The Fourth Law

by Paul Stein

  Then he remembered Amerigo’s sage advice: The hardest steel passes through the hottest fire. He would need this simple truth to fortify his spirit, girding him for the battles that he knew lay ahead.

  SIXTEEN

  GALVESTON, TEXAS

  13:30 HOURS

  TRAVIS MARLON could barely make out the ship’s heliport in the fading light of the overcast sky. As far as he could see, the clouds of Hurricane Hannah dominated Galveston Bay. The winds hadn’t yet picked up beyond a freshening breeze, the pending arrival of the hurricane still hours away. Travis presumed Hannah was the reason Alastair Holloway was so insistent that they immediately depart; he wanted no time wasted sailing his $100-million yacht out of Hannah’s destructive path.

  Travis was thankful that his only responsibility on this flight was to deliver Holloway to the ship. Following this unexpected assignment, he would disembark and rejoin Kilmer’s team as they prepared for the Livermore mission. Travis enjoyed piloting the expensive aircraft Holloway kept at his disposal, but like everyone else, he had a strong aversion to the man. Holloway was not a man difficult to dislike; not only was he one of the world’s wealthiest people, he was also insufferable and cruel. He ground up staff like ice in a blender. Only those that could tolerate his caustic and obdurate behavior remained in his service. Most newcomers didn’t last even a month, and it was not uncommon to see them completely flustered following their first encounter with the quick-tempered egomaniac.

  Holloway’s imperious style was even worse for business competitors who dared to challenge his authority. He was never content with merely beating an opponent; rather, it became his single-minded purpose to systematically destroy him. If by some chance a rival did prevail, Holloway would stop at nothing until they were financially ruined. Never was there a more vengeful person, even if it meant sending a “business associate” to arrange for their permanent disappearance.

  Alastair Holloway was one of the most ruthless individuals Marlon had ever encountered, which was a startling sentiment on its own, having been a longtime associate of Richard Kilmer. He disliked being around the man any longer than necessary. The sooner I secure Holloway and depart, the safer I’ll feel.

  Marlon flew toward the stately white yacht in the fading daylight. The magnificent ship was well lit and reflected a mirror image off the dead-calm water of the bay. The yellow thirty-eight-foot circular heliport was clearly identified as he approached the ship from the starboard side. The blaze-orange wind sock hung limp near the ship’s stern.

  “Mr. Holloway, we’ll be landing in three minutes,” Marlon shouted over his shoulder, disturbing Holloway’s slumber as he was napping in the back of the spacious executive helicopter. “The bay’s calm…should be a smooth landing.”

  “I know that, Travis,” Alastair Holloway replied. He didn’t open his eyes, but stirred uncomfortably from the interruption. “If I wanted an update, I’d ask,” he sneered, his biting response typical of what Marlon was used to.

  “Yes, sir…sorry, sir,” Travis replied, realizing that apologizing was only inviting a tirade. He decided to circumvent his indiscretion by contacting the ship.

  “Jurassic…Dragonfly is on approach from your starboard at four knots. Do you have a visual?”

  “Affirmative, Dragonfly, we have you on radar,” replied the ship’s first officer from the bridge of the yacht. Every crewmember understood that when Holloway arrived, it was analogous to sounding a battle station’s alarm. Captain Suarez assumed command on the bridge and everyone reported to duty, regardless of who was scheduled to work.

  “We’re at anchor and the wind is light. Welcome aboard,” the first officer said in a convivial tone, masking the visceral contempt he had for the ship’s tempestuous owner.

  “Thank you, Jurassic. Touching down in just a moment,” Marlon responded.

  The Jurassic was a 100-foot Royal Denship luxury yacht that contained six full decks below the bridge. The ship could comfortably accommodate twenty passengers along with a crew of twenty-six. Holloway had completely retrofitted the ship in 2006, primarily to add a Jacuzzi for Angelina, and to install a state-of-the-art stabilizer to reduce motion sickness, which constantly plagued him.

