Bad Business

32

A dele McCallister's secretary was a sturdy gray-haired woman in a dark dress.

"Ms. McCallister is expecting you," she said and ushered me into the big corner office.

I t was all a corner office was supposed to be. Leather couch, entertainment console, a large map of the world marked with colorful tacks. There was a round conference table by the window, and an oriental rug on the floor, a wet bar, and at the back wall of the office, facing the door, and dominating all before it, a long table with elegant legs, which served as a desk. Behind it was Adele, wearing a low-necked pink suit with a short skirt. She had pearls around her neck.

"Pearls go great with the suit," I said.

She smiled.

"I'm working on demure," she said. I smiled back.

"You might have to work harder," I said.

"Good," she said.

There were original oils on the two inside walls, a couple of which were pretty good.

"Coffee?" she said. "Water? A drink?"

"Coffee."

"Let's have it at the conference table," she said. "Get a better view of the Burger King."

I don't know quite how she knew, but the sturdy secretary appeared almost as soon as we sat, bearing a silver service with a carafe of coffee and cream, sugar, and Equal.

A dele said, "Thank you, Dotty. Hold my calls, please." Dotty set the tray down, smiled at her boss, and went out. Adele poured us each coffee, into white china mugs, and offered me cream in a silver pitcher. Her mug had "Legs" written on it. It went with the rest of the elegant service like pearls went with a hot pink suit.

"So," Adele said. "Business or pleasure."

"I'm still trying to find out what happened to Trent Rowley," I said. "I was hoping you'd help."

"I'd love to help you," she said.

The way she talked, everything sounded like it would lead to sex.

"Tell me about Trent," I said.

"Trent," she said and leaned back with her elbows resting on the arms of her chair. She drank some of her coffee, holding the cup in both hands. "Trent, Trent, Trent."

I waited.

"You were at Chatham," she said.

"I was."

"With an amazing-looking woman, I might add," Adele said.

"I was."

"You saw what they are, Trent was like the rest of them."

"Which is?"

"Hyperthyroid frat boys out to prove they've got the biggest dick," Adele said.

"By?" I said.

"By bringing in the most business, coming up with the best new scheme, getting the biggest bonus. Kinergy is a money machine if you're good, and willing to work eighteen-hour days, every day."

"Every day?"

"Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays," Adele said. "Some of the losers take Christmas morning off."

"Where do you fit in?" I said.

She grinned and drank some coffee.

"Hyperthyroid sorority girl," she said. "Intent on proving I've got everything the boys have."

"How's that going?" I said.

"I'm doing fine," she said and made an inclusive gesture at the rest of her office.

"What is it you do, exactly?"

"I'm senior vice president for development," she said.

"Yeah?

"I fly around in the company jet and look for opportunities for us."

"For Kinergy?"

"Sure."

"And that includes what?"

"Mostly blowing the smoke and arranging the mirrors," she said.

"Anything else?" I said. "Anything more, ah, specific." She smiled widely.

"An occasional BJ," she said.

"An indispensable negotiating tool," I said.

"Nice choice of words."

I shrugged.

"And what did Trent do?"

"CFO," she said.

"Was he good at it?"

"In some ways he was a wizard. He truly understood the manipulation of money. He was a genius at accounting. He understood banking. He had a ... an almost genetic sense of how Wall Street works."

"That sounds like a wizard in all ways," I said.

"It does," she said. "But . . . it wasn't what he knew and didn't know. It was ... hell, it was that he didn't want it badly enough."

"Want what?"

"The whole enchilada," Adele said. "Money, power, country club, Porsche, Rolex, Montblanc pen."

"What else is there?" I said.

"It's the way we keep score," Adele said. "And Trent played that game as hard as he could. But there was always ... I don't know ... he always seemed to be looking for something that Kinergy doesn't have." She shrugged. "Purpose, peace, love, some philosophical something. I mean Trent could be as big a prick as anyone. And he was a real player ... but there was that something lacking."

