Tate — St. Moritz, Switzerland
Wayland Tate entered his suite at Suvretta House and deposited his gloves and parka on the entryway settee. He’d received Marco’s confirmation call a few hours earlier when he was on the slopes with clients. Everything had gone as planned. No loose ends. The promised funds had already been wired. Although extreme measures weren’t Tate’s first choice, he never hesitated to use them when necessary.
Tate opened the door to the adjoining suite where he found Diane Morita waiting for him at a marble table near the arched window. She looked dazzling in her red Japanese silk robe, but they had work to do. As he sat down at the table, Morita commented that the sun had accentuated the lines around his eyes, giving him a sexy weathered look. His only response was to retrieve a tube of eye cream from the bathroom.
“Where are the next two retreats?” Tate asked when he returned to his seat at the table and began gently applying the cream to the area around his eyes.
Morita smiled at his vanity. Turning her attention to the calendar spread out in front of her, she said, “Banff and Capri.”
“What do you think David Quinn would prefer? Snow lodge or Roman Villa?” Tate asked.
“Vargas says he’s totally relaxed and skiing his brains out. Seems he also has a thing for Banff.”
“Okay. It’s a little sooner than I’d like, but we can be ready. I’ll invite him tonight. Make sure Kamin’s available for Banff.”
Morita nodded and then gave her long black hair a flip over her shoulder as she looked directly at Tate. “I think it’s time to expand Vargas’ role.”
Tate sat back in his chair to observe her. Diane Morita had fastidiously handled Tate Waterhouse’s diverse array of client entertainment needs for the past seven years, including all the arrangements for Tate’s three-dozen client extravaganzas each year. Her MBA from Stanford and fifteen years of human resources experience at the Walt Disney Company had prepared her well, but it was a personal tragedy and an intimate relationship with Tate that had ultimately honed her unique client-handling techniques.
Ten years earlier, shortly after joining Tate Waterhouse as vice president of human resources, Morita had gone through an ugly divorce followed by a romantic fling with Tate, who’d just separated from his wife. When Tate ended the affair a few months later because he felt she was getting too attached, Morita tried to kill herself with an overdose of prescription drugs. It was Tate who rescued her and then nursed her back to health. Now, in addition to being business associates, they were friends with benefits. The bond that had developed between them during her recovery, however, went much deeper than sexual intimacy. What they’d discovered was a mutual lust for the emotional highs that came from exploiting the concealed flaws and obsessions of the world’s powerful elite. Like mythical gods toying with mere mortals, they shared a common vision of eternal glory-whoever manipulates most and best is the one and only true god. Their united lust for manipulation had become Tate Waterhouse’s most distinctive competence, something Tate playfully referred to as an unfair competitive advantage. And they made sure that each of the firm’s personal assistants possessed a natural affinity for it. Tate smiled appreciatively at Morita. “What did you have in mind for Vargas?”
“Client coordinator on the America’s Warehouse campaign,” Morita said, smiling back.
Tate raised his eyebrows slightly as he watched Morita. “She’ll be in daily meetings with him.”
“Exactly,” Morita said, looking as sly and cunning as a minx.
“You still believe she can penetrate Quinn’s armor of tradition and habit?” Tate asked, continuing to feel somewhat skeptical about Vargas’ ability to get Quinn into bed with her. If she could, it would make Quinn’s continued compliance that much smoother. But experience told him that piercing the veil of marital fidelity wouldn’t be easy with a legacy-driven moralist like Quinn. Unless, that is, recent pressures had opened more cracks than Tate realized.
“Unquestionably,” Morita returned, her eyes like steel.
“He may be warming up to her, but I don’t see him going that far, at least not in the near term. Our best bet is to stay focused on his zeal to create a legacy,” Tate said.
“I don’t have a problem with our strategy. Quinn wants the corporate hall of fame; we’ll give it to him. But there’s a hidden recklessness in the man, beneath his corporate exterior. It’s not just posthumous glory he wants.”
“Based on what?” Tate asked, growing more curious.
