Amazing Grace Read online

  “Totally,” Seth said, looking offended. “I never cheat on my taxes.” Only his investors, and Sully's. Honor among thieves, Henry thought.

  “That's good news,” Henry said drily. Seth interrupted him quickly.

  “What am I looking at here, Henry? How much time could I do, worst case, if everything goes wrong?”

  “Worst case?” Henry said, musing, taking all the elements into consideration, or as much as he knew for now. “It's hard to say. The law and the SEC take a dim view of defrauding investors …I don't know. Without any kind of modification or plea-bargaining, twenty-five years, maybe thirty. But that's not going to happen, Seth,” he reassured him. “We can balance out some of this with other factors. Worst case, maybe five to ten. If we're lucky, two to five. I think that would be best case in this instance. I hope we could get them down to something like that.”

  “In a federal penitentiary? You don't suppose they'd agree to some kind of electronic incarceration at home? I could live with that a lot more easily than going to prison,” he said, sounding frightened. “I have a wife and kids.” Henry didn't tell him that he should have thought of that before, but it crossed his mind. Seth was thirty-seven years old, and out of sheer greed and lack of integrity, he had destroyed their lives as well as his own. This was not going to be pretty, and he didn't want to give Seth the false impression that he could save him from paying society back for what he'd done. The feds who would be involved in this didn't kid around. They hated guys like Seth who were consumed with greed and their own egos, and thought they were above the law. The governing laws on hedge funds, and institutions like them, were made to protect investors from men like him. The laws on hedge funds still had some loopholes in them, but not big enough for an offense like this. And Henry's job was to protect Seth, for better or worse. In this case, possibly worse. There was no denying it was a tough case, at best.

  “I don't think keeping you at home with a bracelet is realistic,” Henry said candidly. He wasn't going to lie to him. He didn't want to frighten him unduly, but he had to tell him honestly what his chances were, as best he could assess them. “Maybe I can get you early parole. But not in the beginning. Seth, I think you have to face the fact that you're going to have to do some time. Hopefully, not too long. But given the amount that you and Sully passed around, this is going to be a big ticket, unless we can come up with something that appeals to them to make a deal. And even then, you won't get off scot free.” It was roughly what Seth had said to Sarah the morning after the earthquake. The minute it hit and their phones went down, he knew then that he was screwed. And so did she. Henry was just spelling it out for him more clearly. They went over the details again then, and Seth was truthful with him. He had to be. He needed his help, and Henry promised to be at the FBI meeting with him the following afternoon. The grand jury would be meeting in New York about Sully at exactly the same time. It was six o'clock when Henry left, and Seth came out of his office, looking drained.

  He went downstairs to find Sarah in the kitchen, feeding their children. Parmani was doing laundry downstairs. Sarah looked worried as Seth walked in.

  “What did he say?” Like Seth, she was hoping for a miracle. It was going to take one to save him. Seth sat down heavily in a kitchen chair, and looked miserably at his children, and then back at her. Molly was trying to show him something, and he ignored her. He had too much on his mind.

  “About what I thought.” He decided to tell her the worst case first. “He said I could get up to thirty years in prison. If I'm lucky, and they want to make a deal with me, maybe two to five. I'd have to sell Sully out to do that, and I don't really want to.” He sighed then, and showed her yet another side of who he was. “But I may have to. My ass is on the line.”

  “So is his.” She had never liked Sully. She thought he was sleazy, and he had always been condescending to her. She'd been right. He was a bad guy. But so was Seth. And he was willing to sell out his friend, which somehow made it seem even worse. “What if he sells you out first?” Seth hadn't thought of that. Sully was further into the process than he was. It was entirely possible that at that very moment Sully was singing to the SEC and FBI. He wouldn't put it past him. And Seth was willing to do it himself. He had already made up his mind, after everything his attorney had said. He had no intention of doing thirty years, and was willing to do everything possible now to save his hide. Even if it meant burying his friend. Sarah could see it on his face, and it made her feel sick, not that he would sell out Sully, who deserved it in her opinion, but that nothing was sacred to him, neither his investors, nor his partner in crime, nor even his wife and kids. It told her where she stood and who he was.

  “What about you? Where are you in all this?” Seth asked her, looking worried, after Parmani took the children upstairs for a bath. The conversation had been over Molly's head anyway, and Ollie was a baby.

  “I don't know,” Sarah said thoughtfully. Henry had told him that it would be important for her to attend the hearings and the trial. Whatever look of respectability they could give him was crucial to them now.

  “I'm going to need you through the trial,” he said honestly, “and even more after that. I could be gone for a long time.” Tears filled her eyes as he said it, and she got up to put the baby's dishes in the sink. She hadn't wanted her children to see her cry, or even him. But Seth followed her to where she stood. “Don't leave me now, Sarrie. I love you. You're my wife. You can't bail on me now.” He was begging her.

