The Consultant (13 page)

“Sounds like a plan.” Craig sat down on the bed, patting the mattress next to him to indicate that Dylan should sit, too. “But we need to talk about this weekend.”  

“Are we going to go miniature golfing? You said we could! Can I invite Toby?”  

“Uh… not this weekend.”  

“How come?”  

Craig looked down into his son’s innocently hopeful face. Now that the time was here, he was finding it harder to explain than he’d thought it would be. “I have to go somewhere this weekend. For work.”  

Dylan didn’t seem as upset as he’d expected, although maybe it was just taking time to sink in. “Where?”  

“It’s kind of a camp. In the mountains. Mr. Allen’s going, too. And most of the people I work with.”  

“Mr. Lang?”  

They hadn’t told Dylan that Tyler was dead, and Craig wondered now if they should have. “No, not Mr. Lang,” he said simply.  

“Can I go?”  

Here it comes
. “No. It’s only for grownups.”  

Dylan was silent for a moment. “How long is this camp?”  

“The whole weekend. I’ll be gone Friday night, all day Saturday, and won’t be back until Sunday afternoon.”  

“You won’t be here to brush with me?”  

They brushed their teeth together each night, a ritual for both of them.  

“No. I’m sorry.”  

“I don’t want you to go.”  

The honesty of the plea made Craig’s heart ache. He felt guilty, and he put an arm around Dylan’s shoulder and brought out his big gun. “Why don’t we go to Disneyland next weekend? Me, you and Mommy. All three of us.”  

“What if you have to go to another camp?”  

He hugged his son’s shoulder more tightly. “I won’t.” And he repeated the hopeful sentiment Angie had not let him get away with. “It’s only this one time.”  

“I still don’t want you to go.”  

“I know. But it’s only this weekend, and the time’ll be over before you know it. And next weekend we’ll go to Disneyland.”  

“Okay, Daddy.” It was resigned acceptance, but it was still acceptance, and it was a more mature response than he’d been expecting. The two of them got off the bed and walked back out to the living room, where Angie was turning on the TV to watch the local news.  

“Daddy’s going to be gone this weekend,” Dylan told her.  

Angie nodded sympathetically. “I know, sweetie.”  

“But at least we get to go to Disneyland next week.”  

“What?” Angie shot Craig a look over their son’s head that made him realize he should have talked it over with her first.  

“That’s what Daddy said.” Dylan looked back at him with an expression of worry.  

“We are,” Craig assured him.  

“Good! Oh, wait, I forgot my book! Me and Daddy are going to read!” he told Angie. He turned and ran back down the hall to his bedroom.  

Angie fixed him with a hard stare. “Disneyland?”  

“We haven’t been for over a year. I thought it would be nice.”  

“You’re not getting any tonight, mister,” she told him.  

But he knew he would, and he did, and afterward they both fell asleep, tired, sated and content.  

ELEVEN  

They left friday after lunch, on a chartered bus. The retreat was in the San Bernardino Mountains, a good three hours away, and the fun started almost immediately after they pulled out of the parking lot. Bonding exercise number one was a participatory sing-along. Not “99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall” or “John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt,” but an equally simple, equally repetitive, equally annoying song that involved making each person sing a verse alone before joining in with everyone else on the refrain. Craig felt obligated to participate, but Phil, sitting next to him, felt no such obligation, and, when it was his turn to chime in, he continued to play
Angry Birds
on his phone, ignoring the high-pressure silence around him until the song moved on to Jack Razon across the aisle. Inspired by Phil, more and more people dropped out, and by the fourth round, there were only a handful of diehards still singing. By the time they reached Pomona, the bonding exercise was history and everyone was reading, texting, talking to friends or otherwise doing his or her own thing.  

Craig stared out the window at the passing scenery as they headed up into the mountains. It was supposed to be spring, but the landscape outside looked like winter. There were patches of snow on the rocky ground, and the only trees that didn’t look dead were stunted asymmetrical pines growing from cracks in the cliff.  

