Zero Sum, Book One, Kotov Syndrome (13 page)

“It’s your call, Steven. The sooner the
better, in my opinion. We need to get this cleared up.”

His next call was to Peter
Valentine.

“Peter, it’s Steven. What’s the
word?”

“Some funky stuff down in the islands.
Did you know Griffen’s partner died in the Caribbean?”

“Let me guess. Anguilla?” Steven
asked.

“What, are you psychic? Do you already
know all this?”

“No.” Steven went on to explain about
the Barbados fund actually originating in Anguilla. “It was an
educated guess, is all.”

“Well, it’s pretty weird. I can’t get
much out of the locals. It was billed as an accident. I called down
there and talked to the folks running the paper, and they vaguely
remembered some kind of boating thing, but couldn’t do much for me.
There’s no microfiche, and the file has been misplaced, so nothing
to reference.” Peter sounded annoyed at the Island inefficiency.
“And when I called the police there to ask about it, no one had
anything to say; it felt like I was getting stonewalled. I’ll keep
digging, though. Something’s definitely up.”

“I gotta say this, even though you
already know it. Be careful,” Steven warned.

“I’m not completely defenseless,
Steven. Appreciate the concern, but you’d do well to follow your
own advice. I’m not the one giving them the middle finger with a
Fuck Allied website. And I do have experience with bad
guys...”

“Sorry, Dad. Hey, I have to run, but
I’ll call in a day or two. E-mail if anything comes up. My cell’s
broken.”

“Sure. I’ll do that. You be careful
too. I mean it,” Peter said.

Steven went to the nearest Starbucks to
give the wireless network a try. He’s never used it, as he
typically did all his online work from home.

He sat in a corner in a surprisingly
comfortable overstuffed chair and updated his website real-time,
creating a page devoted to the information he’d uncovered. He
started with the fact that the Barbados fund was Barbados in PO box
form only, with the trading likely going through Canada in order to
circumvent U.S. rules. He closed the page with the tidbit that
Griffen’s ex-partner had died in Anguilla several years earlier
under a shroud of mystery, which was also the true home of the
fund. He saved the page and uploaded it, even as his mind returned
to his present, real-world problems.

It had been a long day. Now he needed
to contend with the open question of where it was safe to stay
while he waited for Stan to deal with the Government wonks. The
boat made the most sense. It was in a gated, locked marina, and he
could move it at will. There was a lot to be said for a home that
could be in international waters in a few hours’ time.

He ate in Mission Viejo, and considered
his situation. He’d been relieved of most of his worldly
attachments in little more than thirty-six hours. Avalon, gone.
Jennifer also gone, barring a miracle.

That got him thinking.

Did he really dislike the idea of them
parting ways that much? It wasn’t as though he’d clung to her,
begging her not to go, swearing it was all going to be different.
In fact, he was strangely ambivalent about the end of the
almost-two-year relationship.

Perhaps it had been more convenient
than impassioned lately. She’d seemed almost too ready to call
things quits, as if it had been on her mind for a while. He
couldn’t say he blamed her. He was a lousy pick for a nesting
partner at present, and circumstances hadn’t improved his odds for
papa of the year.

In the end, whatever was meant to be
would be. That had been his philosophy for years, strengthened by
his meditation and his martial arts involvement. There was a
definite pattern to the way energy flowed, and events were simply
singularities of energy; snapshots, if you will, of a greater
energy.

The same awareness that enabled him to
catch a rod thrown his way while blindfolded or block an unseen but
intuited strike from behind was nothing more than a harnessing of
that same energy. The Chinese called it Chi, and other philosophies
called it many other names: Holy Spirit, cosmic consciousness,
super string theory; all explanations for the same inter-connected
fabric of underlying energy.

Still, it helped if you were not just
aware but also proactive, so Steven solidified tomorrow’s plan of
action in his mind, paid the bill, and drove down to Dana Point
Marina, where ‘Serendipity’ floated in peaceful
solitude.

* * * *

The next morning Steven awoke to the
gentle rocking of the incoming tide. He slipped his running gear on
and went above-board to survey the marina, which was silent except
for the faint creaking of dock lines and the low drone of a small
dinghy approaching the bait dock at the mouth of the harbor. After
carefully closing the main hatch, he hopped onto the dock and made
his way up to terra firma to begin his daily run.

Dana Point Marina was surrounded by a
verdant, park-like setting, deserted in the early morning except
for the odd gull nosing around for scraps of edible litter and the
ubiquitous, strutting pigeons congregating for their daily social.
Steven’s footfalls marked time and distance through the park and up
the hill to the main drag, where he noted the French bakery was
open for business, as usual.

For fifteen minutes, his run took him
south along the streets paralleling Pacific Coast Highway, then he
circled back around to finish the route with a morning cup of
coffee. He realized this was the first weekday morning in months he
hadn’t been watching the market open, and that realization produced
both a sense of anxiety at having missed the open, tempered by a
feeling of calm acceptance at not being agitated with concern over
the daily price movements. Conflicting forces at work.

He returned to the dock area and
climbed back onto the boat. The decks were slick with beady
condensation so he had to be cautious as he balanced on the
sideboard, admiring the other vessels bobbing in the water. Some of
the larger boats sold for over three million bucks and cost fifteen
percent of their purchase price to maintain and operate every year.
The boating thing wasn’t a poor man’s game, that was for sure, and
other than a heroin habit or a jet, or both, he couldn’t think of a
more impractical way to burn money. Still, mornings like this on
the water made it almost worth it.

Steven went below and rinsed off in the
onboard shower, which was an intimate-sized affair, to put it
charitably. Finished, he called Stan, who was also an early
riser.

