Dangerous Allies (The Ruby Danger Series Book 1) (7 page)

A
t the dining room entrance
, Antony Carver, dressed in a dinner jacket, argued with the maître d’ and waved an opened wine bottle. Even from the other side of the room it was obvious he was swaying.

Ruby turned back to the table and tried to smile at her fellow diners.

“My husband has been under a lot of pressure lately.”

They nodded gravely at her, but they all turned to follow Antony’s progress through the room. Chairs scraped, one by one, across the floor as he lurched to their table. Ruby held her breath, not wanting to turn around.

“’Scuse me,” Antony said loudly, several times.

A waiter hurried over to pull out the empty chair next to Ruby, and Antony sat down with a thump. He placed an almost empty wine bottle on the table and gave it a pat.

“There,” he said, grinning at the other guests.

Ruby leaned against him, her voice low. “Why don’t we go back to our suite?” She pushed back her chair and stood up.

“What for? Siddown.” Antony slapped her on the rear and she jumped. He picked up the bottle and poured the last of its contents into a glass, sloshing some on the tablecloth.

“Women,” he rolled his eyes at Gareth, “always telling us what to do.”

The investment banker grasped his opportunity.

“Mr. Carver, I’m so glad you’ve been able to join us,” he said, extending his hand. “I’m Gareth Nesbitt, with Nash & Bros.?”

When Antony didn’t respond, Gareth lowered his hand and gestured at a leather portfolio propped against his chair.

“I have a little proposal I thought we might discuss. Perhaps after dinner, over a cigar?”

Antony, who wiped his eyeglasses with his napkin while Gareth spoke, put his glasses back on and stared at the investment banker.

“Happy to oblige. And while I’m at it, is there anything else you need me to do? Sleep with your wife, maybe?” He squinted at Tabitha. “What do you think, honey? Are you up for it?”

“Antony,” Ruby said, “for heaven’s sake.”

He ignored her.

“As for your proposal, Gareth, yeah, leave that crap with me, my boy. I’ll
file
it for you.” Antony turned and waved at the waiter, who hurried over. “I want another of this,” he said, pointing at the empty bottle, “and don’t tell me you don’t have any, cause I know better.” A second waiter hustled over with a table setting, but veered after Antony shouted, “Go away.”

Gareth and his wife exchanged glances and then he stood up and pulled out his wife’s chair.

“Perhaps you’ll be feeling better tomorrow, Mr. Carver. Good evening, Miss Delaney.” With a token nod to the other guests he walked away, followed by his wife.

“I feel fine now,” Antony called after them. Drumming his fingers on the table, he peered across the room, looking for the wine steward. “Where’s that bottle?”

Ethan ran a hand down his pink ruffles and cleared his throat. “Perhaps you’ve had enough, Mr. Carver?”

Antony turned his head to look at Ethan and Emily.

“Well,” he said slowly, “aren’t you the cutest little couple? Let me guess. Honeymooners?”

Emily smiled shyly and giggled.

Antony smirked at Ethan and said loudly, “Well, good luck with that, sucker.”

A startled Emily knocked over her glass. Red wine flowed across the table and dripped into Antony’s lap. He leapt to his feet, blotting wine off his shirt with a napkin.

“What the hell? Watch what you’re doing, bitch.”

Ethan stood up, his face flushed.

“You can’t call my wife that.”

Emily tugged at his arm. “Honey,” she whispered, “please sit down.”

Ethan glowered at Antony, who glowered back. Ruby held her breath. She didn’t realize Pete Osler had left his chair until Antony’s arms were pinned behind his back.

“Time to say good night, Mr. Carver,” Pete said. He maneuvered Antony past the table and nodded to the maître d’, who motioned for two waiters to lend a hand. Ruby followed them out. Around the corner, the men released Antony.

“No need for that,” he slurred, adjusting his rumpled lapels. “I was leaving anyway.”

Pete nodded at Ruby.

“He’s all yours.” As he brushed past her to return to the table, he said in a low voice, “Call me if you need any help.”

R
uby stood
close behind Antony as he fumbled through his pockets at the door to the Emperor Suite, looking for his key card. Reaching around him, she handed over her own.

“Take mine.”

Antony swiped her card through the lock and dropped it into his jacket pocket. Turning to face her, he smiled crookedly and held out his arms. Ruby stepped into them and leaned her face against his chest, listening to his steady heartbeat, feeling the world slip away. He buried his hands in her hair and tipped her head back for a lingering kiss. The corridor dissolved until there was nothing in the world but the pressure of his lips and tongue against hers. She wrapped both hands around his neck, shivering with pleasure as he slid his fingertips down her bare back.

With a smile, Antony released her. Reaching behind him, he pushed the door open. He stepped back over the threshold.

