What Did Happen in Vegas?

Tuesday June 10, 2003

6:35 AM

Tom had a restless night and didn't get much sleep. He got himself out of bed and managed to make a pot of coffee and sat at the little dinette table next to the kitchenette and waited for the coffee to brew. When it was ready, he poured himself a cup and picked up his cell phone and called Zack's office. No one answered but then Tom didn't expect Zack to be in his office yet. He just wanted to leave a message.

"Zack, this is Tom. Would you please call me when you get in this morning. Call me on my cell phone. Thanks."

Tom finished his coffee and went to the bathroom to bathe. With the cast on his leg and the pain in his chest, bathing was a difficult chore and left Tom exhausted. After bathing Tom put on a Colorado Rockies tee-shirt and a pair of sweat pants with the left leg slit up the side to accommodate his cast.

*****

7:00 AM

Tom had just finished dressing and was sitting on the sofa with his second cup of coffee when someone knocked on his door. He didn't want to have to get up so he thought about ignoring whoever it was but realized that it must be Don again. After all no one else knew where he was staying. Tom was on his feet and slowly moving toward the door when he heard another knock on the door.

"Hold on, I'm coming," Tom yelled at the door.

Tom looked through the peek hole in the door and saw Zack standing on his doorstep. A surprised Tom opened the door and moved aside to let Zack in,

"How did you find me?"

"Don. He didn't tell me where you were but I saw him get your computer from you office last night so I followed him to find out where you were staying. I decided to wait until this morning to come see you. So, why the hell are you not at home and where the hell is Lisa? I called her several times last night and again this morning but she has not returned any of my calls," Zack said.

"I don't know where Lisa is. Things are not going well between us right now and I don't want to talk to her for a while."

"Can you tell me what's going on?" Zack asked.

"I honestly don't know," Tom said. "Someone has gone to a lot of trouble to make Lisa think I had an affair in Las Vegas but I don't know why."

"Did you have an affair?"

"Of course not."

"I saw the pictures Tom," Zack said. "They looked like proof that you did something. They didn't show you in the act but they were pretty convincing."

"How did you get the pictures?"

"They were sent to me anonymously."

"They were faked. That woman was not in my room in the nude. As a matter of fact that wasn't my room. It was the suit we were using for customer meetings," Tom said.

"How could the pictures have been faked?"

"Zack, don't you read any of those technology magazines you get. The pictures were taken with a digital camera and then edited."

"How do they edit a nude woman into the room with you?" Zack asked.

"I wasn't in the room. I was outside the door going to get ice. The picture of the nude woman had to be taken at a different time and then edited in to make it look like she was in the room behind me."

"How could it have been made to look so real?"

"I have been thinking about that. I think the nude woman had to be in that room when the picture was taken. Then that picture was combined with the one of me going out to get ice. Not hard to do but both pictures had to be taken from the same perspective in order to get them to look right. My guess is that they were taken by the same person too," Tom said.

"Who would have had the opportunity to slip a nude woman into the suite and take that picture?" Zack asked.

"That's the part that stumps me. That room was in use almost all of the time. We had visitors in and out all day and then we locked up the room at seven o'clock. I had the only key to that room."

"No one else had access to the room that week?"

"No."

Suddenly Tom slapped himself in the head. "Oh, shit. That geeky little bastard,' Tom yelled.

"What geeky little bastard?"

"Bill Werner. He stayed in Vegas for the weekend and the hotel let him keep the suite we had been using. He told Brad he had met a girl and she was going to spend the weekend with him. That gave him the opportunity but what was his motive?" Tom said. "I barely know the guy. Why would he want to ruin my marriage?"

"Did you tell Lisa the pictures were faked?"

"I tried. At first I was so stunned that she was accusing me of having an affair that I didn't know what to say. I never even asked her to show me the pictures because I already knew they had to be faked. When I finally saw the pictures my brain froze. All I could think about was where did they come from. Lisa was waiting for me to confess that I had an affair and instead of trying to explain that the pictures had to be faked I got angry. By the time I got around to trying to tell her they were fakes she wasn't about to believe anything I told her."

"If I could get my hands on that little fuck Werner right now I would find out what this was all about."

