“Good. Let’s talk.”
Ryan pulled on the hoodie and fumbled with the tiny recording device while Don collected Charles with a sharp whistle. “Going to talk a little business,” he said to his wife, who was coaxing her young grandson to choose fresh fruit from a platter on the table.
“Not for long,” she said. “This is a family weekend, Donald.”
The interior of the house was cool and quiet. Don led Charles and Ryan down the hall and into a sleek office, all reclaimed maple and steel fixtures. The windows opened on the beach, the sound of the women talking, children laughing, the waves curling against the shore, hopefully not too loud for the recorder. Ryan chose a position against the bookshelves, as far away from the windows as possible, and folded his arms as he watched Arden MacCarren weave daisy chains with her nieces. Her bright smile made his stomach lurch, but now wasn’t the time to pop antacids.
“Okay,” Don said simply, staring at Ryan across his desk. “You’re in.”
Not enough, he thought, not with Daniel Logan on the other end of this. He needed details, confessions, acknowledgement of wrongdoing. “Good,” he says. “Bring me up to speed. How long has this been going on?”
Don shrugged. “Since I bought out my brother years ago, more or less.”
“Who else is involved? Arden? Any of your brother’s kids?”
“Just myself and Charles,” he said. In the corner of his eye Ryan watched Charles puff up a little.
“Why not Arden?” From everything he’d heard, Arden had the same pedigree as Charles: Brown undergrad, Wharton B-school, but after just a few months at MacCarren, she’d moved to the family foundation, which was funded almost entirely by the investment house.
“She’s better suited where she is,” Don said magnanimously.
“Does she know?”
“No.”
“Anyone else? Your wives? Garry?” he asked, naming the brother who’d shoved off for New Zealand a few years earlier.
“Why do you care?” This, from Charles.
“I need to know what I can say, and to whom,” Ryan pointed out reasonably.
“Only the three people in this room know anything,” Don said. “Aren’t you the clever boy to figure it out?”
Ryan shrugged. Other people had to know. They’d just chosen to keep their mouths shut, or leave. He was just the first person brazen enough to do something about it. “How did it start?”
He’d been prepared to dig, probe, ask leading questions, but fuck him running, they wanted to talk about it. It started like these things always started. Don had an idea, investors, a way to exploit a loophole no one else noticed. After a couple bad months and a highly desirable beach property in the south of France coming up for sale, they fudged the numbers a little and withdrew what they needed to buy the property. They repaid it the first time, but not the second. Or the third. Brought in more investors to pay out the ones who left. Then it snowballed. A third kid, a third private school tuition, a house in Vail, a big donation to charities that got them newspaper recognition, and more investors clamoring for the MacCarren mystique. Charles was like a frat boy bragging about conquests, or players after the big game. They were just so fucking smart. Like Ryan was smart enough to join the club, but as a sycophant, not quite a water boy but definitely junior varsity. He complimented their accounting ingenuity, their audacious bravado, nearly weightless with sheer relief. He’d done it. He’d fucking done it. The recording device caught the shit dribbling from their mouths.
“Didn’t you ever worry about getting caught? The SEC reamed our ass pretty hard a couple of times after the crash,” he said giddily.
“People smart enough to figure out what we’re doing don’t go to work for the SEC. They go to work for us, take their bonus payments, and keep their mouths shut.” He looked at Ryan across his desk. “We’ll need you to make it rain. Hard.”
“Not a problem,” he said. “I’ve got the contacts I need, trust me. It’s all good.”
“You gotta tone down that lifestyle, though,” Charles cautioned.
“You think so?” Ryan said. “It’s working. Look who’s building sand castles with your kids. New money. Younger money.”
They all looked out the window at the expansive horizon. Storm clouds were massing to the south and west, looming in the distance, bearing down on them.