Enemy In the Room (13 page)

“Wait. She’s our daughter. We shouldn’t just
abandon her.”

“She has abandoned us. It’s clear. She has
chosen Alex over us.”

Elizabeth was silent for a moment. “David,
this isn’t the Middle East.”

He turned to her. “I was waiting for that.
Elizabeth, I grew up in a nominally Muslim home, but today I’m
about as Muslim as you are Christian. This isn’t about geography,
politics or religion. It’s about family and the consequences of bad
choices. Plenty of American Christians and Jews would do the same
thing. I’m not going to have her stoned. I do love her and want her
back. But not with that creep. And, by the way, she runs a good
chance of dishonoring our family. What if someone told my mother?
Callie
has chosen this course, not us.”

“But it sounds like you made it a choice
between him and us.”

“How can we send money, when we’re also
trying so hard to pay off our debt, to support this outrageous
behavior?”

Elizabeth paused again. “I hate what you’ve
told me. But it’s not fair to mix Callie’s education and the bad
investments we made.”

He started to speak, but she raised a hand.
”Let’s not talk about our debt right now, David. It will be there,
but Callie may not be. And think about it. Doesn’t similar
outrageous behavior help support us?”

“What do you mean?”

“Didn’t you say that you were just out
looking at adult movie studios, and isn’t USNet into video sites,
X-rated television, internet gambling—all that?”

“That’s business. Callie is our family.”

“Yes. But we, in essence, live off other
people’s less than perfect behavior. Maybe we should try to
understand Callie and keep talking.”

“What other people may do is not our
business. But Callie and Rob are. And I’m glad to keep talking—but
she has to dump Alex. That’s the choice she has.”

“Parents or boyfriend.”

“Yes. And please don’t call her.”

“What?”

“I’ve given her a choice, and I want her to
understand it. Things are not the same. We can’t give in.”

“I can’t talk to Callie?”

“Not for a while. She has to feel the
difference, and we have to be united on this.”

“You didn’t ask me.”

“You weren’t there. It just came out of the
conversation. But now we have to stick by it.”

“Or what?”

“Or she’ll continue to use us to support a
boy and a life-style that go against everything I believe in.”

“I understand your anger, but where did the
‘belief’ suddenly come from?”

He paused. “I’m not sure. But you know what
I mean. Basic right and wrong. Growing up in a church in the South
someone must have told you that it’s wrong for unmarried people to
live together. And I think it says somewhere that you’re supposed
to honor your father and your mother, not take their money and live
with your boyfriend.”

“I don’t think living together was a major
topic then. But they did mention the back seats of cars.” She was
silent for a while. “OK, I get it. I’ll go along for a while, but
I’m not agreeing to cut Callie off forever. She means too much to
me—to us. At some point I’m going to call her and talk about all
this. She needs us.”

The sound of children playing outside two
houses away punctuated the silence.

He turned to her. “You know I don’t want
there to be problems. Rob is just going through a phase. Hopefully
Callie will figure it out soon about Alex. I just want you and them
to be happy.”

“Hmm. I’m pretty happy, or I was until this
conversation. I’ll give Callie a week to think about what you said,
but then I’m going to call her. She’s our daughter.”

“If you have to.”

“I do.”

“Hey, the grill should be hot enough now for
the steaks. How are the potatoes doing?”

“Wait about ten minutes. I almost hate to
ask, but did anything else happen today?”

“Yes, as usual, given all our projects. But
one thing just blows my mind.” He gave her a summary of the Capital
Tower situation with Bill Porter.

When he finished, she asked, “What will
Trevor Knox think? I bet he’ll be angry.”

“He’s due back from Mexico tomorrow. I’ve
briefed Paul, and tomorrow we’ll have a real estate meeting with
Trevor. He doesn’t like to lose, particularly to a rigged deal. He
will
not
be pleased.”

There was a loud crash upstairs. The first
time it had happened, months earlier, they had rushed to find the
problem; now it happened frequently enough that they were no longer
concerned. Rob became so involved in his virtual reality games that
he would contort himself into difficult positions to “fire” around
virtual rocks or to hide in difficult spots. So occasionally he
simply slipped and fell on his virtual reality floor plate, usually
with a crash because he protected his equipment.