“Asking you to manipulate the board. His willingness to sue Kresge amp; Company. And the comment about Wilson Fielder.”
“He hasn’t sued Kresge yet,” Tate said, before pausing a moment, then he added, “What comment are you talking about?”
“He told Vargas that he wouldn’t hesitate resorting to dirty tricks to get Wilson off his back.”
“That’s just talk,” Tate said, downplaying the comment to see how Morita would respond. “He said the same thing to me at the Kurhaus.”
“My first impression as well. Then Vargas told me about his skiing. He takes risks. Reckless chances. Vargas grew up on skis; her parents were ski patrol at Aspen for years. I think her father still is. Trust me, she’s good. Quinn scared her today, doing figure eights on a near vertical slope with a cliff halfway down. She almost lost it.”
Tate leaned back in his chair again, this time crossing his legs and folding his arms with a sardonic smile forming on his lips. “Maybe he’s more frustrated than I realized.”
“Suppressed desires,” Morita said. “He’s lapping up her praises like a schoolboy and she believes he’s vulnerable. Getting her more involved will allow us to monitor him more closely, just in case he begins to mourn any of his lost integrity.”
“You think Vargas can pull it off?”
“When we give Quinn what he wants, his euphoria will have to go somewhere. Just like it did today. In that sort of situation, Vargas could make anyone vulnerable.”
“Are we vulnerable?” Tate asked.
“Vargas’ net worth passed the ten million mark last week. She’s elated and she likes Quinn. Give her a few weeks, and she’ll have him buying her diamonds.”
“That’s not what I mean. Are we vulnerable if we let Vargas get closer to us?”
“Absolutely not. I know this girl. She’s like you and me. She loves what she does.”
“Remind me, what’s our contingency with her?” Tate asked, knowing full well what the contingency protocol was for Andrea Vargas, in case she ever decided to blow the whistle on Tate Waterhouse or any of its clients. There were contingency protocols for each of the personal assistants who worked with Tate Waterhouse’s most preferred clients. To earn the seven figure incomes that went along with escorting such clients, each personal assistant had to designate a member of her family or a close personal friend for ongoing surveillance. The unspoken implication was that, if she ever divulged sensitive information about the internal workings of Tate Waterhouse and its clients, someone close to her would suffer. Tate wanted to make sure Morita had been thinking about Vargas’ contingency protocol and was satisfied with it.
“Her parents,” Morita said. “She knows the game and the stakes. And she loves playing it.”
“I’ll talk to Boggs amp; Saggett about the new assignment when we get back. Then I’ll talk to Vargas. In the meantime, let’s figure out how to deepen her commitment to us. Maybe a special bonus of Musselman stock if she breaks him,” Tate said as he stood up.
“I’m going to take a shower before dinner.”
“Would you like some company?”
“Will your offer stand for a few hours?” he asked with a charming smile. “Right now I’m in desperate need of some down time before the mingling resumes-and a chance to visualize Quinn’s wilder side.”
“The offer expires at midnight,” Morita said temptingly.
During a luxurious dinner buffet at Rotisserie des Chevaliers, Wayland Tate and Jules Kamin enthusiastically informed David Quinn that Musselman’s Chairman of the Board, James MacMillan, had made it official: instead of breaking up the company, Tate and Kamin would be discussing Wilson Fielder’s mismanagement of the Kresge consulting project at next week’s board meeting.
“What did MacMillan say?” Quinn asked anxiously. James MacMillan had mentored Quinn earlier in his career. Quinn returned the favor by asking MacMillan to be Musselman’s chairman. At age seventy-eight, MacMillan was healthier than most forty-year-olds. He’d been the perfect chairman, giving Quinn free reign as CEO, until profits started declining a couple of years ago. That’s when things had changed, much to Quinn’s dismay. MacMillan’s deep sense of fiduciary responsibility to Musselman’s shareholders had caused him to get increasingly involved in company issues. Now Quinn wanted his former mentor off his back.
