X-Ray Vision Ch. 12: Exposed

She was on board! Yay for Renae! Looking how to make this work, not looking for reasons it wouldn't! And using her experience with the bank's customers, their problems and hiccups, to help design a path to success.

I smiled, stacked the mess on the table into her folder, shut it.

Stood and held out my hand. "Renae, I know you are the right person to head this up. Once it has succeeded, I want you on full-time, dedicated to this fund.

"Think about it! This could be a long-term project, with a chance to make permanent change in the business landscape!

"Short-term, lets make a plan for management classes, lunches with local business leaders, maybe even create a handbook for each kind of business model - services, delivery, manufacturing and so on, a primer for folks new to running those businesses."

She was really excited now. Way ahead of me already, thinking about venues, speakers, publishers.

"Let's review funds you recommend for our first two investment categories. Same time, next week?

"Meanwhile lets both create a list of potential investment board members. Brainstorm ideas for soliciting business plans, identifying community entrepreneurs. Review, make choices, then reach out."

Renae was almost bouncing when I left, her mind a million miles away, barely looking at me as I said my goodbyes and headed out.

I hadn't come here to do more than put some of Greg's money, no our money, into some funds.

And I left with a new community organization, headed by a dynamic investment expert.

Not bad for a Wednesday afternoon!

What had gotten into me? Some kind of confidence boost. Something I had eaten for breakfast? Or was it hormones, some pregnancy-related emotional surge?

Oh! My dear loving Grandfather was proud of me, and so happy for us, our growing family! That had been what I needed to really engage in my life.

Not just engage at work; all of us, working at our different goals, me finding a goal for myself, because I knew we could do anything we put our minds to.

Was this truly my goal? Growing local business? What about my Lost Girls?

Maybe they were the same goal. Find the lost, catch them in a safety net of support/job/housing. Then help them find purpose, make their own dreams come to life!

Not everybody, sure. Some of us just want to work for a living, then spend quality time with family and friends. A fine way to live a life. Greg was like that! A loving, supportive family guy, gonna make things work for the rest of us, the rock we build our castles on!

But the occasional individual has big plans. Folks who'd seen the barren, dry underside of life, had hit rock bottom in opportunity and support. This sort seemed to have a spark, to want to do something significant, to make a mark. And so often, to help others.

Like Tito? and Kelly of course. Billie, for sure! Nick, I know there's a germ of a goal in her somewhere and it isn't band-roustabout.

Anyway, in my current giddy I-love-my-life frame of mind it seemed this way to me!

Greg was gonna be fascinated to hear what I'd done. After that, I think, I'm gonna screw his brains out. Yeah.

...

Greg

I was a little embarrassed when Tito and Kelly came over, after supper. I was just getting out of the shower, pink and scrubbed, most of the Jillian-juice washed off.

Had taken a bit, pretty slimy from our activities. Not content to just bump-and-grind and get off, we'd tried new positions involving a barstool, then two barstools. Jillian still had the pink blush across her shoulders, her chest.

In that cutoff t-shirt it was very obvious.

Add her contented expression, her lazy languid posture, and nobody could mistake her for anything but a happy just-fucked Mom.

Fortunately, Kelly was in pretty much the same situation. She wandered past me, when I answered the door in shorts and a collarless beach shirt, gave me a drive-by peck on the cheek and headed over to Jillian. Gave her a full-on hug and nuzzle, just two contented woman-friends sharing their post-orgasmic buzz.

From my point of view, their semen deposits alone gave everything away.

Tito shook my hand, which felt very warm. His physiology reflected my same post-coital circulation and muscle relaxation. Breathing, heartrate, gut recovering from blood redistribution. There was absolutely no doubt now, Tito and Kelly were an item. A very active physical and emotional item.

"Let's convene on the porch! Enjoy the last warmth of the day. I'll bring glasses."

The girls were sharing happy talk of work, how the afternoon had gone. Tito lagged, took two bottles from me, let me gather the glasses on a tray, followed me out.

I left Tito to the corkscrew, Kelly arranging glasses, pouring. Took mine, settled on the loveseat with my wife(!), gathered my thoughts.

"So, we have an opportunity, we'd like to sound you out. Could be involved, maybe take some weeks to get arranged. Can't do it ourselves, need somebody with your talents to pull it off." This to Tito; Kelly just looked proud. Had Jillian shared something with her? Or was she just proud of Tito by default? Probably that.

