The Empire Read online

  The audience applauded again.

  “You have become very influential in American politics,” said Oprah. “Some call you the most powerful woman in America. Some even call you the ‘Empress of America.’”

  “I wish people would stop calling me that,” said Padma, laughing. “It’s true that I’m an advocate for causes that I believe are important to the country, like clean energy and education, though all citizens have a right and obligation to speak and have their voices heard. I am no different in that respect.”

  “Let’s talk about Anderson Wild,” said Oprah.

  “OK,” said Padma, taking a nervous breath.

  “The mysterious Anderson Wild—who is he? There is almost no public information about him—”

  “And most of that information is wrong,” Padma interrupted.

  “No one has even seen him before! He’s the other richest person on the planet besides yourself—who is Anderson Wild?”

  Padma hesitated, smiling. The audience laughed nervously.

  “Obviously, he’s a recluse—” Padma began.

  “Why is he so secret?” Oprah interrupted. “What’s he got to hide?”

  “He doesn’t have any rattling skeletons that I’m aware of,” said Padma. “However, to say he’s painfully shy is an understatement.”

  “What can you tell us about him—how old is he?”

  “He’s about my age.”

  “Which is?”

  “I’m 42.”

  “Wow! Wow! You are gorgeous!” Oprah said to the audience’s applause. Padma smiled, embarrassed.

  “What does he look like? Is he good looking?”

  Padma looked away, embarrassed, laughing. The audience laughed with her.

  “Yeah, I think he’s good looking,” Padma said.

  A whoop erupted from the audience as the crowd burst into laughter and applause.

  “So, have you two hooked up?”

  “Oh my God!” Padma exclaimed, laughing and holding her hand to her face. “No.”

  “Uh huh,” said Oprah, unconvinced.

  “We haven’t! Oh my God!” laughed Padma. The audience roared.

  As the laughter died down, Oprah continued. “Let’s talk about Kyle.”

  Padma nodded. “OK.”

  “It was seven years ago today that you lost Kyle when he stopped the hijackers on American 11 and saved the lives, not only of the passengers on the plane, but also thousands of people at the World Trade Center. Tell us about Kyle.”

  Padma looked down for a moment, preparing.

  “Some of us are fortunate enough to meet the one love of our lives,” said Padma. “Kyle was that love.”

  Tears began to well. A pin drop could be heard in the studio.

  “Tell us about the 48 hours of your marriage.”

  Padma paused.

  “Do you need a moment?” asked Oprah.

  Padma shook her head. “We eloped. My parents did not approve of Kyle. They wanted me to marry a doctor or lawyer. When Kyle died, I hadn’t yet gathered the courage to tell my parents we were married.

  “We were married in New York’s city hall. No witnesses—just the two of us. The day we were married, Kyle had a tattoo done of my name in Sanskrit.”

  Padma pointed to her arm. “It was on the inside of his arm.

  “We spent the rest of that day and the following morning in a suite at the SoHo Grand. Kyle didn’t make a lot of money in the Army, and he spent every last cent of his savings on that room and this ring.”

  Padma held up the sparkling diamond ring, still on her left ring finger.

  “You’ve never taken that ring off?”

  “No. And I never will,” Padma replied. Tears began to stream down her cheek.

  The camera cut to crying women in the audience.

  “You’ll never remarry?”

  “Not a day goes by when I don’t think of him. He was already bigger than life in my eyes and my heart before he became the hero of American 11.”

  “He was…he was extraordinary,” Padma said, looking at Oprah. “He was strong and courageous and funny—”

  “And not bad to look at,” said Oprah.

  “My God, he was a hunk!” Padma exclaimed. The audience laughed through their tears.

  “No man could compete, even before American 11. Then he went and raised the bar even higher that day,” Padma said. “So, no, I can’t begin to imagine another man who could turn my head. I don’t just love him. I am every bit in love with him as I was seven years ago.”

