The Girl From Home: A Thriller (16 page)

“Okay, how do you do that, then?”

“We're still in the process of ruling out various things. Hopefully his BP will come back to normal on its own in a few days, but you should prepare yourself that he's going to be like this for the next day or two, at least.”

“But eventually he'll get back to . . . I know he's not normal, but the way he was before, right?”

“We're just going to have to wait and see.”

Jonathan is struck by two questions at once. “What's the best-case scenario?” he asks first.

“That he's more or less like he was right before this episode, but for shorter periods. So, whatever his cognitive state was last week—and I understand that wasn't great, either—but the hope is that he returns to that level. He's likely going to need more rest in between his periods of alertness, however. And before you ask, the worst-case scenario would be that he doesn't really improve from how he is now.”

That wasn't Jonathan's other question.

“How long can he live this way?” Jonathan asks.

“It's hard to tell. And I hate to answer that question because most family members believe that I have some type of crystal ball, and then they're very upset if I'm wrong, which I quite often am. But, if you're asking for my best medical opinion, and you're willing to understand the margin of error involved in this type of analysis, I would say that, short of a superseding event, I don't think he's in any immediate danger.”

*  *  *

After the doctor leaves, Jonathan calls Amy to tell her the news. She says “Thank God” when Jonathan tells her that Dr. Goldman didn't believe their father's death was imminent. Then she adds, “Thank you so much for staying with him, Jonathan. I'm sure it meant a lot to Dad.”

“He never opened his eyes, Amy.”

There's a pregnant pause. Jonathan assumes the silence is because his sister is weighing her next words.

“Can I ask you something, Johnny?”

“Sure,” he says tentatively.

“Why are you so angry at him?” she asks.

She asks this without betraying any judgment. As if it was a perfectly valid question, the answer to which she's long wondered about.

“I'm not angry at him, Amy. I just don't . . . care as much as you do.”

“In a way, that's almost worse. Being indifferent about your father. And I just don't get it. I mean, if you guys had some huge falling-out over . . . I don't know, money or something, or if he didn't like Natasha—which he didn't, by the way, but he never told you that, I bet—then I might be able to understand. But you kind of just gave up on him. Like you gave up on all of us. I know you don't think you need your family, Johnny, but we're good to have.”

“Why?” Jonathan asks. He's surprised he's been so blunt with Amy, but his sleep deficit has brought it out.

“
Why?
Because . . . because family loves you forever. Stands by your side no matter what. Because we have a shared history. What do you even mean,
why
?”

“I didn't mean it that way, Amy,” he says, although he very much did mean it that way. “I'm just exhausted. I was up all night with him, like you asked, and that should at least earn me some slack from you.”

“Okay,” she says. “I'll let you deal with whatever is going on between you and Dad on your own. I just hope that you figure it out while he's still here. For both your sakes.”

Jonathan is thankful that it will end there, because he knows that the truth is that she was right. He
did
give up on their father. And not just because of Phillip Levinson. Jonathan had long ago recognized that the whole episode at the barbecue was a symptom, not the cause of their estrangement. It was his father's weakness that Jonathan despised. The weakness that allowed Phillip Levinson to encroach on his best friend's marriage in the first place. The weakness that, to Jonathan's mind, made his father a failure.

To avoid a similar fate, Jonathan was determined never to be weak. He would be a rich and powerful master of the universe, so that no one could take what was his.

And, of course, the irony is now staring him right in the face. He's allowed others to take everything. Even his failure of a father owns a home, had a wife who loved him, has children who are caring for him. What does Jonathan have? Nothing. Which makes Jonathan Caine the weakest man alive.

I
n the investment-banking world, suspended without pay is a purgatory that only leads to hell. Jonathan knew he'd be fired soon enough, but Harper Sawyer would dangle the possibility of reinstatement, or at least the possibility of unfreezing his accounts, to squeeze whatever they could from him before they finally cut him loose.

