The Gods of Greenwich (22 page)

Ever since the night at L’Escale, Cusack had been mulling a comp strategy born on Wall Street and perfected in Hedgistan. Renegotiate the package. Top producers, the best salespeople, could squawk and bitch and threaten to leave until they got what they wanted and said they deserved. All it took were revenues.

Graham Durkin, an entrepreneur with over $1 billion in cash, could generate monster fees for LeeWell Capital. Bagging Durkin as a client, Cusack knew, would change the balance of power between employee and boss. Leeser might not explain how he hedged. But he would talk turkey when it came to Jimmy’s mortgage, no doubt about it.

*   *   *

Cusack boarded Amtrak 2150 north for Providence. He marched through several cars and found the first-class cabin. After hefting his travel bag onto the overhead rack, he grabbed an empty seat next to the window and pulled out his presentation materials.

Executives jammed the 8:03
A.M.
train, which continued all the way to South Station in Boston. From force of habit Cusack surveyed the car. Several suits pounded away at their laptops, pausing every so often to talk Yankees baseball. Others busied themselves with BlackBerrys. A few sported wireless headsets, the models that suck one ear like electronic ticks that have grown fat from hanging on. Amtrak’s first-class cabin was the perfect place to prepare for Durkin—loads of space and few distractions.

Cusack grabbed a coffee from the food car before opening his pitch book. He had reviewed it at least a thousand times. He proofread every word and double-checked sentences to make sure the sales material told a logical, easy-to-follow story about LeeWell. He suspected Graham Durkin knew little about hedge fund alchemy, the longs, the shorts, the correlations, the leverage, and the relentless quest for “alpha,” god patois for outperforming indices like the Dow.

Why should he understand what we peddle?

Durkin never worked in finance. He never whipped securities around the exchanges or suffered the ritual humiliation of Wall Street’s sacred ceremonies. Durkin sold a medical-device company to Johnson & Johnson. Nobody ever scissored his tie to celebrate a first trade and the coming of age.

As the train railed toward Providence, Cusack visualized his presentation. He played what-if games and tried to anticipate questions, projecting a response for each one. That was when he noticed an envelope peeking from his pitch book.

Sometimes Emi buried love letters in his luggage. Wrote provocative things like, “I’m aching for you, Bluto.” Not this time. The letter was addressed to “Jimmy Cusack,” not “James.” Nor was it Emi’s handwriting. Block letters, no script.

Cusack ripped out a letter, folded in neat thirds, penned in the same labored style as the envelope. There was no greeting. No “Dear Jimmy.” No date. Cusack’s eyes raced to the bottom of the page.

It was signed “Daryle Lamonica.”

*   *   *

Ólafur stewed at his desk.

He was hungover and pissed off. He craved “hair of the dog.” A shot of Reyka vodka and a beer chaser at Vegamot would do the trick, that and a bacon burger drowning in béarnaise sauce. The bistro’s monkfish was out.

So was his hip flask. Empty. Buried in the middle drawer of his desk, behind business cards and staples, the pewter medicine bottle offered the right antidote for most every ailment. These days, Ólafur needed refills all the time.

Last night the Reyka flowed nonstop. But vodka shots hardly explained the banker’s foul mood. He had grown accustomed to headaches and cottonmouth, the need for coffee-and-Advil cocktails at the office. Days came. Days went. But hangovers remained the same. They were reliable, their consistency comforting in a perverse way. They masked his anxieties about, well, everything: no wife, no kids, and, as of late, no money.

Ólafur owed his crabby mood to Hafnarbanki’s stock price. The shares were dropping like anvils. He had first spoken to Chairman Guðjohnsen when Hafnarbanki traded around 850 kronur. The shares rallied over 900 with the Qatari purchases but were now trading just over 750.

Guðjohnsen called again that morning, just as he had called the day before and every previous day since the end of July. He always asked the same tedious question: “Do we have a problem?”

“No, sir.”

“Our shares are trading lower than when we started,” asserted the chairman. “Perhaps you declared war on me.”

Ólafur bit his tongue. “You know how many shares I own, sir.”

It was all Ólafur could do to refrain from telling the old man,
“Farðu í rassgat.”
Icelandic for “Go fuck yourself.” A career-limiting gesture in any language.

“Yes, of course,” the chairman replied. “What about our problem?”

“It would help if the Qataris double their position.”

