Shell Game (Stand Alone 2) (14 page)

“$20 million against current appraised real estate of $50 million.”

“Jeez, Eddie. Normally, I could go to our banks and handle the refinancing for you. But the Federal regulators have forced them to cut back on commercial real estate exposure.”

“I know, but I’m not about to give up. Let me know if someone from Broad Street National Bank calls you about the franchise rights.”

“Oh, you can count on that. I won’t make it easy for them.”

“Thanks Peter.”

“De nada. Vaya con Dios.”

Edward dragged himself home at 10:30. He had agonized about how to save his business, but no realistic ideas had come to him. There just wasn’t enough time to raise $20 million, especially in this financial environment.

Betsy met him at the door, kissed his cheek, and took his briefcase from his hand. “I’ve got dinner waiting for you,” she said.

“I had a burger at my desk. I think I’ll just watch the news for a while, try to decompress, and go to bed.”

She gave him a sad look. “I wish there was something I could do.”

He hugged her and told her somehow things would work out, but he didn’t believe his own hollow words.

After Betsy went upstairs, Edward retrieved a large tumbler from the bar before cracking open a new bottle of Johnny Walker Red. He filled the glass with ice and took it and the bottle to the den and placed them on the coffee table. Picking up the television remote, he was about to turn on the set, but hesitated and then hurled the remote across the room into a plush chair. “Sonofabitch!” he said, in a subdued voice so Betsy wouldn’t hear him.

He poured three inches of scotch into the glass and took a healthy pull straight from the bottle. Resting his head against the back of the couch, he closed his eyes and allowed his suppressed anger to build. Since meeting with Stanley Burns at Broad Street National Bank a couple days ago, he’d wanted to shove his fist through a wall—or, better yet, to punch out a banker, or a Federal regulator, or a politician. Then he thought about Gerald Folsom. Folsom. He would be the ideal target.

Despite his usual optimism, Edward now faced the very real possibility of losing the company he’d built from scratch. All of the effort he had put in would be for nothing. And with his personal failure would go his mother’s and sister’s investments in the company.

Beneath Edward’s anger was fear. This wasn’t like fighting in Iraq. In fact, he told himself, he would rather be back in Iraq than confronting the evil he was now dealing with.

“Bastards!” he growled. “Evil bastards!”

“What is it, Eddie?” Betsy asked.

He hadn’t heard her come downstairs. She came to the couch and sat next to him. He knew she didn’t like to see him drink; she’d grown up in a home with an alcoholic father. But she didn’t say anything.

Edward set down the bottle and took Betsy’s hand. “I don’t know what to do,” he said.

She rested her head against his shoulder. “Things will work out; you’ll see.”

Edward wanted to be strong for Betsy, but his overwhelming sense of defeat and fear quickly turned to bitter outrage and hatred.

“They’re stealing my business, Betsy, and there’s not a damn thing I can do about it. The unfairness, the injustice of it all is more than I can stand. The government, the regulators, the politicians, Wall Street. Take your pick. I’m just a pissant they can step on.” He coughed a scornful laugh. “The bastards took over General Motors and Chrysler; they took over the banking system. Why am I even surprised?”

Betsy sat up and looked at him. “You’ll figure it out. You always do. That’s what attracted me to you when we first met. Your self-confidence.”

For an instant, Betsy’s words rubbed him the wrong way. He wanted her pity, not her stupid assurance. He almost yelled at her to leave him alone, when she added, “Win or lose, you can’t give up. You do that and you’ll never be able to live with yourself.” She kissed him on the cheek and stood. “I’ll be waiting for you upstairs.”

Edward watched his wife leave the room. His stomach churned with acid, swamping his mouth with a sour taste. He was ashamed of the self-pity he had been basking in. Betsy was right. He couldn’t give up. He may not win this battle, but he’d go down fighting . . . fighting every enemy he could in the process.

He stood and took the scotch bottle to the bar. He went upstairs to tell Betsy how much he loved her.

