She started to go, then stopped. Bogosian stood on the stairway to the second floor. Marta shivered with fear and cold. She flashed on the bloodied security guards. She had to get a grip. What was Bogosian doing? She had to see.
Marta flopped over, chin in the snow, and crawled the few feet to the small dune. She crouched behind it, wind pummeling her back. Her hair lashed her cheeks and she shoved it away with a snowy glove. The surf crashed on the beach, a deafening white noise. Bogosian was motionless in the middle of the staircase. He seemed to be squinting up the stairs.
Marta looked up to the second floor of the mansion. A light blinked on in a far window, where a bedroom would be. It was too high for Marta to see inside. On the stair, Bogosian cocked his head like a pit bull, his large hand resting on the banister. Whatever was going on, it didn't look like Bogosian and Alix had arranged to meet here. An ominous feeling rumbled in Marta's gut.
The light in the second-floor bedroom snapped off. A split second later, a light appeared in the window next to it. Alix must have been going from one room to the next. Marta craned her neck but still couldn't see anything. What was going on? She had to move back if she wanted to see upstairs.
Marta edged from the dune toward the ocean, low as a snow crab. She backed against another dune and ducked behind it. From her new perspective, she could see Alix's head and shoulders in a room on the second floor. Alix appeared to be searching for something in an exercise room, with a Stairmaster and a Lifecycle. Marta watched as Alix opened a cabinet in the room and rifled its contents. White towels and Evian bottles fell to the floor. What was Alix looking for?
On the stairs, Bogosian took a step up, running his gloved hand on the banister.
Marta looked up again. The exercise room went dark. In the next minute a light went on in the middle of the second floor, where a set of French doors opened onto a wooden deck. The French doors gave Marta a full view and she could see Alix was in a home office. She was tearing open file drawers and ransacking them. Papers sailed to the carpet. Alix kept searching. What was she looking for?
A sudden movement on the stairs caught Marta's eye. Bogosian eased his Magnum from his shoulder holster.
My God. Marta looked up at Alix. She was still searching the files, on her knees in front of the file cabinet.
Bogosian started up the stairs with his gun drawn. Did he know Alix was up there? Did he mean to kill her? Why? Marta didn't know what to do. Panic constricted her chest.
Alix was tearing at a cardboard box with her nails. She kept clawing at it, then grabbed a scissors from a desk and slit it with the scissor blade.
Bogosian reached the top of the stairs. Marta felt her heart thundering though her thick coat. What could she do? She had to do something. She couldn't let Bogosian kill Alix. No one was around. It was the middle of a blizzard. Marta couldn't make it inside the house in time if she tried. She rose to her feet, unsteady in the fierce wind.
Alix was kneeling in front of the cardboard box, reading its contents. Bogosian appeared in the office doorway and aimed his gun point-blank at her forehead. A wave crashed loud as a thunderclap, and Marta heard herself screaming even over its roar.
32
Snow swirled around the steel skyscraper that served as a platinum setting for the city's largest and most expensive law firm, Cable & Bess. Light sparkled from its emerald-cut windows like a diamond choker strung around the building's neck. A sterling-haired attorney sat in a corner diamond talking on the telephone. A trim sixty-two, John LeFort remained composed and professional, even though it was past midnight and on the phone was the fifth unhappy banker he'd spoken with. All of them were lenders of LeFort's client Elliot Steere.
"I assure you, the Steere debts are under control," LeFort was saying. He ran a forefinger over one of his dark eyebrows, which sheltered his light eyes and fine features like a sturdy roof. A Harvard graduate, LeFort was the consummate banking lawyer, so he didn't judge his clients. Some became rich, some failed, and all tried again.
"The debts are not under control, to my mind," the banker responded. This time the banker was Morris Barrie at First Federal. LeFort had dealt with Mo Barrie many times over the years and knew him well. The men spoke the same language, so this conversation, which could otherwise be ugly or profane, would be quite civilized.
"We'll need another waiver, Mo," LeFort said evenly. He always used the term "we" when referring to his clients, to encourage their creditors to think of them as a team. A team they couldn't quit.
"I'm not so sure, John," said Mo, who at this point was showing worrisome signs not only of quitting the team, but of selling the franchise.
"Another month on the principal payments would do it."
"We've rolled over the one-month waiver six times. How long can we keep waiving? Steere owes both past and current principal payments on his outstanding loans."
"It's a temporary situation," LeFort soothed. His gaze wandered over his desk, which was stacked with squared-off correspondence and legal pads. A Waterford pen and pencil set and black-and-white photographs were the only personal touches; LeFort much preferred black-and-white portraits to color. "We're meeting the interest payments. We'll resume principal payments as soon as the acquittal is in, any day now. The bank retains the properties as collateral. The debt is secured."
"I'm at a loss to see how. I reviewed the leases, and those properties can't generate the cash to resume principal payments, with the interest and taxes. The purpose of the investment was the resale of the properties. Steere's legal position makes that untenable, perhaps impossible."
"Our legal position is sound."
"Sound, you say? His defense lawyers are dropping like flies. One vanished and one shot. It's been on every broadcast. My wife thinks they jumped ship, for God's sake!"
LeFort laughed, not so loudly as to be impolite. Bunny was a hysteric, everybody knew it. "Remember that the jury is deliberating. They have the case. I sat in the courtroom, I saw the closing, and I can tell you that in my judgment they will acquit by the end of business tomorrow."
"So you say, but Steere's refinancing brings the debt above conservative appraisals— above anybody's appraisal— of the liquidation value of the property. On paper, these nine buildings are valued at ninety-three million. They're probably not worth sixty million, and our exposure is growing."
"We're almost out of the woods, Mo."
"John, the committee is concerned. Deeply concerned. Every hour the jury takes to reach its decision decreases the salability of the properties. If the jury is hung, this could go on for another year. Then we can't wait for the best offer. We'll have to liquidate."
"You won't have to liquidate."
"I don't mind telling you, I'm out on a limb at this point. Personally, I mean." Mo sighed, and there was the musical chink-clink of ice cubes against crystal. LeFort knew what that meant. Glenfiddich, the elixir of downside analysis.
"I wouldn't worry overmuch, Mo."
"How can I not? I've lent you more than the properties are worth in a fire sale. No, more than they're worth, period. The committee will have my head for this one." Another clink, then the sound of a discreet sip. "John, if Steere has any hidden resources, hidden assets, he should bring them into play. Anything in Switzerland, the Isle of Man, the Caymans. God, man, now is the time. Concealing them is no longer—"
"There's no concealment," LeFort assured him. There was nothing to hide. Steere's net worth was by any measure negative, he was so extraordinarily leveraged, but no one with whom Steere did business could admit as much. In other words, if Steere weren't so in debt, he'd be broke. LeFort no longer found it ironic that massive debt was as potent as massive wealth.