  Jurassic was capable of cruising at sixteen knots with a range of 7,000 nautical miles, and flew under the flag of the Cayman Islands. She was by far the most luxurious ship Captain Suarez had ever sailed. There were four staterooms among the several smaller bedrooms to accommodate guests, an incredibly opulent dining area, a dance floor, movie studio, exercise room, and several full bars conveniently located throughout the ship. Holloway’s stateroom was the largest and most lavish of any stateroom the captain had ever seen. It afforded an unobstructed view of the bow, second only to that which the officers enjoyed from the bridge.

  Holloway’s routine never varied from the moment he landed. The ship steward delivered his luggage to the private stateroom that was only used by Angelina and himself. Following a few moments to freshen up, the captain would visit the stateroom to discuss the departure schedule and other pertinent information. Then the crew could relax as Holloway usually hunkered down in his stateroom. But given today’s early afternoon arrival, the chef had prepared an early dinner, which would be served as soon as Holloway was settled. This meant the galley staff would also be working later than usual, alert for any demands that might strike his fancy.

  The Jurassic’s chef had a galley ready to comfortably serve up to twenty guests in the yacht’s opulent dining room. A wine cellar offered vintages that would make the most discriminating connoisseur envious. Most of the galley staff, however, held a low opinion of the ship’s owner, believing it disgraceful that their talents were not better utilized. But Holloway considered entertaining a waste of money. He had no desire to indulge people he knew didn’t approve of how he had acquired his wealth.

  Holloway had no family, other than his only daughter, Monica, whom he had purposely estranged years earlier. He believed Monica was just like her mother: a greedy, money-grubbing whore. He was still humiliated by his gullibility, believing his ex-wife’s hollow promise to love him apart from his considerable wealth. In the end it was clear she had seduced him with her physical charms, saddled him with an alimony payment, and given him a gluttonous, vacuous daughter to remind him of his stupidity. Following this experience, he pledged to never again trust a woman. As for Monica, his only connection to her was providing for her personal well-being in the form of monthly checks that supported an indulgent lifestyle. Otherwise, his only daughter was just a terrible disappointment in his shallow, self-absorbed existence.

  Alastair Holloway was an overweight man of sixty-five. He was a squat, corpulent, balding man who was always in a bad mood. Bushy eyebrows overhung dark, beady eyes and a bulbous nose, giving him the appearance of Scrooge. He was slightly hunched, as if weighted by a heavy load, and had the temperament of a badger. He had amassed incredible wealth through a mixture of skill and foresight, but never could he draw enjoyment from anything, except making more money. He seemed incapable of relaxing, driven by an inexplicable force that never relented. He had no trusted friends, and apart from his mistress, Angelina, there was no one in his life. It was hard to imagine a more miserable and lonely existence.

  Holloway was an industrial capitalist, cast from the same mold as many of the true pioneers of American industry. Capitalism was his passion and it consumed his every waking moment. His father, Aldus Holloway, was a farmer who cultivated corn and wheat on 2,000 acres of rich bottom-land near Tulsa, Oklahoma. On the farm, Alastair learned young in life the value of hard, backbreaking work, long hours that typically went from dawn to dusk, and the risk mentality that was the hallmark of farmers. Watching his family struggle to overcome droughts, declining commodity prices, bank foreclosures, and a myriad of other seemingly endless setbacks taught him the valuable lesson of personal responsibility. He also learned to be cautious of any livelihood dependent on weather.

  It was widely be
lieved that Alastair learned his devious ways from his mother, Theresa. Her temper was legendary, and she had no equal when it came to staving off unscrupulous bankers and bill collectors. There wasn’t a creditor in the region that hadn’t been tongue-lashed by Theresa Holloway for trying to collect a past-due bill. She could at times be cordial and beguiling if it served her interest, but could just as easily become a she-devil so vile that it kept everyone on guard. Theresa Holloway’s language could be so profane, in fact, that even men would sometimes blush during her protracted tirades.

