The Ambition
Authors: Lee Strobel
LEE STROBEL
THE
AMBITION
a Novel
To the memory of
Cook County Chief Criminal Courts Judge
Richard J. Fitzgerald
— a friend
whose integrity inspired me
Contents
No one would expect him here. Not at the house of an estranged half-brother few knew existed, all the way out on the rural fringes of Cook County. Not when he had so carefully let it be known around town that he was heading for a long vacation at his condo in Boca Raton.
Pulling up the stubby driveway, he was pleased that the two-car garage was open and empty, dimly lit by a full moon. Shadows welcomed him to this shabby sanctuary. Until he could sort things out, until he could figure out a way to convince the Bugatti brothers that he hadn’t stiffed them on his street tax (well, maybe a little), he just wanted to lay low.
He exited the car and moved toward the side door that led into the house, wondering if he should’ve closed the garage first. What he should’ve done, he thought, is bring something to eat — he doubted his road-warrior bro kept a stocked fridge. Surely, though, he’d have a few cold ones waiting.
Out of the corner of his eye, a blur streaked toward him; the sound was like the striking of a match. The impact of the hollow-point bullet lifted him off his feet, sprawling him into three plastic trash bins along the garage wall.
The bookie was dead before he pitched forward, his head thudding face down at the feet of a hooded Nick Moretti. Something like moonlight spilled through the small window and illuminated a tight smile.
The job was done.
I
As he walked toward the metal detector in the lobby of the Cook County Criminal Courts building, Tom O’Sullivan’s heart pounded so hard and so fast and so loud that he was almost afraid a sheriff’s deputy would hear it. Or that someone would notice the sweat on his upper lip. Or that a security guard’s suspicion might be aroused by his awkward smile, a rather transparent attempt to act naturally.
Through the years, Thomas Ryan O’Sullivan III, attorney at law, had entered the squat, concrete building on Chicago’s West Side countless times to defend drug dealers and second–rate thugs charged with felonies. But this time was different; today this scion of a once–powerful political family was coming to commit an egregious crime of his own.
A sheriff’s deputy picked up Tom’s attaché case from where he’d dropped it on a table for inspection. The deputy made brief eye contact with him; there was a glimmer of recognition, and the officer didn’t even bother to open the case. Tom had counted on the fact that attorneys warrant only casual attention from the security force, especially frequent visitors like himself.
“G’morning, counselor,” the deputy said with a nod, handing Tom the briefcase after he emerged from the metal detector.
Tom didn’t linger. “Have a good one,” he said, grabbing his case with one hand and scooping his watch and car keys from the plastic container with his other. He turned and walked briskly toward the elevator. His footsteps echoed loudly in the cavernous hall, and he forced himself to slow down.
Is the deputy still watching me? Should I have shot the breeze for a few minutes? What about the security cameras — will anyone watch where I’m going?
Reaching the elevator, Tom glanced back toward the entrance. The deputy was busy patting down a defendant who had arrived for trial. Tom sighed deeply, shoved his personal effects into his pocket, and pushed the call button. He took out a handkerchief and dabbed at the perspiration from under the modest wave of reddish–brown hair that swept across his forehead.
How many times, he wondered, had his father dispatched thugs — the kind Tom usually represented — on clandestine missions like this? It was the first time he had ever allowed himself such a thought. He preferred to remember his dad the way he saw him while growing up — powerful, connected, warranting universal recognition and admiration.
He tried to suppress memories of the way his father’s life ended — the dishonor and ignominy, their entire family buried in humiliation. And now, here he was, wallowing in the same corruption — the last place he ever expected to find himself.
More than anything, Tom wanted to run, to hide, to escape, to call off everything. But he knew he had no choice. And in a twisted way, that provided some comfort. The decision had been made. There could be no backing out. The consequences of abandoning his assignment went beyond his imagination.
He gave his lapels a yank to straighten out the gray pinstripe suit. The only thing he could do at this point was to concentrate on not getting caught.
II
Garry Strider threw himself into a maroon vinyl booth at Gilke’s Tap. “The usual,” he called over to the bartender. “Just keep ‘em coming, Jerry.”
The place was virtually empty. Jerry glanced at his watch — a little after three — and let out a low whistle. He hustled together a J&B Scotch with a splash of water and brought it over, slipping into the seat across from his long–time customer.
“Had lunch?” Jerry asked. “Want a burger?”
Strider didn’t hear the questions. “It’s unbelievable.