"Or vice versa," I said.

"What? Oh, yes. Maybe not. Maybe it was a good thing. But not here. You want to be here, you can't be good ... and survive."

"He didn't," I said.

"Yeah. That's kind of sad. But I didn't mean it that way."

"You good?" I said.

"God, no. I'm talking to you because I can't think of any reason not to. But, no, I'd lie to you in a heartbeat. If it would get me something I wanted, I'd sleep with you."

"Be a treat in itself," I said.

She paused and looked at me as if she were considering a purchase.

"Probably would be," she said. "But it would waste a fuck."

"Because I can't do anything for you."

"That's right."

"And you want the whole enchilada?"

"All of it," she said. "Everything the men want, and to get it I have to be better than the men and when I am, I get to rub their noses in it."

"My God," I said. "A feminist."

"Fuck that," she said. "I'm not doing anything for women. I'm doing it for me."

"What can you tell me about Cooper?" I said.

"Wants to be senator, as a way of positioning himself to run for president."

"Hell of a pay cut," I said.

"His focus is upward and out," she said. "Trent and Bernie Eisen ran the place."

"And now it's just Bernie," I said.

"Yeah. But that'll change. Bernie hasn't got the cojones or the smarts without Trent to help him."

"What's Cooper like?"

"God knows," she said. "He might even be what he seems. I don't know. Mostly he's an absentee landlord. Spends a lot of time in D.C."

"He married?"

A dele smiled a little.

"Big Wilma," she said.

"Big Wilma."

"She's the wife he married in college and never should have. But he can't divorce her because if he runs for president the divorce will kill him."

"You think?"

"Doesn't matter what I think. That's what he thinks."

"He talks about this?"

A dele smiled and didn't say anything.

"To you," I said. "Under, ah, intimate circumstances."

A dele continued to smile.

"Coop fools around?"

"I don't think Coop is ever fooling," she said.

"Can you talk about Gavin?"

"Un-uh," she said. "I got nothing to say about Gavin."

"Scared?"

"Prudent," she said. "Mostly he functions as Coop's bodyguard."

"Coop needs a bodyguard?" I said.

A dele shrugged.

"He's very loyal to Coop," she said.

"Do you know why Cooper needs a bodyguard?"

"No."

I nodded. Adele poured me some more coffee. She was sitting with her legs crossed, and when she leaned forward to pour, her short skirt got much shorter. My devotion to Susan was complete. I noted it merely because I am a trained observer.

"You ever hear of Darrin O'Mara?" I said.

"Why do you ask?"

"His name keeps popping up," I said.

She looked out the window for a time. Then she smiled.

"The corporate pimp," she said.

"Ah ha," I said.

"Is that what detectives say?" she said. "Ah, ha!"

"I used to say things like `the game's afoot,' but people didn't know what I was talking about."

"And `ah ha' is shorter," she said.

"Exactly."

"What a funny guy you are," she said. "This is one of the most successful companies in the world. Are you at all impressed with anything that goes on here?"

"Coffee's good," I said.

She smiled. "I'll broaden the question," she said. "Are you impressed with anything? Anywhere?"

"Susan Silverman is fairly amazing," I said.

"That's the woman that was with you in Chatham."

I nodded.

"Tell me about the corporate pimp," I said.

"It's just an expression," she said. "He used to spend a lot of time with Cooper and Bernie Eisen and Trent, before Trent died, and you know he's this sex guru. It's just sort of a joke around here."

"Tell me about the time he spent."

"God, you sound like one of my therapists," she said. "You know, he'd be at company social events, they'd play golf together, sometimes he'd come here to see one or another of them. They'd have lunch."

"Any women involved?"

"There were some, in those sex seminars he runs. Wives, some of our employees."

"How about Coop?" I said. "He take one of those seminars?"

"Not that I know."

"Big Wilma?"

A dele put her head back and laughed. "Wait'll you meet Big Wilma," she said.