T. Bunn - Drummer in the Dark

“This won’t take but a moment.” When the senator moved away, Wynn stepped up alongside Valerie. “I wish I could say I’m disappointed. Or even surprised.”

Valerie used the hand not holding her briefcase to sweep the hair off her shoulders. “Good afternoon, Congressman. Could I take a moment to inform you of the incredibly vital dangers of the Hutchings Amendment?”

Wynn replied softly, “Honesty.”

“What about it?”

“That’s what you promised me. Our dinner together in Georgetown, remember? You said there wasn’t enough of it in this town.”

“Fine, you want honesty? No problem.” She managed to make glacial look sexy. “I’m going to make you scream with public agony. Shriek in CNBC-captured distress. Pain and no gain. That’s how this is going to play out.”

Carter moved up alongside him, watching her high-heeled departure. “Lobbyists make you feel like a penny waiting for change. That’s their specialty.”

Wynn knew that hers was not an idle threat. “Is it too late to change my mind, take a graceful bow, and ride into the sunset?”

“Come on.” Carter steered him around. “We’ve got other guns to load.”

That evening, Wynn was walking through the main lobby of Georgetown Hospital when the squat little Fed executive and the FBI agent caught up with him. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you guys were stalking me.”

“Our agent observed you enter Mr. Saad’s room and called it in,” Welker told him.

“I didn’t see any agent upstairs.”

“Then he’s doing his job, Congressman.”

Bowers drew Wynn out of the flow. “You’ve left the Willard?”

“Moved into a room at the M Street Marriott.”

“Smart, very smart. Give them less of a target. How’s your friend?”

“They’re going to let Nabil go home tomorrow.” Wynn crossed his arms. “This is not a social call, so let’s hear the bad news.”

“We’ve been getting messages for two days now,” the agent told him. “Evidence slipped through the mail slot, under doorways, left in cryptic code on our website. About how you’ve been involved in some serious business. Felonious activities in the form of insider trading, using your sister as a front. Enough to warrant a full investigation and a possible freezing of all your assets.”

Wynn nodded slowly. Trying to figure out what he felt. Deciding the shock would strike soon enough. “Are you here to arrest me?”

“No, Congressman. We’re not.” Gerald Bowers was not just ugly. He was a pusher. He shoved with his words and his gestures, punching the air between them, getting in close enough for Wynn to catch the stale odor of cigars. “Last time we met, you questioned our bona fides. So we’re laying it out plain as we know how. We’re not going to do a thing with this.”

“Which doesn’t mean the press can’t attack you,” the agent warned.

“They might, but we won’t.” Bowers leveled a stubby finger at Wynn’s nose. “Here’s the deal. We’re after one target and one target only, and it’s not you. That good enough to show which side we’re on?”

“So why don’t you go after Hayek yourself?”

The arm dropped. “Life as a top bureaucrat is as political as elected office. There’s just one rule to riding the Washington bull. Fight the battles you can win.”

“I don’t get it. All the manpower and connections at your disposal, and your best hope is the greenest guy in Congress?”

“It’s not as crazy as it sounds,” Welker replied. “Our first alert on Hayek came from somebody else without any logical connection to the financial community. A nobody acting as messenger for a group called Sant’Egidio. Does the name ring a bell?”

“Let’s take this outside. I hate hospitals. They smell like bottled death.” Bowers led them into an evening mist too fine and windless to be called rain. “Here’s the thing. We know Hayek has been involved in some nastiness south of the border. But there’s nothing concrete we can pin on him.”

“Mexico?”

“Farther down. Doesn’t matter. What I’m saying is, Hayek is tainted, but also very careful. We know for certain he’s not colluding with any of his Wall Street brethren. We also know he’s being flooded with funny money, enough so he’s started a second fund. But none of it traceable to anything illegal. Remember, there’s nothing illegal about betting against the market.”

“But that’s not what you think is going on here, right?”

Bowers’ spectacles glistened like glass flowers, hiding irises of angry blue. “Would I be wasting my Friday night standing in the rain if I did?”

“Give us the ammunition, Congressman,” the agent said. “We’ll blast the guy right out of the water.”

“We’ve heard that this Tsunami project might be aimed at crippling the U.S. financial markets,” Wynn ventured. “But we don’t have any proof. Not yet.”

A swift exchange of glances, then Bowers allowed, “Hayek’s crew has suddenly gotten very busy this afternoon, buying dollars with both fists.” He shoved a card into Wynn’s pocket. “Cellphone and home numbers are on the back. You’ve already got Welker’s card. Stay in touch.”

Saturday

The top man in Valerie’s firm owned a riverside house he stubbornly insisted was in Georgetown, although both the state and city lines were set firmly on the wrong side of his property. He paid Glen Echo city taxes and drove a car with Maryland license plates, but declared with all the inbred stubbornness of his Deep South ancestors that someday he would set the matter straight. Whatever side of the line, the place was still a jaw dropper. Three acres, mostly of trees and ridgeline, overlooked the steep-sided Potomac. Upon this plateau rested a redbrick throne embroidered with pillars, balconies, chandeliers, heart-of-pine flooring, and original oils. One associate claimed to have seen a letter from the chairman to the architect approving an order for three thousand square feet of granite.

Valerie’s wrought-iron chair was at one corner of the slate-and-stone veranda, an untouched drink on the table in front of her. All four senior partners were present. A bombshell she had promised, and a bombshell she was going to deliver. One big enough to require the privacy of an off-site meeting. “Yesterday evening I received information that should take down our principal opposition once and for all.”

“That greenhorn congressman from Florida, what’s his name?”

“Bryant. He was the CEO of a high-tech start-up. They sold out to the company formerly run by Jackson Taylor. Two weeks before the buyout, Bryant apparently used secret accounts in a Bermuda bank to purchase futures in Taylor’s stock, which had been depressed by a major court case that looked like it was going against them. The case was resolved through the acquisition of Bryant’s company. Bryant shared these profits with his sister. Very hush-hush.”

“Dynamite,” her immediate boss declared. “This will totally destroy the guy.”

“There’s a slight problem,” Valerie warned.

“How slight?”

“The sister is Governor Wells’ recently deceased wife.”

“The one who was whacked by the Arab terrorists?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t like it.” The top partner was three years from retirement and considered himself more of a mover and shaker than a mere lobbyist. He had the booming tone of an actor reading unfamiliar lines. “We’re in this for the long haul. There’s a difference between striking hard and hitting below the belt.”

Valerie gripped the arms of her chair, her features set in the concrete of having been through this many times before. This was precisely the sort of imbecilic rubbish she had come to expect from their top man.