The Candidate (24 page)

ON THE FLIGHT BACK TO New York that night, Erica is still reeling from what she learned in that tiny Iraqi village. It was the Chinese who were spending all that time just torturing Mike Ortiz. His book is full of lies. It wasn't just torture. It was systematic brainwashing.

Isolation. Sensory deprivation. Fear. Indoctrination. Love.

Erica can imagine it all going down in that sweltering jail hidden from the world. Ortiz kept isolated, blindfolded, his ears plugged, caged in that tiny cell, his will wearing down. And then hauled out for the long sessions of torture, beaten, threats made to him and his family, and more torture until he's thrown back into the cell, where he cowers in the corner, trembling with fear. Then, when he's broken, desperate and terrified, the mind games begin, the propaganda, programming, paranoia. And finally, when Ortiz is reduced to a quivering subhuman mass, deranged with confusion and want and fear—the love. The love that is his if he obeys. Love. Always and forever. Of course he'll obey. Any edict. Any order. Just keep loving me and not hurting me. Please. Please don't hurt me.

All hail. But all hail
who
?

Erica is beginning to doubt her theory that the CIA was behind
the plot. Surely they wouldn't have enlisted the Chinese to help them. From what Hamade told her, the CIA had more than enough Iraqi operatives to pull it off themselves had they wanted to.

Erica's mind goes back to Lily Lau and Celeste Ortiz. Lau is the daughter of a Chinese diplomat. Celeste was a banker specializing in China. Who recites incantations in Chinese with her husband before public appearances. China is the world's greatest economic power and is spreading its global web of influence in cunning ways. Like all empires, it wants to keep expanding. How brilliant it would be if China could gain control of the White House through the means of a subservient, compliant, brainwashed Mike Ortiz.

All hail
. . . Lily Lau
?

No, it's too crazy. Too grandiose. Too bizarre. Or is it? She remembers Nylan Hastings's plan to gain control of global media and communication and turn himself into some kind of twenty-first-century messiah. And how close he came to pulling it off.

Erica turns to her laptop and Googles Lily Lau. She devours a profile that ran in
San Francisco
magazine several years ago. From a family that has been prominent in Chinese politics for generations, the article details her cosseted childhood as the daughter of Chen Lau, then Chinese counsel general to San Francisco. The article touches on the deep ties between the city and China, dating back two hundred years to when San Francisco was the entryway for tens of thousands of Chinese seeking work. Today the city is still home to a vast Chinese population. It goes on to discuss Lily's years at Stanford and her friendship with Celeste Pierce, which morphed into an extraordinarily lucrative business alliance. There's a picture of Lily as maid of honor at Celeste's wedding to Mike Ortiz at a Napa vineyard, another by the pool at her stunning country house in northern Marin County, and another of Lily in the compound's courtyard, which is dotted with three guesthouses. Lily explains that she needs them for her extended Chinese family.

Really? Three guesthouses? And the estate is so isolated.

The article ends with Lily praising Celeste and Mike Ortiz and
talking about how honored she is to be a part of all their good works, which she hopes will only multiply in the years to come. All in all, Lily comes across as smart, driven, charming, and caring, with a touch of becoming modesty. In other words, it's a total puff piece. Lily may as well have written the article herself. The woman is a master of image manipulation.

Next Erica Googles Chen Lau, Lily's father. She reads about his distinguished lineage and career, that he is considered shrewd and ruthless, that he is an undefeated chess master known for his ability to plan a dozen moves ahead of his opponents. When Lily was at Stanford, he moved back to China. Finally the article states that today he heads the Ministry of State Security, the Chinese intelligence agency—its equivalent of the CIA.

Erica is glad she's in a private first-class seat. Otherwise, her fellow passengers might wonder why her whole body suddenly quivered like a leaf in an icy gust.

ERICA WALKS IN THE DOOR of her apartment, drops her suitcase, and heads straight for her office, where she keeps several prepaid phones. She calls Mark Benton, the former GNN IT wizard who helped her crack the Nylan Hastings case. For his efforts Mark was assaulted, beaten, and left for dead on a Greenwich Village sidewalk. He survived, but it's been a long haul back to physical and emotional health. By his own admission he's still suffering from PTSD, although he's functioning and even finding pleasure in life.

