Broken Trust

by W. E. B Griffin

  She really is one stunning woman.

  But where the hell is she going? Not to her room?

  I would really be an unmitigated bastard if I wound up sleeping with her.

  Especially since I am engaged. At least, I think I’m still engaged.

  No, not a problem—jumping her is not even a remote possibility.

  But given that I’m even considering the idea, however remote, with all that’s happened today, proves that I am an unmitigated bastard.

  He came around the corner in time to see her going into the entrance to the condominium lobby.

  Oh boy.

  Not only absolutely proves that I am the poster boy for unmitigated bastards but also that a stiff prick hath no conscience.

  Keep repeating: Listen to what she has to say, then leave . . .

  He went through the lobby and found her standing just inside an elevator. She held out her right foot, the high heel shoe keeping the doors from closing. She motioned for him to move faster. Standing behind her was an attractive, well-dressed couple, each holding what appeared to be a flute of champagne.

  The elevator alarm buzzed.

  “Matthew, hurry—please!” Camilla Rose said, and smiled.

  Payne moved quickly to the elevator. As he stepped in, his phone began ringing. He looked at it.

  She moved her foot from the door. The elevator doors started closing.

  “I have to take this,” he said, quickly turning sideways and stepping back off. “I’ll catch up.”

  Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her watching with a perplexed expression just as the doors shut.

  The elevator ascended.

  Payne put the phone to his head.

  “Nice timing, Tony. Think I just dodged another bullet. What’s up?”

  After listening to Harris, his phone vibrated and he quickly checked its glass screen. Camilla Rose had texted her unit number.

  “Sure,” Payne then said to Harris. “I’m free.”

  [ FOUR ]

  The Union League

  140 South Broad Street

  Philadelphia

  Thursday, January 5, 9:35 P.M.

  Matt Payne was alone at the large, heavy wooden bar—there were only two other men, both in business suits, at the far end of the room—draining his third scotch whisky with a splash of water. He saw Baxter step into the doorway from the front desk stand, look toward Payne, and then with his left arm make a sweeping gesture into the room. Tony Harris then appeared from the corridor. He was carrying a large file folder.

  Baxter, who had been at the Union League for as long as Payne could remember, and had to be in his eighties, scowled his disapproval as Payne raised his scotch glass toward him and smiled and waved.

  Baxter then bowed slightly and slipped away as Harris crossed the room.

  “I never get tired of this place,” Harris said as he took the seat next to Payne. “It’s like stepping back in time. The ambience drips of Old World Philadelphia circa 1862.”

  Founded during the Civil War as a patriotic society, the Union League of Philadelphia long boasted a membership of great wealth and power. Its enormous historic brownstone—with its iconic pair of curved stone staircases dramatically leading up to the heavy wooden doors of the main entrance on the second level—occupied an entire Center City block in the shadow of high-rises housing the offices of Fortune 500 corporations and just steps south of City Hall.

  Harris scanned the large, high-ceilinged room. The polished-marble floor highlighted the exotic rugs. There was rich wood paneling and leather-upholstered furniture. The corridors were lined with bronze and marble busts and sculptures, as well as presidential portraits and paintings of man-o’-wars sailing the high seas.

  Harris then saw that Payne had his smartphone on the bar.

  “Still having trouble not breaking rules, I see,” he said.

  A sign was prominently posted near the front desk—ostensibly for guests but certain members required constant reminding—that League policy prohibited cellular telephone conversations. The signs also stated that the devices should be turned off.

  Payne, like many others, simply put his phone on SILENT and, except for now, out of sight.

  “No one here for me to annoy, unfortunately,” Payne said as the bartender approached. “What’s your poison?”

  “Club soda for now, please,” Harris told the bartender, who nodded and turned away.

  “You trying to make me feel bad? Or worse than I already do?”

  “I might have something stiffer, in a bit,” Harris said, pulling papers out of the folder. He slid the top sheet on the bar in front of Payne.

  “Before we get into this,” Payne said, “let me add to what I said Camilla Rose told me in the car. About an hour ago, I decided to grab a bite at the Library Bar after an interesting evening with Amanda—”

  “You say that like it’s not good,” Harris interrupted.

  Payne grimaced.

  “And it really is not good,” he said, “but I’ll not burden you with my personal troubles.”

  “You know I’ll be your sounding board anytime . . .”

  “Yeah, I do. And I appreciate it, Tony. But not right now, thanks. I don’t want to think about it, let alone talk about it. Label me as being in deep denial.”

  “Ours is a shitty business for relationships. If it’s any consolation, we’ve all been through it.”

  The bartender placed a tall glass of club soda on a napkin in front of Harris and silently slipped away.

  “Misery loves company—cheers to that!” Payne said, and touched his glass to Harris’s. “So, anyway, I was walking up to the entrance of the bar full of beautiful people having a grand time when I decided I was really at the wrong place at the wrong time, that I should be having my pity party here, quietly drowning my sorrows . . .”

  A couple minutes later, Payne finished, “And that’s how you helped me dodge another bullet.”

  “Jesus, you really think she was going to jump your bones?”

