me laid.”

  Mike chuckled, but in the next instant his face went deadpan. “This time it’s different. Hicks is ready for us. The war is on his turf, and he’s just waiting.”

  “Okay. So let me tell you about why nothing scares me anymore.” Al looked down at the rug, and then into the mirror above the desk. He picked up the statue and studied it. “Once you get shot and you wake up on a veterinarian’s operating table, nothing—and I mean nothing—can ever frighten you again.”

  His words hung as he handed the statue to Mike.

  “I guess when you put it that way.”

  “And what about you, Mike? You’re always on top of your game. Don’t you ever get scared?”

  Mike put the statue back on the desk. “Sure. Everyone is scared. You’d have to be crazy not to be scared, especially when someone’s shooting at you, or you have a mission with long odds. But here’s how it goes for me.” He grabbed two beers from the minibar and tossed one to Al.

  “I was sitting on a C-5 Galaxy specially outfitted with about a hundred troop seats. We were heading for Iraq. To be honest, I didn’t want to go. I thought Desert Storm was a bad idea, but I was in the air-force reserves, and when your country calls … I was sitting next to a soldier who had been deployed there before. He told me something that baffled me at the time. I didn’t believe what he was saying, but it turned out he was one hundred percent right.

  “He said that before you enter the warzone, you worry that you’ll die. You can’t sleep and you can’t eat. You’re terrified about what could happen to you. Once you’re there, in the thick of it, and you build bonds with the guys in your unit, you start to pay more attention to their lives than your own. You feel responsible for them. You want to protect them. You’ve built an attachment that is tighter than anything you’ve ever experienced. Civilians can’t understand it. Fears about your own safety become secondary. Your main concern is that one of your comrades could take a bullet. In an odd way, you’re somewhat relieved of the burden of worrying about your own skin. You’ll do anything to save a comrade’s life, even sacrificing your own, or taking a chance you might not have taken, and that makes you a formidable and deadly combatant. This focus makes you a better soldier and, in some ways, fearless. Not reckless, but fearless. That’s what keeps me focused.”

  Mike hesitated. “There’s a downside to this, Al. Survivor’s guilt. You don’t even need to have a buddy die. Just being away from your guys, knowing that you’re out of danger but they’re still under fire, is agonizing. That feeling of helplessness and not knowing is so painful that you may act out in ways that—well, you’ve watched the news about some returning vets and PTSD.”

  Al took a long pull on his beer. “Wow. Shit.”

  They finished their beers in silence, until Mike said, “Al, I have a plan.”

  He scrolled through the photos he’d taken of Kane’s house drawings. “I didn’t see this before. It was in with the blueprints, and I wasn’t really paying attention. I just kept snapping pictures of everything in the architect’s file as fast as I could. It’s the plat drawing of the property. Look at this.”

  Mike indicated several parallel dotted lines leading away from the house. He opened his tablet and read from a Wikipedia entry about antebellum homes. “It was not uncommon for southern plantations to have a short tunnel leading away from the house into neighboring woods or stream banks. The area would be used for hiding silverware, artwork, and other family valuables from the invading Union Army. It could also be used in cases where slave uprisings might end in house burnings. Many of these tunnels were employed just after the Emancipation Proclamation by plantation owners and their families, who escaped as their houses were being engulfed by flames or taken over by now-freed slaves.”

  “Wasn’t Kane’s mansion burned down?” Al asked.

  “Yes. Much of it was destroyed. Here’s the interesting part. Unlike most everything else on plantations, the tunnels were not built by slave labor, as the owners didn’t want their slaves to know about the tunnels.” Mike clicked some of the citations and read the original material. He turned back to the plat. “It’s not marked as a tunnel, but nothing else on the blueprint looks like it. The surveyors thought it was an important enough feature to include it.”

  “Looks like it starts at the safe-room area. It’s got to be a tunnel,” Al said. “You’re right. Nothing else makes sense.”

  “Let’s assume that it is a tunnel, then it comes to …” Mike pointed to the screen. “It looks to be about six hundred feet and it comes out … hang on.” He clicked his phone, and an aerial earth map of the property appeared. He overlaid the two. “It comes out by this group of trees.”

  Al bounced from foot to foot. “Do you think the tunnel is still passable? How do we find the entrance? Wouldn’t it be closed? Wouldn’t there—”

  “It’s a longshot, Al. The tunnel is what, over a hundred and fifty years old? I’m sure it was braced by wooden planks that have surely rotted. Slim chance it’s in good shape.”

  Al sighed and lowered his head.

  “Kane’s men will be on high alert, so there’s no way we can pull the same stunt as last time. I wouldn’t be surprised if they’d mined the stream.”

  Al’s eyes widened. “Really?”

  “I’m kidding, but I have no doubt that Hicks brought in extra guards. No one gets in or out of that place. He knows we’re coming to get Evelyn, and that we can’t bluff our way in. Nothing short of an air assault is going to get through his perimeter. This tunnel, if it really is a tunnel, is our only play. We go tonight.”

  Chapter 56

  Kane sat in his limo and watched the small jet land at Easton Airport, a favorite of corporate pilots, private owners, and Washington officials visiting their weekend houses. He waited for the plane to taxi toward the terminal and cut its engines before he told Bobby to meet it.

  The attorney general stepped off the plane and stood at the top of the stairs. He scanned the bright sky, as if looking for something, then signaled Kane to come onboard. A minute later, Kane sat facin
g the AG. They were alone in the cabin; the pilot and copilot remained in the cockpit with the door closed, making arrangements for the next flight.

  “McKenzie, I want to take off in ten minutes,” the AG said into the intercom phone. He turned to his guest. “What do you have, Richard?”

  Kane handed a manila file folder to the AG, who leafed through its contents quickly, then tossed it onto the adjacent seat.

  “Any problems that I need to know about?”

  Kane shifted in his seat. “We did have one incident at the house, sir. Something was stolen, a piece of art.”

  “When was that?”

  “A few days ago.”

  “Did you call the police?”

  “No, sir. I did not,” Kane said, emphatically.

  The AG cracked his knuckles. “I don’t like this, Richard. We’ve had too many mishaps. I’m inclined to call the whole thing off.”

  “It was just a simple burglary. It had nothing to do with our work. I can assure you of that.”

  The AG shook his head. “What kind of art?”

  “A statue, nothing special,” he lied. “Sir, we’ve gone this far, and—”

  The man waved his hand. “I don’t think so, Richard.” He looked at his watch. “I think we’re done here.”

  “I already have the money in my account. The last of it was deposited today. I’ve been to the bank and had them place the orders.”

  “I’m sorry, Richard.”

  “How about if we alter our arrangement? I’m willing to give up two more points to make this happen.”

  “Hmm. And you’re sure that it was just a simple burglary, nothing to do with us?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Another thing,” he said, “that other matter we talked about. The disruptive fellow. Has he been taken care of?”

  Kane winced. “In all honesty, sir, no.”

  “Four points.”

  “Agreed,” Kane responded immediately.