The Aspen Account (31 page)

“Why?” Don asked with a weak voice.

“Because he was trying to kill me. Your sons knew I had discovered the fraud. And they knew I suspected them of murdering Kurt Matthews.”

“My God,” Seaton said in a weary voice, and his hand fell to the windowsill to help him keep his balance.

Michael watched him. His words had hit hard, but he could not see any into the depths of the man’s soul. At that moment, a powerful gust shook the window, and heavy, sleeting snow pattered against the glass. Both Michael and Marcus were jolted by the violence of the storm outside. But Seaton stood motionless even though he was closest to the window, as if he had somehow been anticipating this storm for years.

52

GLAZIER LOOKED OUT the window of the government Learjet, first at the turbulent storm clouds below, then at the dark reaches of space strewn with the winter constellations above. The heavens seemed so peaceful and cold.

“Agent Glazier,” a voice broke through an overhead speaker in the small cabin. It was the pilot. “We have a small problem with Denver. The weather’s getting pretty fierce down there, so DIA still has all outgoing flights grounded and is turning away all approaching flights outside a fifty-mile radius. They recommended that we turn toward Sioux City or Wichita.”

Glazier jumped up from his seat and moved toward the cockpit. “Captain, we’re not turning back and we’re not going north. Keep this heading. I need to make it to Aspen tonight!”

“
Aspen?
That’s completely out of the question. The storm system is pulverizing the Rocky Mountains and everything for a hundred miles east. Didn’t you hear me? It’s hell down there right now. They’ve basically shut down Denver’s airport. Most of Interstate Seventy west of the Colorado-Kansas line is closed. Aspen’ll be hit within the hour. There’s no way we can get through it. I suggest we go up to Sioux City and wait it out.”

“Look, Captain, I’ve got an undercover agent I need to reach in Aspen as soon as possible. If you can’t get me there tonight, then at least land in Denver so I have the best chance of reaching Aspen the minute a small window opens in the weather. My agent’s life could depend on it.”

“It’s not recommended, sir. The crosswinds are cutting in at over a hundred miles per hour, ice is all over the area, and visibility’s almost nothing.”

“Captain, please! I used to fly cargo navigation planes for the military. I understand the risks, but I have every confidence that you can still manage to put us down in this stuff.”

The pilot said nothing as he considered what Glazier was asking him to do. “It might be possible to land in Denver. Air traffic is down, so we’ll probably have a good look at the area without having to worry about other flights. I’ll radio Denver and tell them to be prepared. I’ll let them know we’re on a federal investigation and that it’s urgent we land in Denver. They can’t turn us away. Take a seat in the back and get into emergency landing position. I don’t know how rough this is going to get.”

“I’ll stay up front with you,” Glazier said, strapping himself into the empty seat next to the pilot. “There might be something I can do to help.”

Both men tightened their harnesses as the jet descended from the peaceful stratosphere into the roiling chaos of the storm. The pilot radioed the tower at DIA and informed the controllers of his intentions. Almost immediately the entire cockpit began to shake. Red lights began flashing on the console as they penetrated deeper into the storm. Glazier watched in suspense as the pilot moved through his instruments, hitting various buttons, adjusting the stick, trimming their descent, and barking situational reports back to the tower. 

The wind shears knocked them about so hard, it felt as if the jet had completely broken apart and was now cartwheeling to the earth. Then Glazier saw the beacon lights in the distance, barely visible through the flying snow.
Dear God,
he thought, realizing the hell they still must pass through before reaching the runway.

An alarm began beeping from the console, and Glazier realized that this had quickly turned into another of the half-dozen moments in his life when he truly felt as though he was walking on the edge of death. He looked at the pilot’s face, drawing some comfort from the man’s disciplined, steady concentration. But then he saw something new in the pilot’s expression: a distinct look of concern. Glazier turned to look back out the windshield and was horrified by what he saw—or, more accurately, didn’t see: the beacon lights had vanished. It was as if the storm had just tightened its grip around their falling jet. 