“He’s going to break a bone,” Elizabeth
muttered, looking up at his window. David shook his head and took
another sip. She continued, “Actually, I think he’s already broken
something, but not a bone. David, Rob is ‘off’ somewhere. I mean
really, and I mean almost all the time. No, listen, it’s not just a
‘stage’. Even when he’s unplugged from that stuff, you can tell
that he’s thinking about it. He can’t wait to get back to it. It’s
taken over his life. Look at his grades. Look at us. We never see
him except when he passes through and occasionally eats. David,
it’s not right. We need to unplug that equipment and get rid of
it!”

“Elizabeth, I’m concerned, too. But we’ve
got cutting edge equipment that cost a lot of money. There must be
another way. Maybe we can limit his hours.”

“Fine,” she said with an edge to her voice.
“Do it. I don’t see how we’ll enforce it. But we’ve got to do
something. If Callie is going to have to live with consequences for
her bad choices, then Rob needs them, too. We’re losing Rob to all
that ‘stuff’. I’m
very
serious. We have no idea what else he
sees or does on the internet. It scares me.”

“OK. I’ll think about a solution.”

She touched the armrest with her index
finger. “David, I…”

He raised his hand. “Really. I
understand.”

She stopped and looked at him. “All right.
But, this is not good. I want you to talk to him.”

“I will. I promise.”

TUESDAY, APRIL 19TH

Trevor Knox was at the console at the front
of the cabin in his corporate jet as he re-crossed the Atlantic
from a USNet Europe meeting early the next Tuesday morning. He had
read through his RTI messages via encrypted satellite link. Using a
headset to reduce the airplane noise, he was talking on the secure
radio/ video link to Akbar Kamali.

“Akbar, the demonstration of the NovySvet
technology as reported by Simon North exceeded my expectation. They
have the nucleus of an incredible weapons system which in a year or
two can be deployed against targets anywhere in the world. “

Kamali nodded on the screen. “And we may
have a lead on a cruise missile in Russia.”

“Yes, I saw that in the messages. How good
that would be, with NovySvet right there.”

“We will figure out who is involved.”

Knox continued, “Also, we should move to
purchase the controlling interest in Ezon Communications. Send an
email to Cleve Danforth to set up a meeting with them tomorrow to
explore our purchase. Of course Cleve won’t know what we know about
their problems, but eventually we’ll offer to cover the undisclosed
‘accounting irregularities’ in their CFO’s emails.”

Kamali smiled. “Cleve must be happy with his
success each time he gets an email from his special anonymous
client that sends him to negotiate with a company that’s not even
for sale, and he walks away controlling the board. He probably
thinks he’s an incredible negotiator.”

“He is. But our extra information certainly
gets him to the right targets.” Knox put down one note, picked up
another and tapped the desk with his gold pen. “Let me ask you
about our campaign against President Harper. It looks like Senator
Pritchard is ready to take a fall with those gambling payoffs. And
you have ten other congressmen and senators on Harper’s team ready
for surprises this week. But what about this Sullivan situation?
How could you have missed that the woman her husband was seeing now
works for us?”

Knox could see Kamali grimace. “There is no
good explanation, other than we just missed it. We were focused on
Richard Sullivan and the affair he had several years ago, not on
the other woman.”

“But a simple check would have told you.”
The plane banked slightly to the left.

“I know. Sometimes we just have too much
information to sort through. We have the ability to check virtually
everything about everyone for the past fifteen years. The problem
is, where do we stop? In this case, we knew we had them on the old
cell phone intercepts, and we knew it would embarrass the
Congresswoman, so we stopped there and moved on to others.”

“Well, it’s embarrassing to have USNet even
tangentially in a story like this, since we work so hard to keep
RTI separated. You should search all of these upcoming revelations
for any connections to us.”

“Yes. The woman, Kristen Holloway, is in
real estate. We’ll focus the media through our usual sources on the
Sullivans, and away from the Holloway woman.”