  Alastair Holloway made his fortune in the oil business at a time when wildcatting resulted in fortunes for a lucky few and drove the rest into bankruptcy. Following World War II, America began an unprecedented economic expansion that was fueled by cheap oil. Because the Holloways hailed from Oklahoma—rich in oil and gas deposits—there was ample exposure to the overnight fortune possible if an oil strike was rich enough to cover the drilling and exploration costs. Oil derricks sprang up like toadstools following a midsummer’s rain. Alastair decided that he wanted in on the action, and convinced his father to let him drill a few test wells to determine if their property had oil. To everyone’s amazement, Alastair hit a gusher on his third attempt, launching his career in the oil industry.

  Like every successful capitalist before him, Holloway reinvested his windfall into bigger and better equipment. He quickly expanded to a dozen oil derricks, thereby increasing the odds of a strike the more often he sank a hole. His luck was better than most wildcatters, and his wealth skyrocketed like the oil gushing from his derricks. This was the beginning of his avarice. He became obsessed with growing his company and looked for ways to more quickly capitalize the unparalleled opportunity before him.

  To raise money, he founded the Triton Energy Group, LLP with a handful of select private investors. He rounded up ten partners willing to commit $2 million each to the joint venture, and established himself as the company president and general partner. This allowed him unilateral authority to take large positions in the oil futures market and other high-risk investments that he believed were potentially lucrative.

  Through Triton Energy, he gained a reputation as one of the savviest investors in the black-gold industry and learned how to manipulate oil futures. Because he could control when he would deliver his oil commodity to market, he took large positions at below market price, knowing he could deliver the actual crude oil at a point he controlled in the future. This allowed him to pay back the futures contracts with oil he was currently producing. In only a short time, Holloway doubled his investors’ money. He subsequently bought out his partners and took Triton Energy private, never again willing to share the profits he generated with anyone.

  Under Holloway’s fearless leadership, Triton Energy was the first to pioneer many innovative techniques that revolutionized the oil exploration industry. Triton developed the first offshore drilling platforms that allowed oil recovery in the North Sea, known to contain up to twenty-five percent of the world’s available oil deposits. Triton made advancements in drilling technology, including the first diamond drill bits, and commissioned the first supertankers able to transport huge volumes of crude to satisfy the world’s insatiable oil appetite. Holloway proved time and again to be peerless when it came to innovation and the wherewithal to surmount any technological hurdle.

  Unfortunately, among the many pioneering advances Holloway developed over the years, it was the tragedy on one of Triton’s floating oil platforms that would forever mar his accomplishments. In July of 1988, 176 Triton Energy employees perished when the Lankis offshore oil platform exploded from a gas leak in the North Sea. It was Holloway’s staunch belief that the very nature of an oil platform operation—the extraction of volatile substances under extreme pressure in a hostile environment—entailed risk where tragedies did sometimes occur. He believed he paid a premium to those willing to accept this inherent risk, which fully discharged any further obligations. The victims’ families were coaxed by personal injury attorneys to file a class-action suit against Triton Energy, but the resulting lawsuit was settled out of court for the paltry sum of $91,000 per claim. The media vilified Holloway for the trifling sum he agreed to pay, and the public was outraged. Even fellow oilmen expressed their disbelief at the callousness with which Holloway responded to the catastrophe.

  But, ultimately, this indignation had no effect and the disaster slowly moved off the front page of leading national newspapers. Those closest to Holloway claimed that the loss of 176 employees had no effect on him whatsoever. Within days of the accident, he was back to his normal routine: ordering and belittling staff, setting unrealistic deadlines, generally being his crabby and temperamental self, and remaining heartlessly detached from the terrible grief he had caused the loving families of these loyal employees.

  “Welcome aboard, Mr. Holloway,” said Eduardo Suarez, the captain of the Jurassic. “I trust you had a pleasant flight.”

  “Yes, yes, everything’s fine, Eduardo,” Holloway responded, more agreeably than Suarez expected. “Is Angelina in my room?” he asked, rushing from the heliport toward the bridge of the yacht. “If not, tell her to get her skinny ass down there. And we’ll have dinner served while you give a report on the storm.”

