Sweat (21 page)

The cleaning crew bantered back and forth in Spanish with a thick El Salvadorian accent. It was after eleven and on the top floor of the building that housed Winthrop Enterprises, Jake was the only native English speaker. A handful of lawyers burned the midnight oil on the floors below—writing their briefs, imposing their legal opinions on paper. It was good work if you could get it—forming legal policy, protecting the rights of the wrongly accused, or the wrongs of the rightly protected, and charging five hundred dollars an hour.

With far less focus on the legal ramifications of what he was doing, Jake stuck the pointy end of the letter opener in the keyhole of Marilyn's old desk. With one quick turn of the wrist, the drawer popped open, and Jake joined the ranks of petty thieves. With a vacuum humming in the background, Jake fumbled through Marilyn's old desk, pushing the new receptionist's personal minefield of cosmetics out of the way until he found the janitor-size key ring. He grabbed the keys and sent the bell attached to the silver ring singing its familiar ding, ding, ding. Two members of the cleaning crew looked up. The younger female in cleaning overalls continued to stare at Jake while wiping the glass wall between the work area and the breakroom.

Jake grabbed the wad of metal, a mix of stainless steel and brass that opened everything from the bathroom to Peter's personal liquor cabinet. He weaved his way through the office, over yellow extension cords and past cleaning carts, and stopped near the emergency staircase. He fumbled through his newly found source of power and jammed a key with a small label reading “files” into the lock. He entered the room, flicked the lights, and shut the door behind him.

The room was a massive cave of information, the walls lined with rows of shelves and stacks of boxes. With real estate leasing for a thousand dollars a square foot, the on-site filing room was costing a mint. Sparkling filing cabinets stood near the closest wall, and Jake started shoving keys into the locks as fast as he could. Each key was marked with a word or initials, clues to an indecipherable code that Marilyn took with her to her grave. He tried the key labeled “f.c.” guessing it was “filing cabinets,” but got nowhere. He tried his trusty letter opener again, but the drawers didn't budge. He dug through boxes and came up for air forty minutes later with a handful of legitimate looking invoices. “Shit,” he said to himself.

He emerged from the filing cabinets ten before midnight and went to his office to see if Kate had broken down, forgiven him, and called. As he flipped through the key ring, checking his voicemail with the phone wedged between his ear and his shoulder, the newly printed key label with the initials “J.O.” caught his attention.
J.O.
, Jake said to himself.
Jake's office
. He got up, walked across his ridiculously large office, and put the key in his door. The lock opened with a smooth click.

Jake sat down, put his right leg on the desk, and donned his decryption hat. He shifted through the set of keys reading labels aloud.

“F.D…” “Front door,” Jake muttered, taking a shot in the dark.

“L.B…” “Ladies bathroom,” Jake whispered.

“W.O.T…” “Waste of time”, he chuckled.

“P.O…” “Peter's office,” Jake said, catching himself.

“Peter's office,” he said again, his feet already in motion.

At the entrance to his father's office he glanced at the remnants of the cleaning crew, turned his attention to the knob, and unlocked the door with as much I-have-every-right-to-do-this demeanor as he could.

He turned the small banker's light on his father's desk, and the green-stained-glass shade cast a pleasant hue into the room, the reflection from the bulb shining off the brass stem of the lamp. Jake opened the main drawer of his father's desk without a key. He yanked the other drawers in order, none of which were locked. Jake didn't take his father to be paranoid, and the open drawers were evidence that he was right. Paranoia and over-the-top confidence didn't go well together.

Jake didn't know what he was looking for, but knew he would recognize it when he saw it. He walked around his father's office like a thief casing a job—eyeing the walls, the photos, the shelves. Jake opened the towering custom-made cabinet on the far wall, beyond the leather sofa and table, near the private restroom. A stash of top-shelf alcohol used to replenish the bar on the far side of the room filled the upper cabinet. At the bottom of the bookcase was a smaller cabinet door. Jake took one look at the keyhole in the door, an octagonal shaped ring lock, and started sifting through the key ring in his hand. With another set of dings, Jake tried the only key on the ring that could possibly open the lock, and gave it a twist.

