“Really,” I said matter-of-factly. I was in that state of extreme weariness where you can't immediately fathom the consequences of what you're hearing. So the fact that Gary Kaminsky had intimate knowledge of my Swiss dealings wasn't troubling me—at least not yet. “What did he get indicted for?” I asked.
“Money laundering. Does the name Jean Jacques Saurel 3*ring a bell?”
That one got me! Woke me right the fuck up! Saurel was my Swiss banker, the one man who could sinkme with Agent Coleman. “Not really,” I said tentatively, clenching my ass cheeks. “Maybe I met him once, but… I'm not sure—why?”
“Because he got indicted too,” said Grover. “He's sitting in jail with Kaminsky as we speak.”
To my own surprise, it still took OCD more than three years to secure an indictment against me, despite the fact that Saurel began to cooperate almost immediately. And while some of the delay had to do with the loyalty of my Strattonites, more of it had to do with my recruitment of the Chef to help me devise a cover story. In fact, as my house of cards was collapsing around me, the Chef was busy cooking up one of his legendary recipes. And this particular recipe was sotasty and somouthwatering that it kept OCD scratching his head for more than three full years.
And now the Chef was a wanted man. He had a federal bull's-eye on his back, and not just because he'd aided and abetted me, by helping cover up my money-laundering debacle, but also because of his relationship with the Blue-eyed Devil. Jam up Gaito, reasoned the Bastard, and he'll roll over on Brennan, who was the true target.
In truth, I wasn't so sure of that. The Chef was fiercely loyal to the Devil—selling his soul to him, so to speak—and he was the sort of battle-hardened cook who could stand the heat in the kitchen, preferring, in fact, to conjure up his recipes right beside the flames. The Chef loved the action—no, he livedfor the action—and after all those years of working with the Devil he'd become completely desensitized. Things like fear, self-doubt, and self-preservation were foreign concepts to the Chef. If you were his friend he stood up for you; if you were in trouble he went to warfor you; and if your back was truly to the wall—and it was either you or him—he would fall on his sword for you.
Perhaps that was why today, this very afternoon, the Chef had defied the conventional wisdom and taken my phone call. After all, the first rule of thumb in myworld—meaning, the villains’, thieves’, and scoundrels’ world—was that when someone gets indicted, you lose their phone number forever. It was like becoming a leper, and whether a leper actually touches you or not, it doesn't really matter. If you even get close, he infects you just the same.
So tomorrow would be D-Day, the FBI plan simple and devilish: The Chef would come to my house, and I would be wired. After a few minutes of small talk, I would casually bring up the past and get the Chef to incriminate himself. And as sad and de spic able as that was, what choice did I have? If I didn't cooperate they would indict the Duchess; and if I didn't cooperate my children would grow up without a father; and if I didn't cooperate I would risk becoming Mr. Gower! All I could hope for was that the Chef would be smart enough not to incriminate himself, that he would dance close to the line but wouldn't actually cross over it.
That was my only hope.
1*Name has been changed
2*Name has been changed
3*Name has been changed
CHAPTER 9
WIRED FOR SOUND
It was early afternoon, and I was sitting on my gray slate patio, in a $1,200 Smith & Hawken teak armchair, when that horrific thought came bubbling up into my brain. And while I couldn't see them, I knew they were there— Frick and Frack! Tweedledee and Tweedledum!OCD and the Mormon were camped out in my daughter's perfect pink bedroom, sneaking peeks at me through the tiny gaps in the perfect pink slats of her Venetian blinds.
What kind of father would allow such a thing to happen? I was supposed to be Chandler's protector! Her guardian! Her savior! It was a daddy's job to keep intruders out; yet now there were two armed intruders defiling her bedroom, as a hundred fifty immaculately dressed Barbie dolls and an equal number of wildly overpriced stuffed animals looked on in utter helplessness, bearing silent witness to Daddy's failure as a protector.
Meanwhile, the Chef was due to arrive any minute, so I needed to grab hold of myself. I needed to rein in all these stray thoughts roaring through my brain—the guilt, the remorse, the panic, the sheer fucking terror! In truth, it wasn't really my fault that the FBI had declared eminent domain over my daughter's perfect pink bedroom; the problem was one of geometry, since Chandler's window happened to be at the perfect angle for OCD and the Mormon to take clandestine snapshots of the Chef as we sat outside on the gray slate patio and I went about destroying his life.
Such shame I felt! Such terrible dishonor! Me—theignoble rat!
Still, it happened to be beautiful outside. It was one of those glorious, uplifting days, where a young man of worth and substance can relish Mother Nature and all she has to offer. And what better place to do it than from the fabulous gray slate patio at Chez Belfort? The scenery, after all, was beautiful; behind me, my ten-thousand-square-foot gray stone mansion rose above the grounds with the grandeur and magnificence of the Palace of Versailles; before me, the crystal-blue waters of my Olympic-size swimming pool sparkled like diamonds; and, beyond that, my breathtaking pond and waterfall system was pumping out thousands of gallons of water per minute, as a jet-powered fountain shot up a thick stream of it twenty feet into the air, in a dazzling display of wealth and excess. Such beauty I'd surrounded myself with! Such opulence!
Then my spirits sank. That lousy pond and waterfall had set me back a million fucking bucks, a million fucking bucks I could really use right now! Just this morning I had had a debilitating attack of money anxiety. I was alone in bed when the cruel reality of having to disgorge most of my assets to the federal government hit me like an iron wrecking ball. Next thing I knew, my heart was beating out of my chest, and I was sweating profusely. I started panicking.
And why was I alone? Because that dirty Duchess hadn't even come homelast night! Apparently she'd zeroed in on a new gold mine and was now in the process of staking her claim. It was only a matter of time until she became the blond-headed arm candy of another mine owner. Where did that leave me? What woman would want a broke and penniless Wolf who'd ratted out his friends?
I took a deep breath and resisted the urge to sneak a peek up at my daughter's Venetian blinds. I had been up there myself—less than five minutes ago—and the scene was sheer bedlam. The Mormon had been pacing back and forth (while smiling broadly and kindly) with a Minolta camera dangling from his neck, like some grinning Japanese tourist. Meanwhile, OCD had been hunched over on his knees, affixing an ultrasensitive tape recorder just above my loins, using a roll of masking tape he'd purchased at Staples.
For my part, I had mostly been complaining. “Jesus—this is gonna hurt like a bitch when you take it off!” I'd snapped at OCD. I was alluding to the fact that most of my pubic hair would be ripped off when he removed the recorder.
“I know, I know,” OCD had replied sympathetically, as he carefully avoided my pubic hair with the back of his hand. “But you gotta trust me on this one; there's no better place to hide a tape recorder.” He shrugged as he secured the last piece of masking tape four inches above my scrotal sac. “Even someone as suspicious as the Chef is gonna think twice before he pats down your balls!”