Ark Storm (10 page)

“As it happens,” she answered, channeling her natural drawl, “I do. One of their chief meteorologists was my prof at Stanford.”

“Friends?”

“Yeah. She’s a surfer too.”

“I’d like you to pay her a visit. Get an update.”

“Sure, I can do that, but with a view to what? Their Web page gives a pretty good update of their thinking.”

“There’s the stuff they put out in the press conferences, then there’s what they really think but don’t want to share with the public in case they scare the shit out of them. Privately, they might be on the same page as you. Be nice to get confirmation.”

“I’ll see what I can find out. Hi Mandy.”

Messenger turned around.

Mandy was standing patiently outside the office.

“Sorry to interrupt,” she said with a little shoulder shrug, “but Sheikh Ali rang when you were grinding that poor pro into dust out there on the court. Went through to voice mail. Didn’t sound urgent but I thought you should know.”

Messenger straightened up as if someone had just flicked a switch. He gave Gwen a backhanded wave as he strode off to his office.

“Who the hell is Sheikh Ali?” asked Gwen.

“You don’t know?” asked Mandy tinnily.

“Er, no, should I?”

“He’s Falcon’s major investor. He backed Dr. Messenger just after he started out in this business. He’d seen the doctor’s blogs on investments on the Internet. Got in touch and offered him money to manage.”

“Wow! Just out of the blue?”

“Yep.”

“Dr. Messenger must have written a killer blog.”

“Oh, it was. And get this. He wrote it during his down time, during his shifts when he was on call at the hospital, but there was nothing happening.”

“Stop!” Gwen held up a hand. “Dr. Messenger is an MD?”

“Well, yeah.”

“I thought it was a DPhil, like mine.”

Mandy vigorously shook her head. “Everyone thinks that, but no. He was a real medical doctor. Brain was his thing.”

“And he gave that up to be an investor?” asked Gwen.

“Let me put it another way. He gave up a half a mil a year and four sleepless nights a week for a few hundred million and a life.”

Gwen blew out a breath. “Wow again.”

Mandy laughed. “Yeah, wow again. And look, I can see you thinking what a waste of all his doctoring and all that baloney, but he paid his dues, over and over, let me tell you. He saved plenty of lives. He’d done his giving back, before he got his getting.”

“Didn’t say he hadn’t.”

“Didn’t need to. In your eyes.” Mandy laid a freckled hand on Gwen’s shoulder. “Piece of advice. This place is a money machine. Lean and mean. Check your moral qualms at the door, honey.”

Not trusting herself to speak, Gwen nodded mutely.

“How d’you know so much?” she asked after a pause.

“I was his nurse. We paired up for most surgeries. Then he started Falcon, he asked me to join him, and before you ask, honey, I’d paid my dues too, needed time off my feet and on my ass plus enough dough to buy me a home.”

Gwen raised her hands. “Truce!”

Mandy laughed and bustled out of her office.

Intriguing, thought Gwen, getting up to fetch herself a coffee, eyeing Messenger in his office as she passed, wondering how much else she had yet to learn about Falcon, its backers, and about Messenger himself. How many personae did he keep in that pared-down frame? The Healer, the Investor, the Murderer?

23

THE WEST VILLAGE, MANHATTAN, THURSDAY NIGHT

Special Agent Ange Wilkie walked through the streets of lower Manhattan, reveling in air—hot, humid air, but still air—and sounds and life: a couple chatting on their stoop; an old man with his aged dog, both limping down the sidewalk; the smell of frying garlic wafting from the Italian restaurant she just passed; a noisy game of basketball played under blinking neon. Anything but the life she had been listening in to, the sterile, avaricious, to her meaningless life of Ronald Glass. She had listened in for over twelve hours today. Her share of eight, and an extra four.

When she went to ask her partner if he wanted her to grab him his customary corn beef on rye, a giant Coke, and a Danish for lunch, she found Pete Rodgers, now known throughout the building as Rac, asleep in his office, headphones still attached, head on his desk, snoring loudly enough to drown out whatever detritus of a life he was listening to. Sleep was in short supply at home, especially at night, which as far as Ange could gather, baby Rodgers had switched with day.

So she’d woken him, told him to go home. Meekly, sleepwalking almost, he had gone and she’d listened in to his share of the intercepts.

