Read Online The Millionaires by Brad Meltzer - Free Book Online Page A

guests?”
    “Yeah… no…. Sorry—just one of those days,” I stammer. I’m trying to keep it calm—even if it’s obvious I’m failing.
    Kenny says something else, but all I can think about is Shep. I look at Charlie, and he looks at me. There’s nothing worse
     than fear in your brother’s eyes.
    “So tell us what’s going on,” I say to Kenny. “What position are you interviewing for?”
    “Interviewing?” Kenny laughs. “I’m not here for a job—I’m here as a client.”
    I rocket up in my seat.
    That’s all Kenny needs to see. Big putz grin. “I’m telling you, real estate is always hot,” he adds, the canary still fresh
     in his teeth. “Seventeen million—and that’s just from the buyout. Where else you gonna get free cash like that? I mean, without
     getting arrested, of course.”
    * * * *
    The instant the door slams behind Kenny, I sink down in my seat. Charlie’s up and moving, unable to stop. “Maybe we should
     call Shep,” he says as he starts pacing. “He’s still my friend… he’ll listen to reason…”
    “Just give me a minute…”
    “We don’t have a minute—you know he’s gonna be here any second… and if all we do is sit around… I mean, what’re we still doing
     here anyway? It’s like pulling the pin and waiting with the grenade in our pants.” He wheels around, all set for me to argue,
     but to his surprise, I give him nothing but silence. “What?” he asks.
    “What’d I do now?”
    “Repeat what you just said.”
    “About the grenade in our pants?”
    “No—before that.”
    He thinks for a second. “What’re we still doing here?”
    “That’s the one,” I say, my voice now cruising down the runway. “How do you answer that?”
    “I don’t understand.”
    “What
are
we still doing here?” I ask as I stand from my seat. “Shep just had us nailed for swiping three million bucks—but does he
     tell Lapidus? Does he tell Quincy? Does he call in his buddies from the Secret Service? No, no, and no. He walks away and
     saves the conversation for later.”
    “So?” Charlie says with a shrug.
    “So what’s the first rule of Law Enforcement 101?”
    “Be a power-mad donkey’s ass every time you pull someone over?”
    “I’m serious, Charlie—it’s page one in the rulebook: Don’t let the bad guys get away. If Shep smells something wrong, he’s
     supposed to go straight to the boss.”
    “See, now you’re reaching. Maybe he’s just giving us a chance to explain.”
    “Or maybe he’s—” I stop mid-step. Up goes the suspicious eyebrow. “How well do you know this guy, Charlie?”
    “Oh, c’mon…” he says with a roll of his eyes. “Now you think
Shep’s
the thief?”
    “It makes perfect sense when you think about it. How else would he know about the original Duckworth fax?”
    “He told you, Sherlock—he saw it come in…”
    “Charlie, do you have any idea how many hundreds of faxes come in here every day? Unless Shep spends his days hunting through
     every fax in the building, there’s no way he’d find it. So either someone tipped him off before it got here… or somehow, some
     way…”
    “… he knew it was coming,” he says, completing my thought. His mouth gapes open. His body stiffens, like his blood’s running
     cold. “You really think he…”
    “You don’t know him at all, do you?” I ask.
    “W-We hang out at work.”
    “We should get out of here,” I blurt. I take off and rush to the door.
    “Right now?”
    “The longer we sit here, the more likely we’ll be tagged as scapegoa—” Tearing the door open, I look up. There’s a figure
     in the doorway.
    With his chest in my face, Shep steps forward, forcing me to step back. Once he’s in the room, he whips the door shut. He
     studies Charlie, then stares at me. His thick neck keeps his head brutally arched, but it’s not an attack—he’s taking our
     measure. Weighing. Calculating. It’s like one of those silences at the end of a first