The Associate

Before leaving for West Virginia, he carefully set the traps. He cut several four-inch pieces of brown sewing thread, and with a dab of Vaseline stuck the threads to the bottoms of three interior doors. Standing and looking down, he could barely see the thread against the oak stain, but if anyone entered the apartment and opened the doors, they would leave a trail by displacing the threads. Along one wall in the den he had stacked textbooks, notebooks, files for this and that, generally useless stuff that he wasn’t ready to part with. It was a haphazard pile, but Kyle arranged everything in careful order and photographed it all with a digital camera. Anyone looking through it would be tempted to toss things back into the collection, and if that happened, Kyle would know it. He informed his new neighbor, an elderly lady from Thailand, that he would be gone for four days and was not expecting any visitors. If she heard anything, call the cops. She agreed, but Kyle was not at all confident she understood a word he said.

His counterintelligence tactics were rudimentary, but the basics often worked just fine, according to the spy novels.

THE NEW RIVER runs through the Allegheny Mountains in southern West Virginia. It’s fast in some places, slower in others, but on any stretch of it the scenery is beautiful. With Class IV rapids in some areas, it has long been a favorite of serious kayakers. And with miles and miles of slower water, it attracts thousands of rafters each year. Because of its popularity, there are several established outfitters. Kyle had found one near the town of Beckley.

They met there at a motel the first night. Joey, Kyle, and four other Beta brothers. They drank two cases of beer to celebrate the Fourth of July, and woke up with hangovers. Kyle, of course, stayed with diet soda and woke up pondering the mysteries of the bankruptcy code. One look at his five friends and he was proud of his sobriety.

Their guide was a rather rustic local named Clem, and Clem had a few rules for the twenty-four-foot rubber raft that was his livelihood. Helmets and life vests were mandatory. No smoking, period. No drinking was allowed in the "boat" while it was moving down the river. When it stopped, for lunch or for the night, they could drink all they wanted. Clem counted ten cases of beer and realized what he was facing. The first morning was uneventful. The sun was hot, and the crew was subdued, even suffering. By late afternoon, they were splashing water and began jumping in. By 5:00 p.m., they were parched, and Clem found a sandbar to settle into for the first night. After a couple of beers each, and one for Clem himself, they pitched four tents and set up camp. Clem cooked T-bones on a grill, and after dinner the crew ventured off to explore.

Kyle and Joey followed the river for half a mile, and when they were certain they could not be seen, they sat on a log with their feet in the backwater. "Let’s have it," Joey said, cutting to the chase.

For weeks, even months, Kyle had struggled with the conversation they were about to have. He loathed the idea of upsetting his friend’s life, but he had decided that he had no choice but to tell the story. All of it. He justified his decision by convincing himself that he would certainly want to know if things were reversed. If Joey had been the first to see the video and knew of its dangers, he, Kyle, would want to know. But the bigger reason, and one that made him feel selfish, was that Kyle needed help. He had worked on a rough draft of a plan, and it was more than he could handle himself, especially with Bennie lurking in the shadows. The plan could easily lead nowhere, and it could just as easily lead to something dangerous. It could be aborted at any time. It could also be rejected outright by Joey Bernardo. The first step involved Elaine Keenan.

Joey listened in rapt silence to Kyle’s detailed replaying of the initial encounter with a man known as Bennie. He was sufficiently stunned by the existence of the video. He was thoroughly bewildered by the blackmail. He was terrified by the thought of some forgotten girl accusing him of rape and producing the evidence to back it up.

Kyle unloaded everything but the background on the lawsuit. He had not yet passed the bar and received a license to practice, but he had signed a contract with Scully & Pershing and felt an ethical obligation to protect firm business. This was silly in light of what he would be forced to do, but for the moment his career was unblemished and he felt rather ethical.

Joey’s first reaction was a halfhearted attempt to deny any contact with Elaine, but Kyle waved him off. "You’re on the video," Kyle said as sympathetically as possible. "You’re having sex with a girl who’s probably floating in and out of consciousness. In our apartment. Baxter goes first, then you. And I saw it on a twelve-inch laptop screen. If it’s ever seen in court, it’ll be on a big screen, a massive one. It’ll be like sitting in the cinema with the images and sounds enhanced so that everybody there, especially the jurors, will have no doubt that it’s you. I’m sorry, Joey, but you’re there."

"Totally nude?"

"Not a stitch. Do you remember it?"

"It was five years ago, Kyle. I’ve worked hard to forget it."

"But you do remember?"

With great reluctance, Joey said, "Yeah, sure, but there was no rape. Hell, the sex was her idea."

"That’s not real clear on the video."

"Well, the video is missing several important details. First, when the cops showed up that night, we scattered. Baxter and I ran next door and ducked into Thelo’s apartment where there was a smaller and quieter party. Elaine was there, bombed as usual and having a good time. We hung around for a few minutes, waited for the cops to clear out, then Elaine tells me she wants to leave, wants to go back to our place for a "session," as she liked to call it. With Baxter and me. That’s the way she was, Kyle, always on the prowl. She was the easiest lay at Duquesne. Everybody knew it. She was very cute and very easy."

"I remember well."

"I never saw a girl so promiscuous and so aggressive. That’s why we were stunned when she cried rape."

"And it’s why the police lost interest."

"Exactly. And there’s something else, another little detail not on the video. The night before the party, you and Alan and some others went to a Pirates game, right?"

"Yes."

"Elaine was in the apartment, which was nothing new. And we had a three-way. Me, Baxter, and Elaine. Twenty-four hours later, same apartment, same guys, same everything, she passes out, wakes up, decides she was raped."

"I don’t remember this."

"It was no big deal until she cried rape. Baxter and I talked about it and decided to keep it quiet because she might claim we raped her twice. So we buried it. When the police started squeezing us, we finally told them. That’s when they packed up and went home. Case closed. No rape."

A small turtle stopped swimming by a log and seemed to stare at them. They stared back, and for a long time nothing was said.

"Do Baxter and Alan know about this?" Joey finally asked.

"No, not yet. It was hard enough telling you."

"Thanks for nothing."

"I’m sorry. I need a friend."

"To do what?"

"I don’t know. Right now I just need someone to talk to."

"What do these guys want from you?"

"It’s very simple. The scheme is to plant me as a spy in my law firm, where I can extract all sorts of secrets that the other side can use to win a big lawsuit."

"Simple enough. What happens if you get caught?"

"Disbarred, indicted, convicted, sentenced to five years in prison  –  state, not federal."