  Oprah was speechless. There wasn’t a dry eye in the room as the audience rose to its feet in a standing ovation. Padma, visibly moved, clasped her hands and bowed to the audience in a Namaste blessing. Several audience members returned the blessing.

  Oprah turned to the camera. “We’ll be back,” she said, wiping tears from her face.

  League City, TX

  September 17, 2008

  18:30 hours

  Timeline 002

  A television ad blazed onto screens across Texas at dinnertime.

  On the screen, an American flag waved against a blue sky.

  As the flag waved, a male intoned in a deep voice: “Our founding fathers sacrificed their lives for the one thing most precious to Americans…

  “…Our liberty…”

  The skies behind the flag grew cloudy and dark.

  “That liberty has been taken from us—by an outsider…”

  The visual cut to a close-up picture of Padma. Her image had been photoshopped to further darken her skin. Her brow was furrowed and the corners of her lips pulled down into an angry visage. Errant strands had been added to her normally disciplined straight hair.

  “Someone with a foreign agenda who has taken your hard-earned tax dollars from the AIG bailout and used that money to buy politicians. She’s bought congressmen, senators, even the president!

  “She wants to take away your Second Amendment constitutional right to bear arms. She wants to take God out of our classrooms. She wants us to obey Sharia law. And she wants to destroy our oil and gas industry, eliminating tens of thousands of jobs.

  “But there’s one man who can’t be bought by foreigners…”

  A plump middle-aged Caucasian man, wearing jeans with a rodeo buckle, cowboy boots, a button-up shirt, and a cowboy hat, hoisted an AR-15 assault rifle and began shooting at watermelons perched on wooden posts. The watermelons exploded into red fruit and rinds.

  “Since 2002, Senator Jonah Jones has fought to protect Texans from tyranny. He’s willing to stand up to foreign forces that would take away our liberty and destroy our way of life.”

  The image cut to a group of white men wearing jeans, boots, button-up shirts, caps, and straw cowboy hats. They were holding assault rifles. One held an American flag. Another held the lone star flag of Texas.

  “2 Corinthians 11:14 tells us that ‘Satan disguises himself as an angel of light.’ Don’t be fooled by darkness. This November, stand with Senator Jones in the fight against tyranny.”

  The commercial ended with a twanged voice: “This is Senator Jonah Jones, and I approved this message.”

  One World Trade Center

  New York, NY

  September 22, 2008

  10:05 hours

  Timeline 002

  The Twin Towers gleamed in the sunlight on a beautiful fall day in New York City. Giant signs trumpeted the owner’s name— Wild Industries—in white letters against a blue background on all four sides of each tower.

  Senator Jonah Jones sat in a windowless anteroom on the first floor of the World Trade Center’s North Tower. Like all of his Senate and House colleagues, he had made the requisite pilgrimage to the new Mecca of American
politics.

  Called “The Bunker” by everyone who set foot in it, this concrete and reinforced steel fortress inside the World Trade Center contrasted with the airiness of the rest of the building, where sunshine poured through floor-to-ceiling glass. The bunker was a building within a building—ten floors above ground and five below. It was virtually impervious to conventional weapons and surveillance, and had been built to withstand the ridiculously unthinkable contingency of the tower’s collapse. The bunker was the inner sanctum of Wild Industries, housing Padma’s office, her apartment, and offices for select staff. The bunker was completely self-contained, with its own electricity, water, and recycling infrastructure. It even housed its own private subway garage behind a reinforced steel vault door.

  The mysterious Anderson Wild had bought the World Trade Center towers in 2005. He had appeared from nowhere in 2001, becoming the wealthiest man on the planet in a few short years. Earth’s other wealthiest person, Padma Mahajan, was the mastermind behind the couple’s vast reserves. That the two were a “couple” was pure speculation. Anderson and Padma were not married, and no one had ever seen them in public together. Indeed, no one had ever seen Anderson Wild at all. As Padma’s wealth skyrocketed, the gorgeous financial prodigy drew increasing media attention. In 2007, after poring through New York City’s hardcopy public records, one enterprising reporter stunned the world when she broke the story that Padma had married the hero of American 11, Major Kyle Mason, only two days before he lost his life on September 11, 2001.