  “Sure seemed like it. Then, right after I sat down here, she sent a text that said Where are you? I’m out on my terrace. And followed that with this picture of herself by a roaring fireplace.”

  Payne tapped the glass screen of his phone, then Harris looked at it.

  “Holy shit!” Harris blurted. “You took a pass on hooking up with that? You, my friend, have the strength of legions.”

  “Trust me, I’m as weak as the next guy. The thought crossed my mind. But while I went through my first drink here, I knew it was the little head doing the thinking. By the second drink, the big head weighed in and reminded me that party girls are dangerous. So, I called her—wound up getting her voice mail, fortunately—and apologized that work called—which was, literally, true—but that I was waiting to hear what else she said she wanted to share—also true.”

  “Coming on to you while her boyfriend is in the hospital—dangerous is right.”

  “You know, despite what she told you, I don’t think he’s really her boyfriend. She may just be leading him on. I told you she said she wouldn’t marry him.”

  Harris grunted, then said, “Women—who the hell knows?”

  Payne nodded, and thought, And maybe that’s what Amanda’s thinking now about marriage.

  Taking a sip of his scotch, Payne’s eyes went to the sheet of paper on the bar. He picked it up.

  “So, what am I looking at?” he said. “Would appear to be a company’s performance chart.”

  “This is the tip of the iceberg of what we found on Benson,” Harris said, pointing to the printout. “The Krow started digging for data points with his scan software and—bingo! He’s still collecting more open-source intel, but this was what he found after only a few hours.”

  Detective Danny Krowczyk was a Signals Intellige
nce analyst assigned to the Digital Forensic Sciences Unit. The skinny, six-foot-four thirty-year-old’s office attire never varied—jeans, white polo shirt, black sneakers—and his idea of a seven-course meal consisted of a six-pack of diet cola and a package of yellow Tastykake Dreamies.

  Harris went on. “In addition to CEO of NextGenRx, turns out Benson was basically the hands-on head cheerleader of the small start-up. He was aggressive. Had a short temper and was prone to yelling, or firing off rants on social media, at anyone who questioned the company. Actually called them idiots and worse.”

  “Sounds like classic small-dick syndrome,” Payne said, studying the chart. “Maybe too aggressive? That’s what caused the share price to tank?”

  “Good question. All I can tell you is, don’t ever come to me for financial advice.” He gestured toward the sheet. “While I have never heard of NextGenRx before today, it damn sure is well known among the penny stock traders on the over-the-counter exchange. And especially on the investor websites, on their discussion boards, where you cannot count the number of postings by people frustrated and angry with the company. Judging by the posts, more than a few people would not be unhappy to learn what happened to Benson.”

  “Losing money on lousy penny stocks? You think that’s motive to whack the guy? In broad daylight in Center City?”

  Harris tapped his index finger on the stack of sheets of paper by the brown folder.

  “First, I would’ve made fun of penny stocks, too, before I saw the comments on these discussion boards that referenced a Silicon Valley tech giant quietly snapping up a penny stock company that manufactured smart-home technology. When word got out, the share price shot from two-tenths of a cent to four cents—to the tune of three billion bucks. Then went up from there.”

  Payne whistled softly. “I stand corrected.”

  “Second, as to motive, I suppose it depends on how much one loses relative to how much one can afford to lose. And the Mob used to whack people in broad daylight all the time.”

  “Damn it. You’re right again, of course. Jason’s voice just popped in my head. It is a stone to turn over. And likely a big one. What happened with the company?”

  “According to the discussion boards, investors lost confidence.” He pointed to the chart. “Here, some people bailed at or near the top at a dime a share. Others lost money as shares collapsed back to around a penny. Many wrote online that they had given up on a return on investment. At this point, they would have been satisfied with just a return of investment.”

  “So, what caused the stock to nose-dive?”

  “Apparently the company could not provide proof that they (a) actually had a physical product that did what they claimed and (b) one that would be approved by the FDA. Medical device approval by the feds, from what I’ve picked up, is tough as hell. And without that, they had no marketable product. Remember the phrase patent pending? Well, that’s about what they have. Lots of paperwork filed with the U.S. Patent Office. And when certain shareholders asked for independent scientific proof the device worked, Benson said that the company would not show a product until their intellectual property was safely under their patent, then berated them as short sellers bad-mouthing the company in order to profit on the share price drop.”

  “Sounds like The Wizard of Oz: ‘Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.’”

  “Exactly. And when you get an idea of what the device is supposed to do, you really wonder . . . It’s futuristic . . .”

  Payne gestured for him to go on.

  “Remember those eyeglasses they came out with that let you surf the Internet? You essentially are wearing a computer and no one knows what you’re viewing.”

  “Yeah. That was futuristic by itself.”

  “This goes another step further. Instead of glasses, they’re like contact lenses. The surface of an eyeball is a sort of one-stop shop. It can give these special lenses your body’s vital information—temperature, pulse, et cetera. They claim the lenses can also monitor a person’s level of medication. It works with a mobile phone—specifically, a smartphone—”

  “Which is actually just a small, powerful computer that happens to also work as a telephone,” Payne put in, tapping his on the bar.