"Kelly said something about Jillian being cagey at work. We're listening."

Typical Tito, direct and taciturn. And I didn't miss the 'We'; they were already in this together. Good.

"A salvage operation! Cargo lost from a boat, bottom of the bay, maybe fifty feet? Been there since I was in High School; nobody alive likely remembers it's there."

"We talking about artifacts? Precious metals? Something recent, or historical? Chemicals?" by which he meant, Drugs?

And he had no problem believing, me knowing a box was in fifty feet of bay water; Kelly shared everything it seemed. Of course, like any good couple.

I shook my head. "Simpler, maybe. Cash-money. A crate of American currency, watertight, heavy, firmly embedded in the mud."

"How big? How much? The crate - plastic? metal? wood?"

I had to wrack my brain; it had been decades. "Wood over metal. The wood was sound back then, likely decayed now. The metal, pretty thick? Maybe three feet on a side; nearly a cube. Clamshell, two parts. Some rubber seal, bolted tight."

"Full?"

I nodded; it had seemed a fortune, when I saw it as a kid. Filled my head with thoughts of pirates and adventure. Quickly dismissed; I had no feasible path to recovering it, like so many other things I've seen, passed up.

"What denominations?" Here he looked hopeful, wondering if my vision went as far as reading the face of bills sealed in a steel box in total darkness through fathoms of salt-water from a moving boat.

"All one-hundred-dollar-bills. Thru and thru, far as I had time to look. We were moving pretty fast; I saw it for maybe thirty seconds."

He thought, briefly. "Provided there are no dividers, no floats, no other internal structures? Then what you have there is sixty million give or take."

Jillian spilled her wine, stared, her mouth open. Then laughed!

"Greg! Here you've been foraging half your life, and all that down there! You goof!"

I kissed her, to shut her up, but mostly because I like kissing her.

"Remember, I can't swim! It may as well have been on the moon.

"And then, what if we do bring it up? Who does it belong to? What kind of taxes will we owe? How do we even explain?"

Tito nodded, all good points. Took a moment to arrange his thoughts.

Began.

"What you got here is a salvage situation. Governed by maritime law, with particular reporting requirements. The idea is, somebody lost it, might want it back. The governments will want their share, state and federal.

"They'll slice off the biggest part, then tax the bit they leave you. At a high rate; the highest. And take their time doing all that."

"We talking months?"

"Maybe years. Maybe never; it gets in court, folks fighting over who gets how much, maybe you grow old waiting for your part."

That put a dent in our enthusiasm; we all fell silent, sipping our wine.

Kelly spoke, like she was expecting this, was introducing a new topic.

"Does it depend on where the salvage is done?" With an innocent expression, a question to Tito but really for us to hear the answer.

Yup. "In territorial waters, all governed by US maritime law. Outside, different. Very different. You just have to deal with the original owner, not the government.

"So where is this crate? Fifty feet? Has to be coastal. You said, in the bay?"

I nodded, tilted my head. "Kind of; we were just passing between the points, getting into choppy water. Slowing down, the tide was coming in? I'm not a sailing guy; does that still count as 'in the bay'?"

Tito looked concerned. "Not legally significant; US territorial water is 200 miles. You can still see land, you're still subject to US maritime law for sure.

"But tides? Can't do salvage when the tides are running, the bay filling or emptying creates tremendous currents. That crate wouldn't be there if it wasn't so dang heavy; it'd move, tumble, break up. Maybe it has?"

I put that issue to rest. "It's still there! I can see that much, from the shore. At my limit, lots of water in the way, lots of fish, other stuff, can't make out details, just enough to know something is there.

"What about, original owners?"

That seemed unlikely to me; nobody drops millions in cash and leaves it for decades. Not if they know where it is or are in any condition to come fetch it.

"Unless there's identifying mark on the crate, or in the crate, that might simplify things. Anonymous."

Jillian cut in. "We're all thinking it; drug money? Some smugglers laundering their cash, moving it around? Lost in a storm? Not likely to make a claim."

Tito agreed, conditionally. "Not likely to file any paperwork, but they still might put up a fuss."

We all knew that meant, violent objections. Nowhere I wanted to go. But I had some experience in these matters; I spoke up.

"I've found 'lost money' before, hidden, bundles of cash left in unlikely places. Not this much, just a couple thousand here or there. Also maybe drug deals gone wrong, nobody around to retrieve the cash, left for years.