“Good. I think that’s it. And you’re
probably right that we need to expand the number of duty officers.
There
is
a lot of information flowing through our system
now, and we don’t want to miss anything important. You and Victor
should start putting together a list of people with the motivations
we need as duty officers. I’ll take a look when you’re ready. And
now I’ll try to get a little rest before we land.”

“Yes. Good night, sir.”

Knox turned off and locked the console, then
swiveled in his chair and pushed buttons that turned it into a
comfortable recliner. He noted the time and thought through his
meetings scheduled for Tuesday, then dropped off to sleep.

That Tuesday morning David was behind his
desk preparing the real estate briefing for Trevor Knox and Paul
Burke, scheduled for right after lunch.

As he finished reviewing the agenda for
their meeting, David glanced over to his credenza at the picture of
Elizabeth and their children taken two years earlier. He placed the
agenda in his outbox and took out a legal pad. At the top of two
pages he wrote,“Callie”, then “Rob”. Below each name, as
appropriate, he wrote “Alex, Money, Porn, Drugs, Sex, Internet, Bad
grades and Other?”

On each page he wrote “Solutions and Action
Steps.” He looked at the pages on his desk, pen in hand, ready to
create a plan of action to help each child, just as he did with
business issues. He was still staring at them when the phone rang.
“Mr. Sawyer, it’s Phyllis Jordan. Mr. Knox has had to change his
schedule and wonders if you can do the real estate briefing at
twelve instead of two?”

“Sure, Phyllis. We’re almost ready.”

“Thank you.”

He pushed the pages together and started to
throw them away. But instead he opened a desk drawer and put them
in a file marked “Personal.” He closed the drawer and turned his
attention back to their meeting.

An hour later he and Paul Burke took seats
at Knox’s conference table.

“Thanks for changing the time, gentlemen. I
find that I have to leave for Brazil this afternoon. David, I know
we have a lot going on, but can you keep it to fifteen minutes
today? Hopefully we’ll have more time next week.”

“Sure. I’ll hit the high points.” He passed
copies of the agenda to the two men and began working his way down
the list.

Ten minutes later he was on the next to last
subject, Capital Tower. He explained that it appeared that the
listing agent bettered their offer by a small percent after
reviewing all of the other bids.

“Who is the marketing agent?” Knox asked,
pulling out his pen.

“Bill Porter.”

“Give me a sense of the magnitude of what he
is doing to us, assuming this is true.”

“If we could borrow virtually all of the
purchase price, which is below replacement cost, at today’s low
rates, and values continue to increase downtown as they have for
the past two years, the difference to us over a typical ten year
hold could exceed fifty million.”

“You mean this guy is going to steal the
building and fifty million from us, and we’re just going to let him
do it?” Knox asked, his voice rising, the pen pointing.

“No, not at all,” Sawyer replied. “I’m
meeting at four today with our attorneys, and we’ll figure out a
course of action.”

“Fine. But keep me informed. Send me an
email after your meeting. I hate losing, and particularly to a
thief.”

“I will. Now, our last subject is Los
Angeles. Here is a separate report I prepared after touring the
target facilities with local agents. Paul, it gives you an idea of
the values that we assign to the real estate in each company, and
whether we recommend to use or sell each facility.”

Knox and Burke looked at the package Sawyer
handed them. It contained a summary by company, with pictures and
maps of each facility and its probable value.

“This looks quite comprehensive, David.
Thank you. I’ll read it on the way to Brazil and get back to you.
Paul, this should be a big help with your financial analysis.”

The agenda had been covered, and the meeting
was coming to an end. David’s stomach turned, and, thinking of
Callie, he said, “Trevor, about Los Angeles. The company’s strategy
for XXXtra Cinema. Is it to grow that operation?”

Knox, who had been making a neat stack of
his papers, stopped, looked puzzled, and asked, “Why wouldn’t we,
David? It’s enormously profitable.”

“I know. But, well, I’m just not sure that
these movies are the best use of our money and our people.”