Philadelphia (13 page)

It was late when attorney Harris Grant, accompanied by his wife London, entered the corporate headquarters of Duncan Motors. The two maneuvered through the dimly lit exotic car showroom, then along the dark corridors of offices until they reached the board room. Harris had tried to convince London, who was due to give birth to their second child any day now after a difficult pregnancy, to stay home and relax. London refused, arguing that she had a responsibility as a stockholder and a member of the Duncan Motors board of directors to attend the emergency meeting of the board. Concerned that arguing would stress his pregnant wife more than she already was, Harris reluctantly agreed. He did, however, feel that his wife's insistence to attend the meeting had more to do with her being nosey and wanting to be in the loop than her sense of responsibility and duty to the company.

Already in attendance were London's siblings—Rio, the company's director of marketing and promotion; Junior, the company's head of security; and Paris, the company's trouble shooter, who was also about ready to pop with child. By the time Harris had helped his wife to her seat and taken his, London's father, Laver-nius Duncan Sr., or L.C. as he liked to be called, entered the board room. An imposing figure in his late sixties, L.C. was the founder of Duncan Motors and chairman of the board. Known for his explosive temper, L.C. was not a man you wanted to anger for any reason, and he didn't look happy as he scanned the room. His eyes stopped briefly when they reached his youngest daughter, Paris, who quickly removed her shoes from the boardroom table. When L.C.'s gaze rested on an empty chair at the table, Junior, the oldest child, shared a knowing glance with Harris. Conspicuous in his absence was the man who had summoned them all to this meeting, the company's new CEO, Orlando Duncan.

“Where's Orlando?” the elder Duncan barked. He was holding out a chair for his wife, Chippy, who had followed him into the room.

The room fell silent until Rio, the youngest son and twin to Paris, said, “He went to get something out of his lab, Pop. He said to tell you he'd be here in a minute.”

Rio's explanation did not help L.C.'s mood. “What's he doing in his lab?” he snapped. “Is that where he's been the past few weeks? He's supposed to be running this company, not dissecting frogs.”

Rio shrugged, slumping back in his chair. “You gotta talk to him about that, Pop. I'm just relaying the message.”

L.C. started grumbling something under his breath. It was obvious that he was not happy about Orlando calling an emergency meeting in the middle of the night and then not being there when he and the other board of directors arrived.

Chippy spoke up for her son. “You're the one who wanted them all to have specialties outside their jobs with the company,” she said. “You know him, he's probably got some experiment running that needs to be checked on every couple of hours. He'll be here soon.”

Like most parents, L.C. had a vision for his children and watched them all very closely as they grew up. He helped and pushed them to hone their interests and abilities no matter what they were. He wanted each of them to have an expertise outside the car business or specialties as he called them, that they could fall back on. In Orlando's case his specialty was chemistry, which he held a master's degree in along with a pharmaceutical license.

“Finally,” Paris huffed, when Orlando walked into the room five minutes later. He was still wearing a lab coat as he carried a briefcase in one hand and small brown paper bag in the other.

“I know, I know, sorry I'm late,” Orlando apologized then gestured for Junior to close the doors to the room as he took his seat. “I'm sure you're all wondering why I called this meeting and more importantly why I didn't just have it at home or during our next scheduled meeting next month. I thought about that but I wanted to give you all the good news right away.”

L.C. sat back in his chair rocking it. “Ok, then son what's this good news you've got?”

A huge grin took over Orlando's face before he spoke, “I've done it, Pop. I've fucking done it! After all these years I've finally done it!”

He stopped himself looking each of his family members in the eyes before moving to the next. He now had this crazy smile that with his lab coat he was wearing, made him look like a mad scientist that had lost his mind. L.C.'s first thought was that his son may have had had some kind of breakdown. He wasn't the only one who had come to that conclusion either because his outspoken daughter Paris said what he was thinking.

