by C. J. Box
Low-slung retail shops lined 71st: tattoo parlors, pawnshops, dollar stores, hair salons. Accordion-style security gates were up across the doors, and every window he could see was barred. Lights from inside the closed shops were dull and soft.
Across the street from the BP Station was a low square cinder-block building painted bright yellow. The facing wall of the building announced on the side that it was the State Street Grill and that it was open twenty-four hours a day. A list of items offered inside were painted on the side of the bricks:T-BONE & EGGS $9.95
JERK CHICKEN WINGS
BBQ RIBS
BREAKFAST SERVED ALL DAY
The neighborhood just seemed right for what he was after. It was old, dark (except for the BP station), run-down, urban. The buildings weren’t packed together tightly so there were plenty of places to gather, hide, or run. It would be hard to pin someone down here because of all the exits, and it would take someone in a car less than a minute to shoot down the off-ramp and join the stream of traffic going north toward the shining city center.
He was looking out at the street and the grill when he saw a flash of movement in his rearview mirror. They were coming up behind him on both sides of the car.
The passenger window suddenly filled with a pair of dull white eyes in a black round face. He said, “What-choo-doin?” as if it were a single word. Nate guessed he was fourteen or fifteen years old, maybe younger. A scout. He had close-cropped hair and big cheeks and a mouth that showed no expression. He was wearing big clothes under a down coat that was so enormous it reminded Nate of a frontier buffalo robe.
From inches away, at the driver’s window, a girl said, “What-choo-lookin-for, mister man?”
Nate looked from one to the other. They’d approached his car in a rehearsed, cautious way—like cops. The girl was lighter-skinned, hair pulled back with beads in it, not unattractive despite her put-on street scowl.
“Wha-choo-doin here?” the boy asked, high-pitched, as if astonished by Nate’s naïveté.
“I like that,” Nate said to the girl. “Mister man.”
“What about it?”
“I’m hoping you can help me,” he said, keeping his voice low. “I’m looking for some protection. I was hoping you could steer me in the right direction.”
“Pro-tection?” the boy said, still shrill and high-pitched and mocking. “Like rubbers? They inside.” He thumbed over his shoulder toward the outside wall of the BP station. He laughed at his own joke and looked over at the girl, hoping she would laugh, too.
“You know what I mean,” Nate said.
“Are you po-lice?” the girl asked. “You gotta tell me if you are. You look like po-lice.” She said it poh-lease.
“No,” he said.
“You lyin’,” she said. “You a lyin’ motherfucker, mister man.”
Nate sighed. “Such language. Look, I need to buy a gun. If you two can’t help me out, I’ll find someone who can. I’ve got cash and I’m starting to lose my sunny outlook on life.” He thought briefly of shooting his arms out and grabbing both of them by the ear and pulling them inside to make his point. He’d done worse.
The girl looked him over, her face as hostile as she could make it. He felt sorry for her, because her eyes told him she wasn’t lost yet but was working on it. She said, “Wait here a minute,” and was gone.
The boy shook his head at him, condescending, and started to say something and Nate gritted his teeth and whispered, “Don’t.”
The word struck home and the boy was gone.
Ten minutes later, Nate Romanowski steered his rental down the State Street off-ramp. The gangbanger the two had sent over had a thing for nines like most gangbangers, plenty of used pieces in stock, but Nate bought the only revolver he had: a five-shot .44 stainless steel double-action Taurus Bulldog with a two-and-a-half-inch barrel.
“That ’un ’ill make a big mother-fuckin’ hole,” the gangbanger cackled when Nate chose it.
“You don’t need to tell me about guns,” Nate said, and handed over eight one-hundred-dollar bills. The gangbanger threw in a half box of cartridges in the deal. Nate didn’t spend much time speculating what the missing ten bullets had been used for.
As Nate cruised toward the city on the five-lane, he thought: Simple things.
Like how simple it was to buy an unregistered handgun in a city that tried its damndest to ban them. It meant he could pick one up just about anywhere—at any time. No hassle with gun stores, hours of operations, dealers, forms, ID, or criminal record checks.
As long as he had the desire, a purpose, and a brick of one-hundred-dollar bills, he was in business.
Twenty minutes on the computer in the business center of his hotel would give him the rest of what he needed.
Instinctively, he reached over and felt the heavy steel outline of the .44 in his overnight bag. He thought of Sun Tzu.
And he thought about going hunting in the morning.
SEPTEMBER 7
For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind.
—HOSEA 8:7
31
Smith said, “What is it you want to know about Rope the Wind?”
As had happened many times when Joe interrogated people with a high opinion of themselves, it didn’t take long for Orin Smith to open up. He explained how he’d come to own so many companies, and how he’d acquired them. While he explained the strategy and growth of his former enterprise, Joe nodded his head in appreciation, sometimes saying, “Wow—you’re kidding?” and “What a smart idea,” which prompted Smith to tell him even more.
Orin Smith was proud of his business accomplishments, and was grateful someone finally wanted to hear about them.