Mark left New York and moved out to Portland, Oregon, in part to live in a more low-key city, in part because he's a passionate windsurfer. He found a good job in IT at Nike, which has much less of a pressure cooker culture than GNN. Erica is happy for him. The man has proved himself above and beyond.

“Hi, Mark, it's Erica Sparks.”

“Erica, how goes it?”

“There's no short answer to that question at the moment. Listen, I need your help.”

“Uh-oh.”

“If you don't want to get involved, I will understand completely.”

“To be honest, I am getting a little bored by sneakers.”

“I'm working on a story about Mike Ortiz, an in-depth profile. As you may know, his wife is a billionaire and she is
very
secretive about how she manages her money. It's all done through a company called Pierce Holdings, which is headquartered in San Francisco. I'm not at all sure things are what they seem. Hypothetically, is there any chance you could get into their system?”

“Hypothetically that would be breaking the law.”

Erica lowers her voice and gives him a broad-strokes overview of her investigation. When she's done there's a pause, and then Mark says, “Let me look into it.”

“Mark, there aren't words.”

“Erica, my adrenaline is pumping. In spite of everything, that's a good thing.”

They hang up. Erica trusts Mark with her life. The question is: Does she trust herself with his?

ERICA IS SITTING IN HER broadcast booth at Houston's NRP Park, better known as the Astrodome. Down below, the center is filled with thousands of delegates to the Republican convention, who are listening to yet another speech. There's even less drama here than at the Democratic convention, because presidential nominee Lucy Winters has already announced her pick for vice president, Senator Clark Hobbs of Tennessee. Erica is fidgety and fighting to stay focused, basically running on automatic pilot. The only story that interests her is unfolding out in San Francisco.

The energy here is a pale shadow of what it was in Chicago. Lucy Winters just doesn't inspire the same fervor as Mike Ortiz. In the course of putting together her piece on Winters, Erica has come to like and admire her. She may not be a show horse, but she's a real workhorse, well versed in policy, with a raft of solid ideas. Erica believes her low-key, methodical manner would serve the country well in these overheated times. Especially since Winters shows no hesitation in standing up to the far right, almost bloodthirsty ideologues in her party. In the primaries, her moderation almost cost her the nomination. In the general election it should help her, although she's still behind in the polls.

The speech ends and Erica goes live, introducing yet another speaker, some governor, does it really matter? What matters is that Mike Ortiz is months away from becoming the most powerful puppet on the planet.

GNN cuts away to a panel of gasbags who will rehash what just happened—and bore the pants off any viewer not addicted to predictable “in-depth analysis” that any sixth grader is capable of. One of the producers comes over and tells Erica she has fifteen minutes. Erica goes to the craft services table and tries to pretend she has an appetite. Her prepaid rings and she goes out into the hallway.

“Erica, it's Mark.”

“Hey there.”

“Listen, I've gotten partway into Pierce Holdings. A lot of firewalls here, it's going to be very tough to get through. But I have discovered something very interesting. The company seems to have two servers.”

“Meaning?”

“They basically have two sets of computer systems.”

“Could it just be a backup system?”

“When an organization does that, it backs up the original system as a fail-safe. It doesn't create an entirely new system. That's what we have here.”

“Don't some companies have one system for management and then a general system for all employees?”

“Yes, but that's not what this looks like. Pierce Holdings is a
very
lean machine. One hundred percent owned by Celeste Pierce Ortiz. It has enormous assets in just about every sector of the global economy. Considering the size of their assets, the number of employees is strikingly low. And there seems to just be one system for all of them. So this second system appears to be a discreet entity.”

“What would the motive be to have two systems?”

“One may be a cover.”

“You mean the main system is a front for activities not related to Pierce Holdings?”