He closed the door in her face.

For a second Ruby was motionless. What on earth?

Opening her handbag, she reached for her key card. Damn. It was in Antony’s pocket. She tapped on the door.

“Antony, let me in.”

Silence.

“Antony? Not funny. Let me in.”

More silence.

She tapped again, harder. “Antony,” she hissed, leaning her forehead against the door. “I know you’re there.” Tears stung her eyes. “Please don’t do this.”

“Is everything all right, dear?”

Ruby whirled around.

An elderly couple in evening clothes stood behind her. The husband’s black cummerbund strained over his belly and his wife clutched a satin evening bag to her ample chest. Wisps of gray escaped from her diamond pavé hair clip.

“Do you need any help, dear?” the woman asked.

“No, no, I’m fine, thanks. I’m just on my way to the revue. I hear it’s excellent.” Ruby turned and walked briskly down the corridor to the elevator. As briskly as she could on three-inch heels.

Damn Antony. What was she going to do now?

She stepped onto the elevator and leaned against the back wall as the car started down. Its lurch matched the one in her stomach. Snapping open the clasp on her beaded clutch, she pawed through it until her fingers closed on the malachite pebble in its tiny velvet bag. She felt calmer once she had it in her hand.

If only Lily were here. She would have known what to do.

They had found the pebble during one of Ruby’s visits to Vancouver, when they scoured the rocky beach for shiny rocks and semi-precious stones to add to their collection. After spotting the malachite half-buried in sand under waves lapping the shore, Lily splashed into the water after it, getting her sandals wet, and held it aloft with a grin.

Antony had not made the trip, of course. Too busy at the office. Lily was sorry he had not come. She had never been intimidated by Antony. She liked him, in fact. And though he was gruff with most everyone else, he had been gentle with Lily.

Ruby tightened her grip on the pebble, blinking rapidly. What happened to that rock collection? She dropped the pebble back into her handbag and snapped it shut. It was probably in that rental storage unit where Quentin put the things he couldn’t bear to look at any more.

The elevator door opened and Ruby walked out onto the promenade.

A
ntony leaned
against the door of the Emperor Suite and ran his fingers down its surface, listening to Ruby whisper his name, until an unfamiliar voice said, ‘Is everything all right, dear?’

Antony scowled. Why were there so many interfering busybodies in the world? He straightened up and walked into the bedroom off the den. Dropping his wine-stained clothes on the floor, he reached for a pair of gray track pants and pulled them on. As he tugged a long-sleeved cashmere T-shirt over his head, a double rap sounded on the suite’s main door. He walked out and opened it.

Bogdan stared at him impassively.

Holding the door open, Antony shook his head.

“I still think this is a damned stupid idea. What if my wife comes back?”

“Not likely, after your performance in the dining room.”

Antony walked back into the bedroom, leaving the door open, ran a comb through his thinning hair and appraised the result in the mirror.

“What does Viktor want now? I thought the plan was to meet on Pintado Island. In fact—” He took a last look in the mirror and turned to face his visitor. “Why are you on this ship at all? Someone more cynical than I might think that your boss doesn’t trust me. But that couldn’t be the case, could it?”

“Viktor does not approve of your new plan.”

Antony narrowed his eyes. How could Viktor know about that?

“What new plan? I don’t know what you’re talking about. Nothing’s changed. I give you the money and Viktor buggers off.”

“That was before you decided to disappear.”

Antony walked through the den into the living room and stepped behind the bar.

“Vodka?”

Bogdan shook his head.

Antony poured a shot of Talisker for himself and then walked to the stereo and turned it on. Listening to the rapid-fire piano chords that poured out, he nodded in recognition. Bach.
Goldberg Variations.
He strolled to the sofa and placed his glass on the coffee table.

“Listen,” he said, pronouncing every word, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Antony sat down and stretched his arms along the back of the sofa.

Bogdan perched on the arm of a chair facing him, shaking his head.

“The passports. Did you think Viktor wouldn’t find out?”

Antony studied Bogdan for a moment and then reached for his glass.

“What does it matter? After we dock at Pintado tomorrow you’ll be leaving the boat anyway. With my payment. That’s our deal. The bonds are fully negotiable. You don’t need me to cash them.” He shrugged. “Although, frankly, bearer bonds? Viktor is woefully behind the times.” Turning to the window, he sipped his Scotch.

“You must give them to us now.”

“I don’t think so. I don’t plan to take a header into the Caribbean. Besides, I don’t have them here. You’ll get them at the bank on Pintado Island as we arranged.”

“Viktor has another job for you after that.”

Antony’s chest tightened, and he placed his glass on the table.