“Yo, O, you been sniffing that shit you be making over at the lab or something? 'Cause bro, your ass is talkin' real crazy. Keep it up and I'm gonna check your ass into Creedmoor for a psychic evaluation.” She gave him the universal sign for crazy, twirling her index finger at the side of her head. More than one person at the table laughed including their mother.

“I'm not crazy Paris. Am I Rio?” he tilted his head in his younger brother's direction and all eyes turned to Rio.

“No, O you're not crazy. You're not crazy at all.” Rio and Paris were usually the least mature of the Duncan clan but this time Rio sat up straight in his chair, articulating his message clear and professionally. “What you are about to do is make us all filthy fucking rich.”

“We already are rich,” Paris spat skeptically.

“No little sister, we are nigger rich,” Orlando said firmly turning his attention from Paris back to L.C. “I'm about to make us Donald trump . . . Bill Gates rich . . . Warren Buffet rich. I'm talking about billionaire rich.”

There was an eerie silence in the room until L.C. said, “Son, what the hell are you talking about?”

“You got that thing on?” Orlando glanced over at his older brother Junior who nodded.

As the head of the family's security Junior had the board room and his father's office outfitted with electronic jamming devices. Even if prying ears wanted to, they couldn't listen to the Duncan's board room conversations. The device was so powerful you couldn't even use a cell phone in those rooms when they were turned on.

The fact that Orlando was making sure his conversation wouldn't be overheard let everyone in the room know that he was about to talk about the Duncan family's dirty little secret. A secret they'd kept hidden from both law enforcement and the general public. You see the Duncan's weren't just successful car dealers, they were also one of the nation's largest illegal distributors of narcotics on the east coast.

Orlando stood in front of his family purposely hesitating for dramatic affects before he spoke. For him, today was like Christmas Day and he was Santa Claus about to give them the biggest Christmas present of all. He glanced over at his mother who smiled proudly at him. She'd always been his biggest supporter, reinforcing in him that he could do anything if he put his mind to it. His father on the other hand was not as easily impressed but for the first time in his life he wasn't worried about that, because once he finished his presentation he was sure L.C. Duncan would be kissing his ass.

“For the last thirty years we've been the ultimate middle man distributing other people's product around the eastern United States through our dealerships and transport businesses. Now don't get me wrong we've made a lot of money being a distributor. It's a good business and we're good at it but wouldn't it be nice if we didn't have to pay for the product we distribute? Wouldn't it be nice if we ran not only the distribution side of the business but the manufacturing and production side as well, Pop?”

The two of them stared at eachother until a smile creped across L.C.'s face and he nodded his head at his son. “You got my attention son. What exactly do you have in mind?”

“This!” Orlando picked up the paper bag he'd carried into the room emptying its contents onto the board room table. At least a hundred red M&M's came sprawling across the table. “Ladies and gentlemen of the Duncan family . . . I give you H.E.A.T.”

L.C. stared at the M&M's and frowned. “What the hell is this some kind of joke?”

“I ain't complaining, I been craving M&M's all week.” Paris reached out to pick up a handful. She'd barely closed her hand around the candies before Rio grabbed her wrist.

“Don't eat that!” he yelled squeezing tight.

Paris yanked back her arm. “Why? What the fuck is wrong with them?”

“Those aren't M&M's,” Rio scolded.

“Then what the fuck are they?” Paris snapped.

“Orlando, what the hell's going on?” L.C. demanded. He picked up a handful of the candy look-a-likes then dropped them on the table. “What is this crap?”

“I call it H.E.A.T., Pop.” He held one in his hand. “It's the new crack. No, actually its better than crack. It's extremely potent synthetic pheromones and endorphins laced with morphine and its gonna make us wealthy beyond your wildest dreams.”

Harris gave his brother-in-law a cynical look. “Excuse me if I sound doubtful, but we've heard that before?”

“Harris is right. What makes these things so special?” L.C. asked.

