the Plan (1995) (21 page)

"Where's Ryan? I tried to call him at the Cape May Inn," she said.

"Ryan doesn't exist anymore."

"Mickey, don't," she said weakly. "You're hurting me."

Finally, Mickey shoved her back. She stumbled and fell on the beach house carpet.

He moved to her and stood looking down. There was something absolutely soulless in the stare. "I told you not to see him. You chose to ignore me. . . . You went to Iowa anyway. If I can't trust you, Lucinda, I can't leave you in my life. Pack your stuff and get out." Then he turned and walked out of the room.

She packed and, half an hour later, left the beach house in the old Mercedes station wagon that was there for the servants.

She knew as long as Mickey was there, she would neve
r r
eturn.

Chapter
28.

BUD RENNICK ISSUED THE INVITATION ON BRENTON SPENcer's six o'clock news. It was a TV remote from the union headquarters on East Fifty-seventh Street. Bud was standing on the steps of the Teamsters headquarters dressed in a black suit. "We welcome any help in this negotiation that we can get. If Governor Richards thinks he has a solution, we'd be more than happy to hear it."

Ryan had been asleep for hours and the newscast woke him up. He was now watching the TV propped up in bed, his leg on fire, while Kaz sat in a straight-backed chair, drinking Coke out of a long-necked bottle.

"This has A
. L
's fingerprints all over it," Ryan finally said under his breath.

"Who's A
. J
.?" Kaz asked nonchalantly, hoping he would open up.

"Better question is, who are you?"

"We'll get around to that. First I wanna know what you're doing with Mickey Alo."

"Why?" Ryan answered, feeling dizzy.

"If you keep answering questions with questions, we're not gonna get far."

"Why should we get anywhere?"

"Am I remembering this correctly? Weren'tyou about to get dumdummed off the fucking planet when I showed up?"

Ryan felt tooweak to answer. He wished somebody would get a chain saw and cut his leg off.

"So, who's A
. J
.?" Kaz asked again, as if no time had passed.

"Teagarden. He's Haze Richards's campaign chairman."

"You feel strong enough to answer my other questions?"

Ryan studied the man who had saved his life and decided he owed him something.

"You're Ryan Bolt, right?"

"Right."

"What's your connection to the Alos?"

"I was Mickey's roommate in prep school," Ryan said as Kaz's expression went flat.

"Don't shit me, Bolt. I'm looking for comedy, I'll go watch pigeons fuck."

"He and I went to Choate School in Connecticut twenty years ago. We were roommates. I didn't pick the room assignments." The two traded empty stares.

"So why are you hanging with him now?"

"When you get through with this interrogation, are you gonna let me know who you are?" Ryan's leg was gettin
g w
orse. He looked down at the bandage, still seeping blood. "Depends on whether I like what I hear."

"When my son died a year ago, Mickey came out fo
r t
he funeral. I hadn't seen much of him since college, bu
t h
e helped me get through it. And then . . . I hit a roug h p atch, careerwise, this year, and he said he'd help me out."

"What career? Whatta you do?" Kaz asked, but he already had a pretty good idea. He'd been shopping in
Ryan's wallet and found his Writers Guild card and his
T
. V
. and Motion Picture Academy memberships. Unfortunately, there were no picture IDs. "I'm a writer-producer in television."

"So, Mickey calls you up, asks you to come out here. Why?"

To make a documentary film on the candidate." "Must a' been a pretty shifty film."

Ryan looked at him blankly.

"Mob guys don't like a movie, they generally just walk out. They don't take the filmmaker into a field and try and blow his head off," Kaz explained.

"Yeah, it was a bad movie, especially if you want to put Haze Richards in the White House. It showed Haze to be a coward. Mickey wanted it back."

"It's a wonder you only got one hole in ya. You been stomping around in a mine field wearin' snowshoes." He set down the empty beer bottle. "My name is Solomon Kazorowski. I used to head the Vegas Organized Crime Unit of the FBI. I lost my job and my tin for trying too hard to put the Alos out of circulation. They got to my bosses, but Mrs. K. didn't raise no quitter, so I'm still in the hunt."

"FBI?" Ryan said, not really believing that this unkempt, sagging monster had ever been a member of the Bureau.

"Been off the job for ten years."

"You know Alex Tingredies?"

"The Tin Man? Yeah. Alex is good people. He's still wearing his asshole behind him. One of a dying breed down there."

"Mind if I call him and ask him about you?" Ryan asked, trying to forget the rising agony that was now consuming his whole left side.

"Don't trust me?"

"Just trying to get the snowshoes off."

"Last I heard, Tingredies was in Atlanta."

"He's back in D
. C
. I called him a couple a' days ago. I got his home number in my wallet."

Kaz found the number. He sat in the chair next to the bed and dialed. On the third ring, Alex Tingredies answered.

"Hello," the agent said.

"Is this Rin Tin Tingredies?" Kaz said, a smile forming on his face.

"Who's this?"

"It's fucking J. Edgar Hoover, calling collect from Dead Fed Heaven."

"Gotta be Kaz. Don't tell me you're still vertical. I figured somebody would a' put a 'nine' through you by now."

"Gonna take more than nine millimeters to put me outta service." They both laughed, then: "Listen, you know a guy named Ryan Bolt?"

"Why?"

"He says he knows ya. I'm trying to find out who he belongs to. New York Tony put a round through his leg." "Is he okay?"

"Yeah, but Tony's gotta bad headache. I sent him to harp class."

"Nobody's gonna miss that piece of shit."

"This guy Bolt . . . can you describe him?" Kaz said, looking at Ryan, who was trying hard not to move his throbbing leg.

