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THE NFL OWNERS ANDCommissioner Joel Abrams and most of his New York staff had taken up residence in the Beverly Wilshire Hotel, just off Rodeo Drive, for the league meetings.
Jenny Wolf was staying there. So was Danny Wolf, simply because in the eyes of the league he still had as much standing with the other owners as his sister did, if not more.
John Gallo had taken a suite at the Four Seasons. His plane had landed at Burbank Airport an hour ago, and he had called Danny from his limousine and told him to be waiting for him at the Four Seasons when he got there—he had already checked in.
Now he and Gallo were in the living area of his suite. Danny felt as if he’d been called to the principal’s office, as if he’d gotten caught smoking in the boys’ room.
“How could you possibly not have known about the Oprah interview?” Gallo said.
“No one knew about it until they released a few clips from it this morning,” Danny said. “They kept the whole thing buttoned up.”
He had seen Gallo angry plenty of times before, at him and at Jack, especially when the subject was Jenny. Danny thought Gallo liked going at him the most, maybe because he knew Danny would take it. It was different with Jack. Jack would at least make a show of standing up to Gallo, pushing back, if not for very long, just to reaffirm that he didn’t take shit from anybody, even though both Jack and Danny knew they were basically both making a career out of doing just that with John Gallo now.
“You and your brother assured me you were on top of this,” Gallo said. “The last thing I said to your brother was that it was time to finish her.”
Danny started to speak.
“Shut up and listen,” Gallo said. “I’d like for you to ask your brother the next time the two of you speak if he’s under the impression that a prime-time interview with Oprah Winfrey is his idea of finishing her. I’d very much like to know the answer to that question.”
Danny wanted to tell Gallo to ask Jack himself. But he didn’t.
By now he knew that Gallo prided himself on not raising his voice, as if doing that would be a show of weakness. But he was raising it now.
“You know how this is going to play out!” Gallo snapped at him. “Oprah will make your sister seem more sympathetic than that actress the prince married!”
“May I speak?” Danny said.
“By all means.”
“I have been talking to the other owners since I got here,” he said. “I spoke to at least a dozen today. I’m telling you that she doesn’t have the votes. She may think Oprah can drag her across the goal line. But I’m telling you, it can’t happen. This is all about the numbers now.”
Gallo offered a thin smile. It was a gesture that always made Danny feel as if he were being knifed.
“You’retellingme,” he said, clearly mimicking Danny.
He makes my father,Danny thought,seem more lovable than Oprah.
“Are you suggesting that this interview isn’t going to change any minds?” Gallo said. “Or any votes?”
“It’s a goddamn television interview,” Danny said, “not a presidential address!”
Suddenly he was shouting, too.
Gallo stared at him.
“Conducted by a powerful and influential woman who most people probably likemorethan the president,” Gallo said.
“You don’t even know what she’s going to say.”
Danny knew it sounded as if he were whining, probably because he was.
“You occasionally come across as a bright boy, Daniel. So see if you can figure out how your fellow owners might react if they get the idea that Oprah might begin to think badly of them—and that she might tell all the people who hang on her every word that she thinks badly of them.”
“This vote is just business,” Danny said.
“Precisely,” Gallo said. “And they may very well make the determination that it’s bad for business if a group largely comprising wealthy and powerful men comes across as bullying poor Jenny Wolf.”
There was something else going on here today with John Gallo besides his obvious anger and frustration about the interview. Danny found himself wondering what it took to make Gallo afraid.
