Free The Codex by Douglas Preston

was the color of rich mahogany. A dash of cool Evian released the flavor, and he brought it to his lips, sucked in a goodly amount, savoring the taste of peat, hops, the cold sea, the Highland moors, fine Spanish Amontillado.
    As the feeling of peace stole over him he thought longingly of the big swim, of floating away on a sea of light. If it came to that, all it would take would be two dozen more of those tablets followed by the rest of the Macallan and he’d be sinking forever into the blue deep. No pleading the Fifth before Congress, no claiming to be just another poor misled incompetent CEO before the SEC, none of that Kenneth Lay shit. He’d be his own judge, jury, and executioner. His father, an army sergeant, had taught him the value of honor.
    The one thing that could have saved the firm, but had sunk it instead, was that big breakthrough drug they thought they had. Phloxatane. With that in hand, the bean counters figured it was safe to start cutting long-term R&D to jack up current profits. They said the analysts would never notice, and at first they didn’t. It worked like a dream, and their stock price shot through the roof. Then they started shifting current marketing costs to amortizable R&D, and still the analysts didn’t notice and still the stock price rose. Then they assigned losses to paper-thin, off-the-books partnerships in the Cayman Islands and Netherland Antilles, booked loans as profits, and blew whatever cash was left over to buy back company stock to innate the price even more—also inflating (naturally) the value of executive stock options. The stock soared; they cashed out, they made millions. God, it had been a heady game. They broke every law, rule, and regulation on the books and had a creative genius of a CFO who invented new ones to break. And all those high-flying stock pickers—they turned out to be about as perceptive as Br’er Bear, he a-earnin’a dollah a minute.
    Now they’d come to the end of the line. There were no more rules to bend or break. Finally the market woke up, the stock crashed, and they had no more tricks up their sleeve. The carrion crows were circling above the Lampe Building at 725 Avenue of the Americas, cawing his name.
    A shaking hand slipped the key into the lock; the drawer slid open. Skiba chewed up another bitter pill, took a second slug of scotch.
    There came a buzz, announcing Graff.
    Graff, the CFO genius who had gotten them to this point.
    Skiba took a swig of Evian, swilled it around, swallowed, took another swig, and a third. He swept his hand over his hair, leaned back in the chair, and composed his face. He was already feeling that creeping lightness of being that started in his chest and moved outward to his fingertips, buoying him up, filling him with a golden glow.
    He swiveled his chair, his eyes falling briefly on the photographs of his three bright little children smiling from their silver frames. Then his eye reluctantly traveled from the desk to rest on the face of Mike Graff, who had just entered the room. The man stood before Skiba, oddly delicate, encased from head to toe in impeccable worsted wool, silk, and cotton. Graff had been Lampe’s rising young protégé, profiled in Forbes, courted by analysts and investment bankers, his wine cellar featured in Bon Appétit and his house in Architectural Digest. Now his protégé was no longer rising: He was holding hands with Skiba as they swan-dived off the edge of the Grand Canyon.
    “What is it, Mike, that was so important it couldn’t wait until our afternoon meeting?” Skiba spoke pleasantly.
    “I’ve got a fellow outside you need to meet. He’s got an interesting proposition for us.”
    Skiba closed his eyes. He suddenly felt tired almost unto death. All the good feeling was gone. “Don’t you think we’ve had enough of your ‘propositions,’ Mike?”
    “This one’s different. Trust me.”
    Trust me, Skiba waved his hand in a gesture of futility. He heard the door open and