"We can hope this is such a case? Lost, the smugglers arrested or otherwise unavailable to return?" By which I meant, dead.

Tito brightened. "I'm thinking that too. This is essentially free money, nobody wants it, knows it's there. Opens up.. alternate options."

Now we were talking. I had no trouble circumventing grabby politicians. I'd not declared anything I found, not ever, in my life. If I found it, likely it would have been lost for good. No reason to share with busybodies who just wanted to get their beak wet.

Jill was of the same opinion it seemed.

"Fuck the bureaucrats! This is just gonna rot down there. We bring it up, make it do some good, everybody benefits!

"My goal, buy property, a place to raise Greg's superkids, safe and sane. Set up rooming houses for my Lost Girls, up and down the coast, a safety net to get them back on their feet."

We sipped some more, considered our imminent descent into a life of federal crime, maybe even becoming international gangsters.

Tito had suggestions.

"We can do it either way; fetch it up, invite the newspapers, get famous but probably end up where we are now, honest and poor.

"Or bring it up quietly, carry it offshore, across the ocean, deposit it where not so many questions get asked. End up with most of it, minus certain fees."

Which meant, bribes.

"A bank would be needed, offshore, Cayman Islands, Hong Kong would probably be best, some 2nd-tier foreign bank. Don't risk attracting the attention of drug-runners that way.

"I can do it either way. But the first, all above-board, I don't see how it would pay."

Tito wasn't going into this for nothing. He needed not only pay, but a significant profit. Otherwise, risking life in prison for very little.

"How does that work? There are laws in Hong Kong too!"

"People with millions of dollars have less trouble than you'd think. One suggestion, form an offshore company, lets say Chan Salvage, deposit the money in that name. Buy land under the company name, better yet buy overseas and do a land swap, assets not cash. Different rules!

"Jillian, that way you get your safe houses, all under the umbrella of a foreign corporation?"

She nodded. "I don't give a fuck who's name it's in!"

"Ok; let's think Caymans for now. Buy some land, any land, commensurate with the value of what you want here. Swap, call the new place Chan Salvage headquarters.

"Never use your own name; pay yourself as an employee or better yet a contractor."

I looked around, saw we were largely of one mind. Nodded as one.

I raised my glass, toasted our enterprise. "To Chan Salvage!" We drank, deeply, then Kelly refilled our glasses.

"How does it work? Getting one tiny crate up off the bay floor?" I was optimistic, Tito less so.

"We'll have roughly half an hour between tides, when the water is quiet enough to get down, attach the salvage sling, get it up.

"Can do it in two dives if that's easier, sling first, then raise. That leaves us idle until the next tide, twelve hours exposed in the bay. Can't leave the spot, else we might lose it."

I corrected him. "We won't lose it."

He raised his head, nodding, still getting used to this x-ray vision deal.

"Then we attach the sling, go further out, do some ocean fishing. Come back between the next tides, raise it, go back out, do some more fishing. Decide to head for the Caymans for the Yellowfin! Drop off a package while we're there, find a sympathetic lawyer, sign some papers. Retain an agent, for the land swap deals?"

I was happy with that. One thing remained.

"Tito? What do you need from this? A lot of risk, and your skills are indispensable."

He spoke without hesitation. "I want 15% of the gross. Enough there for everybody, we all get what we want?"

"More than fair!" We all stood, shook hands like the Three Stooges, and that was that.

Jillian was not quite ready to be done.

"Setting up a company sounds pretty easy. What else will we need? How much up-front money? What to buy?"

Tito looked up and to the right, making a list in his mind.

"Buy gear, rent a boat under the Company name, not a big one, but big enough for the open sea. Salvage is what? 1, 2 metric tons. Get the crate two hundred miles out, home free."

I was flabbergasted. Money was heavy!

"We need a boat captain!" Jillian was thinking ahead.

"Tito can do that. Has his license." Kelly gave Tito a fond look.

Of course, Tito can do that. What can't he do? He's been preparing for a life of intrigue and adventure, forever. This is his chance to make it all count.

He continued his inventory.

"Winch, ten ton to have a safety margin. Slings, one to use and a backup. Diving gear, good stuff, water brakes and anchors, ballast and air canisters, floats. Spares of all that.