"If he's six-two, 'bout one-eighty, pretty-boy goodlookin', California blond, it's probably him. He used t' be an all-conference wide receiver at Stanford. He's got some edge."

Kaz looked down at Bolt and nodded. "I'm gonna put him on. Tell me if this is the guy." He handed the receiver to Ryan, who took it and looked at Kaz.

"I thought I was checking you out."

"Hey, we're checking each other out, we're not getting married, so relax."

Ryan put the receiver to his ear. "Alex?" he said
,
weakly.

"Yeah. You okay?"

"Sorta. Who is this guy?"

"You know I don't throw compliments around, but Solomon Kazorowski was the best agent I ever worked with.

I don't know what trouble you're in, but if it's got anything to do with Mickey Alo or any of that stuff we talked about yesterday, you better listen to him, Ryan. Anybody gets you outta the tunnel, it's Kaz. . . ."

"Thanks," Ryan said. "I'll put him back on." He handed the phone to Kazorowski, who put it up to his ear. "He sounds trashed."

"He is, but he'll come back."

"Anything I can do for you?" Alex asked, worried.

"Yeah, send me a Hawaiian shirt. I'm walkin' around looking like Paul Bunyon. And if you got a wire on your phone, burn the tape. It wouldn't do either of us any good."

Chapter
29.

"THESE TRACKING POLLS ARE UNBELIEVABLE," A
. J
. WAS
saying. He was in Haze's hotel room in the Savoy. A
. J
.
wanted Haze to stay with the Caulfields, but Haze wa s a damant, and in the long run, A . J
. figured, it wasn't wort h t he effort. So they'd moved him into a suite on the sevent h f loor.

It was ten A
. M
., the morning of the Iowa Caucus. The campaign staff was gathered in Haze's room. . . . Besides Haze, Carol Wakano, the Rouchards, Ven and Van, Malcolm and Susan Winter were scattered around the suite in blue jeans and T-shirts, while A . J
. moved back and forth in front of the window that framed a gray Iowa morning.

"Over all, we're tracking at twenty-one percent. We've knocked Skatina down to forty. He's not even gonna get a majority if this is accurate. The rest of these clucks are out of it. Gulliford is at ten, Savage at seven, Dehaviland . . . Get this--he's tracking at four percent after spending a whole two months kissing blue-ribbon pigs and getting tractor-seat hemorrhoids. Undecideds are down to twelve percent and leaning our way."

"How are the internals?" Malcolm asked.

"We've got a net plus of nine percentage points. O
n v
alues, we're plus seven. Economy, we're plus fifteen--and we haven't said one thing about how to fix it, change it, or deal with it. Fucking amazing." A . J
. was bouncing around the room. "I'm telling you, the message is a winner, a major pony. We're gonna come in second tonight, just like we planned. Then we're gonna get on that commuter train and ride down to New York and we're gonna fix what ails the Teamsters and the Truckers Association."

"How 'm I gonna do that?" Haze asked. "I don't even know what those guys are arguing about."

"I got it worked out, babe. Don't I always have it worked out?" He moved over and patted Haze on the cheek like an adoring parent.

Haze slapped his hand away. "Cut the shit, A
. J
. I need to talk to you."

"Okay, boys and girls, everybody go get brunch."

They all trooped out except Susan Winter, who was lounging in short-shorts and a halter top on the chair next to Haze. She made no move to leave, and Haze didn't shoo her out as the others left. Once they were gone, Haze got to his feet.

"How 'm I gonna solve the Teamsters strike? I walk in there with those guys, with the whole world watching. I look like a fool if I don't pull it off."

"Would you mind leaving us alone, Susan?" A
. J
. said to the twenty-five-year-old body woman, who was flexing her naked thighs seductively as she wiggled her toes in white, beaded moccasins.

"She can stay."

"I'm not gonna discuss this unless we're alone." "You must of forgot, I'm the candidate for President of the United States."

"Shit," A
. J
. said, spit-spraying across the room. Some of it landed on Susan Winter's bare legs and she wiped it off with a grimace. "You actually think this is about you?"

"Of course it's about me. It's not your face, not your reputation that they're talking about."

"But they're my ideas, Haze. I'm the guy who comes up with the bullshit."

The argument arose so fast, it startled both of them.

"You wanna know how you're gonna solve the Teamster strike? I'll tell you, but get her out of here!"

The tension in the room multiplied again before Haze finally moved to the door and opened it. "Give us a minute, Sue."

She got up and moved out, taking her time, showing how she felt about it. When the door closed, Haze spun on A
. J
.

"I've had it with this shit! I won't be treated like some dumb asshole. I don't need you to tell me what I think."

"Hey Haze, if I wasn't here, you'd be selling twenty-year life policies for Aetna, and if you don't think I'm right, give me the gate and see how far this campaign goes"

"You're pissed off because I took Susan and you wanted her."

"No, I'm pissed off because every good idea, every piece of worthwhile strategy that ever happened for you came outta my head. And now we're sitting here, ready to make the biggest play of our lives, and you start sounding like you're actually responsible. I put Mickey Alo in the picture. I set up the debate. I came up with the defining event. Me! Not you! Me! And if you start to read the newspaper and think this is about you, then you're the stupidest son of a bitch on the planet!"

They glowered at each other across a threadbare carpet. Finally, Haze took a deep breath.

"How does this Teamster thing work?"

"I don't know. Mickey is working it out. He told me it's a done deal; all you gotta do is go down there, walk in that room with those two guys, spend an hour, walk out and announce that you made it happen. You brought management and labor together. You made America work again."

"I wanna know the terms of the agreement first."

"You wanna ratify the fucking contract?" A
. J
. was stunned. "All you know about trucks is they're hard to get around on the turnpike."