A high-pitched hysteria invaded Russ’s speech. “I’m not going to admit that I’m involved in an insider trading scheme, if that’s what you mean,” he squeaked.
“And you’re not going to mention me either, right, champ?”
“Of course not. If it comes up, I’ll say that we went to college together but that I haven’t seen or heard from you for years. Unless...”
Trip’s smile blinked off. “Unless what, champ?”
“What if they have some evidence? What if they have your trading records, and see that you bought those stocks the day before the ‘Street Talk’ columns appeared in the paper? Then what do I do?”
Tapping a finger on the glass desktop, Trip nodded slowly to himself. “They’d still have to prove a link between you and me.”
“How hard is that? I write about a stock, you buy the stock right before. Sounds like a link to me.”
“They won’t have my trading records, champ. The stocks and the cash go through so many cutouts and offshore accounts — the feds don’t have enough accountants to even get to first base.”
“But they could know that there was unusual activity in those stocks just before my columns came out. They could know that was buying or selling, even if they don’t know who. They’ll figure benefited.”
“Sadly, champ, they will likely conclude that that someone is you. So I wish you the best of luck.”
Russ’s face grew slack. “What... what are you telling me, Trip?”
“I’m telling you, champ, that I don’t want to see you again. I have better ways of making a buck.” Trip favored him with another smile.
“You... you bastard. You ungrateful bastard!” Russ was yelling now. “Who do you think you are?”
Trip’s smile took a malevolent twist. “I think you’d better get out of my office before Mr. Abercrombie comes back.”
Russ glared at him. “Listen, you self-centered son of a bitch!” he shouted. “I’ll tell the feds every little last bit about you. I’ll destroy you!”
“You can prove nothing. Get out.”
“No? You don’t think I recorded our calls? I’ll give the tapes to the feds, and tell them what the code words mean. It’s your voice on the other end of those calls, Trip. And we have credit card charges for the same amount at the same time at Per Se. I bought you drinks at Inferno. People there saw us together. All that sounds like a link to me.”
Trip jumped to his feet. His eyes flared and his perfect lips drew back in a snarl. In all the years he’d known Trip, it was only the second time Russ had seen him lose that famous cool. A vision of the first time flashed in Russ’s brain — Trip’s bare back, the sweat in his blond hair. Trip smacked his hand on the desk, and the vision vanished. He was screaming now.
“You’re nothing! Nothing, nothing, nothing!”
Russ gathered his breath. “Or maybe,” Russ said, his voice shaking, “maybe I could gut it out and protect you. The feds can’t have proof that I bought and sold those stocks — because I didn’t. They can accuse all they like, but without proof... Maybe this is all just a fishing expedition.”
Trip spread his hands on the glass desktop and trapped his ire behind a set of white teeth. “You’d protect me?” he asked.
“I would, Trip. But we’d have to be much more careful about things. And I’d need more money.”
“More money,” Trip repeated. He nodded to himself and drummed his fingers on the desk. Then he looked at Russ with a sly light in his eye. “We’ll take it out of Abercrombie’s share. I’ll make an excuse about why the count is lighter. He’s not that smart.”
Russ’s eyes widened. “But what if he objects? What if he wants to see some proof — trading tickets or account statements?”
Trip laughed nastily. “The guy wouldn’t know a trading ticket if it jumped up and bit his ass, and he has no clue about how the market works. I could show him my cable bill and he wouldn’t know the difference. Look, if he complains, I’ll tell him we’re suspending operations until the heat is off. You and I will keep on with our arrangement, and I’ll pass you the cash directly.”
“And if, somehow, the feds link us? What then?”
Trip gave a graveyard laugh. “Then we give them Abercrombie. We tell them he forced us — threatened us at gunpoint. I mean, the guy has a criminal record like a phone book. Who are they going to believe — him or us? We just have to stick together, champ, just like we always have.”
Russ paused, gulping air. His vision was blurry and his voice was trembling when he spoke. “Trip, I... Don’t you know how I feel about you?”
Before Trip could do more than raise an eyebrow, there was a rap at the door. Beatrice looked in. “Your Los Angeles call,” she said.
Trip grinned and glanced at his watch. “No rest for the weary, champ. And anyway, you’d better get going. Don’t want to be seen loitering around here, after all. Unless there was something else...?”
Russ’s throat closed up. “Nothing else,” he said, then bolted through the door. There was no sign of Mr. Abercrombie, and Beatrice said nothing as he hurried by. In what seemed like no time he was in the empty subway station. He leaned back against the dirty tiles and tried to calm himself. Images of Trip reeled through his head.
He heard a low rumble and felt the building wind of an oncoming train. He smelled something acrid and opened his eyes. He wasn’t alone on the platform anymore. Mr. Abercrombie towered over him. And behind him, steaming with anger, stood Trip.
Abercrombie’s massive hand closed around Russ’s slender arm. “Get the other one, Trip,” he said.
Trip recoiled. “Are you crazy? I shouldn’t even be down here. You were supposed to take care of this yourself.”
“I said, get the other arm.” The fiery menace seethed out of Mr. Abercrombie, and Trip took tentative hold of Russ’s other arm. Russ felt the tremble in his hand.
“What are you doing?” Russ cried as they dragged him to the edge of the platform.
“You know the feds will crack you like a walnut, champ.” Trip’s voice was soft in his ear. “And I just can’t let that happen. I like the income stream from you, but the risk profile is up too much.”
The subway train sped into the station, a thirty-five-ton, stainless steel behemoth with harsh eyelike headlights. It rolled at them with inhuman force.
The train was almost upon them when Mr. Abercrombie dropped Russ’s arm and, with amazing agility for such a big man, took Trip by the throat. Trip let out a shriek and let go of Russ, who stumbled backward, away from the platform edge.
Trip’s hands flailed feebly at Mr. Abercrombie. His gorgeous teeth were bared in pain and panic. Mr. Abercrombie lifted Trip from his feet and tossed him to the tracks.
The subway motorman looked up in horror to see some-one stumbling off the platform. He hit the horn and then the brakes. The first car shuddered as it bumped over the body, and the cars kept rolling past amid the brakes’ banshee wail.
Mr. Abercrombie took Russ by the arm again and hauled him out the turnstile and up the stairs. Russ followed the massive form numbly, along the empty street and into a black car parked in an alleyway. Mr. Abercrombie got into the driver’s seat and started the engine. “We gotta get out of here.”
“Trip,” Russ whispered.
“I gotta hand it to you, Ickes,” he heard Mr. Abercrombie say through a fog, “you had him pegged — how fucking quick he’d be to sell me down the river if he thought the feds were coming through the door. No fucking loyalty at all. I hate that. You had him pegged, all right. And that crap about the U.S. Attorney calling — that was nice touch, just like the thing with the intercom. Bea kept the line open and I heard the whole thing. You did okay tonight, Ickes — a real brain trust.”