Tom noticed that the expression on Zack's face had changed. Zack had a puzzled look on his face when Tom had started telling his story but now Zack's face had taken on a dark red color and the anger that was building was obvious. Tom wondered momentarily if Zack's anger was directed at him.

"Tom, I think I might know what this is about and I don't believe it has anything to do with someone just wanting to break up your marriage."

"What are you talking about?" Tom asked.

"I told you that I have been working with several well-respected local businessmen to select people to sit on the Board of Directors when I take the company public until our stockholders can elect a permanent board in about a year. In order to get these men to agree to sit on the board I had to tell them who I intend to have as officers of the corporation. I of course intend to be the CEO and I named David Ransom as Vice President of Marketing and Sales and you, as president of NewTech Design.

"Dave had been after me ever since I first mentioned going public, trying to get me to make him the president. I finally had to tell him my plans. He wasn't happy about it but said he would support me. I suspect that he may have had something to do with your problems. He knows that the people I am asking to sit on the board would never go along with me naming you as president of the company if you are in the middle of a messy divorce. Of course I can't prove any of this. Until we can get to the bottom of this, the best defense against this is for you to straighten things out with Lisa."

"I can't believe this. Do you really think David would do something so underhanded?" Tom asked.

"You don't know David like I do. I wouldn't put this past him. Besides what other reason can you think of for someone doing this to you?" Zack asked.

"I guess I thought that someone was trying to take Lisa away from me."

"Who?"

"Brad."

"Brad's your best friend."

"Not anymore."

"I don't know about Brad," Zack said, "but this scam required money and a lot of it. Someone had to pay for the suite at Treasure Island over the weekend. If Bill Werner was involved, what was his motivation? What could Brad offer him that would make this worth the risk? David could easily have paid for the room and the girl and made it worth Werner's time. If David became president of the company he would have been in a great position to take care of Werner for a long time."

Tom was feeling all kinds of emotions now. His wife didn't trust him, his best friend had betrayed him, at least two people at NTD were plotting against him and he was suffering from pain and exhaustion.

"I must be a prize idiot. I played right into their hands," Tom said as he slumped into the sofa. "If I would have been more patient with Lisa, I could have ended this before it got out of hand. How do you want to play this?"

"You get busy patching things up with Lisa and don't tell anyone what we discussed here. Lisa needs to know so that she understands what is going on but no one else," Zack said. "I want to keep things quiet until we can find proof that David was involved, then I will fire his ass so fast he won't know what happened to him."

Zack started moving toward the door and Tom started to stand up.

"Don't get up Tom, I'll let myself out. Now call Lisa."

"I will."

When the door closed behind Zack, Tom reached for the phone and said to himself, "I wonder if she will even talk to me."

He tried their home phone first but didn't get an answer so he tried Lisa's cell phone but again there was no answer. Tom left messages on both phones asking her to call him. Tom wondered if Lisa was screening calls to avoid talking to him.

*****

8:30 AM

Brad Thompson was standing next to Bill Werner's desk asking about some design drawings that Werner was supposed to be working on.

"When can you have them finished?" Brad asked.

"I am working on something for Mr. Ransom right now but I can probably get to those other drawings this afternoon sometime?"

"Next time Ransom tells you to do something for him I want you to remind him that you work for design engineering not marketing. This bull shit has got to stop."

"Hey, man, he's a fucking VP. I can't tell him no," Bill said.

At that moment Werner's phone rang.

"Hello?"

"It's me," the caller said.

"Just a minute," Bill said.

Bill put his hand over the mouthpiece and whispered to Brad, "It's Mr. Ransom."

"Well, tell the son-of-a-bitch you have design work to do."

As Brad walked away, Werner said, "Okay. I'm back."

"I have been thinking about how we can correct the mistake we made on those last pictures. Somehow I am going to have to make Mrs. Boyer think that I just made a mistake on the date that the pictures were taken. I plan to make her think they were taken at least a month before the Vegas pictures," Ransom said.

"You think she'll buy that?"

"Sure, why not? That will make it seem that the affair has been going on for a lot longer," Ransom said, "and just to be sure she believes it we are going to need one last set of pictures. I am going to ask your friend Brandi to come back here this week. Then all we need to do is get her in the same room with Tom for a photo op."

