The Big Con

by Adam Walker Phillips

  “I’ll check that county in Florida where she was raised. If she went back there, there must be some record of it.” And not that I needed further clarification, but Badger added, “I’ll start with the death records.”

  “How does the money work?” I asked. “We know it’s old so it probably originates from Maggie’s time in Arizona and is connected to her arrest.”

  “It could have been the real Julie’s money.”

  “That doesn’t match the librarian profile.”

  “It has to be drug money, then.”

  “That sits for thirty years,” I added. “Why didn’t she spend it?”

  “How do you know she didn’t?”

  I had heard the story of Power of One’s rise from obscurity countless times over the years. Self-made people have an insatiable appetite for chronicling the steps leading to their success, and Julie was no exception. In all of the retellings, I never got a sense that there was a large pool of money funding the business.

  “Also, the money only surfaced in the last year or two,” I added. “Large transfers to Lois, payments to Fitch, activity at a secret bank account in Pasadena.”

  “And Fitch declared that his sister croaked last year,” Badger threw in. “One reason you make it official is to get access to their belongings.”

  “Next of kin,” I finished for him.

  One question partially answered only succeeded in spawning several more to replace it. Our attempts to unravel this crisscross of relationships led to the same place—a vague trail pointing back east and disappearing on the horizon leading to the desert.

  “Maybe that detective in Phoenix can fill some stuff in for us,” I offered.

  “As long as the Alzheimer’s hasn’t kicked in,” Badger scoffed.

  Badger often felt threatened when anyone trespassed on his turf, but I ignored his snub and placed a call on speaker. Detective Fortin was a key link in this story and we needed his help. He answered on the third ring.

  “I’m mad at you, Mr. Restic.”

  “Why’s that, sir?” I said into the conference phone.

  “Because you got me thinking about work again,” he answered. “I’m supposed to be retired.”

  “Enjoy the rest of your life,” Badger threw out.

  “What’s that?” Fortin asked.

  “Nothing,” I answered, and shot Badger a look. “I got the sense you rather enjoyed your work.”

  “Love-hate, more accurate,” he said. “Cost me a family, among other things. I’d rather not have it cost me my retirement, too.”

  I thought about that statement and momentarily got lost in an evaluation of my own life’s work. I struggled with the passion he expressed, not because I didn’t think it was sincere, but because I had so little for mine. While the detective’s career-long struggle was that of never finding the right work-life balance, I grappled with the question of whether I could remain in such a state of indifference about my career for forty years.

  “I’m having a hard time hearing you,” I said. There was a fair amount of background noise coming through his line.

  “That’s my retirement,” he said. Detective Fortin explained he was on his way to the mountains for a week’s worth of fishing and drinking.

  “Alone?”

  “Is there any other way?”

  “I’m just looking for some more information on Maggie Fitch,” I said. “I think I found her.”

  The only response I got was the road noise from his phone. The detective ember still burned. I let him stoke it for a while in silence.

  “Good ole Maggie,” his voice whistled.

  “The one who got away,” Badger quipped.

  “Oh, I got her,” he shot back. “I just never had her mounted on my den wall.”

  I asked the detective a series of clarifying questions about Maggie’s arrest and subsequent disappearance. I was particularly interested in how she made bail, given that it was such a large sum. I purposely ignored Badger’s gaze, knowing it was his idea in the first place.

  The detective answered some of my questions half-heartedly. The rest he ignored. He was clearly distracted, but it was the good kind of distraction.

  “Did he fall asleep?” Badger whispered to me.

  Over the speakerphone, we heard the car noise slowly die down. There seemed to be some movement and then the noise picked back up again.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “You know what I’m doing,” he replied.

  “Having a stroke,” Badger said under his breath.

  “How long will it take you to get out here?” I asked with a smile.

  “Give me a day or two to collect some stuff back in Phoenix then I’ll look you up in La La Land.”

  COLOR OF SUCCESS

  There were two distinct groups among the sixty or so people who showed up to the memorial service at the Palos Verdes house, but neither came to honor Julie.

  The executives freely roamed the compound like a long-term houseguest who is overly comfortable in someone else’s home. Most looked a little miffed that access to the Dojo was blocked off by stanchions. “Lots of great memories,” I overheard Pat Faber remark to another C-suite member as they stared down the long corridor leading to the scene of the crime. Precious recollections of company-funded development sessions would have to wait.

  Manning the fringes and clogging up the doorways were the Executive Coaches, Leadership Gurus, Productivity Mavens, and Success Mindset Experts. The coaches mostly talked over each other about the numerous “breakthroughs” their programs/books/seminars/webinars were delivering. All these projections of success didn’t seem to manifest themselves monetarily, though. Their clothes were a little shabby and foreshadowed the sensible compact cars with 150K miles waiting for them down the road and out of sight of the executives’ luxury sedans.

