Page 30 of Asher Black (The Five Syndicates)
“I didn’t always fix situations through legal means, but in terms of my business consulting, that was mostly legal. I was paid a consultant’s fee and even filled out a W-9 for my work. My income was taxed by the government, too. Fully legal.”
I don’t believe it. “But some of those businesses are money laundering schemes.” I read that on a blog that follows the Romano family.
He looks startled by my knowledge. “Are you sure you’re not a spy?” But the lack of heat in his tone tells me that he’s only joking. “They make a lot of their money through legal means, but one of the on paper businesses is a money laundering scheme.”
“Which one?” I ask.
He glances at me. “Are you sure you want to know? You can’t un-know it, and this can be dangerous knowledge.”
I think about it. I don’t really want to know, but my gut is telling me that I need to learn as much about the situation, about him, as I can. Ignorance is often more harmful than knowledge. Just ask Mary Jane Watson when the Green Goblin dragged her all over the city. She’s a damsel in distress, which I refuse to be.
I’ll settle on being a scaredy cat with random bouts of courage.
I nod and say, “Un-know isn’t a word, and the Asher Black the world knows wouldn’t let anyone harm his fiancée.”
He barks out a stunned laugh. “No, he wouldn’t.” He’s silent for a moment. “It’s the strip club chain.”
I roll my eyes. “Figures.”
“It’s actually one of my more brilliant ideas. Stripping is a cash heavy business. The IRS knows and accepts this. The Romano family has their boys come in with their cash earnings, and they spend all that money on tipping the strippers and waitresses. The girls pool the tips, which go to Frankie Romano.”
Frankie Romano is the head of the Romano family.
I finish for him, “Let me guess. The girls are legal employees that get paid in wages, which come from the tips and cover fee, while the boys keep their share of profits and tip the rest. The tip income and club employee wages are even taxed as legal earnings.” I laugh. “You probably even have the tip policy in the employee contracts.”
Asher looks impressed. “Exactly. The feds can’t touch the Romano family. The only ones involved in the illegal dealings are technically just customers of the clubs. They’d have to target those guys individually, and even if they’re caught, it doesn’t trace back to the Romanos. There’s no way to cut the head off the snake. Just a never ending supply of tails that are pointless to go after. Tails always grow back.”
I study Asher’s profile. This is the most animated I’ve ever seen him. It flows into his appearance, and he looks both refreshed and invigorated—and far less scary than usual. The effect is enough to make my heart skip a few beats.
I whisper. “You’re pretty smart, aren’t you?” I shake my head, clearing it of whatever just possessed me to compliment him.
He sighs, and it reminds me of why he’s telling me this stuff in the first place. I need to know as much as I can about my new “fiancé.”
“Not smart enough.” His fingers clench harder against the steering wheel. “I signed a contract for 10% of the earnings of all of the businesses I helped create for the Romanos. It was a lot of money, and I used it to invest in my own businesses. All of my businesses are under one company, Black Enterprises.”
He pauses, allowing the information to sink in. “One of the board members is trying to vote me out based on my suspected mafia ties, and he can point out my shares in Romano businesses as evidence. Even if they’re technically not illegal, those businesses are tied to the Romano family, which has a notorious reputation for organized crime dealings. They’ve mostly turned away from the hardcore stuff, but it doesn’t paint the most favorable picture of me.”
“The one that’s trying to vote you out… He’s the one that was sneering all night, right?”
Asher gives me a dry laugh. It’s amused and irritated all at once. “Yeah, that one. His name is René Toussaint. He thinks that, if the board votes me out, he’ll be promoted to CEO. The man’s after my bonus and power, and he doesn’t care how he gets it. Hell, if he can get his hands on my majority shares of the company, he won’t hesitate to take them.”
“Is there grounds for your dismissal?”
“There’s no proof that I’ve done anything illegal for the mafia, so he can’t attack me from that angle. What he’s been doing is painting me as young, inexperienced and unstable in order to prove that I’m a threat to the wellbeing of the company. It’s a smear campaign, through and through. I haven’t exactly made it hard for him, either. In the business world, I am young, which automatically makes me inexperienced to them.”
He’s only 25. Whereas I see that as something that only makes his achievements even more impressive, I can see how René can depict it negatively.
“As for my instability, all of the board members have wives, kids and homes. That’s their view of stability. I’m single, have no family, and am living in a penthouse apartment.”
“Which is where I come in,” I say, putting the pieces together. I can handle this, being involved in an office dispute rather than a mafia one.
“If I have a fiancée, René can’t argue that I don’t think about the future, that I’m not putting down roots.”
“And as a ‘ghost,’ they won’t be able to pull up any dirt on me.” I don’t bother telling him that Lucy isn’t even my real name. It’s not like I’m a criminal.
“Exactly. Couple in the fact that you attend an Ivy League and spent the last two years of your life volunteering, you’re practically a saint. You’re an even better candidate than Nicole ever was.”
I can’t help myself. “Why was she a candidate anyways?”