WEDNESDAY

JULY 20, 2011

Folsom hadn’t been back in his old neighborhood in years. His parents died still living in Germantown. He wanted to move them out of the area, but by the time he could afford to do that, his father was dead of lung cancer and his mother institutionalized with Alzheimer’s. Until today, he’d had no desire or need to visit here. But things had changed.

He cruised down Germantown Avenue, passing Washington Lane, continuing on for another two miles. Many of the active storefronts of his youth were now boarded up, but street corners were still gathering spots for unemployed young black men. At Claremont Street, he made a right turn and drove down a block to Frankie’s Pool Hall, a joint that hadn’t changed since Folsom hung out there over forty years earlier. Parking the Mercedes in the four-car lot next to Frankie’s, he walked to the front entrance and pushed through the door.

“You lost, man?”

Folsom stopped and wheeled around. He glared at a twenty-something black man slouched against the wall to the right of the door and growled, “Do I know you?”

The man’s eyes widened, obviously surprised by Folsom’s reaction. He pushed off the wall and straightened up. “Nah, you don’t know me. What you doin’ here?”

Folsom jutted his chin forward, shortening the distance between the two of them. “None of your fuckin’ business,” he rasped. “Back off or I’ll embarrass you in front of all your brothers in here.”

The younger man seemed to be considering his options. Without even turning around, Folsom knew that every eye in Frankie’s was on them. He’d whispered his challenge so the guy would have the option of backing down.

“Tell you what,” Folsom added, again in a whisper, “I’m going to put an arm around your shoulder and we’re going to walk over to the bar with big smiles on our faces. Then I’m gonna buy you a beer like we’re old buddies. How do you feel about that?”

“I could use a beer,” the man said.

Folsom laughed, put his arm around the man and walked with him to the bar. He ordered two beers and asked the bartender if Frankie Jones still owned the place.

“Frankie’s been dead some ten years,” the bartender answered. “I’m his son. This is my place now.”

Folsom turned to look at the young man next to him. “Why don’t you take that beer over to one of the tables?”

The guy clapped Folsom on the back. “Sure, man,” he said and walked away.

“You handled that well,” the bartender commented. “I was about to pull out the baseball bat.”

“I dealt with punks like that when I still lived in this neighborhood.”

“You knew my dad?”

“I loved your dad,” Folsom said. “He used to let me do odd jobs around here when I was twelve, thirteen years old. Taught me how to fight.”

The bartender nodded. “Yeah, he was like that. My name’s Tyrese. Somethin’ I can do for you?”

“Used to be a guy named Toothpick hung around here. He’s probably sixty by now.”

The bartender smiled. “Bad guy, that Toothpick. Was short and skinny. Lot of guys underestimated him ‘cause of his size.”

“He still around?”

“Ain’t so skinny no more. But he’s still around. How ‘bout I call him for you?”

Folsom smiled. “Appreciate it.”

“I’d need some change for the phone call,” Tyrese said.

Folsom kept his expression blank, but he was laughing inside. Nothing changes, he thought. “What’s the cost of a call today?”

“Hundred bucks,” Tyrese said.

“Damn inflation,” Folsom said, peeling off a bill from the wad in his pocket.

Tyrese palmed the bill and shook his head. “Ain’t it a bitch?”

The barman picked up a telephone receiver from the corner of the bar and punched in a number. He cupped a hand over the mouthpiece and talked to someone for about fifteen seconds. After he hung up he said to Folsom, “Why don’t you take a seat over there? You won’t have to wait long.”

Folsom suffered curious or threatening looks from the pool hall’s patrons, but no one challenged him. He sipped his beer and checked email on his BlackBerry. Only one message of consequence: Some customer of Broad Street National Bank was demanding a meeting with someone who could make a decision about his loan. Normally, Folsom would not have been bothered with stuff like this. But this customer was threatening to go to the media and Folsom didn’t want that kind of attention. Even though the deals between the Feds and investors in banks were legal, they could be perceived as unfair by the average citizen. He didn’t want a bunch of goody-goodies questioning the six different bank deals he’d done with the Feds over the past twenty-two years. And God forbid the deals he’d made on the loan pools he’d bought from the Feds at huge discounts became public knowledge. All thanks to his old friend Donald Matson.