  The room had correctly sized me up for what I was—a mid-level manager of little significance. I fell short of the status needed to garner the resentment of other executives but not high enough to get the attention of the coaches looking to land another gig. In this realm of the undesirables, I was able to witness the depressing event in peace from the comfort of an armchair.

  There was no memorializing of the deceased—Julie’s name was almost never mentioned—and there were no condolences offered to the deceased’s widow; Rebecca was just a stranger in her own home as she hung around the cheese table. In a simple black shirt and pants, she looked more like one of the caterers than the chief consolee. The few times someone paid their respects to her occurred after they’d shoved a block of smoked gouda in their mouths only to realize the person giving them the napkin was the bereaved party.

  The memorial somehow managed to outdo the most insincere of celebrations: the office birthday party. The vapid conversations were that much emptier. The political maneuvering was that much more obvious. Executives one-upped each other with plans for ski vacations, and the coaches jostled each other in the hallway leading to the bathroom so they could be the first to give their elevator pitch to anyone waiting in line.

  I had feared the memorial would be a sham but I wasn’t ready for this version of it. Rebecca had taken the call from the Palos Verdes police informing her that the extensive search of the vast shipping port below the Vincent Thomas Bridge (for a body that wasn’t there) was sufficient to officially declare Julie dead. Rebecca surprised me by immediately organizing a service. As I sat there watching the display in front of me, I tried to figure out her motivation but couldn’t come up with anything plausible.

  “Meditating?” a voice asked.

  Bronson Thibideux sat down next to me. He apparently didn’t deem it necessary to darken his attire for the occasion, but his assistant hovering nearby more than made up for it as she was dressed like a twice-widowed Sicilian grandmother. The only thing missing was a black veil. She looked a little unsure of her role at that moment, particularly whether she should sit down and join us. Bronson helped clear up the conf
usion.

  “I thought I saw them laying out a pouch of Long Jing tea,” he said. “Be nice on a cold day like today.”

  It took her a second to grasp what she was being told. It actually took longer than a second and required Bronson to shoot her a look that told her to scram.

  “Why don’t I brew a pot,” she chirped, and immediately set off on her errand. That left me and Bronson to discuss whatever it was he had on his mind. But he decided to let me lead.

  “The consultant community made a good showing,” I said, looking out at the gathering.

  “They came for the free food,” Bronson replied. “It looks more like a Fleecing Expo at the Convention Center than a memorial.”

  “These are your people,” I said.

  “Not my kind,” he shot back.

  Unlike his fellow consultants skulking on the fringes of the crowd, Bronson confidently trolled the executive turf. He swapped stories like a member of the club. Judging from the quality of his clothes, I was certain he had no need to park his car down the road, far out of sight of any of the executives’ judging eyes.

  “What were you doing snooping around that house in Burbank?” he asked. That caught me off guard and I struggled to find a response. He filled the void with another question even more direct than the first: “And why the hell did you call the police?”

  Bronson was a little too comfortable and casual in his line of questioning, especially when factoring in what happened to Hearns.

  “I thought the police might be interested in the man you left for dead in the garage,” I answered in a tone that matched his.

  “I had nothing to do with that,” he said firmly.

  Even if true, there was still the fact that Bronson did nothing to help the man. As if sensing my scorn, he added, “They were all in on it.”

  “In on what? And who is they?”

  “You tell me,” he replied. “You seem to know just about everything.”

  This commenced a five-minute sparring match in which we tried to out-deflect each other. I found myself answering more of his questions than he answered of mine and suddenly wished the flunkey would hurry back with that tea. I had the feeling we might not see her for a while.

  “What were you doing in Hearns’s house?” I asked, trying once again to get the focus back on him. “I left that detail out in my account to the police but could easily recollect it.”

  “And maybe you could recollect for them why you were in the house, too.”

  “I’m trying to help Rebecca clear her wife’s name,” I said, feeling the need to explain. “We don’t think Julie murdered Lois or the man they found in Sierra Madre.”

  “But what do you think?” he asked, picking up on the collective “we” that people like to use when they want to hide. “No one ever thinks their loved one is capable of such a horrific crime.”

  The only way to win this game was to stop playing and say nothing. Apparently Bronson was as uncomfortable with silence as the rest of us and decided to fill it. “I wouldn’t be surprised by anything about Julie,” he said. “She’s rotten.”

  I wondered how much he knew. It was possible he knew as much or more than I did about her true identity.

  “I broke into the house to recover a document. Julie screwed me on a deal with that ‘artist’ and I’m trying to undo it. Given all that’s going on I could just let it go, but I thought it might be better to clean it up myself.”

  “Why did you agree to purchase Power of One?” I asked.

  That at least got him to stop gazing out at the executive-and-coach waltz playing before us. He looked at me more like a respected adversary than the peon who was thirsty for his wisdom.

  “It was a mistake that I’m trying to undo.”

  “How much money are we talking about?”

  “Money for what? The company? It’s not much,” he said, answering his own question. “It’s the reputation risk that matters.” He waved his hand at the surroundings. “And I can’t let all this…silliness besmirch my name.”