The key opened the door to intrigue and heartbreak. The front half of the drawer was business, the back half lined with folders of information labeled as personal. He flipped through both sets of files, three dozen in all, and stopped at the file named Chang Industries. There was information on Lee Chang, his father, his brothers. Schools attended. Positions held. Birthdays, favorite foods, vices of choice. Golf handicaps. Names of wives, kids, lovers.

Jake ran his finger along the top of the folders and his head spun when he read the tag labeled “Jake Patrick.”

“What the hell?” he said to himself, as he opened the file and read his dossier.

The security guard's fluttering eyelids touched intermittently, flirting with sleep. The sound of the floor buffers were just loud enough to ward off a full onslaught of REM. Reina, the Spanish queen, wiped the last window on the revolving door with a final sweep of her hand. She stepped back to admire her handiwork and jumped at the face staring back at her through the window. She quickly moved aside and Peter Winthrop walked in the front door.

“Good evening Mr. Winthrop,” the security guard said, trying to snap out of his daze. “Late evening tonight, sir?”

“Yes, I just flew in from Rio. Been back and forth three times in two weeks.”

“I've always wanted to go to Rio. Big celebrations in the street with beautiful girls in little bikinis.”

“You know, some of them even wear clothes,” Peter said, busting the security guard's chops.

“I believe your son is working late, too. I didn't see him leave yet. Nice kid, likes to talk.”

“He's still here, you say?”

“Haven't seen him leave.”

“Not sure that means too much,” Peter responded, stabbing at the guard's propensity to nap. The security guard looked nervous.

“Thanks,” Peter said, ending his goodwill break at the security guard's counter.

“Goodnight, Mr. Winthrop.”

Reina hightailed it to the bank of elevators as soon as she realized Peter Winthrop was the face on the other side of her just-cleaned window. She stopped at the passenger elevators and pushed the buttons to send them to the top floor. Then she boarded the service elevator and headed up.

Reina, cousin to Peter Winthrop's domestic help, flew out of the service elevator on the top floor as the CEO pressed the button for the passenger elevator from the first-floor lobby. He waited for a minute before cursing the cleaning crew. He turned toward the guard, now fully awake, and yelled. “How many times do I have to tell you to keep the cleaning crew in the service elevator?”

“Yes, Mr. Winthrop, I will remind them. It isn't like they forget. They just ignore the rules.”

On the top floor, Reina stretched her short gait and jogged to the office on the far side of the floor. She knocked, grabbed the knob to Peter Winthrop's office, and pushed the door open. Jake jumped, and his pulse skyrocketed.

“Jake, your father just arrived in the building. He's on his way up. I thought you should know.”

Jake looked up, completely confused, and calmly thanked the cleaning woman whom he had never spoken to. Then tried not to wet himself.

He grabbed two folders of interest, threw the rest back into the filing cabinet, gave the scene a one second look-over, and ran back to the safety of his office.

Jake held his head down at his desk, the haphazard spread of papers and folders under his nose evidence of someone hard at work. Peter finished cursing halfway through the ride up and calmed as he entered his domain. He headed straight for Jake's corner office.

“You're here late.”

“Hey,” Jake answered. “How was the trip to South America?”

“Good. Looks like I may be able to work out a deal with a Brazilian chemical company to import some Japanese cosmetics. Should be painless and profitable.”

Jake put on airs of naivety. It was easy. His father barely took the time to get to know anyone but himself, unless there was money in it.

“The Japanese and Brazilians?”

“Sure. Brazil has the largest Japanese immigrant community in the world. They have close ties.”

“I didn't know that,” Jake said treading water while trying to avoid the riptide he had created. “On the topic of world trade, I have been working with the International Group on getting the night vision goggles for Hasad. I had a few questions that I didn't feel comfortable asking them and wanted to ask you directly.”

“Sure,” Peter said, finding the corner of the desk with his butt.