Unbelievable!”
he said, gulping his drink.
For seventeen years, Jerry had run a hole–in–the–wall tavern strategically located between the offices of the
Chicago Tribune
and the
Chicago Examiner.
During that time he had learned more about newspapers than most ivory tower journalism professors would ever know.
For him, the clues on this particular day were obvious: it was mid–afternoon in the first week of April and the chief investigative reporter of the city’s second largest paper looked like he should be on suicide watch.
“So,” said Jerry. “The Pulitzers were announced.”
Strider downed the rest of his drink and removed his wire–rim glasses, tossing them on the table and massaging the bridge of his nose, his eyes shut.
“We worked eighteen months on that series,” he said, more to himself than to Jerry. “We proved that lousy forensic work by the Chicago police lab had tainted dozens of criminal cases.
Scores
of cases. Two guys were released from death row. Seven cops resigned; a grand jury is investigating. We may nail the chief yet. We won every award in the state. What more do we have to do?”
Jerry knew more drinks were in order. He stepped behind the bar while Strider kept talking. “And who do they give it to? The
Miami Journal
for a series on nursing homes. C’mon —
nursing homes?
Who even
cares,
except in Florida?”
Jerry shoved another drink into Strider’s hand and plopped down a bowl of pretzels.
“You remember Shelly Wilson,” Strider continued. “The redhead? Nice legs?”
“Oh, yeah, I had to pry the two of you apart a couple of times.” Strider shot him a sour look. “Don’t tell me she won it.”
“She was an intern when I hired her,” Strider said. “I taught her everything — undercover work, public records, Internet research, milking informants. Maybe I taught her
too
well — she dumped me and ran to the
Journal
when they offered her more money and her own team. And now she screws me again.”
Jerry shook his head. He felt terrible for his friend. For as long as he had known him, all of Strider’s focus had been on winning a Pulitzer — although Strider had never come right out and admitted it.
They both knew it: a Pulitzer turbo–charges a career like nothing else. It means a shot at the
New York Times
or
Washington Post.
It becomes a proud label for the rest of a reporter’s life: “In his commencement address at Harvard University, Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Garry Strider said yesterday that
blah, blah, blah
…” It would have been in the lead of his obit someday.
Most importantly, bagging the Pulitzer would have gotten John Redmond off Strider’s back. Hard–driving and relentlessly arrogant (and, yes, recipient of a Pulitzer back in 1991), Redmond demanded big results from Strider’s three–person investigative unit. His willingness to let Strider spend month after month pursuing a single series of articles was predicated on him bringing home a prestigious Pulitzer for the paper.
Now that he had failed —
again
— to win the big one, it was unclear what the future would hold. Would he get one more chance? Newspapers were cutting investigative reporters around the country. When tough economic times hit, they were often the first to go.
“You told Gina yet?”
Strider slipped on his wire–rims. “Yeah, I called her. She listened; she sympathized. What else could she do? Then she said she had some news of her own.” He polished off his drink, holding out the glass for another refill.
“Unbelievable.”
III
On the fourth floor of the Criminal Courts Building, Tom O’Sullivan walked up to the door of Chief Judge Reese McKelvie’s courtroom. He grabbed the brass handle — then paused, shutting his eyes tightly.
How did he get to this point? How did everything go so terribly wrong?
He was such an unlikely candidate for something like this. For much of his life, he had lived a golden existence — never having to work hard, never having to worry about his future. In Chicago, the O’Sullivan name had been the key to opening any door that was worth going through.
The O’Sullivan legacy went back to his great–grandfather, Ryan, who emigrated from Ireland in 1875 and bullied his way into a job as an organizer for the new American Federation of Labor.
Ryan’s eldest son, Big Tom O’Sullivan, was the first to make a mark on Illinois politics. Gregarious and brash, conniving and charismatic, Big Tom scratched his way through law school and then gained notoriety by successfully defending six Irish teenagers who had been framed for a killing committed by an off–duty cop. When the alderman of his heavily Irish Ward died of cancer, Big Tom rode a wave of popularity into office.
Over time, he systematically consolidated power. The street smarts he had garnered at the knee of his father, mixed with his larger–than–life personality, made him an irresistible leader. His lock on Ward politics continued until his death in 1957.
His son — Tom’s father — blended seamlessly into the Ward’s political machine during the last several years of Big Tom’s life, but his ambitions were loftier. The year after his father’s death, Tommy Junior was elected to the Illinois General Assembly.