Smith explained how he’d—legally—taken advantage of a Wyoming initiative to encourage business development during the last energy bust of the 1990s. The state legislature had passed laws that made it very simple and inexpensive to incorporate in the state as a limited liability company. The idea, Smith explained, was not only to encourage new enterprises to start up in Wyoming but also to get existing firms to possibly move their headquarters for the advantage of low taxes and slight regulation. He said he learned the ins and outs of the process, and for a while served as a kind of broker between those wishing to incorporate and the state government entities that processed the applications and granted LLC status.
“I placed ads in newspapers and business journals all over the world,” Smith said. “‘Incorporate your company in Wyoming: it’s cheap, easy, and hassle-free! ’ For a fee, I’d make sure my clients did their paperwork correctly and I’d even walk the applications to the secretary of state’s office on their behalf. You’d be surprised how many people out there took advantage of the new regulations.”
But after serving as a facilitator for a few years, Smith said, he began to encounter more and more competition in the field. He realized there was a new market for turnkey companies that had already been created and were “established”—at least on paper.
“Think about it,” Smith said. “Let’s say you’re an entrepreneur or you just came into some cash. What makes more sense—to put the money in a bank and declare the income so it can be taxed, or to ‘invest’ it into the ownership of a company with all the benefits a small business owner had at the time? Like expense accounts, travel, tax credits, and the like?”
Joe nodded and said, “Exactly.” He’d learned over the years in interrogations that using the word exactly seemed to encourage his subjects to keep talking.
“Then it hit me,” Smith said. “Because it was so easy to create shell companies and bank them away, why not look ahead in the economy and create limited liability companies with names that investors and entrepreneurs might want to buy outright? I mean, wouldn’t it be more valuable for a guy to approach the bank if he had just acquired a two- or three-year-old company with a paper track record than to go into the meeting with all kinds of highfalutin ideas about a start-up?”
&nbs
p; “Exactly,” Joe said.
“So that’s what I did,” Smith said proudly. “I started coming up with company names that sounded great and applying for incorporation and filing them away. I tried to figure out what was hot and what was coming down the pike and tailor the names for that. I’ve always had a genius for names, you know.”
Joe nodded.
“Some company names were plays on words: ‘Nest Egg Management,’ ‘Green Thumb Growth,’ like that,” Smith said, getting more and more animated. “Then I realized how many of these folks out there liked company names that sounded cool and modern but didn’t really say anything, like ‘PowerTech Industries,’ ‘Mountain Assets,’ ‘TerraTech,’ ‘GreenTech, ‘TerraGreen’—anything with green or tech in it was golden, man . . .”
Smith went through dozens of names and Joe recalled the short list Marybeth had read to him over the phone. He hadn’t actually heard of any of the companies, but it seemed like he had. He conceded to himself that Orin Smith did have a way with names.
“So you were kind of like those guys who went out and bought all kinds of dot-com names in the early days of the Internet,” Joe said. “You locked up common names so when folks came around to wanting to use them they had to pay you a premium.”
“Right, but then it all came to a crashing halt,” Smith said, his mouth drooping on the sides.
“What do you mean?”
“Apparently, some less-than-upstanding folks out there figured out how to buy and use these companies for unscrupulous means.”
“Like what?” Joe asked.
Smith glanced toward the mirrored window, where Coon was no doubt listening closely.
“Apparently,” Smith said, choosing his words carefully, “it’s a lot easier to launder illegal money through a corporation than it is by other means.”
“Like drug money?” Joe asked.
“Apparently,” Smith said. “Or other kinds of cash. From what I hear, the Russian mafia and Mexican drug cartels discovered they, too, could set up cheap corporations in Wyoming and use them as a front for financial transactions.”
“Not that you did that or knew anything about it,” Joe said.
“Of course not,” Smith said, acting hurt. “Not until the secretary of state started a campaign to shut me down and say that limited liability companies in Wyoming had to have all kinds of new restrictions, like street addresses and boards of directors and crap like that. It just wasn’t fair.”
“Exactly,” Joe said.
“So I had to divest what I had, and fast,” Smith said. “If the secretary of state would have just stayed out of my business, I’d still be doing it. I never would have gotten involved in this thing the Feds said I did. Not that I did it, you understand,” he said with another glance toward the glass.
“Rope the Wind,” Joe interjected.
Smith paused and sat back. “One of my best,” he said. “It could be used for a dozen kinds of industries or products. I have to honestly say I wasn’t thinking wind energy at the time I came up with the name. Nobody was.”
“So that’s how you met Earl Alden,” Joe prompted.
“Not quite yet. That came later.”
“Later than what?” Joe asked.
Smith squirmed in his chair, and rubbed his hands together.
“I saw the writing on the wall,” he said, “a new president, a new administration. Their big talk about ‘breaking our addiction to oil,’ renewable energy, solar and wind. I could see it coming because it was right out there in front of us. They were talking about it all the time during the campaign.
“So by then,” Smith said, “I couldn’t create any more new companies without all the hassle, but I still had all the company names I’d already registered. I did a little research and figured out where the windiest places in the state were located. So instead of waiting for entrepreneurs to knock on my door, I decided to get proactive. To hit the road and talk to businesspeople and landowners about what was coming down the pike. You see, I could see it plain as day. Those fools in Washington earmarked eighty-six billion dollars for ‘green initiatives,’ including forty billion dollars in loan guarantees and grants for renewable energy projects. But convincing anyone—that’s where I just . . . failed.” He spat out the last word, and dropped his head to stare at something on the top of the table between his hands.