  “Right away, Mr. Holloway. We’re ready to depart as soon as Mr. Marlon disembarks.” He was speaking from behind, hurriedly trying to keep up with Holloway as he moved through the narrow passage off the bridge of the ship.

  Holloway shook his head but continued walking. “Marlon… humph! Fucking prima donna pilots,” he muttered, under his breath, but still loud enough to be heard. “Why isn’t the boat standing by? I expected to be under way immediately. Must I really tell you everything?”

  “The skiff is ready for Mr. Marlon, and I’ll be in your cabin in ten minutes. Miss Navarro is already waiting for you, sir,” Captain Suarez answered in staccato fashion, addressing each one of Holloway’s concerns. “The chef will send in your dinner as soon as we know your preference.”

  “Well, see to it, then. I’m in no mood for delays.”

  The captain watched Holloway disappear behind the elevator doors. The tyrant had arrived, so every crewmember needed to be at his best or risk the personal rebuke of Holloway’s displeasure. At times like this, being fired didn’t seem so terrible, even though the job was most enjoyable when Holloway wasn’t aboard.

  The crew considered the Jurassic their home and they each took great pride in performing their duties. They sailed the world in the lap of luxury, staying close to wherever Holloway might fancy boarding his spacious multi-million-dollar yacht. But there was clearly no enjoyment whenever he was on board.

  “Hello, Alastair. How was your flight?” Angelina Navarro asked as Holloway blasted into the spacious stateroom. “You look tired, honey. Is everything okay?” she cooed, rising from the sofa to greet him with a hug.

  “Yes, yes, good to see you, Angel. You look lovely,” Holloway replied nonchalantly. Then he looked at her crossly, exasperated by what little she was wearing. “Please put on something more than just that negligee…you can see right through it. The captain will be here any moment.”

  “Whatever you want, dear,” Angelina replied, pulling away from his cool embrace. She was grateful he didn’t seem to be in too bad a mood and hadn’t started yelling the moment he came through the door. She could usually soothe his temper, but was thankful that she didn’t have to immediately engage this repugnant chore.

  Angelina Navarro was a strikingly beautiful woman. She was tall and slender at five-foot-eleven. She could have easily been a model had she not long ago entered the professional escort business in Los Angeles.

  At the age of seventeen, Angelina moved to Los Angeles from Murfreesboro, Tennessee, with dreams of becoming the next Hollywood starlet. Just like many naïve young women before her, she fell into the clutches of an unscrupulous promoter who promised that starring in a few porn movies would greatly improve her chance of discovery i
n the motion picture business.

  Angelina had an eye-catching figure. She had a slender build with uncommonly large 38 DD breasts that were not implanted, like so many other porn stars’. Her long raven hair fell in gentle curls around her ivory shoulders, framing a beautiful face that was a combination of Cherokee Indian and Genovese descent. She had full, voluptuous lips and captivating dimples when she smiled, but her green eyes became her trademark. Angelina was known simply as Jade in the pornography industry.

  After several hard-charging years in porn, Angelina finally realized that she would never shake the reputation of being a sex starlet to become a real movie star. She was encouraged by others in the profession to enter the lucrative business of high-class prostitution, and joined a renowned escort business that connected her with wealthy clients able to afford her $5,000-per-night services. It was in this capacity that she was first introduced to Alastair Holloway.

  Even though she was warned early about Holloway’s extremely volatile temperament, she seemed to be one of the few people who could calm his edgy, highly explosive personality. She could also withstand his abusive behavior, remaining detached from his searing, inflammatory remarks. She tolerated Alastair’s boorish behavior, aware that she possessed a degree of power over him that few enjoyed, probably due to his infatuation with her physical beauty. She had no delusions about the permanence of their relationship; she could be summarily discarded with the same impulsiveness that drew her into his life.

  But Angelina was also a pragmatist, realizing that at age thirty-three, she needed to leverage her income potential while her beauty still lasted. When she was invited by the aged billionaire to be his mistress, she didn’t hesitate to get off the street, choosing the pampered life of luxury for however long it would last.