  The day after September 11, Padma abruptly quit her investment banking job at Cantor Fitzgerald and began making uncannily prescient investments—going long on some stocks like Apple and shorting others. Padma’s sixth sense for investment seemed clairvoyant, drawing suspicion from both the press and the government. She and Anderson had been investigated multiple times by the FTC for insider trading. Each time, not a shred of evidence could be found to support the government’s suspicions. If the couple was cheating, they were exceptionally good at it. By the end of 2005, the couple was worth in excess of a quarter trillion dollars. Though Anderson had been subpoenaed multiple times in the course of government investigations, he’d ignored all requests to appear. Contempt warrants were issued. Wild offices were searched—no one could find Mr. Wild. Eventually, Wild Industries’ infinitely funded legal team eroded the government’s resolve. Warrants for Wild’s arrest were torn up.

  At the beginning of 2006, Padma suddenly and inexplicably shifted her focus away from stocks, instead plowing over $100 billion into exotic derivatives—specifically, credit default swaps.

  To Wall Street sharks, Padma’s move was madness. In 2006, housing prices were soaring. Padma was betting on a collapse—and a catastrophic one at that.

  She bought credit default swap insurance for pennies on the dollar. In some cases, she actually paid only one penny on the dollar, meaning a billion in cash insured $100 billion in bad debt. By the time the housing market began to crash in 2007, Padma was holding over $5 trillion in insurance—insurance AIG was unable to pay. When AIG and the investment banks began to fail, the American taxpayer stepped in, paid off Padma’s insurance and bailed out the investment banks. The one bank denied the taxpayers’ largess was Lehman Brothers. Just as Kyle had predicted seven years earlier, the iconic investment bank filed for bankruptcy in September 2008.

  Padma and Anderson were trillionaires, worth more than the next million wealthiest humans combined.

  Credit default swaps were not all the couple were buying. Anderson and Padma also invested heavily in state and federal elections, stacking the decks in their favor. The conventional wisdom in politics was that it was now impossible to win an election without the power couple’s finger on the scale.

  Wild Industries no longer needed lobbyists in Washington. Instead, lawmakers made pilgrimages to New York to pay homage and receive marching orders. Padma took meetings with the president, governors, and senators. House members were met by others on Padma’s staff. Legislation was written by Wild, passed by Congress, and signed into law by the president. The two most recent Supreme Court justices, including the chief justice, had been hand-picked by Anderson and Padma. The high court only took cases that were in the couple’s business or personal interests.

  Senator Jones looked at his watch—seven minutes past the hour. Padma was late for their meeting. He chuckled at the slight, though it didn’t bruise the Texas senator’s lone star-sized ego.

  Jones looked around the anteroom. The walls were concrete, shaped into simple geometric block patterns. Mid twentieth century-style black sofas and chairs with efficient square edges surrounded a copper coffee table. Across the room, a receptionist worked at her desk next to a locked heavy metal door—the gateway to Padma’s office. A guard stood outside it. The buff guard was Caucasian, over six feet tall, with a blond crew cut. He wore a perfectly tailored black suit, accessorized with a matching black MP7 submachine gun.

  The guard was an employee of Wild Industry’s Dark Star subsidiary. Formerly known as Blackwater, the private military and security consulting company had been acquired by Wild in 2005. Over the years, Wild had paid top dollar to recruit the very best Special Forces operators from Delta, the Navy Seals, Green Berets, and Army Rangers. Over time, Wild had assembled the world’s best private army. Padma’s personal security exceeded that of any world leader.

  “Ms. Mahajan will be with you shortly,” said the receptionist, noting that Jones had checked the time. Diane Galovan was always watching, even when she appeared distracted. She was an attractive brunette in her thirties. She wore an expensive crimson haute couture suit. Wild Industries bucked the conventional corporate American trend toward casual wear in the office. Wild employees were expected to look as though they were paid as well as they actually were.