  There existed countless words to describe the events of the past week and yet he chose that one. It was a surprisingly candid explanation told in an unnervingly ho-hum way.

  “I stole back what was stolen from me,” he said. “No harm, no foul.”

  He began to look bored with the whole thing. With a tiny attention span, Bronson was more executive than coach and signaled that he wanted to move on to another topic.

  “I look forward to working with you on some programs,” he told me. There were a lot of assumptions in that statement, namely that he would be granted the contract with my firm.

  “We’ll do our due diligence and see where we land,” I answered in a way that promised nothing and if anything, signaled to him that he should be prepared for an unsatisfactory outcome.

  “We’ll see,” he said in a patronizing manner. He all but patted me on the head and called me “cricket.”

  I stewed and let the conversations around us fill the silence. One to my right involved a particularly shrill coach bemoaning the new healthcare requirements and recent minimum-wage hikes burdening her small business. The costs of cut-rate insurance and a barely livable wage apparently inhibited her ability to deliver her new program.

  “And which one is that?” Bronson challenged.

  The coach studied him warily. Bronson had a penetrating gaze that made you question everything you were about to say.

  “An eight-week seminar on achieving ‘Dignity at Work’?” she replied, more as a question than anything else.

  “‘Dignity.’” He smiled. Bronson then turned back to me. “Who do you think they’re helping?” he asked cryptically and loud enough for anyone nearby to hear.

  I glanced around, sensing the awkwardness of the moment.

  “I don’t understand the question,” I deflected.

  “All of these people,” he gestured. “Who are they helping?”

  I felt the impending cruelty in the answer to that question, meted out on the gurus surrounding us. I decided to make light of the whole thing.

  “Oh, I don’t know…maybe a bunch of insecure executives with enormous egos who have over time convinced themselves they deserve what they’ve been given but every now and then need reminders of how special they are. There’s big money in that.”

  Bronson smiled. The gurus exhaled.

  “How long did it take you to write that out?” he asked.

  “Been giving it some thought lately.”

  “Well, you’re half right,” he said, and leaned in to whisper. “Most of these folks are attracted to this trade for personal reasons.” Bronson waved his hand at the people around us. I followed his hand and surveyed the small group of off-the-rack shirts and pantsuits that purported to project professionalism but in reality did the opposite. “They’re damaged people channeling their own weaknesses into a program to help others overcome that which they can’t. Their greatest success comes from the work they do with themselves.”

  “Well, it’s a good thing you have that Chroma-Map doodad to give you so many insights into the human mind,” I said, smiling.

  “Chuck,” he said, patting me on the knee, “I don’t need some dumb tool to tell me what I already know about people.”

  As Bronson stood up and glided over to collect the cup of green tea waiting for him, I was convinced that had he actually been wearing his Chroma-Map, it would have been pure black.

  The memorial was over not long after it started. Executives drifted out in dribs and drabs, and once that pool was depleted, the leadership gurus left en masse. All that remained were the catering folks with thousands of dollars’ worth of food destined for the dumpster.

  Rebecca and I stood in front of the long gas fireplace built into the living-room wall. The blue gas flame flickered through white stones. You had to all but put your hands on the glass to feel any heat.

  “I’m done, Chuck.”

  I turned back to face her.

  �
�Done with what?”

  “All of it,” she answered. “The whole search.”

  “For Julie?”

  She nodded, and I finally started to understand, at least partially, Rebecca’s decision to hold a memorial for someone still alive—it was a way for her to apply an ending that had so far eluded her.

  “Call it what you want,” she said. “Energy, heart, desire, need—I don’t have enough of any of them to continue looking for someone who’d rather not be found. This is the part where someone suggests it might be better if she were actually dead,” she added. “Goddamn…” she faltered, “that doesn’t help a bit.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, continuing my tradition of conjuring up hollow words at the very worst time.

  “People like to apologize for things they didn’t do,” she said, “but rarely for the things they actually did.”

  For some reason, she then related a conversation about me she’d had with Julie years ago. “She explicitly instructed that you were never, under any circumstance, to get an invite to the Dojo. You were permanently persona non grata.”

  “I knew it!” I said, vindicated that my feelings of exclusion weren’t those of an overly insecure person. “I have to admit, I sort of wanted to go.”

  “Trust me, you weren’t missing much.”

  We rehashed memories from working together while the catering crew folded up the tables. It felt like both of us were delaying something. After some time, while the last of the racks of glassware were wheeled out the front door, Rebecca announced:

  “I’m having surgery on Thursday.”

  I had the urge to make a physical connection, something as simple as squeezing her hand or placing my arm around her. But I did neither. We stood side by side with our backs to the fire and said nothing. Rebecca seemed at peace or just plain exhausted with everything. In either case, it sounded like she had found some level of comfort.

  “What a sorry excuse for a fire,” she said.

  AFTER HOURS