“Yes, it’s time.”

“Then you approve the loan increase, sir?”

Chairman Guðjohnsen hesitated for sixty seconds, an eternity of dead space on the phone. Ólafur waited, knowing the older man expected him to break the silence. “Yes,” the chairman finally said. “How soon can you start?”

“Yesterday.”

“Good. And what about your hedge funds?” the chairman asked.

“Time to rip out their eyes and piss in the sockets.”

“Save the venom,” Guðjohnsen advised. “Just get our share price up.”

Alone in his office now, 1:15
P.M.
in Reykjavik, Ólafur dialed the sheikh’s office and told the family’s chief investment officer, “I need your help.”

“Same deal as before, brother? No recourse if Hafnarbanki shares blow up.”

“The same.” Then Ólafur clarified: “That includes our attack on LeeWell Capital and Bentwing Energy.”

“Agreed.”

“Has your man in Greenwich learned anything?”

“Not yet,” the Qatari replied.

“Can you turn up the heat?”

“Of course. We’re the largest investor in the fund where Dimitris works.”

“Excellent. I’m about to turn up the heat myself,” Ólafur said.

The two men clicked off the phone, and for the first time that day, Ólafur felt okay. Once the Qataris resumed their purchases, the slide in Hafnarbanki’s stock price would stop. Maybe the shares would hold steady this time.

Ólafur dialed Siggi and asked, “What are you doing for lunch?”

“Nothing.”

“Have you ever tried boilermakers?”

“No.”

“Good. Meet me at Vegamot in fifteen minutes. I’ll introduce you.”

“What for?”

“Remember how happy Leeser was about the Goncharova painting?”

“How can I forget?”

“It’s time for phase two, cousin.”

*   *   *

Rachel Whittier slipped into her white coat, the cotton soft and familiar. Through the years she had grown fond of the clinic’s unique morning scent, a cross between French roast coffee and the antiseptic bouquet of hand soap. It was 8:30
A.M.

Doc’s practice woke slowly during the dog days of summer. RNs often lingered in the kitchen, chatting over bagels and savoring the whatever of August ennui. The morning commute siphoned their energy, left them clammy from humidity and vulnerable to the artificial chill from air-conditioning.

Soon the pace would soar at the Park Avenue clinic. There were three liposuctions scheduled, including Robinson. Fatty face, beefy belly, and chubby chin, he was getting the works. His butt required two hours minimum.

“Never seen anything that big without a John Deere stamp on it.”

Rachel could almost hear Daddy, his Texas accent and the aw-shucks twang that hid a sot’s violent rage. He once had an opinion, a funny colloquialism for everything and, unfortunately, for everyone. That included Rachel. He rode her hard for years, really hard, about forty pounds too many:

“It takes you two trips to haul ass.”

The taunts turned vicious more often than not. And Rachel still winced at the burn scar, Daddy’s home remedy for losing weight. After guzzling a bottle of Jim Beam one night, he snuffed out his cigarette on her right hand. “Lay off the feed bag,” he warned, “or I’ll tattoo the other one same way.”

Two weeks later Rachel turned sixteen, and no one was there to celebrate. Her mother had died long ago. Her father was camped out back in a chair, listening to AM radio and dining on his nightly supper, the six-pack and a toothpick that he labeled a “seven-course meal.” When he discovered a half-eaten chocolate layer cake, the one Rachel baked for herself, all hell broke loose.

“You got two hogs living in your jeans, girl.” His face crimson and bloated from beer, he slapped Rachel. Hard. Really hard. Held nothing back.

Rachel pushed the drunken old man. Anger. Self-defense. Whatever. He fell backward, rolled down the stairs, and landed at the base—neck broken, head cocked at an angle from
The Exorcist.

To her great surprise, Rachel discovered she liked what she saw. Her father broken. Powerless. No longer a threat. The vision intoxicated her. Standing over his lifeless body, she crowed, “I got the rigor-mortis touch, old man.”

Rachel’s extra rolls were gone, all forty pounds of cellulite and blubber. But the burns from childhood still seared. The puffy white blemish haunted her every minute of the day. Rachel rubbed the damaged flesh, her mood souring with each stroke of the index finger.

There was only one way to cheer up—she knew from experience and two-hundred-dollar-per-hour sessions with her shrink. He was always saying, “Compartmentalize. Find something that gives you pleasure.”

