Дэвид Балдаччи - Absolute Power

“I’m sorry about Walter, Sandy. I really am.” Jack checked the view across the cityscape. A penthouse apartment in Upper Northwest. The place must have been enormously expensive, and the dollars had continued to flow for the interior design. Everywhere Jack looked were original paintings, soft leather and sculptured stone. He reasoned that the world didn’t have many Sandy Lords and they had to live somewhere.

Lord sat by the fire that popped pleasantly in the grate, a loose paisley robe covering his bulky frame, bare feet comforted in leather slippers. A cold rain fell against the broad expanse of windows. Jack drew closer to the fire, his mind appeared to crackle and jump like the flames; a loose ember hit the marble surround, flamed and then quickly disappeared. Jack cradled his drink and looked at his partner.

The phone call hadn’t been totally unexpected. “We need to talk, Jack, the sooner the better for me. Not at the office.”

When he arrived, Lord’s aged valet had taken his coat and gloves and then inconspicuously receded into the farther reaches of the home.

The two men were in Lord’s mahogany-paneled study, a luxuriously masculine retreat that Jack felt guiltily envious of. A glimmer of the large stone house briefly came into focus. It had a library, much like this. With an effort he focused on Lord’s back.

“I’m kinda fucked, Jack.” The first words out of Lord’s mouth had the effect of making Jack want to smile. You had to appreciate the man’s candor. But he caught himself. The tone in Lord’s voice demanded a certain respect.

“The firm’ll be okay, Sandy. We’re not going to lose many more. So we sublease some space, it’s no big deal.”

Lord finally stood up and went straight to the well-fed bar in the corner. The shot glass was filled to the rim and downed in a well-practiced motion.

“Excuse me, Jack, maybe I’m not making myself real clear here. The firm took a blow, but not one that’ll send it down for the count. You’re right, Patton, Shaw will weather this broadside. But what I’m talking about is whether Patton, Shaw and Lord will live to fight another day.”

Lord lurched across the room and wearily plunged himself on the burgundy leather couch. Jack traced the column of brass nails as they marched across the outline of the heavy piece. He sipped his drink and studied the wide face. The eyes were narrow, no more than penny-wide slits really.

“You’re the firm’s leader, Sandy, I don’t see that changing, even if your client base took a hit.”

Lord groaned from his horizontal perch.

“A hit? A hit? I took a goddamned A-bomb, Jack, right up my ass. The heavyweight champion of the world couldn’t have hit me any harder. I’m going down for the count. The buzzards they are a circling, and Lord he is the main course; the stuffed hog with the apple in the mouth and a bull’s-eye on the butt.”

“Kirksen?”

“Kirksen, Packard, Mullins, fucking Townsend. Keep counting, Jack, the list goes on until you get to the end of the partnership roll. I have, I must admit, a most unusual, hate-hate relationship with my partners.”

“But not Graham, Sandy. Not with Graham.”

Lord slowly edged himself up, perching on one flabby arm as he looked at Jack.

Jack wondered why he liked the man as much as he did. The answer probably lay somewhere in the lunch at Fillmore’s way back when. No bullshit. A real-world baptism where the sting of words made your gut clench and your brain hammer out responses you’d never have the nerve to actually deliver. Now the man was in trouble. Jack had the means to protect him. Or maybe he did; his relationship with the Baldwins right now was far from solid.

“Sandy, if they want to get to you, they’ll have to go through me first.” There, he had said it. And he meant it. It was also true that Lord had given him his chance to shine with the big boys, thrown him right into the fire. But what other way would you know if you could actually pull it off or not? That experience was also worth something.

“The waters might get a little rocky for both of us, Jack.”

“I’m a good swimmer, Sandy. Besides, don’t look at this as purely altruistic. You’re an investment of the firm in which I’m a partner. You’re a top-grade rainmaker. You’re down now, but you won’t stay down. Five hundred bucks says within twelve months you’re back in the number-one slot. I don’t intend on letting an asset like that walk away.”

“I won’t forget this, Jack.”

“I won’t let you.”

After Jack had left, Lord started to pour another drink but stopped. He looked down at his quivering hands and slowly put down the bottle and glass. He made it to the couch before his knees gave out. The federal-style mirror over the fire-place caught his image. It had been twenty years since a single tear had escaped the heavy face. That had been at his mother’s passing. But now the outpourings were steadily coming on. He had cried for his friend, Walter Sullivan. For years Lord had duped himself into believing that the man meant nothing more to him than a solid-gold draw check each month. The price for that self-deception had come due at the funeral, where Lord had wept so hard that he had gone back to his car until it was time to go bury his friend.

Now he rubbed at the puffy cheeks once again, pushing away the salty liquid. Fucking young punk. Lord had planned everything down to the last detail. His pitch would be perfect. He had envisioned every possible response except the one he had gotten. He had mistaken the younger man. Lord assumed that Jack would have done what Lord himself would have done: pressed for every advantage in exchange for the enormous favor being asked.

It wasn’t only guilt that pulled at him. It was shame. He realized that as sickness enveloped him and he bent low over the thick, spongy carpet. Shame. He hadn’t felt that one for a long time either. When the nausea subsided and he once again looked at the wreck in the mirror, Lord promised himself that he would not disappoint Jack. That he would rise back to the top. And he would not forget.

Frank had never in his wildest fantasies expected to be sitting here. He looked around and quickly determined that it was indeed oval in shape. The furnishings tended to be solid, conservative, but with a splash of color here, a stripe there, a pair of expensive sneakers placed neatly on a lower shelf, that stated that the room’s occupant was not nearly ready for retirement. Frank swallowed hard and willed himself to breathe normally. He was a veteran policeman and this was just another routine inquiry in a series of endless ones. He was just following up a lead, nothing more. A few minutes and he’d be out of here.

But then his brain reminded him that the person he was about to make inquiries of was the current President of the United States. As a new shock wave of nervousness rushed over him the door opened and he quickly stood, turned and stared for a long moment at the extended hand until his mind finally registered and he slowly moved his out to meet it.

“Thank you for coming down into my neck of the woods, Lieutenant.”

“No trouble at all, sir. I mean you’ve got better things to do than sit in traffic. Although I guess you never really sit in traffic, do you, Mr. President?”

Richmond sat behind his desk and motioned for Frank to resume his seat. An impassive Bill Burton, invisible to Frank until that moment, closed the door and inclined his head toward the detective.

“My routes are pretty well laid out in advance I’m afraid. It’s true I don’t end up in many traffic jams but it does stifle the hell out of spontaneity.” The President grinned and Frank could feel his own mouth automatically turning up into a smile.