Doing a quick count of the tables, Michelle had estimated the crowd at around or over three hundred people, close to capacity for this room. Good enough. Men in suits, women in cocktail dresses. An older crowd, mostly, and very white.
They’d hung huge plastic banners around the room, photos of smiling multi-ethnic children’s faces, mostly, with the occasional suburban home and green lawn and more little kids running through sprinklers and riding little bikes with big training wheels, the words A Safer America written across every other panel. Floral centerpieces, white chrysanthemums in blue and red bunting, decorated the tables.
“It looks great. Excuse me-I’d better get back to Caitlin.”
She hadn’t been gone that long, maybe fifteen, twenty minutes between the conversations with Cyndee and Moss. But here was Caitlin, apparently already on her second glass of wine, and not scheduled to speak for another hour at least.
“Come on, let me get you something,” Caitlin said. “Believe me, you don’t want to try and get through one of these things sober.”
“I’m going to need to keep my hands free to take notes,” Michelle said. “While you’re mingling. We still have half an hour before dinner starts.”
Caitlin sighed. “You know, the last thing I want to do is talk to any of these people. And I’m not in any kind of mood to hear Matthew go on and on the way he does. Let’s go downstairs and get a drink.”
“You have a drink, Caitlin,” Michelle snapped.
For a moment, Caitlin stood there, wine glass in hand, staring at Michelle like she’d been slapped.
She put the glass down on the bar.
“Not any more.” Caitlin made a face and smiled, like a kid who knew she’d been bad but figured she could get away with it. “It wasn’t very good, anyway.” She put her hand on Michelle’s arm. “Tell you what. I just want to get out of here for a few minutes. Get some air. I promise I’ll be back in time for dinner, even if that means I have to listen to Matthew. You don’t have to come with me.”
Oh yes I do, Michelle thought.
“I’ll come,” she said. “I wouldn’t mind some air.”
x x x
On the way out, they passed Cyndee, who stood by the sign-up table at the entrance to the banquet hall. An older man wearing an expensive suit was there, signing a check with a flourish. “In case I have to leave early,” he said, presenting it a volunteer who sat behind the table. Michelle couldn’t read his name or the amount, but she was pretty sure she saw a lot of zeros.
“Oh, hi, this is Caitlin?” Cyndee asked. “I’m such an admirer of yours!”
“That’s so sweet of you, hon,” Caitlin said, meeting her eyes and clasping her hand for a moment, before heading out the door.
Michelle could see now that Caitlin had that particular gift, the ability to connect with someone in an instant, and then break apart without a backwards glance.
“Where is she going… is everything okay?” The tendons in Cyndee’s neck looked ready to snap.
“Fine,” Michelle said. “Just fine. She needs some air, that’s all. We’ll be back in a few minutes.”
“But the donors-”
“There’ll be plenty of time for them to talk to her, I promise.”
She hoped there would be, anyway.
The Century Plaza had an outdoor bar off the lobby, with round tables and dark wicker furniture and overstuffed earth-tone pillows, illuminated by warm-hued lanterns. “Just one drink, I promise,” Caitlin said. “As long as you join me.”
“Okay.” Better to have one drink with Caitlin if that kept her from having two, Michelle figured. She hoped that wasn’t just a rationalization. The drink was tempting.
They sat at a small table next to a low wall made from stacked wooden cubes that separated the bar from the gardens and reflecting pool. Faux votive candles sat in the wall’s open-air alcoves. Flattering light all around, Michelle noted.
“Just a glass of red wine,” she told the waiter.
“Pinot, merlot, cabernet, zin?”
“How’s the pinot?”
“I’d do the cab.”
“I’ll have that too,” Caitlin said.
After the waiter left, they sat in silence. Michelle wasn’t sure what there was to say. Did she owe Caitlin an apology? She didn’t think so, but she hadn’t exactly been the deferential employee back there in the ballroom.
And what she said… it had all kinds of implications.
Inferences.
“Look, there’s something that you’re gonna have to trust me about,” Caitlin finally said. “I realize I’m not… I don’t take care of myself as well as I should, and I know I have to change that. But this?” She gestured toward the hotel lobby. “I know how to do this.”
“I’m sorry,” Michelle began. “I was-”
“Don’t apologize. I know why you’re here.”
For a moment, Michelle froze in her chair. She couldn’t know. Could she?
“You’re here to make sure I don’t get into any trouble. Maybe help me clean up my act. Look, part of that was my idea anyway. I understand, you’re just doing your job.”
The waiter appeared with their wine.
“Enjoy, ladies!” he said, depositing their glasses in front of them.
Caitlin lifted up her glass. “Just realize that I know how to do mine.”
Michelle raised hers. What else could she do? They clinked.
“You know what I don’t know?” Caitlin said with a sigh. “Whether I want to keep doing it.”
They’d worked together how long, a little over a week? And how many times had Caitlin already said that she was feeling ambivalent about Safer America?
Were those doubts important? Was that why Gary wanted her here?
Why would it matter if Caitlin stepped away from Safer America?
For some reason, Michelle thought of the check she’d seen upstairs, the one with multiple zeros. Safer America was on track to earn $37 million dollars this year, hadn’t Debbie said that, back at the board meeting?
It was always about money.
Caitlin was the draw. The rainmaker. If she quit, would Safer America raise as much money?
Maybe Gary and the Boys got a cut somehow. Maybe it was some kind of money-laundering scheme, where Safer America was taking in money that wasn’t exactly clean, freshening it up, and funneling it to some CIA shell company that was “off the books.”
Did that make sense, or was it something simpler?
Our donation.
Those tattooed Mexican mobsters buying some guns and throwing in over $900K extra…
Some of that money had been her payment. Where had Carlene taken the rest of it?
Maybe it really was a donation.
A drug cartel wouldn’t favor marijuana legalization, would it?
And the Boys were all about buying elections, from what Danny had told her.
“Michelle, are you all right?”
“I’m fine. Sorry. I was just, just thinking about what we have to do tonight.”
“Oh, trust me, it’s easy. We talk, we drink, we eat, we talk some more. And then we take their money.” Caitlin grinned, and tilted her wine glass to her lips.
“Excuse me.”
A deep, male voice. Michelle turned.
A big black man in a rust-colored suit and black shirt. Shaved head.
“I’m sorry to interrupt. Are you Caitlin O’Connor?”
Caitlin hesitated. Michelle could see her shrink back into her seat. Then she straightened up and nodded. “I am.”
The man stuck out his hand. A big hand, like a basketball player’s.
God, stop thinking in clichés, Michelle told herself.
Besides, he really looked more like a football player: muscular, solid, a little thick through the middle.
Caitlin took his hand, with that same hesitation she’d shown before. Her hand was dwarfed in his. He handled her hand gently, Michelle thought. Not a squeeze, just letting it rest there a moment.
“I’m Troy Stone. I was really hoping to meet you tonight.”