“Like my night job,” Rachel mumbled, alone in a consultation room of the Park Avenue clinic. She pulled out a cell phone and dialed the number she knew by heart.

“Conrad Barnes,” she said, referring to the seventy-plus target from Bronxville, “is proving tougher than I thought, Kemosabe.”

“Not my problem.”

“Bad mood?” she purred, more mocking than sexual. “Maybe
you
need a vacation.”

“No.”

“I can’t shake Conrad’s wife,” she reported. “They’re inseparable.”

“I don’t need details, just results.”

His abruptness surprised her. Their relationship had almost been cordial since her trip to Paris. The thought reminded her of what she wanted most, not so much retirement as the opportunity to shop for clothes and build the carefree life she had never known as a kid.

“You have things under control, right? It’s nothing personal, Kemosabe.”

“I keep telling you. In my business, everything is personal.”

*   *   *

Cusack stared at the Daryle Lamonica signature. For the second time that morning, he stood and surveyed the Amtrak cabin. Recognized no one. The occupants were just suits heading up to Providence or on to Boston. They were guys carrying briefcases chock-full of sales propaganda and other lies. Nobody appeared capable of impersonating the storied quarterback from Oakland.

He reread the short note. The block letters were rigid and penned in black ink. He had not seen such crisp handwriting since second grade. The message was short, absent any emotion, and to the point.

It read:
Get out while you can. Beware the Greek, and whatever you do, watch your back. There will be no further warnings. Daryle Lamonica.

Cusack forgot all about Graham Durkin and the big sales pitch for LeeWell Capital. Instead, he read the letter over and over. He dissected every word, comma, and space. He tried to envision when and where someone slipped it inside his pitch book. His trip to the food car had been the only opportunity.

After a while, Cusack packed up his computer and began walking the train. He checked for faces, anyone he might know, not sure where to look or what he would find. He opened three bathroom doors in as many minutes, which prompted one suspicious conductor to ask, “What are you doing?”

Looking for the “Mad Bomber.”

“Returning to my seat,” he replied, squeezing past the conductor in the narrow aisle and heading back to the first-class cabin.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

PROVIDENCE
 …

“Glad to see you, Jimmy.”

Graham Durkin extended his right hand. He stood Ranger straight at six foot two, buff for a guy in his fifties. His dark eyebrows were thick but trim, his head shaved like guys thirty years younger. Durkin’s brown eyes radiated an appealing mix of energy and curiosity. In person he exuded warm intensity, the kind of guy who reads
Peanuts
and can still finish crossword puzzles in the Sunday
Times.

“Thanks for meeting with me.” Cusack forgot Daryle Lamonica and focused on Durkin, who could move the dial at LeeWell Capital.

“Do you have other meetings today?” Graham gestured Jimmy to sit, and took control of the meeting with practiced ease. Through the years, the entrepreneur had grown accustomed to being in charge.

“We have clients in Providence,” replied Cusack, measuring his words. “But I came to see you.”

“Oh.”

“I have no expectations,” Jimmy continued, “either positive or negative.” It was important to put Durkin at ease. Pressure spooked prospects the way bad reviews emptied restaurants before restaurants emptied wallets. “Thank you for meeting with me.”

“You brought pitch books?” Durkin glanced at Cusack’s briefcase. “You finance types kill too many trees. Goldman is the worst.”

“I remember,” Jimmy agreed, smiling wide and revving up the charm. “I spent two years at the gulag.”

Cusack pulled out two presentations, one for himself and one for Durkin. He inspected the covers one last time. All the hours, the research, and the PowerPoint gymnastics—they had come down to this moment. And it was a moment, regrettably, where Jimmy missed the billionaire’s cues as he handed over a work of art.

Durkin eyed the presentation like it was fresh dog shit in the middle of a busy sidewalk. He grabbed the booklet anyway and said, “Let me have yours.”

“It has my notes.”

“You don’t need them.”

Daryle Lamonica’s warning was still buried inside Cusack’s copy. Jimmy fished it out and jammed the letter inside his jacket pocket. He handed over the presentation book, unsure what to expect.

With the flourish of a Barnum & Bailey ringmaster, Durkin dropped both presentations into his trash can. “Let’s just talk.” He leaned back in his swivel chair, hands behind his head as though to punctuate the unspoken message: less show and more substance.