"How do you plan on doing that?" Werner asked. "Tom isn't going to sit there and let us take incriminating pictures of him."

"He won't have any choice in the matter," Ransom said. "I want you to visit him when his wife isn't around. Then all you have to do is slip him a special drink and the rest will be up to Brandi and your camera."

"Special drink? What are you talking about?"

"I just happen to have some rohypnol. You will just put some in Tom's drink and he won't know what's going on. When he is doped up we'll get some nice pictures of him playing with Brandi."

"Isn't this getting a little risky?" Werner asked.

"The risks are high but the rewards are much higher. If things work out I'll be running this company in less that a year. I need you to keep tabs on Tom. I want to know what he is doing and where he is all day. We have to find the best time to get him alone so that we can get our pictures."

"I'll do what I can but I am getting a lot of crap from Brad. He's pissed that I am spending so much time doing things for you instead of doing the work that he assigns to me," Werner said.

"Don't worry about Brad Thompson," Ransom said. "A year from now Mr. Thompson will only be a distant memory. You will have his job and you will be giving the orders down there."

*********

8:35 AM

Tom called Lisa's office but got no answer. He transferred to the department secretary and asked if Lisa was around. The secretary told him that Lisa called in and said she was going to be out of the office on vacation for the next couple of days. Tom had a bad feeling about that. What was Lisa up to? She wasn't answering her phone and she wouldn't return his calls. Tom's concern was building. Could she have gone off somewhere with Brad?

"NewTech Design, Brad Thompson speaking."

"Brad, it's Tom. Do you know where Lisa is?"

"No, I don't. I know she didn't come into work today."

"You had better not be lying to me."

"I'm not. I haven't seen her."

Tom hung up on Brad without saying anything more.

"That asshole," Brad said to himself as he put his phone down.

*****

Wednesday June 11, 2003,

9:30 PM

Tom was very worried. He had tried all day Tuesday and Wednesday to track Lisa down but no one knew where she was or at least they weren't telling him where she was. Could she possible be hiding on him? Why would she? After all, he's the one all crippled up. He was supposed to be hiding from her.

Tom had given up. He didn't know who else to call or where else to look so he got a beer and sat on the sofa. He debated on whether or not to take a couple of Darvocet so that he would sleep through the night.

*****

Brad Thompson was sitting at his desk trying to find the design specs that Bill Werner had been working with on the department file server. They weren't there. Brad was pissed. He had to work late because Bill Werner wasn't doing his job.

"That little fuck has spent so much time sucking up to Ransom that he hasn't done any of the work I assigned him so now I will miss a deadline for the first time because of him."

There was no one else in the building to hear him but it felt good just to let off some steam. Brad got up and walked out to Werner's desk and turned on his computer. The computer powered up and then asked for a password. Brad was sure that Werner would have his hard drive password protected but he was disappointed to find that he was right.

Brad tried the drawers in Werner's desk but they were all locked. He was about to give up when he lifted up the large month-at-a-glance calendar on Werner's desk. Underneath the calendar Brad found a Post-it note with one word on it. "Ham?" Brad wondered. "Could that be his password?"

Brad typed 'ham' into the password box and hit enter. Immediately a message popped up on the screen; "Password not recognized."

Brad was about to give up when he remembered that Bill Werner was into Ham Radio. When Werner first came to NTD he used to bore Brad with stories about his radio and all the people he talked to all over the world. Brad wondered if Ham might be a password hint or reminder that Werner had forgotten that he left under the calendar. Brad tried to remember Werner's ham call sign. He had sat in Bill's car one day as Bill talked on his two-meter radio and he remembered Bill constantly repeating a certain phrase that indicated his call sign. Brad began thinking out loud, "Katie wants... Yeah, that's it Katie wants... what the fuck did Katie want? Katie Wants Good Dogs? NO. Katie Wants 2 Good Dogs. That's it. KW2GD. That was his call sign."

Brad typed "KW2GD" into the password box and Bill's desktop opened. Brad laughed. "The geek isn't very smart when it comes to passwords."