“He asked a lot of questions about Wilson’s father, mostly out of curiosity, I think,” Tate said. “Then he asked about Fielder amp; Company. He was especially interested in why The Wall Street Journal had dubbed it the most secretive consulting firm in America. When we finally got around to discussing Wilson, I told him that I’d done some probing and discovered that Wilson exhibited the same tendencies of mental instability as his father. I also said that he had serious problems with authority figures, in general, just as we discussed. I informed him that Wilson was seeing a psychologist about his extreme behavior and growing irrationality.”
“He believed you?” Quinn’s eyes grew wide.
“Let’s just say it’s impossible to disprove a negative,” Tate said, enjoying the drama. “One threatening cloud can convince anyone of an impending storm.”
“You’re sure he’s convinced?”
“Kresge amp; Company’s presentation has been postponed indefinitely,” Tate said with a wily smile. “Jules and I will make some summary comments next week, but I think the project is going to be permanently buried. MacMillan seemed particularly concerned when I informed him that Wilson had been seeing a clinical psychologist. Of course, I didn’t mention that the psychologist was his girlfriend or that they broke up several months ago. By the time I was finished, he began discussing avenues of redress against Kresge amp; Company.”
“Beautiful! Absolutely beautiful,” Quinn said, reaching over and squeezing Tate’s shoulder. The three of them burst into mercenary laughter, tinged with relief in Quinn’s case.
When their laughter died down, Quinn became serious again, wanting more assurances.
“Did he seem at all suspicious or reluctant?”
“Not at all,” Tate said. “He thanked me for doing my homework. You were right. The fact that I had recommended Fielder amp; Company instead of Kresge amp; Company a few months ago made me even more credible.”
For the next hour, the three of them strategized about the timing of Musselman’s next public stock offering and how to put J. B. Musselman on Fortune’s top ten list of most admired companies. To Tate’s pure delight, Quinn was spinning into executive bliss.
After dinner, Tate invited Quinn to the Banff retreat.
“My most memorable day of skiing was at Banff fifteen years ago,” Quinn said before pausing a moment, “Until today, that is.”
“I heard about your figure eights in the powder above the Diavolezza Bowl,” Tate said with raised eyebrows. “Here’s an opportunity to do it all again next week. We can finalize everything, America’s Warehouse grand opening and the Musselman stock offering.”
Quinn was silent for a few moments before he grinned broadly and said, “I’ll be there.”
There was another round of toasts to skiing and lavish corporate retreats before they decided to call it quits for the evening. Tate excused himself from Quinn and Kamin who were sharing a few last minute thoughts on how to reduce Musselman’s ballooning debt in the next stock offering. As soon as Tate had left the dining room, he called Vargas to inform her that their dinner had concluded and that Quinn was feeling rather euphoric. Then he dialed Morita’s cell. “It’s 11:40 and I’m on my way.”
“I’ll be ready and waiting,” Morita said seductively.
Fiery melodies and exotic rhythms from a Spanish guitarist and his band wafted beguilingly through the hotel lobby, as Quinn returned to his room. Still on cloud nine, he decided to stop at the Club Bar and enjoy the music. The crowd was abuzz as he slowly made his way to the bar and ordered a scotch. While surveying the scene around him, he spotted Vargas alone at the end of the bar.
She looked up in feigned surprise when he sat down next to her. Quinn’s suspicions about Vargas’ true intentions were gone. And despite his occasional discomfort with Tate’s aggressiveness and unpredictability, he knew that Tate was the only member of Musselman’s board who could have accomplished what he did today. For that, Quinn was deeply grateful to Tate and his entire organization.
Quinn and Vargas enjoyed the romantic music, the drinks, and each other until the band stopped playing around two. As they said goodnight in the foyer, Vargas leaned in to kiss Quinn on the cheek, the way friends do when saying hello or good-bye. At the last second, Quinn turned slightly and kissed Vargas on the lips.
She responded with a soft and sensual “hmmm.” Then she stroked his neck lightly with her fingers before leaving for her room. They agreed to meet in the lobby at eleven to share a limo to the airport.