  Unbeknownst to Senator Jones, Galovan’s desk was fitted with a reach-in compartment with a loaded Glock pistol and a panic button. When pressed, the panic button would secure the steel door to Padma’s office with two-inch bolt locks, while simultaneously summoning a platoon of the guard’s colleagues. Galovan had been selected for her job in part for her gracious attention to detail, part for her crack aim.

  Galovan sized up the senator. He was in his fifties, 5’9”, overweight, with slicked-back silver hair. His signature cowboy boots sprung from the pant legs of a brown rack suit.

  “Did you take the train from DC, Senator?” asked Galovan.

  “No ma’am,” replied Jones. “I flew.”

  “The Wild maglev train is so much faster,” said Galovan. “It takes only 30 minutes.”

  “I prefer to fly.”

  Galovan smiled at Jones. Her gaze returned to her computer screen.

  The door to Padma’s office opened, and a woman emerged. She was a petite woman in her early sixties, with quaffed dyed brown hair, a navy Chanel suit, and a resigned expression. On the lapel of her suit, she wore a United States Senate pin. California Senator Barbara Anastasio saw her expansive fellow senator splayed on the sofa and instantly turned on her best gleaming politician smile. Jones’ big gap-toothed smile reflected back at Anastasio. To Anastasio, the fat senator in his cheap brown suit looked as though a dinosaur had taken a dump on the sofa.

  “Barbara!” Jones exclaimed as he launched himself off the sofa with a boost from both hands. He extended a hand to shake Anastasio’s hand, then gave her an unsolicited sloppy kiss on the cheek. Both Barbara’s smile and her contempt for Jones never wavered.

  “You here to kiss the ring too?” Jonah asked in a twanged voice that was way too big for the room.

  “I’m here to listen to the opinions of a concerned citizen,” replied Anastasio, putting a politic face on the total collapse of American democracy.

  Jones let out a belly laugh. Anastasio’s glistening Botox smile remained fixed.

  “You know you are the smartest person
I know?” asked Jones.

  “I did not know that. I must say I am flattered, that coming from someone as erudite as yourself,” replied Anastasio, wondering whether Jones knew what “erudite” meant.

  “You are as kind as you are beautiful!” replied Jones.

  Galovan interrupted the senators’ faux love fest. “Senator Jones, Ms. Mahajan will see you now.”

  “Gotta go—can’t keep the empress waiting!” exclaimed Jones with a laugh. “Let’s you and me have lunch.”

  “That sounds lovely,” replied Anastasio, revulsed at the thought of watching Jones eat a Flintstones-sized portion of rare prime rib.

  Galovan opened the door for Jones. Behind the door was an enormous office—100 feet long and 75 feet wide, with a ceiling nearly three stories high. As was the case in the anteroom, the walls were untreated concrete, though the floor was hardwood. On one wall hung Rembrandt’s The Night Watch. Padma had strong-armed Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum into selling the gigantic Dutch masterpiece.

  The facing wall was covered with high-resolution LCD panels. Padma normally used them to monitor aspects of Wild Industries’ operations, as well as her portfolio performance. Today, those sensitive metrics had been replaced by a live video feed of Lower New York Bay from the World Trade Center’s South Tower.

  At the far end of the office, Padma stood in front of a large Onyx-colored desk. She was wearing a jet-black pantsuit with a white Nehru collar blouse. Her long black hair was pulled into a tight ponytail bound by a silver cuff. Her hands were folded neatly in front of her.

  “Empress Padma!” Jones exclaimed as he bounded into the office.

  Padma smiled politely as she watched the buoyant Jones bounce cheerfully across the expanse of the room. While her left brain understood the duplicity of politics, her mind was not able to fully reconcile the cartoonish image of the fat, gap-toothed senator with his hateful television messages targeted squarely at her.