James Grippando - Money to Burn

“How can you say such a thing?”

“Because it’s true.”

She rose quickly and went for the box of tissues on the bureau.

“Mallory, I-”

“Stop,” she said, cutting me off before I could say it. Then she took a breath to compose herself. “Let’s just forget it, okay? I shouldn’t have said anything. Go see your lawyer.”

It was an awkward moment. I hated to leave like this, but I really did have to meet with the general counsel.

“We’ll talk more when I get back,” I said.

“No,” she said. “I don’t want to. Don’t worry. It’s off my chest.”

She seemed to be trying to convince herself, not me.

“Are you sure?” I asked.

“You just go and take care of what you need to take care of.”

I rose and started toward her, but my phone rang. It was the general counsel wanting to know where the hell I was.

“I’m on my way,” I said before quickly hanging up.

I tried to find parting words that might reassure Mallory. Before I could speak, my laptop sounded from across the bed. I had a new e-mail in my in-box. Mallory and I exchanged glances, as if we both sensed that I needed to check it before leaving. I crossed the room to do just that.

The sender’s address was unrecognizable, a random mix of numbers and letters. But the subject line told me that it wasn’t spam.

It read, Zero balance.

I glanced across the room at Mallory, telling her without words that it was indeed important. I opened the e-mail and read the message aloud.

“Just as planned. xo xo.”

It wasn’t enough for the thief to take my money. Now he had to taunt me with “hugs and kisses”-as if it were personal. Things were getting creepier by the minute.

“What does that mean?” Mallory asked.

“It means I’ve got one hell of a mess to sort out,” I said.

I WAS IN THE BACKSEAT OF A YELLOW TAXI, ABOUT TWO BLOCKS AWAY from Saxton Silvers’ offices on Seventh Avenue, when Sonya Jackson, my firm’s general counsel, phoned me with a change in plans.

“Go directly to the FBI’s field office at 26 Federal Plaza and look for my car on Duane Street. I’ll have Stanley Brewer, our outside counsel, with me. He’s a former federal prosecutor who specializes in identity theft issues, and he’s excellent. You’re in good hands.”

I was glad to see the firm treating the matter so seriously. On the other hand, a former prosecutor taking the matter straight to the FBI didn’t exactly send a message that there was nothing to worry about. I thanked Sonya and redirected the driver toward downtown.

I found Sonya’s black Mercedes parked a block away from the security barriers that protected the FBI Field Office. Sonya was behind the steering wheel and Brewer was on the passenger side. I climbed into the rear seat behind Sonya, and the three of us spoke in the privacy of a virtually soundproof sedan before going inside the building.

Before becoming one of the most respected corporate officers at Saxton Silvers, Sonya had worked with Stanley Brewer at Coolidge Harding & Cash, and she was the first African American woman to make partner at the prestigious firm with a presence on Wall Street that predated the transformation of the Customers’ Afternoon Letter into the Wall Street Journal. The unofficial motto of CH &C was “You get what you pay for,” which explained why it was simply known as “Cool Cash.” I assumed the meter was running as I told Brewer everything, from the separate account for Ivy, to the most recent e-mail I’d received before leaving the hotel suite.

Sonya spoke first. “Sounds like a well-organized identity theft.”

“The e-mail confirms as much,” I said. “Why else would they say ‘Just as planned’?”

“Yes,” said Brewer. “But I find the way the thief signed off-‘xo xo’-far more interesting. That tag at the end was designed to add insult. It’s as if the thief takes more satisfaction in the way the scheme hurts you than in how it benefits him.”

“That was my reaction,” I said. “It almost looks to be more about revenge than outright theft. Or at least equal parts theft and revenge.”

“I’m theorizing at this point,” said Brewer. “But the very nature of your business puts you in a position to hurt people financially, even if it’s not your intention to harm anyone.”

“Transactions have ripple effects,” said Sonya, “and when you’re talking about the kind of transactions that Saxton Silvers is involved in, these ripples can reach all the way across the globe.”

“That makes it even more unsettling,” I said.

“It does,” said Brewer. “Because when the motive is revenge, you never really know when-if ever-they are going to call it even.”

Everyone on Wall Street had rivals, even enemies, but my stomach knotted at the thought of someone out to completely destroy me.

The clock on the dash said 2:55 A.M. I knew how quickly money could move across the globe. With every tick of the clock, I could feel my fortune slipping through the cracks of bank secrecy, untraceable.

“Shouldn’t we get the FBI moving on this?” I said.

“They’re already going strong,” said Sonya. “I sent the account details to the Computer Crime Division right after I called Stanley.”

“I’d still like to get face-to-face with them,” I said.

The two lawyers exchanged glances. Brewer then looked at me and said, “Sonya and I talked while you were cabbing it over here. We agreed that it would be best if you weren’t part of this initial meeting with the bureau.”

“But it’s my money.”

“I understand,” he said.

“My entire personal portfolio has been cleaned out.”

“I’m not minimizing that.”

“I’m the victim.”

“It would appear so,” he said.

“So I have to be there when you talk to the FBI.”

Brewer took a breath, letting it go as he spoke. “Michael, I can’t begin to tell you how many times I have seen law enforcement treat the victim as a suspect.”

I suddenly thought of the way the Bahamian authorities had treated me after I reported Ivy’s disappearance. Not even a clean polygraph exam had convinced some of them of my innocence.

“I understand where you’re coming from,” I said. “But I didn’t do anything here but check my account balance.”

“I know how these agents think,” said Brewer. “If you set foot inside that building, they will shift into fact-gathering mode and will want to know everything about every transaction you have ever structured that involves an offshore bank. That’s sensitive information that you and your clients don’t want to hand over freely, and just as soon as you put up any resistance to their inquiry-bam. You go from victim to suspect in their mind.”

The man was making sense, but I kept coming back to the bottom line. “This is my life savings.”

Sonya chimed in. “Let Stanley and me deal with the FBI. I’ve called in our head of security. The best thing you can do right now is go to the office and use the firm’s internal resources to find out what happened.”

Another good point. When money went missing, private security was often more effective than law enforcement, especially in international matters.

“All right,” I said. “That sounds like a reasonable plan.”

I handed Brewer my business card and told him to call me day or night. Then I stepped out of the car. The lights were burning brightly at the old fire station on Duane Street. Even so, everything else was quiet in this city that never sleeps; there wasn’t a cab in sight. The night air wasn’t quite cool enough for me to see my breath, but I was feeling the chill. I buried my hands in my pants pockets and walked up Broadway, where, for fifty bucks-maybe my last fifty-I convinced a taxi driver with a Ukrainian accent to switch off his off-duty light.