Free A Bridge to Treachery From Extortion to Terror by Larry Crane Page B

Jory is only five.”
     
    * * *
     
    “If you ask me, darling, you need to get busy on something,” Mag said. “You’re thinking too much.”
     
    Leonard Motors advertised a Lexus for $450 a month on lease; and after a very rigorous test drive along Route Eighty all the way to Sparta and back, Lou was itchy. Mag preferred a more cautious approach: a thorough analysis of safety, reliability, and economy statistics from the latest Consumer Reports New Car Issue which recommended a Camry station wagon.
     
    Lou walked all around the Camry, even tried out the keyless entry system, but his Lexus fever never cooled. Mag backed off and only insisted that they at least hang on to the old car. That night, the Lexus occupied the garage.
     
    * * *
     
    In the third week of July, first thing in the morning, Calvin Swisher met Lou at his desk in the bullpen and personally escorted him into the third glass office from the left.
     
    “It’s yours,” Swish said. “I’m sorry it couldn’t have been sooner. You deserve it. You’ll need the extra privacy for your duties as planner of this year’s Big Tuna Bash. Have fun, rookie.”
     
    Every year, the firm treated the ten top producers in the office to a sumptuous beach party in Mantoloking.
     
    Patricia Buck called around Labor Day.
     
    “Louis, I wonder if you could free yourself up to take my place with a couple of clients out at Westchester Country Club this weekend. Bring Barry Westover along.”
     
    Pierson Browne, in a piggyback deal with Manufacturers Hanover, used the Westchester Golf Classic as a drawing card for many of their biggest institutional clients. The drill was to meet them at the first tee, supply them with some goodies—maybe a T-shirt, a sleeve of golf balls, and an umbrella—and then follow some of the pros around the holes nearest the clubhouse and cap it all off by sauntering over to a big yellow and white striped tent for lunch.
     
    Barry Westover couldn’t care less about golf, so they wound up wandering with the crowd between holes, catching a glimpse of Johnny Miller driving into the rough on thirteen, then lounging under the tent drinking Bloody Marys.
     
    Dolly, the party facilitator from Executive Privilege, the hospitality outfit Pierson Browne used for all its “schmooz-fests”, was a middle-aged woman doing her best not to look it. The morning after Patricia’s call, she was already in Lou’s office to talk Mantoloking when he arrived.
     
    “How do you do?” Lou said to her. “Please, have a seat, and I’ll be off the phone in a minute.” He draped his jacket over the back of his chair, punched the squawk box, and stood looking out through the wall of glass.
     
    “Darren, how are you? Listen, let me cut straight to the chase with you on this one, okay? We’re positive out to the end of the year on rates. You won’t regret parking in intermediate term treasuries ’til then. Last week in December, we’ll have a clearer picture. Meanwhile, you sit on six percent. My bond man’s never wrong, Darren. Okay, leave it to me.”
     
    He walked to the door of the office.
     
    “Mutch! Stick Darren Golden in the bonds. Yeah, intermediates.”
     
    “Tell me about the beach house,” he said to Dolly, leaning well back in his chair, clasping his hands behind his head.
     
    “We’ve reserved a nearly brand new cedar and glass, five-suite house, right on the beach.”
     
    “There are going to be ten couples,” Lou said.
     
    “Our history with these parties is that at least half, and probably more, of the attendees will elect not to stay the night,” Dolly said.
     
    “How many times have you done this?”
     
    “This is the eighth year for me.”
     
    “Well, I want it to be the biggest and best goddamned...”
     
    “Open bar, party gifts, hors ’d’oeuvres, choice of lobster or filet mignon, four female facilitators, taped music?”
     
    “A band. We have to have a band.”
     
    “We’ve never had a live band,