  “Right. And because it’s also a phone, it can send a report to your doctor. Let’s say you’re diabetic. The user puts an app on the smartphone that checks blood sugar levels and warns you before it’s too low or high. Or if you’re, say, schizophrenic, the app can tell if you’re on your meds—and, if not, then send a report to your doctor. They claim—again, key word claim—eventually the next level will be maintaining medication, so the doctor can send a command that administers your meds through another device.”

  “Jesus. Amazing. No more crazies? Or, at least, fewer? That’s huge. So is reducing diabetic comas.”

  Harris said, “And that, supposedly, is the tip of the iceberg.”

  “What powers the lenses, and how do they communicate to the phone? I mean, you can’t really have wires hanging from your eyeballs.”

  “Exactly. Good questions. And that seems to be exactly what the investors also want to know.”

  “So it’s futuristic. And it’s incredible. But, then, so was the smartphone not too many years ago. Still, if there’s no patent and no FDA-approved device, it’s all speculation. Investors are gambling—arguably, more than usual.” He looked back at the chart. “What am I missing? What caused this spike in price at a dime?”

  “News that there’s been some interest by much larger companies, which suddenly gave the device and company some credibility. The suggestion was made—Benson was accused of using a shill to feed it on the discussion boards—that NextGen was the target of a takeover, and, if that failed to go through, then that the bigger companies would license use of the technology. Sound like another penny stock tale, one that has a happy ending?”

  “And it went down again today,” Payne said, pointing at the sheet. And then his eyebrows rose. “Maybe we should look into getting some shares. Damn, sure looks cheap now.”

  “Might want to wait and see what happens when news of Benson’s death goes public,” Harris said, then grunted. “But, then, I’ve already warned you about taking investment advice from me.”

  He took a long drink of his club soda.

  “Right now,” Harris then said, “until we talk with Austin, it’s the best we have to go on. I also left a message for McGuire asking for a list, if there is one, of anyone requesting protection for the Camilla’s Kids event.”

  Lieutenant Gerry McGuire, a somewhat plump, pleasant-looking forty-five-year-old, was the commanding officer of Dignitary Protection.

  Payne nodded, and he said, “Let’s plan on being at Hahnemann when Austin wakes up tomorrow morning. See what we can get out of him. Then, if I don’t hear back from Mason Morgan—I’ve left voice mail messages on three different numbers—we’ll make a surprise courtesy call at his office . . . Anything new on the shooter’s van?”

  “Well, the doers are still in the wind. Not a trace of the bastards. And not much in the van. There was a little blood in back—like, maybe, from a bloody nose. And the spent shotgun shells. And a burner phone, which Krow’s techs are going through.

  “The security video files that McCrory got from the steak house cameras show the van turning off Walnut and parking at the driveway entrance about an hour before the shooting. The driver—a short, skinny white male—got out to put the orange cones at the front and back bumpers but was very careful to keep his back to the curb and keep his head down to conceal his face. All that can be seen of him is his clothing, including a black cap and gloves.”

  “And the gloves suggest the crime scene guys will be shit outta luck on getting fingerprints off anything—the phone, the shells, the vehicle.”

  “The plates that were on the vehicle came off another white Chevy van, ident
ical make and model.”

  “Of course they did. All of which suggests these particular bad guys aren’t exactly newbies to the trade.”

  Payne’s phone vibrated on the wooden bar, its glass screen illuminated. Both their heads turned toward it.

  Payne saw there was a red box with a text message from 215-555-2398, a local number. It read A guy on staff heard that Morgan lady tell the blond guy, “That’s the last $100K he gets. Not another payment till the bastard produces.” Maybe that’s connected to the shooting?

  Payne showed it to Harris.

  “A hundred grand?” Payne said. “If it’s the same envelope, she said it held only fifty-large.”

  “Who’s that message from?” Harris said.

  “Not sure. Maybe Ryan, the valet. When I dropped off my car to go to the bar, he asked about how someone would submit an anonymous tip on the shooting. I think he knows something. But he denied it. I said we need information now, gave him my number, and told him to share it.”

  “The number for your department-issued cell phone, right? You’re not giving out your mobile number to anyone.”

  “My department phone keeps crapping out, so I leave it plugged in at my desk and forward its calls to one of the throwaway lines on my smartphone. I can add and delete the throwaways all day long with the app. That way, I’ve got everything in one device and my personal number stays private. Don’t need anyone trying to track me down with it.”

  “How do you tell them apart? Who’s calling which of the numbers?”

  “Caller ID usually tells me the name. But if it’s just a number or blocked, the background colors for the ID box are all different.” He pointed. “This throwaway line is red. See? My personal line’s blue.”

  Harris nodded, looked across the bar, then rubbed his chin.

  “You know,” he said, “when we asked her about the cash, she dodged the question. Wouldn’t say which vendors. But we didn’t push her on that, either.”

  “That can be one of the first things I ask her tomorrow,” Payne said, then thumbed a text reply asking when and where the staffer had overheard the conversation about the money.