The Gods of Greenwich (17 page)

“What’s an average job cost?” he asked, sounding much like a Socratic philosophy professor.

“Fifty thousand, give or take.” She grew wary, uncomfortable and acutely aware he was her only client. “Plus expenses. I always get expenses up front.”

“How many jobs a year?”

“Not including you, Kemosabe?”

“That’s right.”

“Four or five,” she answered. She thought these numbers sounded impressive.

“So it takes four years just to save a million bucks,” he said. “I don’t see how you’re ever going to retire in France unless—”

“Unless what?”

“Unless we work together and get it right.”

The guy’s smooth, Rachel decided. Her employer was Mr. Charisma, a regular George Clooney when he tried. She had seen his pain-in-the-ass side, too. But she was giving him the benefit of the doubt ever since Paris.

*   *   *

With cool air blasting full tilt inside the theater, Rachel snugged her white cotton cardigan over a beige sundress with spaghetti straps. The sweater and cinched belt, she decided, eased the seductive cut of her neckline. Toned it down, because tonight called for a modest look. Rachel even wore flats so other women would think her shoes nothing special.

And forget her.

The 6:45 show in Bronxville attracted the oldies, especially on Thursdays. Rachel staked out a back row in the theater, expecting the surveillance to be peaceful if somewhat mundane. But oh my god, this crowd was a crabby lot. Or hard of hearing. Or something.

A seventy-something woman blasted into her mobile phone. “Herbert, we’re in the back. On the right. Would you hurry? Have you parked the car?” It was like she paused every few words to catch her breath or ratchet up the volume. “I’m hanging up, Herbert.”

Given her decibels, Rachel wondered whether the woman needed a cell phone to be heard outside the building. “I’m hanging up,” she repeated as though Herbert missed what she said the first time.

More seniors doddered past. One man in his seventies—hair migrating from scalp to bushy white unibrow—lumbered past and seated his wife a few rows up, near the aisle. He asked in a voice loud enough for the entire theater to hear, “You want something to eat, Marge?”

“No, Conrad. And neither do you.”

“I’m getting some popcorn,” he insisted, asserting his male independence via the overpriced concessions.

“You just ate.”

“What can I say? The Bronx Zoo makes great hot dogs.”

“Keep your voices down,” somebody shushed from up front. The aging crowd behaved more like the fans of World Wide Wrestling than moviegoers.

Amid the noise Rachel decided Conrad was a gentle old man. She would rather do Herbert’s wife. That old bird was a grouch. She deserved to get “done,” something other than a random act of fate like going to bed one night and not waking up. Herbert’s wife deserved something more creative. Maybe two or three corks stuffed down her throat. But hey, a contract was a contract. Even if it meant trekking out to the suburbs.

Conrad was turning into a royal pain in the ass. For one, the train ride from New York City took thirty minutes. For another, the hit was all wrong, too close to the Colony Club.

Rachel, of all people, a cleaner for chrissakes, feared that erratic patterns and pieces would fit together. That clues would beckon hotshot detectives to come sniffing and asking questions, always lifting their legs in her direction.

She needed “operating leverage,” whatever that was. She still didn’t understand what Kemosabe meant by the expression.

The biggest problem was Mrs. Conrad Barnes. For all her seventy-something aches and pains, Marge could not leave her husband the hell alone. It was like she camped out on his shirttails. She was always there: his shopping expeditions, his errands, and every Thursday when they hiked around the Bronx Zoo together.

You’re getting in the way of my retirement plan,
thought Rachel.

*   *   *

Once the movie began, Rachel considered sneaking out of the small theater. A few doors down, on the other side of the wine store, there was a bistro that advertised a mean skirt steak. All the chomping and chewing inside the theater, the slurping of Coke until air gurgled through straws, made her hungry. Somebody was taking forever to rip off a wrapper.

Too risky to leave, Rachel decided. She was on the job, watching Conrad and learning his habits. And, unfortunately, she was watching a stupid movie with crusty old cranks who grazed like cows.

Tonight was about perfection and flawless execution, not errors. She could not afford to leave clues. Or succumb to steak frites and a French red, only to be recognized later from good times at the bistro. Tonight was about surveillance.