"Electronic gear for ocean navigation. Buoy for recovering the sling, a backup. Water bladders in case the crate is breached.

"A second diver for safety, a dive buddy, paid a flat rate, just there so everybody is safe. I got a buddy I can trust."

Did we trust Tito's buddy, though? Well, this whole deal was going to involve trusting one another, why balk at that.

To begin with, trusting Tito with sixty million dollars on a boat that can go halfway around the world. No guarantee we would ever see him again.

Yes, trust was important. Without it, we're just simple thieves. And heck, we had nothing now. Anything goes wrong, we're back where we started, some money in the bank and surrounded by the people we love.

And Tito was, well, Tito. He loved Kelly, and Kelly loved him. If we couldn't trust them, trust their high opinion of each other, the money thing seem insignificant in comparison.

"Seat of the pants?" I had no idea what renting a sea-going fishing boat might cost.

"Twenty, thirty thousand should cover it, the gear, a month boat rental, fuel."

Kelly was concerned, that seemed like a lot. But Jillian and I relaxed, we had most of that right here in the house!

Kelly laughed. "You two! I can't figure you! Buying a very-used truck! Living in the most expensive condo in the complex! Eating out several times a week! Making those ridiculously tasty but cheap red-chili-cheese-enchiladas, on the weekend! Wear your thrift-store shorts and shirts every day, then go out in bespoke god-help-me-beautiful designer clothes!

"It's like, you want to behave like money is tight, but at the same time spend it like it's nothing, when something important comes along!"

Jillian and I nodded; she had us pegged.

Jillian spoke, figuring this out herself and at the same time telling us.

"If you don't have enough, then money can seem very important. But after a point, it's not about getting more.

"It's about, saving time. Greg could forage for years to get this much saved. We'd have to put off our family until then. You'd have to put off your agency, put off getting married.

"This way, we all get a head-start, which means we can take care of the people we love, the people under our care! Now! Not in ten years!"

Kelly blushed at the 'getting married' part but didn't flinch, just took Tito's hand, squeezed. She was getting what she wanted, too. A happy Tito, a chance to do whatever it was they wanted to do, together.

I had a thought.

"When? Can you do salvage in winter? Is there a tide schedule we have to beat?"

Tito grinned. "More like, when are the fish running? We want a plausible reason to be out on the water, it's got to be fishing. And that means, wait until spring."

Jillian brightened. "That means, we can get married first!"

Tito raised his eyebrows, mouth open, astonished. Here we had tens of millions of dollars dangling in front of us, and Jillian was happiest to know her wedding plans wouldn't be upset?!

And the impossible happened: Tito laughed. Kept laughing, sure now he was teaming up with the right folks, who put family and friends ahead of money, any amount of money, money wasn't even in the same league as family.

Kelly got it, leaned into him, smiling and smiling.

...

Thursday

Nick

Strange morning! Tito comes in, all quiet, his mind not on the job. Misses the first call! He's nabbed the opening shot every day he's been working here. This morning, maybe number five.

Was it the home visits? That hadn't affected him at the time. Got him thinking about his agency; maybe that was it.

Then Jillian. Not subdued: outgoing, loud, happy, centered. Like the job is important but she's got real stuff to worry about, this is all routine.

My Aunties came in half an hour before opening. Jillian met them, something else on her mind, clearly forgotten they were coming, puzzled then Aha! and went straight to it.

Felt them out about the clients, the contracts, the 'paper' we call it. Tried their English - excellent, accented but understood everything she threw at them.

Took her no time to understand, this was going to work!

Kelly was assigned to bring Mrs. Tram up to speed; I got Mrs. Tran. We'd already met them at the Pham's last night, over for dinner, they had asked a thousand questions about the job, the hours, their part in it all. Sharp.

Now, details. I went over the charge sheet, the patter. The board, the paper, the date on the wall. Turning in the slip, waiting for the boss to approve. How to answer the phone.

Who was in charge! The client, lawyer or whatever, would try to run the conversation. Our job was to take control, let them know what was going to happen and what wasn't. The Aunties had absolutely no problem with that, with telling some asshole Hold on a minute! We're doing it my way or the highway!

In English and in Vietnamese, in case we got a Vietnamese caller. Which was about one in ten, the same as the population mix here on the shore. Nobody had any monopoly on ass-hattery around here. Guys got up to about the same mischief, no matter if they lived in Vietnam-town or elsewhere.