  “Why didn't you think of that before?” she said in a whisper as tears rolled down her cheeks, as she stood in the beautiful kitchen, in the house she loved so much. Her problem with their current state was that this wasn't about saving their house or their lifestyle, but about being married to a man who was so corrupt and so dishonest that he had destroyed their life and their future, and said he needed her now. What about what she needed from him? And their children? What if he was gone for thirty years? What would happen to all of them? What life would she and the children have?

  “I was building something for us,” Seth explained to her weakly, standing near her at the sink. “I was doing it for you, Sarah, for them.” He waved vaguely toward their children upstairs. “I guess I tried to do it too quickly, and it all blew up in my face.” He hung his head and looked ashamed. But she could see that he was manipulating her now, and just as he was willing to betray his friend, this was more of the same. It was only about him. The rest of them could burn.

  “You tried to do it dishonestly. That's different,” Sarah reminded him. “This wasn't about building something for us. This was about you, being a big shot and a big winner, whatever it took, at everyone else's expense, even the kids'. If you go to prison for thirty years, they'll never even know you. They'll see you once in a while for visits. For chrissake, you might as well be dead,” she said, finally angry, instead of just heartbroken and afraid.

  “Thanks a lot,” Seth said, with something ugly coming to light in his eyes. “Don't count on it. I'm going to spend every penny I have paying for the best attorneys I can get, and appeal it forever if I have to.” But they both knew that sooner or later the price of his crimes would have to be paid. This last time would lead the way to all the other times he and Sully had done the same thing. They were going down, together, and hard, and Sarah didn't want him taking her and their children with him, whatever it took. “Whatever happened to ‘for better or worse'?”

  “I don't think that was meant to include securities fraud and thirty years in prison,” Sarah said, her voice shaking.

  “It was meant to include standing by your husband when he's up to his neck in shit. I tried to build a life for us, Sarah. A good one. A big life. I didn't hear you complaining about the ‘better’ when I bought this house and let you fill it with art and antiques, and bought you a shitload of jewelry, expensive clothes, a house in Tahoe, and a plane. I didn't hear you telling me it was too much.” She couldn't believe what he was saying to her now.
Just listening to him made her feel sicker.

  “I told you it was too expensive and I was worried,” she reminded him. “You did it all so fast.” But now they both knew how. He had done it with ill-begotten gains, conning investors into believing he had more than he did so they would give him more money for risky investments. And for all she knew, he had skimmed some of it off the top. Thinking about it now, she realized he probably had. He had stopped at nothing to rise to the top, and now he was going to take a fatal fall to the bottom. Maybe even fatal for her, after he destroyed their life.

  “I didn't see you giving any of it back, or trying to stop me,” he reproached her, and she looked him in the eye.

  “Could I have stopped you? I don't think so, Seth. I think you were driven to do what you did by your own greed and ambition, whatever it took. You crossed all the lines here, and now we all have to pay the price.”

  “I'm going to be the one sitting in prison, Sarah, not you.”

  “What do you expect when you do shit like this? You're not a hero, Seth, you're a con. That's all you are.” She was crying again, and he stormed out of the room and slammed the door. He didn't want to hear that from her. He wanted to know that she was going to stick by him whatever happened. It was a lot to ask, but he felt he deserved it.

  It was a long, agonizing night for both of them. He stayed locked in his office till four A.M., and she stayed in the guest room. He finally lay down on their bed at five o'clock that morning, and slept till noon. He got up in time to dress for the meeting with his attorney and the FBI. Sarah had already taken the children to the park. She still didn't have a car after losing both of theirs in the earthquake, but Parmani had her ancient Honda, which they were using to do errands. Sarah had been too upset to even rent a car, and Seth wasn't going anywhere so he hadn't rented one either. He was locked up in their house, too terrified about his future to move or go out.

  They were on the way back from the park when Sarah had an idea, and asked Parmani if she could borrow her car to do an errand. She told her to take the children home for their naps. The sweet-natured Nepalese woman said that Sarah was welcome to it. She knew that something was wrong, and feared that something bad was happening to them, but she had no idea what, and would never have asked. She thought maybe Seth was having an affair, or they had a problem in their marriage. It would have been inconceivable to her that Seth was about to be indicted and might go to prison, or even that they could lose their house. As far as she knew, they were young, rich, and solid, which was exactly what Sarah had thought two and a half weeks before. Now she knew they were anything but. Young maybe, but rich and solid had gone out the door with an earthquake of their own. She realized now that he would have gotten caught sooner or later. You couldn't do what he had done, and not have it come out at some point. It had been inevitable, she just hadn't known.