Without thinking, Rachel rubbed the puffy blemish on her hand. It was always that way whenever her thoughts drifted to food. She remembered that night with the chocolate layer cake. Her daddy screamed, “I’ll beat the wax out your ears.”

“Damn him,” Rachel muttered.

The theater, she decided, would not work for an insulin hit. There were too many people around, not just Marge the ubiquitous, but every moviegoer within a five-mile radius. And there was too much candy, enough to fish Conrad Barnes out of a diabetic coma a hundred times over. No wonder these people got all grouchy and loud. They were probably suffering from sugar highs.

After the movie, Rachel abandoned Marge and Conrad; enough stalking for one night. She walked through the parking lot across the street from the theater. She headed down into the tunnel leading to the southbound side of Bronxville’s train station. She wandered along the platform until she found a concrete bench, then plugged in her earbuds and listened to Josephine Baker, the American-born singer who moved to Paris in the 1920s and became “La Baker” to all of France.

The music was sultry but Rachel hardly drifted on the humid summer night. With exacting precision, she mentally probed the lives of Mr. and Mrs. Conrad Barnes. What they did. Where they went. Whom they knew. Their patterns were her blocks, the pieces she assembled for a successful hit. Rachel found herself returning to one place, a venue that stretched her lips from ear to ear, which was how her daddy said, “Smile.” Conrad Barnes was a regular at the Bronx Zoo, an endless stream of intoxicating possibilities.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

MONDAY
,
AUGUST
4
BENTWING AT
$49.25

Most Monday mornings, sixteen employees packed inside LeeWell’s conference room and jockeyed for eleven of the twelve available chairs. One seat was sacred. Nobody ever sat in Cy’s throne, which had achieved a hallowed status equal to several Vatican relics. He made the decisions. He paid the bonuses. He decided who was exceptional and who was expendable.

During these company-wide meetings, employees buzzed from caffeine transfusions and the innate optimism that follows two days off. Leeser encouraged his entire team, from accounting to reception, to trade ideas about the markets or the office. Whatever was on their minds. Discussions were frank with no holds barred.

Today was different. On Friday Bentwing closed under fifty dollars for the first time since January. The doors were shut, and there were only eight people in the conference room. Those eight said nothing and avoided eye contact, all except Victor. He looked ready to strangle someone. Cy sent e-mails that morning asking other employees not to attend.

Cusack, Victor, and his three junior traders gathered round the table. Nikki sat at the far end, poised to take notes on her steno pad. Shannon stood, arms folded, with his back against the wall. Nobody said a word. All eyes fixed on Cyrus Leeser.

“Since the beginning of the year,” Leeser said, “we have lost over one hundred million dollars.” He parsed his words and spoke with a slow, methodical cadence that slapped the blues onto every face in the room.

Silence in response. A hush hung over the conference room. It was heavier than L.A. smog and produced roughly the same results. Heads ached. Hearts pounded. Throats turned dry.

Leeser appeared calm, but his coal-black eyes burned with the fire no one had seen in a long time. His clothes were rumpled, the wrinkles totally out of character. And Cusack thought there was the faintest hint of grass stains on his shirtsleeves.

“Victor,” Cy continued. “Get us started.”

“The shorts are all over Bentwing.”

“Tell me something I don’t know,” snapped Leeser. “Who the fuck is attacking us?”

Victor recoiled and squirmed in his seat to the right of the throne. His hands fussed across the table, uncomfortable without his sixteen-ounce Estwing hammer. “If I had to guess, it’s an institution in the Middle East or Europe. Maybe a combination.”

“I don’t pay you to guess,” bellowed Cy. “Find out. You got that, Victor? You find out, and you get back to me.”

“I’m on it.” The head trader sounded calm, but his eyes blinked over and over behind horn-rimmed glasses. His junior traders scanned the room for a place to hide.

“What about Hafnarbanki?” pressed Leeser. “We’re giving back our gains. Why?”

“A royal family in Qatar is buying stock,” Cusack volunteered. He had seen the press releases. He had scrutinized every position in LeeWell’s portfolio. Intensive research was the only way to compensate for the nagging question he could not answer:
How does LeeWell hedge?

“The family owns more than five percent of Hafnarbanki,” added Victor, still nursing his ego.

“That’s fucking goofy,” snorted Leeser.

“Maybe not,” countered Cusack.

