AllFreeNovel
Share Us
WATCH YOUR BACK
James PattersonandLoren D. Estleman
PART 1
On Ramp
CHAPTER 1
THE SIGN TOWERED above the horizontal suburb like a pagan shrine: a wide open, baleful eye perched atop a pyramid, reminiscent of the Masonic symbol on the obverse side of the dollar bill.
ASPECTUSread the block letters at the base of the pyramid. Just that, nothing in the legend to explain or justify its existence.
If you didn’t know it already, it implied, you weren’t worth educating.
Dennis Cooke knew. Aspectus owned a nearly unbroken string of magazines, newspapers, information websites, and TV stations stretching from Lake Michigan to Salt Lake City; local and national were as one in its eye, not so much a global community as a great sprawling ranch ruled by a single patriarch named Todd Plevin.
Cooke coasted into a space near the entrance, cut the ignition, and waited for the motor to chug itself out. It stopped with a clunk and a tragic wheeze, like an old man dropping into an armchair. One day soon, the noise said, the old crate would stay right where it was until someone noticed and came to tow it away.
It made a man feel all used up at the ripe old age of thirty-five.
An arrow directed him to suite 1800, where a young Asian woman sat at a desk working a keyboard. She was slender in a green sheath dress that revealed well-toned biceps, and her hair—a startling cranberry—was cut to the shape of her head.
She looked up, smiling. Confirming his business from a pad, she tipped a switch to tell Mr. Plevin his four o’clock was here. “Go right in, Mr. Cooke.”
Todd Plevin stood behind a glass desk, sorting through a stack of glossy sheets: late twenties, athletic build in a cashmere sweater, brushed jeans, and three-hundred-dollar sneakers. His brown hair was tousled after the fashion of dot-com multimillionaires and he had the narrow face and long rectangular jaw that Cooke associated with aggressive types.
He laid down the sheets—photo reproductions, Cooke saw, of airbrushed illustrations—and came around to offer a hand. His grip was light but there was iron in it. Letting go, he tipped the palm toward a scoop chair and cocked a hip onto the desk.
“I see you brought your portfolio.” His was a bright tenor; encouragements from third base came in just that tone.
Cooke laid the elephant-folio folder across his lap and began to untie the string. Plevin held up a hand; that seemed to be his chief unit of expression.
“Later. I’ve seen your website: nice mix of primaries and secondaries, bold, frank images, character in every stroke. A Rockwell for our time.”
“That’s a polite way of saying I’m old hat.”
“People who say that put too much faith in high-tech splash at the expense of tradition. Personally I prefer oils, watercolors, and charcoal sketches to Photoshop; any hack can work a mouse. My walls at home are hung with originals—and they’re not all investments, either. I buy what I like.”
Cooke felt a warm flush. So far all his interviews—those he’d managed to land—had been with media execs who subscribed to the school of electronic paint-by-numbers. For some time now he’d felt like the last dinosaur.
It was his turn to say something flattering. He indicated the poster board image propped on an easel near the window, a mock-up of the front page ofAmerica Now,the newspaper Plevin had rescued from bankruptcy and placed in every hotel in the country. “You certainly know composition. That’s a front page I’d stop to read even if I were in a hurry.”
“That makeover was entirely mine. It was a smudgy mess when I bought it, all gray columns and pictures of guys in suits handing checks to other guys in suits. First thing I did—after replacing the staff—was dump 40 percent of the copy and widen the borders, gutters, and alleys, increase the white space. It’s what you leave out that counts.”
A cliché, spoken with all the conviction of a revolutionary thought. That, it dawned on him, was at the heart of Plevin’s phenomenal hold on the public, his sure grasp of the banal.
He was banal in response. “It certainly invites you in.”
Plevin slid off the desk. While he was on it he’d come off as friendly, approachable. Standing, even with his hands in his pockets, he dominated the room. A door had slammed shut on the small talk.
“Unfortunately, we have no openings. I’m cutting staff as it is. Like it or not, Silicon Valley has made it possible to run a leaner, meaner machine. My board of directors knows that, and they answer to the stockholders.”
Cooke shrank inside. He’d been negotiating his salary in his head, and now… “Then, why am I—?”
“Here? Assuming it’s not a philosophical question, because I wanted to see you in person. When I got your application I checked you out, as I said. I was impressed with your eye for detail; it suggested the kind of instinct I was looking for. Now that we’ve met, I’m sure of it. And I think the terms I have to offer will make you very pleased you came.”
He smiled, evidently pleased himself. The expression made the boy wonder look younger still, and for some reason slightly sinister.