He heard the door to the pool hall open and saw two black men in suits and ties enter. One of the men stopped by the door and looked around like a Secret Service agent guarding a President. The other, a short, hugely obese man, waddled over to Tyrese, who tipped his head in Folsom’s direction. The man moved toward Folsom and said, “I hear you’re looking for me.” The man tilted his head to the side and squinted at Folsom. “You ain’t no cop, and you sure as hell don’t live around here, so what do you want?”

“Jesus, Toothpick, what the hell happened to you?” Folsom said. “You look like Jabba the Hut.”

The man’s face suddenly contorted in anger. He reached inside the pocket of the light-weight topcoat he wore despite the summer heat.

Folsom chuckled. “You wouldn’t shoot an old friend would you?”

His hand still in his coat pocket, Toothpick glared at Folsom and said, “No old friend be callin’ me Jabba the Hut.”

“You used to call me a lot worse than that. Like white trash, punk ass, shit-for-brains fucker.”

Toothpick stared harder at Folsom. “You sort of look familiar.”

Folsom smiled; Toothpick had moved his hand from his coat. “It’s Jerry, man. Jerry Folsom.”

Toothpick’s mouth opened and his eyes bulged. “Sumbitch! You be lookin’ uptown. Last time I saw you, you was waitin’ tables, or sumthin’ up on the Hill.”

“Long time ago. A lot has changed.”

Toothpick raised two fingers at Tyrese. “Whiskey, brother.” Then he sat down on a cane chair across from Folsom, somehow not crushing it. After Tyrese delivered two whiskey shots and walked away, Toothpick downed his drink and raised the glass at Tyrese for another one before he had even gotten back to the bar.

“You always was crazy,” Toothpick said. “Guys used to try to kick your ass just to make their bones. Word got around you could be knocked down but you wouldn’t stay down.”

“Tyrese’s father taught me that. Can’t show any weakness.”

“Got that right.”

Tyrese dropped off another whiskey shot, which Toothpick greedily downed.

“But you ain’t visitin’ for old time sake. So what you here for?”

“I have a need for someone with special skills, skills you used to have.”

Toothpick met Folsom’s gaze. “I used to have all kinds of skills. But like you say, time has changed things. Jabba can’t do what he used to.” He smirked at Folsom. “Jabba the Hut, my ass. You a crazy mother.”

“So I wasted my time coming down here?” Folsom asked.

“Depends. You said you needed someone with special skills. I said I
used
to have them; maybe I can provide someone with those skills. Maybe you should be a little more specific.”

“I have a couple problems that need to go away.”

“That always means people problems. People problems aren’t easy to fix. Lots of risks. Can cost a lot.”

“How much is a lot?”

“We talkin’ high-profile people?”

“Nah. A low-level federal government bureaucrat and a nobody woman.”

“Ain’t no such thing as a nobody woman. Especially if it’s a bitch married to a guy with people problems.”

Toothpick had always been quick on the uptake. “How much?”

Toothpick showed a huge white-toothed smile. “Special price for an old friend. Ten grand each.”

“Tell you what,” Folsom said. “I’ll add another ten grand bonus if you take care of business within a week.”

“Ten up front; the balance after your problems go away.”

“Agreed. Let’s go outside and finalize our business,” Folsom said.

Toothpick struggled to his feet and moved toward the door, saying to Folsom behind him, “Don’t forget to pay for the drinks.” He walked outside laughing as though he’d told the funniest joke in the world.

Katherine forced herself to remain composed while she photographed Wendy Folsom’s injuries. Wendy, standing in only her panties in the middle of Katherine’s bright living room, showed no emotion while the pictures of her body were snapped. The young woman’s stoicism and determination gave Katherine the strength to do the job, as badly as she felt like crying.