All eyes in the room turned to the head of sales. Even Shannon, who had not displayed much interest, focused on him. Cy raised his eyebrows and voiced what they were all thinking:

“What do you mean?”

Before Jimmy could respond, Victor recouped his hogshead of testosterone. “You think Hafnarbanki is a buy, Cusack?”

Nikki glanced up from her pad. Shannon frowned, which was how he handled all situations. Leeser’s reaction was the worst. He waited and watched. He said nothing.

“No,” Jimmy replied to Victor. “I’d go all cash. I’d sell everything in the portfolio and take our profits on Hafnarbanki. I’d get safe in this market.”

Cy’s eyes widened.

“All cash,” Victor scoffed. A vein in his forehead throbbed angry and indigo blue. “We’re not a goddamn money market fund.”

“Focus,” growled Leeser, exercising his authority. “What’s the interest in Hafnarbanki?”

“Follow the money,” Jimmy explained. “If the Qataris buy stock, the chairman is the single biggest winner. He owns more shares than any other investor.”

“You think he talked the royal family into buying?” asked Victor.

“How many times do we flush before this fucking bank goes away?” Leeser was growing agitated.

“I bet Hafnarbanki’s management made a sweetheart loan with no downside to the Qataris,” said Cusack. “Bankers have all kinds of tools. Low interest rates. No personal guarantees. They can structure almost anything.”

“But why make it easy on the Qataris?” argued Cy.

“With my net worth tied up in one stock,” Jimmy answered, “I’d figure out how to prop up the price.”

“Me, too,” agreed Leeser. Then he added, “You think they know we’re short?”

His question betrayed the classic paranoia of short sellers. Betting against companies creates the opportunity for finite gains—and unlimited losses. If investors short stock at ten dollars and the price goes to zero, the gain is ten dollars. If the same ten-dollar stock rallies to one hundred dollars, short sellers lose ninety dollars per share. And the stock price can always climb farther.

“They know somebody is short,” said Cusack. “But why us, Cy? We don’t know who’s shorting Bentwing, right?”

“But when I find out,” Victor threatened, rebounding from Cy’s earlier rebuke, “I’ll fucking drill the Bentwing shorts.”

Does Victor know something I don’t?

“How will you drill them?” asked Leeser. He leaned forward with elbows on the table, chin resting on his thumb and knuckles pressed against his nose. He disappeared into a nether world of concentration as the whole room watched and waited.

“We back up the truck,” Lee answered, “and buy, buy, buy until the price skyrockets. Until we crush any dickhead who bet against Bentwing. It’s time LeeWell shows some balls.” And then he added gratuitously, “Which may be a problem for Cusack over here.”

“Who the hell are you?” asked Jimmy, taking the bait.

“I’m the guy who makes money. You must be the other guy, Cusack.”

“Knock it off.” Leeser leaned back in the throne and wrapped his hands behind his head.

“It makes no difference who’s shorting,” urged Victor. “I say we attack by adding to our position in Bentwing.”

“My thoughts exactly,” agreed Leeser.

Cusack avoided the temptation to roll his eyes. He suppressed his crooked smile, which resembled a smirk and might enflame tensions in the war room. “Buying more shares of Bentwing takes cash. How much do we have?”

“Forty million and one pizza lunch less than you promised,” taunted Victor. “New Jersey Sheet Metal fucking missed the June closing.”

Lee was referring to a common industry practice. Most hedge funds, including LeeWell Capital, accepted new money at the end of every quarter. This custom simplified the accounting.

“We missed June by one signature,” explained Jimmy. “The guy was on vacation. We’ll get the money.”

“You’re paid to close,” the trader growled, “not to find excuses.”

“New Jersey is rock solid,” Cusack observed, calm on the outside, not taking the head trader’s bait this time. “They’ll fund our September closing.”

“Knock it off, Victor,” interrupted Cy. Then he turned and said, “Victor’s right, Jimmy. We don’t run from fights here.”

Cusack’s ears grew red but he said nothing.

“When you get back to your desk,” Cy instructed Victor, “buy Bentwing in size. Put the word out. I’ll worry how we fund.” Then he addressed Jimmy: “What about your other prospects?”

“Plenty of people in the pipeline. But half of them are at the beach.”

“Buy some fucking sunscreen.”