Though not as affable or loquacious as his father, he was equally adept at manipulating the levers of power. After three terms, he easily advanced to the state Senate, where he gained control of key committees dealing with appropriations and transportation.
Growing up an O’Sullivan in Chicago meant every door flew open for Tommy Junior’s namesake son, his only male heir. Tom had learned quickly that mediocrity was more than sufficient in a world that revolved around his well–connected dad.
He partied through college and used his father’s clout to get into law school. But then everything collapsed overnight when the
Examiner
disclosed that Tom’s father had been caught sponsoring a “fetcher bill” — a proposed law whose only real purpose was to negatively impact a particular industry so that it would “fetch” a payoff in return for killing the legislation.
Headlines came fast and furious as allegations multiplied. Contractors told the grand jury that Tommy Junior had steered highway construction projects to friends in return for a piece of the action. It was classic Illinois “pay to play” corruption.
Before long, the investigation, led by Debra Wyatt, a bulldog federal prosecutor intent on making a name for herself, spread like cancer. The senator never discussed the investigation with Tom or his sisters. The closest he came was one morning when he walked into the kitchen and found them reading the
Examiner.
“Lies,” he muttered without looking up. “Wyatt wants to be governor — that’s what this is about.”
Then came the seventeen–count indictment: mail fraud, tax evasion, extortion, racketeering. Tommy Junior’s health collapsed. And that’s when prosecutors turned up the heat.
Come into the grand jury,
Wyatt whispered in his ear,
and implicate every friend. We’ll cut you a deal.
Not a soul expected him to turn state’s evidence — until a story by Garry Strider, based on a leak from prosecutors, landed on the front page of the
Examiner,
alleging that the senator had agreed to tell everything.
The leak was a lie, designed to chase away Tommy Junior’s friends so he’d feel isolated and more likely to testify against his colleagues. He could’ve shouted from the top of the John Hancock Center that he wasn’t cooperating with the authorities and nobody would have believed him. His fate as the biggest pariah in state politics was sealed. But within seventy–two hours of the story hitting the streets, Thomas Ryan O’Sullivan Jr. was stricken by a massive heart attack. Tom still blamed Debra Wyatt and the
Examiner
for hounding his father into an early grave.
Tom barely made it through law school and still wasn’t sure how he’d done it. The O’Sullivan name became political poison. He passed the bar on his first attempt, but then nobody would hire him. He ended up opening his own office and taking run–of–the–mill criminal cases — anything to pay the bills.
Only one thing still reminded him that he was alive — gambling. The thrill of placing the bet, the rush of eternal optimism that this one was it — this horse, this hand, this roll of the dice. Only he was losing more and more, the price steeper as his financial hole deepened. Now, as he swung open the Chief Judge’s heavy oak door, he was taking the biggest gamble of his life. And the odds, he feared, were stacked against him.
IV
Jerry’s coffee did a pretty good job of clearing the buzz in Garry Strider’s head. The walk through the cool air to the front of his DePaul area townhouse helped too. But opening the door and seeing the living room couch made into a bed — well, that’s what finally jolted him back to full mental acuity.
“Uh, Gina?” he called, closing the door behind him.
She emerged from their bedroom, carrying a pillow and a newly laundered pillowcase. Her fresh–faced beauty still startled him at times — how did he get so lucky? Strider braced himself, figuring she was going to lambaste him for his drinking binge. Instead, she smiled and greeted him with a quick kiss on the cheek.
“Hi, Strider,” she said —
everyone
called him that. “I’m really sorry about the Pulitzer thing. Honestly, they’re idiots. You okay?”
“Total disaster,” he said. “Someone spending the night?”
Gina clad the pillow and tossed it onto the couch. “Honey, no. Listen, we should talk. You eaten? There’s lasagna I can heat up.”
“What’s with the couch, then?”
“You want a sandwich?”
“I want to know about the couch. What’s going on?”
Gina sighed and eased her slender form onto the sofa’s edge. “Look, sit,” she said. Strider lowered himself into a recliner. She thought for a moment, then gestured toward the makeshift bed. “This is for me.”
Before Strider could interrupt, she added: “Now, don’t get all excited. This isn’t the end of the world. I just think, well, that we should cool it a bit — at least physically. Not forever — just until … well, if we get married.”
For Strider, this did not compute. “What is this — the 1950’s? We’ve lived together for nearly a
year!
Suddenly, you don’t want to sleep together? If this is pressure to get married — “
