Secret Prey

Wednesday, but probably won’t make a decision. They’re talking about a search, for Christ’s sake.’’
    ‘‘A search? That’s just a way of slowing everything down.’’
    ‘‘I know that. It’s me or O’Dell or Bone.’’
    ‘‘Have you talked to your father?’’
    ‘‘Just for a minute, to ask him to stay out of it for the time being. I thought it might be a little too obvious if he got out there. At this point.’’
    ‘‘Good thought . . . What about the cop?’’
    ‘‘It’s this fuckin’ Davenport,’’ McDonald said impatiently. ‘‘He was talking to Bone today, and the word is, he’s asking about me.’’
    ‘‘What’s he asking?’’ Audrey asked. ‘‘He doesn’t think you . . .’’
    ‘‘I don’t know; I’m finding out. He could be a problem.’’
    ‘‘How can he be a problem? You didn’t shoot anybody.’’ His eyes slid away from hers: ‘‘I know . . . but he could be a problem.’’ He looked back: ‘‘I mean, Jesus, if there’s a search, you think they’re gonna pick a guy who the cops are investigating?’’
    ‘‘Okay.’’
    ‘‘And the thing is, the sheriff up there, Krause, he’s just about signed off on the thing, from what I hear. He’s dead in the water. If it wasn’t for Davenport, it’d be pretty much over with.’’
    ‘‘Maybe that’s something your father could help with right now.’’
    ‘‘Come on in here,’’ Wilson said, and turned back toward the study. The study was a large room with a window looking out on the front lawn, and two walls of shelves loaded with knickknacks, travel souvenirs, and small golf and tennis trophies going back to Wilson’s days in prep school and college. Framed photos of Wilson and Audrey with George Bush, Ronald Reagan, and in much younger days a tired-looking Richard Nixon, looked down from the third wall. Wilson dropped into the brown-leather executive’s chair behind the cherry desk, while Audrey perched on a love seat below Nixon’s worn face.
    ‘‘So call your father on Davenport. On the board, we can call Jimmy and Elaine,’’ Audrey said. ‘‘Elaine is very close to Dafne Bose, and Jimmy’s been trying to get into the trust department’s legal work forever . . .’’ Dafne Bose was on the board. ‘‘If we can get to Dafne, we’re halfway there.’’
    ‘‘You know who else?’’ He looked down at the legal pad. ‘‘We’re carrying two million bucks in land-andattachments paper on Shankland Chev, which they couldn’t get a half-million anywhere else. And Dave Shankland . . .’’
    ‘‘. . . is married to Peg Bose.’’ Peg Bose was Dafne’s daughter. ‘‘We couldn’t use that right away, it’d look too much like blackmail. But if we got in a squeak . . .’’
    ‘‘Here’s the list I’ve got so far,’’ Wilson said. He passed the legal pad to Audrey. ‘‘Seventeen board members, so we need nine. Four I can count on—Eirich, Goff, Brandt, and Sanderson. If we can get Dafne, we can probably get Rondeau and Bunde, ’cause they pretty much do what she suggests. Then we’d need two . . .’’
    ‘‘How about Young? You know he wants to get into Woodland.’’
    ‘‘Oh, man, I don’t know if I could swing that,’’ Wilson said doubtfully.
    ‘‘We need a black member anyway, because of that government thing, and who’d be better than Billy Young? His father was a minister and he’s really pretty white. And he must be worth . . .’’
    They began working down strings of possible supporters, analyzing relationships, working out who knew who, who owed who, who could be bought, and with what.
    Later, getting coffee, Audrey without thinking brushed her cheek, and flinched at the sudden lancing pain. The black eye: she’d forgotten about it, and Wilson had never really paid any attention to it anyway. The excitement of conspiracy, she decided: some of their tenderest moments had occurred in the study, working over legal pads . . .
    • • •
    MARCUS KENT WAS AN ASSISTANT VICE PRESIDENT IN corporate operations, working for Bone; he sat on one end of Susan O’Dell’s couch. Carla Wyte, who technically worked for Robles in the currency room, lounged on the other end. Louise Compton, wearing blue jeans and a Nike sweatshirt, sat cross-legged on the floor.
    ‘‘. . . either Bone or me,’’ O’Dell was saying. She was on her feet, as though she were a junior exec making a presentation to the board of directors. ‘‘McDonald can’t get