“No, he doesn’t. I have one more payment to make and then our arrangement ends.
Finito.
”

Bodgan’s eyes narrowed, and the cobra writhed as his neck tightened. “Your arrangement ends when Viktor says so.”

“It doesn’t matter what Viktor wants. I can’t do anything else. The regulators would notice.”

“You will find a way.”

A breeze rippled the curtains at the open balcony doors. The music paused, and laughter from the pool three decks below drifted in.

Antony leaned forward.

“When we did the first deal, Carvon had cash flow problems. Our stated revenue, that is, the money we told shareholders we were earning, had diverged a bit from our actual revenue. We had—”

“Lied.”

“—
overstated
our revenue. Happens all the time. It’s an accounting thing. But unfortunately, this occurred at the same time that equities were experiencing a normal cyclical correction—”

“The market crashed.”

“—which put downward pressure on our stock price—”

“The stock crashed.”

“—requiring an additional small adjustment to our stated revenues to keep the price-earnings ratio in an optimum range—”

“You lied again.”

“—with the result that Carvon developed a cash flow crunch. Which is where your people came in.” Flicking his hand, Antony leaned back against the sofa.

“You washed our money, and you took your cut,” Bogdan said. “But then you,” he pointed a finger at Antony, “took a cut of our money.”

“Excuse me?” Antony’s voice was shrill. “What about my exposure in all this? What about my risk?” He rubbed a hand over his face and took a deep breath, trying to calm down. “Let’s fast-forward to today, shall we? The Securities Exchange Commission is busting balls all over Wall Street. It’s getting so you can hardly take a guy out for lunch without somebody screaming collusion or insider trading or worse. Simple creative accounting is suddenly fraud.

“Meanwhile, the economy has dropped to the point that we can’t make any more upward revenue adjustments without raising red flags. In two weeks, we have to release our numbers. And they’re not good. Two weeks. And then,” he shrugged, “it’s over. There’s no more rope.” Draining his glass, he replaced it on the coffee table with a thud.

“So. Two weeks.” Bogdan spread his hands. “Plenty of time.”

“Are you deliberately slow? I told you, the whole damn company is going under. I have to get out now before the SEC connects the dots. You don’t know anything about it. And neither does Viktor. Tell him I can’t help him, it’s beyond my control. Just tell him. You’re a smart fellow. He’ll listen to you.”

Antony ran a hand over his hair, willing himself to be calm.

“You know, I might be able to free up a little extra if someone, say someone such as yourself, was to be helpful. Perhaps a quarter of a million helpful?”

“What would I have to do?”

“Persuade your associates that they’ve gotten everything from me they’re going to get. That they should take this last payment and move on.” Antony rose to refill his drink at the bar. “Listen,” he said, throwing ice into his glass and pouring another shot, “do you think you’ve got a future with this
vor v zakonye
thing?”

Bogdan stared at him.

“They’re goons, let’s face it. But you’re smarter than that. This is your chance to set yourself up somewhere with a bankroll and start your own scam. Or whatever, no offense. A restaurant, say, maybe a farm, or a business. With a quarter million you can do quite a lot. It’s a damn good offer. And it’s safe, very safe, because it would be between you and me. No one else would know.” He smiled. “How about it?”

Bogdan smiled back. He rose to his feet and took a step toward Antony, who lifted his glass in a mock toast. But before the glass reached Antony’s lips, Bogdan had grabbed two fistfuls of cashmere and yanked him across the room. Pinning Antony’s arm behind his back, Bogdan rammed him face-first against the wall.

Pain exploded in Antony’s forehead. His face was flattened against the wall and his glasses skewed to one side. Sweat trickled down his back as he struggled to breathe.

“Listen to me,” Bogdan hissed into his ear. “You will not leave the ship. You will give me the bonds and you will go back to New York and you will do what Viktor says.” He shoved him even harder into the wall.

Antony gasped, certain that his shoulder had been dislocated. Bogdan let go and he slumped to the floor. He leaned against the wall, gulping air and cradling his arm.

Bogdan leaned over him.

“And if you think you can outsmart us, you should think about your wife.”

Antony peered up at him, still wheezing.

“What are you talking about?”

Bogdan leaned back on his heels, smiling tightly.

“She is very beautiful, your wife. Shame you do not get along.” He shrugged. “But you do not want to lose her, no? Because then, people might talk.”

Antony adjusted his glasses with shaking hands. Scotch had splashed onto the lenses and Bogdan’s face was blurry.

“What do you mean, lose her?”

“If something happens to her, you will be the main suspect, no?”

Main suspect?
“What are you saying?

Bogdan pointed a finger at him. “Also, if you ever mention
vor v zakonye
again—I will kill you, you worthless piece of shit.” He walked out, slamming the door.