“It's a high no user has ever seen. The drug seems to take them to the same place of exhilaration that crack or meth does for about an hour without physical addiction nor withdrawal. Some test subjects have experienced mental addiction on the level of marijuana. To make it simple they can't get enough of this stuff.”

“He ain't lying, Pop,” Rio sat up in his chair. “He gave me five hundred of these things and I gave half of them to the club dealers to give away last Friday. The next day dealers were buying them wholesale five dollars a pill with a retail price of ten bucks and they were begging me for more by the end of the night. Now the whole sale price is $10 a pill and demand is so high if I want I can raise the price at any time. We can barely keep up with demand. I must have sold five thousand already and that's being conservative. I'm telling you these little red M&M's are a gold mind.”

Harris leaned forward in his chair. You could see the excitement in his eyes. There was no doubt he could see the potential in the new drug. “What's the manufacturing cost?”

“Right now about a buck a pill but once we gear up production I can get it to about thirty-five cents,” Orlando relied.

Harris reached down into his briefcase pulling out a calculator. He punched in some numbers then stared at the results. He looked like he might have done something wrong so he punched the numbers in again. “Holy shit!” he said turning the calculator in the direction of L.C. who was seated next to him.

L.C. glanced at the numbers then did a double take, removing the calculator from Harris's hand. “Is that yearly?”

Harris shook his head. “Nope, that's monthly, using just our domestic network numbers. If we go outside the network you can triple possibly even quadruple that number. And that's not including overseas.”

L.C. sat back in his chair playing with his goatee as he contemplated the information that had been presented to him. It wasn't the type of thing that happened often, but he actually looked impressed.

“Have you tested for side effects?” London chirped in. Her nursing background and family specialty coming out. “Synthetic drugs usually have side effects.”

“Yes, extensively London, there are no side effects that we can see other than the user sleeping for long periods after consecutive use. Like I said before, it's not physically addictive, but it can be mentally addictive.” He opened his briefcase and handed her a folder. London skimmed through it as Orlando continued.

“Pop it's the ultimate recreational drug with no side effects.” Orlando said. “The yuppies can use it all weekend long and with a good night's sleep go to work on Monday feeling fine.”

L.C. turned to Harris. “Ok, Mr. Grant you're our legal counsel, what do you think?”

“You saw the numbers, L.C. and numbers don't lie. If Orlando and Rio are anywhere close to being correct about demand and production cost, this is a no-brainer. We can't afford not to be involved, there's too much money at stake.” Harris replied confidently.

“How much money we talking about Harris?” Junior asked.

“We could make our first billion within a year and that's just in the US market.” Harris smiled. “Smart thing to do is set up a factory outside the US. Buy a small South American pharmaceutical company under a shell corp to do all the manufacturing. We can do it here for a while but once this thing goes national we're gonna wanna put some distance and corporations between it and us. We might wanna bring in some of your Cuban and Colombian friends as fronts to give us some cover, L.C. We're also going to need quite a few legitimate companies to launder the amount of new cash we're gonna pull in.”

Junior whistled then said, “A billion dollars. Damn that's a lot of bread.

“No, that's a lot of shopping,” Paris injected dancing in her chair. She raised her hand and Rio high-fived her.

“That's enough out of you two.” L.C. spat then turned his attention to his older daughter. “London, anything in that report that we should be worried about?”

“Nothing that I can see Daddy. He's done a pretty thorough job and all the proper tests. From the looks of it, Orlando's right; he's created the perfect drug.”

L.C. nodded his head. “You've done good here, Orlando. Real good. I'm proud of you, son.”

Orlando beamed. “Thanks Pop.”

L.C. looked around the room smiling for the first time since he'd entered the room. “Well, I say we go forward with this new H.E.A.T. venture. Harris you start putting together the corporations and the legal protection we'll need. I'm thinking we should buy a couple of big rig dealerships in the Midwest and down south to launder some of this money? Oh, and set up a meeting with some of the law enforcement folks we have on payroll. Probably time some of them got new cars.”