The first step in that dance came a week after security had escorted Jonathan out of Vincent Komaroff's office, in the form of a call from James Jefferson.

Jefferson identifies himself as an attorney whom Harper Sawyer has retained to represent Jonathan free of charge. Considering that his assets are frozen, Jonathan knows he's looking a gift horse in the mouth, but he's obviously more than a bit suspicious of this arrangement.

“Why would I want those guys picking my lawyer?” Jonathan asks.

“You heard me say free of charge, didn't you?” Jefferson replies with a tone that indicates Jonathan wasn't the person to pose the question. “That's why. And believe me, I don't come cheap to them. A thousand bucks an hour, to be exact. So, at the very least, why don't you meet with me for an hour and cost your former employer a grand?”

A few days later, Jonathan is sitting in a well-appointed conference room near the top of a Midtown Manhattan skyscraper. Jefferson reminds Jonathan a little of a drill sergeant. A no-nonsense guy who doesn't suffer fools lightly.

“Here's how it works,” Jefferson begins. “If you decide to hire me, I'll represent you and nobody else but you. I do not represent Harper Sawyer, and I have never represented Harper Sawyer in any capacity whatsoever. They're paying me to represent
you
to the best of my ability because they've made the calculation—the correct one, in my opinion—that
they
, meaning the good people at Harper Sawyer, are better served if you are well represented, at least at this stage of the process.

“Our relationship is covered by the attorney-client privilege,” Jefferson continues. “That means that anything you say to me will never be shared outside this room without your consent. Doesn't matter what it's about. You stole from Harper Sawyer. Sure, whatever. You engaged in the worst form of securities fraud this side of Charles Ponzi. Oh my, how could you? You're the mastermind behind 9/11, you goddamn traitor. I don't care. It's our secret. Unless you instruct me to disclose it, I take it with me to the grave.”

Jonathan allows Jefferson to give his little speech, but as soon as he's finished, Jonathan says, “So what's the catch?”

Jefferson doesn't miss a beat. “The catch is that Harper Sawyer expects that you will instruct me to share our attorney-client communications with them. That's what they get out of it—knowing what you're going to do before you do it. Don't get me wrong. They're definitely going to claim you acted alone here, Mr. Rogue Trader. Like the London Whale and the guy in Singapore. But that doesn't mean they don't fear the firm being hit with a failure-to-supervise charge. Or worse, that you're going to claim you told the higher-ups all about it, and they looked the other way, hoping you could trade your way out of it.”

Against his initial impulses, Jonathan actually likes Jefferson. He seems like a straight shooter, if you overlook the fact that his entire professional life is built on the dubious premise of being wholly independent from the people who actually pay him.

“Well, that's going to be a problem because there's nothing I'd like to do more than hurt them. Bad. I'll say whatever it takes to get those bastards to unfreeze my twenty-five million.”

“That right there is the other reason that Harper Sawyer thinks it's a good idea to have me represent you,” Jefferson says with a smile. “They know, human nature being what it is, that your greatest impulse will be to hurt them. Might even cloud your judgment about your own self-preservation. My job is to protect you, not hurt them. And the two don't align here. Don't get me wrong. I know the value of a buck, especially when you're unemployed and your assets are frozen, but you need to understand that money is worthless in prison. And admitting you engaged in securities fraud in the hope that Harper Sawyer pays some kind of fine that's chump change to them anyway is the surest way to wind up spending some time as an involuntary guest of the federal government.”

Jonathan feels sufficiently chastened. Jefferson's right. He needs to get his priorities straight.

“So how do I stay out of jail?” Jonathan asks.

“First, by hiring me, and then once you do, by doing exactly what I tell you to do.”

*  *  *

When he comes home on Halloween, Jonathan's greeted by a nearly six-foot-tall Cinderella, the bodice of the costume straining to contain Natasha's ample bosom. It's only then that he remembers they have a benefit masquerade party to attend.