Antony remained slumped against the wall. On the radio, one variation came to a halt with a flourish and another began. He rose to his feet with a groan and sank into the sofa, avoiding the areas soaked with Scotch. His glass had rolled across the floor and he retrieved it, his hand numb, placed it on the coffee table and wondered whether to call housekeeping. He decided against it. Reaching for the remote, he remembered it was in pieces on the other side of the room. Shuffling over to the stereo, he turned off the music.

‘Worthless piece of shit?’ Well, he’d heard that plenty of times. It had been his old man’s favorite phrase. No way to know what he’d say about his son’s current predicament, though, given that the death certificate from the nursing home had arrived in the mail a decade ago. Antony had tossed it into the trash. One less bill to pay.

And now, aboard the Apollonis, he pumped his fingers to get the circulation back. He fantasized about landing a single powerful punch to Bogdan’s face and kicking him repeatedly as he lay crumpled on the ground, screaming for mercy. Next time.

It was good that he hadn’t fought back. Maybe now these thugs would think he was scared shitless and ready to cooperate. Antony smiled despite the pain in his shoulder. He had misled the market, and the media, for years. A framed
Time
cover hung behind his office desk. The headline, ‘Wizards Of Wall Street,’ spanned photos of a dozen men and women including—in the bottom row, second from the right—Antony Carver.

He headed for the bedroom, pulled off his Scotch-soaked T-shirt and dropped it on the floor next to his dinner jacket. Reaching for his phone, he tapped in a number and put it on speaker. Time to give Hari a call.

I
n a stateroom
below the Emperor Suite, a man adjusted the wire that led from his headphones to a box on the coffee table. He leaned back on the sofa. At a staccato rap on the stateroom door, he looked up. “Come.”

Bogdan entered the room and nodded. The first man flipped a switch and Antony Carver’s voice filled the room.

“I know, Hari, but things have changed. We’re leaving too much money on the table.”

“You promised me the Kyrgyzstani deal would be it, that you would quit after that. My source at the SEC says they’re interested in Carvon. Your extracurricular activities are going to blow up in our faces.”

“Relax. If the SEC had anything on us, we’d have heard about it.”

“If they’re investigating Carvon, we’ll be the last to know. They’ll show up one day and haul us out in handcuffs and send in snot-faced junior investigators in cheap suits to wring the books dry until they find something, anything, to send us both away for a hundred and fifty years. Maybe more.”

“That’s a little melodramatic, don’t you think?”

“Easy for you to say. You’re not fielding calls from reporters all day. They smell blood. One of those
Wall Street Journal
twits is even writing a book. A book, for God’s sake. He took Vanessa out for drinks last week and tried to pump her for information.”

“He grilled my assistant? Who the hell is this guy? What did she tell him?”

“My fellow Brit, whatever his name is. You’ve talked to him before. It doesn’t matter. Vanessa didn’t tell him anything, and we had a chuckle over it the next day. She does a hell of an imitation of him. I can’t do it justice, but,” he switched to an upper-class English accent, much stronger than his own, “Now, Vanessa, you have to admit that the recent revenue stream seems a trifle hard to sustain. Oh, and, by the way, is it true that Mr. Carver has a twin whom he committed to a mental institution?’” Hari laughed. “Oh, wait, I made up that last bit.” He lowered his voice. “Seriously, though,” he added solemnly, “now that I think of it, she did tell him what a first-class prick you are.”

“Oh, good. Thank you both so much.”

“You have to get back here. The auditors are asking questions.”

“What are you telling them?”

“As much as possible, obviously. I’ve got them drowning in disclosures. It will take them months to sort it out. That compliance officer the board made us hire has been a real pain in the ass, though.”

“Send him out of town somewhere. Hari, you’ve got to go to Boca for me. There are things there that I can’t trust to anybody else.”

“I don’t have time to fly off to Florida. We’ve got alligators enough right here, I’m up to my proverbial ass in them. Whatever it is, it won’t matter once we come clean at the shareholders’ meeting anyway.”

“Yeah. A few things have come up that may have a bearing on that plan.”

“It’s more than a plan, Antony. We agreed.”

“I need your advice on something. Something I can’t talk about on the phone.”

“Ruby’s worried about you.”

“Give it a rest, Hari.”

“She thinks you’re leaving her. Are you?”

“You’d enjoy that, wouldn’t you? I’m not talking about Ruby. Meet me at the house in Boca. I’ll be there in a few days.”

In the stateroom on the deck below, the first man switched off the unit with a smile.

“I hope you didn’t rough him up too much,” he said in Russian. “Viktor wants him to look good for the shareholders’ meeting.”

Bogdan gave a quick, disgusted snort. “I’ll worry about Mr. Carver. You keep an eye on our insurance.”