“Basically, yes. Although Pierce Holdings is obviously a very real and successful entity. But I believe something else is going on at the same time. To get into this second system, you have to go through Pierce Holdings, which acts like a potent firewall. Without it, this second system would be much more vulnerable to hacking. You could be a Pierce Holdings employee and not know this second system exists. It's basically hidden in plain sight.”

“It sounds like an incredibly smart setup.”

“I've never seen anything quite like it before.”

Erica feels a terrible sense of responsibility toward Mark. Helping her out almost cost him his life once. “Listen, Mark, thanks so much. I'd like you to stop working on this now. You've already given me very valuable information. I'll take it from here.”

“Erica, once I get started, well, it's tough for me to stop. This is a fascinating configuration they have set up. My curiosity is raging.”

“I don't want to put you in any danger.”

“You're not holding a gun to my head. I trust you that if this wasn't really important you wouldn't have called me.”

“Please don't do
anything
that will let them detect your cyber-presence. If you sense they have,
stop immediately
. And that's a gun to your head talking.”

“Gotcha.”

Erica puts a call in to Celeste Ortiz, who gets back to her within two minutes.

“Erica. You must be bored out of your skull there in Houston.” Her voice is both warm and cold.

“I'm strictly nonpartisan.”

“You could belong to the Birthday Party and be bored by that convention.”

“I wanted to thank you for all your cooperation with my piece on your husband.”

“I sense an ask coming.”

“You must be psychic.”

“I can predict trouble. What's up?”

“The piece is coming well, but to be honest, Celeste, there's a tremendous amount of interest in your finances.”

“I've released my tax returns. Isn't that enough for the vultures?”

“Mort Silver and my producers are pressuring me to delve a little deeper. You know that people are fascinated by wealth and privilege. I'm not interested in an exposé, but I do think it's a legitimate topic to explore.”

“Out of the question. Pierce Holdings is a privately held company. I'm the sole owner. Besides, do you know how many pieces have been done on me and my money?
Fortune
, CNN, FOX Business, Politico, you name it. My finances have been turned inside out. Yes, I was born to privilege, but I sure didn't rest on it. I
made
the bulk of my money and I'm proud of it. There's more than enough public information for you to cobble together a segment on my holdings.”

Erica waits before answering.
Let her sweat
. “You know, I'll have no choice then but to make your refusal part of the segment. In fact, it will probably be the
focus
of it. It may look as if you're hiding something.”

“Erica, I gave you the biggest scoop of the Democratic convention and this is how you repay me.”

“We agreed that came with no strings attached. I took you on your word.”

“Don't you know how the world works?”

“I know how I work.”

“This is blackmail.”

“It's nothing more or less than a journalist going after a story.”

“I'd call it a journalist
creating
a story.”

“You can take that up with Mort. For my piece to be well-rounded, I have to cover the issue. You know it could come back to bite you. Remember Romney's fatal 47 percent remark.”

“My husband is
not
Mitt Romney.”

“But he is a one-tenth of one percent-er. Lucy Winters grew up on a farm. That her father later lost to bankruptcy. I've heard whispers
that the Winters organization is going to make the contrast a lynchpin of their campaign, just as Obama did so effectively with Romney.”

There's a pause, and Erica can practically hear Celeste's wheels turning.

“What do you want?”

“What are you offering?”

Now Erica can almost hear Celeste's teeth grinding. “Well,
I'm
certainly not going to give you an interview. That would only create the wrong impression in people's minds. Besides, I'm not involved in the day-to-day operations. I have more important things to do.”

“Who would you suggest?”

“How about our operations manager, Paul Court? He's articulate.”

“I'm not sure an operations manager is the right choice. We need someone with real authority.”

“You drive a hard bargain, Erica.” There's a pause, and then Celeste says, “I suppose you could do a
short
interview with our CEO, Lily . . . Lily Lau.”

Yes!
“We met in New York. I remember her well.”

“She's a memorable woman.”

“Please tell her I'll be calling to set a date.”

There's a frosty pause before Celeste says, “You know, Erica, playing hardball can be dangerous.”

“Batter up.”