Brad started going through folders looking for the files he needed when he came across a folder named 'Ransom.' Brad opened the folder and there were several more folders inside. Brad opened a folder named 'Boyer' and found several pictures of Tom. Most of the pictures appeared to be from their Las Vegas trip. There were pictures of Tom standing in front of the Treasure Island hotel and several shots of him in and around the suite they were using for meetings. The rest of the pictures were taken in Denver. Most of them showed Tom coming out of an Applebee's restaurant. Brad recognized it as the restaurant where he and Lisa were eating when Lisa's nosey neighbor spotted them.

All of the pictures looked like candid shots and Tom obviously didn't know anyone was taking his picture. Then Brad remembered Tom asking him if he remembered anyone taking pictures when they were in Vegas. Brad couldn't remember seeing Werner with a camera.

Brad wondered why Werner had taken so many pictures of Tom. Brad closed the folder and opened another folder named 'Brandi.' This one contained pictures of the blond that had been in the pictures Lisa had showed him. Suddenly Brad began to understand. The pictures of Brandi show her in all the same places that Tom had been. There were even nude pictures of the blond in the suite they had used during the conference.

"What the fuck is going on here?" Brad wondered even though he already had a pretty good idea. Brad closed the 'Brandi' folder and opened another named 'Trouble in Paradise.' In that folder Brad found all of the pictures that Lisa had showed him. These pictures were all fakes. "So that's what that little shit has been up to," Brad hissed.

Brad found another folder named 'The Plan.' Inside this folder was a word document that outlined everything that Ransom had planned and what he had asked Werner to do. There were also copies of several e-mails that Ransom had sent Werner with instructions and there were also copies of the two notes that were sent to Lisa. Brad figured Werner would use that file to make sure that Ransom didn't try to fuck him over later.

Brad quickly copied everything in the 'Ransom' folder to the department file server. Then Brad shut down Werner's computer and went back to his own and opened the "Ransom files on the server. Brad zipped the files and put them in a password-protected folder.

*****

11:05 PM

Tom had decided not to take the Darvocet and was still awake as a result. He was watching the late news and trying not to think about Lisa and how worried he was that she hadn't called him yet.

Tom was reaching for the television remote when his cell phone rang. The unexpected ring startled him causing Tom to knock his phone off the table as he quickly reached for it. It was difficult for Tom to reach down and pick the phone up. Once he retrieved the phone Tom opened it and said, "Lisa?"

There was no response. Tom had been too late. Tom looked at the call history to see if the missed call was from Lisa. It was not. As Tom stared at the number on his phone it began to ring again, only this time it was the ring tone that indicated that he had received a new voice mail message. Tom hit the button to play back the voice mail.

"Tom, it's Brad. Call me on my cell phone. I know you don't want to talk to me but this is important."

"What the hell does he want?" Tom wondered out loud.

Tom used speed dial to call Brad back.

"Tom?"

"Yeah. What do you want?"

"Tom, you have to listen to me. First you have to believe me that I never would have gone near Lisa if I didn't believe that you had cheated on her in Vegas. Remember you are the one who said you spent your nights in your room reading. You have got to know that I would not believe that. Anyway, I know the truth now. Dave Ransom and Bill Werner set you up."

"I know," Tom said.

"You know? When did you find out?"

"Zack and I figured it out earlier this evening," Tom said.

"I have all the evidence," Brad said. "I broke into that little geeks computer tonight looking for some work he was supposed to have done for me and found everything or almost everything. That stupid little shit left all of the pictures he took of you and that blond on his computer."

"Holy shit," Tom said.

"That's not all. Werner has copies of e-mails from Ransom telling him what he wanted Werner to do for him and to you. Werner also created a word document that lays out their plan. Apparently Werner doesn't completely trust Ransom and wanted to make sure he had something he could hold over Ransom's head if Ransom tried to screw him. Anyway, the reason I am calling so late is that Werner's notes say that the blond, whose name is Brandi, is coming to Denver tomorrow. The plan is to somehow drug you and then get some real explicit pictures of you with the woman. Pictures that you wouldn't be able to tell Lisa were faked. So you have been warned. I put everything on the department file server in a password-protected folder to make sure that Werner can't erase it. I sent the password to Lisa, Zack and you so that you can see what they have been up to."