53

THE BLACK GMC Yukon cut through the smooth, white expanse of mountain highway, defiant against the blizzard. Its tires occasionally spun and drifted, kicking plumes of snow in front of the covered government plates. The snowstorm had dumped so heavily through the night that half the roads in the high country had been closed.

“Every highway within sixty miles of Glenwood Springs has roadblocks searching for his description,” Deputy Marshal Chris Beasley said excitedly to the driver, his youthful enthusiasm betraying his inexperience. “There’s a team of officers waiting for our arrival at the police stations.”

“Still no choppers,” said the older African-American man in the backseat. Anthony Noble’s strong face showed no concern over the encroaching storm. “All search efforts are still taking place on the ground. Weather’s supposed to let up this evening. Then we can bring in the birds.”

“He won’t get far, Jason,” Beasley said with unjustified cockiness. “We’ve got him pinned down in the mountains. He can’t keep moving; all he can do is hide—but we’ll find him.”

Jason Kano held the wheel with the relaxed confidence of a professional driver. “What do we know about the officer Chapman overpowered?” he asked, sliding the Yukon through another turn.

“Good record,” Beasley replied. “One of the best officers in the county, so they say.”

Kano drifted back into his own thoughts. He was considering every angle, every motive. “And the officer wasn’t hurt?” he finally asked.

“A few bruises, that’s it. Chapman never even fired the gun.”

“How did he knock the officer unconscious?”

“No one knows. There was no bruise on his head or anything—maybe a carotid hold.”

“This Chapman guy is interesting,” Kano said. “An accountant that can handle a good officer this easily and vanish without a trace… There’s something not right here. If he didn’t discharge the gun, then he didn’t even panic. He’s a cool customer.”

“The cop said Chapman claimed to be an undercover federal agent,” Beasley added.

“Trying to throw the man off balance,” Noble said. “Pretty smart, really.”

Kano was silent. He had tracked down and captured over a hundred fugitives in the past five years. After so many cases, he could immediately understand and classify 90 percent of his targets based solely on the factual background of their situation before the start of the manhunt. But the other ten percent were the wild cards, dangerously unpredictable. And the more Kano concentrated on the facts surrounding Michael Chapman’s alleged murder of Lucas Seaton, the more complicated the situation seemed. Whoever this Chapman was, Kano was the one man hunting for him who would not be foolish enough to underestimate him—not until the hunt was over.

*     *     *

Michael squinted, dazzled by the morning light as he walked into the glassed-in patio were Mr. Seaton sat. Snow was pressed up two feet high outside the window, giving the room a partly submerged feel. 

Seaton was sipping an espresso when he looked up to see Michael. “Dumped pretty good last night,” he said. “Somehow Marcus still thinks he can move the Hummer through this. Well, who am I to argue? I trust the man with my life.” He paused. “Please sit down, Michael.” 

Michael sat down at the small table as Seaton spoke into a small intercom box near the table. “Hopkins, please bring Mr. Chapman an espresso.” Clicking off, he said, “Michael, there’s something I want to ask you . . . something that bothered me a little when I was thinking about your plan.”

“Yes, of course. What’s your question?”

“Well,” Seaton said thoughtfully, “I guess I can’t figure out why it’s so important for you to save my company. It just seems that you’re taking such a grave personal risk.”

Michael knew the reason. He had felt it burning in him ever since realizing that the fraud was large enough to destroy the company. But how could he explain to Seaton the complex feelings so tied up with his own family history?

“My great-great-grandfather started a steel mill in Elk County in central Pennsylvania in the 1890s,” he said. This seemed to surprise Seaton. “The steel industry was booming. Over the years, it became a solid business, and by the time my great-grandfather took over during the 1920s, an entire community had grown around my family’s business, with nearly four hundred workers at the mill and close to two thousand people living in our town, Bethel.”

“That’s wonderful,” Seaton said.

Michael felt a little glow of pride at his ancestor’s accomplishment. “Years later, the great depression hit the community hard, like it did everywhere, but my great-grandfather was more willing than most businessmen of the time to make personal sacrifices. He made every effort to avoid layoffs even during those years when the company was losing money. It’s said my great-grandfather kept Bethel alive when many similar communities were turning into ghost towns.”