Joe shook his head, confused. “But Rope the Wind . . .”
“One guy actually showed some interest for a while, but he was just an ignorant rancher and he couldn’t make a decision. He strung me along for months and then he stopped taking my calls. I hadn’t heard anything from him for a couple of years and then he calls me a few weeks ago out of the blue and said he wished he would have done it. He tells me he was sick and going over what he’d done in his life and he realized not pulling the trigger on the wind project had been a mistake. Now he realizes, the dumb son-of-a-bitch.”
Joe asked, “Was his name Bob Lee?”
Smith shook his head. “I remember Bob Lee. He wasn’t interested at the time and told me to get the hell off his property.”
“Who was it?” Joe asked.
“His name was Bud,” Smith said. “Longstreet, or something like that.”
“Bud Longbrake?”
“That sounds right.”
Joe just shook his head. “Where was he calling you from?”
Smith waved Joe off. He said, “It was Calvin Coolidge who said the business of America is business. You ever heard that?”
Joe nodded.
“Not anymore,” Smith said. “It’s a thing of the past. That’s what I found out when I took my concept out on the road. Nobody wants to take a risk or work hard. Nobody wants to own a business anymore because if they succeed they become a target of the politicians. Everybody’s sitting back, scared, keeping their head down and waiting it out until the storm passes. If it ever does.”
“So,” Joe said, trying to get Smith to refocus. “No one was interested in investing in your companies?”
“That’s what I’m saying,” Smith said, annoyed.
“So why not do it yourself?” Joe asked. “Why not use Rope the Wind yourself? Or why not start your own business and provide something people want to buy? You seem to have a gift for all this stuff.”
Smith simply glared at him. He said, “Don’t be so simpleminded. Where have you been? That’s for suckers. That’s not how people make money these days. Owning a company is for suckers. Employing people is for idiots. Making money in the free market means you’re a douche bag ripe for plucking.”
Joe sat back, confused.
Smith said, “Today it’s about winners and losers, determined by folks in Washington. The winners—God bless ’em—are cleaning house. If you’re a winner, you get the money funneled to you and you can’t fail. And if you do fail, they’ll bail you out. But if you’re a loser, well, you end up in the hoosegow wasting your time talking with a damn game warden.”
“Bud Longbrake,” Joe said. “The one who told you he’s sick? Where did you say he was calling from?”
After the questions and answers continued throughout the morning—Earl Alden came up in a lot of them—Joe excused himself by asking Orin Smith to “hold that thought.”
Joe found Chuck Coon in the hallway where he’d been observing the interview from a stool.
“Can I borrow a legal pad or something from you?” Joe asked. “I filled up my notebook.”
“I’ve never heard him talk so much,” Coon said, shaking his head. “You’re actually pretty good at this.”
“He’s proud of his achievements,” Joe said. “He wants someone to know about them. He’s kind of a twisted genius in his way and he’s done a lot, and it frustrates him that all anyone asks him about is the Ponzi scheme that brought him down.”
“Are you getting what you need?”
Joe rubbed his temples with the tips of his fingers. “More than I bargained for,” he said.
“This Earl Alden h
e keeps talking about,” Coon said. “He’s your murdered father-in-law?”
Joe nodded.
“I heard about that. Man, he really hated that guy.”
“Nearly as much as the secretary of state,” Joe said. “Were you aware of what he was saying, that it used to be legal in Wyoming to register companies by the dozen?”
Coon nodded. “Yeah. That’s how Orin Smith got on our radar in the first place a few years ago. We kicked it over to the state since it was a state issue, but, yeah, we were aware of it.”
Joe whistled. “This is going a direction I didn’t anticipate.”
“I take it you know this Bud Longbrake fellow?”
“My ex-father-in-law.”
“Quite a family you’ve got.” Coon whistled. “Let me get you a pad. But keep in mind Smith has a hearing this afternoon. You’ll need to wrap it up after lunch. Speaking of . . .”
“Thanks,” Joe growled, “but I’m not hungry.”
“Okay,” Joe said, reentering the interrogation room with a fresh yellow legal pad. “You were starting to tell me about your connection with the wind turbine remanufacturer in Texas.”
At first, Joe didn’t pay any attention to the rapping at the interrogation room door. He was busy scribbling, and trying to process what he was being told by Orin Smith. Finally, Smith quit talking and chinned behind Joe.
Coon and a U.S. marshal stood there. The marshal said, “Mr. Smith has an appointment upstairs before the judge.”
“I think I’m through with him,” Joe said. He thanked Coon for the opportunity and shook hands with Orin Smith as the marshal escorted him out of the room.
“I appreciate your cooperation,” Joe said.
Smith nodded. “Just make sure to put in that good word—and to let Gov Spence know.”
“I will.”
As Smith left the room, he paused and turned. To Joe, he said, “If you get the son-of-a-bitch who did it, give him a big wet kiss from me.”