“The board of directors is a little upset that you’ve chosen to release this monster,” Phil Stoppard said to James Howe.
“I know what I’m doing,” Howe replied. “It’s the most efficient and hands-off way to get Luthecker. And we own Parks. If I want him back in his cage, he goes back in his cage.”
“He should have never been let out of his cage to begin with. So far, he’s brutally murdered two people.”
“Two people who mean nothing.”
“The men in the ivory towers want to know what the hell you’re thinking.”
Howe turned away from the window of his office in the Coalition Properties West building and looked at Stoppard. Stoppard was middle management, a simple messenger, and with his Oliver Peoples glasses, Emporio Armani suit, and look of outrage on a superior’s behalf, he had all the boorish indicators of someone who was trying to escape that dead end reality.
“I’m not a soldier like the previous individual who occupied this office,” Howe finally replied. “I’m an accountant. I make sure the debits and credits on the balance sheet match. I clean up after messes. And Richard Brown and The Coalition left a big one.”
“The Coalition board isn’t interested in philosophical perspectives. They want their asset Alex Luthecker, and they’re terrified of Lucas Parks.”
“They’re terrified of both.”
“And you’re not?”
“No.”
“What’s to keep Parks from slaughtering Luthecker outright, and the girl? Or simply disappearing?”
“He doesn’t think like that. He’s smarter than you. He’s smarter than the Coalition board. Do you believe he kills people without a reason? Do you actually think he needs money?”
Stoppard was smart enough not to answer.
“When he tracks them down, and he will, he won’t kill Luthecker. Or the girl. He won’t kill them because he’s curious. And he won’t disappear because I have something he wants.
“And what’s that?”
“Legitimacy. A seat at the table.”
“So, what do I tell the board?”
“That in the end the balance sheet will be balanced.”
The look on Howe’s face indicated that it was the end of the conversation, and the Coalition head stared a now sheepish Stoppard out of his office.
After Stoppard was gone, Howe went back to his window. He found the angular horizon of the downtown Los Angeles city skyline beautiful if not somewhat hypnotic, a peaceful distraction from the variables he had introduced to his task of finding Alex Luthecker and Nicole Ellis.
Parks was a risk, no question. But in Howe’s mind, Alex Luthecker was the bigger risk. The difference between the two was that Howe understood Parks. In the end, Parks was just a businessman.
It was Howe’s grasp of economics and the impossible array of corporate tax codes of not only the United States, but of most major industrialized nations, that had led to a great deal of Coalition Properties’ massive profits over the last decade. Howe knew the players in Washington. And he knew how the economic math worked better than the mathematicians themselves. He didn’t have a constant war-footing mindset and knew how to build consensus when he had to. It was the reason why he, and not another soldier, now sat at the head of Coalition Properties.
Which also explained why Parks intrigued him. The global marketplace was changing at an alarming rate, and those who followed the current rules and structure would soon find themselves naturally selected out of existence. The relentless push for no regulation and the complete destruction of labor as a force in order to maximize short-term profit had proven successful. But that ideology, when combined with the Internet, had the unintended consequence of completely dissolving market borders between nation-states, which in turn had allowed Parks, and men like him, to capture more and more of the legitimate marketplace with illegitimate products. Patents, copyrights, environmental regulations, drug laws, human rights violations, these were all anachronisms to New Order Gangsters. They were obstacles that this new market force was not encumbered by in any way. And now these groups were capitalized well enough to buy small countries. They were building armies. And Howe knew it wouldn’t be long before New Order Gangsters gained enough power and control in the global marketplace that they would be seen as respectable “New Order Businessmen.” And Howe, like the heads of many legitimate corporate entities, were beginning to realize that they wanted in.
Luthecker, however, was an entirely different puzzle to Howe. If what the young man was capable of was true, the reality of which Howe had his doubts, he may prove more of a liability in the long run than an asset. Howe understood the allure that the Coalition board had with the supposed soothsayer; fearful men feared secrets most of all, and he knew that in their thinking if Alex Luthecker could eliminate secrets, he could eliminate that which they feared. It was a false hope at best. Because Howe knew that, in fact, the opposite was true. Secrets were an asset that men of confidence and vision assigned great power to. And they leveraged them. Secrets were the main currency that ambition traded in. To Howe, without secrets there could be no favors. Without favors, there could be no control. And without control there could be only chaos. To James Howe, the very idea of Alex Luthecker threatened the natural order of things.
Howe was also smart enough not to test the theories being floated in the boardroom regarding the fugitive’s abilities. He had seen the documentation of what Luthecker had done to David Lloyd, the interrogator, as well as Howe’s own predecessor, Richard Brown. Both of those men had been war-hardened veterans, and Luthecker had apparently destroyed them with relative ease. Howe was not about to take any chances himself. He’d rather leave that to someone like Parks. Howe admired Parks and considered him a brilliant mind as well as a ruthless sociopath. If there was anyone who could eliminate a variable such as Alex Luthecker, it would be the Cuban-Irish gangster. And that’s how Howe saw it—it would be one man or the other who would survive. It was the only possible outcome. And Howe could work with either result. With Luthecker gone, Howe felt that he and Parks could become partners, legitimate business and illegitimate business reaching across the aisle and working together with a synergy that hadn’t existed before. Howe believed Parks would understand the power that he himself wielded with Coalition Properties and be visionary enough to see the potential, therefore putting any past “disagreements” behind him. And then he and Parks could combine their skills and assets to become the true leaders of the New World Order. If for some reason Parks refused to partner, he would be killed. And if Luthecker somehow prevailed, something Howe viewed as the unlikely worst case scenario, Parks would be eliminated, along with the threat he posed to legitimate trade. And the danger that Luthecker presented to the interests of Coalition Properties would also be crystal clear. Any talk of preserving him as an asset could then be argued against. Taking Luthecker out at that point would be a relatively easy task. And with Luthecker gone, Howe could rest easy, knowing that the balance sheet, as both the world and Howe currently understood it, would be maintained, and the currency he valued most, the one that Howe traded with considerable expertise, would not be threatened. For Howe, a man who believed in long-term, risk-averse strategies, his assessment of the situation and calculated plan to maximize every possible potential—and at the same time minimize its downside—was by far the safest bet.
Howe’s cell phone vibrated in his pocket. He checked the caller ID before answering. “Yes?”
“The package arrived. Two days ago.”
“And the delivery man?”
“He’s made his presence known.”
“I am aware of this. He’s not yet approached the package?”
“No. He’s taking his time. But word on the street is that once he does acquire the package, he’s going to burn everything down. Should we step in?”
“Absolutely not.”
Howe hung up the phone. The moment of truth, Howe thought to himself as he looked out his window at the city of Los Angeles.