“There's a Prince Charming costume lying on our bed,” Natasha tells him.

Jonathan knows that Batman would be a far better choice for him, given that he's been living a double life that would make even the Caped Crusader proud. It's now been six weeks since he was fired, and Natasha still doesn't have the first clue that the world as she knows it is over.

The surprising thirty grand his Lange & Söhne timepiece fetched and the twenty thousand he moved to Citibank on the day President Alexeyev died were enough so that the ATM continues to spit out fifties whenever Natasha inserts her bank card. As long as that continues and her American Express card isn't declined, or the bank padlocks their penthouse, Jonathan is determined that she remain in that blissful state of ignorance.

The other part of the deception was laughably easy to pull off. Natasha never called Jonathan at work, as it was Jonathan's inviolate policy not to take personal calls at the office, long ago telling her if she had anything that couldn't wait, she should text. Fortunately, she didn't think twice when he told her he'd lost his cell phone—which had been paid for by Harper Sawyer back when they employed him—and had to get a new number.

The only part of the charade that was any challenge for Jonathan was deciding where to spend his days. Sitting in Jefferson's conference room going over his old trading records occupied some of his time, but that still left a lot of hours with nothing for him to do and no place for him to be. Jonathan's been passing the time in movie theaters and museums, and drinking scotch at hotel bars, where he figured there was less of a chance he'd run into someone either he or Natasha knew.

Jonathan knows that a better man would come clean to his wife. But he's putting it off, hoping that he'll be able to counter the bad news with something more positive.
Don't worry, I have another job lined up
. Or,
Money isn't going to be an issue because Harper Sawyer agreed to unfreeze our accounts
. Even,
My lawyer says that there won't be any criminal action brought against me.

Of course, he has no illusions that anything he were to say or do would save his marriage. It was over the moment he was escorted out of Harper Sawyer.

*  *  *

As they enter the Neue Galerie, Jonathan is still somewhat unclear about the organization that's sponsoring this fete. It's been something of a mission of Natasha's over the past year to ingratiate herself to the well-heeled benefactors of one cause or another. Jonathan laughs to himself that these people won't give his wife the time of day once they realize she's penniless.

“So what is this little soirée about?” he asks. “Daughters of the czar? Vodka preservation?”

Natasha looks at him sideways. “Neither, actually. It's for juvenile diabetes. A friend introduced me to the executive director, and he invited us.”

“And what did we pay for this invitation?”

“It's all for charity, Jonathan.”

Jonathan knows that this must have been set up months ago. They didn't have enough in their checking account to cover the cost of tonight's dinner. He laughs to himself that Harper Sawyer is actually footing this bill. After all, if Natasha hadn't made the twenty-thousand-dollar or whatever contribution that brought them to this place, those funds would now be frozen along with the rest of their money. Much better it goes to sick kids than to those rat bastards.

The Neue Galerie is located in the center of Museum Mile, in a landmark mansion built by the robber baron William Starr Miller, whose only true contribution to the world was his house. It's now the pride and joy of another billionaire, Ronald Lauder, and serves as the place where he stores his collection of German and Austrian twentieth-century art.

The raison d'être of the Neue Galerie are the Klimts that adorn the first floor's walls. Jonathan never cared much about art, other than the cachet that comes with owning it, of course. But the Klimts—almost life-size portraits glimmering in gold—are an arresting sight, even for him.

“Natasha, my beauty,” says a man sidling up to Jonathan's wife.

He's wearing an overblown military uniform and a funny hat. From the costume alone, Jonathan would guess that he's dressed as Cap'n Crunch, but there's something about his demeanor that suggests he takes himself far too seriously for that kind of frivolity.

“Ferdinand!” Natasha says as they air kiss each other on both cheeks. “This is my husband, Jonathan.”

“The pleasure is mine,” Ferdinand says, in a way you'd imagine a man named Ferdinand to say it. “Wonderful, aren't they?”