“Casey knows what he needs to do. He’ll think of something by the time the ambulance gets them there.”
Chapter 90
Gage turned on his cell phone and checked for messages as the United Airlines red-eye from San Francisco set down on the runway at Dulles International Airport at ten o’clock the next morning. He scrolled through the texts until he found one from Faith reassuring him that Viz and Socorro would be all right. He then activated the CNN Internet site. A reporter stood in front of the Gilbert Street warehouse, a microphone in his left hand and an open notebook in the other. The camera panned up toward the “For Sale” sign, then down again to the reporter.
“Details are scarce and the crime scene is still being sorted out, but the story we’re getting is terrifying. Apparently, Judge Brandon Meyer, the brother of presidential hopeful Landon Meyer, went with an ex-law partner, Marc Anston, and another investor to scout a possible site for a live-work loft development. Judge Meyer was spotted by a disgraced and deranged ex-DEA agent named Boots Marnin who pursued them into the warehouse. By chance, FBI special agent Joe Casey was in the area on an assignment when he noticed Marnin following Judge Meyer. It’s still unclear what happened inside, but the result was that Anston and Marnin now lie dead and Judge Meyer has been taken to SF Medical for what they’re calling observation.”
“Does that mean medical observation?”
“They didn’t say. But one source claims he had some sort of mental breakdown.”
“I understand Judge Meyer and Special Agent Casey had a recent conflict.”
“Yes, Bob. The irony is overwhelming. Just a few days ago, in open court, Judge Meyer all but accused Casey of perjury in the OptiCom trade secrets case.”
G age climbed into the black Escalade to find Senator Landon Meyer sitting on the rear bench seat. The tinted windows shrouded the interior in near darkness. Gage sat down next to him.
As the SUV pulled away from the curb, Landon asked, “Were you there?”
Gage recounted the battle.
“And Brandon?”
“He’ll recover, but he’ll never walk out of federal prison.”
“That bad?”
“That bad.”
T wo hours later, Gage removed Charlie Palmer’s DVD from his laptop, closed the spreadsheets Alex Z had copied from Brandon’s computer, and flipped down the screen. The click echoed in Meyer’s Senate office.
Landon’s face was gray. He gripped the arms of his chair to rise, then stopped as though afraid his legs would give out. He lowered his hands to his lap and exhaled.
“I know Palmer and Anston didn’t talk about my first campaign on the video,” Landon finally said, “but you don’t think Anston was behind the killing of those poor children in Compton?”
Gage shook his head. “He just paid off some community leaders to sound like they were reversing their stand on the death penalty. He used Pegasus to funnel the money, like with the fake jihadist contribution.”
Landon leaned forward in his chair, then hung his head.
“So every election was tainted… every single one.”
Gage didn’t interrupt the silence that followed, and didn’t have an answer to the question that would surely come next.
Landon looked up, his face nearly bloodless, his fists clenched, his whole body rigid.
“Tell me… please God tell me they didn’t kill Ed Lightfoot.”
Chapter 91
"Since Watergate,” Landon told Gage, “everybody says follow the money and you’ll find the source of the corruption. But it’s not that simple.”
It was an hour before the press conference. Landon had met briefly with his staff and sent them away to make the arrangements.
“I remember when I was young and heard my father railing about the links among organized crime and the Teamsters and Longshoremen’s unions and the Democrats and asked myself how politicians could’ve let that happen to themselves. What were they thinking? How could they have been so self-deceiving? Now I know.”
Landon opened his lower left desk drawer and withdrew a humidor of Cuban Cohiba cigars. He opened the box, selected one, and held it up.
“You know where I got these?”
Gage didn’t answer.
“The vice president.” Landon paused, then added, “of the United States,” a reminder of the decades-old U.S. trade embargo.
Landon reached into the drawer again, withdrew a half-empty bottle of Wild Turkey, and set it next to the box.
“You know what’s wrong with the phrase ‘follow the money’?” Landon unwrapped the plastic cigar casing. “I’ll tell you what’s wrong. It’s no secret where the money comes from. Everybody knows from where and what it does.” He looked over at Gage, and then said, “Remember years ago I wondered aloud why Americans had stopped reading James Fenimore Cooper?”
Gage nodded. It had been during a late night talk, up at his cabin. Landon pacing, struggling to understand the country and his place in it.
“It was because of a line of his that had stuck with me since college. He said it ‘was the proper business of government to resist the corruptions of money, not to depend on them.’ Now I know why we turned away from him. It was too much like looking into a mirror that revealed all our hypocrisies and self-deceptions.”
Landon slipped the end of the cigar into a miniature spring-loaded guillotine and snipped it off.
“Picture this. Early May, late evening, sitting on the porch of the vice president’s mansion. Me, him, and the head of the energy lobby, drinking Scotch and sucking on Cohibas. Male bonding. That’s what my wife calls it. But this wasn’t playing football in the park or catching bass on Lake Okeechobee or guzzling beer over boiled crayfish.”
Landon paused, glanced around his office, and then asked himself aloud, “Where am I going with this?” He ran the cigar under his nose, drawing in the aroma. “Following the money.
“Three little criminals sucking on Cohibas. Federal criminals at that.” He pointed at Gage. “I know what you’re wondering. You’re an investigator. You’re wondering where the vice president got the criminal cigars.” Landon smiled. “From the lobbyist, of course.” He gestured again, not pointing, simply punctuating. “And where did the lobbyist get them? From the president of Hudson Wire and Cable. And where did president of Hudson Wire and Cable get them? At a meeting in Barbados with the managing director of Hudson’s Cayman Island subsidiary that installed the electrical infrastructure for thirty-four hotels that were built on Varadero Beach in Cuba. And where did the managing director get them? From Fidel Castro’s brother’s son’s sister-in-law’s cousin who supervises the entire construction project.
“So there we were sitting on the back porch…” Landon paused, then clucked. “In case you’re wondering, the sister-in-law’s father is the leader of the largest anti-Castro group in Florida.”
Landon rose, walked to the window, and gazed over Washington. “Given this introduction, you’re no doubt imagining the lobbyist met with us to push for lifting the embargo. Not at all. And it’s not because he supports it. It’s simply irrelevant. Anti-Castro Cubans in the U.S. are no more than a bloc of votes to be delivered to politicians-on both sides of the aisle-who vote the right way on other matters.
“Hudson Wire and Cable makes tens of millions a year in Cuba, embargo or not. And one of those millions found its way into a political action committee backing me, and part of it has been set aside to get out the anti-Castro Cuban vote in Florida.”
Landon spun toward Gage.
“You think Hudson Wire and Cable ever gave a damn about how many political opponents Castro imprisoned and executed over the years? Or how many innocent Chechens Putin murdered or Egyptian protesters Mubarak shot down in the street? Or Suharto’s genocide in East Timor? Not a bit. As long as Hudson is free to pursue its interests in Cuba and Russia and Indonesia, it doesn’t care. And people like me who took their money didn’t choose to think about it.”