Ronald Glass ringing his dealer; Ronald Glass ringing his wife, telling her he’d be flying to Houston, that he’d see her the next day; Ronald Glass hustling a deal; Ronald Glass potty-mouthing his colleagues; Ronald Glass booking a Manhattan hotel suite; Ronald Glass assuring the gallery owner in Manhattan who rang to remind him that the opening night of the hot new exhibition was tonight
and to please, please come
’cause
he’d simply love the stuff and the artist herself too—so talented—so eminently collectible
. The artist, or her work, wondered Ange.

And here it was, the focus of what she had pretended to herself was just a random walk; Gallery Klesh on West Twenty-first. Ten thirty and still the art lovers were tilting their heads and scrutinizing, still with glasses of what must have been warm wine in their hands, while the odd rebel stood on the sidewalk, cigarette in hand, gesticulating with the grand abandon of alcohol. Ange, sporting her blond wig once again, allowed herself a quick glance, walked on by.

Five minutes later, on the other side of the street, she approached again. A Persian cat crossed the sidewalk in front of her, paused as if debating whether to cross the street. Ange bent down, ruffled the luxurious fur.

“Hey, pretty thing. How ya doing?” she crooned. In the shadow between a Range Rover and a Hummer, she glanced up, saw a man emerge from the gallery, arm draped across the shoulders of a young, spectacularly pretty redhead with tumbling hair and a slightly stumbling walk.

“Exquisite rendering, simply exquisite,” gushed Ronald Glass. “So, honey,
Shibhaun
,” he added deliberately, as if to say he would never forget her name. “I have a suite at The Carlyle. What say you we go and celebrate your sell out?”

The woman’s reply was inaudible, but it was clear to Ange that Ronald Glass was about to collect.

A business trip, he had told his wife. Yeah, it was business, of a kind: a few thousand dollars for a soul. You bastard, she murmured, watching him slide with the redhead into an idling Town Car. Just give me time, she thought, and I’ll collect you too.

24

THE LAB, THE FOLLOWING WEEK

Gwen didn’t go out of her way to avoid her colleagues, and neither did they seem to avoid her, but either way, she had little contact with them over the next week, which was just peachy, far as she was concerned. She wasn’t worried by the odd flashes of animosity, just wasn’t interested in playing their
metrics,
nor in fielding questions about Oracle. Messenger, she just wanted to avoid until she could get her head around Freidland’s accusations, not that she knew how she would manage that. Even Peter Weiss, after the intimacy of his revelations about his parents, kept his distance. He seemed hugely preoccupied with some highly secretive project he was working on, at all hours it seemed from the bags under his eyes.

Mandy popped in every day, like a mother hen, checking up on her, making sure she was settling in. Gwen wondered whether she had children; she seemed the naturally maternal type. The way she buzzed round the office and all the staff made Gwen wonder whether Falcon was all the children she needed. On Wednesday morning, Mandy had come in with a plate of home-baked brownies.

“Eat them, take them, please, else I’ll feed my fat ass.”

Gwen laughed and took two. “Share them round. The grunts look underfed.”

“I’ve already given them a ton. I made three dozen. Get into the manic baking phases sometimes. Calms me down, I suppose.”

“There are worse habits,” said Gwen, taking a bite of brownie, swooning. “These are delicious!”

Mandy smiled. “Thanks, honey. You are the sweetest thing.”

On Thursday, Mandy came in with an envelope that she presented with a small bow.

Raising an eyebrow, Gwen pulled it open, pulled out a stiff invitation.

F
ALCON
C
APITAL’S
A
NNUAL
P
ARTY.
G
ABRIEL
M
ESSENGER AT HOME,
S
EVENTEEN
M
ILE
D
RIVE, MAP ON REVERSE.

She could imagine Messenger living there, with his private equity millions, ensconced in some uber-contemporary cliff-top palace.

“Two weeks Sunday. Hope you can make it,” said Mandy.

“Sure,” said Gwen, figuring it wasn’t something she could really get away with missing. “I’ll be there.”

“Goodie. There’s always a killer BBQ, and Dr. Messenger gets out his finest wines. There’s a fleet of cars made available, so no one needs to fret about drinking and driving.”

Should be interesting, thought Gwen, a party full of tanked-up colleagues.

*   *   *

The day rolled on; Gwen did her job, drove home to her own world. Her deck light—she’d attached a timer to it the past weekend—glowed out into the night.