“Sounds like he was a good man,” Seaton said with admiration.

“Mm-hm. When World War Two pulled the economy out of the toilet, he diversified the business into iron to help with the war effort. Things were good again for another ten years. But then the unthinkable happened.”

Marcus interrupted the conversation by entering the room and walking straight to Seaton. “Excuse me, sir. I have important news. I’ve received word that Glenwood Springs has been set up as the new headquarters for the search effort for Michael. I’ve also heard that a U.S. marshal has been dispatched there to take over the manhunt. Sir, they have checkpoints everywhere. Michael will never make it through if he travels the roads.”

“I need to get to Denver tonight to start preparing my findings for the shareholders’ meeting,” Michael said. 

“You’ll never make it through if you travel the roads,” Marcus replied.

Concern showed in Seaton’s face. “He can take the jet this evening when the weather clears a bit.”

“Is it safe to wait that long?” Michael asked.

“The airport’s still closed for the weather, so you don’t have a choice,” Seaton replied. “But don’t worry. They suspect you in my son’s death, so this is the last place they’ll think you could be hiding.”

“Sir, what about Reynard?” Marcus said.

“Reynard?” Michael asked.

“My butler: Reynard Hopkins. He was very close to the twins when they were younger. He did as much to raise them as anyone when they lived here. He’s not exactly one to wear his emotions on his sleeve, but I know Luke’s death must be hitting him hard. Nothing’s been made public about you. It might be best if he didn’t know you were involved.”

“You don’t trust him?” Michael asked.

“That’s not it. I do trust him, but that doesn’t mean I know how he’d react to something like this.”

Just then Hopkins appeared, with Michael’s espresso on a silver tray. The three men already in the room ceased their conversation as Hopkins set the tray on the table between Michael and Seaton, and when he turned to leave the room, Marcus left with him. 

“Don’t worry, Michael,” Seaton said once they were alone again. “We’ll get you out of here. Now, please, you were telling me about your family’s business. What happened?”

Michael looked down at the colorful Navaho rug beneath them, knowing he wouldn’t be able to hold his head up during the rest of the story. “Well, eventually my great-grandfather stepped down and my grandfather took over the business in the 1950s. But my grandfather wasn’t as savvy as his father or his grandfather. And he certainly didn’t understand the accounting and financial procedures necessary for a business that size.” 

He took a long breath and exhaled. “Then one day his chief accountant didn’t show up for work. He didn’t show up the next day, either. Then the bank called. That’s when my grandfather discovered that the man he had put in charge of watching over the company’s finances had embezzled a fortune without my grandfather suspecting a thing.” 

Seaton shifted in his chair, and Michael thought he heard a muffled grunt.

“Then my grandfather learned that the company was in debt. Most of the family wealth was tied up in the business, and now the worst imaginable scenario had happened. After seventy years of operations, the family business was destroyed in the space of a few years. And down with it went the community. My grandfather was a third-generation owner of Chapman Steel, and now he had to live with the fact that he had let the business that his grandfather and father had built be destroyed. Gone was the family business that he had hoped to pass down to his son, my father, who was about ten at the time.”

“Dear God,” Seaton said.

Michael glanced up to see the billionaire looking at him with sad eyes, and it occurred to him that the man may understand better than anyone what his grandfather had experienced, because Seaton, too, had witnessed his company grow and now saw its potential doom by the crimes of others.

“Obviously, everything changed after the bankruptcy,” Michael said, his eyes retreating back to the safety of the rug. “The family had little money left, and my grandfather could no longer hold his head up.”

“What did he
do
?” Seaton asked with a note of concern, as if he feared the story might end in a suicide.

“He moved my grandmother and my father to Kansas, where they would try to build a new life. But my father told me my grandfather could never completely bury the past, and during the last years of his life, when I was old enough to understand something of what had happened, there were times when I thought I spied him glancing with a deep sadness into the tragedy that happened on his watch.”