Brad Thor - Full Black

“And why would he want to do that?” she asked.

Ralston looked at her. The attraction he’d never acted upon, but had always felt slightly guilty about while dating Ava, was still there. He tried to put it out of his mind. He knew she had felt it, and fought it, as well. That was the reason she hadn’t hung up on him when he called. It was why she was standing here on the beach with him now. It was why she wanted to help him. She just needed a reason to, something other than the feelings she’d always harbored for her sister’s boyfriend.

“Your father won’t need a reason,” said Ralston. “And he won’t ask you for one. I was good to Ava. He knows that. I tried to help her. That’s all that should matter.”

“And if he says no?”

“He won’t,” replied Ralston.

“You’re pretty sure of yourself, aren’t you?” said Alisa.

“No. What I’m sure of, is you. You won’t let him say no.”

Before she could respond, he removed a small piece of paper from his pocket and handed it to her. “Memorize this and then burn it.”

“What is it?” she asked.

“It’s an email account I want you to use, so we can communicate. The instructions are there. I’ve left a signed agreement in the draft folder retaining you as my attorney. I’ve also left a letter clearly stating that you have directed me to turn myself in to the police and that I intend to do so once Larry’s safety can be guaranteed,” he replied.

“What about your safety?”

Ralston closed her hand over the piece of paper and let his hand linger atop hers. “I can take care of myself.”

Alisa thought about drawing her hand back, but didn’t. “Why won’t you tell me who’s behind all of this?”

“I can’t,” he said as he let go of her hand. “Not yet. Please just talk to your father for me.”

With that, he turned and walked away. Alisa watched him go, her mind filled with questions about what kind of trouble he was in as well as what kind of person would send a Russian hit team after one of the most popular producers in Hollywood.

“Do you always travel with security?” Julia Winston asked as she took another sip of the 1992 DRC Montrachet that James Standing had ordered.

They were sitting at a corner table in New York’s famed Le Bernardin restaurant. The billionaire’s protective detail occupied two additional tables a respectable distance away.

“Unfortunately, the world can be a dangerous place,” he replied, lowering his glass back to the table.

The reporter still had many more questions she wanted to ask him and she wasted no time. Picking up her pad and pencil, she said, “That’s a perfect place for us to pick back up. Let’s talk about the world as you see it, or more precisely how you’d like to see it.”

“I’d like to see us all get along.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning, we’re all citizens of the world. What happens in one nation can affect another and because of that, we need a better collaborative decision-making process. It must be something that allows for more intelligent decisions to be made and for those decisions to be made faster, with less bickering and foot-dragging. We share a planet where a volcano that erupts in Iceland can disrupt flights in Europe. An earthquake and tsunami that sweep Japan can destroy nuclear reactors, causing radiation to drift across the Pacific to the U.S. These are all things of collective interest and affect more than just one nation, agreed?”

Julia nodded.

“Where these items of collective interest exist, where multiple nations have skin in the game, as it were, it is my opinion that the only way to get the right things done is by subordinating state sovereignty in favor of international law.”

“And for international organizations as well?”

Standing smiled. “Yes, in fact I just came from a reception at the U.N. You see, it’s all about clarity of purpose. If we can come together with a shared set of values and a shared sense of purpose, we can make the world a much better place.

“Let’s take economics, for instance, a subject I know you and I are both interested in. We cannot continue the failed economic policies of the last thirty years. Our planet is dying and we have more people than ever before in poverty. The only way to bring about reform is for the pendulum to swing from the market toward the state.”

Julia looked up from her pad. “But hasn’t the free market actually lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty?”

Standing shook his head. “The capitalistic system is morally bankrupt.”

“What about India and China? Average incomes there have skyrocketed over the last thirty years.”

“I’m glad you mentioned China. China is a perfect example of what state-run capitalism can achieve. It proves that capitalism doesn’t require democracy. In fact, it operates better without it. And as far as India is concerned, it is home to a third of the poorest people on the planet. I’d think twice about using India as an example of the benefits of capitalism.”

“So we should ignore that the 1980s and 1990s, often known as the new golden age of capitalism, saw the proportion of the world’s population living on a dollar a day or less drop so dramatically that it was enough to offset rising populations in developing countries?” she asked.

“Not at all,” replied Standing. “Life has, in fact, gotten better for people around the world. That is thanks to globalization. But quality of life is nowhere near as good as it should be. The planet is possessed of abundant resources and wealth, yet-”

“Yet you think that wealth should be spread around, correct?”

“I think that if it is in our power to make the lives of our fellow human beings better, we should do everything we can to make that happen.”

“Would that include transferring America’s wealth, let’s say, to citizens in poorer nations?”

Standing laughed. “What wealth? America is bankrupt. In fact, if we had a global reset, America would be much better off.”

“Better off how?”

He thought about it for a moment and then said, “This is oversimplifying it, but picture a homeowners’ association somewhere in America. Let’s say there are fifty homes. The spectrum of the owners’ indebtedness will run from no debt and healthy bank balances to one, maybe two families who are hanging on by their fingernails, not sure how they’ll afford their next bag of groceries, much less their next mortgage payment.”

Julia looked at him. “You’re saying the family who has worked hard, paid off their mortgage, and has saved their money should bail out the family who can’t afford their house, much less groceries?”

“It’s not that simple,” cautioned Standing. “What happens if the poor family defaults on their mortgage?”

“Why don’t we examine why they can’t afford their house and groceries? Did they bite off more than they could chew?”

“Who knows? Maybe Mom and Dad just had a run of bad luck. Maybe they both got laid off. That these people have financial problems doesn’t mean they deserve them.”

“I’m not saying they do, but-”

“Answer my question,” said Standing. “What happens if this family goes under and defaults on their mortgage?”

“I assume they’ll be foreclosed on and eventually evicted.”

“Correct,” replied Standing. “And what happens to the house, then?”

“It goes on the market.”

“At what price?”

“At whatever the market will bear,” said Julia. “That’s the way markets work.”

“Not in this case. You see, the bank doesn’t just have one house, it has thousands; hundreds of thousands. It doesn’t want to be in the home ownership business, it wants to be in the money-lending business. Its motivation is not to hang around and wait for the free market system to work. It wants to dump that house as quickly as possible, and to do that, it’s going to dramatically mark down the price. What would that do to the values of the other properties in the homeowners’ association?”