As we passed through the stone pillars at the edge of the estate, I noticed a car parked outside my property. It was a gray four-door sedan, maybe an Oldsmobile. As I drove past it, a middle-aged white man with a narrow skull and short gray hair parted to the side stuck his head out the driver’s side window and said, “Excuse me, is this Cryder Lane?”
I hit the brake. Cryder Lane? I thought. What was he talking about? There was no Cryder Lane in Old Brookville or, for that matter, anywhere in Locust Valley. I looked over at Channy and felt a twinge of panic. In that very instant I wished I still had the Roccos watching over me. There was something odd and disturbing about this encounter.
I shook my head and said, “No, this is Pin Oak Court. I don’t know any Cryder Lane.” At that moment I noticed there were three other people sitting in the car, and my heart immediately took off at a gallop… Fuck—they were here to kidnap Channy!…I reached over, placed my arm across Chandler’s chest, and looked her in the eyes and said, “Hold on, sweetie!”
As I stepped on the accelerator, the rear door of the Oldsmobile swung open and a woman popped out. She smiled, then waved at me and said, “It’s okay, Jordan. We’re not here to hurt you. Please don’t pull away.” She smiled again.
I put my foot back on the brake. “What do you want?” I asked curtly.
“We’re from the FBI,” she said. She pulled a black leather billfold from her pocket and flipped it open. I looked…and, sure enough, those three ugly letters were staring me in the face: F-B-I. They were big block letters, in light blue, and there was some official-looking writing above and below them. A moment later the man with the narrow skull flashed his credentials too.
I smiled and said ironically, “I guess you guys aren’t here to borrow a cup of sugar, right?”
They both shook their heads no. Just then the other two agents emerged from the passenger side of the Oldsmobile and flashed their credentials as well. The kind-looking woman offered me a sad smile and said, “I think you should turn around and bring your daughter back inside the house. We need to talk to you.”
“No problem,” I said. “And thanks, by the way. I appreciate what you’re doing.”
The woman nodded, accepting my gratitude for having the decency to not make a scene in front of my daughter. I asked, “Where’s Agent Coleman? I’m dying to meet the guy after all these years.”
The woman smiled again. “I’m sure the feeling is mutual. He’ll be along shortly.”
I nodded in resignation. It was time to break the bad news to Chandler: There would be no Rugratsthis evening. In fact, I had a sneaky suspicion there would be some other changes around the house, none of which she would be too fond of—starting with the temporary absence of Daddy.
I looked at Channy and said, “We can’t go to Blockbuster, sweetie. I have to talk to these people for a while.”
She narrowed her eyes and gritted her teeth. Then she started screaming: “No! You promised me! You’re breaking your word! I want to go to Blockbuster! You promised me!”
As I drove back to the house she kept screaming—and then she continued to scream as we made our way into the kitchen and I passed her to Gwynne. I said to Gwynne, “Call Nadine on her cell phone; tell her the FBI is here and I’m getting arrested.”
Gwynne nodded without speaking and took Chandler upstairs. The moment Chandler was out of sight, the kind female FBI agent said, “You’re under arrest for securities fraud, money laundering, and…”
Blah, blah, blah,I thought, as she slapped the cuffs on me and recited my crimes against man and God and everyone else. Her words blew right past me, though, like a gust of wind. They were entirely meaningless to me, or at least not worth listening to. After all, I knew what I’d done and I knew that I deserved whatever was coming to me. Besides, there would be ample time to go over the arrest warrant with my lawyer.
Within minutes, there were no less than twenty FBI agents in my house—dressed in full regalia with guns, bulletproof vests, extra ammo, and whatnot. It was somewhat ironic, I thought, that they would dress this way, as if they were serving some sort of high-risk warrant.
A few minutes later, Special Agent Gregory Coleman finally reared his head. And I was shocked. He looked like a kid, no older than me. He was about my height and he had short brown hair, very dark eyes, even features, and an entirely average build.
When he saw me, he smiled. Then he extended his right hand and we shook, although it was a trifle awkward, what with my hands being cuffed and everything. He said, in a tone of respect, “I gotta tell you, you were one wily adversary. I must’ve knocked on a hundred doors and not a single person would cooperate against you.” He shook his head, still awestruck at the loyalty the Strattonites had for me. Then he added, “I thought you’d like to know that.”
I shrugged and said, “Yeah, well, the gravy train has a way of doing that to people, you know?”
He turned the corners of his mouth down and nodded. “Definitely so.”
Just then the Duchess came running in. She had tears in her eyes, yet she still looked gorgeous. Even at my very arrest, I couldn’t help but take a peek at her legs, especially since I wasn’t sure when I’d see them again.
As they led me away in handcuffs, the Duchess gave me a tiny peck on the cheek and told me not to worry. I nodded and told her that I loved her and that I always would. And then I was gone, just like that. Going where I hadn’t the slightest idea, but I figured I would end up somewhere in Manhattan and then tomorrow I would be arraigned in front of a federal judge.
In retrospect, I remember feeling somewhat relieved—that the chaos and insanity would finally be behind me. I would do my time and then walk away a sober young man—a father of two and a husband to a kindhearted woman, who stood by me through thick and thin.
Everything would be okay.
EPILOGUE
THE BETRAYERS
Indeed, it would have been nice if the Duchess and I had lived happily ever after—if I could have done my time, and then walked out of prison into her kind, loving embrace. But, no, unlike a fairy tale, this part of the story doesn’t have a happy ending.
The judge had set my bail at $10 million, and it was then, on the very courthouse steps, that the Duchess dropped the D-bomb on me.
With icy coldness, she said, “I don’t love you anymore. This whole marriage has been a lie.” Then she spun on her heel and called her divorce lawyer on her cell phone.
I tried reasoning with her, of course, but it was no use. Through tiny, bogus snuffles, she added, “Love is like a statue: you can chip away at it for only so long before there’s nothing left.”
Yes, that might be true, I thought, if it weren’t for the fact that you waited until I got indicted to come to that conclusion, you backstabbing, gold-digging bitch!
Whatever. We separated a few weeks later, and I went into exile at our fabulous beach house in Southampton. It was a rather fine place to watch the walls of reality come crashing down on me—listening to the breaking waves of the Atlantic Ocean and watching the breathtaking sunsets over Shinnecock Bay, while my life came apart at the seams.
Meanwhile, on the legalfront, things were going even worse. It was on my fourth day out of jail when the U.S. attorney called my lawyer and told him that unless I pleaded guilty and became a government witness he was going to indict the Duchess too. And while he didn’t get specific on the charges, my best guess was that she was going to be indicted for conspiracy to spend obscene amounts of money. What else was she guilty of, after all?
Either way, the world was upside down. How could I, the one at the very top of the food chain, rat out those beneath me? Did giving up a multitude of smaller fish offset the fact that I was the biggest fish in town? Was it a matter of simple mathematics: that fifty guppies added up to a single whale?