Perhaps, over time, the gulf between our cultures could become our greatest strength. Americans, after all, had a great soul of their own, didn't they? According to Dostoyevsky, the essence of the great Russian soul was the ever-present and unquenchable need to suffer, and, according to yours truly, the essence of the great American soul was: Why should we suffer at all when our parents and grandparents suffered for us? So, together, couldn't KGB and I unite into a perfect soul? It would be my American optimism mixed with her Russian fatalism, the sum of which would be perfection.
Either way, we had a few years to bridge the gulf. The new millennium was just around the corner—only eighty days away—and it would be three or four years after that until I got sentenced.
Then the phone rang.
“Blyad!”sputtered KGB. “Please pick up phone! It disturb my play.”
Carter turned to me and nodded. “It disturb her play.”
“Disturbs,”I said to Carter, fearing KGB's influence over his language skills, and I reached over to the phone on the side table and picked it up. “Hello?”
“It's your lawyer,” said Magnum, in an octave of C-minor. “How are you?”
“I'm doing good,” I replied automatically, and then realized afterthe fact that I actually wasdoing good. Yes, I thought, for the first time in a long time I was approaching something close to happiness. “What's going on?” I asked.
“There's been a flurry of activity at the U.S. Attorney's today.”
I felt my heart skip a beat. “Oh, really? In reference to what?”
“Are you familiar with an AUSA named Dan Alonso?”
“No,” I replied quickly. “What about him?”
“Well, he's your new AUSA,” answered Magnum. “He called Nick and me this morning to give us a heads-up. Joel is leaving the office next week and Alonso has been assigned to your case.”
I crossed my fingers: “So what's he like? Is he a nice guy or is he a douche bag?”
“Welllllll…”said Magnum, “on a scale of one to ten, with a douche bag being a one and a nice guy being a ten, I would say Alonso falls somewhere between a ten and an eleven.”
“You're kidding!” I exclaimed.
“Shhhh!” snapped KGB. “I cannot concentrate!”
Carter looked up and put his forefinger to his lips. Then he looked back at the screen. I chuckled and said into the phone, “Is he really that good?”
“Yes,” answered Magnum, “he really is. He's tough, fair, very smart, an excellent litigator, and, above all, he's got a big heart. I've already broached the subject of reducing your obstruction charge, and he said he's willing to sit down and talk about it. He wants to meet you first, and then he'll let us plead our case. I think we're in very good shape there.”
I felt a wave of relief come over me. “Well, this is great news, Greg, really great.”
“Yeah, it is,” he agreed. “On a separate note, though, I got a very strange call from Joel Cohen this morning. He was saying something about you being in Atlantic City a few months ago and that you refused to identify yourself. He hinted that you were trying to launder money or something. I know that's not true, right?”
My mouth immediately went dry, my gut drawing conclusions faster than my mind could come to them. “Of course not!” I sputtered. “That's total bullshit! I wasn't trying to launder money! It was a misunderstanding!”
“So you werethere?” asked Magnum, seeming extremely surprised.
I already knew where this was going.
In the end, I could prove that I hadn't tried to launder money, but I couldn't prove that I hadn't violated my bail restrictions. I had left New York without permission. “Yeah, I was there,” I said softly. “Hold on a second; let me switch rooms.”
On my way out of the TV room, I took a moment to regard the innocent face of my son. He had had a rocky start, Carter, yet he had grown strong. A terrible wave of sadness came over me. I felt like I had let him down.
Inside the master bedroom, I picked up the phone of the future and sat down on the edge of the bed, then went about telling my lawyer the story, all the sordid details—starting with the luscious yet underage Kiley and finishing with the stone-faced woman in the cashier's cage who refused to give me my money back. Then I said, “They're not going to break my cooperation over this, right?”
“No,” he replied quickly, “not if what you're telling me is true.”
Trying to maintain control, I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Then I started spitting nails at my attorney, swearing up and down that I was telling the truth this time. First I swore on my eyes, then I swore on my children's eyes, then I swore on my unborn children's eyes, and then I swore on Magnum's children's eyes too.
Finally, he said, “All right! I believe you! I believe you! You can stop selling me now. Jesus! You know, either way, we still have some serious damage control to do. What kind of relationship do you have with your pretrial-services officer?”
“Pat Mancini?” I replied, sensing a thin ray of hope. “He's great!” I chose not to bring up my misleading phone call to Pat, with its vague reference of being stuck in thecity, without saying whichcity. “Why do you ask?”
“I askbecause he's the one who can ultimately turn your lights out here. If he writes a letter to the judge about your little helicopter excursion—destination, Atlantic City; companion, underage girl; seed money for gambling, a bag full of the government's cash—it could be a problem, Jordan. It doesn't look like the behavior of a contrite man. You understand?”
And that was when it hit me: the sheer audacity of my actions!It wasn't so much that I had violated my release conditions (that was bad enough on its own) but how I had done it.
If I had driven to Atlantic City in a beat-up station wagon with my seventy-year-old mother and a bunch of rolled-up quarters, then Judge Gleeson would probably say, “Oh, it's just the case of a good son trying to spend some quality time with his mom,” and then he would let me off with a warning. But I had stolen $100 million and was being given a second chance, and how did I show my appreciation? I took a secret helicopter ride to the Sodom and Gomorrah of New Jersey with an underage model. And to finance my trip I took an interest-free loan from the federal government!
With a sinking heart, I said, “So what happens next?”
There were a few moments of silence, then Magnum said, “Nothing, hopefully. I'll call Joel back and offer your side of the story, and then I'll tell him that I'll work it out with Alonso, although this is not exactly the best way to start a relationship with him.” He paused for a moment. Then: “But what are you gonna do, right?”
“Yeah, right,” I said tonelessly. “What are you gonna do.”
We spent a few more minutes strategizing, but there wasn't really much we could do. The most important thing, we agreed, was to make sure this never made it before Judge Gleeson. He was a conservative man, said Magnum, an altogether rational man, who lived his life by the rules. This was just the sort of thing to raise his ire.
After we hung up the phone, I sat there on the edge of the bed for a moment, dumbfounded. I must have said a thousand times, in jest, that I was my own worst enemy, but this time it wasn't funny. Once more I had put my freedom in jeopardy, and for what? In retrospect, my decision seemed utterly mind-boggling. Was I really that self-destructive? I didn't think so, yet from the outside looking in, that's exactly what I appeared to be. What malfunction did I possess that caused me to do these things, that caused me to take these wild risks, even when there was no upside?
I took a deep breath and fought down the urge to beat myself up any further. What was done was done. If Judge Gleeson found out about this, he would throw me in the slammer on the spot—at which point I would lose Yulia, the children would be heartbroken, the Duchess would move to California, Meadow Lane would be forfeited in my absence, my furniture and clothing would be auctioned off for pennies on the dollar, and my plan to trade stocks would be thwarted. Yet my expenses with the Duchess and the children would continue—so when I finally got sentenced, three years from now, and I emerged from jail a few years after that, I would be naked, alone, penniless, homeless, and my kids would live three thousand miles away, calling John Macaluso Daddy!