The First Wives Club (49 page)

“How could I not be? We’ve had the account for seven years.” Christ, the guy got on his nerves. It was almost impossible not to be nasty to him.

“And do you see Mr. Cushman socially?”

“Not really.”

“What does that mean?”

“Oh, occasionally we may be at the same party, but we don’t go out together.”

“But did you in the past?”

“God, maybe years ago. He’s a major client. I don’t avoid the guy. ” “Uh-huh. So, did Mr. Cushman tell you he was going public?”’ “No, he did not.”’ Aaron was surprised to feel a light sweat break out on his forehead. Once again he asked himself, who was this guy? “That would be illegal, wouldn’t it, Mr. De Los Santos?” Shit, he didn’t like the man.

“People make mistakes,” De Los Santos said.

Was it his imagination or was the guy glaring at him?

“So it wasn’t until September that you liquidated your daughter’s assets and purchased the Madman stock?”

Aaron felt the blood rush to his face. He could hardly believe what he’d heard. How the fuck did this guy know about the trust fund? No one knew about it except Annie and Leslie. Surely Leslie hadn’t said anything to anyone. She was angry, but that would be insane. Did Annie sic this trouble on him?

”Mr. Paradise?”

Christ, he had to say something. Get a grip, Aaron warned himself.

“Yes.”

“You purchased seventy-six thousand five hundred and sixty shares on September the third?”

Aaron nodded. He was sweating all over.

“So you never bought any shares,though anyone who had before that date had made a major killing. You just happened to buy the stock right before the Madman plunge began. How is it you did this?”’ “How is it?

How is it that I lost my shirt? since when is losing money on the market an indication of being privy to inside information?”

“I said nothing about insider trading.”

“It’s what you’re implying, isn’t it? Well, my losses should prove that there was none of that.

Insiders don’t lose.”

“Oh, not necessarily. It may only mean that something didn’t go as it was planned. When much money is lost, just as when much money is gained, it can mean that there has been insider activity.” De Los Santos looked at him blankly, expressionless.

“Well, I’ve told you as much as I know.” Aaron tried to calm himself and attempted an innocent smile.

“Thank you, Mr. Paradise,” De Los Santos finally answered.

His expression was blank, his face unreadable. To Aaron’s enormous relief, he stood up.

“I may have to call you again.”

“Feel free,” Aaron replied, rising. Anything to get rid of the guy.

Get it over. Put it behind him.

“Thank you,” De Los Santos repeated, and turned to leave. Then he stopped and faced Aaron again. “Oh, you’re not planning to leave the country in the near future are you?”

Aaron gave him a look of disbelief. The man must be joking. “No .

.

.” he said hesitantly.

“Well, let us know if you’re planning any trips. Okay?”

They shook hands and Aaron made an effort to keep his grip firm, though he couldn’t prevent his palm from being damp. Then he walked the guy to the door.

He watched him until he was completely out of sight and then walked back to his desk. He fell into his chair and covered his eyes with his hands. He felt exhausted and frightened, more frightened than he could remember being in years, since he’d moved out of his father’s house.

He wondered if there was any way they would find out that Morty was paying him back some of the money lost. If Morty was. Aaron had heard from Morty’s lawyer that all was well, but for some reason Morty was still being held in jail. Christ, he felt cornered.

He went to the closet mirror again. The face that looked back at him looked as bad as he felt. He looked old, and his clothes were all wrong for his next meeting—too conservative, too predictable. He looked like a loser.

Aaron made a quick decision. He got up, put his jacket on, and told his secretary that he’d be right back. Out on Twenty-tbird Street, he turned right at Fifth Avenue and walked downtown a few blocks. There he entered Paul Smith’s, the trendiest of the downtown stores.

“I need a shirt, a tie, and a pair of pants that I can wear out of here,” he told the salesman. “Waist size thirty-five.”

He took a deep breath. He’d go back and present the plan. He’d convince the staff. They should all back him. Christ, he was the talent and he’d hired them. They all owed him. And they better come through for him.

Still, he had a nagging fear in his gut. Who knew with this generation? Who knew what had become of loyalty and commitment?

A Cot and Thee Hots.

Downtown in the Federal House of Detention near the Hudson River, Morty Cushman was lying on his cot, wondering the same thing.

