Untitled - ScholarWorks Home - California State University, Northridge

icks -- shouldn't be more than sixty. We know what we've got here Bradley,
and the planning commission's all over the project, chomping at the bit for the
fee revenue. It's a slam dunk deal for anyone geared up with the right people,"
Bill countered.
Bradley smiled and set before Bill a complete construction budget for a
five phased development and said, "Our offer stands, think it over." In the end
Bradley secured the land for his investors at fifteen thousand dollars an acre
and made ten percent commission on the deal, a handsome one point eight mil­
lion.
Bill's business relationship with him had seen a ten-year stretch that
began in nineteen eighty-two, one year after the Nevada land deal closed. With
a couple of silent investors they'd teamed up and started a savings and loan
they called Westbridge. Bill provided the legal expertise, Bradley the vision for
a billion-dollar institution with ownership interests in planned communities
and office parks all yielding double-digit profit margins. Up until the end Bill
loved it: the corporate jet, the power, the game. So did Marilyn although more
self conscious over the blatant spending. Bradley and Bill were arrogant and
cocky and bought things sight unseen. After a ten-year run the acquisition
prices soared, sales slumped, executive salaries skyrocketed and profits evapo­
rated. In the end the federal government closed them down for fraud and
embezzlement, sent Bradley to the state penitentiary for six months and dis­
barred Bill.
The food came to the table -- yellow curry with chicken and potatoes,
Australian beer -- Bill began to dry off. "So is Indonesia permanent for you?"
he asked.
"Only sure about one thing, I'll never go back to the states. Can't, I
owe the IRS a bundle - and there's the civil suits." The money from
Westbridge was in Switzerland. "It's unbelievable to me, the government get­
ting away with losing millions. Jerks staged a massive fire sale and got away
with collecting fifty cents on the dollar. Our projects were solid, three years
time and we would've been back in the black, fucking bean counters."
"You've got some settling up to do with me" Bill said.
*
"Do you know how many poisonous snakes there are in that part of the
world, not to mention the innumerable, incurable diseases you can get from con­
tact with the water alone? I don't know what bothers me more, your stupidity
or the fact that you've so flippantly dropped Bradley Campbell back into the
picture," Marilyn said.
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