Twenty-two people were on the bus, including Matthews. Dash Robards had gone ahead and was preparing the camp for them. Patoff was not coming, and Craig found himself wondering what the consultant was going to do while they were gone. Granted, the retreat was taking place over a weekend, but he had the sneaking suspicion that they’d been scheduled to leave Friday afternoon so the consultant could do…
something
in their absence. He still didn’t like the fact that BFG had access to all of their passwords and email addresses, and he imagined Patoff moving from office to office, snooping through computer files, reading saved emails.  

He himself had nothing to be ashamed of, nothing private on any of his work machines, but he could understand why other people might. They all spent so much time at CompWare that sometimes it was probably necessary to conduct personal business during office hours. Hell, if he didn’t have Angie and she didn’t have the work schedule she did, he’d probably be doing exactly the same thing.  

He felt a nudge in his side, and Phil passed over his cell phone. On the screen was a Googled image of the place they were headed. Neither Matthews nor anyone else had revealed the name of the camp where they were going to spend the next two days. It was as if the location of the retreat was purposely being kept secret, and more than a few conspiracy theories about that had spread around CompWare over the past few days. But Phil had accessed satellite photos of the road they were on, had cross-referenced any student science camps that might be located in the area, and had come up with an aerial photograph of a log cabin compound in the woods. There seemed to be a large main building, a lodge, and, arranged in a square behind it, twelve smaller cabins bordering an open area that featured a wooden stage and a rock-ringed fire pit.  

Phil took the phone from him, called up another screen and handed it back. “
Camp Ponderosa
,” Craig read, “
was established in 1959 and has provided generations of Southern California schoolchildren with the opportunity to study geology, botany and zoology in a natural setting. Sleeping in comfortable cabins, hiking on well-maintained trails, eating freshly prepared food in a communal dining hall, students are able to experience life in the mountains for an unforgettable weeklong adventure!
”  

Craig handed the phone back to Phil. “I guess that’s where we’re going, huh?”  

“I believe so.”  

“Looks nice.”  

“Yeah.” Phil didn’t sound convinced.  

The road continued to wind up the mountain. Twenty minutes later, they were passing through a small hamlet filled with ski shops and tourist traps, and twenty minutes after that they were on a one-lane road winding through the trees toward Camp Ponderosa.  

The photo Phil had accessed must have been taken some time ago, for while this was indisputably the same location, the buildings looked considerably the worse for wear, and their dilapidated state was reflected in the poorly maintained grounds. The camp looked abandoned, and Craig wondered exactly what Dash Robards had been doing up here to get the place ready.  

Nothing, so far as he could tell.  

There was a car parked in the small lot in front of the main lodge, and the bus pulled next to it. Craig stood, along with most of the other passengers, but before they could gather their belongings, the driver said, “Listen up!” Addressing them as though they were children, he explained that he would return to pick them up on Sunday. “I will be here at one o’clock sharp,” he said. “I expect everyone to be ready and on time. We will depart at one-thirty. If you are not on-board at that time, you will be left behind and will have to arrange for your own transportation back.”  

“No one will be left behind,” Matthews promised them.  

“Yes they will.”  

“No,” Matthews said, and there was steel in his voice. “They won’t.”  

“I don’t know who you think you are…” the bus driver began.  

“I am the CEO of this company.”  

“Well, I don’t work for you. I was hired by Mr. Patoff, and his instructions were very specific.”  

Matthews was angry now. “Mr.
Patoff
works for me. I hired him to consult for my firm.”  

“And he hired me. Piss and moan all you want, old man. I arrive at one, I depart at one-thirty and anyone late will be left behind. Now get the hell off my bus. I’m leaving.”  

There was shocked silence. Craig had never heard anyone talk to Matthews that way, and obviously, the CEO hadn’t either. He didn’t know how to respond other than to order everyone off the bus. Gathering his own luggage, he pointed a finger at the driver. “I’m making a phone call,” he said. “I’m having you fired.”  

The bus driver snickered. “Yeah, good luck with that.”  

Matthews and the four remaining members of senior management got off the bus first, everyone else following, passing by the unmoving driver who stood staring at them with a smirk on his face. “Wow,” Phil said as they stepped off the steps onto the ground.  