“Stan. How’s it going? You up for
breakfast?” Steven inquired.

“Have you ever known an attorney to
turn down a free meal?” Stan joked.

“I figured I knew how to get your
attention. Let’s hook up in your neck of the woods, maybe Carlsbad
– someplace by the water. How about that place we met last year?”
Steven asked.

“Perfect. Give me an hour.”

It was a date.

He tidied up the interior of the boat
and packed his duffel. After making the bed, he began packing his
laptop, but was interrupted by the sound of footsteps on the dock –
and approaching the boat. He froze at the unmistakable sounds of
someone climbing aboard and moving about on deck. Steven scanned
the cabin for anything he could use as a weapon. There was nothing
obvious.

Shit.

Although he was adept at close quarter
combat, if the intruder carried a gun the odds of his walking away
from this diminished if absent a weapon.

Footsteps creaked overhead. He slowed
his breathing, reduced his heart rate, and felt his focus narrow to
just the immediate area around him, time slowing as he prepared to
engage. Strange, he didn’t sense danger or any kind of tension,
which he always had when he’d been in combat, and in competitive
fighting. Still, the adrenaline heightened his awareness and he
moved soundlessly to the rear side of the small companionway
immediately aft of the entryway stairs.

Someone fumbled with the latch. He
readied himself to deliver a rapid series of brutal
strikes.

The hatch opened. Light flooded
in.

“Mr. Archer? You onboard? Anyone here?”
It was Todd, his boat washer.

Steven felt like a complete idiot. Time
resumed its normal flow and he drew a series of slow, deep breaths
and relaxed his upper body, which had tensed in anticipation of
conflict.

“Yeah, Todd, it’s me. I thought I’d
spend a night aboard, get some sea salt in my hair. I didn’t
realize you’d be down here today.”

“Well, it was such a nice morning I
figured I’d get her out of the way, then maybe see if I can hook
one of those big yellowtail running out by the jetty. Hope you
don’t mind… I can always come back if it’s a problem,” Todd
said.

“No, I was just getting out of here.
But you might want to try the fishing now, and rinse her off
afterwards. She’ll still be here later today,” Steven
suggested.

Todd was a great maintenance worker,
conscientious and skilled. Didn’t charge an arm and a leg, either.
He lived on a boat on the other side of the marina and did odd jobs
and cleaning to supplement his lifestyle. Not a bad existence for a
bachelor. Simple. Easy.

“Give me a second, and she’s all
yours.” Still burning off adrenaline, Steven hastily grabbed the
duffel, mounted the stairs and disembarked.

“Have a good one, Todd.” Steven waved
goodbye.

“Okay, then. Later.”

Traffic going south crawled agonizingly
slowly. The I-5 freeway had fallen victim to the perennial
California budget crisis and the surface was as bad as any he’d
ever driven on in Baja. All that was missing was a burro and the
odd roadside shrine.

Carlsbad was a sleepy little bedroom
community by the sea roughly half an hour north of San Diego, and
Stan had lived there for years, apparently enjoying the slow pace
and relaxed lifestyle.

Stan was waiting for him on the patio
of the restaurant when he pulled up. They exchanged pleasantries
while considering the menu, and both ordered coffee and waffles.
Once the waitress had left, Steven described the events of the last
eighteen hours in more detail. Stan considered the
situation.

“I haven’t made any progress with the
bank – they referred me to Justice, who in turn referred me to
Homeland Security, who said they can’t discuss ongoing
investigations.” Stan looked disgusted.

“The runaround.”

“Yes, that would be the technical term.
Ever since 9/11 there’s been a stretching of governmental power;
all, of course, in the interest of keeping us safe. A few years ago
no one could have unilaterally frozen your bank account. Not so
today. I’ll get through it, but I hope you don’t need that money
anytime soon. Where’s their card?” Stan was not the type to forget
details, and wanted the Homeland Security agent’s card.

“Here you go,” Steven said. “See if you
can find out what they want.”

“I’ll have my friend call them today.”
Stan looked at him over his spectacles. “Now, I have to ask: have
you been involved in anything that would have our terrorist hunters
after you?”

Steven shook his head. “Stan, honest to
God, I don’t have the faintest idea what any of this is about. The
only thing I’m involved in is the Allied website, which has nothing
to do with anything but a Wall Street lizard and a loser biotech
company. I told you all about it.”

“It doesn’t make any sense that a
financial guy would be able to wag the dog and get the full might
of the Federal Government to come down on you; things just don’t
work that way. So that’s unlikely. Let’s suspend any speculation
until we know more.”

Steven nodded. “I agree. Now I have a
request for you. I need an ATM card that can also work as a credit
card, drawn on some neutral corporation’s account, so I have access
to cash,” he explained.

Stan considered the request. “Such a
thing can be done. It’ll probably take a week, maybe less. In the
old days, it would have been twenty-four hours.”

“I appreciate your flexibility, Stan.
That’ll help me out a lot. I don’t want to be on the radar. And one
more request. I need a new blackberry.” Being able to log on from
the boat would be invaluable if he was forced to be mobile for a
while.

“Easy enough.”

They sipped their coffee and munched
their waffles. He told Stan he and Jennifer had decided to take a
break. Stan said he understood, sometimes that was best, it would
all work out if it was meant to be. Blah blah, platitude,
blah.

Stan paid the check, and they made
their way back to the car park.

Stan wound down his window before
driving off. “I’ll let you know what happens with the call and the
card and the PDA. Consider the latter two done.” Stan looked hard
at him again. “You call me. I don’t want to have any way of getting
in touch with you, so I can respond to any questions about
knowledge of your whereabouts honestly,” Stan told him. “I don’t
foresee a problem, but better safe...”