It didn’t shake the paranoia. She still had a sense of being followed: her back tingled, she felt that animal awareness—a few times as she took a lunchtime run, one time as she drove home—then she quickly told herself not to be so ridiculous. Peru was a long way away, a long time ago, and, if anyone were following her, then it was Charles Freidland. He’d already admitted as much.

She got to Friday afternoon without incident. As planned, she ducked out early.

“Where’re you off then?” asked Mandy, tailing her as she walked to the exit.

“I’m meeting an old buddy who heads up the ARk Storm Project.”

“Are you now?” asked Mandy, freezing in place, hand planted on Gwen’s arm.

“Dr. Messenger asked me to, so like a good little girl I am doing his bidding.”

Mandy cackled. “I’d say it’s been many years since you were a good little girl, if ever. Look, do tell all when you get back. I am just dying to hear if we’re all gonna be swept away in our beds at night.”

“Count on it,” replied Gwen, swiping her pass and pushing her way out through the heavy glass door, resolving to tell Mandy with her Cheshire Cat curiosity and love of gossip as little as possible.

25

STANFORD UNIVERSITY, FRIDAY AFTERNOON

Ninety minutes later, Gwen walked the cool halls of Stanford University, her alma mater. She felt like she was coming home, to the familiar, the safe. She headed toward the lecture theater, her heels clicking out a tattoo on the stone floors.

She saw her friend at once, deep in conversation with a tall, well-built, tousle-haired man in chinos and a loose blue shirt. Even from behind, he looked vaguely familiar. She walked closer.

“I am really sorry, Dr. Riley,” the man was saying in a low, beguiling voice. “I’ve just got a few more questions. My misguided editor sent me to do a piece about a local pol, can’t keep it trousered. Was doing a mea culpa press con and I had to be there. Shot out of it, but hit Friday traffic. Reckon I missed the first fifteen minutes.”

Gwen spied Riley giving the speaker a dazzling smile.

“Think no more of it. I have time. Got a former colleague swinging by, but she can listen in. It’s her field, so she might get bored, but what the hell. Hey, speak of the devil! Boudy, Your Blondness!”

Gwen grabbed her friend, stepped into a hug. Over Riley’s shoulder, she saw Daniel Jacobsen grinning at her.

Gwen released her friend.

“How are you, Riley?”

“I’m good. I’m excellent. Was just explaining to my new friend here that—” Riley paused, eyed them both.

“You two know each other?”

“Barely,” replied Gwen.

“Yet,” replied Daniel, “something I would like to rectify. Looks like fate’s given me a helping hand.”

Riley laughed. “Too bad for me. Come into my office, kiddos. I’ll play mama.”

As they walked along the hallway, a short, wiry man came barreling round a corner, head jutting forward pugnaciously. Faced with the trio of Gwen, Dan, and Riley walking three abreast, he came to a halt with an audible exhalation.

Dan stood back to let him pass.

“Nice to see someone has manners,” the man declared, aiming for humor, missing it. Deliberately, thought Gwen.

“Who’s that?” she asked as the man stalked out of earshot.

“Jon Hendrix. My new co-head of Hazards,” replied Riley, spitting out the words. “As of two months ago. Can you believe it?”

“Why?”
asked Gwen, turning and frowning at the retreating man.

“Why indeed? They say I run on a short fuse, but that guy, Hendrix, has a temper like an angry rattler.”

They reached Riley’s office. She gestured to them to sit, closed the door behind them. “Two minds are better than one is the official line.”

Dan guffawed. “Two minds equal paralysis and constant conflict. There can only ever be one leader.”

“My thoughts exactly!” declared Riley, beaming at Dan. “The politicos put Hendrix in to
balance
me,” she added with some bitterness.

She spun round to her windowsill where a coffee percolator hissed softly. She turned back.

“Coffee?” she asked brightly.

They nodded. Riley poured, sat herself at her desk, smiled across at Gwen.

“So, Mr. Journalist here has some more questions about ARk Storm. Mind listening in, Boudy? It’ll be a tad basic for the likes of you.”

Gwen shrugged. “Sure. I got time.” So he was a journalist. Didn’t look like her idea of one.

“Basic?” asked Dan.

“Boudy here is a hotshot Doctor of Meteorology. With a rocking invention to her name.”