  When Parmani lent her the car, Sarah drove straight down the hill north on Divisadero. She turned left on Marina Boulevard, and drove into the Presidio past Crissy Field. She had tried to call Maggie on her cell phone, but it was turned off. She didn't even know if Maggie was still at the field hospital there, but she needed to talk to someone, and couldn't think of who else. There was no way she could tell her parents about the disaster Seth had caused. Her mother would have been hysterical, her father furious at Seth. And if things got as bad as they feared they would, her parents would read about it soon enough. She knew she'd have to tell them before it made the news, but not yet. Right now she just needed a sane, sensible person to talk to, to pour out her heart and share her woes. She knew instinctively that Sister Maggie was the right one.

  Sarah got out of the small battered Honda outside the field hospital, and walked inside. She was about to ask if Sister Mary Magdalen was still working there, when she saw her hurrying toward the back of the room, carrying a stack of surgical linens and towels that was almost taller than she was. Sarah walked back toward her, and as soon as she saw her, Maggie looked up in surprise.

  “How nice to see you, Sarah. What brings you here? Are you sick?” Emergency rooms in all of the city's hospitals were fully operative again, although the field hospital in the Presidio was still in use. But it wasn't quite as busy as it had been even a few days before.

  “No … I'm okay …I… I'm sorry … do you have time to talk?” Maggie saw the look in her eyes and immediately set the clean linens down on an empty bed.

  “Let's go. Why don't we go sit on the beach for a few minutes? It'll do us both good. I've been here since six o'clock this morning.”

  “Thank you,” Sarah said quietly, and followed her outside. They walked down the road to the path to the beach, making casual conversation. Maggie asked her how Ollie's ears were, and Sarah told her they were fine. And then finally, they reached the beach, and both sat down on the sand. They were both wearing jeans, and the bay looked shimmering and flat. It was another lovely day. It was the prettiest May Sarah could remember, although to her right now, the world seemed very dark. Particularly hers and Seth's.

  “What's happening?” Maggie asked gently, watching the younger woman's face. She looked deeply troubled, and there was bottomless agony in her eyes. Maggie suspected a problem in her marriage. Sarah had hinted at something before when she brought the baby in with his earache. But whatever it was, Maggie could see it had gotten considerably worse. She looked distraught.

  “I don't even know where to start.” Maggie waited, while Sarah found the words. Before she did, tears filled her eyes and started running down her cheeks. She made no move to brush them away, as the gentle nun sat beside her and silently prayed. She prayed for the burdens Sarah was carrying to be lifted from her heart. “It's Seth …,” she finally started, and Maggie wasn't surprised. “Something terrible has happened …no…he did something terrible … something very wrong … and he got caught.” Maggie couldn't even begin to imagine what it was, and wondered if he'd had an affair that Sarah had just learned about, or perhaps suspected before.

  “Did he tell you about it himself?” Maggie asked gently.

  “Yes, he did. The night of the earthquake, when we got home, and the next morning.” She searched Maggie's eyes before she told her the whole story, but she knew she could trust her. Maggie kept everyone's secrets to herself, and shared them only with God, when she prayed. “He did something illegal … he transferred funds he shouldn't have to his hedge fund. He was going to move them out again, but with the earthquake, all the banks were closed, so the money was sitting there. He knew it would be discovered before the banks opened again.” Maggie was silent but taken aback. This was obviously a much bigger problem than she had thought.

  “And was it discovered?”

  “Yes.” Sarah nodded miserably. “It was. In New York. On the Monday after the earthquake. It was reported to the SEC. And they contacted the FBI here. There's an investigation, and there will probably be a grand jury indictment and a trial.” She cut to the chase. “If he's convicted, he could go to prison for thirty years. Maybe less, but that would be worst case. And now he's talking about selling out the friend who helped him do it. He's already under investigation in New York.” She began crying harder then, and reached out and took the nun's hand in her own. “Maggie …I don't even know who he is. He's not the man I thought he was. He's a con man and a fraud. How could he do this to us?”

  “Did you suspect any of it?” Maggie looked worried for her. This was indeed an awful story.

  “Never. Nothing. I thought he was completely honest, and just incredibly smart and successful. I thought we spent too much money, and he kept saying we had it to spend. Now I don't even know if it was really our money or not. God only knows what else he did. Or what's going to happen now. We'll probably lose our house … but even worse, I've already lost him. He's already a condemned man. He'll never be able to get out of this. And he wants me to stand by him and stay with him. He says that's what I signed on for, ‘for better or worse’ … and what's going to happen to me a
nd the kids if he goes to prison?” Maggie knew that she was young, and whatever happened, she could start her life again. But there was no question, this was a terrible way for things to end with Seth, if they did. It sounded terrifying even to her, with the little she knew.

  “Do you want to stand by him, Sarah?”

  “I don't know. I don't know what I want or what I think. I love him, but now I'm not even sure who I love, or who I've been married to for four years, or knew for two years before that. He really is a fraud. And what if I can't forgive him for what he's done?”