Craig hazarded a look at the CEO who was off to the left, in a huddle with the Board and angrily gesticulating. Craig was disturbed by what had just happened, though he was not immediately sure why. At first he thought it was just ordinary tribalism, a variation of the old I-can-criticize-the-people-in-my-group-but-outsiders-can’t attitude, and it took him several moments to realize that what really bothered him was the fact that the encounter made Matthews seem diminished. He’d been under the impression that the CEO was the ultimate authority at CompWare, but all of a sudden Patoff seemed to be the man in charge. Matthews may have hired BFG, but, here, at least, the consultant was the one calling the shots, and the thought of Patoff having such power chilled him.  

Reasserting his authority, Matthews called out, “Everyone follow me! We’re checking in at the lodge!”  

There was no TV here, Craig learned almost immediately, and no internet access. Even their phones didn’t work, although it wouldn’t have mattered if they had, because Robards—
Dash
— confiscated everyone’s electronic devices as they entered the building. “You won’t be needing those crutches,” he said. “We’re going to be spending some
real
time together.”  

The main lodge did have electricity from a generator, although the cabins housing their individual sleeping quarters did not and relied on battery-powered camping lamps for light.  

They checked in by signing a guestbook page that had already been pre-printed with their names. The guestbook was located on top of an expansive oak desk, and once a person found his or her name on the list and signed on the line next to it, Robards would hand over a laminated nametag with the person’s first name in white letters on a red background.  

The lodge was divided into two main rooms: the one they were in now, sort of a cross between a hotel lobby and a living room, and a larger mess hall filled with rows of picnic tables and flat unupholstered bench seats. Unlike the exterior of the building, the interior was kept up nicely. There were rustic throw rugs on the wooden floor, comfortable-looking chairs and couches, polished wooden coffee tables and end tables, and a rock fireplace.  

Once all electronic devices had been collected and everyone had signed in, Robards directed them to a bulletin board on the wall to the right of the desk where cabin assignments had been posted. Craig moved forward through the crowd to find his and saw that he was in Cabin 3 and paired up with Elaine Hayman. The pairings were purportedly random, but he noticed that no friends had received cabin assignments together. Moreover, it appeared that people had invariably ended up with individuals who were either their temperamental opposite or were of the opposite sex. There were only three female division heads out of all of the departments, and none of them were assigned to bunk together. At least he and Elaine got along, which was more than could be said for Phil and Parvesh Patel, who were going to be spending the next two nights with each other.  

A chorus of complaints greeted the cabin assignments, but Matthews held up his hand and said that this, too, was part of the bonding experience and was a way for his management team to broaden their social horizons within the company and get to know co-workers with whom they might otherwise not associate.  

Elaine smiled at Craig somewhat queasily. “I hope you don’t snore.”  

Each cabin had a small bathroom containing a sink, toilet and tiny shower stall. “There is no hot water,” Robards warned them. “So be prepared. The water’s
cold
.”  

Their bathroom door did not have a lock, which probably wouldn’t be a problem, but it contributed to the sense of uneasiness Craig felt. He let Elaine pick the bed she wanted, and she chose the one closest to the bathroom, which meant that he got the one by the window, although the glass was so dirty and dusty that he could barely see out of it. He placed his single small suitcase on the floor and sat down on the bed, feeling awkward. They were to get settled and then meet everyone else in the lodge in an hour, but until then they were on their own, and the room felt small and cramped to him, the space too intimate. “I’m going to check outside,” he said, and when Elaine, opening her suitcase, nodded acquiescence, he could see the relief on her face. She wasn’t enjoying this any more than he was.  

He wished he could call Angie and Dylan. He’d suspected there might not be cell phone coverage out here, so he’d warned them that he might not be able to talk to them, but he hadn’t suspected that his phone would be confiscated. He wondered if that was legal. Even if not, he didn’t plan on making waves about it. He had the feeling that there were going to be a lot of other things coming up that he objected to, and he needed to pick his battles carefully.