He had been wondering for almost two weeks now. When he’d first arrived, the processing of prisoners moving down the receiving hall was painfully slow. Morty Cushman had been on one line after another for hours, none of which seemed to produce any results other than to test the limits of patience of the prisoners. He had stared at the institutional gray that coated everything, walls, desks, counters, guards’ shirts. He had been instructed to follow one of the various colored stripes painted on the floor, the stripe he was following was brown. The new prisoners were wearing jumpsuits they had been issued earlier in the day and had been given their choice of color, gray, brown, or blue. Why he picked blue he couldn’t say.

Now, in his blue uniform, he lay on his cot waiting. He cursed Leo Gilman again for not getting him out on bail. ‘I will, Morty, it’s just that these things take time,” he had said. “I got to convince them that you’re not going to leave the country. But Chnst, it was stupid to put so much of your assets abroad. They’re afraid you’ll abscond. It looks bad when you do that, Morty.” Morty couldn’t believe the bastards wouldn’t let him out on bail, but he had to admit that after two weeks of prison, leaving the country felt very attractive. Being anywhere but here right now was attractive.

When he’d first gotten in, he looked around for a buddy. The guy in front of him in line seemed not to have a care in the world. Morty had liked the guy until he found out that he had kidnapped his ex-girlfriend and her new boyfriend in the Bronx, killed them in New Jersey, and thrown their bodies out of his van in Maryland. The guy behind him had tried to hijack a plane out of Kennedy Airport, with a bomb tied around his ankle. Morty shook his head and wondered where the country-club prison for white-collar criminals was. He’d been glad when the guard stopped them from holding any more conversations. He didn’t want these kinds of guys to hear he was in for tax evasion, for chrissake. He was sure that was not the kind of thing these guys would respect.

When his turn came for a physical exam, the trustee filling out the questionnaire asked him if he had dentures. When Morty said he didn’t, the trustee shrugged in feigned pity. Morty’s stomach tightened. What the fuck did that mean? Was it some kind of code, some kind of jail lingo?

Finally he was ushered down long hallways, each with a guard station that closed the gates behind him with a clang. After several of these passages, he and the other new admissions came to the cellblock that would be his temporary home. As they progressed down the catwalk, prisoners from other cells began calling out their choices for future mates. Everyone on the cellblock was hanging on to the bars, watching the passing parade.

“Looky, looky, looky. Hey, sweetcakes, you with the peach ass. You’re mine, honey.

Don’t forget, you’re Al’s, anyone asks. Al’ll take care of you. You take care of me, I take care of you. Remember me, sweetcakes, cause I ain’t going’ forget you.”

“Hey, whitey, fatboy, you take your teeth out? I got plans for you, baby. You got dentures, I can get you work day or night. My name Rocket, baby. Rocket got you in his pocket.” Oh, Christ, that’s what the trustee had meant.

Morty kept reminding himself that he’d been raised in the Bronx, so he could do the rolling gait that the homeboys seemed to have developed to an art. He felt foolish walking that way, but he was a man intent on saving his life. He always used to get beat up by the Irish kids in Kingsbridge when he was growing up, but he didn’t know then that you have to walk tough to be thought tough. And he was tough, for a Jew.

Christ, let me get through this, he thought.

Morty was the last prisoner to be dropped off at a cell. His forced bravado immediately left him when he saw his cellmate. The ebony figure stretched out on the lower cot looked like his worst nightmare.

About six feet four inches, 275 pounds, and muscles that bulged at every seam of his clothing, his black skin was tight and shiny, and his shaven head made him look even more menacing. Morty paused for a moment at the cell door. Christ, he wouldn’t even step into an elevator with a character like this.

The guard pushed him in and closed the cell door behind him.” Hey, Mo, look who I got for you. He can’t take his teeth out, Mo, but you’ll work it out. You got a genuine celebrity here. Ever hear of Morty the Madman?

Well, here he is. Only now he’s Morty the Badman.”’ The guard laughed and strode away. Morty was sure that the heavy hitters weren’t treated like this. Boesky was probably given his own cell. And each of Gotti’s boys would get a red carpet, he was sure. Tax evasion, he thought again. Too wimpy. Too Jewish.