“Isn't the exportation of night vision goggles illegal?”

“Didn't you hear me tell Hasad that Winthrop Enterprises wouldn't be involved in illegal exporting?”

“Come on, Dad. I mean, Hasad lives in Turkey, everyone knows that is where they were going.”

“Son, I make it a habit not to acknowledge that I know where they are going. I'm simply buying them and selling them to an interested third party. What they do with them is their decision.”

Peter didn't bother enlightening his son on the best way around export control—transportation on military cargo planes paid for by Uncle Sam himself.

“Couldn't that be trouble?”

“Okay. Let's say these night vision goggles do go to Turkey. Then what? Let's say Hasad uses them to hunt Kurds along the border with Iraq. Jake, these guys have been killing each other for thousands of years, and short of a nuclear war, they will be killing each other for a thousand more. The goggles will not change that.”

“But it is illegal. You could go to jail.”

“First and foremost, I don't export illegal goods. But hypothetically speaking, if I did, let's look at the risks. There are one hundred sixty federal agents assigned to the entire U.S. in the Bureau's Office of Export Controls. Do you have any idea how many companies export goods in a given year? Thousands. Do you know how many more people have exporting licenses? Thousands more. If these federal agents investigate ten percent of all suspicious exports, they are having a banner year.”

“It's still the government. They are still federal agents.”

“Son. One hundred sixty agents. That tells you the government is not serious about it.”

A long pause followed.

“Do you know how much money the Bureau of Export Controls levied in fines last year?”

“No idea, but I am guessing you know.”

“Thousands of companies exporting hundreds of thousands of goods… and the amount of all federal fines levied totaled $1.4 million. Peanuts. Son, I could afford to pay that with cash laying around in my money market. That is $1.4 million for the entire country. All illegal export fines. For one year. If someone wanted to export illegal goods, the cost of doing business is low.”

“The cost of doing business?”

“Like the tobacco industry. They pay hundreds of millions in tobacco-related class-action lawsuit settlements. But they make billions. Subtract a few hundred million from a few billion and you still end up with one big number, son. The cost of doing business.”

“How about going to jail?”

“Jail? Wouldn't happen. You know how many people these one hundred sixty export control agents put behind bars last year? One, Jake. One. One poor guy in Florida who was stupid enough to try and export shoulder-fired missiles. And they wouldn't have caught this guy if he hadn't initially applied for a license to export them and been denied. Then they were watching him. He was stupid and careless, and that is why he was caught. Your odds of hitting the nightly pick-three lottery drawing are better than getting arrested by the federal agents of the Office of Export Controls.”

“The cost of doing business,” Jake imitated.

“A payoff-risk analysis,” Peter answered.

“How can you be so confident, Dad?”

“Because I have been buying and selling everything from air conditioners to underwear for over twenty-five years.”

“What about the FBI?”

“The FBI? The FBI couldn't catch a cold in a Siberian hospital. The FBI only gets involved with the Office of Export Controls in cases of Terrorism and Espionage. And since 9/11, this country is overwhelmingly concerned with what is coming in to this country, not in what is leaving it.”

“So you cover your bases…”

“Jake, let me walk you through the deal with Hasad. It'll be a good hands-on experience. I will show you the ropes myself.”

“Sure, Dad. First thing tomorrow.”

“Can't do it tomorrow, son. I have a golf tournament. The day after tomorrow.”

“Deal,” Jake said, not sure if his Dad was playing the same game he was, or if his father knew his son was playing at all.

“Any chance I can borrow a car?” Jake asked, pushing the envelope. “I need to put mine in the shop for a few days.”

“You feeling responsible?”

“Always,” Jake answered. What he didn't want to be called was irresponsible by a man who was the definition of the word. He deserved more than that. Eighteen months of dragging his mother to the hospital. A year of making every meal, doing all the cleaning, all the shopping. Six months of carrying his mother to the bathtub, bathing her, giving her medication. Responsibility was something he understood more deeply than his father ever would.