Zero Game - Brad Meltzer [158]
“I heard you hired Richie Rubin. He’s a good lawyer,” I point out.
He smells the small talk a mile away—he used to be in the business of it. Now he’s annoyed. The smile disappears fast.
“What do you want, Harris?”
There we go . . . a full two minutes to get back to reality. The man’s no dummy. He knows how I feel—I wouldn’t piss down his throat if his lungs were on fire. If I’m sitting here, I need something.
“Let me guess,” Barry says. “You’re dying to know why I did it . . .”
“I know why you did it,” I shoot back. “When you have no loyalty, and you’re so damn paranoid, you think the world’s against you—”
“The world is against me!” he shouts, leaning toward the glass. “Look where I’m sitting! You’re telling me I’m wrong?!”
I shake my head, refusing to get into it. Whatever perceived slights he thinks he’s the victim of, they’ve clearly whittled away at his reality.
“Don’t judge me, Harris. Not all of us are lucky enough to lead your charmed life.”
“So now it’s my fault?”
“I asked you for help over the years. You never gave it. Not once.”
“So I made you do all this?”
“Just tell me why you’re here. If it’s not me, and it’s not to catch up—”
“Pasternak,” I blurt.
A wide smile creeps up his cheeks. Sitting back in his seat, Barry crosses his arms and tucks the receiver between his chin and shoulder. Like he’s putting the Barry mask back on. He’s no longer fidgeting with his wristband. “It’s gnawing at you, isn’t it?” he asks. “You and I . . . we always had the competitive friendship. But you and Pasternak . . . ? He was supposed to be your mentor. The one person you turned to when you had an emergency and had to break the glass. Is that what’s got you tossing and turning all night—wondering how your personal radar could be so completely wrong?”
“I just want to know why he did it.”
“Of course you do. Sauls bit his bullet . . . I’m on my way to biting mine . . . but Pasternak—that’s the one that’ll frustrate you the rest of your life. You don’t get to punch him, or yell at him, or have the big final confrontation scene with the bittersweet ending. It’s the curse of being an overachiever—you can’t handle a problem that can’t be solved.”
“I don’t need it solved; I just want an answer.”
“Same difference, Harris. The thing is, if you expect me to suddenly scratch your back . . . well . . . you know how the cliché goes . . .”
Forever the lobbyist, Barry makes his point clear without ever saying the actual words. He’s not giving any info unless he gets something in return. God, I hate this town.
“What do you want?” I ask.
“Nothing now,” he replies. “Let’s just say you owe me one.”
Even in an orange jumpsuit and behind six inches of glass, Barry still needs to believe he has the upper hand.
“Fine. I owe you one,” I tell him. “Now what about Pasternak?”
“Well, if it makes you feel any better, I don’t think he knew who was really driving the train. Sure, he took advantage of you with the game, but that was just to get the mining request in the bill.”
“I don’t understand.”
“What’s to understand? It was an unimportant request for a defunct gold mine in South Dakota. He knew Matthew would never say yes to it—not unless he had a good enough reason,” Barry says. “From there, Pasternak just took the game and put in the fix.”
“So Pasternak was one of the dungeon-masters?”
“The what?”
“The dungeon-masters—the guys who pick the bets and collect the cash. Is that how the mine request got in the game? He was one of the guys who ran it?”
“How else would it get there?” Barry asks.
“I don’t know . . . it just . . . all those months we were playing . . . all the people we were betting against—Pasternak was always trying to figure out who else was in on it. When the taxi receipt would come in, he’d go through each one, hoping to read handwritings. He even made a list of people who were working on particular issues . . . But if he was a dungeon-master . . .” I cut myself off as the consequences sink in.
Barry cocks his head to the side. His cloudy eye’s staring straight at me; his glass eye’s