Big Mo continued to flip through the pages of Playboy before finally raising his dark eyes in Morty’s direction. But when he did look up, his tense face relaxed, his eyebrows raised. “You the guy what’s on TV selling portable telephones and shit?” Morty, relieved at the lack of outright hostility, immediately jumped into his madman persona.

“That’s me, Morty the Madman,” he cried in the hyper voice he used in the ads, and extended his right hand.

Mo took it, gave it the uptown double shake with the five-finger slide.

Morty pretended he shook hands this way all his life, but Mo was no fool, major heroin dealer and sometime pimp, arsonist even, but no fool.

Still, he was impressed by this face that he’d seen so often on TV.

This Jewboy was really Mad Mort. He grinned.

“since you a celebrity, let me tell you how it is here.” Mo put his magazine aside. “I’m Big Mo D.C and I’m the guy that gets things done.

If Big Mo your friend, nobody messes with you. So if I can do something for you, just let me know. The way I sees it, one hand washes the other. Right, Little Morty?”

Mo moved over slightly on the cot to make room for Morty to sit. The timing was perfect because Morty’s trembling legs couldn’t hold him upright much longer. Morty continued his bravado, however, and set out to make Big Mo D.C. his best friend. “Mo, for you I can do things.

”You know, Morty, I was thinkin’ the same thing myself. Like I got my woman back in my crib all alone and lonely for her man. So maybe you could like get her something nice. Something that will remind her of me.”

”I got the perfect thing, my man. I can get her a thirteen-inch combination TV and built-in VCR. It’s a beauty, and no bigger than a toaster. How’s that sound?”

Big Mo considered, then shook his head, as if Morty didn’t understand.

“No, man, I want her to get something that will keep her thinking of me-I’m a big man. No thirteen inches. A little toaster-size TV just ain’tgonna do it.”

By way of impressing Morty With his pull in the joint, Mo reached under his cot and pulled out a bottle of Scotch, some brand Morty had never even heard of. ‘Want a taste? Or would you prefer a handrolled?” He extended an open gold cigarette case and offered a perfectly rolled joint.

Morty again thought of Leo Gilman, how gladly he would kill him.

Somehow. to Morty, Leo was more responsible for his being here than Morty himself was.

“Well, how bout a fifty-four-inch giant screen? And a job for you, when you’re out.” Morty blessed all the powers that be for his good luck in a cellmate.

“Mo, leave this to me. Just tell me where you want the TV delivered, and I’ll have it there in two days. I’ll even put a gift card on it.”

“Now we talking business, my man.”

After they each had a couple of pulls on the Scotch, Big Mo was Morty’s long-lost friend. “Ain’t never met no real-life celebrity before, man.

You my first.”

Morty didn’t miss an opportunity. “You want to meet more celebrities?

When we get out, I’ll take you places you never even dreamed existed.”’ Mimicking Mo’s dialect he said, “We friends, man.”

“Okay, Little Morty. Okay.” The big man stretched out on his bunk.

Morty climbed up into the upper bunk and stared at the ceiling just inches over his head. He was terrified, he had to admit that. And very angry, although he wasn’t exactly sure why or at whom. Leo, yes.

And Bill Atchison. And Gil Griffin. And somehow at Brenda and Shelby.

All their fault. Bloodsuckers. All of them.

Morty fell into a troubled sleep, wishing he had a friend.

.

Morty sat behind the bulletproof glass wall that separated him from his visitorS and watched the group of women walk through the door at the far end of the room.

There she was, dressed in his favorite color. He didn’t know that it was a buttercup yellow Azzedine Alaia, he didn’t know it had cost him almost four thousand dollars, all he knew was how glad he was to see her.

He watched Shelby move along the row of cubicles until she spotted him sitting at one of them. She smiled. Shelby always looked good to M orty, but today she looked like a sun-goddess. He took a deep breath, feeling a surge of comfort. She was bought and paid for, he knew, but now, seeing her here in the midst of this sleaze, he felt hope, he felt remembered. He felt cared about. And he needed care. Christ, he felt like he needed his mother.

But Shelby sat down and immediately began to cry. Well, it showed she loved him. Morty motioned her to pick up the phone and tried to calm her. ‘It’s going to be all right, Shelby. I’m going to be home real soon. Please, don’t cry.”